When Trustee Pat Rea visited Poland in September as part of an Illinois delegation, his guide was a young Air Force officer.
For the past week, Rea has had a chance to return the favor.
Capt. Radoslaw Okulski, 34, has been staying with Rea since Nov. 3 and has had a jam-packed schedule, which ends with his departure Wednesday. Besides touring village offices and schools, Okulski made a weekend trip to Nashville to see two Civil War battlefields, trekked to the University of Illinois campus in Urbana-Champaign and will try to squeeze in some last-minute shopping at Orland Square Mall.
But the somewhat exhausting schedule did not seem to bother Okulski. Nor did he mind the 10-hour flight from Warsaw.
Because the pilot of the commercial jet turned out to be a friend, Okulski was invited into the cockpit and got a bird’s-eye view of Chicago.
“The people have been very kind to me,” he said.
Okulski said he was grateful that Rea had extended the invitation. The village official had made the trip to Poland with 44 other business and community leaders in Illinois’ role as a sponsor state in Poland’s efforts to join the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
The officer lives in Slupsk, in northwest Poland near the Baltic Sea, with his wife, a fashion designer. They have a daughter, 9, and a 3-year-old son.
Okulski, a flight commander, is a paratrooper and first-class supersonic pilot and speaks four languages. He also served as a United Nations observer in Bosnia for two years.
Okulski said that during his stay there, his job was to monitor airfields, ensuring that the no-fly zone was not violated. He also authorized flights carrying the injured for treatment.
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