News / Polish police chief removes crosses [250]

When we drive around I am regularly struck by the thought that a huge amount of money has been sunk into the God Bunkers. The modern churches are - can only be - the work of an organisation with too much money and power.

There should be no place for religion in politics, schools, policing. All religions claim supremacy, so how can one religion be allowed to claim a supremacy in government and education? And priests and nuns should be kept away from children

Life / Going to Poland in a hijab - Polish people and Islam [154]

I hate the need people have to thrust their religion at other people. If you wanna look dowdy and wear a headscarf, do it, but don;t expect sympathy because it's your "religion"

Religion - it exists to gain power and money and to keep the people in their place

Life / An Indian wants to convert to Christianity in Poland [60]

Walk away from all religions. They are nothing but a means to control people, amass wealth and power and to provide a crutch for the weak-willed.

There needs to be only one item of faith - do no harm to anyone - same applies for law.

Real Estate / Day of exchange of contracts with property sellers in Poland [12]

Sounds to me like they're stringing you along. We'd told our vendors to move what they wanted out of the house before we went to the lawyers, so money changed hands, keys went the other way, and we had the house and all they left in it. Vacant possession, in other words. Next time we saw the vendor was when they popped in for a coffee and to see how we were doing.

And why would they need two weeks to more their clothes out? Suggest that if they need somewhere to live for ("a minimum of") two weeks they find a hotel or some accomodating relatives. Otherwise, how can you be sure they'll EVER move out?

UK, Ireland / Western Europe is not Paradise after all (Polish doctors in the UK more popular) [75]

North Middx Hospital, July to October 2007, Jon. You could even check out the written statements I was asked to give about one nurse who mis-treated an Irish guy in the bed opposite. The poor guy next to me was not in his right mind, I guess. He'd get up and trail poo across the ward floor, fall to the floor and not be able to get back onto his bed and when they forgot to put the sides up, he'd fall out. Then there was the guy whose sons brought in food from outside evey few days and he hid it until he wanted to eat it - KFC, three days old. MIchael, who was shouted at because he could not walk in paper slippers and too-big pyjamas after his illness - I got a friend to go to Sainsburys and buy him a pair of trainers and a pair of joggers and he was perfectly able to walk after that.

UK, Ireland / Western Europe is not Paradise after all (Polish doctors in the UK more popular) [75]

It used to be a truism that if you wanted elective surgery you wanted to go private, but if something was seriously wrong, the NHS was the place to be. I'm sadly sure that's no longer true.

I had a doctor in London whose surgery was open M-F and Saturday morning. Get there before 11AM or 6OM and, no matter how late it meant he worked, he'd see you. Then targets took over and he had to give everyone an appointment – result, next appointment is next Wednesday, sort of thing!

I was lucky, he'd still see me when I got home from work at getting on for 7pm. But though the surgery closed at 6, he'd still have people waiting to see him.

I was in hospital for 13 weeks and saw how badly some of the patients were treated, and how filthy it was. The old guy in the bed next to mine fell out of bed every few days and the nurses would just laugh and it would be hours before he was put back in. The whole thing was an eye-opener!

USA, Canada / Driving in USA, Las Vegas. [12]

I've only been to Death Valley once, and my feet burned through the soles of my trainers! My g/f refused to get out of the car LOL

USA, Canada / Driving in USA, Las Vegas. [12]

Have a read of this, about papers needed: news.tripwheels.com/2012/08/16/driving-licences-for-car-hire-in-the-usa/

From Vegas you can head in all directions to Death Valley, Grand Canyon, even LA or Palm Springs plus further afield - maybe his flight just goes into LV. Maybe he just wants to drive a car!

Travel / About international driving license - is it recognizable in Poland? [18]

I'm not sure here youre from Thing. As a Brit living in Poland, I just have to renew my UK licence as and when the photo needs changing (10 years). But if you're from outside the EU, you need your local license and an international licence to drive most places in Europe.

Sorry Foreigner4, but insurance has nothing to do with the IDD - it's enough to rtake yourself and your local licence to an office of your country's authorised issuer and thery'll give you an IDD for a moldest fee - see here the AAA site:

aaa.com/vacation/idpf.html

Wherever you live, i9t wil most likely be one or more of the local motoring organisations.

News / Restoring the Port of Elbląg? [113]

Dunno where the figures come from, but Wikipedia quotes 1km and 50 million PLN. Those sound such small figures someone would surely have taken a punt if they thought there was the smallest business case?

Law / UK National Insurance and Polish ZUS and tax issues [11]

As Jon says, the UK has several categories of national insurance contribution, one of which is Class 3 - voluntary.
This:
Who can pay voluntary National Insurance contributions while abroad?

If you want to pay voluntary National Insurance contributions while abroad, either of the following conditions must apply:

you must have lived in the UK for a continuous three-year period at any time before making your payments
before you went abroad, you paid National Insurance contributions for three years or more

There are other criteria you will need to meet, depending on the class of contribution you want to pay. These are covered in the section 'What class of contribution to pay' below.

Comes from the HMRC website, specficially here : hmrc.gov.uk/ni/volcontr/abroad.htm

You can't transfer contributions, as such. They're only effectively another tax, but one which at least buys you credits towards a fututre UK pension. Look, though, at reciprocal agreements. Also, check whether or not you were liable for UK NICs, not that you just paid them by your employer's mistake.

Travel / Rail Travel in Poland - getting to Zakopane from Krakow Airport [14]

Strange that you call yourself Barbara on Trip Adviser .....

Travel / Car insurance (drive) between UK and Warsaw? [3]

Whatever you do, check the fine print. EG, although UK policies cover a holiday in Europe, they will only give full cover for a short time. Once you go over that you're on bare bones cover - like third party ONLY, even if you bought fully comp.

Travel / Train from UK to Poland... How to do it? [8]

Merged: Letting the train take the strain (Best connections UK - Krakow)?

As we live 2 hours from Krakow, we normally fly or drive to the UK. But we've been aware of, and tempted to try, the Jan Keipura connection - EIC to Warsawa, JC to Amsterdam then via ferry to the UK. But it takes the better part of two days.

From 2016 DB will run three ICE services each way, each day, between London and Cologne in four hours! 140mph in the UK then 200mph in Europe.

Does anyone know what the best connections would then be to Krakow? Or to other parts of Poland?

Travel / Driving from London to Poland Poznan [7]

If you want to, you COULD get a very early ferry and drive straight through, stopping only for food and fuel. It's about 1.200km.

If you'd like to stop for a night on the way, I'd recommend B&B hotels, but you can do it in one day if you both drive.

Study / Homeschooling in Poland - possible to apply? [14]

Given homeschooling is when parents teach their own kids at home, what is it you are really looking for?

Law / Bank account - can I can online, without being in Poland? [8]

Remember that international laws exist to counter the laundering of criminally obtained money and require banks to keep on file evidence of the identity of their customers. This is a pain in the *ss if you jst ewant to open an account, but is it something you can get around with accounts in the countries you're based in? For example, though I've lived in PL for a while I still run my UK account to settle AMEX and to pay direct debits etc. My Polish account is just for local transactions.

Real Estate / Warsaw studio apartment for 146K? [5]

In the area of London we moved from last year - not by any means a "good" area - a studio apartment was sellimg for £100,000 up. In better parts of London - x2w or more

Life / Inquiry about prescribed medicines in Poland - Xanax, benzodiazepines [30]


grspring - I'm from the UK and moved to Poland last year. I have medical cover through LuxMed and they have been excellent. I began with a meeting to talk through my medical history, with a copy of my prescriptions from the UK. I moved on to a LuxMed cardiologist who has also been excellent. Prescriptions have been no trouble, appointments easy enough to get and tests and so on very easy to arrange. You have to take your prescription to a pharmacy, but everyone does so that's just part of the process.

One point, btw. Before you can be given anaesthetic by a dentist they'll want clearance from a cardiologist. Simple, but not the first time you need urgent treatment!

Travel / Day Trip from Kraków to Niedzica Castle/Czorsztyn Lake/Falsztyn [7]

Your US licence, passport and and international driving permit

Travel / Day Trip from Kraków to Niedzica Castle/Czorsztyn Lake/Falsztyn [7]


I agree 100%. Plus, if you want to, you can stop off and do the raft trip. Or go on to Zakopane.

Travel / Day Trip from Kraków to Niedzica Castle/Czorsztyn Lake/Falsztyn [7]

I stored some info on this trip here: 1904loghouse.com/about-czorsztyn-and-the-dunajec-river-gor ge/ but I was discouraged by the public transport options and recommended friends staying in Krakow took a day tour down there. You've encouraged me to look again, which I'll do and report back if I find anything useful.

Meantime, if it were us we'd be driving from Nowy Sacz!

Travel / Bus transport (all of them) search engine in Poland? [5]

PKS is pretty comprehensive

Food / Sweet cream like in the UK? Cannot find it in Poland. [3]

Thanks Harry, I'll give it a go!

UK, Ireland / Bank transfer using Euros from Poland to England, UK [7]

You can open a Euro account with the bank in Poland and make a deposit then a transfer to th UK bank - but watch it that you may end up paying conversion costs unless you have a euro account in the UK.

Off-Topic / EM-11C ORKA Polish plane - anyone wants to buy one? [5]

Beautiful plane - but if they want to sell it, they're going to need some better English subtitles!

News / Why is Amazon not present in Poland? [57]

May not have this 100%, but when we moved from London to Poland I left my old home address as my "main" one on Amazon.co.uk and added our Polish address as a secondary one, selected for all deliveries. A little later I'd updated all our bank and credit card companies on our Polish address and in some cases a UK contact address (relatives). I changed our main address to Poland on A.co.uk and it promptly refused to sell/send me anything. I changed our main address to the contact addy with the relatives in the UK and it's been plain sailing ever since ... so, as a matter of course, you may need to have an address in the country before they will process orders, even if you ALWAYS opt to have goods shipped to Poland. Two other points: free delivery applies only for items sold by Amazon, not third party sellers and even if you are willing to pay postage I've found 3rd party seller goods "cannot be sent to (my) country" . Deliveries are by Deutsche Poste, incidentally, to Malapolskie.

Law / Sell my books as private person? Tax question [8]

Very rough ideas:
1. Registering for VAT could mean that you recover 23% VAT on goods and services bought for the business (so PLN 123 costs PLN 100)
2. You then get a deduction against income tax for expenses - so PLN 123 now costs PLN 82)
3. Then - check this - you charge 5% VAT on your sales
4. Separate bank account can save having to segregate later, but if you keep good records, should not be necessary (now if you set up a company, that's different - a company is a separate legal person and you can't mix the money!)

5 If you're gonna do this, you need to engage an accountant who can handle the VAT, advise on deductions and advise you regarding tax payments - once your income stream starts, you make payments on account sort of as-you-go with a view to payimg roughly the right amount of tax by 31/12 (the end of the tax year in Poland). Then there's a final sweep-up when all the figures are in.

Travel / Driving in Poland, are there any rules at all? [149]

Since moving to Poland last year we've seen many surprising things on the roads - horse/carts on a dual carriageway, zebra crossings on a main highway, fast lane become left-turn lane, cray slow drivers, crazy fast drivers. I'm reminded of the first (only time) in living in London for 30 years that I drove my Dad across London then 300 miles up the motorway. He'd driven a lorry all his life - first in the RAF and after local haulage from the local quarry, so stones, tar, etc. He'd always criticised me for driving "right up the a**e" of other cars, shooting round them, then getting back into lane asap. Arriving at his house, he'd said nothing about this until we walked in and he said to my Mum "now I know why John drives like he does - if he didn't, he'd never get anywhere". Aggressive/protective driving, going right up behind cars and overtaking them by dropping three gears and flooring it .... it's the style you have to adopt in and around London, but not sensible or necessary ALL the time.

I love driving in Poland - the fact that the move allowed me to buy a second hand 4wd means I've got the POWER, the size and the "get out of my way" that all boys who have refused to grow up (I'm 54) loves lets me continue to drive "London-style" but also to drive in comfort for long distances (Krakow to London with just food and fuel stops, 20 hours!).

What's all this got to do with the topic? I know different styles of driving, I expect to be surprised, I can scoot past goofy drivers without doing the FSO dither, I'm not too concerned about driving in a line of traffic, so long as the speed is ok - I've driven London to Bristol on a friday, after work, when there's a 120 mile traffic jam .... travelling at speeds between 0 and 90mph. You've just gotta adjust your style to what's going on around you and keep alert .... you're drving like 1.5 tonnes of metal, plus some skin and bones, so if you can't do those things, you ought to lose your car and your license!