[ Aug.2016 ] On the second day of our stay in Warsaw, we had a few hours before our booked tour started, so we decided to go to some shops which I had marked in our guide book.
First, we went to a shop called Cepolia which was in walking distance from our accommodation.
This shop sells Polish handicrafts and it seemed a chain store.
There are some of these shops in the old town, but we went to the fairly big one near the Central Station.
They had a large collection of the hand painted Polish pottery called Boleslawiec.
I have seen some adverts of a shop in England selling this pottery, but I prefer buying them in the place of origin.
Well, it would be better if we could go to the town of the same name which actually makes them, but it is situated far west of the country and I do not think it is easy to get there, so we decided to buy some in this shop.
We bought one big plate to add to our collection and a butter container.
Apart from those, we bought hand-made cards and table napkins with bright patterns and at the far end of the shop, I found some fur jackets.
They were sheep fur but very nice and soft.
And to my surprise, it was only 500 PLN (about 95 pounds or 115 euros).
So forgetting the heat, I tried it on.
The sleeves were too long (which happens so often to me), but otherwise it was just right.
Although it is a fur jacket, the design was casual and I liked it, so I bought it in mid summer in August.
After this shop, we looked for another shop called Neptunea in the old town.
According to our guide book, this shop sells Polish accessories.
But the shop we found finally must have been changed, because they were selling jewellery of semi-precious stones.
My mother and I love stones, so we were far from disappointed and got very excited.
There was a nice shop assistant who spoke a bit of Japanese.
So needless to say, we bought some jewellery there.
By the way, while we were looking for this shop, we had a rest in the shade.
A group of Chinese tourists came along and sat next to us though the space was very limited.
They did not care about touching each other with strangers on the bench.
I was amazed.
Their feeling of the distance between person and person was so different.
Of course there are soooo many people in China, so it would be natural to be forced to stay close with each other, I suppose.
