News / Poland in ruin or flourishing? [35]


Roger's view is fair and balanced and also reflects my own perception of how Poland has evolved. I remember in the early nineties that you could still find horse driven carts in the countryside, now they have almost disappeared. Polonius, what do you expect? I think that for a country that has disappeared of the world map for over 100 years, that suffered a devastating war and then 50 years of communism, Poland's progress has been astounding, and that should make all Poles, whether living in Poland or elsewhere proud. You are obviously an educated and intelligent person, maybe it is your US background and its avid consumerism (everything immediately!) which is preventing you to see the reality?

Life / What are the things which cause culture shock in Poland? [164]


True but the originals are to be found in Germany!

Life / Polish maid very flirtatious? [36]

Tell her you are gay and your marriage is only one of convenience..

Law / Tunisian man got married with a Polish girl. How to get a temporary residence in Poland? [29]


yes, but the French governments have made it a specialty to ignore EU rules and implement laws for political reasons which they know are contrary to EU and will ultimately be rejected (I am sure they can afford good lawyers who warn them beforehand). They take the political benefit immediately and when the law is finally overturned several years later by the EU, they are no longer in power so they don't care. The latest example is a law passed regarding taxation of non residents by French tax office which has just been overturned by the EU court in Luxemburg ; but who cares, it is the previous government who passed the law, non residents do not vote and do not demonstrate in the streets of Paris and now the current government will have to reimburse hundreds of millions of euros.

News / Poland loses bid to built Jaguars and Land Rovers [23]

The E-type was the real stuff. Alas, no longer made!

News / Poland loses bid to built Jaguars and Land Rovers [23]


Only partially. Britain was indeed at the vanguard of the industrial revolution, but other nations like the US (invention of light bulb by Edison) , France (internal combustion engine, photography, parachute,bicycle ), Italy (battery) played a major role.. Even the phrase 'industrial revolution' was coined not by an Englishman but by a Frenchman.. It is true that, unlike the Frogs, the Brits are more doers than thinkers, with the former also more knowledgeable about "revolutions" than the latter :)

News / Poland loses bid to built Jaguars and Land Rovers [23]


A little conceited aren't we?

History / Age of Enlightenment in Poland? [80]


As far as I am aware, Britain does not have a proper "codified" written constitution (ie one that would start with article 1 and finish with article xx). It is rather the combination of acts of parliaments, judgments etc.. which together "acts" as a constitution. Or are you thinking of something else?

History / Age of Enlightenment in Poland? [80]


Indeed; let's not forget that Poland was the second country in the world to get a written constitution (after the US and before France), that it was one of the most "democratic" countries on the planet where kings were "elected" and not "de droit divin" (OK not elected by everyone but by the "nobility", which unlike in other European countries represented a sizeable chunk of the Polish population). In fact, one could even argue that one of the causes of the disappearance of the Polish state from the European map for a couple of centuries was precisely that Poland was "too" democratic given the slavic character of its inhabitants and the difficulty to reach compromises and agree on a few priorities.

History / Age of Enlightenment in Poland? [80]

Hundreds of German popes????

History / What was better in Poland under communism? [67]


In your dreams!

News / Poland loses bid to built Jaguars and Land Rovers [23]


Quite the opposite in this case. Since they are selling their cars in the Eurozone, choosing a country where costs are also in euros minimizes exposure to FX risk

History / Poland PRL era shops in pictures [17]

Similar process in Poland in PRL times.. I remember buying shoes or a coat and going through the same number of queues.

Still exists in a toned down version in Italy, where, when at a bar, you often have first to queue to pay and then hand over your receipt to get your expresso!

Law / Long Stay Proof of Income with an application to support myself in Poland [6]


There is a risk so you better check and have a look at the double treaty between US and Poland (should be available online). The normal rule is that when resident in Poland you are taxed on worldwide income and assets, although there are many exceptions.

Food / SURVEY OF THE POLISH CONSUMERS' CONSUMPTION HABITS OF CAFÉS [28]


Indeed, and no coincidence when one knows that those territories used to be German and that Germany belongs to the "coffee" consuming side

History / Poland PRL era shops in pictures [17]

nice photos Jon. I especially like the one with the caption reminding the reader that Bulgaria was formerly part of the USSR!

History / The story about German- Polish reconciliation [194]


No one expected that, except some loony lefties!


Promises made by politicians only engage those who believe in such promises


He certainly wasn't


He did not make the reunification possible, he jumped (rightly so) on the occasion. If I had to single one or 2 persons who made the reunification possible, I would say Gorbatchov (reunification would not have happened had the SU not been in the process of collapsing) and John Paul II (role in the downfall of communism)

News / Secularism = a dying society. How this phenomenon affects birth rate in Poland? [20]


Clearly you did not know Poland under communism to make such statements. Flats were even smaller then and the current situation marks a significant progress


Yes, these measures are largely (but not only) responsible. Unfortunately, the current French government has reduced them dramatically for the most well off part of the population


Agreed, this is more or less the heart of the system applied in France


Why instead? As explained by InPolska, it should be possible for women to work AND have babies


?? You should get your facts right before posting nonsense. The Turkish invasion was only a reply to a coup initiated by the Greek Cypriots at the instigation of the military junta then in power in Greece, who wanted Greece to annex the island. There were thousands of Turkish Cypriots living on the island at the time and that is why the Turkish army intervened (and no, I am not Turkish!).

News / Secularism = a dying society. How this phenomenon affects birth rate in Poland? [20]


Nonsense. France is undeniably secularised and still has a very healthy birthrate and an increasing population. And no, before you start, this is not due to Muslim immigration!

News / If Poland were in the Eurozone... [39]


Reminds me of the old (but very true) quip; If you owe the bank 1,000 PLN and you default, you are in trouble; but if you owe the bank 10 bn PLN and you default, it is the bank that is in trouble..

News / If Poland were in the Eurozone... [39]


Indeed, the idea was that a common currency would "transfer" part of the German economic strength to other members of the EU (southern Europe) without them having to abide to strict rules (deficit.). But the idea was not not properly thought through,and it is quite amusing when you see that the opposite has happened with the German economy becoming the major beneficiary of the common currency


Not only the Euro, but the whole concept of the EU is originally a French idea (Monnet, De Gaulle). Part of the original idea was that since France could no longer play in the same league as before, with the international scene dominated by the US and the USSR, France could leverage the EU to achieve the same goals. That is why the recruitment system fort civil servants in Brussels was modelled on the French system, and as result France was the country with the most A graded civil servants (then highest rank) in Brussels. Again, this has backfired and today the EU is clearly dominated by Germany.

News / Dunkin Donuts to come to Poland [46]


that's because it is altogether a different product, the real stuff is the Costa Rica one. US style coffee belongs to the same category as US beer, the "washing up" liquid category.. A chains like Starbucks has had such a tremendous success in the US because they brought something which was hitherto unknown, the faint whiff of real coffee

News / Dunkin Donuts to come to Poland [46]

For me, chains like Dunkin' Donuts (or Baskin Robbins..) are a symbol of everything that is wrong with US food. Strongly manufactured, full of sugar, fat and salt, with little or no nutritional value:

dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-3023750/As-Dunkin-Donuts-unveils-new-calorie-laden-menu-health-experts-issue-warnings-fatty-snacks-sugary-beverages.html

At least, they recently decided to remove titanium dioxyde (yes, that's what you also find in paint) from their doughnuts!

theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/mar/11/dunkin-donuts-to-remove-whitening-agent-from-donuts

News / If Poland were in the Eurozone... [39]

what do you mean by " done the austerity thing already" Jon? Poland has not been in recession since the financial crisis and, unlike eg Latvia, did not have to sack thousands of civil servants and reduce by 25% the salaries of those who remained. However if you are referring to the communist period and following this the " Balcerowicz" years, yes, I agree, this was real austerity. Reminds me of an interview I read in the French economic daily" les Echos" some five years or so ago. The French journalist was asking the then Prime Minister of Latvia (now in Brussels) how he had managed to push through such drastic measures ('austerity') when in France the government could not do 10% of what he did without having half the country taking to the streets. The reply was swift: " because you call this austerity?? I don't .. Communism, that was real austerity". Sums it up well, doesn'it?

News / If Poland were in the Eurozone... [39]


Yes, but if they had left and had to introduce, let's call it the new drachma (NDR), the country would have regained some competitiveness through devaluation. That is all the more important since one of the main planks of their economy is tourism, and lower prices have a direct impact on the numbers visiting. OK, all imports, including BMWs and Mercedes, would have suddenly become much more expensive, meaning fewer imports but also more exports and in the long run a positive impact on trade deficit.

I cannot resist the pleasure of quoting the below sentence:
"The decision to suspend Greece from the common currency became inevitable when it emerged that Athens had fiddled with the accounts yet again amid chronic economic weakness, forfeiting what credibility in the international arena it still had left..."

A good description of the current situation one might say.. Not quite so.. This relates to the expulsion of Greece from another monetary union more than 100 years ago, in 1908 (Latin Union) when the Greek state, which was at the time already in dire straits started to debase the common currency by reducing the amount of gold in the coins they were minting..

mostlyeconomics.wordpress.com/2012/05/24/when-greece-exited-from-latin-american-union-in-1908/

Plus ça change...

Real Estate / Poland: Swiss Franc loans come back to bite [37]

Got mine from KB but that bank no longer exists per se, it is part of BZ WBK, itself a part of Santander

News / Pope Francis' anti-Polish encyclical? Criticism of coal burning in Poland. [67]

I beg to differ.

In my book, one of the biggest problems humanity has to face today is the lack of common project/dream to look forward to. The only thing politicians/government propose nowadays is to make sure that GDP continues to grow a few percent every year and that standards of living improve. I am not saying this is a bad thing (if only for the millions of people who are unemployed), quite the contrary, but there is nothing inspiring in that . Compare that to the Renaissance when new worlds were discovered or even to the 60s when everyone got up in the middle of the night to watch the first man on the moon (I was a kid by then).

We all know that the Earth will disappear in a few billion years. All that ecology can do is to delay the time when Earth becomes inhabitable, but it cannot change the fact that one day our planet will be engulfed by the sun. So shouldn't our governments be busy trying to put a manned expedition to Mars, as a first step to further reaches? I might be naive , but incidently I do think that this will help solve issues like terrorism, by having all of us focus on what we have in common ( we are all humans and have a common destiny) as opposed to what our differences are.

Food / Food shop of choice in Poland for foreign nosh? [22]


Definitely not an acquired taste, I have never found a fan outside of the British isles

Food / Food shop of choice in Poland for foreign nosh? [22]


LOL!