An editor wanted 'the undiscovered Poland' and gave me three days and a borrowed bike. Kashubia — the lake country an hour from Gdańsk, with its own language and a strong line in embroidery — was meant to be it.
The problem is that Kashubia has been discovered by everyone who lives there, which is a lot of people, and they're not interested in being a destination. I asked a woman at a bakery in Kartuzy what visitors should see and she said 'the lake' and pointed. I asked what the lake was called and she said 'the lake.' She sold me a kaszubska, a yeast cake with plums, and that was the interview.
Wdzydze has four lakes that meet in a cross, a museum of wooden houses, and a swim so cold I shouted. Kościerzyna has a station with a museum of trains in it and I stayed two hours and wrote nothing. The whole region is like this: full, calm, uninterested in your angle.
I filed six hundred words that said, essentially, go and don't expect it to perform. The editor called it 'quiet.' It's the piece I'm proudest of this year. Some places are their own story and the job is to get out of the way.