Tuesday, March 20, 2007

From Poznan to Rasharkin (via O'Kane's)

Bert came in last night after visiting Pearlie in hospital and said,

I feel bad.

Why?

Because I gave these two Polish guys a lift out of the town and left them off at the garage. They were walking to Rasharkin! In this weather!

Aye. Suppose you should have ran them on out to Rasharkin.

Would you have done it?

Probably.

You're far nicer than me.

To tell you the truth I wouldn't have picked them up in the first place. Two guys?


So tonight we're coming back from visiting Pearlie and we see one of the Polish guys. He's marching briskly along wearing a hi-vis vest and carrying a briefcase. Bert stops. He gets in. He's not that young - maybe fortyish.

Where's your friend tonight?

My friend he has bizzical.

Bizzical?

Yes. Bizzical. I'm sorry my English is no good.

You walk this way every night?

Yes. Is ten miles. I work O'Kin's. Twelve hour. I work Tuesday, then three days. Not Saturday.

Coming into Cully we pass his friend, also wearing a hi-vis and peddling furiously away on a bizzical. Turns out they have acquired one bicycle between them and are taking it in turns to ride it to work. I immediately feel guilty about my rarely ridden mountain bike. Of course we take our fellow all the way to Rasharkin. I never realised before how far it is. When he gets out of the car he stumbles and nearly falls. Probably because he's so bloody tired.

3 comments:

Mudflapgypsy said...

I admire your kindness. Here's hoping we all get treated in a similar manner when we are in someone else's country.

Anonymous said...

you are certainly S's daughter aren't you? (I am too and found your entry quite touching as well as funny) London sister

Anonymous said...

Yes I thought this was quite sad as well. I went to look at a flat a couple of weeks ago. It was a small one-bedroom place and there were three Polish people living there - unrelated and one well into her 40s. There were also two airbeds propped against the wall in the bedroom so there may actually have been 4 or 5 people sleeping in the flat at least some of the time. It makes you think what things must be like in Poland to make people do this.