On a sunny sunday morning I took a bus from Warsaw to Zelazowa Wola, the birthplace of Chopin, as recommended by Joanna, my Polish teacher. The house he was born in has been turned into a (not particularly interesting) museum, surrounded by a large and beautiful park. I arrived just in time for the weekly open-air concert, and to witness an American woman, part of one of the many tour groups, fall off the ridge of a flowerbed into the bushes (no idea what she was intending to do) and break her leg. And as you might guess Americans don´t just shrug off pain like Mongolians, they have to let everyone know about it very loudly, as if that helps. Not quite the peaceful concert I had imagined. Afterwards I went for a walk in Kampinos forest. It´s amazing how close to Warsaw you are in completely rural territory!

On monday I went to another famous Pole´s birthplace. Torun, where Copernicus was born. It´s a beautiful medeaval city, the sort of place one would expect to be swamped by tourists, but luckily that´s not (or not yet) the case. Which also means you can eat in a restaurant on the Rynek without spending a fortune (let's compare: main course + beer in fancy restaurant in Warsaw on my last night there: mediocre food, horrendous service: 36 zloty/8 euro; basic restaurant in Torun: good food, good service, 18 zloty/4 euro including tip; fancy Chinese restaurant in Poznan: delicious food, excellent service: 40 zloty/9 euro including tip, but at least that was a splurge I felt happy about afterwards). The architecture of the old town is marvellous, some of the city walls and gates are still there (including a leaning tower), there's a ruined castle, and of course Copernicus' birthhouse has been turned into a museum too. The only thing I found somewhat disappointing was the skansen.