Seeing on television the tide of wide-eyed Poles exploring western europe for the first time as the Berlin Wall was pushed down in 1989, I felt a strong urge to swim against the current. In December 1990 I travelled to Koszalin for the first time, seizing the opportunity to visit a friend who was working with a theatre company. Stepping off the train after the 1000 mile journey east, I was struck by the dry, cold air, warm hospitality and the purity and potency of the vodka. 14 kms from the Baltic sea, which that year was partially frozen at the coastal resort of Mielno, Koszalin is on the surface, as the guidebooks suggest, an unremarkable small city. So why did I return a few months later and end up staying for three years ?