Ennistymon

Ennistymon

The town looks like hundreds of others. When you are traveling through Ireland you can see many places like this one. Each of them has a fast food (e.g. Franco's, Enzo's), a chinese take away, a small cheap restaurant, many pubs (in Ennistymon once were more than 50 pubs for 2 thousand people; now the number is around 10), a church, a Garda Station, a fire station, a doctor's place, vet's, groceries, chemist's, barber, clothes shop, bookmakers, supermarket (e.g. Supervalu, Dunnes Stores, Tesco), sometimes a library and a bookshop. Everyone on the street smile at you, often asks "How are you?". Everyone in the shop is nice and helpful. Nobody disturbs you, almost everyone ask offers help. In bigger places, like Limerick, Galway, Cork, Belfast or Dublin situation might be different, but in fact, just a little. I started to think about this similarities and just a few dissimilarities between West and East, North and South, different parts of Ireland. For me they are almost the same, but it's obvious, that everyone from Clare knows when he or she is journeying through any other county, for them there is a difference between Leinster and Connacht. It is all the same for me, I am not from this island.

This, rather obvious observation, made me think about Poland. For example: you fell asleep in a bus in Białystok and how do you know, that this village, which you passed few hours later is in Śląsk, Kaszuby, Zachodniopomorskie or Małopolska? We have mountains in the South and sea in the North, many lakes in north-west, a big old forests in the east, a large sparsely populated land in the south-east. There are coalmines in Śląsk, a big farmers' land in the west, but seriously: when you are traveling through small places, like Mszana Dolna, Poddębice, Lesko, Wągrowiec or Orneta - how do you know, where are you? You don't have any bloody idea.

Mszana Dolna

Everything should be on the map - if you have got one. You should remember main orientation points from geografic lessons in the primary school. And you may ask other passengers, because everyone is from different place and might know something. And you have signs on the bus and train stations. Let's create a thought experiment. Imagine, that someone removed all the signs. Mszana Dolna, Poddębice, Lesko, Wągrowiec and Orneta are similar. You have a small town center, a fast-food, groceries, clothes shop, a library, a fire station, a municipal office, medical office, sometimes a vet and a police station. And that's all. But I'm pretty sure, that somehow we know. We put together everything, what I enumarated and we use this in our mind to find out where are we now.

Then, how do you know, that you are not in Poland? Oh, that is very simple: because of roads. If there are no big holes, you are not in Poland. I travelled through just a few countries, and almost each time I knew where I was. Because of films, books, tales of my friends. But sometimes I am wondering, how it is, and how to distinguish Holland from Belgium through the bus window. Is this possible? People are different, countries just so. Is south part of Poland more similar to Slovakia or to Kaszuby? What defines land? GPS and orientation points?

Anyway, it is possible to find differences and to make out one part of Poland from the other, one town from the other. It's difficult, but possible. But the most important thing is this one: don't fall asleep in the bus, when you are traveling somewhere for the first time. Just in case.