Poland on the rocks
Letter from Poland, by Peter Gentle
Over the last week temperatures have plunged to below 20 degrees, with bitter, easterly winds coming in from Siberia. In the last decade or so in Poland the winters have been comparatively mild – with the mercury in the thermometer hovering around zero degrees centigrade for a about three months. But not this winter.
In fact, the last time anyone can remember deep freeze temperatures like this in Warsaw was way back in 1978 – the year Karol Wojtyla was elected Pope. The extreme weather back could be said to have contributed – like the election of John Paul II - to the founding of the Solidarity trade union two years later, as the sub-zero temperatures put an extra strain on an economy already in meltdown due to some very stupid policies by the communist government. The freezing winter of 1978, then, could be said to have given new meaning to the term ‘Cold War’.
Now I don’t know much about very cold weather as I am from England – a country where the people spend a lot of time talking about weather that they don’t really have.
So what is it like going out into temperatures that are lower than what that packet of fish fingers is experiencing in your freezer at home right now?
Last night at 11 O’clock, with the temperature at around minus 25 in Warsaw, I prepared to take the dog out for a walk. The thing about this type of extreme cold weather is that it takes about half an hour to get ready. You have to plan things like you were preparing for a polar expedition. Long johns? Check. Two pairs of socks? Check. Two pairs of trousers, three jumpers, two coats? Check. Thermos flask, compass, map, sleigh and huskies? Check. Willie warmer? Er…check.
When you finally get out the door, three things happen in quick succession: the first sensation is like someone throwing ice cold water in your face; then with your first breath, a ball of steam surrounds your head, and you move around the place with this cloud hanging over you for the entire length of your foolhardy trip outdoors; and thirdly, you get a sensation in your nose. This is the hair in your nostrils hitting the cold air and freezing immediately. After ten minutes, to be graphic, the snot up your nose has frozen solid. After fifteen minutes my nose had turned to a block of ice.
Luckily, I had so many clothes on most of by body was warm as toast. I was wearing on my head one of those rather fetching, Russian fur hats with the two bits hanging down over the ears, so I looked as canine as my dog. In the park male Alsatians tried to chat me up! Even the occasional poodle showed a passing interest.
My dog, Chagall, loved it. For over a week now the paths in the park have been glassy with ice, and he has been tottering around the place like a woman on six-inch high heels. But last night fresh snow had fallen, and my tricolor collie was running around the park like a supersonic Findus Frozen Fish Finger.
But while the dog and me were having a great old time, for many, these arctic temperatures can be literally deadly. Already we have had over 160 deaths directly attributable to the cold here. The most vulnerable are the homeless and the inebriated. It’s impossible to know exactly how many homeless there are in Poland right now, but most charities put the figure at well over 50,000.
If these charities, and shelters, didn’t exist then deaths due to the cold would be much, much higher than a few hundred.
During communist times, officially, there were no homeless, just as there were no unemployed. Despite this, many people tried throughout the nineteen seventies to set up charities for the invisible homeless, of which there were a great many. Finally, in late 1981, in Wroclaw in the southwest of the country, volunteers set up the first cold weather shelter for the homeless in Poland. Despite the authorities assuring everyone that there were no homeless in the Polish communist paradise, the shelters soon filled up to bursting with homeless people.
Now there is a network of homeless shelters across the country and the government has freed up extra resources to try and limit the amount of people who will die here simply because they are without a roof over their heads.
Over 160 people dead due to the cold sounds a lot, but last year when the weather was averagely cold for Poland, there were 180 deaths.
The forecasters are saying that things will get a bit warmer here – the next few days will be an almost tropical minus 6 or 7. And while children and my dog are having a good time of it at the moment, spare a thought for inebriated homeless people in Poland, who might not get to see next summer.