Polish Weddings the farce and how much money to give

Ok so I have been to a number of Polish weddings and I have noticed a trend recently.

In my mind, a wedding should be about celebrating the love of a couple and helping them have a great day but I have noticed over the last couple of years that weddings have become an opportunity for the guests to show how rich they are and to show off their wealth to others in their families. Heres a few things I have noticed which seem absurd.

All arrive in very clean cars or cars they have borrowed from rich family members and insist on parking as close to the venue or church as possible for all to see. The girls seem not content with one dress 3 is now standard with changes throughout the evening again (ridiculous). Then comes the questioning of how much you put in the envelope some of the figures seem absurd. I work and earn Polish money so I know how hard it is to earn it here and we give 500 for non-close family members and more for direct line or close family. At the latest wedding, I went to I heard figures of 1000 or 2000 which I simply cannot believe as I know their professions and can therefore take a rough guess at income and these figures do not make sense.

Has anyone else experienced the same? Also, what is the truth please be honest what is a normal amount?

I don't want to be mean but also think that to invite a guest you should do so based on your desire to share your day not on their ability to put their hand in their pocket.

Discuss below

Many Thanks

I put in 600 and a tidy gift for the house for the wifeys cousin. Agree with you. A right royal.........

UK weddings are worse though. You get charged for the second bottle of wine, so you daren't try to be jolly.

What's new? That's been going on for years.


Depends how much of a villager you are.

What you'll find is the more garish and lavish the wedding, the more 'village' it is.

My rule is never to give money, so it never affects me. Giving money is simply distasteful, and it's even more distasteful to ask for it. Every present I give is unique and well thought out, but giving cash is just a no-no. If anyone demands cash, I'm not going.

Polish weddings are simply the best - two days of drinking dancing eating hooking up... too bad most my polish friends that were going to marry already have.. some of my best memories were made at polish wedding


Anywhere from a $100 for not a close friend, $200 to $500 for close friends and distant family, $500 to a few grand for closer family, even as much as $5k $10k $20k even a property or car for immediate family. I wouldn't marry a girl unless I know her parents are going to give us a nice sum on wedding day. Since im going to be taking care of her amd probably the rents too when they get old they better cough up a s class or a condo. And many polish couples go in with similar expectations. I was at a wedding a few years back where the couple dropped atleast $60k if not closer to 100k but easily got that amount from all their guests not counting brides parents. The brides rents gave them an investment property worth atleast 250 300k at the time and up to a mil at the height of the market. They are still happily married but they lost that property.

If you give less than $100 (300 to 400 zs) don't even bother going because everyone will find out you're a cheapskate


Not at all in Poland. Actually it's been custom for ages to give cash or cash equivalent. It is okay to.give a present for the house like an expensive flatware set. What would be prosto z wiochy or wiesniackie would be gifting a whirpool washer or some appliance... although it does happen still sometimes...

Back in the prl days and early 90s gifting crystal was extremely popular but is rarer now..

I've been to a Russian wedding where quite a few people gifted gold bullion but I never seen that before in Poland or in us/uk/germany amongst polish community

I love going to Polish weddings as well, what a blast!

Are they the same in Chicago, compared to Poland? I cant imagine it being much different?


People might see you as the freeloading villager that doesn't even give enough cash to cover his dinner and drinks...geez!

Do tell us about your thrifty gifts, are they made by 4 graders?


Im more prone to believe the larger cash gifts are in the USA rather than Poland, with their low paying salaries and high cost of living. Post #3 is a perfect example of this.

One the other hand. Polish immigrants that didn't have much money before he came to America are lot more generous after they are making the big $$$$

I think some ppl like to show off after they have become successful and really dont see a problem with it either. If it makes them happy to share their good fortune????

Na Zdrowie:):)

**** ya - I'd say theyre just as crazy maybe even more so since a lot of Poles have money here.

Whenever I think of Polish weddings I think of a part of 'To My Polacy'

Parody, but still is pretty accurate especially the older/village style Poland

youtube.com/watch?v=XcQdJyo1B-8

**** I remember back in the day when they'd play all these crazy games. And in many cases they still do. Russian and Ukrainian weddings are similar. I think still think PL weddings are better. Russians do the same kind of **** with like


Yes but not only. Many Poles have gone to USA, UK, Germany etc for work and bring their money back. Those remittances honestly do more for the average Pole than EU funds - which aside from slightly better roads (but still sh1t compared to the west or even big Asian cities) most don't really benefit. Some 20 30 years ago many even worked in places like Iraq, Libya and quite a few in Australia and S. Africa. When a husband sends his wife back even $2k a month that's like double the national average.


That's one thing - Poles are always very hospitable and many are generous - provided they feel like you're a true friend

Shows how little you know about Poland.


Poor guy, you really have no experience with Poland whatsoever. The circles I move in don't need cash, they look for something more personal and thoughtful. They've got plenty of money, so why do they need more? The last present I gave was a piece of art by an up-and-coming Katowice artist who already has had several exhibitions to her name. You know, a cultured present, based on my knowledge of the Polish art scene. I could have given the same amount in cash, but it would have been seen as cold and crude.

You might think that money is everything, but then again, I doubt you've got much of it in your life, so that explains why you think about money constantly.

My first one was at the Grota by Belmont/Central every table had a bottle of Vodka and when we emptied them, refilled instantly. I think we went through 8 bottles just at our table and they wouldn't give me any beer. I remember waking up in the middle of the night to use the bathroom and I walked right into a wall, Bam! I had a big bump on my head along with a huge hangover! lol

I lived on the 3rdFL in River Grove at the time and in morning my landlord from Warsaw asked me. *&^% was all that noise last night!!!!

I replied: "I went to my first Polish wedding last night"

He just looked at me and with a look of understanding and started laughing, Hahahaha its OK!!


Ya, a bunch of low paid expat English language teachers in Poland..LOL

Are they awake at 1:00am on a Wednesday night posting about weddings or do they really have jobs?


Thats why ppl ask questions on a forum stupid. Just because you currently live in Poland and have some streets memorized really doesnt mean much at all.

Are you even Polish at all?

You seem obsessed with money, is it because you don't have much of it in your life? Do you find yourself burning with rage that other people are successful in life and you failed miserably? It's okay son, I understand. Now get back to the welfare line, LOL!


You see, when you work, you have a thing called "paid holidays". Oh wait, you're in the US, you don't have such things LOL!

Im not the one here complaining about having to give money at a wedding, geez!


Ive offered to compare apples to oranges with you before, but we both know how humiliated you would be.

Im coming to Poland in September with my beautiful Polish wife and yes she still is a Polish citizen and her family has political connections.

When I get back to Poland, Ill be sure to pass on all the derogatory posts your have made about Poles in the past and see what they have to say.

How come you dont have Polish citizenship yet?

You have never lived in Poland so you know the square root of **** all, and ignorantly think of observations of life here as being negative all the time. What have you contributed? This is everything that is wrong about Polonia. You think you somehow belong. Only in the heart.

And actually Delph is spot on about the money thing. It is a simplistic way out - probably very acceptable in the past, but here's the thing.

In communist times, when you found something wonderful - hand made for example, it was a pretty unique gift, and showed that you really cared. I still have the trenchcoat that my wife bought me as a wedding gift. Made in St Petersburg. Nothing of comparable quality around today.

And we all have married beautiful Polish women ( would anybody marry an ugly person, unless they were very unlucky like Pierre Bezuchow in "War and Peace"?) so that's nothing to brag about, and neither is the money thing.

If we had received more gifts at our Big communist Polish wedding in downtown Katowice then we would still have them. Instead we had a lot of envelopes, and we had to spend the money damn quick on Georgian champagne and smoked eel. Pity.

If 2 people are attending the whole wedding, i.e. the church and then the reception then the expected amount would be somewhere between 500 pln to 1,000 pln.

I for one never touch money. I have soooooo much money I dont even need to think about how much money I have, I have people to do that for me. In fact, if someone even says the word money around me, I slap their dirty mouth....

That's the point of many proper polish weddings. Think of it as a cover charge no different than a Nye party. Guests expect 2 says of partying dancing drinking good food etc and pay for it via a gift, oftentimes cash, to the couple.


It is true. They really don't make certain things like they use to. Back then things were quality and there was a sense of pride in creating items. Not anymore. With the exception of custom suits or rolls royces everything is cheap and made to order and if it isnt its ridiculously expensive. Amd even watches that cost more than most cars have a few hundred in materials and are mass produced. But yeab some of.my favorite coats are yesrs if not decades old.

One thing I have noticed since the old.days is people don't gift crystal to the couple anymore.

I gave something like that to friends - they drink a vast amount of wine, so I got some wine glasses made for the couple by a glassmaker. The date of their wedding was etched onto the bottom of the glass, and they were specifically made for Burgundy wine. Not cheap, but they were a quality product and they've had a lot of use out of the glasses.

Very nice present. Good set of cuttlery is ok too.

Yeah those types of gifts imo are the best. I usually gift something decorative or commemorative and some cash - usually $200 $300 in US. In Poland generally 400 500 zsb

Minus some exceptional character traits Would recommend sth practical and durable i.e. pizza baking stone plate. Cause
"something decorative or commemorative" you may get startled to find in a junk shop, a few years after the wedding.

I always give towels ,sometimes it doesn;t cost you anything if you pinch them from the hotel you were staying at the night before.

Lol dolno...

Yea I usually take a few towels esp hand towels too... if I know they wint charge my cars for it though... One place I stayed at had a sign saying $12 a towel if you swipe one... I was like FTS!

If you are indeed the kind, you may garnish your bounty basket with mini shampoo flasks and bog rolls nicked from hotels you stayed at along the way. This will save the happy couple guessing your nationality..

They would catch on if I went over the top with the signature bog rolls, on the other hand if I stayed at a hotel that had the same insignia as the married couple, I would be praised for the personalised gift carrying the couples initials.