This Saturday some friends were held up for three hours at Cracow's train station. For once, this had nothing to do with late trains, drunken drivers, phantom ticket instructors or any of the other inconveniences of modern travel. The reason for the hold-up was that the so-called 'Nowe Miasto' mall had opened next to the train station. Taxi drivers couldn't get within two hundred metres. Rail passengers could barely set foot beyond the platform.
All this mayhem over a mall? Hasn't Cracow already got enough of those things? And when it comes to picking up a present, surely the city offers other charms...? Like stumbling across some curiosity shop on a sleepy backstreet, or tracking down a batch of forest mushrooms at one of centuries old farmers markets. But before you think we've turned into a complete grandpa, let's stress that it's not all bad at the Nowe Miasto. In fact, there are several aspects that are actually quite OK.
The first thing that strikes you on strolling the length of the mall is just how big it is. With three floors and a length of over 250 metres, the 'Nowe Miasto' (New Town) name doesn't seem that overblown. There really are a lot of shops there. Most of them are your fairly standard clothes numbers, with a sprinkling of cafes here and there, not forgetting the ubiquitous Mcdonalds. This may all sound rather unappealing, but there are one or two intriguing places.
If you're about to catch a train and you realise you've forgotten to pick up your paperpack, CD or the like, there's an English bookshop and an Empik branch. And chocoholics will enjoy the Wedel chocolate parlour, courtesy of Poland's longest running confectionery firm.
As far as the architecture itself goes, it could be a lot worse. Inside, there's a strong sense of daylight pervading the structure, which is always a good thing. And unless you really can't stand anything modern, the complex does mean that arrival at Cracow station is not an irredeemably grim affair. Let's face it, with the towering exception of Venice, where you step out over a mind-bogglingly beautiful lagoon, the immediate vicinities of train stations are pretty grim affairs. But today, travellers to Cracow are greeted by a refreshingly harmonious ensemble. A spacious square has been created, flanked by the elegant nineteenth century train station and a former nobleman's palace to the south(now a post office). It's a huge improvement on what was there before. What's more, scores of jobs have been created, and a slightly seedy neck of the woods has been a given much-needed spring in its step. So all in all, not a disaster.
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