Greetings from Poland, from Where This Blog Will Emanate the Rest of the Week

I have recently arrived at my hotel in central Warsaw, after an overnight flight on LOT Polish Airlines from Newark. And because I'm besotten (the right word?) with fatigue from an 8 and 1/2 hour flight, and also have very few new observations to make (other than that Warsaw continues to evolve as a modern, clean, and seemingly-prosperous city), I'll limit this particular post to the repeat discovery that money-changers at airports are taking an unconscionable portion of your funds.

At Warsaw's modern Frederic Chopin International, money firms were taking a cool 20% of all transactions. While the Polish zloty is officially exchanged at 2.78 to the dollar, one receives about 2.20 zlotys to the dollar at the money-changing kiosks here. Smart travelers will set out on their trip with the least amount of currency possibe, and will then replenish their cash from ATM machines found outside every bank. And with that portentous advice, I'll now go to sleep. More tomorrow from Bialystok, the real target of this trip (explanation in a later blog post), to which I'll now be proceeding by train.