London

"Are you thinking of returning to London?"

"Are you in Poland for good?"
Answers to these frequently asked questions are, respectively, "No" and "Yes".

Poland might be a long way from being the perfect place to live, but its moving in the right direction. It's getting better, year by year. The country and its people are becoming more self-confident.

Britain, on the other hand, is in decline. Every trip I make to London confirms this view.

UPDATE APRIL 2011. Four years on, and one global recession later, I'm even more convinced that what I wrote here is absolutely correct

UPDATE APRIL 2016. Eight years on, Poland has an unelected autocratic ruler hell-bent on demolishing the nation's advances of the past quarter century. He will fail. Poland abides. I might be spending more time in London with my 93 year-old father, but my long-term future remains in Poland.

Orchard

A small orchard, half way along ul. Trombity. The fence in the foreground and the ploughed field gives this scene local flavour. Trees still in bloom.

Spirit of Place

Is it just encroaching twilight time that puts me in reflective frame of mind? I feel I've been here before - but that this is not Poland. Is this Kentucky in the 1930s? I see this old farmhouse from our kitchen window. It triggers strong atavistic resurgences - all around is so familiar, yet not associated with anything I remember.

Spirit of place abounds. The land, the light, the sounds and smells; there's nothing of England here. These are sublime moments when the mind becomes detached from the physical, and consciousness transcends time and place.

Far away across the fields

Nine miles away from these fields rises the Warsaw skyline. Where once but one tower would be visible - Stalin's gift to the people of Warsaw, the Palace of Culture - today, several skyscrapers challenge its dominance. From right to left: Palace of Culture, Marriott Hotel (LIM Centrum), Elektrim Tower, Intercontinental Hotel and Warsaw Financial Center. These five skyscrapers are only 800 yards apart.

Above: the same five towers photographed at 5:20 am from the 26th floor of the Novotel Centrum. From right to left: Palace of Culture, Intercontinental Hotel, Warsaw Financial Center; First left: Elektrim Tower, second left: Marriott Hotel

I could not resist this tight crop on the Palace of Culture and the Interconti and WFC behind. Just like out of Koyaanisqatsi!

Heavy lift over Jeziorki

For the last few weeks, a Volga-Dniepr Antonov An-124 (above) has been visiting Okecie on a daily basis. Here's RA 82074 coming in to land. Note the undercarriage - no less than 28 wheels! This is one of the world's largest aircraft. Only the six-engined Antonov An-225 and the Airbus A380 (yet to enter service) are larger.

A less regular, though not infrequent guest, is the C-17 Globemaster III (top). This one belongs to the 437th Airlift Wing, based at Charleston, South Carolina. USAF aircraft visiting Okecie tend to be transport types.

Pheasant heaven

Jeziorki is noted for its pheasants. Indeed, pheasants descended from those kept by the King of Poland range wide across southern Warsaw. They breed in spring and early summer; the characteristic trumpety mating call of the males is often heard at this time of year.

Walking around Jeziorki, one can sometimes startle pheasants in the long grass, which then fly up with a great bustle of flapping wings and with much squawking. They do not fly far - just far enough to get out of your way.

Foxes can be seen stalking pheasants in the scrub and long grass, otherwise the birds have no predators and lived undisturbed.

This magnificent male pheasant was photographed from my bedroom window.

There's something about a sunset...

Artists have ever been fascinated by the setting sun. Film-makers call the half-hour before, and the half-hour after sunset 'magic hour'. There's a quality to the light that creates a sublime atmosphere, a mood of joyful contemplation. More shots at twilight will appear on these pages before too long.

(Sun sets over the tracks, ul. Kórnicka)

Strange Days Indeed

Never in all my life have I seen a sky like this. I dashed outside to catch as many shots as possible before sunset. What caused these strange cloud formations? What do they... mean?
[update 19 April: Thanks to http://www.cloudappreciationsociety.org, I discover that these are mammatus clouds. Click here for pics of some excellent ones.)