Arriving in Wrocław

After a few delays and changes to the original plan, I finally made my way to Wrocław on Tuesday afternoon. It took us 6 hours on the train to get here from Warsaw , but it was a comfortable ride and I had a good time picking my new boss' brain about the way that ADRA/ChSCh works in Poland.

I did not know what to expect when I arrived in Wrocław but one thing that I certainly was not expecting was the shock that I got when the realisation hit that I have moved here to stay (at least for the time being). And this realisation did not hit me until I walked into the apartment where I would be living.

"What have I done?" was my first thought. Don't get me wrong, I did not doubt whether i wanted this, it was just that up until then it still felt like a holiday.

It wasn't until I was being told, "And this will be your room, this is the kitchen and bathroom...", that I was like "What was I thinking?", but thankfully by that stage it was way too late to chicken out, like I sometimes do when things get too difficult.

Over the last few days I have slowly fallen into a routine, and am slowly getting used to everything. I'm slowly getting used to the tiny apartment that I and Irene, an elderly lady from church share on the 4th floor of one of the apartment comlex's (and when I say tiny, I mean tiny). The cold outside and the need to allocate 5 minutes just to get dressed before I leave the apartment each morning. The excessive walking that I'm doing, because the distance to work does not warrant spending the money on transport, yet does require that I leave 40 minutes before work starts. The walking and driving on the other side of the road and making sure that I look the right way so that I don't get run over. The need to say "Good day" to the shop owner as I enter each store (I quite like this one, although it requires me to be social even if I don't feel like it). The new workplace which is quite friendly, yet so unlike my work at ADRA Australia (I miss you ADRA Aust guys). And the constant need to speak and think in Polish (I'm slowly getting a handle on this as well).

So as you can see life here is quite different. But I seem to be enjoying it. The other day, I even got a surprise. It started SNOWING!!

It's been over 15 years since I saw real snow falling from the sky--not just lumps of slush like at Thredbow. So I'm sure you can imagine my excitement. It was beautiful. The night had just fallen, the street lights were lightly illuminating the falling snow, the traffic had died down while I was warm inside looking out from my 4th story window at the world below me. I must say, it's was a picturesque moment. If I could, I would take a picture and ingrain it in my memory. But pictures never look as beautiful as they are in real life. So I just have to enjoy the moments while they last.

And it is moments like these that remind me why I wanted to come and visit the country of my birth.