Police_World_02_2018

Article

My IPA adventures in the East Kevin Silver ; Devon & Cornwall Branch

During a 2015 skiing holiday in Bialka, which is in the beautiful Polish mountains, I met up with IPA member Mateusz “Matty”. During that visit Matty and his friends were kind enough to show my friends and I around the local areas of interest and ever since that visit we have kept in touch. Fast forward to 2017 and whilst chatting to Matty online he was his usual kind hearted self and he asked me to attend his region’s 15 year IPA celebrations scheduled for Saturday 18th November 2017.

I have always enjoyed my visits to Poland , be it a city break to the amazing Krakow or to ski in the mountains and so I told Matty that it would be amazing to see him and his family again. I was humbled by this personal invitation to attend their IPA celebrations in and so I decided that I should do all I could to try and attend. After contacting my regions IPA explaining the invitation they were absolutely fantastic and offered me £100 towards the flight costs. On speaking to my area commander he was very supportive and agreed the costs for a Devon and Cornwall Police plaque that I could gift to my hosts and so after booking a few days leave I set about making my plans to fly out to Poland booking accommodation for my first night in Krakow and then a nice apartment close to the venue in Nowy Targ. After making plans I contacted Matty to say I had been helped by my IPA with flight costs and I would be very pleased to attend the celebrations. I also explained to Matty that I had booked and paid for all my accommodation and would see them on the 18th November as agreed. Matty messaged me straight back to say he was very pleased I could be his guest but he was also a little cross with me explaining that I was his guest and hotels and transport were all paid for by his region and that I needed to cancel my apartments as all of his guests would be looked after.

As I have visited Krakow before I had a good idea of where things were located and as I believe that Krakow is one of the most beautiful cities in Europe I settled into my accommodation as quickly as possible before heading out for some sightseeing and eventually a very reasonable priced meal in the towns famous square. The next day bright and early I was collected by three local IPA members who were absolutely brilliant and despite some language issue (on my part as my Polish is very basic) we chatted happily on the journey all the way to the mountains and the hotel. So dressed in full uniform with gifts for my hosts I, along with other officers from various regions of Europe, climbed on-board the coach for the short journey to the venue. On arrival I was met by Matty and he helped me add the IPA flag from Region 7 of the UK to those already on display. After being seated between the Police Commissioner from Slovakia (Jozef) and Piotr from Poland (both of whom speak really great English so clearly an effective strategical seating arrangement) we settled in for the formal part of the evening which during the meal involved a number of speeches, photographs and the exchange of gifts and awards. We were then invited to change out of uniform to enjoy the rest of the meal (I lost count on how many courses there were but let’s just say there was always food being placed before us) and a number of toasts to the call of “Na Zdrowie” in effect good health or cheers! During this most recent visit I have met with some truly amazing people some of whom I have mentioned but far too many to list them all but in addition to those named above who I consider to be friends I do want to add a heartfelt thank you to “Radek” who was brilliant on my arrival in Poland helping me with any language problems or questions during the whole visit and beyond and of course to the IPA who allow me to travel and make such great friends and memories.

Once it was explained to me that all the guests would be housed in the same hotel that supported the Polish IPA and that it was very close to the venue where the IPA celebrations would take place, it was agreed that as I needed to fly in on the 17th of November which was the day before the event, I would stay one night in Krakow in a self-funded apartment and that once collected on the Saturday morning I would be his guest along with all the other officers from Slovakia, the Czech Republic and of course Poland in their pre booked IPA friendly hotel.

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POLICE WORLD Vol 63 No. 2, 2018