I took an early flight out of London Heathrow Terminal 3 to Warsaw. A reasonably pleasant flight, albeit a bit cloudy, although, that said, the cloud was covering the UK only, it seemed. Within minutes of take-off we broke through the clouds and there were blue skies and sunshine above, as always. It's amazing when you think about it, that a lot of the time there's just a thin layer of cloud between the English and the sunshine and we're all below it moaning. I must admit, having spent four days in Warsaw, where temperatures hit 28 degrees and there was little in the way of cloud, that I started to feel very depressed as the plane slowly descended into the murk where Theresa May and the fucking awful Conservative party ruled the cuntry and police cuts mean there's now been 74 knife murders in the capital.
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| In plane, on tarmac, Heathrow T3, 5th June |
Warsaw was a wonderful place. A peaceful, calm city bathed in sunshine and no sense of threat on the streets. People were happy.
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| Two minutes out of Heathrow T3... blue skies! |
The ride from the airport to my hotel, the Sheraton Warsaw, was fairly short and I spent the next two days working and not really seeing a great deal of the city. I wandered with colleagues to the Buddha Indian restaurant, about a ten-minute walk from the hotel, and on day two wandered a little further down the street to Kaiser, a restaurant I discovered on my last visit, which was roughly one year ago.
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| About to land in Warsaw, Poland... |
On Thursday night, with all the work completed I wandered a little further down the street, to the main square at the bottom where we found a kind of hybrid restaurant offering Italian food mainly, but also dishes like wild boar stroganoff, which was alright, but I wished I'd ordered a pizza instead. I'm still off the alcohol: eight months on 28 June, not that I'm counting. I'm really not. I don't think I'll drink alcohol again to be honest. The trouble with not drinking, of course, is that you're always explaining yourself. People think you're not drinking because you're an alcoholic – that's what they want to think, that's what they hope is true, because in the UK people like one upmanship, they like to think they're better than you.
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| View from room 542, Sheraton Warsaw hotel |
Refurbished hotel rooms...
The hotel had given us refurbished rooms. I remember last year they were in the process of refurbishment. Well, now the rooms have been done, they've made a start at any rate, and I had room 542, which was huge. There was a massive double bed (I reckon it would sleep at least half a dozen people comfortably). The bathroom was fantastic: the shower had two showerheads, one attached to the wall and the other detachable. It was possible to switch from one to the other. Unlike in American hotels, where the bathtubs are shallow and easy to step into, here at the Sheraton Warsaw they're higher and, therefore, the job of getting into and out of the tub is a little precarious – and those hard marble edges are not very forgiving, I thought to myself as I clambered in and out of the shower.
Throughout my stay I never watched television, but there was a decent flat screen in front of the bed and over a minibar, which was fully stocked. I had a chunky KitKat but that was it. A fully stocked minibar, as we all know, is a sign that the hotel trusts its guests. Similarly, there were proper coathangers – another sign that the hotel trusts its guests.
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| Room 542, Sheraton Warsaw Hotel |
Friend of the stars!
Last year we shared the hotel with Damon Albarn and Gorillaz, and spotted Mr Albarn sitting outside a Polish restaurant with some members of his band. This year, the hotel played host to the President of Germany. There was something big going on politically. Whenever we were out in the streets there were motorcades whizzing past with noisy police escorts.
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| Large double bed in room 582 Sheraton Warsaw |
The best day of all was Friday (8th June) when we had a free (ish) day. The flight didn't take off until 1825hrs so we didn't need to be at the airport until 1625. Consequently, we moseyed around town in the 28 degree heat, stopping for tea and then lunch and then moseying back to the hotel to await a taxi.
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| One of many impressive buildings in Warsaw |
The flight back was smooth and I stared out of the window as Poland slowly disappeared from view and I was left with nothing but a blue summer haze. As we approached the UK the cloud built up and we seemed to be circling over London for some time before the plane descended through the clouds and landed.
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| More impressive buildings in Warsaw... |
Racist cab driver...
My journey back home from Heathrow wasn't too pleasant. My taxi driver was an out and out racist who kept referring to London Mayor Siddiq Khan as 'that muslim piece of shit' or 'that muslim piece of stool'. For him, Khan was the root of all evil and he relied, as many racists do, on the story that Khan was the son of a bus driver. That fact, he said, was Khan's only reason for being British. I've never heard so much foul-mouthed venom spat from another human being's lips. He wasn't worried about what I might have thought, he just kept up this barrage of abuse. He was angry. An ex-serviceman who was once stationed in Germany and was claiming to have a few holes in his body (the implication being he was shot), but he was 72 now and retired and I figured he wasn't shot by a muslim). Ironically, the taxi company he works for relies upon many immigrants to drive its cabs: Indians, Pakistanis, Africans, Eastern Europeans, you name it. It was rare, I thought, to have a British cab driver and highly unfortunate that he happened to be an out and out racist.
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| It's the Pope!!! |
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| Leaving Warsaw and heading home... |
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| Back at Heathrow T3... |
