Poland and Belarus

My love of traveling and of Eastern Europe in particular has caught up with me again! This time it was more of a coincidence though, we were looking for cheap tickets to go somewhere over New Year's and a certain low-cost airline had very cheap flights to Warsaw. Since I had heard mixed things about Warsaw I thought that a whole week there might be a bit long and after quickly checking the map I saw that Minsk wasn't too far away - et voilà!

The most difficult part of the whole trip was actually not the travel itself but getting the visa for Belarus. I only know one of my friends who had been there before and it was for work so she didn't have to go through all the hassle but it really seems like they want to keep tourists out on purpose. It was the most complex visa application I ever went through, even worse than for Russia! Not only did they require the usual papers, they also wanted an invitation letter from a Belarussian tourism agency, proof of payment for accommodation and a specific health insurance policy for the country (we later concluded it must be because of the icy pavements where we slipped more than once - breaking a leg doesn't seem like such a far-off option after that experience). After we had all the papers the visa was issued in a week so that was at least quite smooth.

We decided to take the train from Warsaw to Minsk because my experience with the old-fashioned sleeper trains had been excellent on my trips in Ukraine and Moldova. "Seat 61" provided the necessary details, as usual, and I checked all the timetables again on the Deutsche Bahn website which proved very accurate and reliable during our trip (you cannot buy international tickets online but it gives you an idea about the connections). On several online forums the Polrail website was recommended for buying tickets in advance and when I inquired for prices they had a very good service indeed. However, we decided against buying tickets in advance because officially you have to book a separate compartment if you're a couple as the compartments are usually gender specific and we wanted to stay flexible. That surprised me because it's the first time I heard that and of course the separate compartment was a lot more expensive. 

When we got to the station in Warsaw it was all totally easy and hassle-free though, we could book the cheaper tickets (ca. 65 € per person/one way) and the lady at the desk spoke very good English. I can really recommend doing the same thing as tickets hardly sell out and I did the same on my trip from Bucharest to Chisinau, too. The only disadvantage, as we later realized, is that the border control between Poland and Belarus is at about 2 am and the lady who was responsible for our compartment wouldn't let us convert our beds before that. This means that we actually only got to sleep around 3 am so paying for a sleeper train was basically pointless. On the way back we decided therefor to take a regular daytime train which only cost us about 25 € per person and was equally comfortable. The journey took about 10 hrs and we had to change twice but all the trains were on time and it went very smoothly so I can only recommend that - provided you like long train rides, that is. 

All the logistics aside, it was a fun trip! I was a bit disappointed of Warsaw which many people had praised before but to me it was just a bit too grey and too modern. I had expected a city comparable to Berlin 15 years ago but it was very different. I know that it was completely destroyed during the war and that everything had to be built from scratch but it still had this feeling of artificiality to it which for some reason Berlin doesn't have so much. Minsk on the contrary was still very much concrete and very much Soviet style but for some reason it worked better for me - maybe because I got what I expected. In general, Belarus seemed much wealthier than Ukraine and certainly Moldova so that was a surprise to me. We were only in the capital so who knows what the countryside looks like but all the train stations for example were super modern and, amazingly, very accessible for persons with disabilities! Also, people in Minsk generally spoke English and very friendly which was also a bit of a shock to me, expecting Ukrainian style blanking in the street and at sales counters. This happened only once in the theatre but after we checked online we saw that it was actually sold out so maybe the lady only wanted to spare herself the long explanation and just fended us off with  a simple but clear "niet". 

New Year's eve was an interesting experience. Again, I didn't have any expectations and I hadn't specifically come for wild parties and celebrations but when there weren't even fireworks I was a little disappointed I have to admit. We had also planned on going outside to have a glass (a.k.a plastic mug) of Belarussian "champagne" (there was exactly one brand of sparkling wine available in the supermarket, allegedly made in Belarus. It was contrasted with a range of at least 20 different types of vodka in the shelf next to it.) outside on the frozen river. But when we got there it was full of police, nicely spaced about every 20 metres along the river banks, probably to stop people from getting onto the ice. Well, you never know why else they were there. I hid the champagne bottle, too frightened to be arrested for drinking in public on my last day in Belarus. Instead we were invited by some Lithuanian students at the hostel to drink vodka with them which was an acceptable Plan B.

I can definitely recommend Minsk as a tourist, even in the winter. It was cold, around - 15 °C on our first day, but that didn't stop us from sightseeing and getting to places. There is a metro which covers most of the city and with the right clothes you can spend a day walking around with the occasional coffee break to warm up. Coffee shops are becoming more popular it seems but are fairly expensive compared to the normal restaurants and they don't have much food as we had to experience when we were hunting for a place to have breakfast and miserably failed (one of the lowest points of the trip for me at least). I wish we would have had more time to also visit the countryside but it'll have to be for next time. Maybe in a warmer season then.