#7 Reflections, Auschwitz, etc..

There has been so much to share I couldn’t fit in before, that I’m going to close with a reflection which, as you can see, includes a very grim topic. I hope the random mix of observations lightens the mood.

Auschwitz Museum is a day trip out of Krakow in southern Poland. It takes it’s (Germanized) name from the Polish town Oswiecim /oshviechiim/. On the way, we met up with a curiously eclectic mix of folk also headed to Auschwitz and formed a sort of temporary family. Each and every one of us would have been a target of the Nazis at one point or another – even if not as part of the Holocaust – for being either Polish, gay or Asian. There were very few Asians in Nazi Germany, so it’s an untold story, but suffice to say at the end of the war there were only 148 Chinese.

The sombre, guided tour is not a time for discussion, but simply a time to observe.

The thought that came to mind most of all, was that only when people look upon others as non-human, are these atrocities possible.

Overall, I’d have to say public recycling bins are that bit further advanced than in Australia. This bin with 5 categories is on a train platform in rural Poland. Note the plastic bottle recycling and water separating depot at Prague airport. The eWaste recycling centre is at a bus stop in Jakarta.

Food. Don’t go looking for cheap chocolate blocks – even this huge Westfield supermarket in Poland had none!

But the pastries in Poland are really very enticing.

It probably comes as no surprise to hear that in Europe public transport is better than Australia’s.

The local Mstow to Czestochowa public bus puts Brisbane’s busses to shame – they have signage and announcements for every stop, including the next stop.

Trams are everywhere in Prague – even in the narrowest streets. In the 2016 Brisbane City Council elections, the LNP Mayoral candidate won saying Labor’s plan for trams in the city was flawed because the CBD streets are too narrow. Perhaps. One of the main detractors is the overhead wires. But in Prague and Krakow, they were hardly noticeable. The new trams have signage and announcements – note how well utilized they are! And here’s a nice touch – grass on the tracks.

Nonetheless, I wonder what the technical issues of powering trams from the tracks are? Low and behold ‘surface current collection’, as it’s called, has been around since the 19^th century! And not just experimentally, but in widespread use up to the present day. There was a major lull in these systems toward the end of last century because they posed maintenance issues and road safety issues. Although some systems were generally safe, they tended to get clogged by mud and dirt and they fell out of favor within a few years due to the cost of excavating the conduit.[8], [9]

The first ground-level power supply system developed to modern safety standards was the Ansaldo Stream.[7] After a competing system, Alstom APS, became the first commercially implemented system in 2003, there has been a proliferation of commercial implementations of ground-level power supply systems.[10] During the late 2010s, ground-level power supply systems have become more cost-effective than overhead line systems.[11] The Seville Metro Train is powered by supercapacitors charged by a ground-level power supply.

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In Prague, there are two kinds of tourist trams – heritage ones dating from the Austro-Hunagrian Empire (see my Prague post) and some from the 1960s. On the latter, I told the young attendant she was very good at her job, which involved keeping a lot of non-tourists off the tram and providing pamphlets and explanations. I thought it must be very tiring doing that all day – but she only works the job on weekends. That, no doubt, contributes to her doing it so well.

I’d heard Poland was quite anti-LGBTIQ+ (like me, ha ha), but I guessed it wasn’t as bad as places like Russia and The Philippines, where there’s a constant stream of desperadoes trying to latch on to an older guy over the Internet to rescue them. At the nightclub in Warsaw that David and I went to, the receptionist outside told us that sometimes, when warned it’s a gay venue, people leap away in shock. However, many young lads in Poland sport this samurai ponytail.

David said the ruling conservative PIS party calls LGBTI+ an ideology. It is, and in being so, it makes itself a target. I was pleasantly surprised to find a home-grown organization called Lambda that helps gays in trouble. I sent an email offering support. I didn’t get a reply, but nonetheless it’s encouraging to see these signs of Slavs helping each other. In 2011, a Serbian film called The Parade (La Parada) appeared depicting a gay couple trying to stage a gay pride parade. They somehow manage to recruit the help of rough, gun-wielding macho men. It’s a tragic comedy and inspiring to see them recognise and resist the pressure to emigrate rather than stay and try to change attitudes. It’s well worth watching.

I spent a week in bed recovering from my month abroad. That doesn’t sound good, but as I said at the outset, there’s no place like home. The calm, absence of imperatives, comforts of home and realignment of circadian rhythms have been very recuperating.

In my Prague post, I asked why flying has become so ludicrously uncomfortable and provided a video explanation. I discovered Qatar Airways offers something called ‘Economy Reserve’ seating, but the check-in counter clerk and flight attendants hadn’t heard of it! Fortunately, the flight from Warsaw to Doha was half empty so they gave me 4 seats to stretch out on. From Doha, however, the plane filled up with Indonesian workers and their families and my inquiry with the flight attendant was greeted with a brusque ‘No, of course not. It’s a full flight’.

With my next flying experience in mind, I researched airlines that offer premium economy and found one particularly pleasing innovation on Air New Zealand – Skynest.

These will become available in 2024 on long-haul flights (Auckland to NYC) and can be booked for a 4 hour block at about AU$500.

I kept a tally of my expenses and the total – excluding meals – came to $7,727.