i don't think it is a uniquely polish experience, but surely universal for every pole
when you go somewhere and you think about the people, who were there before, but they are not anymore and in a way you took their place, but you know, that you cannot t r u l y replace them and quite frankly, you dont even want to
visiting regions around muszyna and seeing all greek-catholic churches turned into roman-catholic ones, because lemka people are not here anymore, as they were deported. you see their road side chapels and graves 100 years old and you know they lived there for so long, but they don't anymore
almost every single polish city has at least a memorial tablet dedicated to jews, who lived there before the war and whose fate you don't want to think about, really, having been learning about it since you were like 10. watchful eyes can still see balconies, that look out of place, but which once were most probably sukkas, or sometimes even a hole in a doorframe, where a mezuzah used to be. and abandoned cemeteries. so so many of them
there is a karaite cementery in warsaw, but when you think about it, can you name one karaite person? or someone masurian, so to speak? boykos?
to, in a span of ~10 years, go from a country with almost 40% of ethnic minorities among its citizens to a country that is pretty much homogenous is so outlandish
everywhere you go, something, s o m e o n e is missing. and will never come back