Approximately 250,000 people in the Russian Federation identify as having Polish roots in national censuses. Poles arrived in Russia at various points in history — exiled to Siberia and the Russian Far East by tsarist authorities after the November and January Uprisings, and later deported deeper into Russia during the Stalinist terror of the 1930s and after the Red Army’s invasion of Poland in 1939. According to the Congress of Poles in Russia, Polish communities are present in every region of the Federation.
One unique place on the map of the Polish diaspora is the Siberian village of Wierszyna, located in the Irkutsk region. Founded in 1910 by Polish settlers from the southern areas of the Russian partition, Wierszyna remained an almost hermetically sealed community for over a century. As a result, most residents today are of entirely Polish descent, speak Polish, and actively preserve Polish cultural traditions.
The history and everyday life of Wierszyna’s inhabitants will be presented by Maciej Jastrzębski, a foreign correspondent for Polish Radio, who will be accompanied by Ewelina Wiżentas — a village resident and doctoral student at Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń.
Maciej Jastrzębski is a journalist and foreign and war correspondent for Polish Radio. He has reported on armed conflicts in the Balkans, Chechnya, Iraq, Afghanistan, Georgia, Syria, and Ukraine. He lived for three years in Minsk, Belarus, and fifteen years in Russia. Known for maintaining close ties with local Polish communities, he shares their stories and daily experiences. He is also the author of several books on Russia, the annexation of Crimea, and Georgia.
Ewelina Wiżentas comes from the Polish village of Wierszyna in Siberia. She graduated from the Moscow Institute of Culture, specializing in folk choir conducting and singing. For the past four years, she has studied at the Doctoral School of Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń. This year, she is preparing to defend her doctoral dissertation, which focuses on the traditions of her native village.
