PolishForums LIVE  /  Archives [3]    
   
Posts by jon357  

Joined: 15 Mar 2012 / Male ♂
Last Post: 18 Jul 2025
Threads: Total: 73 / In This Archive: 51
Posts: Total: 24805 / In This Archive: 10045
From: In the Heart of Darkness
Speaks Polish?: Tak

Displayed posts: 10096 / page 332 of 337
sort: Latest first   Oldest first   |
jon357   
2 May 2012
News / Polish politics: Lessons in etiquette [15]

"PiS jest szlachetniejszą i trwalszą marką, niż The Rolling Stones" -

Ad as long as they're around, the voters won't get no satisfaction from jumping Jarek Flash.

I was sat by Jerzy Buzek on the plane yesterday - now he's the sort of politician who's also a statesman.
jon357   
2 May 2012
Travel / Anybody VERY familiar with bars in Warsaw? [22]

I'm back on dry land now and will try and pop in between now and the end of the weekend. It's a long public holiday this week so places are either closed, empty or jammed full of people. Something tells me the pawiliony will be busy.

It isn't a brothel - 'knee grow' was joking. There are brothels, 'gentlemens'' clubs, etc, but not round there.
jon357   
29 Apr 2012
Travel / What's good to do in Wroclaw Poland? [34]

beware of this Wrocław dentist:

She was probably an English speaker and the boyfriend a Polish speaker. He wanted to say 'here' = 'tu', so she pulled out two. But they were the wrong ones, so he said 'this' = 'ten', and the rest is history...
jon357   
29 Apr 2012
Life / You are Polish if... [433]

you own an undernourished yorkshire terrier, and regularly kiss it on the mouth ...

Spot on!

I'd add that you're Polish if you believe the people getting off the tram are actually ghosts that you can pass through effortlessly, and that when on the tram you stand right in the doorway and look surprised when people want to get off.
jon357   
28 Apr 2012
Travel / Nightlife for tourists in Lodz. [2]

Also can anyone recommend any good bars and nightclubs to visit.

There's plenty. Lodz has a mile-long pedestrianised main street, called Piotrkowska - trust me, if you're in Lodz you can't miss it. There are plenty of good bars and clubs there - many of the best through archways in courtyards.

Here's a link: inyourpocket.com/poland/lodz/bars-clubs/barsandpubs
jon357   
28 Apr 2012
USA, Canada / Why do Americans (and Canadians) hate Polish people? [226]

If you're talking about Archie Bunker, spare me the whining - the joke was on his bigotry, as it was in the British show they bought the format of. Over there, some less intelligent people missed the point as well.
jon357   
27 Apr 2012
Law / Credit for British in Poland? [10]

As I recall, they don't hold guns to people's heads when signing contracts.

Unfortunately their agents (allowing Howard and the rest of the Provident gang to avoid responsibility) have a history of not only pushing credit on the vulnerable but also giving cash loans to people with learning disabilities who in theory aren't allowed to sign contracts but in practice often can.

My job for 7 years involved picking up the pieces.

'Oh comrades come rally........'

And the last fight let us face....
jon357   
27 Apr 2012
Law / Credit for British in Poland? [10]

provident.pl

Don't touch them with a bargepole. They are a set of leeches on the poor. It's a scandal that they are allowed to operate in Poland (and wouldn't be allowed in the UK if the last government had got its way).
jon357   
27 Apr 2012
Law / Credit for British in Poland? [10]

There are some good threads on the subject here, but you'll have to trawl through the search function.
jon357   
27 Apr 2012
Law / Credit for British in Poland? [10]

Is that one of those things you have to update every three months?

No. They last for 5 years (as far as I can remember). UK citizens don't have to update anything.
jon357   
27 Apr 2012
Law / Credit for British in Poland? [10]

what do I need to do to obtain any type of credit in Poland?

You certainly need your stay regularised with one of those Karta Obywatela things that replaced the Karta Pobytu. You should also be registered at an address.
jon357   
27 Apr 2012
Law / "Good" Polish Bank ? [19]

One problem with PKO BP is the customer service - it sucks. It's certainly a large bank, not least because of the massive deposits, however all banks in Poland are bonded and most are at least partly foreign owned - - and unlikely to crash. I've used PKO BP and wasn't particularly satisfied.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Teenage Pregnancy in Poland [108]

You keep on saying:

Bye.

But keep on coming back for more. Yet none of it actually makes any sense and you compensate for lack of joined-up thinbking by abuse in every post!

You also didn't answer how you reconcile that as social spending has increased, so have instances of teen pregnancy.

I wonder if you actually think the pregnancies are due to what you call 'social spending' rather than the other way round!

Well enough educated doesn't mean well educated and one would think with such a cornucopia of educated people, the problem would be solved. They're educated to think one way and one way only

That is just bizarre, and dismisses thousands of people in one fell swoop as not "well educated" and "educated to think one way only". Clearly you don't know much about either the education system or jobs market in the UK.

weigh the costs of prevention versus the costs of putting out the fires. Proceed from there.

I would disagree - you don't weigh costs against each other - you provide services as appropriate.

I wish I had been kinder to you as it's obvious you're quite young and, with that, a bit naive-

Unkind - no - just abusive due to having your rather jejeune statements about society (or as you called it, government agencies) supporting teenage mothers demolished.

You may think you have all the answers

Nobody has all the answers - however the professionals you dismiss as not 'well educated' are a darn sight closer than the neo-Victorian laissez-faire idea you're pretending to support.

you're simply out of your element.

Quite the opposite in fact - right in my element.

Tell me, if the state withdraws support from teenaged mothers and their families are unable or unwilling to help, who should provide it?
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Teenage Pregnancy in Poland [108]

No sh*t Sherlock but you asked me what I'd like to see and I told you, so what's your problem?

The problem is that your solution is highly impractical at best and Victorian squalor an misery at worst.

Although that isn't what has happened, I'm open to the idea that it could be done. How would you keep such "things" under control?

Happens in the UK.

Yes of course, it must be those pesky conservatives at the root of every problem.

Pretty well.

Police Unions in the UK would never support anything that benefits them though.*sarcasm*

They supported legalisation of cannabis.

Ask them if they'd prefer to be unemployed instead.

Most are well enough educated to have quite a range of choices - and indeed there is a high turnover rate since most of them can earn far more in the private sector for far less work.

I'm going to do a basic intelligence test on you and if you can answer this correctly then we can continue, you have limited time so don't take too long.

Don't be silly.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Law / "Good" Polish Bank ? [19]

The tokens? i don't know, I always used the one time pads where you scratch off the numbers.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Teenage Pregnancy in Poland [108]

I'd like to see a society in which bringing a baby into the world is never seen as anything more than joyous occassion, always to be celebrated, never to be regretted.

Not so joyous if it's a single woman, shunned by her family. Or one in a Mother and Baby Unit, pregnant for the seventh time before her 24th birthday, each kid taken away as soon as possible after what happened to the first three, or a baby daughter in a culture where sons are a partial route out of poverty and too many daughters are a tragedy for the family.

when you give government institutiions an increased mandate to fix social "problems." Those problems are never fixed and they become bigger and bigger.

You don't do that though. You keep such things under democratic control to prevent the situation you describe from arising.

Here's another real world example for you: prison guard unions.

It's an interesting idea, but no co-incidence that their members are probably social conservatives. In the UK the initiative to legalise cannabis came from the police and the prison and probation unions.

When social workers get rewarded for preventing problems

They do get rewarded. Most struggle under an appallingly large caseload. One file closed is what they dream of.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Recommended ISPs (moving to Gdańsk) [12]

Wow! If I hadn't been at work that day, I could have had it even quicker. Because the cabling is fitted to each floor of the apartment building, all they have to do is switch it on and staple some wires to your skirting board.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / "Protestant" or Non Catholic communities in Poland [18]

I googled it and couldn't find, however I know the priest from Warsaw was going up there once a month. Your best bet is to mail them through the contact page on their website or (sine I think they're in an interregnum) give them a call.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / "Protestant" or Non Catholic communities in Poland [18]

I've yet to find anything in Gdansk/Tricity

The Anglicans have a monthly Eucharist in Gdansk and there are various sorts of evangelical gatherings there.

Here's a link: anglicanchurch.pl
I didn't see anything on the site about Gdansk, so you'd have to contact them to check the details.
There's also: gracechurchgdansk.org which looks like an American fundamentalist organisation. There are also Polish speaking protestant churches there plus the Jehovah's Witnesses.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Teenage Pregnancy in Poland [108]

I did not write that no one is ever helped,

So at least you concede that state involvement has its value.

never claimed to know what the answer is but I definitely know what the answer isn't and reality has proven this.

No and that's the problem - you claim to dislike the existing provisions made by society, making patently untrue statements like

People who get jobs in these areas have a FINANCIALLY VESTED INTEREST IN maintaining the problem.

however you don't ever go beyond that cynicism to say what you'd like to see instead.

If you're trolling me then congratualtions on wasting my time.

No trolling, but it would be nice to have discussed this with someone who is a. not as ill-mannered as you are or b. is able to see the bigger picture without resorting to hollow libertarian rhetoric and bizarrely claiming that democratically controlled organisations who have to fight to get a budget in the first place have some sort of vested interest in not actually doing their job. Odd logic...
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Law / "Good" Polish Bank ? [19]

Yes. You can use a token. I preferred to use a one time pad though.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Recommended ISPs (moving to Gdańsk) [12]

If you're in an apartment building, there are usually stickers somewhere. I don't know of any tools. Aster City is the other main one, as is Neostrada (whose speeds are sometimes excellent, sometimes terrible depending on area). There's one called, I think, NT - but that's only in certain cities. Anyone in the building will know the one they all have and as soon as you switch a laptop on the list of people's wifi names should give a clue. Installation is quick - the last time I did it was in an aster City area and from visiting the shop, I had it all set up within 24 hours.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Law / "Good" Polish Bank ? [19]

Nordea is not bad,

I never had any problem with their internet service - you can do a lot on it and the pin codes are optional - they offer a choice of authentication methods.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Teenage Pregnancy in Poland [108]

Those aren't actual examples. Those are broad concepts that mean nothing without concrete examples.

OK, perhaps I should get the phone book out and give you the address of the local Child Protection Unit, where the police and other professionals intervene in the most tragic cases, the city's Mother and Baby Unit where young women in a bad situation without the support of a loving or responsible family are saved from the gutter and the Street Workers who hepl women who've fallen into drugs and prostitution not fall any further.

But I suspect it would be a waste of time, since you seem to believe they:

have a FINANCIALLY VESTED INTEREST IN maintaining the problem

That is a non-sequitor.

It is entirely true, and you know it.

I am advocating not going with a PROVEN LOSING FORMULA

So tell us what's a PROVEN WINNING FORMULA.

Maybe the problem is that there shouldn't be anything wrong with being a teen parent in the first place. Maybe the problem is that society is at odds with biology. Maybe we need to change how we think and operate. Until then, teen parents are more likely to raise teen criminals

That doesn't really make much sense.
jon357   
26 Apr 2012
Life / Recommended ISPs (moving to Gdańsk) [12]

In Poland it usually depends on whichever firms have the cables to your area.Mostly there's just one firm per area, but if you have a choice, use UPC - they are usually excellent.