(Around the time of the previous anniversary I talked to a man who remembered the Rising and nearly took part in it - some organisational shortcomings, to put it mildly, at its beginning prevented him from doing so. "What did people say before it all start?", I enquired. "Complete lunacy", he replied straight away.
I've learnt recently that a fellow Obsendorfer used to live in Warsaw and remembers the event, he was twelve at the time. We've met a few times and talked a lot. He mentioned his cousin whom he watched doing some shooting practice in Bielanski Forest in the summer of 1944. The other boy was 16 and got killed in the Uprising. His name was Rysiek Sikora.
A few weeks ago I was standing outside an up-market off-licence in Warsaw, quite close to where the Uprising started, studying the label of an unfamiliar Cognac. A stranger stopped by and made a remark about another kind of spirit that came from the other end of the continent, or the world in many respects.
From Russian vodka we swiftly moved to Polish politics and the state of the country.
“You know what?”, he took his eyes from a cool, transparent bottle and turned to me. “If someone asked me today to fight for this country, I would refuse.”)
