Lie Down Warsaw

So here is an old cliché, my posts are like buses. You wait for ages and then two come along at once. Well I’ll try to make them less like buses in the future.

So after weeks of anticipation I finally attended my first Polish football game, Wisła Krakow vs. Legia Warsaw. Wisla and Legia are the old firm of Polish football and when they play it’s the biggest match in Poland. Getting a ticket is actually very difficult, however I have a friend who is a big Wisła fan and he arranged everything for me, from the location of the pre-match beer to the tickets themselves.

Before the game i was a little apprehensive, I had heard stories of Polish football hooligans. I was told not to worry though because Legia fans had been banned from the stadium because of crowd trouble at previous games and that in fact Legia fans were also refusing to attend as a protest at the killing of a football fan in Kielce by Wisła hooligans. So as you can imagine, that made me feel much better!

The game kicked off at 7.30pm and before it I met with my friend in a flinstones themed bar next door to the Wisła stadium. After enjoying a beer we made the short walk to the stadium. On the way to the stadium I couldn’t help notice a large group of fans wearing green and white colours. Wisła play in red and white, so this confused me. I also knew that no Legia fans were around, so who were they? I was then told that they are hooligans from Gdansk and Wroclaw and that Wisła hooligans have an alliance with them. Apparently this is common in Polish football. Hooligan groups from different cities are allied and will come and cheer each other on against the common enemy, in Wisła’s case against Legia or Cracovia.

Upon entering the staduim I was searched by Robocop style policemen. I made it to my seat a full 10 minutes before kick off. The stadium was already full and the Wisła fans were making a lot of noise. In the stand opposite to us were the Wisła Ultras. In front of them was a man on a step ladder with a microphone, belting out Wisła songs to which they responded in perfect harmony.

As the teams came out, the Ultras turned their stand into a giant picture by turning over cards they had taken in and setting off the vast amount of flares they had smuggled past the robocops. It was a very impressive, perfectly rehearsed scene which would have made Kim-Jong-Il proud.

As the game started, every Legia touch of the ball was met with 25,000 jeers and whistles. The Wisła crowd also managed to keep singing non-stop for the full 90 minutes, led mainly by the Ultra’s stand.

The game itself, like so many derbies, failed to live up to the big build up. In a boring first half, Wisła opened the scoring with the only real effort of the half. In the second half, things improved and Wisła contrived to miss a couple of absolute sitters before nearly being punished at the death by Legia’s only real opportunity of the game. However Wisła held on for a deserved victory which keeps them top of the league.

Although the action on the field wasn’t great, the action off it was impressive. The atmosphere was great and there always something going on somewhere in the stadium. We even had a protest during the match by a group of around 2,000 fans who all left their seats at the same time for around 20 minutes. This protest was about a deduction in the number of tickets given to fan clubs. It was another example of how organised Wisła fans are. It was also a good Polish lesson for me, particularly in swear words. I was however confused at one point, when with five minutes to go, the whole stadium were singing Legła, Legła Warszawa (to the tune of Go West). When I asked my friend why they were singing for their rivals, he informed that they were not singing Legia but were singing Legła which means Lie down. So another great lesson in Polish language.

Update: Elections

I have been busy recently and I haven’t had a chance to write anything new, however since I last posted an election has taken place in Poland. The election was called because the ruling party, Law and Justice Party (PiS), fell out with their coalition partners (the League of Polish Families and the Self Defence Party). So an election was called for the parliament (Poland has presidential and parliamentary elections) only two years after the last election. Going into the election, prime minister Lech Kaczynski was aiming for re-election (Kaczynski’s twin brother, Jaroslaw Kaczynski is the President). The main rival to Kaczynski was the leader of the opposition party, Civic Platform (PO), Donald Tusk. Being an English teacher I basically get paid to have conversations with people. Therefore in the run up to the election I was quizzing anyone who was willing to talk about it on their views on Polish politics and their preferences for the election.

One thing was clear, the ruling party and the Kaczynski’s in particular, were not popular in Krakow. That is not really surprising in itself because Krakow voted for PO at the previous election and PiS get most of their votes from the more conservative, rural and possibly less educated Eastern part of Poland. What was surprising though was not no-one would admit, at least publicly, supporting PiS. At the same time though, no-one could really tell you the difference ideologically between PO and PiS. Both parties are catholic, centre right parties. It seems PO is perhaps more EU friendly that PiS but that wasn’t really bothering most people. It seems then that the main difference was personality, that of Kaczysnki vs Tusk. To be honest I think most Krakowians were embarrassed by Kaczysnki, who is not the most diplomatic nor articulate of politicians.

Another thing was also clear and that is that Polish people are generally apathetic about politics. Many people I spoke to thought that nothing would change, regardless of who won the election. Others said that none of the candidates inspired them and that in fact they would be voting against someone (almost always Kaczynski) as opposed to voting for someone. This apathy was reflected in a relatively low turnout which prompted one of Poland main newspapers to leave half of its front page blank in protest and prompted Lech Walesa to complain that Poles were wasting the opportunity he and others fought to win.

When the election day finally came, a Sunday (Polish elections are always held on Sunday’s), I went along to a polling station with one eager voter, who in fact was not voting for either of the big two but for one of the new smaller parties representing women’s rights. What I can tell you about voting in Poland is basically that it is the same as voting in Scotland. You go along to the local school, receive your paper, make your selection and place into a big box in the middle of the room. Nothing unusual there then. Well accept that they don't loose 100,000 or so ballots by mistake.

When the elections result finally came in, turnout (all be it still relatively low) was higher than expected and PO had won the election and will now form the next government of Poland, all be it in coalition with someone. This raises several interesting points. Who will PO form a coalition with and how long will it last? How will the PO government and the President (Jaroslaw Kaczynski from PiS) get on? And the question most people want to know, how will things change? We will just need to wait and see but at least most Krakowians are happier now that they are one Kaczysnki lighter.