unFRIENDLY RIVALRY: countryhumans

The time of Unification - TO BE REWRITTEN

1st of May, 2004

The day in which Poland entered the European Union, a day that he was stressing over for the past couple of weeks. He knew what he had to do during the ceremony, and just thinking about it made his stomach turn in the most uncomfortable ways. The stress and discomfort he experienced wasn't anything like the mild nervousness mixed with a note of excitement he felt moments prior to him joining the NATO. He no longer felt like a young boy on his first day at school. Was there anything about this event to even that would overshadow the displeasure he felt about the fact that he would be forced to interact with what he can only describe as the most bitter enemy of all? Germany...

Sure, he might've been forced to see him before all of this, but at least during his NATO entry he wasn't forced to actually look at him, speak to him, or act overly friendly towards his historical tormentor. To be quite frank, the thought of him opening the boarders and letting him onto his land made him want to bring along his good ol' trusty Browning wz 28 with him, just as a small precaution. It might've been a couple of years since his invasive antics, and Poland may have partially forgiven him for his unjustifiably gruesome crimes he has committed against him, but he is not the type to forget things. Especially as dreadfully traumatic as these.

It's not like he was too scared to look Germany in the eye, or that he was too emotionally distraught on the thought of meeting him, no, the anxiety he experienced stemmed from the fact that he couldn't help but feel a tad bit spiteful towards the man that has done him wrong. This whole celebration for all he knows could end up being a complete disaster. He knew very well about Germany's "high opinion" on Poland, after all his jokes about how Poland was in every way inferior to him and well... pretty much everyone else, first used as a propaganda to make it easier for gestapo to dehumanise the innocent civilians and deprive them of honour before their deaths have now been spread worldwide! Britain and America seemed to have taken the most liking into this sick joke. It only makes sense for countries with such overly egotistical and "above-all" mindset to become the biggest fans of something that would let them essentially show their superiority over who they deemed weaker. Ignorance is their forte after all. However America seemed to just do it out of pure satisfaction that seeing UK and Germany laugh had given him. Unlike others America didn't really bare much animosity or hate towards Poland, in fact he somewhat liked his presence in NATO, but at that point in time he didn't really know much about him. They weren't really close in any way, shape or form, and his knowledge of the country was quite limited.

Ready or not, today was the day that Poland would have to stand face to face and side by side with Germany. There was no way of avoiding it, and his pointless attempts at pushing the thought away didn't help much to ease his mind. Everything was already prepared for his visit anyway, and seeing how major of a role Germany played in the EU he knew that it was impossible to just avoid him and turn to his other neighbours ( Hungary,Czech, Lithuania or Slovenia) that were going to join the EU as well, in spite of him having much friendlier interactions with them. No, doing that would just sour their relations even further.

He calmed himself just a bit, thinking back to how a couple of years ago he could just dream about doing such a thing like joining the EU. USSR was always trying his best to maintain his control over him. Not anymore. USSR is dead. He had been for a longer while now. Poland is now free, he can make his own decisions and take care of himself.

It was 10:30 now, as Poland looked down on his silver Patek Philippe watch, a small reminder of how once him and France used to own that brand, a reminder of how friendly they were with each other back in the day.

Realising just how late it was, he quickly got off from the comfortable spot on his sofa and picked up his preselected clothes he was going to wear for this event- dark grey waistcoat, white long sleeved shirt, red tie,black glossy formal shoes, black blazer and trousers. He put them on, his gaze avoiding the mirror in front of him until the very end. He didn't really want to see the reflection of the enormous scar running from his cheek, all the way down his neck, chest and stomach until it stopped on the inner section of his left thigh. A painful reminder of the WW2. A reminder which was partially forced upon him by one of the very people he was going to meet again today. Not wanting to worsen his mood any further, he only looked up to meet his own gaze once he was done with almost everything, only having to fix his tie as he looked up to the large glassy surface positioned in front of him"Ok", he said to himself in a half whisper , "It could be worse." He commented on his current state. Although his tiredness wasn't really showing it's impact on his outer appearance, he felt completely drained. The lack of sleep due to all the research he's been doing on EU and trying to figure out if it would be in fact beneficial for him to join it. Not to mention the workload he had to put up with due to USSR leaving his economy in an appalling state. Hopefully he won't regret his decisions later...

Although the small sense of regret has already started sipping in, he cringed at the very thought of him having to put on the happy face and smile for the entire day, especially considering the situation that he put himself in.

After a couple of hours he spent on making sure that everything was going well, it was the time to open the borders.

The bridge that hovered over the Oder river that once divided Frankfurt with Słubice, wasn't going to be considered a sign of division anymore, but a symbol of unity.