How did I get to this point? Three years ago I didn't know anything about Poland other than it was somewhere east of Germany that tended to get invaded quite often. Which I suppose is an improvement on what my girlfriend knew about Lithuania when she found out she was moving there: 'Where?'. That might be partly where I got the desire to live in Eastern Europe from, although she never seemed particularly interested in Poland apart from to make pro-Lithuanian jokes. One day I randomly got handed a flyer from the Rotary Club which offered anyone who wanted to the chance to visit Poland and stay with a Polish family for two weeks. Having never been further east than Champagne, it seemed like the most impossibly distant place in the world, and I decided immedately to go.
Since then I've been at university for three years, read a lot of Polish history, studied a lot of Polish grammar, learnt the names of three kings (including Wladyslaw Lokietek) and have probably got about three words firmly nailed down in my memory. I no longer think Poland is on the flip-side of a flat world, and I've spent time even further east, in Wilno, but Poland is still the country I fell in love with, and is now going to be my home for the next twelve months.