Jagshemash! Greeting from Poland

The Tearfund team has made it safely to Poland via Koln (where a surprising number of adults were seen sporting Santa and Rudolph hats from the Christmas market) and set up shop for the next two weeks of UN climate negotiations. We diligently made sure we got off at the right stop, as we weren’t keen to go to the train’s final destination of Moscow in December. So far, I’m pleasantly surprised by Poland. The heat-tech thermals and hot water bottle have gone unused since although Poland is cold, they really know how to heat a home!

Dental Tourism
Although we’ve only been here one day, we decided it was time to try a bit of Eastern European dental tourism. Actually, it was forced upon policy assistant Laura who cracked a tooth en route to Poznan. We can report all smiles from the Polish dental industry.

Hopes for the talks
In news of greater importance, the actual talks began slowly today. We hope they will quicken up in order to seal a global climate deal by December of next year to ensure no gap between commitment periods. As the halfway point in the two year plan outlined in last year’s Bali road map, Poland must pave the way to agreeing an outcome in Copenhagen that adequately addresses climate change. In Poznan, the global community needs to move from talking and proposals to agreeing the building blocks and a work plan to get there by December 2009.

Here policy staff Richard and Sara follow a map to the conference centre. We hope the UN talks follow the Bali Road Map with as much attention.

And finally…
Lonely Planet’s advice to vegetarians travelling to Poland is to expect to lose weight. I seem to be conquering the odds however and am finding plenty of lovely Polish meat-free cuisine. Who knew a bowl of olives at breakfast could be so satisfying?