Welcome thomas swick to discuss his book falling place a story of love poland the making of a travel writer. Falling into place is the personal story of young mans discovery of the world. In his development, a travel writer. It is also a love story as he and hanya overcome cultural differences. Communist bureaucracy, unhealthy separations. Intertwined with both is the story of revolution that altered history with the worlds attention. Once again turned to Eastern Europe, a cold war reality. This memoir can help americans better understand both thomas swick, the travel editor of the south florida sunsentinel. From 1989 to 2008, during which time, the newspapers name appeared in the first nine editions of the best American Travel writing. He is author of four books and his work has appeared in National Newspapers and magazines, literary journals and anthologies. He currently lives with his wife in fort lauderdale, florida. And you can find at thomas swick dot com. Speck will be in conversation this evening with eric. Weiner is the author of four books including the New York Times bestseller the geography of bliss, which has been translated now into 24 languages. A former for npr and the New York Times, weiner has reported for more from more than dozen countries. His work appeared in the new republic slate, los angeles times, Washington Post policy. The New York Times management. The New York Times magazine. There we go. And the anthology, best American Travel writing. He divides his time between petes and the dan so you can read more at eric weiner books dot com. So further ado please join me in welcoming thomas swick and eric weiner. Hey, can you hear me . Okay. You know, although. Yeah. Now its mine. Okay. Well, welcome, everyone. Youre in for a real treat because i have read toms latest book and i really love it. And i am sure you will too. It is hard to classify. Is it a travelog . Yeah. Is it a cold history . Its that. But its also a love story. In fact, i think its primary only a love story. Whether its love for. The lovely hannah or love for a country or love books. Love for a way of being in the world. Its definitely those things. So bravo, tom. Theres a lot of a lot going on in these pages. And i think the best way to convey the flavor of the book is to give people a little a little taste, if you dont mind. Thanks, eric. Thanks for that. Nice introduction. Im going to read just a short section. This is from the Second Chapter and this is shortly after i arrive to warsaw for the first time and. It was just after hannahs mother died, hannah was an only child and their father had been in a motorcycle accident when she a teenager. This was years after he and helena had divorced. The marriage never ideal, had been irreparably damaged by imprisonment. In fact she had been she had given birth to in prison after being tried while pregnant for activities against state. Her crime was assistance to a man sent back to warsaw from the government in exile in london. Despite these early once on the visit to the prison, hannah screamed that the sight of a woman she to recognize as her mother. She claimed to have had a happy childhood. As a teenager, she had made the decision. Decision to in sherman of the all girls boarding school. Her mother had attended because she wanted an education of socialist propaganda. When hannah first told me this, i thought back painfully to my teenage concerns. Halina ash was buried in polanski cemetery, which is the warsaw with parallel shares is to paris. There was more of a heroic martial character. I was assigned to a motherly and after the casket had been lowered into the ground, i saw being escorted out by a band black, including a young man who leather on his arm. I an immediate tinge of jealousy until told myself he was probably a cousin. But that was a shock. After the exclusive idol of trenton seeing hannah in her world at the ex boyfriend stop by the apartment. He was a wellbuilt man with a dark goatee. He pulled me into the bedroom opened the polish english dictionary. After searching for a few seconds, he indicated the verb love cojudge. Next he moved to p and showed me gods help. Then looking me the eye, he pointed in the direction. The living room where hannah sat. I had just gotten my first lesson in polish gallantry. All conveyed with two words, basically. Thank you. Were going to back to warsaw. But first, as we know over, to poland, lead through trenton, new jersey. Apparently you are a son of new jersey. I am proudly so, yes. And so im a bit of a student of genius. I wrote book called the geography of genius and about these places around the world that produced an inordinate number of Brilliant Minds and great ideas. And in an oversight overlooked trenton, new jersey, because your work youre at the trenton times and this newspaper and the whole milieu there is produced writers and everyone in this room knows. David maraniss and, blaine harden. There was a Nobel Laureate affiliated with the newspaper. Indirectly, yes. So what was in the water and trenton, new jersey, at the time . Well, you know, the bridge over Delaware River in trenton says trenton makes the world takes. And it was it was true with the newspaper i got the job there in. 77 and the trenton times was owned then by the Washington Post. Something i didnt realize when i applied for the job and most of the people came there from other smaller newspapers. But they were generally young, bright, ambitious with really big of what they were going to do in the. Bigger than trenton, new jersey. Bigger. Trent. Yeah. And you know, it was just a great place to be. And it was shortly this i started working there in 77, so it was not that long after watergate and journalism was sexy then. Exactly right. Woodward and bernstein made it as sexy as it was going to get. I think and you know, we would i remember we would talk writing, you know, it was not just that we wanted to be a lot of them wanted to be investigative reporters. We were all interested in writing and we would read the latest yorker and wed look at, you know, Kenneth Tynan profiles. But the real hero of everyone there was john mcvie for his long narratives in the new yorker, and he lived just up the road in princeton, right . Right. So there something in the air back then . Yeah, there was. Now, youve always been throughout your life and career sort of journalism adjacent. I would call it, yeah. Some of your friends are journalists. You travel in similar circles, but youve never consider yourself a journalist. And it took you a long time to. Call yourself a writer as well. Can you talk a bit about your identity. Well, for one thing, i dont like coffee. Ive never drank. And that that eliminates me from it is a very quiet journalist. I you know, i never wanted to be a reporter. I got in the newspapers as you did back then because. It was an easy way to get a byline. It was an it was the way you would start writing. You know, you started a newspaper and then move on to hemingway. Was yeah. Newspaper. Yeah. Many people were. So thats what i did. And luckily, the people the trenton times had the good sense to hire me as a feature writer, not a reporter and feature writing was a perfect fit. I was going out spending a day or two with some interesting person and coming back and writing about it. I was not writing on daily deadline, which i never, never got used to doing. And i was it was really great training to be a travel, getting out in the world, meeting some of the interesting people in it. So i was very fortunate that regard. And then after a year and a half at the paper, i decided to leave and go to poland because i had met hanya. So lets stop there for a second. So pre hanya if you could. Yeah. Cast your mind then would you have said im going to go. It was poland on radar. No, no, not at all. Not all. Not at all. What did you know about poland then . I knew very little about poland, but i met hanya in london. And interestingly enough, i met her because i was carrying a book by v. S. Pritchett called find faces. And its a its a book. Its a very good travel book. His travels to Eastern Europe in sixties. And i bought it not i was interested in Eastern Europe, but i was interested in travel writing. I already had an idea then that i wanted to write travel and i like this it. So i bought the book and i went back to my hotel. She happened to be working in the bar that night. We started and she told me she was from poland. I showed her the chapter of the book i just bought set in poland and i lent her the book knowing shed have to see me again. That assuming she would return it, she did. Okay. Because apparently theres some people who borrow, but dont return them. Why . Why . Travel writer . Why not food writer . Why not novelist . Why not. Why not a historian . Although you have some of that in you clearly. And were talking now the 1970s. So lets kind of place herself in that time. What was going on . The genre . And what about intrigued you . Well, in 1975, paul theroux, many people here know that name. Theroux published a book called the Great Railway bazaar and its a book about his taking trains from london through through asia and back on the transsiberian express. And it was a huge, critical success and popular success. And that excuse me, that really put travel on the map and. I love the book, too. I mean, what i loved is that he he ignored the sights he wasnt typical travel by them lighting about you know the eiffel tower the taj mahal. He wrote about the interesting people. He met the characters and trains that he rode. And it just seemed to he actually he was a he was a novelist. Hed written some novels that had not terribly successful. That was his big hit, the travel book. But brought a novelist sensibility with this narrative arc. Was this colorful characters dialog, all that that made the travel book really come alive. So that that was the beginning of this really a heyday of travel that lasted for 15 years. Right. So your timing was good. Yeah. And what what can the travel do that the journalist cant . What freedoms do you have . What possibilities are there . Well, the nice thing i one of the things is that a reporter has to go and interview people and interviews. Ive always found are a bit like official in kind of mercenary. Youre looking for something from them and the person you is playing a game too. And not only so much right when you travel by you, you dont interview people basically have conversations. You just sit down and talk with people as im you know from researching your books. Right. And i love about it. You really got, i think, a sense the person the sense of the place just by having a conversation and the conversation doesnt have to be linear in fact. Some of the best ones are circuitous. Right. Right. Then the story itself. It doesnt have to be direct. It can be nuanced it can. It can have. You know, it can atmosphere. Its its much i think its a much broader kind of writing. And thats what thats what i wanted to do. Right. Right. No, im totally on board with that. So you fall in love with hanya and she is sort of in love with you. Thats on this trade. Yes, she was. It took it took a while for her be fully on board. But shes here tonight so she must be fully on board and all of a sudden youre going to pick up, go to poland and lets just this is a different time this is you know. Theyre not using the euro theyre not part of anything theyre part of the eastern bloc. Theyre behind the iron curtain. Its not an easy place to get to. Its not a land of affluence. And you arrive not speaking a word of polish and describe as a helpless who is unable to buy groceries. What were those first days in in warsaw like you . Well, they were difficult obviously because of the death of his mother. It was a very hard time for for hanya and i was sometimes kind of left on my own to fend myself. And i remember i went out to buy some one day and i came back with a bottle of white vinegar instead. And thats why i, i was unable to even buy groceries if there were groceries to be had. There were shortages. Now, this was in 70, 78. So there were there were there were goods. And then the that just the shops were like the shops. I was used to in the united states, you know, it was kind of bare bones. The staff of the shops not friendly. There was no such thing as, you know, consumer people did say, have a nice day. No, no, they did not. But, you know, it was it was a shock seeing you know, my first Eastern European country at the same time. Thanks to hanya, i had access to the world in the i had access to what home life like in poland and that was completely different from life on street and that i found was really invigorating pulls, were very free to speak with the mind the you know at home with with and family. There were always these lively discussions there were long, you know, meals at, the dinner table. It was just a life at home was so different from life out in public. It was so casual traveler, even journalist will go to one word to describe poland and warsaw in particular and thats great. Thats the go to adjective it is and i confess i think ive used it myself and is it fair in a way, yes or no . Well, fair if youre describing as i, say, the physical world, just the exterior world, but what i found living there and getting to know the people, it was the opposite. It very colorful. It was very animated. And it was, as i say, invigorating was you have to get past the gray facade. Yeah, right. Yeah. You grow fond of the poles and of poland and you say at one point poles appeared to be in touch with the essentials the eternals. In a way, americans were not. Now we are were the richest, most powerful country in the world. Weve got, you know, happiness in our one of our founding documents. But you see that poland behind the iron curtain is in touch with the essentials. The eternals in a way americans were not. What do you by that . Well, that that sentence i think comes at the end of a description. Of november 1st, which is the day of the dead in poland. But it has nothing to do, very little to do with the mexican day of the dead, which many of us are familiar with. Everybody goes to the cemeteries, but its a very somber day. People clean the family graves. And then in main cemetery, which i mentioned in the section i read, polanski theres a large military section and people end up going there. And theres sometimes people lined up to pay tribute to. The soldiers who died in the wars, some of the some of the graves are marked by simple birch crosses. And then you read the names and the ages of the of the dead. And there are 18, 19 years old. And i admired was the way that poles them and kept in their hearts and in their minds. This was this is a huge holiday in poland. I mean. Well, how is that different from, say, veterans . They were memorial day here . Because we dont go in mass. We go shopping. We go shopping. Yeah. Yeah. And there were busses. People would be bused into the cemetery and then and then november 1st and poland is invariably kind of a gray, misty day. And so at dusk cemetery takes on this really otherworldly. The theres a mist falling. Then you see the smoke from the candles and its just the its a very moving experience. You also describe them as possessing a rebellious and a keen sense of the absurd. I think i get the rebellious spirit part given their resistance in 1939 and later against. Communist rule. Right. What about the of the absurd . What do you mean by that . Well, if you if you live in poland, you just develop this i think its its kind of an innate thing. They have i found a sense of humor, a sense of irony, dark kind of humor, dark humor. And and, you know, there are always political jokes. When i was there, they would come out. I mean, nobody knew who came up with them. But everybody was telling them and they were hilarious and they werent just they were they were illuminating about the situation. But the one thing i remember, i mean, as soon as i got to the tallest building in warsaw for years was a building, the palace of culture, and it was a gift from the soviets was one of these huge, ugly concrete towers that just lorded over the. Was it . I think it was gray. It was actually oak or yellow. But it took you a entire city to walk by it and hunyor told me early on the would walk by it when it completed, didnt look up and say its small but in good taste. That kind of humor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know, not you. Dont laugh out loud. You smile knowingly knowingly. So i in reading the book and knowing that youre your home is new jersey and youre well you know where you came from and your adopted home was poland and i start to see similarities between the two because you wrote a book early on in your career called new jersey pleasures. And im suggesting you could have written poland unexpected pleasures. Theyre both underdog places. Neither place gets a of respect. Theyre jokes made at their expense but theyre very cultured places that are underappreciated. Is poland the new jersey of europe. Or is new jersey the whole of the u. S. . I dont know. Well, you know, in the book i make the comment that, you know, poland is cursed by its geographical location. Yeah, its its for centuries its been caught between germany, russia and the big sign that says invade me. I think pretty much. And if you think about it new jersey is kind of stuck between new york and pennsyl. Right. Though those are large, but theyve been theyve been happily nonaggressive except for the jokes emanating from manhattan. Right. About new jersey. So theres that i think they both share this kind of underdog status and theyve always been guess because i grew up in new jersey, i think, ive always been attracted to the underdog or the unsung. And as a travel writer, ive often focused on about those places, in part, thats where you get your best stories because they have been overlooked. So its easy to find new material because they havent been written to death. Right. And the people who live there rather than being fed up with visitors really of are happy to see you because its easier to write about poland than france, for instance much easier in a way. Yeah. Easier to write about of the cell. Thats the thing you have to get people interested in. I always that you know, a good travel writer needs one skill mainly which is to be lucky like luck a role. But as Louis Pasteur said, chance favors the prepared mind. So your mind was prepared. But you got lucky. This was a eastern bloc backwater that all of a sudden was thrust into the news with the Solidarity Movement and, the overthrow and the events took place