Food / Making American cheeses (Polish and EU ones are terrible!) [100]


I doubt anyone is jealous of plastic processed "cheese" and "cheese" that comes out of a can. We eat real food here, not stuff mass produced in factories. Try coming to Europe sometime, we can introduce you to small scale cheese makers, and you can accompany it with bread produced by small bakeries and wash it down with local wines. Even Poland has some excellent wines on offer.


Keep on eating canned cheese!

I don't doubt that America has great products available that are comparable to what Europe has, but there's also a tremendous amount of utter garbage on your shelves.

Food / Making American cheeses (Polish and EU ones are terrible!) [100]




This is a particular foul example of the kind of "cheese" you can find in the US.

News / How will BREXIT affect the immigrants in UK and Poland. [1114]


I think you're right, sad as it is. There's a lot of low level racism aimed at them, including a friend of mine who is always met with surprise when people discover that she's Polish and working in a pretty high powered job.

Food / Making American cheeses (Polish and EU ones are terrible!) [100]


That's what he was referring to. The nasty strips of yellow processed cheese.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_cheese

He wasn't referring to cheese made in America, he was referring specifically to this. The cheap, nasty, tasteless crap that somehow is legally called cheese in the US.

And there's no need to discredit anything when that kind of junk is consumed.


I was just thinking this, there's plenty of good cheese available from the counter in my local supermarket to meet all tastes. The cheapest stuff is bland, but there's plenty of imported cheese on offer.

Food / Making American cheeses (Polish and EU ones are terrible!) [100]


I tried it once somewhere in London, and I remember wondering what on earth could be so tasteless and bland. Mafketis, maybe you can explain why your countrymen seem to miss it so much?

Work / Polish / Irish couple with kids moving to Warsaw - finding a job without any connections. [37]


If he's got that kind of background, I can't imagine he's going to have problems. To be honest, he might even be better off just working as a freelance consultant here, as there's plenty of companies that would kill for introductions to the Western market. Polish startups really struggle with sales to the West - I'm 100% certain he could walk into any startup here and get a sales management job within seconds.

Don't waste his time with teaching, just get him to go out there and speak to people.

If he wants, I'm happy to have a chat with him about the Polish startup market and what it can do for him. There's also an Irish guy in Wroclaw that he can contact, who would probably be able to give him excellent pointers.

Food / Making American cheeses (Polish and EU ones are terrible!) [100]


This makes sense, Poland is rapidly getting good at the kind of cheddar found in England, so I wondered what the OP was talking about. Even Biedronka has a perfectly good mature cheddar these days.

But...American cheese? People really miss those tasteless yellow strips?

Love / Urgent Relationship help - wife wants to stay in Poland [118]


Never say never, particularly if the kids are used to private nurseries and a nice place to live. Polish courts are a law unto themselves, hence why he needs to find the best and meanest family lawyer out there.

Work / Polish / Irish couple with kids moving to Warsaw - finding a job without any connections. [37]


In Warsaw, the quality isn't going to be very high for that price. It will essentially be a pretty public school, nothing more.


Nope. He would need academic qualifications to do that, with an MA/MSc as a minimum.

Food / Making American cheeses (Polish and EU ones are terrible!) [100]


...processed yellow strips of uncertain origin?

Must admit, this is the first time I've ever seen anyone claim that American cheese is superior to European cheese.

Love / Urgent Relationship help - wife wants to stay in Poland [118]

She doesn't need to have deep pockets. The legal system is heavily biased against non-resident foreign men, and if you don't go in all guns blazing, you're at a huge risk of getting an unfavourable settlement. You need to essentially get someone strong enough to negotiate as small a settlement as possible, and from there, you need to decide what you'd like for the kids.

Also, be very careful. There's a 99% chance that she will try and strip you of your parental rights.

Work / Salary expectations for CAE engineer in Poland? [7]

I can tell you for a categorical fact that she won't leave once she returns. She might say "Oh, it'll only be for 1-2 years", but then the family puts pressure on her to stay and that's that. If you want to follow her, do it with the expectation that she will never leave.

As for the salary, I doubt a junior engineer is going to take that kind of salary unless you find a job in a very specific place.

Love / Urgent Relationship help - wife wants to stay in Poland [118]

No woman in Poland with a brain would agree to a mutual separation unless she was the richer of the two. In this case, she has nothing to gain by agreeing by mutual consent and everything to lose.

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]


Don't be so sure. They've been conducting exercises near the Suwałki Gap, and it only requires them to seize and hold around 100km of new border to lacerate NATO's presence in the area. They've got the manpower and the tools needed to do it, and several NATO members are unlikely to want to intervene in a small scale conflict that doesn't change much geopolitically.

All Russia needs to do is invade and create a frozen conflict under UN administration. It may not be Poland, but the Lithuanian side that gets targetted, as they've got no real means of repelling such an assault.

Work / Portuguese Speaker considering a costumer service position in Poznan. [11]


Don't do it. Trust me on this, just don't do it.

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]

Couldn't agree more ;)

The logic of Polish right wingers is just absolutely ridiculous. They scream about imaginary Communists, then praise people with open and blatant ties to Russia and the FSB.

Anyone with half a brain in Poland knows to stay far, far away from Le Pen. Does anyone genuinely believe that she's going to order French troops to protect Poland if Russia seizes the Suwałki Gap? Of course not.

Study / How to get into a Polish university? [7]

Sorry Terri, but that's not true.

There are plenty of free adult high schools available - for instance progresjeden.pl/poznan/oferta-edukacyjna/liceum-dla-doroslych.html - Nasze Liceum oferuje naukę bez opłat.

No need for excellent Matura exams. There are plenty of subjects offering entry for those with very low grades, even at the best universities and in good faculties, such as the law faculty at Adam Mickewicz University in Poznań.


Age can vary wildly, it's not uncommon for women to do it later in life, though it's mostly people in their 20's that have realised that they need it. Usually they last for 3 years, but you can probably skip some of it if you have proof of finishing a certain year in Australia. It's not difficult, but the reading might overwhelm you. But bear in mind that this is aimed at getting people educated at a basic level, so it really won't be that tough :)

Law / Poland three year residency [30]


I realised a few years ago about the benefits of knowing Polish. I was on holiday in Austria, and really had a horrible time in the supermarket as I didn't understand anything. I couldn't even buy stuff at the counters without using sign language and looking like a complete idiot.

Ended up going to the supermarket in Slovenia that was about 30km away, and...et voila. Sir? Meso? That'll do nicely!

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]


Meaningless. These polls tend to get hijacked by whatever organised group finds them interesting at the time. There's plenty of Russia-loving Korwinists out there who flock to such polls, often manipulating them with multiple votes. I remember before the election in Poland, Korwin-Mikke was supposed to win as much as 25% according to online polls.


Which is a huge danger for Poland. In fact, Poland should be doing everything in her power to fight against these pro-Russia populist types, especially if they're known to have received funding from Russia in some way.

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]

So you think a party that has openly been funded by Russia is better for Poland?

I mean, you really need to think about this one.

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]


Such an American viewpoint.

Those of us living in the UK remember when terrorism was a constant threat, carried out by Irish Christians.

News / Only 37% of Poles read a book in 2017 [13]


Yes, and so they pass on their simplistic reading habits as a result. You can really notice it among young Korwinists, who appear to be able only to quote from a very limited selections of texts proscribed by others in their limited social circles.

One big problem in Poland at least is that there's a shocking lack of aspiration among the working classes. The idea of working hard and providing a platform for your family to go and study simply isn't there, as they expect nothing from their children.

The ex-boss of the Poznań KJO at UAM told me a few years ago about how shocked she was to discover that schools in rural areas were often operating from 7:30am to around 12, simply so children could go home and work on the farms. I remember having a great discussion with her about what could be done in such cases, as the parents themselves were openly dismissive of the need to learn English, read books and so on.

Travel / Road checks of the Police within Poland on the Motorway [8]


It's one of my favourite tactics here. It takes only a few seconds and doesn't bother me in the slightest, but watching the inevitable idiots get caught is a pleasure.

I wish they would introduce much higher fines and use the revenue to catch as many drink-drivers as possible. I wouldn't have an issue if I was stopped every day for a quick check.

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]


That's exactly it. Even the ECSC was essentially based around letting France use German resources, nothing more.

Law / Granting Polish citizenship by the President (for money) [15]


It's not much of a secret that the whole thing was aimed to give dodgy Russians an easy way into the EU.


Knowing Fidesz, it might be that the programme achieved its aims (passports for dodgy Russians connected to Fidesz) and so could be safely closed.

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]


Oh, absolutely. It should have been launched as a Benelux-only project in the beginning, then expanded to include France and Germany once the initial problems were discovered and solved. I understand *why* they did it this way, but Euro membership should have been conditional upon budgets being approved by the ECB as well as ending the role of national central banks.

I wouldn't cry if the Euro contracted dramatically and left only 5-6 members in it.


Yes, there's a bloody good reason why Thatcher and Mitterrand were deeply unhappy with the fall of East Germany. It all goes back to the problems with the EU - Germany should never have been able to say "come on in" to migrants, as the other countries should have been able to slam the door on the external border. But then again, this is exactly the problem caused by countries like Croatia depending so heavily on German cash to build their own country.

Study / How to get into a Polish university? [7]

Easy enough. Do the American GED - gedtestingservice.com/educators/home- you can sit the test in Warsaw, Berlin, Prague, Lviv or probably even in Australia (you'd need to sign up to check). You can then use this to enter university in Poland. The process requires a thing called "nostrification" - which is a bureaucratic mess, but it's by far the easiest path in your case.

You could also sign up for a free adult high school in Poland, which would let you work towards the Polish Matura, which in turn would give you the qualification needed to enter university, though you'd need to have reasonable Polish skills to start. How is your Polish?

News / Which French candidate for president will be best for Poland? [512]


I think there is a degree of sense in this, but the problem is that everything is based around special interests and compromises. It will get better with the UK gone, but for instance - we're at a point now where we need to seriously discuss the future of the Euro. A single currency without oversight of members is a terrible idea, and it's clear you can't trust countries like Greece and Italy to operate sensibly.

I'm absolutely pro-EU, but I'm not convinced that it is and was the right solution for most members. Integrating Germany, France, Benelux, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Austria and Ireland - yes. Perhaps Estonia and Malta too. The rest? No.

News / Only 37% of Poles read a book in 2017 [13]


It's becoming a badge of honour to be uneducated. We saw it with the last election in the US - people were simply refusing to accept hard evidence in favour of whatever rubbish the media told them. I'd love to say that it's an issue only with the formally uneducated, but the rise of the anti-vax movement shows that even supposedly educated and sensible people are prone to believing nonsense online over scientific evidence.

Speaking about Poland specifically, it seems to me that one issue is that children simply aren't taught to enjoy literature. Much of it is dull (the new school programme is just awful, but the old one isn't fantastic) and exists to bore the life out of children. Memorisation of poems is normal, so how can children develop a love of reading if they're being forced to read for grades?

There's also a very disturbing obsession among the middle classes to regard 'creative' things as being much more important than the most basic skill of reading. I really fear for the next generation of children as a result, especially as children aren't even encouraged to simply take books and read for a while. I did some small research on this, and as part of it, I asked Polish teachers how often they took kids to the library to simply read books for an hour. The answer? "never". With role models like that - how can they ever be expected to enjoy reading for pleasure?

As much as I dislike Harry Potter as literature, at least it got kids reading.

Travel / Road checks of the Police within Poland on the Motorway [8]


Usually unmarked cars are used to patrol the motorway, particularly on the A4.