Posted on 06/02/2007 8:52:24 AM PDT by marthemaria
WARSAW (AFP) - A Pole who spent 19 years in a coma has woken up and will now have to adapt to a country where the communists are no longer in power, a television station announced Friday.
Railwayman Jan Grzebski fell into a coma after he was hit by a train in 1988, the private channel Polsat said.
In an interview, Grzebski said that he owed his survival to his wife, Gertruda.
"She's the one who always took care of me. She saved my life," he said.
Grzebski was a father of four at the time of the accident. He is now making the acquaintance of 11 grandchildren.
Doctors had not expected Grzebski to survive, let alone emerge from the coma.
"I cried a lot, and I prayed a lot. Those who came to see us kept asking: 'When is he going to die?' But he's not dead," said Getruda.
Poland's communist regime was still clinging onto power when Grzebski had his accident, only losing its grip the following year, in 1989.
On the brash neon-lit streets of new European Union member Poland, the period seems a distant memory.
"What amazes me today is all these people who walk around with their mobile phones and never stop moaning. I've got nothing to complain about," said Grzebski.
Life imitates art.
“When I went into a coma there was only tea and vinegar in the shops, meat was rationed and huge petrol lines were everywhere,” Grzebski told TVN24, describing his recollections of the communist system’s economic collapse.
In 1982, an American, a Russian, and a Pole were employed at a factory in Poland. One day, the Polish worker showed up for work two hours late. "Sorry, guys," he said. "I had to stand in line for a ham."
"What's a ham?" asked the Russian, while the American inquired, "what's a line?"
On a visit to the Soviet Union in the early 1970's, a professor of mine went into his hotel room and saw several technicians installing what he figured was sophisticated eavesdropping equipment. The technicians explained to him that they were fixing the light, and the professor replied, "konechno" (of course).
That would’ve been wonderful to read about.
Grzebski will have to learn the new meaning of the term "red state."
Amazing story.
A statement worthy of framing.
Who the @%&$ is Kevin Pollak? :)
Watch your language, young man.
toetappyguy
Did they have a lottery or something?
And grunge rock, the Buffalo Bills losing four Super Bowls in a row and "Star Trek Voyager."
He does, however, have a lot of "Seinfeld" to catch up on.
Lucky he didn’t fall into the “merciful” clutches of Kevorkian...referred by “symapthetic relatives.
Kevorkian is out of jail....looking for fresh meat
“Junior Mint?” < / seinfeld>
LOL!
"Four children he asked? How come there are eight here?"
He said he vaguely recalled the family gatherings he was taken to while in a coma and his wife and children trying to communicate with him.
taken from same url:
http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/europe/06/02/polish.coma.reut/index.html?section=cnn_latest
amazing uplifting story : )
Remember, his wife massaged his body every hour. Not every part of him was in a coma. :)
In Soviet Russia light bulb changes you!
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