Entwined Histories by Piotr Wilczek

For anyone living in the Polish-British space, this book is an absolute must-read. A collection of 38 essays written by Poland's former ambassador to Washington (during the first Trump administration) and to London (taking office just as Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine began), the book is presented as a 'cultural memory'. It avoids the format of a conventional diplomatic memoire; Prof Wilczek reveals no juicy tittle-tattle. "I shall be taking such secrets to the next world," he said at the book's Warsaw launch. Rather, each essay shows how the histories of Britain and Poland have been interwoven by war, exile, culture, tradition and diplomacy in unexpected ways. 

After a spirited attack on lazy media stereotypes of Poles in an article to The Spectator, Prof Wilczek has become a regular guest on the pages of the magazine, currently edited by Michael Gove. A revised version of the chapter, How London became Poland's second capital, made its way from the book to The Spectator earlier this month.

What makes the book so fascinating is the topics chosen for 38 essays. A few are familiar (such as the stories of spy Krystyna Skarbek or General Maczek); most of them, however, uncover new territory even for readers well-versed in British-Polish relations. These include the story of how the Duke of Kent might have become the King of Poland had he not died in a plane crash in 1942, and the story of Poland’s ambassador to the court of Henry VIII, Jan Dantyszek (Johannes Dantiscus), who arrived in London as envoy of Poland's King Sigismund I in 1522, exactly 500 years before Piotr Wilczek took up the role of Poland’s ambassador to the UK. I also found fascinating the story of Socinianism, a nontrinitarian Protestant movement ('the Polish Brethren'), based in Raków, "a modest town which housed a printing press, a famous academy and some of the sharpest minds of the age." Prof Wilczek writes: "For a brief but incandescent period, Raków was Geneva without the dourness – Reformation thinking at its most open and its least vengeful." The Counter-Reformation got to the Socinians in the end, forcing them into exile. "Socianian thought percolated into the bloodstream of English radicalism. Its fingerprints can be seen in the writings of William Penn, the Quaker founder of Pennsylvania." A trip to Raków (40km south-east of Kielce) is thus in order.

Another noteworthy chapter, A Polish Eye on England's Harbours – with Joseph Conrad in Mind, considers through visits to Southampton, Portsmouth, Liverpool and Hull how the Polish-born writer understood the British Isles as home to a sea-faring nation. Prof Wilczek quotes from Conrad's description of the Thames Estuary in Heart of Darkness, which remains one of the most atmospherically evocative passages I have ever read in the English language.

London is a top posting for any diplomat, so about a third of the book is focused on it. I found the essays on the Warburg Institute and the diplomat's guide to navigating London's gentlemen's clubs the most interesting, as well as the descriptions of its bookshops – and its Polish restaurants.

One thing I would have like to have seen in Entwined Histories is some comparisons between the training and ethos of the British and Polish diplomatic corps. Diplomacy is very much a field in which one needs phenomenally fine judgment and superb people-skills – and above all, knowing when to stay silent. Dealing with the assorted ogres, narcissists and ne’er-do-wells that all too often rise to positions of highest office requires a suspension of normal instinct-based behaviour. "Diplomacy is a balancing act between urgency and restraint," writes Prof Wilczek; I feel that it is something you have to be born to do; most of us would be too quick to snap back with an undiplomatic riposte that would carry with it real-world consequences. How the diplomatic mindset is nurtured across different cultures is of great interest to the general reader.

Entwined Histories reads well and smoothly; it shall end up on my library shelf next to Speeches for Leaders by the former British Ambassador to Warsaw, Charles Crawford.

Entwined Histories is available from Chronos Books (www.chronosbooks.com) for £12.99/$17.95.

This time last year:
The [2025-brood] kittens on their 12th day

This time last year:
A new path to Krężel

This time two years ago:
Mutineers march on Moscow

This time six years ago:
Lifelong brand ambassador

This time eight years ago:
How much for locally grown strawberries?

This time nine years ago:
Zamość – the beautiful, must-visit town of Poland's east

This time 15 years ago:
Israeli Boeing 707 visits Warsaw again

This time 16 years ago:
More interesting aircraft overhead...

This time 17 years ago:
Poland is really short on mountains

This time 18 years ago:
The warmth of the sun
[with noctilucent clouds]

This time 19 years ago:
Full rainbow over Jeziorki

The new kittens at one month old

I got back from my evening walk yesterday, opened the front door and walked into the house, to see that for the first time in its life, one of the kittens has left my bedroom and ventured into the kitchen. Following me into the house from the outdoors were Wenusia, Scrapper and Czester; upon seeing a tiny newcomer on the kitchen floor, they approached it, each cat reacting differently. Wenusia hissed; Scrapper growled sub voce; Czester was entirely cool in the presence of the little one.

Now, Céleste and Czester were three weeks and five days old when they made their first expedition beyond the threshold of my bedroom, the new lot are almost as quick to explore (four weeks and two days old). 

I was sure at first that all five kittens are male; today, I can see that I was wrong. Below: the last-born; originally Quinto/Kwinto; turns out it's a girl. So meet Quintessence/Kwintesencja. La Quinta. She has a normal-length tail. She was the first out of my bedroom and into the kitchen. Like her mother Céleste, a natural-born explorer.

Below: Quinta's twin is a boy; the facial markings are very similar, but the face is more masculine and there's less white on the chest. But a stumpy tail, just like mum's and his two tabby uncles, Arcturus and Pacyfik. No name yet for the li'l fella yet.

And the second kitten without a name. Another grey tabby, this time with more white. Is it a girl or a boy? "It's confusing these days/But moon dust will cover you/Cover you/This chaos is killing me."

Below: Five feeding. The two greys (uh, in there somewhere) are Wiktor (grey with white collar) and Dorian (grey). Céleste is, like her mother Wenusia before her, an absolute natural at the job. Half way through it.

And finally, a memory from a year ago when Wenusia's brood were this age. Here's Scrapper. Today, the once-pugnacious Scrapper gets on with every other (adult) cat, goes out on walks with me. An all-round even-tempered guy, a super chap. If he could, I know Scrapper would buy me a pint.

This time 11 years ago:
Vote now in the citizen's participatory budget

This time 12 years:
Where's the beef? Fillet steaks in Warsaw

This time 13 years ago:
W-wa Zachodnia spruced up for the football, W-wa Stadion reopened

This time 14 years ago:
Literature and biology

This time 17 years ago:
Old Nysa van spotted in Grabów

This time 18 years ago:
The oats in the neighbouring field rise high

Brexit and the war between Britain's two elites

Ten years on from the Brexit referendum. Economically, the outcome of leaving the single European market and Customs Union are clear; the UK's GDP per capita is between 4% and 8% smaller than it would have been had the UK remained in. Brexit has negatively impacted trade and investment; Britain exports less, employs fewer people, than its economy would have done otherwise.

Brexit didn't lead to a social and economic collapse; it's more like a slow puncture than a high-speed blow-out. Correct me if I'm wrong. but nothing is better in Britain today than it was before. [However, Brexiteers like to point out that since the end of 2019, the UK economy has grown by 6.0% compared to Germany's pathetic 0.8% growth. But then France grew by 6.6%, and Poland by 15.5%.]

Britain's polluted rivers and beaches are an excellent example; without EU regulatory safeguards, the national legislator (Westminster) was free to bow to pressure from the interests (the water companies, their CEOs and shareholders) and hey presto – 'costly red-tape' is removed. Bathing among bobbing turds is the result.

Another example. Migration from EU member states fell to a trickle after Brexit, but it was replaced by the 'Boris wave' with non-EU workers turning up legally in record numbers (long-term net inbound migration in the 12 months to March 2023 was an all-time high of 944,000, the bulk of those being health- and care workers). 

If you voted for Brexit without a clear plan for how leaving the EU would make you richer and more powerful, then you were gamed by those who did.

The stereotypical privately educated, swashbuckling Brexiteer would say: "I believe in free enterprise! Global trade unrestricted by Brussels! National sovereignty! Cut red tape for growth!" Yet in practice, this tended to mean: "I want maximum freedom to move capital, buy cheap inputs, outsource production, hire cheaper labour, avoid regulation, lower consumer standards and weaken labour-market protections." Meanwhile, the disadvantaged local worker experienced the consequences: insecure employment with zero-hours contracts, lower bargaining power, loss of status, degraded high streets and a sense that 'our people' were no longer valued. 

However, framed in the context of Brexit, the boss could present himself not as the agent of the changes negatively affecting the English white working class, but as a fellow victim: "Brussels made British business uncompetitive! EU regulation tied our hands! Free movement put pressure on services and wages! The political elite in London ignored you! Vote Leave and we will take back control!"

This was politically brilliant, turning the old class conflict into something external. So, instead of boss vs worker, it became local people vs Brussels, the UK vs the EU; common sense vs experts.

I would frame the Brexit referendum as a battle between two elites; the old and the new. The old – typically privately educated, full of ruling-class confidence, still imbued with the old national myths, feeling a need for sovereignty, and disdainful of bureaucratic constraint – especially if it flows from abroad. "From Harrow School/To rise and rule." The private-school-aristocratic tradition says: lead, improvise, command the room, trust instinct and treat bureaucracy as something for clerks. 

The new elite is quite different. From humbler backgrounds, humanities graduates from white-tile universities, grammar-school educated, believing in meritocracy, ethically guided and trusting expertise.

Brexiteers, be they the old elite or the put-upon working classes, see this new elite as the problem. "Woke theoreticians, who've never done a day's real work (plumbing, bricklaying, toolmaking, nursing, bus-driving) in their lives. Citizens of anywhere rather than citizens of somewhere."

There were two contradictory visions of the sunny uplands that would result from Brexit: a Singapore-on-Thames where freewheeling capitalism was to regain control; free to strike deals all over the world, bringing in cheaper labour from the former British colonies to supplant EU citizens; the other vision – an autarkic Brexit Britain with closed borders, tariff walls and a return to the certainties of the 1950s. The white working class longed for the latter. They were unwittingly fooled into voting for the former. 

You never saw this dark ad; funded by billionaires, it targeted the thick community

If you ask a Brexiteer why leaving the EU has been a failure, they will answer "it's because we've not had a proper Brexit." Probe further and they'll either tell you that a proper Brexit would have been total economic liberalisation, deregulation and full openness to trade with the Rest of the World, or else a proper Brexit that would have slammed shut the borders on just about everyone who's not British (or at least a native-speaker of English). Two entirely contradictory visions that mutually exclude one another. The nearest the UK got to the freewheeling capitalism vision was the 49-day-long premiership of Liz Truss. It turned out that the bond markets did not share that vision, preferring steady long-term returns to the kinds of risks taken by hedge-fund managers. 

EU membership, like Gaza, is one of those political issues that touches not the day-to-day lives of British voters. Call-in radio shows on LBC showed time and time again that the average Brexit voter, fired up by the notion that "no one in Brussels is going to tell them how to lead their lives" was unable to name a single EU law that has impacted their lives. Sovereignty is an emotion. 

Supreme lack of interest in EU matters converted into erroneous tropes ("unelected bureaucrats" – a bit like "unelected bus conductors") and going to the polls ten years ago not so much as to regain sovereignty (whatever that means) but to give a kicking to the incumbent prime minister David Cameron and his Tory government. The toffs and the oiks ganged up on the Guardianista blob and won.

Biggest Waitrose queue in history

Is this a negation of democracy? Yeah, kind of. People who could not explain the difference between an EU directive (transposed into national law by member states, allowing some variation) and an EU regulation (directly applicable and uniform across the single market) have no right to vote on such momentous decisions. These should be left to their elected officials. Imagine if flat-earthers won a referendum that determined the future direction of science. Cameron will go down in history as a foolish chancer. 

Below: paperwork that an EU-based importer needs to complete before importing a pallet of goods from the UK post-Brexit. Before Brexit, all that was needed was an invoice. Why should an EU-based importer bother with all this when they can import from Germany, France, Italy or Spain with zero hassle? This is why British small businesses have been thoroughly clobbered by Brexit: exporting to the EU has been made vastly more difficult for them. Clobber small exporters and the result shows up in the nation's GDP figures.

[Thanks to Chris Watts at Intuition Bathrooms, Warsaw]

Britain is repenting. Rejoining the EU will be harder and take much longer than leaving it. No one born this century voted for Brexit, yet it's hurting them most. I hope for a swift return.

This time last year:
Janowiec and Mięćmierz

This time two years ago:
Big Walk to Zalesie Górne

This time six years ago:
My return to central Warsaw after lockdown

This time seven years ago:

From Peace of Mind to State of Elation

This time eight years ago
Last summer before S7 works begin

This time nine years ago
Nostalgia, ideology, aesthetics, emotions

This time 11 years ago:
Civilisation and barbarism – how the former deals with the latter

This time 12 years ago:
Ahead of the opening of Jeziorki's Biedronka

This time 13 years ago:
New views of Jeziorki

This time 14 years ago:
Motorway finally links (the outskirts of) Łódź and (the outskirts of) Warsaw

This time 17 years ago:
Kraków Air Museum

This time 18 years ago:
Quintessential Jeziorki

This time 19 years ago: 
Little boxes, Mysiadło 

As I walked out one midsummer's morning

I've used this title before – borrowed from Laurie Lee.

The sun rises at a quarter past four. Most people are still in bed until at least seven thirty. Today, I rose, as I do, early – at quarter past five, having gone to bed shortly after nine yesterday evening. And yet I still missed an hour of daylight!

My recent habit of early starts have one big benefit; they extend the length of summer as I subjectively experience it. The addition of two daylight hours a day every day between the equinoxes is the equivalent of stretching summer out by around one eighth. That sunlight can be converted into boosted levels of melatonin, serotonin and endorphin, which bring about blissful feelings. "Increase the joy in your life by 12% - FREE!"

The early, pre-breakfast walk in the sun need not be long (5,400 paces today, 4,900 yesterday for example) but it is optimal for bringing on that sought-after state of elation. On an empty stomach, the transcendental benefits of extended fasting bring on a gently altered state. Before eight am and it is already hot; my armpits are sweaty. The paths are sandy, the smell of pine-resin is in the air.

The cherry season has begun; I know where the unkept, unfenced, unsprayed orchards are. The cherries are ripening, a few are already ripe for picking. Given that there's no health benefit of eating more than one portion (80g) of a given fruit in any one day, a few handfuls is all I need before turning home for breakfast.

Ripening cherries. Never ask me whose.

Two midsummer garden anecdotes to recount… Yesterday morning, around 11 am, I went out to chuck out some kitchen waste onto the compost heap at the end of the garden. On my way back, I could hear stirrings in the bushes. "Too big for a cat," I thought. I took three paces forward, and saw an adult roe deer crashing through the undergrowth, across the path and into the trees, no more than about ten yards away from me. It was so sudden and over in an instant, there was no chance to whip out the phone to catch it. This is only the second time I've witnessed deer in my garden. 

A deer in a nearby meadow, last week. The same one?

And today, around 10 am, sitting in the kitchen, front door open, I was aware that the cats were uneasy… something was up. Scrapper, Czester, Arcturus, Hipek and Céleste were milling around outside… suddenly there was a loud feline shriek and action – cats running around every which way. Then I caught sight of him, again, it was just a flash – the grey tomcat that had fathered Céleste's kittens. She chased after him, evidently furious with him, up the path to the drive. I left the kitchen and ran out after them. I caught up with Céleste, sitting on the drive. She had seen him off; no sight of him. 

Cause and effect

Some seven or eight years ago, a visitor to my działka left an almost-full packet of cigarettes behind. Since then, these come in handy for recreating holiday qualia memory. This is a rare occurrence; twice a year, but only if the circumstances are right. 

Today, they are exactly right. The sun is shining; it is hot (30°C outside), there's no rush, it's a lazy day. The kitchen smells of fried food (breakfast: smoked salmon, fried bacon-style, with scrambled egg, served on bread fried in olive oil) and coffee. I light a cigarette from the gas stove; no puffing on it! I impale it upon a wire stand, angled upward at 45 degrees, it smoulders away, with a jar-lid underneath to catch the ashes. Eventually, it goes out; the smell, however, lingers. Time, now, to open a bottle of craft lager from the fridge. And PAFF! I am sitting at that brasserie overlooking the beach in Stella-Plage. All that's missing is the sea… Qualia memory, recreated. (I've done this in winter too; lots of snow outside, blue sky, sharp frost, and I'm brought back to an alpine bar, high up in the French Alps.)

A few hours later, I am in the back garden, picking wild strawberries (poziomki). As I get down among the weeds to fish out the tiny fruit, I notice the lingering smell of the cigarette smoke on my shirt. Marvellous! The Perfume of the Past. Instant nostalgia for the klimat of times when most people smoked. 

Incidentally, this year I notice no, like zero, wild strawberries with rodent nibble-marks upon them. Another bonus of cat ownership!

This time nine years ago:
Jeziorki's grey herons
Cygnets up close

This time 11 years ago:
Midsummer's Day in Jeziorki

This time 13 years ago:
Kittens at six weeks

This time 15 years ago:
And the Lord spake unto the tribe of Hipsters

This time 16 years ago:
Exit polls can get it wrong

This time 17 years ago:
In search of good Polish beer
[Situation's much better, thankfully!]

This time 18 years ago:
In the Solstice garden

Completely automatic

 {{ O! Hail the murky corners of the ethernet! Have a go, do, you have-a-go hero! Tongue-tied and mouse-like, entertaining nobility but from when... from when...? Very civil. Un-rude, moving in the right way. Taken to task and found, wanting. Wanting more.

Another slurp and what does the label say? Return yet not to reality. Try to rise. Rank, metre, sensibility. Thirty more. Stagger, stutter, play out the back office, heated memories, I vaguely shudder. Looping the close. Or closing the loop. Turning helplessness into bait. Untrammelled exotica, as yet catalogued by only the few. The few, who, to do morose facial expressions, ignore the rulebook. Five down. They cast aside the entertaining puzzles and took they the straight road. Again and again and again. Grovelling to authority, farcical fiascos. Set it all upon a flag, hoist it up above the hotel, and ask at the bar for a guide. 

Let it flow. Another sip, feel it. Type those words, familiar and unfamiliar, as they swim in the dark canal, bobbing along. Bubbles of experience. Won't say no. The road has changed, alongside it new bauble-shops. Threshing separates the genuine offers, observe. Count 'em! One by one, some fall, some stand. Purity of conscious flow? Nuggets, bobbing along? Facsimiles of facsimiles – our common history pledges to one and all the harness of our fate, collective and individual, through to times' end. 

Hendon in the 1930s. Billboards, burps, pavements, garden gates and lilac. Now, then, what's this – a henhouse? Pastimes from older times. The men who wrote down train numbers in little books. Crystallise, coalesce – do! From the inchoate to the precise, we are waiting, for a sign, a name, a clue... Hazel? Aerodrome...? Pixelated senses. Waste no time here. Jump.

Go. To the wireless set. Tuned at random. Hilversum. Droitwich. Midnight in Moscow. Sensible chords, the human condition, tapping in. What are you thinking? What will you be thinking, thirty years hence? I write this before you read it. A Walk in the Black Forest? Again, the familiar resurfaces. References caught by the few, inevitably lost to the future. To be found by someone who tries to make some sense of them but is roundly mocked by the experts in the field. Milk floats, that sort of thing. Hold onto the wire. James Clerk Maxwell and his equations. Enjoying the fruits of his genius, aren't we? Solid halls of plenty. The curtain must fall, though. Rage. Our happy consumption approaches its dénouement, its apotheosis. Rage is natural, pure, unfocused. From its abatement harmony rises. A flash, a moth, a flying thing. Hendon in the thirties again! Steam power too; hammering through suburban halts with the crack express. 

Kill your darlings? That's that whole paragraph gone in the edit.

Thirty pieces of silver. Certainly a lot at the time. Buy some land, plant some trees. And see what grows, see how it grows, see what fate has in store for those living things. The evening is both exciting and weary at the same time, the stew is on the fire, rich, chewy chunks of beef, potato and carrot – poor Tom, another piece of toasted cheese? Ideas bounce, ricochet, coalesce, ideas old and new, a whole night's sleep before the next cup of coffee. I love the sound of breaking glass. I do! Pop fineness, pop finesse. We keep circling the same point. Air races. Flavours, crunchy snacks. Exit poll? An hour away. Junction 25.

Keep going, refuse the instinct to quit. It is shallow, ordinary, common. It is what draws the football supporter to the game; the base spectacle of physical determination. Never give up. A flawed metaphor; sometimes you need to close the book and walk away. O, the pain of memory. Things you think but must never say. At the Last Judgment, it will be memory that brings you down. Embarrassment. Atone now, but feel that freedom from guilt will never quite unburden your soul. Again, that's next time. Better, finer-tuned instinct. Impulse under mandate. Begotten, not made. Buzz-buzz notification enters my stream of consciousness. Experimental. XP, XB, XA. Over the field. Excitement and hopes. I am hungry – I want to eat. A large bag of chippy chips, salt and vinegar and a pickled onion. A night out, mate! What could be better? Pale ale followed by chips. Whatever flows, whatever is recorded, imagined, experienced. My fingers are flying over the keyboard. The sense of north-west London, the North Circular, upstairs on the bus, the smell of stale tobacco smoke, the conductor's ticket machine issuing a 6d ticket, early autumn settling in, tall clouds against a blue sky...

I am hungry. I do want to eat. }}

Stop.

This time three years ago:
The sights of summer

This time four years ago
Warka Miasto

This time five years ago:

Elegy for a lost exurbia

This time six years ago:
Farewell to Papuś

This seven years ago:

Classic cars, Ealing

This time eight years ago
Seven Brief Lessons on Physics reviewed

This time nine years ago:
Now it belongs to the ages – on Great Works of Art

This time ten years ago:
More Brictorian Liverpool

This time 11 years ago:
Łódź – city of tenements

This time 12 years ago:
Liverpool reborn

This time 13 years ago:
What goes round comes around: retro is cool - again.

This time 14 years ago:
Warsaw's southern bypass by this time next year?

This time 15 years ago:
Stand Easy! - a short story

This time 18 years ago:
God Save The Queen – I mean it, Ma'am

Wenusia's kittens at one year old, Céleste's kittens at three weeks

A celebratory day on the działka today, with five birthdays; Scrapper, Arcturus, Pacyfik, Czester and Céleste are all one year old, born on 14 June 2025. Scrapper celebrated by killing and eating a squirrel. Meanwhile, back in the same birthing box in which she was born a year go, Céleste continues to feed her five kittens, who are now approaching three weeks old. Wenus, now a grandmother, pops by every now and then, but tends to hiss and growl at the new kittens. And let's not forget Hipek the stray, who's become a permanent fixture. Big, white with black patches, and unflappably gently, even when Wenus swipes at him and Pacyfik hisses.

My działka is a wonderland for the cats. It's the place for cats. As safe as can be; motorised traffic along the top end of my lane is no more than an average of four or five movements a day - this is not Jeziorki where an endless stream of cars bomb down ulica Karczunkowska. An acre of garden, a forest next door, kindly neighbours who'll happily serve up ham and milk, and the knowledge that there are three square meals a day plus treats at my place. And my cats have the best company - they have each other, whom they have known since birth. They live, eat and sleep in the place where they were born. Attachment to place, to their siblings, and to their human guardian - very important factors in a stable and happy feline life.

Left: year-old brothers taking a snooze. Notice that Czester still has his anti-tick collar; Scrapper has lost his, as have Arcturus and Pacyfik. I found one on my drive, which I fitted to Hipek, as the old fella was plagued with ticks when he started showing up; now with the collar on he is clear of the pests. I check the three collarless cats for ticks every day. Ticks suck.

Meanwhile, back in the birthing box, the ever-gorgeous Céleste is doing well. Like Wenusia when she was breastfeeding, Céleste has an enormous appetite. However, unlike Wenusia, Céleste faces fraternal competition at the feeding station, so I ensure that she has priority over her brothers."Lady Madonna, babies at your breast/Wonder how you manage to feed the rest". All are putting on weight at an exemplary manner, ranging between 272g and 342g at three weeks.

Like her mother, Céleste will be taken to the vet for sterilisation once she stops breastfeeding. In the case of Wenus, this was at an astonishing 14 weeks. Sadly, once weaned, the mother-kitten relationship soon evaporates. Post-sterilisation, Wenusia's character changed; I could sense a resentment towards me, towards her kittens, towards fate, etc. She has become distant, introverted.

Below: here are all the new kittens – all male – on my duvet while I change their bedding (Céleste is losing a lot of fur from her underside). 

So far, two kittens are showing behavioural characteristics that mark them out from the rest – here they are, the last born (left), this is grey tabby Quinto (Kwinto or Kwintuś in Polish), the fifth and last born, and Wiktor (right), the first born. These are the first two to venture outside of their birthing box. They are also the lightest and heaviest of the five. Grey-and-white Wiktor will be a longhair like his mother. More names to follow as characters develop.

Left: the Squirrel Hunter. The entire animal was devoured within an hour and half by Scrapper, assisted by his brother Pacyfik. I feel sad at the death of any animal, but then this is cats doing what cats do. An occasional dead thrush or mole appears on the drive from time to time, but I cannot speak of any sort of local 'wildlife apocalypse' brought on by my cats.

Below: Arcturus (left) and Pacyfik (right), woken up abruptly to have their picture taken. These two are identical twins. Arcturus, who uses his paws to eat and signal with, is the only son of Wenus not to have been castrated. He doesn't do smelly wees, nor is he aggressive. His dexterity should be allowed to evolve further into new generations... should there be an unspayed female in the vicinity.

Below: Ol' Mistah Heaps (Hipek). In old age he has found sanctuary; a warm, safe place with food and love. Wenusia and Pacyfik hiss and growl at Hipek, but everyone else is fine with him, and he is gentle with everyone, including those that hiss at him – he does not retaliate; he radiates gratitude, and has a lovely snore (like a human baby).

Below: portrait of Wenusia, the matriarch. Mother of five, grandmother of five, and she's not two years old yet. Great-grandmotherhood not on the cards, as Céleste will be sterilised, and she only has male kittens. Unless Arcturus gets lucky, but that's not something we'll know about.

This time last year:
Kitten time again!

This time five years ago:
The Morning Road Walked

This time 12 years ago:
Poppies in bloom, Jeziorki

This time 16 years ago:

Historical photos of work in progress on the S79

This time 19 years ago:
The year nears its zenith

Persistence of identity beyond biological life

The notion of 'persistence of identity' is key to exploring survival of consciousness after bodily death.

What is it when 'I' have an experience? 

Crucial to persistence of identity is memory, in particular the memory of qualia.

The physical matter that makes up your brain is in constant turnover. Cells renew, the biochemistry flows on – and yet a memory from childhood can snap back with astonishing clarity and immediacy. The neurons, the synapses, the brain structures that neuroscience says once recorded that original memory have long gone. And yet you remember conscious experiences from childhood – being at the seaside, the feeling of warmth on wet skin, the salt tang of the sea, seagulls' cries, the sparkle of the sun on the waves. Or shopping before Christmas, snowflakes brushing your face, the busy crowds, the brightly lit shop windows, neon reflecting off wet pavements at dusk. 

Complex, multisensory memories of being there, that snap you back decades in an instant.

These qualia memories define the essence, the youness of you, untampered with by the ego and its story-telling. 

In your life, there have been events, some which proved to be memorable, some of which you have long forgotten. Reminiscences with former classmates highlight gaps in event memory. They remember events involving you that you have forgotten, and vice versa. 

But qualia memories linger. Event memory is highly susceptible to ego-narration. It's rarely just 'this happened'; rather, it becomes 'this happened to me'. 'I did well', 'I was wronged', 'I was vindicated', 'I failed', 'I was admired', 'they misunderstood me'. The remembered event is often recruited into the ongoing project of self-construction; a palimpsest, written over again and again to suit the ego's needs. 

Qualia memory is closer to the raw material of consciousness. It doesn't depend on external validation and is less easily recruited into the ego’s story about itself. Qualia memory, I believe, preserves identity more deeply than autobiographical event memory, because it is less contaminated by egoic narration.

The neuroscientist may tell me that memory is reconstructive; that I am seeking to put together a timeline of what happened to me. But a qualia flashback is not a witness statement. It is the resurgence of a conscious texture. Congruence, not facsimile. When it comes, I feel it from within. I instantly recognise it. This was what it was like to be there, then, as me. Me, the observer, the experiencer, not me the ego. I am not making anything up or altering anything, this is just about what I felt at the time – and my ego has nothing to gain from the experience.

Qualia flashback vary in three metrics – persistence (usually short or very short), intensity (deep or shallow) and familiarity ( I can pin it down to a place and time; I have had it before, I know that feeling. Or not).

From the point of view of persistence of identity, qualia are a fundamental part of 'what is is like to be me'. And yet, we are told that "to attain spiritual awakening, we must lose the ego".

First-person – the ego as a construct – should be separated from consciousness as an observation platform. Let me explain in the form of a thought-experiment.

Chic stride through piazza - image generated by ChatGPT

You are walking through a crowded piazza on a sunny day. You have presence. You are tall, attractive. You are attired in cool, expensive clothes, wearing cool, expensive sunglasses; a classy gold watch on your wrist. Your credit card is limitless. People notice you; they look at you admiringly, jealously. They want to be like you. You have status. You feel proud, haughty as you carry yourself through the crowd with supreme confidence.

Now imagine that you are walking through that same piazza – but you are invisible.

No one can see you, but you see, feel, hear and smell the same scene. You are pure consciousness slipping through the crowd, pure awareness – but there's no ego. This is not not the extinction of the first-person perspective, but the stripping away of the socially reflected self. Consciousness moving across the face of the planet, aware of all around. It's still you; you have identity as observer, but now there's no ego-vehicle. In decades' time, the qualia memory of the scene around you will still flash back, not as an event that sees you playing the lead role, but as the cocktail of sensations of having been there; the smell of coffee and sun-cream, the feeling of a gentle breeze on your face, the sight of the crowded classical piazza and its architecture.

The ego relies on external validation; consciousness does not. 

When it comes to delving into the mystery of reincarnation, spiritual traditions often speak of 'losing the ego'. This should not be seen as the annihilation of consciousness, nor even the annihilation of individuality, but the loss of possessiveness, vanity, grievance, entitlement, status-hunger and compulsive self-reference.

When it comes to delving into the mystery of reincarnation, there are two schools of thought, two inherited frameworks that shape thinking about reincarnation. One tends towards the dissolution of individual identity after death into a larger field of consciousness (the Buddhist tradition); the other tends towards moral continuity across births, often expressed through karma (the Hindu tradition). Both contain profound insights, but neither quite satisfies me. The first can seem to dissolve the very thing – identity – whose persistence we are trying to understand, which we so acutely feel. The second can too easily be reduced to a cosmic ledger of reward and punishment – religion an instrument of social control.

If there is a middle way, it lies not in the persistence of the ego, but persistence of the observer: an ego-less witness moving through space and time, inhabiting many observation platforms, gathering experience, deepening perception and slowly learning what consciousness is for. Acquiring ever-deeper wisdom across myriad lifetimes, on an upwardly spiralling path of spiritual growth.

Your identity does not persist throughout your lifetime because memory preserves a perfect archive of events throughout your life. It does so because your consciousness recognises those congruences across time; what it feels like to be you and what it felt like to be you. Sometimes these can return as flashbacks, as déjà vus. Familiarity, instantly recognised; they contain the quintessence of the youness of you.

This time last year:
Awaiting the asphalt from Chynów to Piekut

This time three years ago:
The sounds of summer

This time four years ago:
My działka - powered by the sun

This time six years ago:
Poland's town/country divide explored

This time ten years ago:

A long walk to Czachówek

This time 12 years ago:
Half a mile under central Warsaw, on foot

This time 13 years ago:
Dzienniki Kołymskie reviewed

This time 14 years ago
Russia-Poland in Warsaw: the worst day of Euro 2012

This time 14 years ago:
Thirty-one and sixty-three - a short story

This time 17 years ago:
Warsaw rail circumnavigation

This time 18 years ago:
Classic Polish vehicles

This time 19 years ago:
South Warsaw sunset

Police-dog school open day

One station north of Chynów is Sułkowice, home to the famous police-dog school (Zakład Kynologii Policyjnej Centrum Szkolenia Policji or the Police Cynology Department of the Police Training Centre.) This is Poland's national centre for training dog-handlers and service dogs. Today was the annual open day at the school, so I popped over to see.

Below: the handlers began the day by showing off their dogs' obedience to commands, verbal and non-verbal. The dogs, mainly German and Dutch shepherds and Belgian Malinois, seem focused and well-behaved; the handlers have on their belts bags of treats that are frequently given to reward correct response. 

Police dogs are trained here for general patrol work as well as searching terrain and buildings; pursuit and arrest; and tracking human scent. Specialist tracker dogs are used for sniffing out narcotics, explosives, weapons, ammunition and human remains. I have also been told that the national revenue administration trains dogs here to sniff out illegal alcohol stills. The tracker dogs, which include bloodhounds, terriers and spaniels, were not on show today. 

The school is located on a 45-hectare site that includes 21 hectares of training ground, where dogs learn to cope with various forms of obstacles and simulated conditions that they may encounter on service duty, such as smoke (below).

As well as the dogs, there was also a police-horse display, with six horses and their riders down from Warsaw for the event. The horses wore visors and nose-guards, and like the dogs, were entirely comfortable dealing with fire (below).

The dogs showed their worth on the big obstacle course that straddles the Czarna river behind the school. Here, we could watch the hounds scramble over a wooden wall (below).

After all the dogs made it over the blue planks, three more unpainted planks were added to the wall. The final one raised the wall to around two and half metres, and here the dogs finally met their match, none could make it over this height.

Below: the dog tower tested the animals for surefootedness; getting down was harder than getting up, but this obstacle proved to be no problem for these dogs. In the distance, the forest of Wola Pieczyska.

Below: the final display involved police dogs involved in catching a 'criminal' in well-padded clothing. Blank ammunition would not deter the charging hounds; once caught, the dogs would not let go of their prey; the actor playing the thief had to have the padded jacket removed from him, the dog still attached to it! Police dogs are not to be messed with.

The school stresses suitability, health and working ability as paramount considerations when taking on new dogs. They are typically bought at one to two years old, so assessors can test an already visible temperament and body, rather than gamble on a puppy. Dogs must pass obedience and health tests before being trained further. They are function-first dogs. Sułkowice is not producing show dogs; animals are selected that can work around noise, crowds, vehicles, slippery floors, strange buildings, civil-defence exercises, scent trails and a handler under stress. Polish police dogs are bred for utility rather than appearance.

Many of my neighbours in Jakubowizna are retired police-dog trainers, and have set up canine-adjacent businesses; there are dog hotels, dog breeders, service-dog equipment makers, and civilian dog trainers (at weekends, groups of dog owners together with their charges and a trainer, make their way up and down my lane, the dogs learning to respond to commands).

Sułkowice is also famous as the place where Poland's most famous dogs on film were trained.

This time last year:|
Letters to an Imaginary Grandson (IV)

This time two years ago:
Poland's sleeper-train services – summer timetable

This time three years ago:
Conscience, consciousness and sensitivity

This time four years ago:
Little annoyances and optimising one's life

This time five years ago:
The 13th thirteenth

This time six years ago:

Ghastly June day in London

This time seven years ago:
Perfect weather week in Warsaw

This time eight years ago:
Further progress is unimaginable

This time nine years ago:
Baletowa reopens as rail works move on

This time ten years ago:
Polish doctors in UK offer new healthcare model

This time 15 years ago:

The closure of the Góra Kalwaria-Pilawa railway link

This time 17 years ago:
My blazing bus pic gets on front page of Gazeta Stołeczna

This time 18 years ago:
Storm clouds rising