Gdańsk branch has been a "mission" branch for some years and recently was included with the other lone mission branch into the Warsaw District. There are two districts in Poland, no stakes. Our first invitation to a district conference was this past weekend. The members in Warsaw opened their homes for travelers. The six members and three investigators who made the trip got a chance to see what a church meeting with more than a dozen people was like. General Conference is just unfathomable; the images and buildings and people are too far-removed.
Being the only chapel in Poland, it gave a small sense of what our church is like elsewhere, though the purpose of the gym was hard for some to figure. One investigator, on seeing the font said, "I'm going to get baptized before the end of the year." He's been afraid to get baptized in the cold sea. I can't fault him.
The visiting Area Seventy, Elder Cziesla emphasized the need to follow the Spirit as we each minister. Even in small branches where "Peter's telling that story again for the hundredth time" or "There goes Mary again pushing her favorite principle," we need to treat each other with love, even those same six we see every week.
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Gotta admire street performers, even the terrible ones, because they put themselves out there.
This Chopin virtuoso at the Warsaw tram stop did it in freezing weather AND with woolen gloves.
That was worth a few coins, even from cheap me.
On November 11, 1918 Poland took advantage of the political situation and declared her independence from Germany, Austria, and Russia after 120 years of being divided between those powers.
Their parades are participatory, everybody walks in the parade instead of watching from the sideline.
We spent the cold and short afternoon of Independence Day with our friends Mateusz and Natalie, (and some kid looking for his gum in the sand).
Gdynia harbor as the sun sets, one of the tri-cities of Gdańsk, Sopot, Gdynia.
The harbor was opened to compete with Gdańsk harbor and has many buildings in the "Socialist Realism" style. These newer ones, however challenge that in what seems to be the "Optimus Prime" aesthetic.
An important reminder that there is no swimming allowed in this area due to yellow submarines.
Walking through the old Gdańsk Stocznia shipyard where the Solidarity movement was born and then shipbuilding died.
Peering through a broken window at an old and vacant building lighted by discolored glass.
And others we've visited.
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