Places

Wandering is my beginning of learning the places. I walk the roads. I create my own map, marking out the points, measuring distances. The boundaries of the map move. Sometimes we are in the center; sometimes on the fringe. They are marked out by a private topography. A topographer does not struggle with everyday life and the dimensions of finitude contained in commonness of habits, yet prepares reports from the place of events. Together with inhabitants of the village of Stolec, I draw nets. I set episodes of my own paths and tales.
Weronika Fibich 

A MYSTERIOUS LAKE 
The lake in Pampow. Hidden in the woods, quite behind the village. We go there often to bathe with the kids.  

A FIR 
When we moved, it was not high, just above the roof of the house. Since then it double its size. Now it is the highest point in Stolec. A natural monument. In the past there were two such firs. Once a German woman came, who was born here, in this house, in the 1930s. She showed the photos she had: there were two such trees on them. The photos were taken when she was about nine years old and the trees are the same height as she. 
Once there was a telephone line here and the ceramic insulator was nailed to this fir on a protruding hook. Now you cannot see it because it has been absorbed into the tree. As this fir grew, this insulator was gradually disappearing. And now it is completely absorbed. A couple of years ago, it was still visible a bit, but now it is covered with bark. 

CRANE FIELD 
Before you reach the hill, you can see the entire field covered with cranes, they look like gray waves . . . 

RZEDZIŃSKA ROAD 
Now it is completely overgrown, but once everybody used to take it for it was the shortest one. 

JANKA’S PATH 
I like to ride a bike here. It is such a wild road. 

ICY POND 
It is very shallow and we go ice-skating here. Some go to the big lake, but it’s safer here. 

LITTLE SWAMP 
I’ve got very bad associations with this place. 
We used to go there all the time to get duckweed for duck. We picked it with an old metal colander on a long stick. 

A LITTLE BENCH UNDER THE LIME TREES 
Here is our favorite little bench under the lime trees. This is our beloved place. What can I say more . . . A lot of memories, that’s it . . . Granddaughters come and play under these limes. And there is also an swing. This is the only place that suits me best. 

A COMPANY (A FORMER STATE AGRICULTURAL FARM) 
If this complex of buildings – barns, cowsheds, belonging to this company – were renovated, if they were turn in some kind of horse farm, this place would be amazing. You know hotels, spas . . . But these are just dreams.
Now there is nothing in the state agricultural farm. In the past it was different there was an old forge, for example, but now everything is falling apart. 

HORSES 
When the kids say, “We're going to the horses,” that means they go that way, to Kasztanówka, the Chestnut Road. 

KASZTANÓWKA (THE CHAESTNUT ROAD) 
When tourists ask about the Świdwie Lake, I answer: take a chestnut road or a lime road. And they are surprised! Both these road lead to the Świdwie Lake. 

BEEHIVES 
Their owner commutes here every day – probably from Szczecin. They used to be located next to the granary, but too many people walked there, so he moved the beehives here. 
 

GARAGES 
Probably the garages will be the first when the renovation of the chateau complex begins. 
I remember when the army used to keep horses there. 

THE GRANARY 
I remember that we always used to go to Mirek’s place to eat sunflower seeds. 
Now it is decaying, but the sun shines beautifully there. It is in all corners, holes and gaps. 

THE CHATEAU / WATCHTOWER 
Once the watchtower used to be the place where everything could happen. It was such a favorite place, you know, outdoor parties . . . 
When there was a party planned in the watchtower, soldiers asked us to bring all girls here, not to Dobieszczyn (there was another watchtower there). I said: “The girls will come to those who make bigger efforts”. Once about sixty soldiers were deployed here, and the party was really great, people from Rzędziny came, people from Dołuje came . . . To play music we used a phonograph or a tape recorder. Everyone could ask for their favourite song and we played it. 
Here, at the barracks of the Border Protection Unit, as you see these stairs, when they would come to play, they set benches and refreshments on those stairs, and people would dance in the lobby. It was such a great party. Such fun. 
The Watchtower was my first favourite place in Stolec. I fell in love with this place. 
The major renovation of the Stolec chateau is mo dream. Because it is such a beautiful place, a historic building. 
The chateau, although terribly neglected, is a real gem. We hope that one day, after renovation, it will be available to people. 

THE FOUNTAIN 
I really like this hedge complex, this roundabout with a fountain in the middle. 

TENNIS COURT 
This place served as a threshing floor for dancing parties, feasts, amusement and performances. 

THE GATE 
Our gate at the chateau is the first place where tourists stop their cars or bicycles. Passing cars slow down here very often and the travelers watch the palace. 

SMOKING AREA 
There you can see the gate to the Chateau. The young have always been hiding behind one of the pillar. As they get off the bus, they go there and secretly smoke cigarettes. 

THE PATH OF EDYTA AND NADIA 
When Nadia was small, when I was on maternal leave, we had the so-called “round”. I used to “make a round”: first I would go at the lake, then pass through the chateau complex. I would left through the Watchtower, to the horses, to the meadows. Meantime my baby would fall asleep. We would make such a circle together. 

THE SPORTS FIELD 
The sports field that represents us. It is for our beloved youth, as well as for adults. And young people are the future of our country, of our village. And you can reckon on the youth only. 

THE RUT 
They are everywhere. These deer. You can hear them everywhere. 

LIPÓWKA (THE LIME ROAD) 
This is our way to the sports field. 
I like this lime road. I like walking it. 

KANIÓWKA (THE MUSHROOM PATH) 
Here, along the road, between trees, in high grass, you kind find mushrooms called “kania” (parasol mushroom - Macrolepiota procera). I can recognize them by the smell, they have a very peculiar scent, a kind of odour of oldness, yet nice. You cannot imagine confuse them with any other mushrooms. If the weather is appropriate, there are lots of them here. Some people from the village know these places, so they ride here by bikes at dawn and when they come back, their baskets are filled with mushrooms. 

THE BUS STOP 
When kids and teenagers are bored, they sit there. 

THE SORREL MEADOW 
This is the meadow where I pick sorrel. It’s always here. 

THE CEMETERY 
I participated in the renovation of all this, cleaning this entire area and finding historic crosses. This is the place closest to me. There is a monument of the former owner of the chateau. Its condition is deplorable. The crosses are also in miserable state. I would like to save what people once built. This is a very important thing. Such things have to be saved. This is a piece of history. 
And in the spring I really like going through this cemetery. There are so beautiful flowers, snowdrops and squills . . . The whole area is covered with flowers in spring and it is so beautiful, it looks so charming . . . I’ve never seen a place like this, I’ve never seen flowers blooming so beautifully. 

THE CHURCH 
They have not yet started renovating it yet, and it has been in this state for seven years or so. It will eventually collapse. 
The church is in ruin, but it is still standing!
The church is here, falling into pieces and the priest celebrates the mass at the club. 

THE ABSENCE OF SHOP 
I never thought that you could function in a village where there is no shop. But you can, and we have no problem with it.
Stolec would look nice, as if it was neat, but it is just backwoods, without shop, without anything . . . 
All the buildings are over one hundred years old. Someone should build two new blocks for the young and a beautiful, modern shop.
Honestly, it’s not worth coming here. What can you find here? In summer it is OK, but when winter comes . . . No shop, no school, everything is far away . . . 
There was no shop, so people would drink homemade wine. Soldiers brought in cans their booze, one was sour, the other was bitter. 

“SKLEPISKO” 
When the shop functioned normally, it was always a lot of people here, someone would always sit here, from morning till evening. 

THE ANTS-FOLD 
There are such big ants near the tree. Everyone knows that they are there. 

THE PARK 
A park is a place where you spend a lot of time when you are young. 
Once there was a beautiful park there. We used to play there. We would play stalking, we would play we are soldiers. It was our entertainment. Outdoor games. And now . . . there is nothing. Youth cannot play. They don’t know what it is. The park was very nice, clean, there are lots of flowers, small trees.
Children like playing there hide-and-seek, they play war . . . There are snowdrops, lilies of the valley, violets and those blue flowers, how-do-you-call-them. I like being here especially in spring, when snowdrops bloom. 

THE PATH OF LUIZA 
This is the path I visit when nobody is there. 

THE CLUB (OLD SCHOOL) 
I had a wedding there. Downstairs there was a dancing room and upstairs there were chairs. You could drink coffee or sit. And I was twenty years old . . . At that time when the youth know how to enjoy life! 
Every Saturday there was a party at the club until two o'clock in the morning. There were so many people ... All people from Dobra, from the housing estate, would come to Stolec. It was such fun, a lot of laughter. Sometimes the lady who was in charge of the club did not want to sit there anymore, she cried, but she had to. And she had to put coal to the furnace to heat the place for there was no central heating. 
In the club one could have a cup of coffee, or tea and to eat a cookie, sometimes we had a movie projections, there was a TV set upstairs, and a discotheque downstairs, the dances were very cool, soldiers joined us . . . 

FEEDING GROUND OF WILD BOARS 
Here, wild boars come, they feed near the pond, in the woods. They come and rootle in people’s gardens. They enter everywhere there is no strong fence, everything is ploughed. 

ŻABIÓWKA (THE FROG PATH)
When you go there, you can hear the frogs as if there were millions of them. 

THE FLOATING LIPS 
Someone once bought a plastic couch in the shape of a lips but later threw it into the pond. In summer, they float on a surface, and in winter a piece of lips protrudes from the ice.

THE ROCK 
Now it stands near the house. But some time ago there was no house yet – there was a kindergarten nearby and the whole area belonged to the kindergarten. Later, the kindergarten was closed down, but the rock remained. All the kids used to play there. And then the rock was moved by an excavator. 
I remember the nice rock from my childhood. All kids used to climb it. The rock is still there. I played on it for the first time when I was six or seven years old. It was on the kindergarten’s playground. Many of my peers would probably remember it too. Now the rock is near our house. It’s very heavy, several tons, so it was necessary to roll it with an excavator, because we couldn’t do it on our own. And now it’s here. Just is. And children still play on it. And they have a lot of fun. 

IRKA’S TINY ROOM
My room and my couch. The nicest place I have in the world. I feel the best here. Young people enjoy walking here and there, but I am not young anymore. 

COTTAGES
In the past you could not enter them. The cottages were behind the border belt.
Now some of the residents of these cottages stay there from early spring until autumn.
When we play volleyball, someone always throws the ball into the area of where the cottages are located. 

THE ROMAN’S CORNER
Here is my dad, sometimes alone, sometimes with my mum . . . on a small boat they are waiting for this moment at sunrise . . . 

THE FISHING GROUND 
Here my mum always goes fishing. 

THE STOLSKO LAKE 
The lake has its own specific climate. When it is windy here, it’s quiet there; and other way round.
Once, when I used to go fishing, it was a favorite place, but I quitted it couple of years ago. I do not know why. I gave out all my equipment to people. Just like this.
I do not walk to the lake. I cannot swim, so it is not attractive to me. 
The lake is our asset, and definitely it should be used that way by the entire village. 
This is the place one can go to rest, to take a bath, to sit by the water; kids can play there, too.
The lake attracted us here. It is great, especially when someone has small children, because there is a playground, and you can wet your tiny feet, you can splash, your family comes, your friends come . . .  
We’ve got a beautiful lake here, with a variety of fish, it used to be a half-lake, I mean half-Polish-half-German, but now it is all ours, because now we are one plate and one spoon with our neighbors – Germans, and the lake is unified. 

THE SWANS 
There are many swans on our lake, but they are always on the German side of the lake, near the German shore. There is too much noise here. But they do not escape to the shore, they just stay nearby. Sometimes, there are several dozens of them. 

FOOTBRIDGES 
If you say “footbridges”, then everyone knows the place you mean. 

THE FOREST BY THE LAKE 
The forest by the lake is hilly, there are nice views from the bottom and from the top; on the German side it is supposedly the same: hilly and fabulously. 

THE ORANGE COTTAGE 
There’s a place near the orange cottage – “the ditch” – that’s how we all called it. We used to go to bath there when we were younger. My grandmother was always nervous and she would not let us go, but we would always run away anyway. 

THE ROAD TO “THERE”
Let it be a secret of youth ...

THE TREATMENT PLANT
Our treatment plant is over twenty-five years old, we have a new water pipeline, which is a very good thing. 

THREE PONDS
There are three charming, wild ponds in the forest, and when you walk there very early in the morning you can see wonders happening there, the fog rises above the water and the landscape becomes so enchanted. 

GARDENS
The garden, flowers, rhododendrons . . . I like everything that blooms.
We planted fruit trees to have some profits too.
I like to be in my garden, here we’ve got roses, tulips; when the weather is nice I can go out, have a cup of coffee. 
My garden is by the lake, roses are my favorite flowers . . . I just adore roses. I really like sitting in my garden and having rest. 
We cultivate everything. Potatoes, carrots, parsley, lettuces, chives. For children, without chemicals. I enjoy doing everything, from sowing to harvesting. We take cucumbers, zucchinis, everything that we cultivate and put them to jars . . . Most of people eat what they grow.
My beloved place in Stolec is my garden. There are a lot of flowers and bushes, but most of all I love roses. You can enjoy calmness, tranquility, singing of birds, you can breathe fresh air.