August 24, 2023

I'm on the subway, headed home right now, and I just feel so happy. Today didn't have the best start because I was running late for my Polish language class, I was feeling completely exhausted, and I was missing home a little bit. Then after a rough beginning to the day, there were ticket checkers, making sure people had their bus passes. I gave them my bus card, but because I'm fifteen, my pass has a different discount, so they needed to check my age. There were difficulties with checking my ID, and the language barrier further contributed to the challenging situation. I had to call my local coordinator, and she explained everything to him, then he checked my printed-out passport again (the first time I gave it to him, he wouldn't take it) and despite the process being frustrating, everything ended up being fine.
When I made it to the office, it was time for our 2:30 hour language class and I’m discovering that the Polish language is much more difficult than I thought possible. Nothing compared to Spanish haha. Learning Polish is interesting and the teacher for our group is incredible, it just consumes so much energy because of the difficulty, and I usually leave class feeling drained and frustrated with myself.

Following Polish classes, my cohort mates and I got Indian food which was great, and then headed to a meeting with an organization called "Dinah Instytut Dialogu" We learned about service opportunities in Warsaw, especially ones revolving around cultural exchange and understanding. This was definitely way more enjoyable than I expected! The three people organizing and presenting to us were all coincidentally Turkish, and they gave us Turkish tea and baklava, which was absolutely delicious. We had open conversations about the cultural differences between Turkey, Poland, and the US as well, which was very interesting.

On our way to go back to the metro to go home, I heard loud music, and we started walking into the direction of the sounds and found many people gathered around a DJ, dancing together! Of course, I joined in, and while dancing Sophie, my friend from FLEX, "The Macarena" came on, and we started doing the Macarena dance. Nobody else around us knew what we were doing, but by the end of the song we had a whole line of people joining in!

After this, an older man (probably around 70) asked if I wanted to dance with him. At first, Sophie was hesitant, but when he offered his hand out to her as well, the three of us began dancing together in a crowd full of complete strangers. This man had a whole routine and everything! He would twirl one of us and then the other, and then go under our arms. Overall, this memory is definitely one of my favorites from my first week in Poland and really goes to show how warm and loving the people here truly are!