Poland-My 9-day experience

I travelled to Poland 2 weeks ago and stayed there for 9 days. I visited Silesia (katowice, chorzow) Wisla, Zakopane, drove through Krakow without stopping, Warsaw, Danzig and also Hel. It was my first and only visit, and my experience was more or less of what I expected.

The country: Poland is not a beautiful country when it comes to flora/fauna, physical landcapes and architecture. You will be utterly disappointed if you want to enjoy nature in the country. There is nothing distinctive in the country about wildlife, architecture, rivers, mountains or beaches. The only exception might be Zakopane which is beautiful with high hills, pristine lakes, national park, rivers and impressive wooden architecture. The cities and towns look like the poorest suburb you can find in a city in the west.

We travelled from Warsaw to Danzig by train and I was hoping to see some beautiful countryside along the way, but there was nothing worth looking out through the window as the railway was lined with poor,dirty and crumbling suburbs, towns, villages, industries and farms. The disappointment was exacerbated by the train conductor who insisted we pay more because we bought student discount fares. Apparently, only Polish national can claim student discount in Poland.

Warsaw and Danzig have nothing important that is worth visiting. We went to that tall building in Warsaw and viewed the city from there, because the air was so polluted we can't really see anything beyond 1 or 2 km. We tried to use the coin operated binocular but it was broken (it took the coins though).

Hel has fine beaches and clean too. Although another disappointment was there was no waves on the sea. No surfing, no bodyboarding!

The People: People I've met were generally friendly or no different than in other countries, although they look glum and depressed in many places, especially in offices and shops. Normal courtesy and politeness you'd expect in shops and offices in the west doesn't exist in Poland. The most courteous were not surprisingly, employees of Mc Donalds, KFC, Biedronka. Others, especially that woman at Warsaw train stn ticket counter, gave us the look and attitude that we disturb their peace by buying the products and services they were selling. Queue jumping is common (at airport, train stn, tram stop, bus stop and everywhere) and so does spitting in public.

I've read alot about polish girls and boys being beautiful, slim unlike girls in western countries. From what I saw, this is true to some extent. I saw less young overweight people but many overweight adults. I made my own conclusion behind this and I think it is because of poverty and lack of junk food. Most kids and teens here have money to buy whatever they want to eat, whenever they want, but in Poland many teens and young people just dont have the money. Junk foods like Mc Donalds and KFC are out of reach of vast majority of the population. I don't know if this is a reason to celebrate or not, as I believe most people in Poland would rather be well fed than go hungry.

Conclusion: Poland still has a long way to go, socially, culturally, economically and realistically if it want to be part of the "West". The only thing that can rival western standard is prostitution and night club. In everything else, the country is way behind. I think it is not that hard to crack a smile for a change, instead of sulking and look miserable to everyone.

that's interesting. i'm hurt(-not) a bit 'cause i hail from that city. guess beauty is in the eye of beholder? wonder what other foreigners think of gdansk?

ps : having tourist guides dressed in kangaroo outfits might enhance the looks of my city?

AussieSheila - Obvious troll. People - please, stop replying to this thread.

I've already reported this thread to moderators for obvious anonymous trolling.
Let it be the last post in this thread.

where you from australia

ha, sorry, but most of the original post is right on.

i agree with almost all of it.

agreed. there is a lot of truth in the OP's post

Like where???

Ugly physical landscapes, nature and architecture compared to Western Europe?
Bullcr*ap - I've been in almost every European country and Poland has nothing
to be ashamed of.

More ********...


You gotta be kidding me :) I'm not even talking about Kraków, for example, but loads
of smaller cities like Słupsk...

...Tarnów, Sandomierz, Chełm, Jelenia Góra or Olsztyn... I could go on - that look much
better than some of the boring, dull cities in the Western Europe.


LOL

More idiocy from the troll. Overweight adults, because of poverty and lack of junk food :))))


That's a sentence STRAIGHT from the "Internet Troll Manual for PF" :)

Is it enough to put in one or two true sentences about customer service to get away
with heaps of trolling bullsh*it?


"Internet Troll Manual for PF" page 264, rule 71 - always use German names for Polish towns. :)


A lot of truth? A lot of? And that's coming from a fuc*king moderator :)
That's why this board is an anti-Polish paradise for trolls and all other Pole-haters.

Change the name of the forum to antipolishlibelforums.com - that will reflect the content better :)

Anyways - I've feckin had it with this anti-Polish board. This thread (not that bad
in itself) was the last straw for me. I'm not going to stay on a forum which allows
obvious trolling (moreover - the trolling gets support from a moderator.)
This is my penultimate post here.

The architecture is just different. There are some quite nice features of it here in Gliwice, the prettiest town in Upper Silesia.

Utterly disappointed regarding nature? I disagree. Let's not forget that we don't draw cards to decide who gets what species in any given country. Poland has what Poland has and I like the bison here. Many species of birds can be found. What nature do you feel is missing?

What is distinctive about Scottish or Aussie rivers? Do they bend at an angle of 35 degrees rather than 20? Beaches are beaches, they are meant for lying on. I don't think Poles would throw condoms and other rubbish into the sea like Scots do.

Upper Silesia is run down, that's just how it is here. When I walk in some areas, I feel perfectly safe. I can't say the same about similar looking areas back home.

Some are blessed with waves and some aren't. It's not sth that you can work on. It means that they don't get caught by basking sharks like countless bogans do, LOL

Glum and depressed is generally the Slavic demeanour but it doesn't mean that all of them are that way.

Queue jumping is pretty bad, I agree there. Also, old people here have got it into their heads that they are still somebody and I had enough one day. One started ordering while I was in the middle of my order and I told her politely to move back or the next time I wouldn't be so accommodating. She got the message!

Wrocław is right enough, some points were valid. I don't think it was a trolling effort, maybe just that some things were exaggerated but who are we to second guess people, right?

Torq, it's not idiocy. Many Polish adults are getting fatter. I balk at some of the critters on the go here. They are sweathogs, frankly. My wife agrees with me as she hates such fat and lazy people.

Slavic or rather post-commie ?
Anyway I see a bit of generalization here.

Post-commie is better, Borrka. It was a bit of a generalisation, that's true.

I see some masturbation here?


Nature in all slavic countries looks marvellous.Poland,CR,Slovakia,Ukraina have some of the most beautiful landscapes imaginable and they are all different.


Yes,I think the junk food has made the difference in your opinions.

Torq please don't go. All in all, we should feel sorry for the OP. Can you imagine how life/sex/job frustrated one must be to actually spend their time on writing a 1,000,000 words essay about Poland, mostly untrue w dodatku?


Totally agree. There's plenty of BEAUTIFUL, UNIQUE places in PL, that amaze both foreign and domestic tourists. I've hosted many of my foreign friends in Poland, and they were all very pleasantly surprised with the country and the people, and all want to come to Poland again.


that's because the OP has never seen the poor suburbs in America, or some American cities with overall McDonald's like architecture.


You agree with...? moderator, please develop your argument.

• 
  
  

Ah,these Polki.

Torq, Fuzzywickets is nothing but a bitter American who can't actually afford to have a decent life here - so I wouldn't worry about his opinion. He can't even afford to eat in cheap restaurants in Wroclaw, so his opinion is rather null and void ;)

Yeah Torq. Plus, he's leaving soon - hopefully, he will leave the PF as well.
Here's something żeby ci poprawić humor ;)

youtube.com/watch?v=YIAnkrPgTvY

Some of the castles are amongst the nicest in the world. There are two here in Gliwice that are breathtaking. I've yet to see Malbork and some of the other more famous ones. Architecture? Oh, come on. Have you seen the Vang castle in Karpacz? Poland excels in architecture in some parts.

It just depends where you find yourself, in what region. When I went from Izumo to Matsue by train (Japan), there were nothing but rice fields, Toyota trucks and houses. No variety whatsoever! However, did that mean that I thought Japan wasn't a beautiful country with worthwhile sights? Of course not! Get used to the regional conditions.

Do you really think that communists were gonna invest heavily in making buildings look better? NOPE! This is one thing that really frustrates me about foreigners and I'll speak as sb with a Polish family now. It was IMPOSED on Poland, no thanks to that fat cnut of a man, Churchill. The Red Army rejoiced with fellow allies outside Berlin, they wouldn't have started a fresh war. Anyway, Poland had to grin and bear it. Now we are seeing roadworks and housing improvements. Come to Gliwice, roadworks are everywhere. I've lost count of the number of students that have told me they are doing renovations and even building a new place (the richer ones).

Polluted air or just bad visibility that day? When I was at the top of Yokohama tower, I couldn't see Mount Fuji (Fuji san/SAMA) due to a mist on the go. Bytom is polluted, but Warsaw??

The commie staff at rail stations and in hospitals are atrocious, that's true. I gave a surgeon a piece of my mind the other day. I'm not sure if the young surgeon translated my last part, which I said in English :)

Well, he says he's leaving...we can only hope ;)

if u would like photos of bullet ridden buildings, potholed streets, grime covered buildings, lack of colour as in no window boxes or flowers in parks, inappropriate buildings etc, then i'd be happy to post some.

as for wroclaw we will see no improvement for quite some time as the new, behind schedule, stadium has drained the city coffers.

the fact is that i like Poland and especially wroclaw, but i'm used to the place. it's home.
outsiders have a different view, which should be a wake up call to those who develop the country. a multi-million zloty/euro investment in a depressed area only highlights the surrounding neglect.

I can easily make four or five adult-sized main meals for the price of one McDonald's meal, and I imagine that the same is true in Poland.

Poor people who prefer to be "well fed than go hungry" would be better off avoiding places like McDonald's and prepare their own meals instead.


When did you visit Salford?? :D lol

Seriously, though... is there any city in the world which has no run-down, neglected, dirty areas? I'll bet that even Singapore has some areas like that.

Pictures of Mostar don't count, Wrocław ;) ;) Let's not forget that there was a war here too ;) ;) ;)

Potholed streets mean that drivers must focus more on the road and that can only be a good thing :) :)

Grime? Cleaning day was the following one :)

No window boxes? They were all stolen ;) ;) The flowers were also pulled out for sale elsewhere :) This was part of the conversion from communism to capitalism, a real manifestation ;) ;)

I see your last point. You can have a really nice building and the surroundings could be ugly. It makes it look like even more of an eyesore. I'm thinking about the Spodek in Katowice.

Delphiandomine wrote:


alright Moderator, let's get one thing straight here....how much money do you make?

if it's say 5,000/month and below, your opinion obviously doesn't apply here.

you've gone after me for posting 2 short sentences Delph, both of which the Moderator fully agrees with. care to stay consistent and slander him as well?

go ahead, Delphiandomine. the Moderator's waiting.

What's that Torq? Because she isn't gloryfying PL after visiting it, but instead gives a more realistic view on things? You're getting a bit strange, Torq. Seriously. Everybody is entitled to his/her opinion and if Sheila was a bit dissappointed after visiting PL and she wants to write about it, then that is her god given right to do so. That doesn't make her a troll, Torq.


Oh come on. Just because she didn't think that everything was glorious and great and the best on Earth and the most beautiful in the world, doesn't make it untrue. Oh and btw, in your quest to save Torq from the face of PF, I think you should know that Torq is in favour of effective censorship by the mods where it concerns everything not favourable for PL.

>^..^<

M-G (yay!)

yeah having a awful expeirence with ppl I thought where my friends in Warsaw polish hospitality is a joke. at least my friend in the western part of Poland is excited to have me out there.

Go there...its a fantastic castle....if you go in the dining hall you can still see a canon ball stuck in the wall....I bet that spoiled somebodies dinner...!

What was realistic about it. It would be more believable if the author had thrown a few goodies in with the shitties. Can you say you have ever been to a place that had zero redeeming qualities?

This is clearly a wind up, geared to get a reaction, not start an intelligent discussion about the pros and cons of Poland.

The choice of Katowice over Kraków seems like one of someone who truly didn't want to see anything they liked in Poland. Also, I can't understand choosing Warsaw over Kraków - didn't you read a guidebook? Also, unless I am either mistaken or there was another partition of Poland I somehow missed, you went to Gdańsk, not Danzig (the only Danzig I can think of from after World War 2 was that terrible metal band). Personally I find Gdańsk to have lovely architecture. What is it you felt Warsaw and Gdańsk were missing for you to see? Again, didn't you read a guidebook or do ANY research whatsoever before you planned a trip to Poland?

As for Poland being a beautiful country, there are many different types of scenery here and some are quite beautiful. But yes, it also has flat fields and farmlands that are rather boring to look at. I know this may surprise you, but often the nicest parts of towns and villages are not right next to the train tracks. Oddly, some people find the noise disturbing and don't wish to be very close to it. Regarding fares, I'm not certain because I have only ever used a Polish student ID card, but I was under the impression that with a valid passport and ISIC card you could also use the student ticket if you are not too old for it.

Also, I am curious. If you determined the adults here are overweight due to junk food and poverty, can you please explain why people in Western Europe and North America are overweight?

1) Zakopane

2) Hel, fine beaches and clean

3) People - generally friendly

4) Polish beauty - true to a certain extent

You don't consider those as goodies, Shawny? ;0

I don't understand why people are getting upset about a passing through Poland (9 days) tourist who says:


It is a wind up for sure. Aussies are a not that stupid. I met an Aussie in Poland a few weeks ago- my cousin's husband and he was quite tolerant of the differences. Even tried to catch a wireless internet connection in front of the City Hall.

Ok - Agreed Goodie


Then slammed with "but there were no waves".


Smells of Mediocrity.


Again. Mediocrity.

When compared to the amount of negativity in the OP, I think I could be forgiven for saying "zero redeeming qualities".

Don,t agree with this bit...but its only somebodies opinion....

My opinion is that Poland is very pretty...at least the bit i live in.... and there is lots of interesting wildlife here....if you look for it...