Something About Poland: Somewhere in Poland (3)

The Far East is about 200km east of Warsaw. I know that in some countries it could be a distance to the nearest supermarket, but here it's a distance to different culture. Some guidebooks call our eastern border "exotic Poland". Only there you'll find a mixture of cultures containing Christian, Orthodox, and Muslim believers.
However, Poland is considered to be catholic country (33 millions of Christian catholics) and churches are significant signs in our landscape, finding a typical church in the Far East it's not so easy.
The Far East is orthodox (half million believers) and in the villages you'll find orthodox churches with characteristic towers with triple crosses. Some people do not even speak Polish there - the mixture of Belorussian and Polish with
characteristic "singing" accent is in use, as the settlers from Belarus had been here before the Poles arrived from the west in XVI century. So speaking polish does not mean 100% success in communication, however, those languages are similar, and after some tries you can get across when asking for a way or just chatting with someone in a village. What's more some inscriptions on shrines, crosses and graves are written in Cyrillic. Young people, that haven't had Russian at school are not
able to read it. Orthodox celebrate they events according to Julian calendar, so everything happens there two weeks later.
You can spend Christmas or Easter in Warsaw, and then two weeks and two hours drive later you'll have it again!
Not only orthodox, but also Muslims have found they place in the east. Two mosques built in XVII century are still in use by descendant of Tatars who were given this grounds four hundred years ago.
The East has his unique quiet atmosphere, even dogs in the villages seem to bark more silent. Wooden houses with characteristic shutters and porches and decorated corners are popular here.
If you accept only tourist attractions mentioned in Lonely Planet - Bialowieski National Park would be a good choice - meeting a bison in the wild it's still possible there. Finally, if you are interested only in clubs and bars sections of the above guide, you have to know that only in the region of Bialowieża grows a grass used for making world famous Żubrówka Vodka (Bison Vodka). Cheers!