A visit to Szymbark

Yesteday, it was the Indepedence Day in Poland. Despite the bad weather, I went to Tczew to visit my brother, who has lived there from two years. Tczew is a medium city in the Northen Poland. From the one hand it is quite a modern city with many commerce areas and enterntaiment attractions. From the other hand, it can be called a slow city because it is not very crowded and loud. Unfortunately, as my brother said, there are not many monuments in Tczew so he proposed me to visit Szymbark, an architectural complex nearly fifty kilometers from his residence.

Szymbark is a name of a small village located in Pomeranian Voivoodsheep. It is a characteristic place for the Kashubian culture. There is located a Center of Education and Promotion of the Region. Many people know Szymbark from one very special element which is the Upside-down House. It is a simbol of today's life which is sometimes very unusual and complicated. This special building do not have a real door. Every visitor enters by one of the windows. All the furniture is situated in the celling of the house, which in fact is very awry. It causes that our labyritnh does not work well and we have problems with keeping us in balance. It can provoke dizziness.

Szymbark is also a museum of martyrdom related to exciles of Polish citizens to Siberia. There is really interesting and touching house constructed by Polish excile in one Siberian village. It was transported to Poland to become a symbol of Polish suffer and to remind about that difficult time in history of Poland and The Second World War in general. Every visitor can also admire a model of a Soviet train, which was used to transport exciles into the deep of Soviet Union. Every monument is decorated with photos of real exciles, portraits and drawings related to hard work and life in Siberia.

A special part of all the complex is also a bunker of a secret military organisation called the Pomeranian Griffin which organised the resistance during the Second World War. Its interior is reconstructed in detail. One can also read some notes about the story and people related to resistance in Pomerania.

I fully admired that place about which I had heard many times before. The visit made me feel touched and really proud of Polish history and people.