History / Why are Poles/Poland disliked by Germans? [140]

Milo,

Germans typically believe only half (or even less!) of what they HEAR, while nearly 100% of what they read. As long as something has the "authority" of the written/ printed word, many Germans will take it for face value. If the author's an alleged "expert" with a high degree, all the better!

History / Why are Poles/Poland disliked by Germans? [140]

@Ironside, I'm merely speaking from my lengthy experience, both having lived in Germany for just shy of a little in excess of a year, along with having grown up around Germans, practically from childhood:-)

Old stereotypes die hard, if in fact they ever die at all, and many Germans (particularly older ones) continue to see the Poles as simple, dumb backwoodsmen, sort of the hillbillies of Europe, who simply ought to accept their inferior station in life and make room for the German knowledge worker, infinitely able to engineer the world to perfection.

History / What is Poles opinion on Intermarium (Międzymorze)? [188]

It can't, B.B.

History / Why are Poles/Poland disliked by Germans? [140]

Very simply, the reasons are because Germany has always believed herself to be superior to nearly everybody, including the Poles:-)

History / What is Poles opinion on Intermarium (Międzymorze)? [188]

Language was never a great barrier between you both because Russian was the lingua franca of the former Eastern Block along with German.

History / Why do Polish people hate to be called Eastern European? [120]

Central aka "Middle" Europe is in fact considered Austria, Hungary, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Slovenia and the former Yugoslavia. Eastern Europe would therefore be Poland, Russia, Ukraine, Romania, and Bulgaria:-)

History / Why do Polish people hate to be called Eastern European? [120]

Geographically of course, the Poles are clearly Eastern European, albeit more Western in their outlook compared with the Russians or the Ukrainians.

Genealogy / Perception of hair color in Poland [14]

Fairly typical, I should think. When in Poland, I observed how much I stood out from the crowd, even in a medium to large city!

News / Pawel Adamowicz, Gdansk mayor, dies after stabbing [354]

Poland remains to be sure a rock-ribbed, conservative society. For a new idea to break in would be harder than breaking into Fort Knox:-)

Law / Anybody adept in requirements for non-EU citizens to start business in Poland? [39]

PLubbe, I assume you're from Germany, but perhaps from The Netherlands?
Only curious as I've noticed over the past several months, many from either Scandinavia, namely Sweden or Denmark, Germany or The Netherlands, have this interest in setting up a concern in Poland.

Off-Topic / American Jew Voice in Poland [93]

Jewish is not a race! Never was, never will be. It is BOTH a religion as well as an ethnicity, much as being "Hispanic" is also being Caucasian aka "white", while their faith is "Roman Catholic", NOT their nationality:-)

Language / Your perception of the Polish accent [145]

...or that they'll be found out:-)

Knew a fella named Jerry who went back to Poland. He thought that if he said his name's "Jerzy", he'd immediately be identified as Polish, and so he try to Americanize his accent as best he could. A crying shame his personality couldn't keep pace with his ambitionsLOL

Life / Feeling ashamed of my Polish heritage. [237]

Over-"liberalization" is to be sure problematic, people. However, is the converse any better? We need more Centrist and less partisan leadership.....BADLY!

Off-Topic / American Jew Voice in Poland [93]

Black is "Negroid", Jewish is "Semitic", technically (not theoretically) a branch of "Caucasian"!

Language / Your perception of the Polish accent [145]

One of many reasons I've noticed over the years (and not only for the Poles, by the way) that foreigners typically will mask their noticeable accent and/or faulty English grammar etc. behind rapid-fire slanguage and shorthand as distractionary tactics so that no one will call them on their foreignness:-)

Life / Feeling ashamed of my Polish heritage. [237]

Merkel's egregious mishandling of the migrant issue is undoubtedly one of the chief causes for her abrupt exit from politics.

Although her heart was clearly in the right place in trying, however wrongheadedly, to make amends for a shameful NS-past, she fumbled the ball at the

ten-yard line and let the other team win the point:-)

Language / Your perception of the Polish accent [145]

Exactly, Milo! Right on:-) Final devoicing ALWAYS marks the Pole vs. the lazy Russian tendency to pronounce same "Good mawnnin", whereby the final "k" becomes lost.

History / Poland is great Mother of all Slavs from Baltic to Balkan [211]

...not to mention way beyond his present English capacity!
LOL

Language / Your perception of the Polish accent [145]

Polish is more easily recognizable, immediately in fact, as compared with certain other Slavic languages. Poles and Czechs speaking English, I will admit, DO often sound almost alike. However Russian for instance sounds nothing like Polish, Croatian, Slovak or Slovene, very hard to imitate:-)

Language / Your perception of the Polish accent [145]

Without making any value judgements, the Polish accent is as distinctive as other accents. Frankly, I find it relatively easy to identify:-)

Language / Your perception of the Polish accent [145]

When Polish women are speaking together, once more, it often sounds to my jaded Germanic ears much like birds chirping. Men on the other hand, often sound sort of almost world weary or bored:-)

News / Pawel Adamowicz, Gdansk mayor, dies after stabbing [354]

A tragedy of its own as well, jon!

Haven't looked up the specs on this bloke, but it's still pretty horrific.

News / Pawel Adamowicz, Gdansk mayor, dies after stabbing [354]

And what about that Cox woman, gunned down at a flower show or some such event in the North of England, right?

News / Pawel Adamowicz, Gdansk mayor, dies after stabbing [354]

Any kind of hate speech, especially in public, hurts everyone, is therefore everybody's business, both victim and onlooker!!
National disgust and rage notwithstanding, such virulent forms of expression really cannot be justified, albeit the roots of such hatred can
be readily understood.

Polonia / Poland, Germany, France, Spain or Greece? [35]

Nice one, B.B. Two points:-)
lol

Off-Topic / What's your connection with Poland? Penpals. [595]

Hallo,

You have received from me an e-mail in "private-Message"-Box?
Welcome renewed in PF!

Polonia / Poland, Germany, France, Spain or Greece? [35]

Living and working in a country means unconditionally, irrefutably, knowing the language of that country in order to communicate with her inhabitants!
English won't help too much in Poland, Spanish not at all. When I lived and worked in Spain for several months, without Spanish, I couldn't have survived, even for a day!

English proved of even more limited usefulness than in Poland. Germany? Without a serious working knowledge of the local language, one can be literally bamboozled to death, especially in the big towns, where you start to speak in your basic English, at their suave insistence of course, only to learn that they perhaps miscommunicated your message into German, presuming you didn't understand, thus can merrily put one over on you so that YOU seem the fool and not they: In the best case scenario,

they actually DIDN'T understand your English, but typically were just too damned arrogant to admit it:-)

News / Pawel Adamowicz, Gdansk mayor, dies after stabbing [354]

Essentially, Adamowicz is being blamed for his own demise.

News / Pawel Adamowicz, Gdansk mayor, dies after stabbing [354]

In the wake of the Bad Kreuznach horror, what's next?

Polonia / Let's talk about Sweden and other Scandinavian countries [236]

In the US, the definition of rape has been traditionally "penetration", there need not be any completion of said act. Violation is sufficient before the law.

Not sure any more whether the above applies to Sweden as well or no.

When I was first in Sweden as a student during the '80's, the country was just coming out of the heady '60's and late '70's and so the atmosphere was probably completely different from what it is today, For one thing, there was little to any "globalization" yet in Sweden, I stood out like a sore thumb..until I started to speak.

After that, I was dubbed a plain freakazoid and the locals, particularly the men, looked at me as though I had two heads and a third eye growing out of the middle of

my faceLOL

After a few seconds, they generally calmed down and we proceeded to get along famously:-)