News / The financial burden of the SKOK system in Poland [4]


I don't know about their banking competence, but I used to hold training courses in a couple of their institutions, and I would like to say that it couldn't have happened to nicer people.

But they were so up their own arses that I can't :)

News / Have PO (Platforma) operatives in Poland fallen into a panic? [332]


Kukiz? ROFL.
When were you last in Poland Polonius? People who can think for themselves do not want the church any longer to interfere in their private lives - the church is dead, long live the church!

My family is normal as normal can be, from a very religious background, and they only set foot in the place on special occasions, and this may be reprehensible, as alluded to in Sir John Betjeman's "Diary of a church mouse" - but frankly this is the reality, that the church has had it's day. And no one in their right mind wants a lecture from this ageing second rate pseudo-intellectual muso on what is right or wrong.

Thanks.


Wojas/Wojtas. What's in a name when it is ethanolly enhanced dishwater?

News / Have PO (Platforma) operatives in Poland fallen into a panic? [332]


Because there is no pub culture for the working man, such as the corner boozer in the UK, the cafe in rural France, and the co-op owned bar in Germany.

The poor financially challenged Polish boozer is chased out of the flat by his domineering wife and has no option but to stand on the street corner by the bushes with his mange ridden dachshund mongrel, drinking Wojas beer with his similarly down-trodden mates.

Terrible. And PIS will of course throw these poor retirees in the drunk-tank :)

News / Have PO (Platforma) operatives in Poland fallen into a panic? [332]


Actually no - what PIS will do is generally harass small business with endless audits, and bring into law (or back) such brilliant and far-reaching social schemes as banning beer on trains and my favourite ferry.

Also they will arse-lick the coal "industry", or what is (rightly) left of it.

Poland with PIS would be puritanical to a fault if they are given an extended go at it.

Study / I got accepted into a university in Gliwice, Poland! [38]


Nah - just putting Smurf right because I lived in Katowice for 23 years and I am the Kato expert on this board - not him :) ROFL.

PS Joe Cocker played for 2 hours and 5 minutes and it were fab :)

PS Gdynia has the number one rating of any city in Poland but has the shockingly rubbish Open'er - my 22 year old gives it a ZERO rating - and there are never any good bands here at acceptable prices... OK there was Eric Clapton in 2008. EC was there, and so was I :)

But the OP should know that Katowice,and it's satellite of Gliwice, today are better for students than Warsaw for making friends if you are the sociable type, Warsaw being a city that the Germans destroyed, and Gdansk, a city that the Russians destroyed.

IMHO of course.

The guy who is badmouthing lecturers... well, to name names is rather cheap? And subjective, when he is condemning subjectivity?

Real Estate / Landlord in Poland wants me to pay 4500 zl for cancellation of contract [16]


Then she should stay quiet and then change the locks as I said just before the final month. Then if he tries to break the door down, or sends a gang, she calls the police, they come double quick, she cries attack! and the police cart away the gang.

The trick is that there must be someone in the property to prevent the owner from breaking and entering.
Of course in the meantime the owner can get a court order to get the OP out - but this is Poland, right, and that will take ages.

She needs a man around who will front up to this crim. If I were 20 years younger I would volunteer, and offer him violence.

Real Estate / Landlord in Poland wants me to pay 4500 zl for cancellation of contract [16]


Totally legal apparently.

Real Estate / Landlord in Poland wants me to pay 4500 zl for cancellation of contract [16]


Surely not. The OP would then be 2000 zl out of pocket. She should change the locks, make sure there is always someone there, so the owner can't break in again, and not pay rent for the last month.

And get her boyfriend or mates to give him a good slap.

I know I would. Or I would pay the Aberdeen heavies to get satisfaction out of his face.

Real Estate / Landlord in Poland wants me to pay 4500 zl for cancellation of contract [16]


Where do you live Agnie? If it's Tri-City me and the boys will pay your friend a visit and "persuade" him to think again :)

Life / Quality of life in major cities in Poland - cost, culture, work and modernization [11]

Merged: Quality of life in different parts of Poland

Has this been covered before?

Some suggested criteria for quality of life:

House prices
Earnings
Education
Health
Local government
Environment
Local transport/infrastructure
Facilities/entertainment
People (open or otherwise)
Other (folklore/local differneces...)

I'll start: My stereotypical observations:

KATOWICE:

House/flat prices: Cheapish - 3,500 for a flat?
Earnings: Loads of the green stuff if you can do, as in engineering.
Education:University of Silesia/ Gliwice institute of Technology/ Polands' leading sports academy/ number one music academy - speaks for itself.
Health: Blindingly good by Polish standards. If you have a heart attack - make sure you have it Katowice.
Local government: Held back for years by indepentants but real progress today - finally!
Environment: Most trees of any vovoideship but ruined for all time by the Industrial revolution and communist mismanagement and neglect.
Cracking summers/great winter sport. Some beautiful spots, that you have to know about....
Local transport/infrastructure: Excellent after mnay years of serious EU investment. Without the EU the area would now be eating cake. With no bread.
Facilities/entertainment: Tennis central. Spodek music venue. Beer culture positive. Soccer. Plenty going on.
People (open or otherwise): Sound as a pound. Sociable, but cantankerous. Vibrant life to a point...
Other (folklore/local differences...): Mmmm - relatively religious as a whole I would say. Loads of perogi and the rest. Ten pm curfew.

TRI-CITY:

House prices: Not as high as people from outside seem to think. 25 per cent up on Silesia.
Earnings: Maritime industry/Off-shore effect/IT Loadsamoney for some.
Education: Gdansk university has a so-so rep.
Health: Don't know. Self medicating.
Local government: 90% approval rating liberal dictatorships. Strange. Must be corrupt.
Environment: The sea-side obviously, though the Bay of Gdansk is NOT the seaside and is pretty gash for swimming. Nice views.
Great forests in the moraine hills. Bloody winds, and shockingly depressing winters. Healthy sea air.
Local transport/infrastructure: Poor - isolated from the rest of Poland. Unless you enjoy a three hour train/car journey. The only positive, Tri-city is not the real Poland.

Facilities/entertainment: No pubs. Little tennis. Arka Gdynia.
People (open or otherwise): No - Baltic people resemble the weather. Bad for Polish learning - everybody speaks English.
Other (folklore/local differences...) Foreign influences. Chinese/Africans/ Arabs. Tourists from everywhere. I like it.

Conclusion: Southern Poland not as bad as it's painted in the media.

Work / English lad looking for work in Poland [39]


I worked on such in the not-too distant past though Delph, and simply wrote "consulting services" in Polish... never had any comeback. Though I must say when those PIS blighters get elected in the autumn they will be auditing your pets, as well as your income :(

Work / English lad looking for work in Poland [39]


Cough....... choke....:)

Work / First English teaching job in Poland (Katowice) [75]


Nothing wrong with Warrington by 'eck! :) Zory on the other hand.......

The eccentric tag is a fair one :)

Work / First English teaching job in Poland (Katowice) [75]


InPolska:

John is a young chap.

The ladies are just fine.
The beer is cold.
The tennis is the best to be had in the whole of Poland.
The mountains are very pleasant.
He can ride his bike in cracking forests and get lost. Intentionally.
He will meet interesting people and teach bored desperate housewives (see first point)

Only joking with the stupid sexist stuff, but I can think of worse ways to spend a few months/couple of years (Crow's for instance in his pariah State).


They insist on a B Jon - or did. I managed to tolerate 4 weeks of my group/ or rather they barely tolerated 4 weeks of me - and I was grudgingly awarded a C for my 800 quid. Plus IH are intolerable young snobs on the whole, don't you find, what? It takes one to know one though, doesn't it?

It does though take the teaching of question tags to a higher, more authentic level :)

No seriously - I couldn't stand all IH's weekly meeting mumbo jumbo and all the report filling. Almost makes one prefer Profi-Lingua...............

Or not :)

Both at opposite ends of the spectrum. Glad to have got away from all that commendable TEFL career stuff and just plodding :) Anyway, no English/TEFL degree or Delta, no real future in that game.

Work / First English teaching job in Poland (Katowice) [75]


:) I must admit I used to go on a gig there on Saturday mornings, after the goings on the night before............... it sure does stink of a morning!

And it ain't pretty Smurf :) The buildings should be condemned, and in Ireland they would be.

Work / First English teaching job in Poland (Katowice) [75]

Yes - and we know it's a slum street called Mariacka. Fine if you like streets smelling of **** from all the drunks and hobos.

Avoid.

Work / First English teaching job in Poland (Katowice) [75]

Hi

Train to Katowice OK. Night trains home too. I can guess where you are going to work (lived in Kato, PM me if you like). Small towns of less than 25,000 peeps are dead after 10 PM - murder if you are young.

Summers you will love, the best tennis courts in Poland; winters you wont like after the first exciting snowfalls. Unless you ski? Other Katowiceans will be along shortly, such as Smurf.

There are certain dos and donts - such as ONLY acquiesce to talk to Polish bill when sober. I leave it to the young 'uns to point you in the right direction.


What makes you think John is American? He clearly isn't :)

Work / Looking for accommodation & teaching job in KATOWICE [78]


If somebody had told me, after 22 years living in Katowice, that TriCity has no pubs, inasmuch as I understand the word "pub", I would have stayed where I was and not moved:)

Katowice people are alright once you get to know them. The best sports academy, the prettiest girls, the most number of trees of any voivodeship (really), and good transport links (which I can't say for Gdansk for example)

The cleanest lakes (Pogoria/Nakklo Chechlo) and good nightlife for the young.
The OP wouldn't have a bad time there because he is not shallow as to drink himself to death :)

UK, Ireland / Polish community in the UK: are you happy? [46]

What has capitalism got to do with it Wroc? Katowice in the 1990s had more Mercedes cars per square mile than I have ever seen anywhere else.

It still hasn't got capitalism though :)
Plenty of Poles are building their future right here at home, and are far richer than myself, though they prefer to drink Tyskie and eat perogi, and I prefer craft beers and steak. Horses for courses, and I am looking forward to Poland's immigrant population building the economy as Eastern Europeans have Britains.'

Law / Hot dog in hot car in Poland - illegal to break glass? [9]


Nah - more work than I can handle thanks Wulkan. But thanks for your concern. Plenty of dog lovers here in Tri-City :)

News / Have PO (Platforma) operatives in Poland fallen into a panic? [332]


He might do - in the US. Please keep up Delph.

Meanwhile - peeps like Polonious don't pay a zloty in tax here so can give an opinion , but it isn't worth much.

Law / Hot dog in hot car in Poland - illegal to break glass? [9]

Of course... and do a Laurel and Hardy on the car and rip it's lights and bumper off. And the courts should ban the person from keeping a dog for ten years.

My dog often goes in the clients' office with me. If the client isin't happy with that, I find other clients :)

Work / How to get a giving out leaflet jobs in Poland (Poznan)? [15]


The land development tax dodging twins... (allegedly)

Happy to correct it for you.

History / Foreigners in Poland - 1980-1983 [9]


Delph -= have you read "Return to Poland" by Denis Hills? He was the sometime diplomat who was famously under threat of execution from his former boss Idi Amin..........

He gives a very good picture of Poland at around that time (ed: 1985 actually) but he did indeed get the tag of Persona Non Grata and was given a week to leave.

I can send you my copy on loan if it is of any value.

UK, Ireland / Why English do not like Polish? [417]


Plumbing?

Law / Buying a car in Poland or Germany? [36]


Had two Clios for the woman. One blew up and the other wouldn't start in the cold. Absolute gash. Avoid. The OP asked about popular value cars in Poland. Can't go wrong with Opel - a bit boring of course but if it's VFM and reliability you want then they fit the bill (if made in, and driven in Germany.....but that goes without saying - avoid the Polish built rubbish)

UK, Ireland / Why English do not like Polish? [417]


**** me! Miserable? Poles invented the word. I used to think Yorkshiremen were dour. But Poles are just ignorant when they set their mind to it. Brits are amongst the most sociable of creatures, if you don't call the odds, meaning - act too pushy at first contact.

Law / Buying a car in Poland or Germany? [36]


Opel - then have it given the look-see at Opel Pomoc service in Katowice, Dáb, and tell them Dougpol sent you.
Sorted.

Food / Can you do online food shopping in Poland? Supermarkets. [42]

Just had a look in Alma again. Ridiculous prices. Haven't got a clue why people shop there. Some of them are older and deffo poorer than me :)