Zamość
Rynek in Zamosc
December 18, 2004
Zamosc was... well it was probably incredible a couple hundred years ago. The city
today however is run down and dirty, the people rude and isolated. I had one man
come up to me and say something in Polish that I didn’t understand so I said I didn’t
understand in Polish. To this he responded in English “F*ck off!” which sadly is
one of the only encounters I had with a local. It could be completely re-made and
re-created into the most incredible place and one of the world’s best tourist destinations,
but it never will, not with the attitude and poverty.
Today we got up early to go to Belzec, but the bus promising to go there never arrived
so we had to find some way to occupy our day in the city. We started off at the
zoo to see animal cruelty at it’s finest. The animals weren’t necessarily treated
poorly, but the cages were in poor conditions and many of the animals were stuck
outside where it was bitterly cold. There were more birds than anything else and
many of the animals refused to leave their little wooden sheds. The zookeeper did
understand that we would like to see the big animals and I got the impression he
was really quite proud of them so he made sure the lion, tiger, and jaguar came
out to see us as we walked past. The jaguar didn’t want to come out at first so
the zookeeper put some meat out there forcing the jaguar to go outside to get it,
but he almost immediately returned to where it was warm. The zookeeper also followed
us to the monkey cage and encouraged them to come out, but to no avail.
We then went to the arsenal, which was the city's highlight. The people here looked
at us as if we were crooks and followed us around the entire visit, while trying
to look like they weren’t actually following us. We also walked around the city
walls and tried to find postcards, but again no luck. For such a photogenic city
it’s odd we couldn’t find any postcards, but we simply accepted it and headed to
the train station early.
We ate pizza at nearly every meal and I hereby proclaim Zamosc to be the pizza capital
of Poland!
Rynek in Zamosc