Law / Buying and legally using second hand car in Poland; I'm EU citizen [27]


Silly advice with all respect Roger.

10 Grand at a "dealership" buys you a rust bucket with broken suspension here in Poland.

NEVER buy a used car from a Pole you don't know personally. No offence people.

I love a gamble, but know something after 25 years here. Sellers have a vastly inflated view of the worth of their motor, and Germany or France is your friend..

End of discussion AFAIAC


Yeah, sure. French cars are not made for:

Cold temperatures....

Polish roads.......

Go ahead by all means, and learn the hard way.

Best value in Poland if you must buy insist on buying second hand here is GM group in my view.

Study / British Council CELTA in Krakow, how would you rate it? [60]


Very busy in the last mentioned. Come on down if you are experienced and can get up in the morning and, above all, stand the bloody weather!

As you mentioned earlier DominicB the wind does swirl around the old kilt a tad in these parts :)


I couldn't possibly give my true opinion of the bods who tend to work at the British Council. To quote the immortal Brian Clough "I couldn't describe it in words. We would be closed down David. " (referring to his opinion of the scum football manager Don Revie, in a TV interview with David Frost)

Oh alright then, I will comment. The British Council would not be missed if they all went on a rally in the desert with Mark Thatcher as coach driver.

News / Multi-culti (in Poland) -- roadmap to disaster? [344]


Exactly. Geographers and Economists should state further that the Polish economy is not sustainable unless quotas are raised considerably to the hundreds of thousands.

Demographic time bomb anyone?

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

Well Pigsy - for luxury or quality products - sure - they clearly have a good business model there. But people buy over-priced stuff which is available elsewhere for much cheaper. I guess the Tri-City is a good case in point. The big supermarkets have been frozen out of the centres and the old folks have to shop in such places. It's the old case of convenience shopping come back - I'm a fan of Dame Porter and the Tesco's revolution myself - it's a pity that Tescos Poland sells crap of course - so you are right - Alma are filling a niche.

I just don't like them for some reason. I can smell the pretentiousness - maybe it's the green decor et al. The U2 of the grocery business. Plastic and "cool". I grudgingly admire them, but only shop there for special one off luxury items.

PS Their British "cheese" costs an arm and a leg and would not be featured in the Monty Python gag - because it has never seen a

cow.

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


Best value too. Only snobs shop at Alma for every day stuff. Tesco does a 5 zl delivery above a certain buy.

Work / Advice on Teaching English in Poland [709]


?? Que?

UK, Ireland / Renewal of British passport in Poland (how long does it take?) [27]

The Government has actually been listening to somebody - I can't believe it.

Passport DOWN from 170 quid last year to 102 quid.

I just put my beer down and had to re-focus. Am I missing something here? Does the passport self-destruct at the press of a Home Office red button?

Obviously Dusseldorf has claosed and cost cutting has sent the work back to Blighty. I might even vote Tory! Or perhaps not :)

Still ridiculous and a con compared with the cost for a Polish passport, but we have to pay proper wages to our civil service workers 'suppose.

Work / Thinking of working or investing in Poland (Think AGAIN!) Experience and attitude of British toward Poland. [80]


Loving this thread. I could do with a laugh :)

Yours,

..........Nottingham Forest supporter :(

Life / First hand experiences of the Mafia in Poland [28]

Jawohl.

Travel / Do trains in Poland arrive on time? [38]


There - fixed it for you.

PKP have only stitched me up once in 25 IC journeys north to south - and that was the joke that is TLK.

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

UPS drivers with their own business and empowerment and slaving at Amazon is not the same thing and you know it fStop.

One is honest graft and tax deductible. The other is slave labour. If one wants to jog or exercise in their leisure hours then that is up to them. but to pretend it is normal work practice is absolutely scandalous.

Life / Fresh Christmas trees sale in Poland [20]

Again America leads. What a great idea. Cut your own tree from the forest. 5 dollars. Instead of this farmed rubbish that we get in Poland that as I said, is cut too high, and is dead by the time that it gets to the buyer, and so at 100 zlotys a complete and utter disaster.

dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2871123/Christmas-tree-shopping-Cost-vs-convenience.html

Life / Fresh Christmas trees sale in Poland [20]


Neither have I Pigsy. They are never fresh. :(

If you want a real Christmas tree - a fir (swierk) you either have to go to a farmer and ask for one - or steal one out of the state forest.

The other type of real trees are not Christmas trees - the only real Christmas tree is Swierk - end of....... anyway they are really expensive - and look - well - not the real thing ....

The firs on offer at the markets and stores everywhere lose their needles whatever you do - including the trick of cutting the base to allow the tree to drink.

Also the trees are cut to near the lowest branch.

All in all it is really really difficult to get a good tree and at upwards of 100 zl for a good fir it's a bloody cheeky when you get a dead tree that's been sitting in some holding centre for 3 weeks :(

Nobody complains and so it goes on, year after year...........

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


I am for a fair days' pay for a fair days' work. Amazon exploit. Everybody knows that. If people want to be exploited, then in a perfect world they should be protected from themselves. They will not stay long in employment where working conditions are "structurally damaging" as Wroclaw's post suggests, thus there is high employee turnover, with all the costs to the taxpayer, and the state will have to pay for the inherent costs of their exploitation.

For me, Amazon are unethical, so I wont buy from them anymore.
I have no problem with the McDonalds of this world, but Amazon are a terrible trend-setter for what governments - and Departments of Employment - will allow, as apparently legally acceptable work-practice. IMO of course.

Monitor - I am talking about distribution centres in general when discussing the pollution - pollution form juggernauts, delivery vans and the like. When it is production, and delivers real jobs, and real benefits to Polish GDP, then bring it on. But building holding centres for consumerist goods that are only destined for Western Europe, and Poles can't even buy under the same conditions?

No way should this be allowed for a few thousand poxy jobs.

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


Utter nonsense.

1. It is worse than working in the Post Office or in a factory - where there is comaraderie and banter/ chat to pass the time.

2. It is an unsustainable model and produces nothing, just distributes. Therefore we have more roads, more transport, more noise and light pollution. For what? By your admission - so that other countries can get their post free cheap goods.

3. Again, it suggests that Poland is the dumping ground - and "those Poles will work for less".

Get a grip woman :)


Very interesting. A very pertinent study.


SorryMr Monitor :)
Amazon stocks goods that are NOT available in Poland - yet has the temerity to use our tax money, and take precedence because of the "model", and so compete unfairly with ethical businesses. Of course it damages local competition. I take it you do not run a small business?


Thanks cms for your sensible post.

The point is not the pay. The pay is low. A lot of people in Poland work for low pay - and that is irresponsible of the employers and they can get away with it.

I have worked with captains of industry. They feed me ******** such as: "I could pay more, and I would like to - but the government has this minimum wage and I have 100 applicants for one production line position".

It is the same in the UK - so i suppose the rule is - get those papers people! But then - why are people with degrees working for Amazon? As stop-gap work? To survive? Stacking shelves at Tesco has more respect and better working conditions than working for this scum. What is the world coming to when people will abuse themselves to earn a crust? Are we going back to the middle ages?

Anyway people these days don't have it as 'ard as I did when I were a lad.

Travel / Do trains in Poland arrive on time? [38]

Gdansk to Warsaw a 100 per cent yes - there must be a site that confirms percentages?

Anyway - top graded new line - new trains.........what possibly could go wrong?

Unless you lived in the UK in the last 40 years that is.....

Hopefully, PKP still being a state company they have their **** together. Of course when they float as a private company, then you will have a legitimate question.

TLK is another matter. Avoid unless you are a poor teacher :)

PS Monika... If you really want to be sure then don't take the Pendolino. IC take the same route and arrive at exactly the same time - have nicer compartmented trains instead of the plastic plane interior of the Pendolino, and are cheaper.

You couldn't make it up!

PS I meant that the new trains might just have technical problems because of the line etc - but hopefully Polish engineers have done their work well and the new tracks will handle the technology - unlike the Virgin West coast line in the UK when the original Pendolinos were introduced there.

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

Third world countries mate. I can't understand how regional development boards can bring **** jobs like working at Amazon to a region and then crow about it - using our tax millions into the bargain and allowing the Luxembourg fiasco.

If my daughter ever applied to do a shift at Amazon I would kidnap her and do the lobotomy myself.

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


Watch the Panorama programme then about Amazon. Walking/running 11 miles a shift, under constant time pressure, is taken by some to mean that this "job" is detrimental to health.

Life / What should a foreigner do when invited to join Christmas dinner with his Polish-friend's family? [21]


Yes - to be far to my ma-in-law - she did mellow in old age and gave me the option of Sandacz - which was well received.

I stand by my comments about boringly starchy Polish Christmas though :) Much as I admire "Potop" and "Kanal", I do hanker after the British office parties of the Carry On film series stereotype, where the MD would be left locked in his office all night after his secretary promised to "meet him" there :))

Life / What should a foreigner do when invited to join Christmas dinner with his Polish-friend's family? [21]

Oh - and to be my usual negative self - the OP has to be warned about the uneatable food in Wigilia.

Enjoy the soup (for example barszcz with eared dumplings) and DO accept a second helping. Because that is all that the British taste buds can tolerate - unless you are Jewish and enjoy revolting decorative fish then be prepared to suffer.

Carry a flask of whisky in your breast pocket and visit the toilet often.

Even better - go ski-ing and avoid the horrible culture-bound formal evening of Wigilia altogether.

Here to help :)

PS Only joking - have a fantastic time. As Paulina or Dominic or sb said - no need to be nervous. Poles are so warm at Christmas.

Pity about other times mind :)

Work / Finding English teaching jobs in Poland [19]

Well that's a stranshe thing JR - maybe I think Silesians are friendly because I didn;'t speak much German..
There ARE deffo more friendly than here in snobville Gdynia - and anyway Katowice is Polish not Silesian...

UK, Ireland / Polish Vodka, spirituous - available in the UK? [9]

True - the distilled water thing.

Spirytus is excellent for cakes, when trekking long distance, and also, Eric Clapton style, for dipping calluses in a saucer of the stuff when fingers are sore from too much E string :)

A very versatile concoction and according to Mrs Beeton should be in every well equipped kitchen.

Work / Finding English teaching jobs in Poland [19]

Very interesting report DB. I lived down the road in Dusseldorf and I agree with most of what you write. I liked the bars though with their co-op owners - always good for a convivial chat, unlike the souless rubbish that masquerades as "public houses" here in Polska.

However the cleaning ladies would insist on mopping the floor under my feet when I was stripped down after a plunge in the municipal baths. It's some particular German kink I presume?

Of course the Ruhr food is disgusting and I take it you are signed into a good health farm from time to time?

It all reminds me not to complain too much about the perceived lack of a greeting on the streets of Baltic shipyard Poland (Silesians being generally more open).

Life / Swimming in Kalisz [5]

Horrible. Wild swimming is much preferable IMO.

Life / Swimming in Kalisz [5]

Er...at 14.21 it's plenty deep enough for swimming. Poland in summer is a wonderful place.
**** poor in winter :(

News / Self-important Warsaw mayor [18]


Lol. The huge majority of Poles in public office over a certain age stole from government/individuals or applied loopholes in the law.

The same as Britain in the 1700s.

Get over it :)

Life / Polish post, are they still stealing stuff? [20]

Yawn. People do it though don't they? Done so myself. No problem.

The lads who delivered my mail in Katowice were sound and everybody knew them personally.

As opposed to The Post Office (UK) - which used to be the biggest thieves going back in the 1970s.

PS Took my wife's tablet - instead of my identical machine. Posted to each other (she didn't comprehend copying files /photos etc DOH) and had to wait two weeks, but absolutely ship shape and Bristol fashion.

The Polski post office is slow as fook but sound as a pound in my opinion.

Travel / Best places to visit in Sopot in December [11]

There is no "action" at this time of year, Be prepared to be bored stiff.
I know I am.

Love / How many Polish girls are married to foreigners? / How many Polish boys to foreign girls? [104]

Thank you - but at least I can paragraph, punctuate, and spell. And I never pretend to be anything but a paying guest in this country, whereas that Pole tries to pass himself off as British and garbles some juvenile racial nonsense. . Lol.

Love / How many Polish girls are married to foreigners? / How many Polish boys to foreign girls? [104]


Yes - it's always the "We English" who are the racists, isn't it?

That a question tag, by the way. And it wasn't an actual question, but you wouldn't know.

But you do know that you are as English as my dog is - and so please defer from speaking for we English.