Report From Bedzin

A modeler's life in southern Poland is full of joy and time happily shared with other “nuts”. This situation is possible thanks to the many modeling festivals and competitions which take place in our region, for example in Bytom (one of the biggest events in Poland), Katowice (capital city of the Silesia province) and Żywiec (a beautiful city between the hills and mountains of Beskid). It is also not far to come for our foreign friends in Brno in the CzechRepublic, or Mossonmagyarovar in Hungary. So, there are plenty of opportunities to meet people and to integrate, having a beer or two “after hours”. One of these opportunities is the festival in Bedzin.

Bedzin (actually written Będzin but we will stick to Bedzin for the purpose of this report) is a small city with an enchanting medieval castle located on the border of two Polish historical provinces: Silesia and Zagłębie. History has been lucky enough to give the city a great guy: Kazimierz Rauchfleish, a modeller with an extraordinary passion who gives up his time showing the young how our hobby can be interesting and informative. Kazimierz is both organizer and the “spirit” of this festival, which took place in a Cultural Center in the Grodziec district of the city. As an interesting detail I have to add that before WW2 a civilian flying school called “Parcina” was located in Grodziec, which continued its work during the German occupation teaching young pilots for the Luftwaffe. Grodziec has a fine tradition in aviation sports and some of the memorabilia were displayed during the show.

This was the sixth time the festival has been staged. Although this show is well know in Poland and you can meet many highly talented and decorated modelers, this year it was hit by bad luck; about one week earlier a big part of Poland, including a major part of Silesia, was flooded by the water from every possible river and brook. With the threat of having your home flooded up to the first floor modeling is the last thing you think about. Consequently there were fewer competitors and visitors than usual, many people having much greater concerns.

A few official statistics now. We had 133 participants: 77 seniors, 30 juniors and 30 youngsters. It is the only festival in Poland with a separate category for the youngsters. This is because the organizers particularly want to increase the popularity of modeling amongst the young. Seniors brought 219 models, juniors 56 and the kids another 56. This gives 331 models in total. The numbers are impressive, but a word of explanation: this includes not only plastic models, but also ones constructed from paper, cardboard and wood. Because Aeroscale focuses on plastic aircraft kits only this category are shown here. The organizers provided many special prizes and competitions: the Stanislaw Meus Memorial, the Grodziec Citizen's Cup, the Instructors of the Bedzin Soil Cup, the “Parcina” Association Cup and the Marcusa '05 Cup.

In front of the Cultural Center we could see a few military vehicles: an original WW2 Willys Jeep, an OT-64 SKOT armoured vehicle, a UAZ-469 and one of the Honker variants. Everybody could get inside, sit behind the wheel or sometimes even take a ride.

To sum up: my congratulations to the organizers and especially to Kazimierz Rauchfleish for a great event. Despite many adversities of fate the event was still impressive. Many great models were displayed not only in the plastic category but also in the “paper” - some were really amazing. Although the festival in Bedzin is still a local event, it gathers many well know modelers who come here not for prizes but to meet other people with the same passion. Good job all and thank you for being in Bedzin.