News / Polish universities for Polish students (only?) [57]

Yep, Poland (as well as Hungary) looks as though she does indeed require some EU supervision-:)
Bruxelles needn't be the bad guy, but when xenophobia and anti-democratic tendencies are still allowed to run amok,
something needs to be done....FAST!! Had there been such safeguards way back when, maybe Hitler could have been nipped
in the bud.

Life / Poles opinion on Sweden, Bavaria, Greece, Czechia? [28]

Heard Cracow's the best for that.

Life / Poles opinion on Sweden, Bavaria, Greece, Czechia? [28]

Does picturesque win out?

Life / Poles opinion on Sweden, Bavaria, Greece, Czechia? [28]

True. Often, the prettiest regions are the most stultifying-:)

Life / Poles opinion on Sweden, Bavaria, Greece, Czechia? [28]

Bavaria is the most traditionally pictaresque region of the country, yet also, the most rock-ribbed conservative!

Polonia / Which country is better SPAIN or POLAND [118]

Poland is doing better than Spain.

Language / The shame! I can't pronounce my Polish wife's name (Ola) [69]

Modern Polish has NO long vowels, so we're even!

History / What do Poles owe to Jews? [593]

Yep, they're a smug bunch.

History / What do Poles owe to Jews? [593]

Yes, that's true as well. Vasa Sweden was a great deal more powerful that many realize today:-)

History / What do Poles owe to Jews? [593]

Germans established the concept of "race" or "racial hygene" as a method of excluding, later eliminating, all others
whom they deemed either not "German", or, not German "enough"! This practice was unique to German-speaking lands,
as it differed sharply from other nations such as the Poles, the French, the Spaniards, later the Communist Russians, for whom
mere unquestioning obedience to the State, in some cases, converting to the state religion, was all that was necessary for
Jews to exist or cohabitate side-by-side with their gentile neighbors.

History / What do Poles owe to Jews? [593]

Good point. In Poland, it was about faith, in Germany, it was about race.

History / What do Poles owe to Jews? [593]

Assimilated Jews desired nothing more than to blend into Polish society. Sadly, their shtettl brethren often didn't share this enthusiasm, hence spoiling things for everybody else, namely, for the savvy, well-meaning urbanite Polish Jews and, as in Germany, THIS was in the end the dirty shame of it all.

Language / First Year Polish Second Edition Revised and Expanded - Oscar E. Swan (White Cover) [13]

I've had the Swan for years and swear by it! Still looking for the Polish Strunk & White. Figure it's "Polski jezyk, straszny jezyk" by Jan Miótek-:)

News / The ruling party in Poland tries to take American owned TV news station off the air [528]

Right. In many countries, Russia hardly the exception, the law remains THE LAW! This interpretive law stuff having Constitutional scholars coming out of the woodwork

to debate, wrangle, and endlessly discuss to death government decision and policy is a US thing, essentially unknown, indeed laughed at, throughout most of the world. Why, England doesn't even have a Constitution.

News / The ruling party in Poland tries to take American owned TV news station off the air [528]

The PC-mindless among us will deconstruct almost ANYTHING merely in order to prove a point! Is nothing sacred including one's own personal
taste within the privacy of their own viewing screens?? I dare you to show me a single icon, symbol or story which won't be "offensive" to at least one other person.

Ya can't please everybody:-)

Study / Poland-Germany university transfer? [16]

Where is your home country?

Life / Languages understandable by Poles? [38]

I know that, only it shows the cross-pollination between Baltic and Slavic cultures, mutual unintelligibilty notwithstanding-:)

Life / Languages understandable by Poles? [38]

Although Poland's national poet claimf Lithuania as his "ojczyzna"!

History / Wartime Rescue of Jews by the Polish Catholic Clergy. The Testimony of Survivors. [22]

You bet it is!

Travel / Polish people have a weird attitude torwards tourists [82]

I'm not, mate! That's ethnocentric Rich all over.

History / Wartime Rescue of Jews by the Polish Catholic Clergy. The Testimony of Survivors. [22]

Spot on! Heroes aren't all Rambo types! ADRENOLIN is responsible for more acts of pure bravery than heroísm-:)

History / Wartime Rescue of Jews by the Polish Catholic Clergy. The Testimony of Survivors. [22]

Rich, as usual you're being unduly cynical. Heroism isn't "born", it often comes at the spur of the moment!

Travel / Polish people have a weird attitude torwards tourists [82]

Exactly the sort you should NOT avoid, Rich!! If you want your vacation to be just like home....STAY HOME-:))
The smart travellers's the guy or gal who goes exactly to the places the guidebooks either omit or advise against.
Heck, if you don't believe me, ask Rick Steves.

History / Wartime Rescue of Jews by the Polish Catholic Clergy. The Testimony of Survivors. [22]

A noble cause remains precisely that even if you don't happen to believe in it! Had the Allies taken such a position, why, we'd all still be living under the jackboot,

if we'd even be living at all!

Travel / Polish people have a weird attitude torwards tourists [82]

Makes sense.

History / Wartime Rescue of Jews by the Polish Catholic Clergy. The Testimony of Survivors. [22]

Or an impetuously misguided hero, take your pick-:)

Travel / Polish people have a weird attitude torwards tourists [82]

Agreed.

Travel / Polish people have a weird attitude torwards tourists [82]

Nearly twenty years back or so. Still the same country, Johnny. National character never changes completely, only on the surface perhaps.

Travel / Polish people have a weird attitude torwards tourists [82]

Yep, gotta side with Oathbreaker on that one I'm afraid. @Mafketis, although frequently middle-aged Poles do for sure harbor an often suspicious nature, I did find the Polish language to be a definite ice breaker, especially among women. Again, only in my own experience.

Travel / Polish people have a weird attitude torwards tourists [82]

Poles both those whom I've met on holiday as well as in Poland have a well-deserved reputation for being a forthright bunch, not likely to mince words, as the expression goes, yet famous for their hospitality:-) While I never had any specific difficulties, many Polish people are indeed given to firing lots of personal questions at American-born, Polish-speaking visitors who are thought to be Jewish, e.g. "No, dlaczego pan mowi po polsku?" etc.

However, I'm only speaking from my experience, in Poland as well as at home!