PRI's The World » Poland

Russia’s Gazprom Struggles to Keep Europe Warm

The World — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 14:00:48 +0000

The deadly cold snap continues to grip central and eastern Europe.

The deep freeze has caused 80 deaths, mostly in Ukraine and Poland.

It also has Russian gas giant Gazprom struggling to meet demand.

Anchor Marco Werman talks to reporter Julia Barton about the energy challenges Gazprom is facing.

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Marco Werman: I’m Marco Werman and this is The World, a coproduction of the BBC World Service, PRI and WGBH Boston. There’s cold and then there’s deadly cold. The deadly cold we want to tell you about right now, it continues to grip central and eastern Europe. The deep freeze has caused at least 80 deaths, mostly in Ukraine and Poland. It also has Russian gas giant, Gazprom, struggling to meet demand. Reporter Julia Barton is in Moscow. Julia, you’re just back from Ukraine where at least 40 cold related deaths have occurred, what was it like there and how are people dealing with this cold?

Julia Barton: Well, as you can imagine the air in Kiev was very frigid, I mean you walk outside and immediately the hairs inside your nose start to freeze over and the water in your eyes starts to turn to ice. So, that tells me at least that it’s well below zero Fahrenheit, but I didn’t see any sign that people were avoiding going outside. You would see women in these huge fur coats, wrapped up in those, and people with their fur chapkas, their hats. The sidewalks are very icy and dangerous. Again, that doesn’t seem to deter anyone. The did close schools in Kiev today, but children are out sledding with their parents and just enjoying a sunny day off.

Werman: And for those 40, at least 40 cold related deaths, how did those people die specifically?

Barton: Well, most of them were homeless and well, this partly might be an issue in terms of Ukraine, of the country starting to do better than some of its former Soviet neighbors in reporting deaths like this, but Ukraine also does not have a good social safety net when it comes to issues like homelessness. And all that becomes absolutely clear when you have a cold snap like this. The country’s prime minister, Mykola Azarov, had to ask people openly and say “We need to help each other. We need to stop being indifferent when we see someone who has nowhere else to go.” And he had to ask hospitals not to turn their indigent patients out onto the street when their treatment is through. The emergency ministry there has setup over 1,700 heated shelters around the country with food and tea, but obviously that’s just a short term answer to a much bigger problem. There’s no kind of well-knit social safety net that can help people with deeper issues, such as alcoholism and drug use, and so they just end up on the streets living in the storm sewer systems and that kind of thing, and there’s nowhere for them to go when the cold like this hits.

Werman: Now, Ukraine and many other of the affected countries rely on Russian gas for heat that comes from Gazprom, the gas monopoly in Russia. Has Gazprom been able to meet the demand?

Barton: Some European countries beyond Ukraine, such as Italy, complained earlier this week that their gas supplies dropped, and they blamed Gazprom for diverting that gas for domestic use. Gazprom says it did not do that. It admits that it has been strained a bit by just a slight amount and so they’ve increased their supplies from underground storage facilities and that gas is in the pipeline. It should be reaching Europe, but they say it just takes time.

Werman: What about Russia’s former satellite nations? I mean how dependent are they on Gazprom?

Barton: They are fairly dependent, although Ukraine has its own supply of gas and the government has said they also released their own domestic storage supplies to heat the country. So they’re saying they shouldn’t suffer any shortages from this cold snap.

Werman: Now, Julia, on Saturday there are antigovernment demonstrations planned in Moscow, and the cold, apparently, is going to continue through the weekend. Could the weather have an impact on the turnout?

Barton: The protest organizers you know, they are still going forward with their plans, but they are starting to talk about the possible impact, and their spin is starting to sound like well, if as many people or a respectable number of people still show up despite this Siberian level of cold, then that sends an even stronger signal to the government that people are fed up. And the cold didn’t stop a small group of protestors from climbing a seven story building today in Moscow, and putting up a huge anti Putin yellow banner across an entire billboard that was facing the Kremlin. The banner said “Putin Go Away” and had a picture of Putin with an X over his face, and it was visible all over central Moscow and got a lot of attention until the police took it down.

Werman: I’m sure those protestors were wearing gloves.

Barton: I would not be surprised.

Werman: Reporter Julia Barton is speaking with us from Moscow, thank you very much.

Barton: Thank you.

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How Poland Keeps Its Economy Booming

Dave McGuire — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 13:50:30 +0000

No credit crunch: Polish banks are still giving out mortgages and loans, even enlisting Hollywood actors like Antonio Banderas to lure customers. (Photo: Dave McGuire)

In the 20 years since the end of communism, Poland has not been in recession – not once. And projections say it could ride out the current crisis as well.

How do they do it? Warsaw University economist Grzegorz Gorzelak says there are several answers. “One is, it’s a miracle. And you don’t interpret miracles, they just happen.”

More seriously, Gorzelak says there’s too many things going right in Poland to pick just one reason for the strong economy.

By European standards, Poland is a big country with a strong demand for domestic goods. That keeps the economy humming. And when domestic demand has faltered, exports to the rest of Europe pick up the slack.

And, yes, having a free floating currency – the zloty, not the euro – has also helped to keep exports competitive.

Another factor is good banking regulations. Gorzelak says Polish law prevents foreign banks from taking capital from Polish subsidiaries in order to cover their losses somewhere else. So while other countries struggle with a lack of credit, Poland still has money to lend for homes and businesses.

But Gorzelak also gives the country’s leaders credit for simply using the power of positive thinking.

“Polish government also played a very good propagandist role. They were saying, what crisis? We don’t have crisis, Poland is safe, which was very fortunate because economy is a psychological sphere and if you are being told that you’re going to have a crisis, you save money and you don’t spend and then you have a crisis.”

The Polish economy also benefits from a young and tech-savvy workforce that, now that the rest of the world is in the doldrums, doesn’t have to go abroad for jobs.

They work for companies like Polcode – a web developer that does the dirty work of building databases for small websites in the US and Canada.

Polcode Vice President Wojciech Hyzopski. (Photo: Dave McGuire)

Wojciech Hyzopski is the company’s vice-president: “When I came to Polcode, there were eight people four years ago. Now, we hire 64.”

He says, his company has benefited from the global downturn.

“We are doing well. The recession isn’t very harmful for us, because we are cheaper for West Europe or USA clients so they are more likely decide to outsource their job to Poland.”

But it’s not all computers. The economic boom in Poland even reaches down to what people eat…

Tucked among the communist era apartment blocks in Warsaw, there’s a small shop selling organic vegetables, high-quality meats, and artisan cheeses direct from small Polish farms. The owner is Ola Turkiewicz.

“My mission is to make people aware they can make informed choices when it comes to food. They don’t have to buy – can I say that? – crap. For me, that mission is also to support the local economy – local meaning the Polish economy.”

Ola Turkiewicz, owner of Sudawia, an independent food store (Photo: Dave McGuire)

It’s the kind of boutique-y philosophy that wouldn’t be out of place in gentrified Portland or San Francisco. But it’s unique for gritty Warsaw and Ola’s store has quite a following.

“I don’t think this store would exist if we had more economical problems,” she says. “It is definitely the indication that Poland is doing not so bad.”

No Pole will argue that the country is a finished product but there is an idea here that Poland is a green island in Europe. Credit agencies are considering improving Poland’s debt rating, which stands in stark contrast to their neighbors in the west.

But whether the Polish miracle can keep the rest of Europe’s troubles at bay remains to be seen – especially if and when the country joins the eurozone.

Polish Art Looted By Nazis Returns Home

The World — Fri, 23 Sep 2011 12:30:44 +0000

A couple of oil paintings by the Polish impressionist Julian Falat disappeared in 1944. The paintings depicted hunters gathering in the snowy woods near the Polish-Lithuanian border.

They once were displayed in Poland’s National Museum and we want you to tell us where that museum is located.

These paintings were stolen by the Nazis, part of Hitler’s mass looting of art, much of it from Jewish victims.

The fate of these two oil paintings took a surprising turn. They were recently seized from auction houses in New York.

Last night they were returned to the Polish president. So name the Polish city where the paintings will return for public exhibit.

The answer is Warsaw, where Poland’s National Museum of Art will exhibit the recovered works. Anchor Lisa Mullins finds out more about the case from Poland’s Consul-General Ewa Junczyk-Ziomecka.

Poland Wants US Travel Visa-Free

The World — Thu, 26 May 2011 20:10:06 +0000

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(Photo: Dave McGuire)

Natalia Piotrowicz, who lives in the Polish city of Warsaw, planned to fly stand-by to Argentina with her German boyfriend and Danish friend earlier this year. But when they got to the airport, the flight was full.

“Then one of the guys came up with the idea to go to United States, to New York, but I couldn’t do that because of the visa,” Piotrowicz said.

Poland is one of the few countries in Europe whose citizens still need to get visas to visit the United States for tourism. It can take weeks and over a $100 to get one. It’s a sore point for Poland, which has long been among America’s staunchest allies in Europe.

Piotrowicz didn’t end up going to New York that day.

“Sure, it’s not the end of the world, but it’s annoying, it’s inconvenient,” she said.

It’s also a bit embarrassing. Successive Polish governments have tried for years to get Poland on the US visa waiver list, like its neighbors in the European Union.

The reason Poles still need visas is because so many are rejected when they apply. Without getting the rejection rate under a certain percentage, the US won’t add Poland to the visa waiver program.

Last year, when President Obama met with his Polish counterpart, he made a promise.

“I am going to make this a priority, and I want to solve this issue before very long,” President Obama said. “My expectation is that this problem will be solved during my presidency.”

Now Obama is wrapping up his current European tour with a visit to Poland on Friday, and Poles are hoping he’ll address the issue.

National Pride

Grzegorz Kostrzewa-Zorbas, a former member of the Polish foreign affairs ministry, said it’s a matter of national pride.

“Poland feels discriminated against,” Kostrzewa-Zorbas said, “differentiated from other allies of the United States around the world.”

From the Polish point of view, visas just don’t make sense, he said.

“Will al-Qaeda penetrate America disguised as Polish peasants? Will the job market be flooded by unqualified, culturally alien workers from Poland? Of course not,” Kostrzewa-Zorbas said.

The visa issue may be why Poland’s usually high public opinion of the United States has taken a slide lately. But Zbigniew Lewicki, speaking outside of the University of Warsaw where he teaches, said it doesn’t really matter what Poles think.

Backing Down

“Too many people in this country think that we, as Poles, deserve better, or more than anybody else,” said Lewicki. “I don’t buy it.”

Lewicki said he thinks many Poles are turned down for visas because they clearly plan to work illegally in the United States, so it’s ridiculous for the US to back down.

The president would need congressional support to change the rules for Poland. But Kostzrewa-Zorbas said if Obama doesn’t make a big statement on the visa issue while he’s in Warsaw, it will be a disaster.

“This will be a major disappointment and it will spoil the whole visit of Obama in Poland,” he said.

But Zbigniew Lewicki said there are bigger issues on the table between Poland and the US; for instance, the growing calls in Europe for a ban on shale gas drilling – a major blow to Poland’s hopes for energy independence. Visas, Lewicki said, are a minor distraction.

“It would be a huge mistake if both issues, shale gas and visas, are raised at the same time, and Obama says, ‘sorry, I can’t help you with gas, but here’s visas.’”

Cycling the World

The World — Thu, 19 May 2011 19:45:11 +0000

Somen Debnath (Image: Somen2020)

We’re trying to track down Somen Debnath in the Geo Quiz. He is traveling around the world on bicycle to raise awareness of AIDS and Indian culture. Somen grew up just outside of Kolkata, India. Back in 2004 he headed off on his bicycle. By his own count, he’s visited 60 countries so for and traveled more than 50,000 miles. He says he was captured and roughed up by the Taliban in Afghanistan.

On Thursday, he was in a Central European capital that’s near the Baltic Sea and the Carpathian Mountains. But he’s not going anywhere fast from there. It seems someone stole his bicycle but that hasn’t dimmed his spirits. Somen is hoping to set off soon on two new wheels, to Germany, Denmark and then Iceland.

So where is he now? The answer is Warsaw, Poland. David Leveille reports.

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Somen’s YouTube channel
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New ‘fracking’ report sure to heat up debate

Peter Thomson — Wed, 11 May 2011 09:00:46 +0000

Global Shale Gas Reserves (Source: U.S. Energy Information Administration based on Advanced Resources International, Inc. data)

Does natural gas “fracking” contaminate water supplies? A new report strongly suggests it does.

A couple of weeks ago we reported on the relatively quiet arrival in Poland of shale gas fracking — that’s shorthand for a new type of natural gas and oil extraction known as hydraulic fracturing. The technology has been producing increasing amounts of natural gas — and controversy — here in the US and is starting to generate opposition elsewhere as it spreads around the world. So far in Poland, though, the only opponents seem to be neighbors of drilling wells. Environmental groups like Greenpeace Poland are reserving judgment, and the government is eager to develop domestic gas supplies that could help free the country from reliance on Russian gas.

The biggest criticism of fracking here in the US is that it contaminates ground water. Greens and local activists say both the chemicals used to help access the gas and the gas itself are leaching into local water supplies, posing both immediate safety and long-term health risks. In a particularly dramatic scene from the 2010 Oscar-nominated anti-fracking documentary “Gasland,” a neighbor of one fracking operation contends that his water supply has been contaminated by methane and proceeds to light the water flowing from his kitchen tap on fire.

The gas industry has vehemently denied such charges. They’ve questioned the veracity of the flaming faucet scene, but have also said that even if it’s real, the flammable water problem could have been due to a broken gas line or other causes unrelated to fracking, and that there’s no mechanism for either gas or fracking chemicals to get from the deep shale rock to the much shallower water tables.

Well, a new peer-reviewed study published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences provides strong evidence that the flaming faucet phenomenon is real.

The study by scientists at Duke University found high levels of methane in drinking water wells within a kilometer of gas wells in Pennsylvania and New York, compared with water supplies up to three km away. On average, the report says, methane concentrations were 17 times higher in water supplies near fracking operations, and “within the defined action level… for hazard mitigation recommended by the US Office of the Interior.” The authors point out that while “dissolved methane in drinking water is not currently classified as a health hazard for ingestion, it is an asphyxiant in enclosed spaces and an explosion and fire hazard.”

The researchers also found telltale chemical markers indicating the gas was in fact from the deep shale reservoirs targeted by the fracking operations and not from sources closer to the surface.

The authors say their results “suggest important environmental risks accompanying shale-gas exploration worldwide.”

Interestingly, the researchers did not find any traces of fracking chemicals in these water supplies. That suggests to them that the gas is leaching not from the fracking process itself but either from disturbances in rock formations between the deep shale and the shallow aquifers, or from the gas wells themselves.

So–after years of growing dispute, journalistic examination and government inquiry, this first peer-reviewed study of the impact of fracking on groundwater essentially splits the difference between opponents and supporters. It links fracking to serious contamination of drinking water with methane, but not with other hazardous chemicals.

The authors call for more research to further inform the public debate. And for now, that debate is sure to heat up. Maybe even in Poland.

PNAS: Methane Contamination of Drinking Water Accompanying Gas-Well Drilling and Hydraulic Fracturing

ProPublica: Scientific Study Links Flammable Drinking Water to Fracking

EPA Submits Draft Hydraulic Fracturing Study Plan to Independent Scientists for Review

America’s natural gas and oil producers: Frac In Depth

Now on PBS: “Gasland”

Poles unfazed by fracking?

The World — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 20:25:43 +0000

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(Photo courtesy: Plazak/US Energy Information Administration)

By Dave McGuire

For years, Maja and Maciej have dreamed of building a house and raising their daughter near the quiet Polish village of Niestkowo. But during a recent visit to the town, they found that quiet village suddenly disrupted by a huge metal tower with bright lights on it.

“It was nighttime but it was actually as bright as if it was daytime’” Maja said. “And we were just, ‘oh my god what’s this?’”

It was a new test well for shale gas, the latest to pop up in the north of Poland near the Baltic Sea.

Shale gas drilling or “fracking” as it is sometimes called, is growing around the world and bringing an environmental backlash in its wake. The couple had heard about test wells coming to Poland. But they had no idea that one would be built so close to their land.

Maja said it has left her and her husband uncertain about the future.

“Now we have a question,” she said. “Should we stop planning and change completely our life? We don’t know. We are just terrified.”

Maja did not want to give her last name because she said she was worried about drawing attention to, what she called, the big money interests involved. But her concern about shale gas puts her in the minority in Poland.

Millions of Poles already use gas for cooking and heating, but until now virtually all of it came from Russia. And after centuries of domination by their giant neighbor to the east, it is a big problem for many Poles. That is part of the reason why Polish government is pushing shale gas drilling. Prime Minister Donald Tusk, recently told an audience in Warsaw that the search for domestic energy sources must be a priority.

“We are determined to make shale gas in Poland become a reality,” Tusk had said.

The prime minister didn’t specifically mention Russia when talking about developing Poland’s own gas supply. Few Polish politicians will, but people in the gas industry certainly do.

John Buggenhagen of San Leon Energy said Russia has not been a good supplier of gas “based upon their past history of forcing their hand on countries and governments.”

Buggenhagen said tapping Poland’s large shale gas reserves could end Russia’s gas monopoly. And that would change the regional balance of power. The key, he said, is what’s called hydraulic fracturing, or fracking technology, a practice developed in the US.

Shale gas is trapped in impermeable rock, and until recently, it was too expensive to get it out. Fracking changed that. The process uses high pressure to blast water and tiny round beads into underground rock, cracking it open and allowing the gas to seep out and be sucked up.

Fracking has made a lot of new gas available in North America. But it also has a lot of critics. A growing wave of scrutiny has dogged fracking operations in the US, including investigative reports and the 2010 documentary film Gasland, which chronicles what it says are the environmental consequences of fracking.

(Photo courtesy: Energy Information Administration)

Critics say that among other problems, fracking can contaminate groundwater. And the backlash in the US has spread abroad, most recently to France, where the government said it might stop shale gas exploration because of environmental concerns.

In Poland, though, there has barely been a peep, even at environmental organizations like Greenpeace. Greenpeace Poland said it doesn’t have a position on fracking yet. They are investigating it, though, and climate and energy campaigner Julia Michalak said if one day Greenpeace decides fracking is one of the main environmental problems in Poland, “we will definitely act.”

But Michalak said that right now, Poland has more pressing energy problems, like weaning itself off of coal.

“Our biggest concern is the coal-based economy,” he said.

Michalak said Poland gets more than 90 percent of its energy from coal, and that for now, Greenpeace sees shale gas as a possible transition fuel between coal and a future powered by renewable energy.

And just as there is no concerted environmental campaign against shale gas in Poland, there are also few legal obstacles.

Piotr Otawski of the Polish Environment ministry said there is no special environmental law concerning shale gas, and that the country does not need one. Otawski said Poland already requires every big new project to have an environmental impact assessment, and that like those other projects, the government will consider fracking proposals on a case by case basis.

San Leon Energy’s projects will stand up to such scrutiny, said the company’s John Buggenhagen. Shale gas drillers in the US reject concerns about ground water contamination, and Buggenhagen said if the water issue comes up in Poland, the industry is also ready with a response.

“You’ve got shallow water and deep gas,” Buggenhagen said. “If the groundwater aquifer’s at 200 meters or even 1000 meters, the shale gas here in Poland is between 2500 and over 4000 meters. So in my opinion there’s no risk here in Poland of tainting the sweet water deposits.”

Buggenhagen acknowledged that there would be big impacts on the surface. But he said San Leon will work with local communities so that both parties benefit.

Some of Maja and Maciej’s future neighbors in Niestkowo are eager to see some of those benefits. One, who lives on the edge of town, said she has nothing against it because it is far from where she lives.

“And maybe there will be jobs,” she said.

But Niestkowo Mayor Bogdan Zabinski doubted that his village would see any benefit. And he feared the potential costs.

“Just look what has happened in Japan with their nuclear power,” Zabinski said. “It was supposed to be incredibly safe, but it turned out that it isn’t. And the same can be said for shale gas. We’ve been told it is okay, but there’s no guarantee that our environment won’t be harmed.”

For now, gas companies in Poland are only drilling test wells. Any actual production could still be years away—plenty of time for the debate over fracking to play out around the world, and in Poland.

Read More

Could Shale Gas Power the World?
World Shale Gas Resources: An Initial Assessment of 14 Regions Outside the United States
‘Fracking’ Comes to Europe, Sparking Rising Controversy
China set to unearth shale power
S.Africa imposes “fracking” moratorium in Karoo
Andrzej Sosnowski, translated by Benjamin Paloff, Open Letter, 163 pp, $13.95

by J. Kates

For a long time, modern Polish poets were seen by American readers only through the dark lenses of Cold War rhetoric and a mythology of “captive nations.” We were introduced to a number of interesting poets, a surprising number of whom were not driven by politics, but the context of their presentation was, tinged with the ferrous oxide of the Iron Curtain. But now a new generation has arisen that knew not Joseph, refreshingly influenced by Western poets as diverse as Algernon Swinburne and Frank O’Hara, and making easy connections with Paris and New York. Among these is Andrzej Sosbnowski.

Sosnowski, born in 1959, has such stature now in Poland that it is unfortunate that the edition of his poems translated by Benjamin Paloff in Lodgings is slightly unreliable. For the first five poems for which I have easy access to comparative texts, one (“What Is Poetry”) has dropped its terminal climactic line entirely, and another (“A Song for Europe”) mistranslates “forty” as “fourteen,” where the number matters.These may be anomalies, but a random sampling that yields a 40% error rate does not inspire confidence. There are other curiosities — a title left untranslated without explanation, and so on. The translations may very well be for the most part sound, and are vouched for by some who know Polish far better than I do; but when I read a loaded phrase like “nocturnal emissions of factories” (given in another translation as “factories spew by night”) I don’t know where the pun originates, or what to make of it.

You won’t find out much about the poet from Lodgings. There is a brief biographical note at the end, yet you’ll have to go somewhere else for information and context about Sosnowski’s place in contemporary letters. The Paloff and the publisher provide no notes, and only the briefest of introductions, mostly bibliographical.

For poems that the translator claims are pervasively allusive, readers are given no critical information — that the Korea of Sosnowski’s first book Life in Korea is the name not of a country in East Asia, for instance, but of a district of Warsaw; or that Hel is less a Germanic mythical allusion than a geographical location on the Baltic. Paloff alerts us to “the initial difficulties of reading Sosnowski’s work,” but neither elucidates these nor explains how he deals with them in English.

Poet Andrzej Sosnowski -- a major Polish poet whose verse reflects American influences.

Without the original Polish texts, Lodgings exists in a kind of suspended animation, unattached to anything around it. Paloff does refer briefly to Sosnowski’s literary relationship to American poets he has translated, but the only direct connection he makes is between John Ashbery’s “What Is Poetry” and Sosnowski’s response. In a little interview tucked in just before the last poems, Paloff talks with the poet almost exclusively about American correspondences, yet Sosnowski himself seems relatively uninterested in chasing these down: “This is something that only you, and eventually your readers, can sense and know for yourselves. I have read quite a bit of American poetry, and I’ve translated some. Has some of that rubbed off on my own poems? I don’t know.”

The poems exude an exuberant air of playful language, and sometimes I don’t care if the voice is Sosnowski’s or Paloff’s:

to hell with your distant voice in the receiver
to hell with drops of dew on lilac
tears of alder above the mill what did you do
with that light the deutzia flowers charlock the view of delft
what was your last magic my make-up artist
the last vaginalia turned out so pale
followed by horrendalia that’s now so-so
over the rainbow . . .

(“Spring Rounds”)

Sometimes, though, it makes a difference: one image in the original “Czym jest poezja” turns on a rhyme of two words, glos and los, “voice” and “fate.” Paloff has gone for the rhyme, “voice” and “choice,” at the laborious expense of meaning.

Does meaning matter here — is “fate” the same as “choice?” Underneath the playfulness of Sosnowski lies an insistent earnestness, a sober engagement that comes across at his best in the longer poems, as in “dr. caligari resets the world” and in the “The Oceans,” a Swinburnian double sestina:

How difficult it is, essentially, to understand this shadow,
which meanders behind me through all the oceans,
through the foam, like the Flying Dutchman, outpacing the day
on crescent-moon sails as it assaults the night with our belongings!

We do want to know what Sosnowski has to tell us.

Lodgings offers a generous selection of poems from Sosnowski’s books from 1992 through 2010. A few of Sosnowski’s poems have been available before, but not in such profusion. For this, we must be grateful, and hope that this tantalizing look at an intriguing Polish poet will spark more, and more reliable, English versions.

====================================================================

J. Kates is a poet and literary translator who lives in Fitzwilliam, New Hampshire. He helps run Jephyr Press.

Towering Jesus

The World — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 19:35:13 +0000

Poland's Christ, the King statue (Photo: ProhibitOnions)

If you’ve ever been to Rio de Janeiro, then you’ve seen the towering statue of Jesus Christ the Redeemer. It looks out over Rio from atop Corcovado mountain. It’s so high up there that there are lightning rods installed on the statue but the statue itself is not the tallest statue of Jesus Christ in the world. Rio’s landmark is rivaled by a similar one in Cochabamba, Bolivia. But for today’s Geo Quiz, we’re looking for a place in Poland that claims to best them both.

The giant statue that’s on our radar this time took 10 years to build. Like Rio’s it depicts Jesus Christ with arms outstreched and it rises some 100 ft above the ground. The location is not as picturesque, it’s in a town in western Poland, not far from the German border. People there claim theirs is the tallest Jesus in the world, though others may quibble.

So, where in Poland is this towering Jesus?

Well, it’s in Świebodzin. Helen Pidd has been to see it closeup. She writes for Britain’s Guardian newspaper.

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Guardian article

Tatar cuisine

The World — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 19:50:10 +0000

We’re looking for a Central European country on the Baltic Sea this time. This nation borders seven countries. The longest borders are shared with the Czech Republic and Belarus.

Below we hear about a tiny restaurant that recently opened in the northeast of this country, on the Belarus border. But first one more clue now, completely unrelated:

This country issued commemorative coins today with the portrait of one its most famous sons: Pope John Paul II. The coins have been pressed to mark his beatification in May.

So, what Central European country are we in now?

Answer: Poland. Reporter Dave McGuire visited a brand new restaurant serving Tatar food there. The Tatars are a Turkic ethnic group spread across many countries, mostly in Central Asia. Most people of Tatar heritage live in Russia today. Tatar cuisine relies heavily on meat. McGuire takes us on a tour of Tatar cuisine in the village of Kruszyniany in northeastern Poland.

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Fat Thursday

The World — Thu, 03 Mar 2011 20:45:18 +0000

Paczkis on display (Photo: Dave McGuire)

A jelly donut is your first clue for today’s Geo Quiz. Most everyone in the Central European country we’re looking for enjoys a good jelly donut. Except they call them paczkis.

Today happens to be Paczki Day over there and we have reports of long lines of customers waiting outside local bakeries to buy a bag of paczkis.

“I can see around 30 people who are waiting, and they are smiling…and some of them take out really huge bag of paczki I can guess that some of them have 20, or 30, or even 50 paczkis inside”.

Can you name this Central European nation, which borders the Baltic Sea and the Carpathian Mountains.

Geo Answer:

The answer is Poland, where many Poles celebrate the diet-busting tradition of Fat Thursday today.This last Thursday before Lent is an occasion to let go and dig in to paczkis, traditional jam filled donuts. They weigh in at 300 to 400 calories each. Dave McGuire sent us a postcard from Warsaw.

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The World’s intern Zuzanna Sitek has a Polish grandmother, try her paczki recipe:

Ingredients:

1 stick of butter
8 cups of all-purpose flour
4 oz. fresh yeast (Red Star or Fleischmann’s)
10 egg yolks
2 cups of milk
4 tablespoons of sugar
4 tablespoons of rum
2 teaspoons vanilla sugar or vanilla extract
.5 gallons of oil for deep frying
Fruit preserves or jam (optional)
Powdered sugar (optional)

Directions:

1. Pour the flour into a large bowl.

2. In a separate bowl combine the yeast, one teaspoon sugar, and one teaspoon vanilla sugar or vaniall extract with about half a cup of warm milk until the yeast is dissolved.

3. Make a depression in the flour and pour the yeast mixture into it. Sprinkle some flour on top of the yeast mixture until covered and allow the yeast to rise.

4. In the meantime, cream together yolks and the rest of the sugar until the mixture is white. Add rum and one teaspoon of vanilla sugar or vanilla extract to the mixture.

5. Heat up the rest of the milk (do not boil it) and pour it into the flour bowl along with the yolk and sugar mixture. Beat the ingredients together by hand until smooth.

6. Melt butter and add to the dough. Beat again until smooth. At this point, the dough will be very slack.

7. Cover the dough and put it away in a warm place and allow to rise until double in bulk (about 1 to 2 hours).

Now you are ready to form the paczki.

1. Roll out the dough until 1/2 inch in thickness. Using a 3 inch (or bigger) biscuit cutter cut rounds out of the dough (re-roll and re-cut as needed)

2. Make a small indentation in the dough rounds and insert a teaspoon of fruit preserves. Pinch the sides closed so that the filling remains inside. Place the paczki aside with the pinched side down.

3. Heat the oil to 350 degrees in a large skillet.

4. Place the paczki pinched-side down a few at a time. Fry for 2 to 3 minutes or until golden brown. Flip over and fry for another 1 to 2 minutes or until golden brown. If the oil is too hot the outside will brown before the interior is done. Cooking time and oil heat may have to be adjusted accordingly.

5. Drain the paczki on a paper towel.

6. Sprinkle with powdered sugar.

(You can also hold off on the fruit preserves and fill the paczki with it after they are fried. Poke a hole in the paczki and using a pastry bag squeeze in the filling)

Enjoy!

Poland duo Paula and Karol

The World — Fri, 12 Nov 2010 21:05:17 +0000

A new Polish band is creating buzz on the Warsaw scene – Paula and Karol. They’re attracting attention not just because of their folk-indie international sound and their appealing lyrics – but because the songs they sing are so… nice. Amy Drozdowska reports. Download MP3

Audio extras: Paula and Karol’s “Mother’s Stew”

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“Calling”

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Poland remembers saints and souls

The World — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 20:10:36 +0000

by Dave McGuire

November 1st and 2nd are All Saints’ and All Souls’ Day in Poland. Every year the entire country heads to the cemeteries to tend to graves, light candles, pray, and also socialize.

The holiday is solemn and religious, but not morose. Outside cemeteries are stands selling candles, flowers and traditional wreaths to decorate graves. There’s also food, candy, balloons, toys… it’s a bit like a carnival. There are plenty of traditional snacks to be had, like little ringed bread, called obwarzanki, are strung on a rope like beads on a rosary and taste a bit like angel food cake.

It’s expected that up to 30,000 people will visit Powązki, Warsaw’s main cemetery, where military and cultural heroes of Polish history are buried. After dark, the cemetery lights up with thousands of candles and an atmosphere that is both respectful and lively.

Most Poles leave the cities and head out to the small towns where they’re from. It’s not unheard of for one family to visit five or six cemeteries. The traffic on Poland’s rural roads and highways is therefore heavy. Every year, in an unwelcome bit of irony, dozens of people die in car accidents on the roads, sometimes from drunk driving.

The Polish rail companies have run extra trains, and Warsaw’s public transit system has special cemetery buses and trams to help with the traffic. Police have put an extra 10,000 officers on duty this weekend in an attempt to lower the death toll.

Poland’s national cemetery

The World — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 19:35:30 +0000

(flickr image: Michal Matuszewski)

For today’s Go Quiz we head to eastern Europe: Halloween’s come and gone in America but folks around the world are still observing some version of the holiday. In Mexico, there are Day of the Dead celebrations. Several other countries commemorate what they call All Soul’s Day today. In Northern India Christians visit family gravesites and pray.

In Poland, too, thousands of families remember the dead by visiting cemeteries. In honor of the day we’re looking for the name of Poland’s national cemetery in Warsaw. There you’ll find the graves of Polish soldiers who died in the 1944 uprising against Nazi Germany.

And this year a massive granite monument was unveiled. It pays tribute to the former Polish President and others who died in a plane crash in Russia earlier this year. So can you name this historic cemetery in the western part of Warsaw?

Geo Answer:

The answer is Warsaw’s Powazki cemetery. Anchor Lisa Mullins speaks with Amy Drozdowska, a Polish-American journalist living in Warsaw, about a new monument that appeared in the cemetery this year.
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Church weighs in on Poland IVF debate

The World — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 20:00:18 +0000

Poland’s parliament is considering several proposals related to in-vitro fertilization, or IVF. The Catholic Church has entered the debate and voiced its opposition to the procedure. Amy Drozdowska reports that the debate is part of a larger discussion in Poland, about how much influence the Church should have there. Download MP3

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LISA MULLINS: Millions of people owe their lives to in-vitro fertilization, or IVF. The process involves the fertilization of an egg by a sperm outside the body. In Poland, the parliament is considering several proposals related to in-vitro fertilization. The Catholic Church has entered the debate in opposition to IVF. Catholic leaders say it’s morally akin to eugenics and abortion. Others say IVF brings hope to childless couples. For more thought, Amy Drozdowska reports the debate is part of a larger discussion about how much influence the church should have in politics.

AMY DROZDOWSKA: IVF is technically legal in Poland, but it’s expensive and controversial. Six different bills, introduced last week, range from making IVF free under the National Health Service, to making it a felony. The church is expressing its opinion on the issue, and loudly. The debate caught fire recently, when a Catholic bishop said in a newspaper interview that any lawmakers who support IVF will “find themselves outside of the church.” Many interpreted that as a not-so-subtle threat of excommunication. And after mass this past Sunday, a priest in the southern Polish city of Tarnow read aloud a list of local politicians and their stances on IVF. The church’s recent pronouncements have touched off a national debate on church influence in politics.

MIKOLAJ CZESNIK: It was not done by accident. It was done for purpose.

DROZDOWSKA: Mikolaj Czesnik is a political scientist in Warsaw.

CZESNIK: It means that the Bishops expect this speech and this message to have an impact.

DROZDOWSKA: And that’s what’s caused all the fuss here in Poland. One liberal politician has gone so far as to accuse the church of using an “Islamic style” of pressure on the government. But not everybody agrees that just because the church is speaking out forcefully on a sensitive issue, that it’s out of balance. Szymon Holownia is a prominent Catholic commentator. He says the church can say what it wants. It doesn’t have any particular influence over lawmaking.

SPEAKING POLISH

SZYMON HOLOWNIA: Here in Poland we have a frightening amount of emotion about things that are completely straightforward. The Church voices their opinion, politicians make their own decisions. It’s all very clear. What the politicians do is their own affair and they have their own responsibility to their constituents.

DROZDOWSKA: There’s plenty of historical precedence in Poland of church leaders trying to influence politics. Poland considers itself a Catholic country much like Italy, meaning that it’s been completely natural for the church to play a role in lawmaking. The Catholic Church was highly praised for its role in the Solidarity movement against Communism. Again, political scientist Mikolaj Czesnik.

CZESNIK: I would say for majority of Polish citizens, the activity of bishops is something quite normal. But it is changing. I would say that for younger people, it can be a problem.

DROZDOWSKA: It’s definitely a problem for people here at a club in Warsaw’s scenic Old Town. A group of thirty young people are meeting to plan a protest at the bishop of Warsaw’s residence. They sit on couches, sipping local beer and coming up with strategies to get the most attention. Kasia Stawczik is a 24-year-old student. She’ll be part of a string of demonstrations across the country.

SPEAKING POLISH

KASIA STAWCZIK: As far as I’m concerned, what the church is doing is blackmail. It can’t be this way, that the church is the one making the decisions about our most important issues. Because if we allow that, we’ll be returning to the Middle Ages. Either the church changes together with us and catches up with the spirit of the times, or at some point really, there will be a complete religious war.

DROZDOWSKA: Catholic commentator Szymon Holownia says for him, the words of this younger generation feel unusually sharp. In the 20-year history of a free Poland, he says, the church has never been criticized in such aggressive language. Political scientist Czesnik is also struck by this new, more critical tone. And he says, it highlights the church’s declining role in public policy.

CZESNIK: The polls are more important than the voice of the bishops, but still this voice is very important, especially for the two major parties which are all in all right wing parties and they care about what the bishops say.

DROZDOWSKA: A recent survey says that 60% of Poles support IVF for couples who can’t conceive naturally, so in the end politicians may find political considerations more persuasive than spiritual ones. For the World, this is Amy Drozdowska in Warsaw.