News / Amb. W. Sobków's response to G. Coren's "Today I am make first column in Polski" [59]

thanks CB88, i missed it in my excitement

his dad Alan Coren was such a great author, i read his "D-Day" article on the 50th anniversary of 6/6/44 and i was laughing so much i couldn't breathe!

i don't think it'll translate well without a load of explanation of all the old UK Brands, i can't find it online anyway

That is a really good reply from the Ambassador, i hope its widely circulated

Polonia / What are qualites of Germans? [60]

Your histories are so intertwined like England & Ireland, theres so many Polish Surnames in Germany, and before '39 the reverse was also true.
its good that relations are so strong at the moment.
I think it shows real political maturity and courage that the authorities in Opole have made German an official language of the locality

as I've mentioned in other threads i have good German friends i find them easy to talk to, and a calming influence on me.

when i get wound up about some trivial post someone makes online, i can rely on my mate Jurgen to tell me to ignore it etc

i'm amazed that some English people born in the 60's still have a residual suspicion of Germans, which i assume they inherited from parents who fought in the war.

my Dad was born in 1938 but was never indoctrinated with that anti-German mindset possibly because his own father was a foundry/munitions worker and never fought. however their home town was bombed by the Germans.

News / Amb. W. Sobków's response to G. Coren's "Today I am make first column in Polski" [59]

The times apologised for the Netanyahu cartoon very quickly, any sign of an apology for Corens piece yet?
I'd love to see the Polish Ambassadors comments, anyone got a link?

write to the times, let them know what you think of them

this seems to be getting worryingly common (anti-polish content in UK press), after reading this thread last night i ordered one of those little Anglo-Polish friendship badges with crossed flags from amazon, a small thing but wouldn't it send a nice message if enough English people wore them?

i'm a little involved in local politics, i declined a chance to stand as a councillor due to health problems. if i get a chance to do anything for the Polish community here, you can rest assured i'll do it

ps: actually may i suggest it may do more good to complain to the press complaints commision than just the times

News / Amb. W. Sobków's response to G. Coren's "Today I am make first column in Polski" [59]

[*************************** there is no understanding of what patriotism is and it gets confused with racism.[/quote]
indeed, because patriotism (especially English) was frowned upon for many years and equated with the far right, its improved a bit now.
but especially under Blair we were told Scottish & Welsh nationalism =good, English Nationalism = bad
our dear old St George flag was tainted.

i got a st georges day t-shirt when i worked in a charity shop, i forgot i was wearing it when i was in Malta, i was just about to go out with my Maltese GF and i saw this worried look on her face, and she said: you're changing first right?

i did, but perhaps i shouldn't have!

History / What do nations of the world owe to Poland and Polish people? [58]

Torun Gingerbread
Przewalski's horse, and the subsequent preservation of it made possible by the interest caused by Przewalski's "discovery" of it

History / What do nations of the world owe to Poland and Polish people? [58]

Copernicus, 'nuff said
how to stage an insurgency, AK tactics were probably studied by liberation movements everywhere, Kosovo even had a Polish style underground state

News / Amb. W. Sobków's response to G. Coren's "Today I am make first column in Polski" [59]

well let me tell you first of all that as a writer he's not worthy to lick his Dads boots.

I've noticed a decline in the times for a while, we just haven't found a decent newspaper to replace it with, they used to have excellent world news coverage and correctly predicted Kosovo. but now all i read in the times world news is the love life of French politicians.

shame on them for printing this rubbish.

History / What do nations of the world owe to Poland and Polish people? [58]

86% spoke Polish in 1910

News / Poland leads nations in raising 90 million euros for Belarus opposition [73]

what do people think of external broadcasts like European Radio for Belarus (68.24mhz)?
i've come to be very sceptical of the "radio free europe" type organisations calling for people to rise up while knowing that no help will be given and the protestors will be massacred.

don't get me wrong Lukashenko is a cancer on Central europe and his treatment of Belarus' Poles is disgraceful

History / What do nations of the world owe to Poland and Polish people? [58]

everyone is western Europe owes Poland a debt for stopping the advance of the Soviet Union in 1920 ,and paying the ultimate price when the NKVD got hold of the heroes of 1920.

Lwow gave us the first street lights and the typhus vaccine at a time when the population of that city was majority Polish.
Poles fought for the Paris Commune in 1871

theres already threads for WWII stuff so i won't repeat that stuff here.

History / Powstanie styczniowe (The January Uprising) [5]

wow!, you can't leave it at that after tantalising us like that :-)
i'd love to hear any of the stories you remember

Language / "Niemal" & "Konkurs" do they mean the same as in German? [8]

it means Bankrupt in German, which would have altered the article in Angora in a very amusing way!

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]


surely i can brand my own country after living here all my life?

as for Italy i don't think its a particularly new or controversial idea that they're one of the most child-friendly countries in Europe..

i had a real insight into how Brits are seen today, it wasn't meant maliciously but it was clear enough.
i was really taken with a cartoon in angora so i used it as my signature on another forum, when a Polish forum member pm'ed me to find out why i was using a polish sig, he was friendly enough but he was amazed and surprised that a Brit would want to learn Polish, he was very pleased but said "you must be in a minority"

a Ukranian friend was similarly bemused when i said i wanted to visit Lvov, i had to convince him by namedropping Petlura, the Polish childrens choir and the Armenian cathedral!

re: British ignorance
it almost seems to be that some Brits had never encountered Poles before 2004, i guess i took for granted that everyone had the same experience as myself.

my town is close to a mining area in North Staffordshire that employed many many Poles since 1940, they were just always around.
i didn't meet any Black people til (iirc) the final year of primary school. but i knew Poles even before Mum went to work for some. i probably once asked my parents why a boy at school had a "funny" name, it was explained to me and i said "oh, ok" i think i thought of them like Welsh people, not exotic at all.

there were people with Polish names on TV, like (gardening expert) Stefan Buczaki (sp?) (Cancer specialist) Dr Karel Sikorski and writing in the papers like Nina Miscow. there were Polish teachers at school and every street seemingly had at least one elderly Polish man with a heavy accent and an intriguing history!

my Dad was/is pro-Polish as a result of his army experiences with displaced Poles in Germany and having them around when he was a kid but even before i was old enough to absorb that, they were just a part of normal everyday life. even my maternal Grandmother who to be honest hardly knew what day it was and had zero interest in the world could be heard saying things like "the Poles suffered terribly" like a lot of her generation she could be pretty racist, but the Poles were a special case!


#spot the stupid mistake

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

its interesting, my friend from Latvia thinks Latvians & Russians are Cold, she likes England because she finds people friendlier.
i do indeed find Germans & Finns orderly, calm, precise in the way they use language and that is something i really appreciate.

i had a very positive experience of Italians when i was young, they love kids
we visited Rimini in'88 and it had been raining, but i was a silly kid and went out to play on the slippery wet climbing frame, so of course i fell off and badly banged my head and spent the rest of the holiday vomiting, we went to a little family cafe thinking i had recovered but i started vomiting all over the table, floor, chairs etc.the matriarch of the family bought a bucket and mop and when she'd cleaned up, she bought a cushion for me to put my head on "por la bambini". i will remember that act of kindness and the concern and sympathy on her face for the rest of my life.

i can't imagine that happening in England
i think it was almost worth bashing my brains out to get that insight into the Italian Character!
i think its the little things like that which stay with you and affect you

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

sorry to hear about your experience CB88, but i have to admit most of my online friends are from outside England,(i love talking with Finns & Germans)

i find that British people online are just looking for a fight and the politeness i was taught as a child is just seen as weakness these days.

now i think about it My GF's have mostly been Non-English: Maltese, American, Turkish. wierd

feel free to remind the miserable gits about 303 squadron ;-)

when i visited Czech rep in '93 there was obviously still a lot of poverty but the people had dignity and they were resourceful, making their own clothes etc,

not like the tracksuited hordes of violent "Chav" scum here in England, they need to be kicked up the arse and shown what real poverty and hardship is

sorry, i think its time for my medication, nurse!

Language / Popular simple children's books in Polish? [11]

Merged: Fikus (Childrens book) by Wanda Mycielska. do your kids like it?

I used to know the late author, and i'm really interested to find out what your children think of it.
is it too dated for them or still fun?
all the very best
Tim

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

thanks, are the UK residents combined into a seperate electoral seat like the French system, or are the votes counted in their home constituencies?

i don't suppose there's any chance of Wałesa canvassing in south cheshire ?, we have at least 1 Polish Pharmacist here :D

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

my local news agents are going to try and stock Polski for me, they can't stock Angora or Dziennik because they don't deal with Quickmarsh distribution, so i'll still have an excuse to visit the beautiful market town of Leek

isn't it wierd how the story of Immigration here always starts with the Windrush in 1959, they never mention the Polish resettlement act of 1947.
My Dad just found his old army photos (Tank Corps) from the late 50's and pointed out his highly decorated Polish Sgt who fought his way across North Africa and up through Italy in WW2, the whole regiment signed the back of the picture but we can't decipher his signature.

will Polish politicians campaign here like the French do?

Tim,
( who is happy to be living in North Polonia, aka England)

Life / The old Polish FM Band (66-73 Mhz) R.I.P [3]

Thanks, i always regretted that we were too late to buy one when we went to the Czech rep in '93. they rushed through the switchover ridiculously fast.

theres a bit of a revival in Ukraine because Chinese manufactuers like Tecsun have started making cheap high quality portables that tune down to 64mhz

Pukas in Kaunus on 70.22 must have hardly any listeners because they had a fault last year and radiated dead air for months, apparently nobody even noticed!

looks like Russia will run both systems for many years to come, i hope 66-73 lasts for decades. i don't want every country to be identical!

we used to have big old Unitra valve radio with Lvov marked on the dial, it left me with a deep fascination with Lvov.
it made a loud bang when turned on that used to terrify me when i was a little kid, but the reception quality was amazing

Language / "Niemal" & "Konkurs" do they mean the same as in German? [8]

they're in Angora (in different articles)

Language / "Niemal" & "Konkurs" do they mean the same as in German? [8]

Thanks Lenka

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

you could argue it either way..
the Atlee Government was terrified of offending Stalin which caused them to behave shamefully and insultingly but they also treated the Karen in Burma badly too.

and as late as the 70's you still had stupid stuff like the Labour Government trying to block construction of the Katyn Monument in Cannock

however if we ignore the idiocy at the top of the uk, theres some amazingly inspiring stories about how the Polish community was built here.

there was a brilliant article in Dziennik on 3rd Jan this year (which i should have kept!) about how exiled academics from Universities like Lwow built new Polish

universities in abandoned RAF Nissan huts in places like Gloucestershire, then theres the Cadet school which was moved from Palestine to Southampton in 1947.
surely all of that couldn't have happened if the UK was totally unwelcoming?

UK, Ireland / How might Britain`s withdrawal from EU affect Poles there and here? [474]

fwiw i am European & English i just don't like what the EU has become, my happiest times were in Europe, i love Germany & Germans

I tried to emigrate to Malta in '09

i don't need to be in a political union with Germany, Poland etc even though i love them.
but i do feel strongly that there is such a thing as a european Identity that includes Ukraine and other non-eu states


using mostly free resources online like family search i'm back to 1275/1750/1575 (norman/viking)on my mothers side 1530 (English/Welsh/Irish) on my Dads side ;-)

phrases like "pure bloodline" scare me.. no English person has a pure bloodline even ones as spectacularly in-bred as me ;-) (i suspect mum & Dad share a common ancester)

my family tree is pretty typical for an English person and bloody boring,i keep hoping to find a Kazakh herdsman or something but there weren't many in Stoke on trent!

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

cool, i didn't know about the DAB station, i guess its a start. but PRL is a rather unfortunate set of initials! ;-)

i once met a Welsh woman on holiday who was at a train station in Slovenia, so she thought she'd shout something really obscene since nobody would understand, but the reply came back : same to you Mrs!

yes pity about the music, Znad Wili is the same.
but the news was interesting to me, Belarus is never reported here

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

35,000 is a nice surprise, good luck to them keeping their traditions alive.
my Dads great grandmother was Welsh (b1842), that sounds quite distant but when he was growing up in the 1940's there were still some Welsh words used in his home related to food etc.

have you guys heard the stories about possible linguistic links between some Native Americans and Welsh?
theres a theory that some ancient Welsh Cleric or Nobleman (i forget which) crossed the Atlantic, one of the words they used as proof is the word for Brook: "Nant" (as in Nantwich near Crewe)

we Holiday in the Lleyn Penninsular (near the Polish Retirement village) its the most beautiful place in the UK IMO, its nearer than Cornwall and the locals are friendlier!

if anyone reading this wants a really relaxing holiday i suggest North West Wales, hearing people speaking another language only adds to the feeling that one is far away from home and all ones troubles. if anyone wants details of B&B accomodation in the area, PM me

the BBC are now saying that Polish is 3rd Language after Welsh!, clearly nobody knows what the heck is going on and they rushed into this story without checking facts!

the media are catching up very slowly, Last Night BBC Radio 3's excellent late junction show played 2 polish tracks and advertised the Polish film festival

We need some Polish language radio in the UK, actually we've needed it since 1940

UK, Ireland / Polish is Britain's second language, says UK report [52]

pretty excellent news for people trying to learn it like me, maybe i'll even be able to get the Polish papers in my Home Town soon.

BBC Radio 4 this morning quoted the Daily mail as saying that Polish was the 2nd Language in the UK, this felt incorrect to me due to my experience in Wales. Even in Congleton i hear Welsh spoken more than Polish, not very much but still more than Polish.

when i saw a copy of the paper it said 564,000 Polish Speakers in the UK as a whole , i still found it hard to imagine there were less Welsh Speakers but a google search reaveals that apparently its true, theres only 562,000. (19% of the Welsh Population)

I'm really shocked by the decline in Welsh over the last decade as my own experience in North & Mid wales made me think the Language was in Robust good health. I'm saddened that a language with such an ancient history in this Island is struggling

you'd think with devolution that there would be increased interest in Welsh, i had naively imagined the number of Welsh Speakers would maybe be 1.5 million since its taught in School at primary level.

the government could do some things to improve this, it could put BBC Radio Cymru on national freeview/DAB multiplexes to make it easier to hear outside Wales and the same with the TV Station S4C.

here in North West England BBC R Cymru is available via overspill on 104.3 FM, i often have it on in the background.
Before Digital Switchover i could also watch S4C

My own towns name is almost certainly derived or partly derived from Welsh who were the original inhabitants here, we also have a district called "Hulme Walfield" the last part of that name indicating it was named after its Welsh inhabitants

so i'm pleased by the growth of Polish but saddened by the decline of the UK's oldest surviving native language

History / WAS KATYŃ GENOCIDE? Polish officers were killed [237]

heres an interesting angle on it,
the campaign to restore Konigsberg is citing Kalinins part in Katyn
kaliningrad-eu.blogspot.co.uk/search?updated-min=2012-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&updated-max=2013-01-01T00:00:00-08:00&max-results=17

i can't see how to sign the petition however