History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

The initial drafting of the Basic Law of the German Federal Republic has been subject to interpretation for years, even though her Constitution differs sharply from the US-Constitution, if only in the allowance for amendments as well as the extent to which any constitution regulates which aspects of a citizen's everyday life!

History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

To what extent though does Germany finally "move on" and out from within the shadows of the Nazi Era? Must she continually beat her breasts until the end of time in order to atone for the sins of the fathers, grandfathers, by this time, GREAT grandfathers, if merely to satisfy what by this time must surely be a long-since soured taste of revenge??

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

You want educated native Yanks, you'll have to pay through the nose for it:-)

History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

Quite the contrary, dolno. Poland was merely a pawn in Germany's hands. They were definitely NOT the instigators of mass murder. No, that had to come from a technologically more advanced society:-)

History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

The Germans always get the brunt of everybody's discontents, don't they? Perhaps, this may be their "eternal punishment" for being deemed forever guilty:-)

Pity.

History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

Go buzz off, crow!

History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

I roundly concur with that last post:-)

History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

Can one be blamed for that, jon?

@Maf, you're right. Then again, the Germans have also been blamed for their very economic boom following the War, much of that success having been built squarely on the backs of foreign (as well as Jewish) slave labor!!

Quite an irony, isn't it?

History / For what the Germans owe Poland one trillion U.S. dollars? [299]

Germany has been made to feel of late as though she owes EVERYBODY something!! Merkel has already appointed some type of "Special Arbiter" (Sonderbeauftragter) to handle the issue of funds the German government allegedly should (or shouldn't!) pay out to, among others, Poland, Israel, Holocaust survivors world wide, Italy for WWII, Lord knows whom else:-)

Small wonder therefore that on top of everything, such as the entire migrant business, that Germans are becoming even more emotionally strapped and pushed to the limit than they already have been now for several decades!

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

I agree, maf!

USA, Canada / Polonian or Polish food in America better? [26]

I live in New Jersey and Garfield is a Polonophile's paradise with a Polish bookstore and a Polish delicatessen. Krakus sour gherkins are the best!!

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

As I no longer live in Poland, I couldn't say for sure.
Whatever their regional "accent" though, just make sure they're NATIVE speakers of the language they're teaching and not some cheap facsimile thereof:-)

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

Still lookin', but what I see, I don't like, that's the difference. One can accept without acknowledging.

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

You've yet to produce a shred of evidence to support your claim, you realize.

Not entirely to blame, roz. Ever since Woodstock, the US has promoted "Do your own thing!", not necessarily the RIGHT thing:-)
Compare how average teens spoke before '68 and today. It's not about different slang, allusions, etc. It's about the difference between:

Kid: Boy, were ya scared? (1958)

Kid: Were you, like ahmm, like scared? (2017)

And the latter's no doubt a hedge-fund mogul's son!

Same sentence fifty-odd years ago, ZERO GRIT!!!

Language, like nature's landscape, knows no real age, roz. Good language, like a view of the Tetons, is timeless:-)

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

Rest my case. You read it here, folks.

NEXT!!!

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

All depends on one's sense of standard as well as general expectation, roz. Since English is, once again, pluracentric, the result (above all, nowadays - ahh me, for the good old days of CBS in the '60's when announcer Jon Stephenson would correctively re-cast a foreign interviewee's English - deftly, seamlessly, unflappably, yet ever so soundly!) has been that it has turned into a kind of universal nurf ball, a helpless pin cushion into which the needles of abuse and misuse are all too merrily jabbed, sadistically and without mercy, more often than not, without a clue:-)

Walter Cronkite, Gil Noble, Eric Severeid, Jon Stephenson, and Charles Collingwood, where art thou, when thy reign is so desperately needed?

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

I'd have somehow felt cheated if I'd had anybody other than a true native-speaking Pole teach me the language.

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

...while you're at it, remove all verbal aspects and counting "quirks" from the Polish language! They mess us poor foreigners up somethin' fierceLOL

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

While I'd have to agree with you here, if only based on my own experience studying high school French with Mme.Osborn (from Athens, Georgia, but one HELL of a grammarian!!!), as regards the ins-and-outs of a language, not to mention the subtleties of accent etc. even the great Mme Osborn had to bow to her French-born and bred colleague, Monsieur Cabeau from Toulouse (admitting his own "francais de langue d'oc").

:-)

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

Hey, I'm not expecting foreign-born/trained English instructors to be double-agents, able to be remain indistinguishable from an English native speakers!!
That's clearly nonsense.

I do though expect a degree of modesty on the part of a foreign-born English teacher when in the presence of an educated native English speaker:-) Just sometimes, the native might actually know betterLOL

A little parity, that's all I ask!

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

True enough. I'm only concerned in as far as some school/teachers might actually adopt the attitude that the accent of the teacher is unimportant in the long run; their students wouldn't know the difference or care anyhow.

Ever since the end of the '60's, there's been this ridiculous notion afoot that structure and proscriptive standard are somehow "bad" and that"freedom of expression" (however blatantly, even blithely offensive or disrespectfully vulgar) is somehow "good".

Travel / Question about the Rynek and City of Wroclaw [15]

Not surprising at all, Dirk!

Just look at what's become of Prague's Vaclav Nemesti.

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

If believing that standard pronunciation, be it US standard, UK standard etc. (English is pluracentric, after all) is somehow out of date makes me "old-fashioned" and "provincial", then I proudly plead GUILTY AS CHARGED!!

So long as any language variants are prefaced as such, e.g. a German teacher with a Viennese accent, an English teacher with a Scots intonation etc. I have no problem whatsoever:-)

Not ALL rules however are made to be broken.

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

Oh, believe me, I have. And once moved, saw the decay of much current "standard", therefore, decided to move right back to greener pastures.

Does nature make one out of date for not preferring urban blight??
LOL

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

Standard or "neutral" English is preferrable, and that of course includes the absence of ANY "strong" or decided US or English accents as well.

Travel / Question about the Rynek and City of Wroclaw [15]

Yep, the Black Market (Czarny Rynek) is still alive and well, don't let any Pole tell you different!

Study / Studying English in Krakow, private tutors, schools or universities [49]

Make certain that your teachers are either native-English speaking Brits, Canadians, or Americans!

Study / Lodz, new international school for kids? [22]

Three cheers and good luck, then!

Work / Teaching Mandarin in Poland [10]

I can imagine! How could you even understand their English filtered through your Polish accent?

Work / Teaching Mandarin in Poland [10]

Although most will prefer to use English when dealing with either China or Taiwan, the smart ones will do their level best to learn at least "survival" Chinese, above all the business language of China, Mandarin:-)