THE PRINCELY BUT ORDINARY FAMILY
IWONA FLISIKOWSKA
The visit of prince William and princess Kate will undoubtedly remain in our memory and will be inscribed in the modern history
When we were greeting the nice guests on the airport in Warsaw, we saw a picture of the family: parents with their children, and looking after them. The princess Kate with her little daughter in her arms, and the prince William who was gently encouraging his 4-year-old son George. George and Charlotte ‘discovered’ their place in Belvedere where they had rooms with toys specially prepared for the members of the royal family.
In Warsaw – privately and officially
The princely couple were officially greeted in the sunny afternoon on 17 July this year on the courtyard of the Presidential Palace by president of Poland Andrzej Duda and the first dame Agata Duda. Both couples had a walk later in the gardens of the palace and then everybody went for a solemn breakfast.
A lot of friendly emotions were raised by the walk of the guests on Krakowskie Przedmieście during which the princely couple were to meet with cheering inhabitants of Warsaw and tourists gathered round the route of their walk.
On the first day of their visit in Warsaw, accompanied by president Duda and his spouse, they visited the Museum of Warsaw Uprising where there was a meeting with the Polish and British veterans of the Second World War. At the end the guests went to the Wall of Remembrance on which there are nearly 12 thousand surnames of soldiers who fought and were killed in the uprising. President Duda and the prince William lit grave candles at the bell ‘Monter’ in order to pay tribute to the insurgents of Warsaw. They also paid tribute to British pilots whose airplanes had been knocked off and they were killed, when flying with help to insurgent Warsaw. The surnames of nearly 40 of them are on the Wall of Remembrance.
In his entry to the memory book, the princely couples assured about their everlasting memory about heroes who had fought for freedom and devoted their life: ‘We will remember, William and Catherine’.
To the honour of queen Elizabeth II
The crowning point of the first day of the prince William and the princess Kate’s visit in Poland was a solemn party to the honour of queen Elizabeth II, organized in Łazienki park, attended by 600 people invited by the British Embassy in Poland. During the party, the prince William gave a speech, which was his only public pronouncement in Poland. – Poland is an example of courage, determination and sustainability. You have survived attacks on your country for centuries, including the partitions of Poland whose purpose was to remove you from the maps of Europe. In XX century Poland showed an unusual courage as it opposed to the brutal Nazis occupation, not mentioning the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto in 1943 and the Warsaw Uprising in 1944 – said the prince William. He also emphasized that the relations between Poland and Great Britain reached back to centuries and mentioned today’s cooperation among the others, within NATO. The prince William also read out a letter which the queen Elizabeth II had addressed to eminent birthday guests.
In Gdańsk – another lesson of real history
On the second day of his visit in Poland, William and Kate visited the former German Nazis concentration camp Stutthof in Sztutow, in which they paid tribute to the Nazism victims. In Gdańsk they visited Shakespeare’s theatre whom William’s father – prince Carol had been a patron during its building. The couple also visited the European Centre of Solidarity. The prince William and princess Kate also laid down two roses symbolically: a white and a red one at the monument of Killed Shipyard Workers, commemorating heroism of people of Solidarity movement.
Belvedere was their home
In the evening the princely couple returned to Warsaw. The visit ended on 19 July with a private meeting with the Polish presidential couple in Belvedere . – We treat this visit as a visit of respect and friendship. It is to show also good social and inter-human relations, including the state ones: between Poland and Great Britain. This is also the role of this visit, it has not got a political character – emphasized Krzysztof Szczerski, a chief of the President’s Office of Poland. everybody: diplomats, and also media people agree that the visit of the successors of the royal throne of Great Britain was extremely fruitful and will surely be one of unforgettable events in our modern history.
AA
„Niedziela” 31/2017