Dworek, sweet dworek

National Review, Sept 15, 1997 by Radek Sikorski

As a listed building, the manor had been protected by law --theoretically at least. But the Communists' appreciation of our national heritage may be judged by the way the price was set: the local authority delegated a builder to estimate the value of bricks, beams, and other usable material at demolition prices.

At the last moment, there was a hitch. The local authority's clerk, who had steered the paperwork for a year, suddenly remembered: "Do you realize that if you go through with this, you lose all rights to ration cards?" She looked up at my parents, despondent, expecting the deal to be off.

As far back as I could remember there had always been "temporary" shortages of such luxuries as soap, shoes, toilet paper, and sausage. In the 1980s, even vodka, sugar, and butter were available only with ration coupons. However, farmers -- anybody who owned more than a couple acres of land -- were excluded from most entitlements. Those whose cards identified the countryside as their place of residence were assumed to be keeping a pig or some chickens in the garden and could surely barter their produce for everything else.

"No more ration cards, then," said my father. For all he knew, he was resigning himself to spending the rest of his life raising pigs and chickens.

Thus we acquired a ghost estate with a few acres of land near a major city for not much more than a thousand dollars. The deed sold for 6,849,899 old zlotys, to be precise, at a moment when the dollar sold on the street for 5,500 zlotys. In early 1989, when the paperwork was completed and the money handed over, this was no small sum. An average Polish monthly salary edged only just above 100,000 zlotys.

It might have been years before I saw Chobielin. By the very act of claiming political asylum in Britain I had broken Communist law and could not safely visit Poland. In the spring of 1989 I still expected the war I had privately declared on the evil empire to be a long march. It proved a sprint. By August, I was to sit in the gallery of the Polish parliament, watching the swearing-in of the first non-Communist prime minister of Poland since the war. We had finally won, and I could start enjoying the fruits of our victory.