By Ania Gnidziejko, Wagner College’16 “I belong to a nation which over the past centuries has experienced many hardships and reverses. The world reacted with silence or with mere sympathy when Polish frontiers were crossed by invading armies and the sovereign state had to succumb to brutal force” – Lech Walesa Lech Walesa was born on September 29, 1943 in Popowo, Poland. During World War II, Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union occupied Poland Walesa’s father, Boleslaw, died in 1946 so he was raised by his mother Feliksa. Feliksa had a great effect on Walesa, because she was a single mother. The priest of their church said the Feliksa was the wisest women in the entire parish. Walesa attended vocational school in Lipno, where he learned the electrician’s trade, worked as a car mechanic at a machine center from 1961 to 1965. His training as an electrician and...