Poland, 3:15 a.m.
What You’ve Been Sleeping Through All June
If you’ve ever been to Poland in June, you surely know what happens at 3:15 a.m.
In fact, not just Poland - also Germany, Slovakia, Ukraine… anywhere in Central Europe. And, I suppose, in Japan too. In all these temperate-climate countries, in June, the most important, and most beautiful thing happens at 3:15 a.m. Do you know what?
The concert.
At 3:15, the birds start yelling.
You didn’t know? You didn’t know. Because you live in town. And you’re asleep with windows shut, so nothing can annoy you. So, for the past forty years, you’ve done everything you could to skip the most beautiful part of your day …
June isn’t over yet. Try!
The birds’ concert is something to witness. It starts gently. One tiny bird chirps, timidly. Immediately, his neighbor replies, and soon their comrades join in. Within minutes, the entire forest starts yelling! And they are loud - if your window is open, you will wake up.
The song takes about half an hour. Then the birds grow tired, and the concert fades.
Half an hour later, the sun rises over the waters.
The cathedral
At noon time, I like to walk my dog. We often visit a certain place in the woods. In my mind, I call it The Cathedral. If you live near an old beechwood forest, there’s probably a cathedral near you.
The beech trees are monsters. You didn’t know? Maybe, in the forest, you never looked up? Or maybe you can’t tell different kinds of trees apart. Most modern people can’t.
But beeches are easy to recognize—because of their sheer size. Thanks to their incredible adaptability, beech forests have come to dominate much of the Carpathian Mountains. They grow to monstrous proportions, competing ruthlessly for sunlight with other trees. It is an unequal fight, because no tree can outgrow a beech. The difference between cultivated, commercial pine plantation and a stately beech woodland is immense.
The fire show
If you missed the 3:15 concert, you can still make it for the evening fire show. But that’s trickier to find. Do you know where to go, when the night falls?
The fire show starts about 11:00 p.m., soon after dark. It is only visible two weeks in a year, around end June. And only on a humid, hot evening.
That’s when the fireflies come out. Big armies of fireflies. The most magical sight in a temperate forest.
You didn’t know? You didn’t know. Because normal people don’t walk in the forest after dark. It’s dangerous, right? Wild predators…? Creepy things that you’d rather not meet…?
No, the temperate forest is not dangerous at night. And in Europe, there are no wild animals that prey on humans. If they ever were, we killed them all, many generations ago. There were also ghouls, dwarfs, and ferries, but we stopped believing, and they disappeared too.
On a hot midsummer night, go into the forest after dark. Turn off your flashlight, and just sit. Don’t talk, don’t play music. Just sit in the dark, listen and watch. Soon, you will see a firefly. Then another. And then hundreds, weaving between trees. If you sit long enough, you will also encounter many other things that move. Deers, rabbits, a fox or maybe an owl. Often, they will approach you with no fear. With surprise, you will realize - they were already there when you arrived. You didn’t see them at first. But now, when you’ve stopped thinking, talking, and doing, you’ve started seeing.
In Polish, these fireflies are called świetliki świętojańskie - Saint John’s bugs. Because the shortest night of the year is Saint John’s night, also known by its old pagan name: Sobótka (Midsummer Solstice). In the olden days, on that night, fires were lit and music was played. Couples danced, and then disappeared in the woods to search for the mythical fern flower. In Slavic folklore, the fern flower blooms only on Midsummer Night. It grants fortune and wisdom to the one who finds it.
I was never able to picture a firefly. A better camera is needed. But I did capture the Sobótka bonfire. Yes, we still do it. Every year.
Post Scriptum
n other countries, the birds’ concert may not begin exactly at 3:15 a.m.—astronomical time differs from political time zones. But it does happen—about an hour before sunrise. Check it out!
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