Life / POLAND'S QUASI-BROTHELS? [21]

There are no legally operating brothels in Poland. On paper, that is. What are known as "agencje towarzyskie" (escort agencies) are licenced businesses but under the law all they can do is provifde custoemrs with contacts with female escorts and charge a fee for that servicde.. "Kuplerstwo" (providing premises for debacuhery) as well as deriving a profit from prostitution (pimping) are against the law but it is flagrantly violated.

Poland's Euro-apers have long called for legalised prostitution as usual showing Poland is trailing behind things. Norway has only just introduced a new law punishing, not prostittues but their male clients, and paid sex with someone under 16 can land the offender in gaol for up to 3 years.

By the way, Poland's pro-pot agitators seem not have noticed that even notorious Amsterdam has started cracking down on coffee houses that sell marijuana and hashish. The open sale of allegedly "safe and harmless" marijuana, once hailed by potheads and assorted anarcho-libertines as something oh so "progessive", has turned Amsterdam into the drug capital of Europe. This goes far beyond hemp extracts and includes all manner of opium, cocaine, amphetamine, etc. derivatives toxifying countries and destroyuign young lives all over the continent.

Language / TYPICAL MISTAKES OF POLISH LEARNERS OF ENGLISH? [23]

To Poles who are learning English as a foreign lnaguage and those who teach Poles English, what do you regard as the most common Polish errors or difficulties with English? Obviously verb tenses and articles, but what else?

Life / HATPINS & KEY-RINGS V MUGGERS? [12]

To those expats, esp. females who do not feel safe in Polsih cities, let me pass on the following. A few years ago it became fairly common in many big American cities for women to hold onto long (5-6 inch) hatpins in one hand. In the event of an attack a swing of the arm would penetrate the attacker quite deeply in some part of his body. The sudden stab of pain and blood would disorientate the attacker, giving the woman ample time to flee to safety. Maybe women in Poland might try the same when they have to walk through dark areas at night. Pepper spray is good but you need time to reach into a handbag for teh aerosol. Unless they hold the can in one hand the whole time. As for males, one American trick is to hold one's king ring (the kind that has 5-8 keys of varying size on it) in one hand with individual keys protruding from between the clenched-fist fingers. One good punch can cause a lot of damage to the attacker's face and eyes. The big Polish latch-keys afre especially good for this purpose but shorter car keys are also OK.

USA, Canada / FIRST POL-AM CATHOLIC (?) PRIESTESS [72]

US-born Milwaukee-raised Janice Sevre-Duszyńska has become the first Polish-American woman "ordained" to the Catholic priesthood. The unsantioned ceremony was performed in Lexington, KY by a Father Roy Bourgeois in contravention of Canon Law which specifies that only men may be ordained and only bishops are authorised to perform ordinations. Both face excommunication.

Father Adam Boniecki, the editor of Poland's leading Catholci weekly Tygodnik Powszechny, said Sevre-Duszyńska has doing a disservice both to the church and the women's cause.

She has agitated for female ordinations for over a decade and was arrested on one occasion for causing a disturbance in an Atlanta church.

Food / OLD POLISH FOOL-PROOF COUGH REMEDY [4]

Many people who hear about this dismiss it as an old wives' tale. Until they actually try it. It really works.
Chop up an onion, put in glass a jar, add liquid honey cover, seal and let stand at room temperature at least 24 hours. Use the syrup that forms as a cough remedy as needed, a teaspoon at a time. The taste is not great but medicine does not have to taste good.