Meditating in my Warsaw apartment, 1997 Well, and then out of the blue, I moved to Poland to witness the Solidarity uprising, another hippie style revolution but without hippies. Later, I found that hippies in Poland (spelled "hipis" in Polish) were very different from other hippies I came across elsewhere in the world. So, I never hung out with any hippies there. Even today, they are strongly tied to the Roman Catholic Church. They were always well monitored and also used by the Secret Police. They also took the worst possible hard drugs, and shared extreme rightist and nationalist worldviews. Generally speaking, they gave hippies a bad name. A typical image of a hippie in Poland that was created is that of dirty bums who shoot up hard drugs and go around bagging for money. No wonder Poland was America's strongest partner during the GW Bush era. But, I have noticed some positive changes taking place there in recent years.