Diary: Eastern Europe's road to the EU

By Ray Furlong BBC Berlin correspondent

With less than a month to go before 10 countries join the EU, the BBC's Berlin correspondent Ray Furlong is keeping a diary for News Online as he journeys around the countries of Eastern Europe.

A group of deer gazed out from a grove of silver birch trees that my train rumbled past.

Sopot is near the picturesque town of Gdansk

It was a romantic start to my five hour journey from the port of Szczecin to Sopot, a spa town near Gdansk.

I'd been looking forward to this trip - a chance to return to my old stomping ground in Eastern Europe before the countries here join the EU and to see how prepared they are.

But first I thought I'd see how EU membership has affected the only former Eastern bloc country to join so far - I'm talking, of course, about East Germany.

From the point of view of infrastructure everything seems OK.

I floated smoothly from Berlin to Rostock in a spotlessly clean modern carriage through picturesque villages.

Deceptive appearances

But the Sunday night out in Rostock told a different story.

The restored historic centre was a ghost town. The bright lights of its bars and restaurants merely served to show how empty they were.

Rostock has around 20% unemployment which is the average for the whole of the former East Germany.

Click here for a map of Ray's journey

Germany's huge investments here have created a pretty facade, not a vibrant economy and its failed strategy for rebooting the former East must hold lessons for how not to integrate the new post-communist members into the EU.

Despite its shipyard, Rostock has high unemployment

In Poland there are also economic problems minus the beauty treatments.

The first thing you see after crossing the border is a huddle of tumbledown shacks with corrugated iron roofs, selling cheap alcohol, cigarettes and lots more besides.

Not much has changed in this scene in the last 10 years. How long will it remain after Poland joins the EU?

Moving on I arrive at the small suburb of Szczecin Dabie - the railway station has seen better days and the rusting iron bridge which spans the platform looks singularly miserable in the spring rain.

My train is dirty, old and noisy but as we've seen, appearances can be deceptive.

Poland has changed significantly in order even to qualify for EU membership.

When I arrive at my next destination I'll begin to see how.

Return to the story