Swimming and Diving: Polish quartet learn about America while competing for Panthers

A trek of just less than 4,500 miles — from Poland to Pittsburgh — gave four swimmers the… A trek of just less than 4,500 miles — from Poland to Pittsburgh — gave four swimmers the chance of a lifetime: to swim and earn an education at Pitt.

Now that they have each other, they realize how lucky they are. They’re free to explore swimming options around the world and travel to the United States — things their parents couldn’t do more than 22 years ago.

“It’s crazy because when our parents were growing up, they weren’t allowed to leave Poland at all,” sophomore swimmer Dawid Goszczycki said. “As far as they could go for a vacation was Bulgaria. They couldn’t even go west at all.”

The Polish invasion of Pitt’s swim team began with junior Andrzej Dubiel. The soft-spoken Dubiel said he followed former Pitt swimmer Adam Plutecki, also from Poland, before coming to Pitt. The difference is that Dubiel brought more swimmers after his arrival.

Dubiel said he talked with Goszczycki and freshman Joanna Budzis before they decided to come to Pitt. Budzis did the same and spoke with freshman Adam Maczewski.

Now, they’re all here.

It also helped that one of head coach Chuck Knoles’ former swimmers is now a coach in Poland.

“I’m good friends with a Polish coach, Mariusz Podkoscielny, who I coached at Arizona, and he knew Andrzej and Dawid,” Knoles said. “Then, through Andrzej and Dawid, we knew about Joanna. And through Joanna we found out about Adam. But once we got Andrzej and Dawid, that really started it for everybody else.”

Ask the two freshmen how Dubiel and Goszczycki convinced them to come to Pittsburgh, and according to Dubiel, they answer with a laugh: “The city of champions!”

But their choice to come overseas was almost a necessity, rather than a luxury.

In Poland, young swimmers must choose between pursuing swimming full-time or ditching swimming and attending a university for an education. It’s almost impossible, according to Dubiel, to pursue both.

American universities offer that opportunity, though students must earn it.

Many people from Poland say they want to go to an American university, but few pursue the exam needed to travel from their starting country. Plus, all of them must take the SATs like any American college student must. The four did well enough on both of those exams to land spots at Pitt.

All of them traveled directly from Poland to Pitt except Goszczycki. He attended a year of high school in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., before coming to Pitt.

“I was 15 when I came here, but the first year I was here, I was just smiling,” Goszczycki said. “I went to high school for three years, so I picked up English.”

But once here, it was time to get used to the culture.

Polish people have a tendency to be more conservative, pessimistic and complaining than Americans, according to the four.

The open communication of Americans was different for them, yet it was unanimously appreciated.

“When you go to get your groceries in Poland, sometimes the people will look at you like, ‘What are you doing here? Get out of here,’” Goszczycki said.

“Americans always seem happy. People in Poland, they complain,” Budzis said.

Perhaps they have a reason.

The era from 1945 to 1989 in Poland was a period of Soviet dominance imposed on the country from the conclusion of World War II. Russian leaders demanded that Poland be turned over to them after the war, and the United States and Great Britain obliged.

It was during this time that many of the four’s parents were born and grew up.

Social unrest and economic depression marred the time period. All acknowledged the difficulties their parents faced during the time.

“When you went to the grocery store, you had to have a special card with it written how much food you could get,” Goszczycki said. “It was like a pound of food per month or so.”

It’s a huge difference now, to say the least.

In 1989, Poland elected its first non-communist leaders in forty years. Slowly, Poland established a stable democracy and market economy. The nation even joined the European Union in 2004.

“We are the first generation of the post-communist Poland, if you want to call it that,” Dubiel said. “Poland was like a playground of Europe. We were into so many conflicts. After 1989, everything changed. We are just taking advantage of it, changing for the better, doing things our parents couldn’t or wouldn’t even think about. It’s amazing.”

They all agreed they missed the food in Poland more than anything.

“Everything is so different, bread is different here,” Dubiel said.

“You have toast bread here,” Maczewski added.

“Our eating habits are so different,” Dubiel said. “We like eating fresh, and here it’s like, donuts for breakfast, donuts for lunch and donuts for dinner.”

Each one acknowledged the language barrier, which still occasionally becomes an issue for all of them. Knoles said he’s stopped in practice to explain to the four the different words Americans use for swimming terms, such as lap and lane, which differ from what Polish coaches use.

“When they first get here, we had to stop and ask them what they were doing, what they thought they were doing, what they thought the explanation was, and then we help them understand what we were asking,” Knoles said. “It’s like if in school you’re told your whole life that the color blue is called yellow, and then one day you’re told that the color blue is blue and yellow is yellow.”

Another adjustment is the math performed by Pitt coaches to convert times from meters, used everywhere else in swimming but the United States, to yards.

It’s a minor adjustment the four must make, but one they’re comfortable incurring while swimming at Pitt.

The four swimmers left Poland for the United States, and in the process grew into the culture and became ambassadors.

“We’re talking with a few more people back home about coming here next year,” Budzis said.

“They’re reaching out to friends because they find so much here at a university they really like and on a team they really like,” Knoles said.

Even with four swimmers, it looks as if it’s only the beginning of more to come on Pitt’s swimming pipeline from Poland.