Life / Diesel GTI not a good choice for Poland? [25]

Stop worrying, the days of using blowtorches to warm up diesel engines on a frosty morning is long gone.

Poland isn't the automotive backwater it was a decade ago; you and your Skoda will be fine here.

News / Will Poland be badly hit by Recession ? I don't think so. [70]

A charming but pointless article. "Do you THINK there's a poverty problem" does not mean there IS a poverty problem.

Life / Do Polish people have a good ear for music? [90]

There are a number of good Polish bands, and there's a reasonably healthy underground of bars where small bands can play.

Unfortunately, the Polish attitude to music is "it's good if I can sing along with a bellyful of vodka in me" which explains the everlasting popularity of Kazik and Kult, Lady Pank, Strachy na Lachy and the new band of pointlessly growling pseudopunks like Hey! and Illusion.

For those who prefer something a bit more melodic than pointless growling, have some Tides From Nebula:

youtu.be/wZmEWmHJR8c

Travel / What can Poland do to attract more tourists? Llamas farm? [71]

I think it's all a ploy. "Visit Krakow, and have your soul shattered by the horrors of Auswitz. Visit Warsaw, where we invite you to our proud and noble Museum of Misery and Death, located on ul. Grzybowska."

By funding only those tourist attractions that give Poland an international reputation as a dour, miserable place to live, it keeps the fanny-pack socks-and-sandals tourists away, so that the rest of us can enjoy this beautiful country in peace :D

Law / Buying a USED CAR in Poland, my personal experiences and TRAPS to avoid !! [133]

I drive old cars, it's my hobby, but even then it's not easy to get proper, legitimate components.

I'm on the lookout for a replacement engine, and I want to do everything by the book; buy an engine WITH the paperwork, get the change registered with the authorities, inform my insurance company

I put offers on every club page for that brand of car in Poland, and I contacted every engine seller on Allegro. "Do you have the documents for this engine so that I can register it?"

Unsurprisingly, the unanimous reply (nine so far, and counting) was "um, well, no, I don't, but what do you need them for anyway? Why do the authorities need to know?"

UK, Ireland / Bilingual Polish Primary School in London [18]


Microwaveable bacon. A perfectly understandable English phrase made up of Latin, Greek, French, Old Norse and Old German, with not a single component of anything you could call uniquely English.

English is a mongrel mixture of foreign languages. If Poles want to add to it, the more the merrier, it doesn't "degrade" because no language has any purity to start with.

Stop waving your idiocy around, it's embarrassing for others.

Real Estate / Building a house in Poland need advice from anyone that has built [100]

Hi Sean,

I appreciate the detailed answer, although I'll put your mind at rest and let you know I'm not out of my depth here. This won't be the first build I've been involved in, and I'm familiar with the different styles of construction used in Poland, I just wanted some examples of what people have paid in the recent past, since costs of labour and materials have been swinging all over the place recently.

I intend to do the draughts myself, although I know that Polish law requires me to have an approved and registered Site Engineer to be "responsible" for the build. I'm also familiar with the legal costs regarding registering the build, getting media to the site and so on.

I'm simply looking for some anecdotal tales of costs. As I said, I've had wildly differing quotes for essentially the same work (100k vs 500k for a block shell with roof) so I'd like to hear what the average seems to be, and just how rip-off the rip-off merchants around me are.

I'd build the whole thing myself if I could get the time off work.

Real Estate / Building a house in Poland need advice from anyone that has built [100]

Yeah, the price I'm looking for will not include the cost of the land or purchasing the plans. So Monia, does your 1million+ PLN include the land as well, or is that just the materials and the construction crew?

Basically, I have my eye on a few plots of land in and around Warsaw, and want to know what's within my budget. I don't think I can quite afford 1million PLN...

Real Estate / Building a house in Poland need advice from anyone that has built [100]

Can anyone update me with costs on building houses, now it's 2011? Looking to construct something in the region of 150m2, brick-and-blockwork, probably beam-and-block floors for the second storey.

I've heard wild estimates for the shell, from as little as 100,000zl to as much as 500,000zl, so I'd like to have some idea what the expenses are.

Law / Buying a USED CAR in Poland, my personal experiences and TRAPS to avoid !! [133]


I've been buying and selling cars in Poland for six years now. I've not made any money doing so, but that's the way of these things. I don't do it for money.

The way the market looked in 2004, pre-Schengen, pre-EU money, was vastly different to the way things look now. And of course, "new" cars are sold here, but almost always to businesses buying cars for their workers, which then pass on to their wives; a pathetic dribble of those three-year-old cars are now on the second-hand market, and that's what I'm referring to. Those not sold to businesses were mainly sold to Germans (nearly 20% of new car sales!). So my point still stands; a new (three-year-old) used car in Poland has a very VERY low likelihood of starting its life in Poland.

Law / Buying a USED CAR in Poland, my personal experiences and TRAPS to avoid !! [133]

As sound as this advice is, I can't imagine how naive someone would have to be to think any differently. Modern cars in Poland are a VERY new thing; five years ago the streets were still filled with Polonezes and old 1970s Mercedes. If anyone thinks that a three-year-old used car started its life in Poland, they are beyond gullible.

I never spend more than 3000zl on a car, and they're always 20 years old, and from that I've always been amazed at the lengths Poles will go to to keep a car running, often well beyond what any tester would consider safe. And yet the car will have a przeglad stamp every year for the past five years...

Work / Favourite English textbook (to learn/teach from)? [13]

The trouble with all business books is the topics they choose. If you're doing a business class with some Sales managers, why are they going to need chapters on how to have a job interview AND marketing AND human resources AND customer support? And when are secretaries going to want negotiation practice? Each person in the group might find one unit interesting, but that just means all the other students are bored of the topic, every single class. Business books try to be all things to everyone, and that is their failing; business doesn't work like that.

There's a distinct lack of ESP Business books; a book that covers ALL aspects of Human resources (interviews, CVs, Health and Safety, Corporate Culture) or one that ONLY deals with Marketing and Sales and explores those areas thoroughly.

I normally use the Ian McKenzie Book "English for Business Studies" which is really dull but has a hell of a lot of useful vocabulary and ideas in it; much more so that any business coursebook, including Market Leader.

Food / Is brain-damaging vegan fad growing in Poland? [176]


Bloody hell, it's just food. It goes in one end, it goes out the other. Do you have an orgasm every time you take a sh!t? Do you go to gourmet bathrooms, with heated seats, and pay $10 per sheet of paper woven on the thigh of a Columbian virgin? No. It's just bodily functions. Food is food, whether it's dry bread or caviare, and it's not worth getting that upset about.

Food / Is brain-damaging vegan fad growing in Poland? [176]

Polonius, do you really think, 100 years ago, that Poles could afford to eat meat every day? That every single family had enough pigs and chickens to slaughter that they could eat meat all the year round, including winter when there's hardly anything to feed the animals with?

Humans are perfectly capable of living on a vegetarian or even vegan diet. With advances in medical research, this has been shown more and more true, and with enough information about ingredients it can be cheaper AND healthier to live a vegetarian lifestyle in the modern world. Of course, meat gives us a lot of essential vitamins in one basic package, but it comes at the price of a lot of fat and, to be honest, wastage too. 5kg of grain to grow 1kg of chicken meat, which doesn't have 5 times the nutritional value? There's no way an agricultural economy could survive on those numbers.

So don't let your smalec-addled brain distort basic scientific fact.

Work / Favourite English textbook (to learn/teach from)? [13]

Most textbooks are designed for use by a teacher, giving a class to a group. Therefore, as self study books they are essentially useless as very few present the grammar in any sense, or provide any vocabulary explanation, and are filled with practise exercises that require a partner or a CD Player.

Having said that, Headway Advanced (the one that's now five years old) has proved a lifesaver and has some great pages that work out as "instant lessons", or can be customised into hundreds of explanations. FCE Expert has some excellent exercises in it, and for a reference book and for giving vocabulary exercises, Macmillan Publishings book "CPE Use Of English 1" is absolutely superb. Those three books know my photocopier intimately.

Law / Zloty lifts Poland's Economy [43]


Yes, I know, and I agree, but my point is more that, when outsiders decide "it's time for the zloty to come down" there's very little the NBP can do about it. JP Morgan was however fined as a result of their misleading news, if I remember rightly.

I don't want a Euro either. I'm just pointing out that I don't think Poland will be given the choice, and that it's pretty much a guaranteed thing within ten years whether we want it or not.

Law / Zloty lifts Poland's Economy [43]

Whilst that's a fair point in terms of economic regulation,

a) Poland is not a big enough country to play the currency game against the big world banks. If JP Morgan want to make another announcement predicting a drop in the zloty strength (like they did two years ago) just so that they can make a killing on the recovery, the national reserves are not strong enough to counter that action. The country simply isn't strong enough (yet) to compete in that sort of market.

b) Poland signed the Maastricht treaty, and must join the Euro at some point; it's simply a matter of when. As other countries around it adopt the Euro, there will be increasing political pressure on Poland to join the bloc, with Germany and France's own banks stepping in to mess the zloty up until Poland has no choice.

Law / Poland - Temporary Residence card - Karta pobytu - required documents [142]

Karta Pobytu and Right to Stay are two different things. The first is a flimsy piece of photographic ID, the second is a paper document, passport-sized, that looks like it was designed during the PRL. If you've been here long enough, your KB is exchanged for this Right to Stay.

Process is to get Meldunek, then go to the office with four photos, Meldunek, proof of income, proof of medical insurance, passport, proof of date of entry into Poland (visa), proof of marriage, and then fill in the appropriate form. Then copy EVERYTHING four times, pay, and submit papers to the right woman. Then come back four weeks later to collect your card, find they've spelt your name wrong, and repeat the process once again.

Love / Polish women are complicated. Why? [51]


I've heard this tale too, although I don't have much sympathy for the men. If they insist on this macho attitude of "me work, you cook", then what result do you expect?

Law / HELP: ALLEGRO... Do most Polish buyers at allegro.pl use PayPal? [33]

The allegro payment account still requires a Polish bank account to withdraw money into, so if you don't have one of those, then you still don't have a valid method of payment.

Some buyers insist on using Allegro's system, others don't trust it (because they don't like to leave any trace of their purchases - national suspicious character trait there), but either way, Paypal is pointless in Poland.

Genealogy / Polish looks? [1410]

Trying to break your image down into separate European countries is a fool's task. The English, Irish and Scottish have been interbreeding for a thousand years now, and are themselves a mishmash of all the previous invaders to that island. Similarly, the number of foreign hordes passing through Poland have left their marks on the genetic landscape so that it's rather hard to distinguish any one Slav from the other.

If it's any help, you're not ugly enough to have a face from the British Isles. But you definitely don't have the "Polish face" either.

Life / Class system in Poland - does it exist? [90]


There's 38million Poles, so there's 38million classes. They all find a reason to look down their nose at one another at some point (although, in fairness, occurrences of such snobbery are now only about five a day, per person.)

Compared to the English system of lower-middle versus upper-working and all the others, no, there's no class system. But that doesn't stop insults like "wiesniak!" being hurled around occasionally...

Love / English Men vs Polish Men [207]

It is in all the countries Britain has exported its boorish idiotic binge-drinking culture to. Therefore, Ireland, America and Australia. Other countries might get catastrophically drunk, but the sudden desire to bare their buttocks (and their other, significantly smaller, muscles) is a purely Anglo-saxon trait.

Love / English Men vs Polish Men [207]

I simply cannot subscribe to the ridiculous concepts put forward on either side of the Polish v English male camps. I can, however, spout some anecdotal evidence.

I've worked in language schools in Warsaw for six years. Many schools, with many teachers, with a high turnover of natives from both English and the colonies (sorry, Commonwealth.) In all that time, all those years, I've only met one female teacher (from England) who has run the gauntlet, married a Polish man and settled here. The other women run, run as fast as their flat-soled shoes can carry them.

Why is that? There's no clear answer, but it certainly makes me feel that English men with Polish women is a more appropriate match than a Polish man to an English woman. It doesn't mean that either man is worse; just how they meet the expectations, however shallow, old-fashioned or demeaning, of either side.

Travel / My visit to Poland - Likes & Dislikes. [137]

The weather and food are the two criteria that prevent me from ever returning to Greece. Too hot, too much seafood; vomit-inducing in every aspect. Different strokes for different folks...


Ahhh, my home town. How glad I am to have swapped its urban decay and potato-faced population for Warsaw...

Law / Opening a Polish Bank Account by a foreigner in Poland. Recommendations. [299]

Alior was financed by an Italian, and staffed by all the talent who left during the merger of Bank BPH and Pekao SA (so mostly ex-BPH staff.) They offer astounding returns, but they're a VERY new bank so I have no idea about how long their dynamism will last.

I cannot urge enough to stay away from Pekao SA. But Millenium have been very good to me with their current account and mortgage products.

Law / Opening a Polish Bank Account by a foreigner in Poland. Recommendations. [299]


Currently the best performing bank in Poland, and PKO BP (the last state-owned bank, and worst in terms of customer service) were looking at taking it over before the Government themselves announced they might be selling their stake in PKO, which has put the whole aquisition into doubt.

Still, aside from PKO BP every bank in Poland is foreign-owned, so the staff have to have a modicum of English to get things done internally.

Law / HELP: ALLEGRO... Do most Polish buyers at allegro.pl use PayPal? [33]

I buy and sell on Allegro a lot. Paypal is not an option here, but bank-to-bank transfers and Allegro's own pay system are very good, and free (unlike Paypal's daylight robbery fees.)

I've got a decent rating, only been fobbed off with cheap Chinese junk a few times, but I've never lost serious cash on it. In that respect, Allegro is much better than eBay.

Travel / Traffic roundabouts not common in Poland? [13]


Staying in the inner or outer lane depending on your chosen exit, not finding the "racing line" that involves clipping the inner verge and then careering across both lanes half a second later.

TVN Turbo has given many Poles ideas of driving skills beyond their station ;)

Travel / Hiking around Zakopane/ Tatra mountains [22]

[Moved from]: Polish Mountains in September (any tips or experiences?)

I'm looking to bring my Dad over to Poland for a long weekend doing something in the mountains; probably hiking up and down the trails between PL and Slovakia.

Does anyone have any tips, or recent experiences? Good trails, advice on where to spend the night, highlights; that sort of thing?