Expats/Immigrants in Poland: Needy, Greedy or contributor. Which one are you?

I find the majority of expats/immigrants I meet here in Poland fall into three types:

Contributor - building a sustainable business, creating jobs, working for a NGO/ Charity or providing a service that gives back to society.
Greedy - Only in it for the money, when the money dry's up they will be on the next Plane out of town. You normally find them sucking on the belly, of most tiger economies around the world.

Needy - they are only in PL because the better half is Polish. They always have tales of grandeur,looking for a mug to buy them a pint in the expat hangouts and listen to their lost soul tales of woe.

Which one are you, or maybe you are a combination of two or three?

Contributor. I don't go to expat hang outs. I have a sustainable small business and I give back to society.....but I initially came for the money but stayed for the life.

That's me.

I run the local Language Exchange Club (all totally free), I work for a business that puts the community first (if I was interested in solely money, I'd do something else) and I'm just about to start a campaign for access to sport for all after discovering just how utterly dreadful the provision is in Poland for young people who want to get involved with sport.

(an example - where I work, to hire a local sports hall - 80zl an hour. Ridiculous)

Oxymoron


You simply do what you’re told, since it’s not your business all the good the business you work for does is not of your prerogative, now is it? That puts you in the Greedy category as it seem to pay well and you simply do it for the money, now be honest.

Like many recent Polish immigrants in the UK or Ireland, you mean? ;)

I'm no supporter of expats or the "expat" lifestyle, but you are sadly wrong if you think that all expats move to their adopted countries by choice. Do you think people are queueing up to live in places like Port Moresby for the "lifestyle"?

Yawn.

And what have you done for Poland, apart from sit in the United States and whine about Jews?

(directed at ShortHairThug)


Ugh, I can't imagine living such a lifestyle. The utter detachment that many of them have - yuck.

LOL.
The least you could do is be honest with yourself, you're not fooling no one but you're free to pretend if it makes you feel better about yourself.

Is that the taste of bitterness?

Just because you work for a faceless multinational corporate doesn't mean we all do.

We all do. I have no illusions about it either but the charity work I do for free and on my time.

Except my better half won't let me go to pubs and there don't seem to be any expat hangouts that I've been able to find, so I have to tell my tales of grandeur to the dog. The cats aren't interested.

Partly needy and partly a contributor. I believe my teaching is now at a highly advanced level and I actually say this modestly. It's simply experience, not any special talent as some say about me (I can't think of myself this way). There's my contribution. Needy? Not in the sense the OP outlined at all. I find there are many expenses to cover and I need to knuckle down, simple.

A mixture , originally came here because of a chick. I do live the expat lifestyle, play golf and socialise with mainly expats etc. I would say though that mainly I'm a contributor i own a business which employs around nine people and I'm currently working with a large charity/foundation in regards to helping them with a new model on raising money based on an existing UK model but don't get me wrong if the money dried up I would probably be off1 I don't see this as greed though more a need of survival.

I am not an expat, but I feel a contributor - I extensively take part in the forum, after all.

I once tried to have a serious talk with a serious local guy who devotes a lot of his time to charity. I tried to explain the concept of sponsored swim/walk/run, etc, a way of raising cash which is old, tried and tested all around the world. Not, it seems, in Poland. I was trying to help but this guy just looked at me as if I'd just landed from another world. I suppose I had.

Re: thread. The first and the third. I left greed behind to come here.

This is the thing, just because it works somewhere else doesn't mmean it will work here.

Charity means self help here, guys. Poland really lacks charity shops with second-hand books and clothes etc etc. Aberdeen, my home city, is full of them and you can pick up many goodies for dirt cheap. Poland is fooling itself with sky-high prices and paltry salaries. Time to wise up and smell the roses. Eyes must be opened. My wife loves them when we are in Aberdeen. She can't get enough of them.

Seanus you are spot on, it is going to be long hard slog here before the whole idea of charity catches on. As for the idea of charity shops it will simply not happen here and I'm sure I don't need to explain why!

I think that is a brilliant idea. One of the tings that I noticed on my visit to Poland, was that next to all these schools there was no recreational facilities. I know that the government has been running quite a successful Orlik program, though I am not sure that is enough. What about other facilities like swimming pools and the like.

I know exactly why, EPoz. You needn't explain ;) ;)

well please explain for me then, i'm curious.

and if you believe that modern histororical has an impact on the psyche and personality then feel free to include that in your explanation.

sorry that meant to read modern historical events.

Yeah, the access to sport is really dreadful if you don't have money here. It's partially the fault of the schools - where I am, you're looking at around 100zl an hour to hire a school hall - which is utterly ridiculous. You're effectively looking at having to make 200zl an hour to make it profitable to run a class - which means charging around 20zl an hour - utterly unaffordable for poor kids.

There's plenty available for middle class kids, but for poor kids? Forget it. The culture is all wrong too though - many PE teachers are from the Communist mindset of high performance - and simply don't have any interest in kids who try hard but don't perform well.

Some of us are still trying to acquire your insiders knowledge!
Could it be that there is too much competition from "for profit" second hand stores? I've noticed quite a few of them and my wife gave me that blank stare of total incomprehension (I see it a lot) when I asked what charity they supported.

Not that, simply just the Polish mentality - people will either sell or give unwanted things to someone that needs them - no need for the middleman.

If you look around the world, I think you'll find that the whole concept of charities/charity shop is more of an "anglo" feature ..Certainly, it is not as developed in continental Europe where the view generally held is that as taxes are higher, it is for the state to provide the kind of services that charities usually provide. But things are slowly changing..

But what is the cost base ? I'm guessing PLN 30 for heat and light, PLN 10 for showers and lets say PLN 30 inc ZUS to have a janitor open it up and stay on site for 1,5 hours. Add in a bit of insurance, cleaning materials, repairs (I know some of these places dont do many) and the cost of the sports equipment and you are soon at PLN 90. On that basis the PLN 100 doesnt leave a vast profit for the school. Might not be affordable for poor kids but thats not the school's worry.

Before the goverment provided access to sport and cultural activities , with the fall of communisim this has not yet been replaced by a community or goverment area.

There were whole floors of the palace of culture dedicated to sporting and cultural activities for poles, all provided for free by the gov. When communism collapsed and the chicago school of economics dictated a top down free market approach, all these things were eliminated.

Its not necessarily a Chicago school thing - more common sense. If the state provides lots of things then someone needs to pay for them and when you work out costs of things then they are often more than you expect, as I tried to point out in the example above.

The state was bankrupt in 1989. Maybe we can ask Poles whether they would rather go back to having a good football team but having to queue up all night for cuban oranges and russian shoes. Life expectancy has increased steadily and considerably since 1989 and with the arguable exception of classical music then the cultural scene is obviously much better than it was in 1989.

You must live in a different Poland to me. Loads of second hand stuff here in Krakow, there is shops that buy clothes by the kg for instance.

I think Seanus meant home-grown ones like Oxfam in the UK.
Yes, where I live there are several good second-hand shops. Last week I bought Stephen Fry's autobiography (hard cover, published last year at 20 pounds) for 3.50zł.

In Poland there are many organisations which carries after school classes (such as instrument playing, acting, drawing, photography, dance). In most cases those classes are not free but the fees are often very symbolic. In my school we had physical education on near YMCA swimming pool.