David FengAs Long as We Live, Poland Will Not Perish!
(Translated from the Chinese version with the help of Claude.)
On Monday morning while commuting on the train, I took out my e-reader and continued reading Hofstadter’s “I Am a Strange Loop” (setting a flag here - I should write a review later). In Chapter 18, the author uses the relationship between regions and ethnicities as an analogy for each person’s body and mind. He mentioned that Poland’s territory has been partitioned multiple times throughout history1, but the Polish people still exist. The first line of the Polish national anthem is “As long as we live, Poland will not perish!”
These powerful lyrics stir one’s emotions, so I searched to listen to it:
After listening, my blood was boiling with excitement! “March, march, Dąbrowski” - it’s as if I could understand Polish! There’s also a version with the entire stadium singing in unison2:
I know very little about Poland as a country, probably just about Nazi Germany’s blitzkrieg of Poland, Polandball (memes), and the fact that at the 2024 Paris Olympics, both the gold and bronze medalists in women’s speed climbing were from Poland (both named Aleksandra, with silver medalist Deng Lijuan being a fellow Hunanese). The men’s speed climbing gold medalist was from Indonesia (with silver medalist Wu Peng also being a fellow Hunanese!). Then I realized that the Polish flag 🇵🇱 and the Indonesian flag 🇮🇩 look so similar! (Here are more fun facts about flags.)
I’ve digressed. After listening to the Polish anthem and still feeling inspired, I also listened to similar themed songs like the French national anthem “La Marseillaise” and the Chinese national anthem “March of the Volunteers”. Listening to these stirring melodies as I got off the train and walked to the office, I felt more motivated, and the red scarf on my chest seemed even brighter!
Su Shuyang's detailed analysis of the "March of the Volunteers" lyrics
- Arise, ye who refuse to be slaves
- If you’re willing to be a slave, no need to arise
- These people who arise have no choice; if they don’t rise up, they’ll become slaves
- With our flesh and blood, let us build a new Great Wall
- The Great Wall was already built with our flesh and blood, now we need to build a new one
- The Chinese nation faces its greatest peril; from each one the urgent call for action comes forth
- Greatest peril, forced, last. The final roar is forced out
- We’ve endured to the limit and can truly no longer survive
- Arise! Millions with but one heart, braving the enemy’s fire, march on
- Not necessarily against invasion, could be fleeing famine, but either way, we must “brave the enemy’s fire”
- Source
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Does this remind you of the “The imperialists whipping up a frenzy to carve up China” and the accompanying “Situation Map” from middle school history textbooks? ↩︎
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Seeing Lewandowski reminds me of a colleague with the same surname who joined the new company with me — after checking, they’re not related. Also, while writing this post, I discovered that Lewandowski once scored five goals in nine minutes? Isn’t that comparable to McGrady’s 13 points in 35 seconds?! ↩︎