Warsaw Uprising

It's strange being in another culture and seeing well-celebrated events or happenings through different eyes.

Friday marked the 64th anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising. While that isn't a celebrated event in the US, being in Poland when the 60th Anniversary was being commemorated put a new spin on World War II for me.

Poland, of course, was invaded and then occupied by the Nazis, and most Americans don't know much beyond that. I didn't know much beyond that until I lived in Poland, and I'm still learning bits and pieces.

What I wanted to write about today is one memory that struck a chord with me during that 60th anniversary commemoration, only because it seemed so familiar.

I woke up the morning of August 1st and left my apartment early because Warsaw was opening its Uprising museum that day, and I wanted to both see it and get an autograph from Norman Davies, a British historian who's well-loved in Poland because he's written several books about Poland's history. I got on the tram and found myself amongst a huge assortment of men and women in their 70's and 80's, each with what looked like their grandchildren. They all were chatting with one another, and I realized these were men and women who had fought with the Polish Home Army during the Uprising. They were finally being decorated for their heroic service to Poland and to Warsaw in that brutal battle in 1944 to save Poland from the Nazis.

It was amazingly moving to me, especially since I had grown up among World War II veterans at home. It was particularly moving the more I got to know the story: men, women and children banded together and fought off the Nazis in absolutely brutal conditions for about 2 months before they finally had to capitulate. The city was systematically destroyed after that. The people I was seeing were the survivors from that battle, people who were willing to stand up and fight no matter what, not knowing what the outcome was going to be.

I'm so used to the American perspective of the war- we fighting against the powers of evil with a glorious victory at the end. It was humbling to see the pictures and be in a city that experienced that war with all of its consequences more directly than we had.