Differences between Irish, British, Polish, American and other nations culture, tradition, music - loose talk

Paulina those are lies and made up stories. The same goes for "a real life" confessions to support their biased ideology. Don't be gullible.

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Anyway and by the by it is no longer permitted to sing rebel songs in pubs in Ireland....

I can sing it myself. I learned it years ago. However, I don't hear my neighbours singing it very often :) I can also give you a fair rendering of Krakówiaczek Jeden miał koników siediem, po jechał na wojne, został mu się jeden..........for our school's International Day a few of the Polish children in the school did an absolutely beautiful dance to it, complete with fabulous costumes which their mothers ordered specially from Poland for the occasion. Everybody was absolutely charmed by the whole thing.

The comment I made to Comrade Troll was a throwaway remark simply to yank his chain, nothing more than that. However, if pressed, yes, I would say that Poland doesn't have a strong folk tradition outside a few rural communities and I'd be right. However, I did not say that folk culture is the only culture, nor do I think that.


I'm sure you learned a couple of songs in school, girl guides, or some youth group. I'm also sure that the pair of you probably hail from the more southerly part of Poland.


Of course you do. I'd be an ignorant lump if I thought otherwise.


No, we have a such strong cultural identity in the first place and American influences have been absorbed very slowly over the last fifty or sixty years. Poland is a different story. It was messed with so badly over the last hundred years and then pitchforked into the western world that I think it's going through a bit of an identity crisis and is becoming increasingly Americanized. Even the work culture is changing. Poland didn't have her independence long enough between the Wars for her to really establish what it meant to be Polish in the twentieth century and then you lost a whole chunk of your elite, your intellectuals, your officer class, your gentry. I think that has seriously affected Polish society. When I've discussed this with Polish friends - who, believe it or not actually like me and are not offended by my views - I find that we are in broad agreement on these matters.


I hope I never find out. Spare me, spare me, bleedin' spare me, as they'd say in Dublin. I'm sure that would go down well in Praga on a Saturday night alright. Strangely enough when the youth of Warsaw assemble neath my window after a few beers, they don't recite passages of the Polish classics. Nor have I been subjected to it at any social gatherings I've attended, I'm happy to say.


No, I'm just nicer.


No, I distinctly remember citing the cakes of Blikle as superior. Magnificent confections, true works of the pastry chef's art and a legacy of the French influence on Poland. You see, your culture is a compound of many influences from East and West. Did you not know that?? Yes, I'm yanking your chain Paulina dear.


And Dolnosląsk. Very nice man. Shame he seems to have disappeared. I hope he's just on holiday and not unwell. I'm very fond of Ziemusz. He's intelligent, has a very dry sense of humour and is capable of discussing things in a calm manner without getting red faced and huffing and puffing all over the place.


Like your folk music :))

Well, you proved me wrong but not entirely, Irish may be your native language but how many Irish know it? I think not many know it enough to communicate in it. It is a neglected part of Irish culture. However, I am impressed by your Irish language skills, I translated some of it through internet translator (not very accurate system) and it seems you know a bit of it and I am inclined to believe you know much more of it. Good stuff there.

Irish beef or meat better than Polish meat??? I do not think any Irish meat industry can compete with Polish one.

I agree with you for the first time in the most part regarding your comments about what has become of Polish culture and that it is a shame and shame on Polish people for not noticing it enough. It is increasingly becoming Macdonalds culture. However, you are not entirely correct, a lot of people are familiar with folk songs, folk culture survives in Poland somehow (it is still holding on but little is done by too few people to make it more widespread and prominent) but it is not visible enough and now days seems like it's not there anymore. Even Irish people cultivate their old traditions better than we do, what a shame but true, not only we have almost wiped out the remnants of Slavic (Slavic pagan being the origin) culture away but whatever we produced after is also disappearing fast, just like Christian traditions are being wiped out. So you are for the most part absolutely correct!


Lenka I am shocked!! You are defending Poland so fiercely for the first time ever, I am starting to like you again (I always liked you), you are confusing me, your patriotism is out of balance but I am very happy that you are able to stand up for Poland so strongly. Sadly, I can not really agree with you, as usual your insight is just lacking insight, Atch can see it better. The fact that Irish look after their ancient culture better than us is not even (for the most part) due to their high western ego but their pride and stronger ties with their traditions. We are in comparison the goose, the goose that just follows what is new because we associate our own with poverty and therefore unworthy, how misleading, we throw our traditions away to be more western (because it's better, because the west is richer - that's how we think - how shallow) while some westerners cultivate their old cultures. It is us, Polish who are the idiots, take a good look around. Also, we are too lazy now days to take care of our traditions. We constantly are being told how pagan or Slavic traditions are out of date and too eastern or Catholics tell us how barbaric and silly these are, and then we even reject these days our Catholic traditions, I wonder what will there be in the end left for us. Our Polish culture now compared to that of even 15 , 10 or dare say 5 years ago differs and is getting worse at ever faster rate.

It's not neglected. First of all it's taught in school from the age of four and is compulsory for the whole fourteen years from primary through to secondary. Secondly there are many Gaelscoileanna which teach entirely through Irish and these are growing in number. Thirdly there are groups such as Conradh na nGaeilge where adults can meet to either acquire basic Irish if they have none (though that really is rare, Irish people always have a few words and it comes back to them from their schooldays when they become immersed in the language again) or to keep their fluency going and improve on it. Then you have the Irish colleges as they are known where children or adults can go for a two week course in one of the Gaeltacht (Irish speaking) regions of Ireland. Here's a taste of how the language is being embraced by the young people of Ireland, these are some of the Gaeltacht students from one of the summer colleges. It's nice, you'll enjoy this:

youtube.com/watch?v=pX12ulRkqYI

As one of the comments says - feck an Béarla, is brea liom Éire !!!!!!

You also have to realise that the language has survived in other ways through our musical tradition and thanks to the thousands of songs that are still sung after hundreds of years and are added to all the time.


What do you mean 'even' you cheeky article, especially Irish people.


Yes, and what are you doing importing Hallowe'en from Ireland????That's our ancient tradition, not yours. Do you know where you're getting it from? America. It was brought there by the Irish and Scots who continued to observe it and now Poland is importing it as yet another piece of American cutlure. Hallowe'en has no cultural significance for Poles. It has for the Irish because Oíche Shamhna (the Eve of Samhain)is one of the four ancient Gaelic festivals. It's an unbroken tradition in Ireland right down to the lighting of the bonfires which are still lit all over the country on that night. For days beforehand you'll see the children of the inner cities out collecting pallets, any scrap wood they can find and wheeling it back to their blocks of flats in shopping trollies 'borrowed' from the local supermarkets :)

Anyway it's nice to see that you're capable of being less of a lummox - careful now! Down with that sort of thing :)

Why are you so surprised about the things you just described so well ?
Christians are being persecuted and murdered like no other time in history.
This is all prophesized in the Bible of what the last days will be like.
Only the blind that have no faith couldn't see that we are living in the last days my friend.
Hells bells look what our leaders are doing today.
Muslim Obama wants the Catholic institutions to provide condoms and abortion yet you don't see him trying to force the Muslims to serve bacon and alcohol.

And it is only to get much worse and it ain't gonna be pretty.
Put on your breastplate and stand strong.

I forgot about the meat!

Quantity doesn't always mean quality you know. Have you heard of Smithfield a company very active in Poland and the disgraceful conditions their pigs were kept in? And of course they're not even Polish, they're American. See what I mean?? Bringing horrendous American large scale factory farming methods to Poland.

Then a couple of years ago there was the illegal antibiotics found in Polish poultry.

Irish meat is better Sussexguy because it's raised on small farms in near organic conditions and fed on the natural pastures which are incredibly lush. Ireland has a terrible climate for people but those damp, temperate conditions are ideal for farming. That's why the meat is better. It's just a fact.

Yes, one of the lowest qualities of pork (and cheapest) in America.
They drowned their hormone grown bacon in salt because it smells so bad and tastes even worse.


I don't know much about Poland and you don't know much about the United States.
It took me forever to find this for you Paulina but knew it would VERY WELL be worth it once everyone watched it.
You might have a different take on Crooked Hillary once you see this.
Be ready to vomit.

youtube.com/embed/BdNHf1g4ivA

You're right that internet translators are generally rubbish. It's impossible to fake a knowledge of Irish through such a thing because it translates literally and Irish for the most part can't be translated literally from English for many reasons.

Just for the craic I took a simple phrase 'put on your coat' which in Irish is 'chuir ort do chóta' and put it through Google translate and what did I get? A chur ar do chóta - never heard anyone say that in Irish! Another very basic example would be 'she is happy' In Irish this would be 'Tá áthas uirthi' (which literally means happiness is on her, emotions are always 'on' a person in the Irish language). Google Translate will give you 'bhfuil sí sásta' which is completely meaningless. However you could have 'AN bhfuil sí sásta?' which means 'is she pleased?'. Sásta means satisfied or pleased with, as in 'Tá sí sásta leis.........' she is pleased with something or other. If you want to ask if she's happy however, you'd say 'An bhfuil áthas uirthi? So yes, I do know more than 'a bit' of Irish. Tá níos mó ná beagán Gaeilge agam which translates as 'I have more than a little Irish' although of course poor old Google can't cope with that either! There you go now, ceacht a h-aon in our lovely language for you :)

But did she know that? BTW not all Yanks* are as ignorant as you try to make out. That's just over 20 yards or about 71 feet.

*The word Yankee has different meanings depending on context:
1) Americans in general esp. when used by foreigners.
2) Northerners as opposed to southerners (the old Union v old Confederacy) in the USA, or those living above or below the Mason-Dixon line.
3) In New England, esp. Boston area -- WASPs as opposed to Irish and other Americans.
4) The name of NY's famous baseball team.

I'm just teasing Polly same as when you make those comments about the Irish 'whiskey soaked Micks' etc. Now what was the topic of this thread again - oh yes, smells in Poland. Can't say I've noticed it. You come across the odd whiffy person everywhere in the world.

"Pan Tadeusz" is briliant, no doubt about that. I myself have seen elder people originating from the gentry of borderlands (Kresy) crying when it was read to them. "Hej Sokoły" is really an Ukrainian song written in Polish by a Ukrainian-Polish gentleman. These two illustrate the point once made by Marshall Józef Piłsudski (himself originating from the borderlands) saying "Polska jest jak obwarzanek. Wszystko co najlepsze na Kresach, a w środku pustka".

Indeed, Henryk Sienkiewicz wasn't a man of the borderlands. His "Trylogia" served the purpose of "ku pokrzepieniu serc" and served it very well at the time. In our days , however, such a goal is useless, so the three-volume book have become increasingly "old-fashoned". Did you know that there would be a gap in time between the two volumes since this way the author would gladly omit the period of internal wars in Poland and in particular one enormous slaughter of soldiers in one Polish army accomplished by another Polish army despite the word of honour to save them given by the commander of the winning army. They probably told you nothing about that in your school or mine.


But this poem below by a well-known Polish artist clearly says that 'kieleckie" is not wonderful at all.

I to wszystko na tle zupełnej nędzy
W smrodzie u jakiejś gospodyni potwornej wprost jędzy,
W ciągłej niepogodzie, co lepsza jest od słońca,
Bo wtedy wszystko zda się bliskim już, ach, końca -
Tak sobie wyobrażam Kielce, symbol, jako szczyt ohydy,
Jako jakiś Paramount najgorszej małomiasteczkowej brzydy.
A może piękne to jest, ach, miasteczko, ach, i nawet miłe
I niełatwo jest w nim złapać nawet kiłę...

Are those silly jokes taking the stuffings out of the Irish still circulating in Pommyland? BTW do the Irish have a pejorative tag for Brits? Ameicans say Limey, in Oz it's Pommies. Wonder what the Scots say? You know copper wire was invented by Scotsmen...trying to pull a penny out of each other's hands!

I find it very important that the Polish people hear the truth of the matter.
When you have the "self proclaimed TEACHERS" come on this forum brainwashing this crowd with Socialism and distorted views of the American politicians I feel it only right to set things straight with the truth.

We can not continue to send our children to Caesar for their education and be surprised when they come home Romans.
These "progressive liberals" can't argue that U=tube video that I posted for Paulina can they.
They want that swept under the rug about the REAL Hillary.
Same with the REAL Bill Clinton with his sex addictions flying on the Lolita Express to a private island of under age sex slaves. (28 times)

The Liberal news media sweeps all the good stuff under the rug about those "slime balls".
All you here about is Trump being a racist and bigot (the Liberals guilt defense words) by the liberal media which IS Crooked Hillary's campaign.

I hope everyone watched that u-tube video, especially the women here, if not, go back and watch it.

youtube.com/embed/BdNHf1g4ivA

Polonius, I know this will be hard to get your head around, but about a third of people in the UK, (if that is what you mean with your stupid expression 'Pommyland') have Irish ancestors so close, that they could get an Irish passport if they wanted.

'Pom' is an Australian expression and as such, is to be used by Australians. Not sad old toerags who are not even sure where they are from.

I should have said "English". From a strictly sociolinguistic perspective, what is the nickname Scots, Irish and Welsh use for the English? This has nothing do with insulting anyone, just intellectual curiosity. If interested, I can tell you what slang terms are used in the US for different ethnicities: Polack (Pole), Kraut, Squarehead (German), Dago, Wop, Greaser, Guinea (Italian), Kike, Hebe (Jew), Bohunk (Czech but also Hungarians and at times all Central East Europeans including Poles), Ukie (Ukrainian), N-word, Jungle Bunny, Jigaboo, Zigaboo, Spade (Negro), Spic or Spick (Mexican), Cannuck (Canadian), Scandihoovian (Norwedgian, Dane, Swede)...

The Scots of the Highlands would refer to the English as 'Sasanachs' but that just derives from the Gaelic Sasanaigh meaning Saxon. Mind you it was said with a certain contemptuous tone. Very subtle. The Irish word for England is Sasana. I never heard the English called anything other than 'the English' or maybe Brits. We only insult our own!

Compared to African American versions of it. What originated in USA is not what has been associated with rock and roll for most of its history. Its sound has undergone a profound change with an introduction of a guitar. We can either say that the pure form of rock and roll stayed in the 50s and that a pseudo version of it is known internationally today or we can say that what was before was not rock and roll and that its pure form emerged later out of African American gospel music having been revised and polished in Britain, for when I hear American, so called, rock and roll made by Caucasians I hear mess and scream but when I hear British rock I hear a distinct sound of guitar, piano etc. Compare Marylin Manson with Oasis, both bands are regarded as rock and roll sounding ones, come on, really? While I prefer the music of Marylin Manson I think the latter one is rock and roll, whereas, the former is ...whatever music.

the Welsh call the English 'Saes' (pron. sice) short for 'Saesneg' which means 'English'.
So not that bad, but yes probably not in a good tone.

Eh, they had guitars back in the 1950s and they were played in rock and roll back then.
I think when you talk about rock and roll, you're talking about the development of rock music since the 1960s?


Now why doesn't that surprise me? I'm afraid it doesn't count as music though.

You want to teach Paulina a lesson regarding her views (distorted or not) on American politics then why don't you go on American forum, for this is a Polish forum, get the idea yet?

Hilary Clinton is a dykhead and works most likely for the Zionists but Polish people do not have the responsibility to know that so take it easy here with lesson teaching. It would also serve you right to learn more about Polish politics since you are on PF instead of rumbling about American political scene.

Can you honestly say you already knew all those nicknames?

the only one I have not heard out of those is 'Squarehead' for Germans.

Correct! Why this late? Why didn't you then back me up when I was defending Poland from those Western vultures so many times here? You actually joined them. Nobody here stood up for Polish culture as much as I have, where were you? You are an uptight, ignorant individual all around who should be the last person to talk about Poland here or patriotism, you don't know anything about it, you are only good at petty words, spitting them out century after the event has already happened. Your comment above is spot on but funny thing is when I was making comments like that I was slammed by rubbish like you.


I have never heard anything about Irish food or meat being any good, that does not mean that it can not be good or very good but nothing about it ever has been mentioned anywhere. I have tasted Irish food and it was similar to English food. Maybe Irish meat is good or better than Polish meat but I would be surprised if this was so. However, Polish deli is superb, and I know for a fact, that the meat itself is premium, at least in most cases. The taste of Polish meat products is outstanding and if we were more proficient in business we would be selling all over the world our meat products like hot cakes, but we are not business oriented in the slightest. Polish food is so versatile and delicious that I am shocked that we have not made anything out of it to improve our economy.


Correct! However, you got it wrong about us not having anything to do with Hallowe'en, we have Dziady which is almost identical to Hallowe'en, only we don't celebrate Dziady anymore. We are being complete, total idiots, we pushed it into the corner pretending it doesn't exist because it is so evil to talk about pagan festivals. Yet, we keep in a somewhat distorted form imposed by Catholic Church whereby we celebrate the Day of All Saints (Wszystkich Swietych) when we go to a cemetery and visit the graves of our ancestors. During communism it was called more appropriately: "The Day of the Dead" but even then we did not celebrate Dziady.

I do not know if there is another nation in this world which is aware of having had a festival like Dziady, keeps ignoring it, yet relives it in a distorted manner through Catholic tradition and then celebrates almost the same pagan tradition in the form of borrowed festival like Hallowe'en just because it is celebrated widely in USA. What is wrong with Polish culture????? Lenka, what do you say about that one?


I had no idea Irish language was like that, looks like a very interesting language, very different from English (visually, at least). Why it is not more widespread in public and/or spoken instead of English then?

why do you think that might be? Have you read any history of 'the islands'? Where I live there is also a different language (approx 280 miles from London) but most English people will just laugh about it and would certainly not know any words in it. Most.

Poland's historically lopsided social structrue is what's wrong, and its vestiges are still with us. Poland has traditonally been mainly a land of peasant farmers with no more than 10% nobilty and almost no indigenous bugher class. The cities were largly planned, designed, run and developed by Germans, Jews dominated crafts and commerce and peasants brought their produce in from the surroundign countryside. There is nothing wrong with peasants or farmers, except that it is not they who by and large build castles, cathedrals and urban infrastrutcure, compose symphonies, sculpt statues, invent things, cultivate urban crafts or build industry -- the middle classes do.

Since in contemporary times many if not most average Poles believe that all the interesting, colourful, trendy and sophisticated things must be imported, they tend to be ashamed of whatever they regard as home-spun, folksy and inidgenously Polish but readily adopt foreign imports from Valentine's hearts to pagan-rooted Hallowe'en artefacts. By contrast, Polish house-to-house rounds by caroler-masqueraders done up as an angel, devil, grim reaper, soldier, gipsy, Three Kings and other familiar denizens of Old Poland are encounterede nowadays mainly in the remote countryside, since the custom is perceived as rural and therefore unsophisticated. It was widely practised in pre-war Polish cities. Even though pocket-money-starved youngsters could cash in on a custom in which householders offer them a few złots along the way, it has not caught on.

Of course, neithger have the Tescos, Carrefours and other Biedronkas that promote plastic pumpkins and Hallowe'en ever marketed any Polish carolling gear, as far as I know.

Now, now, to jest bardzo nie ładne to call a lady 'rubbish'.


Ireland was an English colony for 800 years. The first wave of colonists were the Olde English as we call them, the Normans. They were Catholics of course and it was their practice to adopt the language and customs of the lands they colonised and to intermarry. The Irish surnames which begin with Fitz such as Fitzpatrick are Norman in origin,the Fitz deriving from the French 'fils' son, thus Fitzpatrick the son of Patrick etc. So although there was great resistance to the Normans we got on better with them than the later wave of English settlers who began to arrive in the 16th century. T

he final straw was Cromwell in the 17th century. These settlers persecuted the native Irish to an extent almost beyond belief. We stuck to our customs, language and culture despite their efforts to forcibly Anglicize us but the Famine of the 1840s took its toll on the language with around a quarter of the population dying or emigrating. The language went into decline and a period of revival began in the 1880s but by then English was firmly established. We had been bilingual for centuries before that but that was the end of Irish as a language in daily use to a large extent. That's one of the reasons why our Gaelic culture is so important to us because we managed to hang on to it through centuries of colonization by the British. Our language is probably actually the only thing that we lost and even at that, people like myself at least still have some knowledge of it.


Yes, and we don't have that problem in Ireland. Despite being not only a Catholic country, but one that Christianised much of Europe, the old pagan traditions survived alongside the Catholic ones. As for Hallowe'en (Samhain to give it its proper name) that dates back to Neolithic times.

Correct me if I'm wrong. I always thought the Irish patonymics were O' O'Brien) and Mc (McHenry), whilst Fitz as in Fitzpartick originally meant Patrick's out-of-wedlock son.

no that is not what Fitz means.
It simply means 'son of' .
You might be thinking about Fitzroy which means 'son of a King' (eg a bastard)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitz

Yes and Nay!
No, nothing to do with nobles and only 10% citizens able to vote is still better then all countries in the world until USA or Britain (in the second part of the 19th century).

Yes, It has everything to do with the WWII and its aftermath. Poland as Soviet colony government directly form Kremlin with installed middlemen, that consisted traitorous scum, minorities and such. That supposed to be 'Polish' government.

More than have territory of Poland have been stolen and incorporated into the Soviet Union directly, populace from those lands have been treated forcibly into lands taken from Germany.

Rapid industrialization followed in 50' and 60' with growing cities and towns, people have been uprooted, brain washed with agnostic, soviet propaganda, no élites to speak off, or rather what's left of them have been marginalized.

People mainly form rural areas have been ashamed of their often very modest origin, custom, song and dance have been all but forgotten.

That is miracle that so much survived.
Slowly that lost trove of very rich and vibrant culture is been rediscovered.

Comparing histories of Ireland and Poland is like compering apples and oranges.
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