When I got my initial site assignment to Rzeszow(pronounced ZHeshoof), many of
the Poles I had met reacted with with a mixture of disgust and pity. "Oh, I'm so sorry, they're
not sending you someplace nice." I soon realized that most of these
people had never even been there and were reacting more toward
the region than to Rzeszow itself. Rzeszow is located 5 1/2 hours from Warsaw
by express train, putting it somewhere near the edge of the earth as
far as Warsaw residents are concerned. It's also in the eastern part of
Poland, which is generally regarded as poorer and more backward, presumably
due to its proximity to the eastern front. Historically, and Poles are
very big on history, Rzeszow was a fairly insignificant town prior to World
War II with a population of around 10,000 half of which was Jewish (See the Simon
Wiesenthal Center's web page for more information on the fate of Rzeszow's
Jews). Following
the war and the redistribution of lands which put Lvov in Ukraine, the Polish
communist authorities believed another industrial center was needed in the
southeast. Apparently the final decision came down to a choice between Przemysl and Rzeszow.
Reportedly Rzeszow got the nod thanks to its staunchly pro-communist mayor at that
time. This decision has never been forgotten or forgiven by the residents of Przemysl.
Another historical point of interest is that Rzeszow was the birthplace of the rural
Solidarity movement.
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