Life / How do Polish people treat their animals? [33]

That was probably the most horrible cruelty to an animal I have ever heard of. The perpetrator was 21 years old

History / MAP OF POLAND IN 1880'S [95]


You think they were Polish in the year 940?

History / MAP OF POLAND IN 1880'S [95]


In about 940 AD when Poznań was founded, the Piast dynasty was not "royal", they did not know they were "dynasty", and what is even more to it, they did not even know they were "Polish".


Perhaps it is 'SWARZĘC'?

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]

Other rusicisms frequently heard in Mazovia:
- 'pod rząd' instead of 'z kolei';
- 'co z tobą' instead of 'co ci jest'
- 'do roku 1837' instead of 'przed rokiem 1837'
- 'okrążyć' instead of 'otoczyć'

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]

From the Russian one. But the topic of linguistic heritage is interesting. Do you in Galicia use the expression "Paszoł/paszła won!" ?

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]


I haven't heard of a portrait of Bismarck (except in a museum), but there is the fully equipped cabinet of Herr Hitler, leader of the 1000-Year Reich, in Poznań. In every detail it looks precisely like its original in Berlin, but the latter is long gone, while the former is still with us available to everyone who wants to see it.

Come and visit Poznań everyone!

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]


I think Franz Joseph of Austria is the only one enjoying such an esteem. In Białowieża there is a huge portrait on display of Nikolai II of Russia, but it is inside a restaurant (the Restauracja Carska) and in their smaller room.

What is really interesting about your pictture, Pawian, is the contrast between the venerable countenance of the keiser and the rather gross name of the pub!

News / Years of Poland in the EU - assessment of pros and cons [1199]

This is undoubtedly true. Plus Belorus was doing the same taking advantage of a non-existing custom border between Belorus and Russia. When Putin wanted to send inspectors to help Belorus eliminate these practices, the Belorussian leader Lukashenko told him: No, thank you, camrade. We have our own inspectors who are as good as the Russian ones. And the re-export continued undisturbed by any inspectors. Plus we started to send our apples to China and Japan, if I remember well.

News / Years of Poland in the EU - assessment of pros and cons [1199]


If I remember well, it was Putin who first banned the export of Polish apples to Russia before sanctions were imposed.

News / Years of Poland in the EU - assessment of pros and cons [1199]


Thanks Delph for that splendid and very informative resumé. Now I am looking forward to what the so-called anti-EU true Polish "patriots" are going to say to that.

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]


But all this, the 'good spirit of Austria' known in Galicia, came only long after 1772 when the province had been originally taken by Austria. In this beginning period, Galicia was very much exploited by the new masters, to the extent that it earned itself a new name: Królestwo Golicji i Głodomerii (Kingdom of the Naked and the Starving), a name being the rewording of the new official name given to the province by the Habsburgs: Królestwo Galicji i Lodomerii.

Po polsku / Katowice-gdzie mogę spotkać ludzie? [58]

Ja bym radził skorzystać z jakiegoś portalu randkowego. Znam osoby, które korzystały i dobrze na tym wyszły (w sensie ustabilizowania swojej sytuacji życiowej).

Niestety nie wiem co to za portal i nie będę pytał, aby nie być posądzonym, że szukam jakichś przygód na boku.

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]


This double meaning is well reflected in an old joke going back to the time when they were starting to build the first railway line in Russia.

The construction team went to tsar Alexander and asked him if the gauge (rozstaw torów) in Russia should be the same as in Europe or wider (szerszy). Tsar Alexander listened to their plea and told them the verdict in the form of a question: A na chuj szerszy? But the problem, however, was that they had a different grasp of the phrase than what tsar Alexander meant.

Language / Harmless old-fashioned Polish swear words/phrases [159]

Jezu kochany, Józefie święty!

Travel / Are Polish people as unfriendly as Slovaks? [84]


Theoretically, Polish and Slovak being in the same western Slavic language group should be closer to each other. In practice, I judge Ukrainian and Slovak to be at the same distance. Maybe Ukrainian is even slightly closer for me, but this is because I used to learn Russian in school.

On the other hand, Czech and Slovak seem to be strikingly similar to one another. It is sufficient to read descriptions on products to see there is practically very little difference between them.

History / Unforgettable quotes about Poland and Poles from Polish and world`s history and culture [99]


We are who we think we are, but I think this Polish origin was just a fantasy of his. Is there such a name (Nicki) on the lists of Polish noble surnames? I doubt it.

History / Unforgettable quotes about Poland and Poles from Polish and world`s history and culture [99]


That is simply not true. He preferred his Polish roots and the music he wrote was Polish to the core. Even in France he is considered Polish.

He was just a Polish emigré in France. One of many there who spoke perfect French since such people were taught this language as children at home by French baby-sitters. I myself met someone who went from Poland to France in the 1960s for the first time in his life at the age of about 60 and he was being taken for a Frenchman by French people in Paris. The reason was that he grew up in a Polish aristocratic family in Humań, near Kiev, which family employed a governess from France plus his mother usually talked to him in French (both parents were Polish).

The fact that Chopin was genetically half-French is pretty irrelevant to the Polishness he felt in him.

History / Unforgettable quotes about Poland and Poles from Polish and world`s history and culture [99]

No picture for 'dupa', but here is one of an 'obwarzanek':

History / Unforgettable quotes about Poland and Poles from Polish and world`s history and culture [99]


And ever since their death, those two coffins rule over Poland ... the coffin of Piłsudski and the coffin of Dmowski ... (and it is felt on this forum, too).

Other quotes by Piłsudski on Poland and Poles:

1. Polska to obwarzanek: kresy urodzajne, centrum - nic [sorry, the version in Polish only as I don't know the English word for "obwarzanek"].
2. Racja jest jak dupa - każdy ma swoją [Pawian is kindly requested to translate this into English].

History / What do Poles owe to Germans? [451]


Of that time, what Poles owe to the Germans is Thietmar's (of Merseburg) chronicle. Thietmar was born in 976 and died in 1018, so the great period of his adult life matched markedly the big period of Boleslaus Chrobry's reign (ruler of Poland between 992 and 1025). Thietmar's chronicle is an immense source to the history of Poland of that time since - beside writing about the Germany's Ottons - he wrote extensively about Poland's Piasts and also West Slavic tribes inhabiting the area of today's Eastern Germany. Once he dies, there comes a sudden stop in detailed information on events taking place in Poland.


Some in Poland say that if he were king of Poland in place of Stanislas August Poniatowski, Poland would have never been partitioned as the Strong knew a lot better the principles of international diplomacy and was very skillful in sailing across the waters of international politics. In this way Poland could have safely survived until the Napoleonic era...

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]


I did put a link, it was still there yesterday evening, but it seems the new policy of the forum seems to be removing certain links.

It is not my type of music either, but in the song she goes on to sing some other phrases of this type as, for example: not every apple turns into wine.

Joanna Rawik has a lovely voice, but had never been as popular in the 1960s as were other singers, and these days she seems to have been almost completely forgotten. In my view, the proverb which became the title of her song is less frequently used these days than some time ago even if people still recognize it.

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]

Here is how Joanna Rawik sings about it (1967) - song entitled:

Language / Short Polish<->English translations [1049]

The literal meanings of the English verb 'circumvent' in Polish are" obejść, obchodzić, ominąć (bypass, go around). The same would be true in the figurative meaning: obejść: (regułę, zasady). 'Przechytrzyć' might possibly be good in some contexts.

The Polish meaning is exactly as in Latin: circum <--> 'around' + venire <--> 'come'. For an exact translation, you should provide the full context.

News / POKO and LGBT lobby is trying to sexualize children in Poland. Now they aim for adoption [120]

Finding a cure for clowns like yourself - I would definitely inscribe this to the Constitution of Poland (and of any other country in the world, to be sure).

News / POKO and LGBT lobby is trying to sexualize children in Poland. Now they aim for adoption [120]


While the approval rate for adoption of children by LBGT couples is indeed very low in Poland, you must have (deliberatly?) missed my post on homosexual civil partnership [post #104 in "What do decent Poles think about true rightists?" thread]:

Society is changing quickly in Poland.
For example, same-sex registered partnerships were accepted by 33% of Poles in 2013 (that is, in the sixth year of the liberal PO government in power), while today (the fourth year of the conservative PiS government in power) this figure has reached 56%. [All data according to IPSOS polls]

https://polishforums.com/life/decent-poles-think-true-rightists-84619/4/#msg1680317

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]


I heard a similar one in my grammar school once (quite a long time ago). It was almost exactly the same as you have described. The history teacher walked into a class and said:

Proszę o ciszę! Żydowski porządek panuje w waszej klasie!

The class burst into laughter as no one ever heard such a phrase, so one can safely say the expression had already been outdated. [The teacher was known was using expressions which sounded weird to the class as for example: Niech mnie dunder świśnie! And to this very day I don't know what dunder is!]

Life / Why does Poland need racial diversity? Opinions [67]


Poland as a mono-ethnic state is in fact an invention of comrade Stalin who decided to move Poland westwards after the end of the WW II. Since the reign of Casmir the Great who died in 1370, Poland was always a multi-cultural, multi-ethnical and multi-religious country where tolerance was a great virtue observed by society as a whole and its main political forces. This has ended in 1945 and ever since the younger generations increasingly think of Poland as an ever homogenous state.

Si non iurabis, non regnabis - said Jan Zborowski, Court Hetman of the Crown, to Henri de Valois (future king of Poland), who did not want to assure to the kingdom the freedom of faith, conscience and speech as guaranteed to its citizens by King Henry's Arlicles of 1573 (essentially a first constitution of Poland).

Life / Why does Poland need racial diversity? Opinions [67]


Some Jews did, some did not. I remember having been extremely surprised later in adulthood at the fact that Julian Tuwim was a Jew!

Stoi na stacji lokomotywa,
Ciężka, ogromna i pot z niej spływa:
Tłusta oliwa.
Stoi i sapie, dyszy i dmucha,
Żar z rozgrzanego jej brzucha bucha:
Buch - jak gorąco!
Uch - jak gorąco!
Puff - jak gorąco!
Uff - jak gorąco![...]

[poem by Julian Tuwim which is known to every Polish child schooled in Poland]

Travel / Lovely trips to Poland - Warsaw and Wrocław, Krakow and Warsaw, Poznań and Gdańsk [43]

Thank you for your kind words. Your opinion is a bit too flattering and thus may look suspicious. Could you please add some critical comments which will make your opinion a little more trustworthy?

USA, Canada / Will U.S. Citizens Need A Visa To Visit Poland Starting In 2021 [11]

This visa business between Europe and the US is pretty complicated. I once said on the forum, Poland should impose visas on the USians visiting Poland because the US requires visas from Polish citizens crossing the American border. Atch replied to that it was impossible since Poland was obliged to allow American citizens to enter visa-free as this regulation was inscribed into the accession treaty between the EU and Poland.

Thus, according to the above, Poland is not entitled to act on her own regarding the movement of people between Poland and the US.