News / How Poland bought German Airline Condor and might lose massive from it [34]


With heavy state intervention and massive amounts of state interference in the affairs of other airlines. One almost gets the impression that you prefer socialist solutions to capitalist ones.

News / RUSSIA TO MAKE PUBLIC THE KATYN FILES... [274]


There was some logic to those Soviet nationality laws, I think. They allowed for the creation of various autonomous republics and other subdivisions, where individual nationalities could in theory look after their own affairs, all within the larger Russian Federal Republic. Even today, you see it in places like Dagestan and Chechnya where local strongmen impose their own laws on locals with agreement from Moscow.

One of the more interesting things about the Soviet Union was the way that the Union collapsed, but Russia itself didn't disintegrate. I suppose one reason for that was that the autonomous republics within the Russian Federation never really had the same level of national consciousness that the Estonians/etc had. I know about opposition/nationalist movements within the Soviet republics, but I've never really looked into whether places like the Republic of Komi ever had any demands for independence from both the Soviet Union and the RSFSR.


The aim is to downplay Russian complicity and to replace it with a 'common enemy'.

Where's Paulina when you need her? She's fantastic at sharing the thought processes behind these people on the Russian internet.

Life / What is Poland going to be like in the 2050s? [72]


And it's a step that won't be taken. Do not underestimate the power of the elderly to keep people in power, as in Belarus.

Life / What is Poland going to be like in the 2050s? [72]


Sounds like a slogan taken straight from the Minister for Culture, circa 1982.


As viewed by no-one in particular, as current releases prove. Most of them are only attended by bored schoolchildren during the day, with little enthusiasm by the general public.


Unfortunately, if they're isolated from free-market economics, they tend to end up being political and of little merit.

Off-Topic / Stock Market and Trading Talk [1011]

At least in Poland, there were bargains to be had about 3 weeks ago. I snapped up PKNOrlen at 48.99PLN (now 64.90), Lotos at 43.33 (now 63.53) and PGNiG at 2.902 (now 3.542) - all of them were terribly undervalued, and being up 33% overall isn't bad at all.

Tallink (on the Tallinn Stock Exchange) is worth a punt. They're nominally a transport (shipping) company, but they have huge interests outside shipping. They own hotels, restaurants, all sorts - yet the stock is pretty much traded on the transportation side of the business. Shares are down about 30-40%, yet the fundamentals are solid. I'd buy them myself, but I use my bank's trading platform and it doesn't have foreign stocks.

News / Poles say a big YES to our European Union [957]


Meanwhile in Poland, the government is busy trying to change the rules of elections and introducing new bills to the Sejm while ignoring the needs of people and businesses. Your man Bosak has plenty to say on the topic, after all.

News / Scandals, conflicts, tensions, arguments - real life examples from Poland [470]


And no-one else enters or leaves the building?

You rightists have a problem with common sense.

News / Presidential elections 2020 - your opinions about campaign, candidates [2222]


Gowin has come out and said himself that elections won't be happening on the 10th May. twitter.com/Jaroslaw_Gowin/status/1246429078401495040

Time will tell, but this, combined with his "I'm going to talk to the opposition over the weekend" is clearly resulting in panic among PiS supporters on Twitter. He's getting abuse from a lot of them, and the abuse from that idiot Mazurek won't be forgotten easily. I'm almost certain Gowin will be using this weekend to find out whether or not the opposition will support him leading a technocratic government, and that the '2 years delay' is just a smokescreen.


Assuming that PiS are even still in power. What's going on over the last couple of days means that they might be out of government by the start of next week.

News / How hard will Poland be hit by the economic crisis? [116]


You don't want to do that under any circumstance.

It was in the media last month - tokfm.pl/Tokfm/7,103090,25731169,ajenci-chcieliby-wyjasnienia-skad-wziely-sie-ich-dlugi-spor.html - essentially, there's some major issue with Żabka forcing promotions on franchisees, but then the franchisees have to pay tax on the non-discounted price. As I understand it, let's say there's a "two hot dogs for 5zł" promotion. You have to run the promotion, but then you pay tax on the basis of having received 8zł (the normal price for two hot dogs) from your customers. It's very strange, but well documented. If you look in a typical shop, you'll see that these promotions are everywhere, so you can see how you end up in a mess tax-wise quickly.

There's also some racket involving the franchisee signing some sort of open-ended credit agreement with Żabka, and when the franchise ends, the franchisee gets hit with huge bills under very unclear circumstances. There are examples where franchisees have kept detailed records showing that they owe nothing, but Żabka presents them with bills for hundreds of thousands of złoty.

News / Presidential elections 2020 - your opinions about campaign, candidates [2222]


Konfederacja are absolutely roasting them in the Sejm today for the lack of support for businesses, and it seems that PiS have been caught up fighting with themselves rather than on focusing on solutions.

Given the way that infections are rising rapidly now, the opposition should do nothing now. Let Kaczyński ram through an election at the height of an epidemic and destroy Duda's legitimacy.

News / How hard will Poland be hit by the economic crisis? [116]


Linking it to the EU budget is *very* interesting. It gives Italy and Spain what they're begging for, yet it opens the door to linking it to the rule of law. A win-win.

News / How hard will Poland be hit by the economic crisis? [116]


It's particularly the case for younger people, I think. A friend is a manager in a typical BPO/SSC type place, and they've just let go around half the people working there. Many of them have no real skills beyond generic "business" stuff, and it almost certainly means they'll be giving up their rental properties and returning to their smaller towns/villages.

News / Presidential elections 2020 - your opinions about campaign, candidates [2222]


It's an obvious scam.

The sad part is that the Church fell for it.

News / How hard will Poland be hit by the economic crisis? [116]


Unfortunately, they're their own worst enemy. They think that small business owners are far wealthier than they actually are.

News / Presidential elections 2020 - your opinions about campaign, candidates [2222]

It's an absurd plan, and proves that Kaczyński wants to maintain power at all costs.

Furthermore, they want to deliver the ballots without verifying people's identity or receipt. It's a guarantee of electoral fraud.

News / How hard will Poland be hit by the economic crisis? [116]


Was it you that posted about how most apartments are bought for cash in Poland?

I don't remember where I read it, but they were saying that real estate is likely to be quite fine in Poland as the combination of cash buyers and a need to protect against inflation will keep prices where they are.

About Poles not selling at a loss - yep, they won't.


It's quite likely to have been sold regardless. There's still not enough property to meet demand in Polish cities, as Poles don't really like to commute far.

UK, Ireland / Irish (live in London) moving to Poland [44]


I'm not sure I'd agree - the Baltic States were really pushing hard in the late 80's too.

Totally agreed about how you need to stand up for yourself, and I would say one thing - Polish people have no concept of 'fair play'. Some of them do understand win-win, but the mentality of "I lose if I have to give up anything to you" is still incredibly strong.

News / Throwing away the constitution in Poland? [626]


It gets even worse. They're now proposing a solution that involves universal postal voting and use of the army/police to count the votes.

News / Throwing away the constitution in Poland? [626]


They won't be able to do. PiS intend to completely disenfranchise those abroad.

Life / Asking cost of living in Poland [24]


Home Schooling in Poland is strictly regulated - you're required to be under the supervision of a school, which then conducts yearly exams to prove that the children are learning the mandatory school programme.

Many, many children fail, and when they do, they're obliged to return to mainstream schooling.

Study / Various education and school issues in Poland. Opinions, stories, controversies. [940]

So, we sent out a large amount of packages today, along with e-mails and text messages asking parents to make sure that they're ready for Friday. The materials sent out will cover Thursday until next Friday, and then the second package will be sent out next Wednesday to take kids through to Easter.

One thing that keeps coming up - parents are telling us that they don't have the possibility of teaching their kids, and they're asking for support.

Study / Various education and school issues in Poland. Opinions, stories, controversies. [940]


I was prepared - I went to our school at 7am to get everything printed before anyone else turned up. Now I'm waiting around to help anyone if they need it, but so far, so good. The only problem is that I've seen some of the materials prepared by my colleagues, and it's very obvious that kids won't be able to do all this by themselves.

Study / Various education and school issues in Poland. Opinions, stories, controversies. [940]

Pawian, about private schools and fees: there was a decision by UOKiK a few years ago that if a child couldn't attend a private nursery/kindergarten for whatever reason, then the parents don't have to pay. We're now seeing this in our school - parents are writing and asking for a reduction in fees as we can't provide the service that they're paying for. The contract does state that the 'mode of learning is decided by the headteacher', so it seems that we're in the clear, but a lot of private nurseries/kindergartens won't have such a thing in their contracts.

News / Presidential elections 2020 - your opinions about campaign, candidates [2222]


It's amazing how much you're clinging to this despite continually offering opinions that are far more in line with PiS than Konfederacja and Bosak.


He obviously prefers a party where the slightest criticism results in being suspended from the Party. Other parties, such as Konfederacja, PO, the SLD, etc have healthy internal debate - PiS doesn't.

Study / Various education and school issues in Poland. Opinions, stories, controversies. [940]

We're not using it because the parents are... Well, you know what they're like. I did some testing, and without a decent / stable connection, video conferencing becomes a nightmare with too many participants.

My argument was simple: if it doesn't work properly the time, the parents will give us hell. Fortunately, the MEN seem to have accepted that it can't be used in every school.

About grading - the regulations state that it's up for discussion between teachers and the headteacher, so we agreed that for our collective sanity, we won't have grades now.

If it carries on after Easter, we'll rethink it. We haven't had time to develop a fair policy for grading, so it's best not to bother.

News / Presidential elections 2020 - your opinions about campaign, candidates [2222]

I think even genuine Konfederacja supporters have realised that PiS will stop at nothing to steal this election. However, a lot of people are genuinely angry about this, and Duda's electorate being older and poorer has the most to lose from this irresponsible decision.

Study / Various education and school issues in Poland. Opinions, stories, controversies. [940]


End result: a vote against, on the grounds that the MEN hadn't produced the new regulations. However, the new regulations appeared today, and the headteacher has decided to use her powers to implement our original plans as no-one opposed them for any reason other than "we don't want to prepare for something that can't be done".

So, tomorrow, we'll carry out our original plan (with a one day delay to account for students not getting the materials until Wednesday).

The e-learning platform will have limits in accordance with the MEN regulations - so the plan is that there will be time limits on the daily use of the platform. The system that I'm fighting with right now is that teachers will be given 'access' to kids for a set amount of time, dependent on the amount of hours they have with each class. There won't be any video conferencing, but for instance, I'm working on kl. 1-3 right now. They have 30 minutes 'screen time' daily, so the class teacher will have 20 minutes to use and the English teacher will have 10. It gets more complicated with kl. 4-8, but what I'm doing is dividing up the hours until Easter and then allocating them accordingly.

The plan is that each teacher will have a mandatory two hour evening 'phone' time for questions from parents and kids, as well as 2 hours during the day. That covers their 'blackboard' time, and the other 20 hours are to be used for preparation/marking. We dropped the virtual classroom idea as some informal feedback suggested that kids and parents preferred to do it this way

Critical point - there will be no grading.

News / Presidential elections 2020 - your opinions about campaign, candidates [2222]


And yet again, you follow the PiS line rather than the Konfederacja line. Bosak already made it clear that these are no conditions for holding an election.

Off-Topic / English teachers - 'functioning alcoholics with a superiority complex' [54]

Two of the three most affected provinces are run by rightists.

Off-Topic / English teachers - 'functioning alcoholics with a superiority complex' [54]

How could he be an enemy of the people when the Senate isn't run by the government?

Still, nice to see that Rich is spending even more time on PF now.