well i’m on my way…

We arrived in Krakow around ten, but due to an outdated phamplet, we didn’t get to the hostel until midnight.  We dropped off our bags and went out in search of food and beer.  We found a 24 hour pierogie place and indulged-Ryan a mixture of meat, mushroom, and potato and potato and cheese for me.  We drizzled what we thought was olive oil and vinegar on our pierogies but found out they were these sweet syrups.  Still not bad though.  We found a literal hole in the ground pub (through a cellar door) and had a Tyskie (my favorite Polish beer!) each-we were so tired, unlike the other people at the bar who kept on disappearing and coming back with more and more energy.  Nice first impression for Ryan.   Held up to the impression he had, since the Swede from Budapest told us he got robbed in Krakow.  Twice. 

We learned that there was a free concert on the Vistula River for the Wainki, a traditional Polish Midsummer Night festival.  It’s been going on for centuries, but in the last few years, the legislation of Krakow has been throwing concerts of artists ‘with international status’ to ‘put Krakow on the European map’.  (I’m pretty sure Auschwitz has already done that.)  Last year Jamiroquai (sp?) played, and this year it was Lenny Kravitz. I don’t hate Lenny Kravitz, but he’s OK.  Some of his radio songs are sweet, and I really like his acoustic version of “Fly Away”. 

So we had a few Tyskies at the hostel before packing more into my purse and heading down to the main square to follow the masses to where the actual concert was being held.  We discovered that the stage was set up on the river, and the crowd was hanging out on the bridges around it-there was quite a bit of water between the stage and the crowd.  We both thought it ruined part of the concert-going atmosphere, not to mention the sound quality.  Lenny started the show by saying “I’m here, but you’re over there, but you can still feel the love…”  The crowd was ridiculous, with people pushing and shoving, no one could even dance, I couldn’t lift my beer to my lips, people were fighting, I’m sure over pushing and shoving.  There was a kid on his father’s sholders, speaking in a taunting voice to people around him in Polish.  I bet he was saying “Haha, I can see and you can’t.”  It was crazyier than most crowds I’ve been in.  No one really cared about Lenny Kravitz, as everyone clapped politely when each song was over, but they did chant “Len-nay” after his encore was done.  

After the show was one of the best fireworks displays I’ve seen in my life.  Lots of massive gold explosions and spiraly fireworks-all to the music from Requim for a Dream-which made it kind of creepy (for those of you who don’t know, Requim is a film about heroin addicts) but the music is beautiful.  The fireworks display definately made up for the Lenny concert. 

This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009 at 11:48 am and is filed under Europe. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.