Work / Polish Canadian ESL job/student advice [78]


I would actually tend to agree with that. With a BA in linguistics and being a native speaker of English, she really doesn't need a further English qualification. If anything she needs to improve her Polish and as you suggest, combine that with a technical subject. However she sounds like an 'arts' type of person, what with the Yoga and the free spirit vibe and all that :) Best of luck to her anyway.

Work / Polish Canadian ESL job/student advice [78]

I have to say Jon that I agree with Dominic that a field of specialization is very important. My own sister has worked as a translator and would confirm that. Actually there is quite a demand for translators in software localization and information technology related material. Unfortunately most translators don't have enough of a background in computer science to do the job.

UK, Ireland / A new mayor in London: opinion of Polish people in the UK? [317]

Thanks for the link Maf. I think the interviewer did a reasonable job of putting the guy on the spot and not letting him away with his comments. Our Islamic scholar on the other hand came across as a shifty piece of work who clearly knew he was defending the indefensible. There's a huge outcry in the national press over it. People are disgusted. A good thing because it's brought the matter to public attention. What we need now is a few prosecutions and there will be a great national will for it I can tell you. Irish people are easy going and tolerant up to a point but they won't go along with appeasing any extremist religious groups.

Law / New law for foreigners : No longer any need to submit documents before expiration of Karta Pobytu? [15]

What is it specifically that you're confused about?

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

Sig isn't Pol-Am which makes it even worse! I really don't know why Americans concern themselves so much about Europe. They'd be better off sorting out the mess in their own country first.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


I think that's also an important distinction, 'currently'. You are an American working abroad on a contract but you haven't lived abroad pretty much all your life. You were born and raised in your country of birth, educated there, worked there etc. I think there is a difference.



Well he's not a guest because he's a permanent resident. In addition to that he has certain rights as an EU citizen and can vote in local and European elections. Voting in the European elections means that Doug has a say in issues of national importance and as a permanent resident of Poland, he is represented in the European parliament.

To be fair as somebody who has spent a sizeable chunk of his adult life in Poland and experienced first hand nearly thirty years of change I would say that he is entitled to some respect, especially from two people who don't even live in Poland at all. Doug's everyday life is directly affected by events in Poland while yours and Dirk's are not.

@TAcitus I was talking about Doug, not Dirk.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


How is it insulting to call Dirk a Pol-Am?? He is. He was born in Poland, moved to America when he was six or seven years old and has lived there ever since.

As for DougPol's competence, he's as competent as anyone on this forum and far more so than some. None of us are economists or civil servants nor are we members of parliament or even local government. We're just ordinary people whose information comes from a variety of sources accessible to us all and from our own personal experience, so we're all equally unqualified to discuss these subjects!

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


This is a statement regularly made by people who don't really know anything about how the EU functions and usually don't even know the difference between the EU Commission, the European Parliament and think that the Council of Europe is part of it. They also couldn't tell you if asked, which 'officials' are elected or how that election process works. So for the information of all those who are ignorant of these facts and don't want to use Google to find the answers:

The EU Commission is in charge of the budget and funding. The President of the Commission is elected. Candidates are nominated by the heads of state of the 28 nations. Then the Parliament (which comprises MEPs elected by the people of the nation states which make up the EU) votes. The President of the Commission is then selected by majority vote. The President selects 27 members, one from each nation state and the Parliament must approve the overall selection. All decisions subsequently made by the Commission and all new laws proposed by it must be approved by the Parliament which is directly elected by the people of the EU.

It's ironic that in many cases those who protest the loudest about the EU are those who are completely ignorant of how it functions and who in many cases have never even voted for an MEP and probably couldn't tell you the names of their country's representatives in the European Parliament.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

You can download for free two very interesting articles here:

researchgate.net/publication/315833692_Zasoby_naturalne_Poleskiego_Parku_Narodowego_a_rozwoj_turystyki

researchgate.net/publication/312499760_MOTIVES_FOR_TOURISM_IN_THE_AREA_OF_THE_POLESKI_NATIONAL_PARK

Of course you won't because you're just an old Moaning Michael.

In some ways I don't blame you. Poland is a very harsh place to live even now. It's fine as long as you're under fifty, healthy and employed. But lose your job when you're 45 and live in the sticks and that's pretty much that. But it's not over till the fat lady sings, you have to believe that it's possible for things to get better and building a factory or a coal mine is not the answer. It's just not that simple these days.

As for the EU, blame your own useless government and your own apathetic electorate for voting in a shower of eejits who have no clue how to budget or make social policy.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

The problem is that there are still a significant number of people in Poland struggling for their basic survival needs and the last thing on their minds is ecology or whether they're being poisoned by the smog plus if you're already a smoker, which many Poles are, then you don't really care whether living in Warsaw, you breathe in the equivalent of 1,000 cigarettes a year or four times that in Kraków.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


Oh dear. I was! The figures are for Białowieża - BUT the principle remains. Apparently there are 150 species of birds including several endangered eagles. You can attract people from all over the world who have an interest in that kind of thing and they do bring money to the local area whether you want to accept it or not.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

Apparently it's more like 100,00 visitors per year.


Here are some actual figures on the income derived from the forest annually. This is from a report published almost ten years ago, in 2009, so those figures would have increased since:

Entrance fees: 100,000 euros
Hunting Licences: 100,000
Horse Riding: 150,000

Plus

Mushroom crop: 180,000
Honey: 100,000

What makes me want to weep with frustration is this pattern of stubborn resistance and negativity by certain kinds of Polish people, like yourself Gumi, who simply want to be awkward about everything and are contemptuous and scornful about ways of doing things that have been proven to work elsewhere. Ireland gets a staggering 5 billion euro each year from tourism and about 5% of that is from Eco-Tourism and goes into the pockets of the communities who live in those areas. Now if a tiny country like Ireland can make that kind of money, just think of the possibilities for Poland.

Law / Why would they make it harder for freelancers or artists in Poland? Taxation. [2]

Rewarded as long as they produced art in line with the Party philosophy. Apart from that agree that artists making very little money should be exempt from tax on their income from creative work.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


I've frequently criticized them for it. The money should be spent, but spent differently on the kind of solid community development I mentioned, access to subsidies and services which make a real difference in the long term well being of society.

News / Road deaths increase in Poland [43]


The Mods moved my comment from a different thread and I don't want it to sound as though I'm defending deaths on Polish roads by using an argument about America. So, just for the record, Polish road deaths are a disgrace and particularly the high number of pedestrian fatalities which are proportionately much higher than other European countries.

Work / Sikh coming to Poland with over 14 years experience in Customer Service and running operations [30]


You won't get a salary of 10-12k with a six month programming course under your belt. For computer science graduates with a full three or four year degree, the opening offers tend to be around 4K. Bear in mind they are also native speakers of Polish and most have basic English too.

News / Beata Szydło - the best Polish politician, world's politicians could learn from her [80]


Good man yourself. That's the way to keep the thread on topic! :D

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

Oh gosh Dolno, no problem. You're a very nice person and I like you very much. We can have a bit of a disagreement about politics and that's fine. I myself have a terrible, condescending bossy boots manner but even if I could change it with huge effort, I'm not sure I want to. It's too much fun :))

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

Fair enoughski. We'll agree to differ. The most important thing in life, I think, is to keep a sense of perspective and to try to foster a bit of goodwill between ourselves rather than discord :))

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

Of course one should have nothing to do with Putin if at all possible, vile creature that he is. However, it seems that where Poland's EU partners are concerned, PIS seems to do nothing but try to alienate them and create difficulties, then complain because they're being marginalized.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

How about not passing laws to damage Poland's emerging wind power initiatives?

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

I'm not suggesting Poland builds something on the comparative scale of Ardnacrusha or that hydro-electric is the right route for Poland. I'm saying that solutions can be found to sustainable energy problems but it takes vision, courage and prudent financial planning to achieve them. Giving people 500zl per month for each child and at the same time, creating a Poland where those children are being poisoned by toxic fumes - well you know what I'm saying.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


Well, almost immediately after the Irish War of Independence back in the 1920s when we were a very poor country we built one of the most ambitious hydro-electric power stations in Europe at that time and it's still functioning today so I wouldn't accept that argument. My own grandfather was a young trainee engineer and was one of the guys sent to Siemens in Germany as part of the project. It cost a terrifying one fifth of the state budget so, it's all about priorities and how you decide to spend your money.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


Dolno, don't be silly. Of course not. But Poland cant' keep blaming the Rooskies, anymore than Ireland could keep blaming the Brits for our ills. It's not the Soviet's fault that Poland has filthy air. Poland has had thirty years and the advice and mentoring of a great many international experts available to them gratis through many sources, to do something about that problem.


They're doing the bare minimum and that's a fact.

News / Road deaths increase in Poland [43]

[moved from]
Well America, despite having half the population of the European Union, has twice the number of road deaths, so they clearly shouldn't be allowed on European roads anyway. There's certainly an argument to say they are statistically more dangerous. And America does seem to produce a disproportionately huge number of weird and nutty people, wouldn't you agree Maf?

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

That's not a very Christian attitude Dolno. I hope you're being tongue in cheek.

And you can't continue blaming the Soviets for everything. They've been gone for a generation now. The present government is not only doing almost nothing about the poisonous air quality - and failing to educate the population about its dangers - they're pledged to continue using coal as the main fuel source for Poland.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


I'm not sure they do. If they did, then there would be far greater social initiatives and other important community supports for the elderly, disabled and so on. And they wouldn't be continuing to poison the people with smog levels amongst the worst in Europe, nearly as bad as New Delhi at times. Really Dolno, the smog in some urban areas of Poland rivals London of the 1950s or LA of the 1970s. And I wouldn't be too happy about their plans for nuclear power either - you could have another Chernobyl on your hands a few years down the road.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

I took at look at that link Dolno. Bit of a mish mash of statistical sources there and some of them a few years old and where social rankings are concerned Ireland is way ahead of Poland. Anyway, the bottom line is that Ireland remains one of the richest countries in the EU. If you look at the EU official stats you will see that Ireland, in terms of GDP is in second place after Luxembourg while Poland is in 26th place. Now if you look at AIC which is the actual spending power of a household, Ireland despite being in second place for GDP is around 10% below the EU average but Poland is 20-25% below average so whatever way you look at it, it's Poland that lags behind Ireland, and not the other way round.

We have also honoured our bail-out debts and in December the Taoiseach announced that we'd be paying off some of them early.

"I think this is a very significant landmark that Ireland is able to pay off in full and early all of its loans to Sweden, Denmark and the International Monetary Fund."

We won't pay off the UK one early as there would be a penalty attached.

Of course we made a complete mess of the economy in the first place but there you go! Life's not fair is it :))


Poland like most of the post-communist countries has a lot of Banana Republic elements to it still, you know it has Dolno. It's unpredictable here and huge, sweeping reforms and changes can and do happen overnight in a way that doesn't occur in long established democracies.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]

The leprechaun economics thing is actually what some Nobel prize winning economist said about Ireland so yes, we are indeed a very strange little country where everything is just a bit illogical and yet somehow it all works anyway. But we did actually have 25 years of year on year continuous growth from the 1980s before the big crash in 2008. Poland is a totally different kettle of fish. I would say that despite its size, it's a much more fragile economy than Ireland partly because it's politically far less stable.

News / Poland's economic future? [294]


Not necessarily. Ireland's economy grew by over 26% in 2016! In fairness that includes foreign corporations but even without those, the growth rate was 7.6%. Last year it was around 10%. Even when we were in recession we remained one of the richest countries in the EU. It's a magical land, how do we do it - Leprechaun economics :))