from Falling into Place: A Story of Love, Poland, and the Making of a Travel Writer:
"The morning of May 1st, as I dressed to go out, Hania once again urged me to be careful. A service was going to held in the cathedral, after which a protest march was planned, as a counter-May Day parade.
"On the street I passed a worker, a tragic figure in a comic book outfit: a soiled cloth cap; an ill-fitting grey suitcoat, shiny with age; purple bell-bottom trousers. He was walking away from the buses that would have transported him to the parade in his honor."
Later, after the service, marching through the city:
"We soon made a right turn, to avoid a paramilitary unit holding carbines. "ZOMO do domu!" (ZOMO go home!) people chanted. Also, "Who are you serving?" A young mother watched from a balcony with a baby in her arms; another woman leaned out of her window and clapped rhythmically as we passed. I took in my fellow marchers, the trees green with buds, a world awakened, and thought: Prague. Warsaw. The Eastern European spring."
