Germany Doesn't Suck

1) Poland is just east of Germany and is relatively poor. They also had a homophobic president and prime minister–twins as I recall.

2) cute. nice.

3) No. Homophobic president is still in office (or is it the prime minister, one of the two). I will not support the Polish economy until they are gone. (I also avoid, to the extent possible, homophobic states/economies in the USA, so I am not discriminating here…)

tqe / Adam – Its kinda funny you used “homophobic” word three times.You seem to be heterephobic or something like that,To my mind you need some psychological therapy,then maybe you stop being overfussy gay.Poland always be strongly conservative and we will never tolerate any deviation like homosexuality.

Adam, thanks for your reply and your honesty.

proud_pole, welcome to my blog. I do appreciate people being respectful of other’s opinions no matter if it is in line with yours or not.

If need be, I can switch to comment moderation.

Hi there,

I live in Poland and, as many of my counterparts, I travel a lot.

Poles travel mainly to western, rich countries. They admire their prosperity, good roads, neat houses and when they get back to Poland they complain and expect Poland to be the same as Germany or US. I think these are exaggerated expectations – after almost 50 years of being under Soviet destructing rule our economy has deteriorated substantially and it requires much time to improve. Also mentality of Poles has been influenced by the communism – people are distrustful and they often don’t care about doing things well as in the past nobody checked upon them and they got paid regardless the result of their work.

Nevertheless, things are going in right direction. Every year we become a richer nation that is more and more proud of itself.

1. What do you know about Poland?
* It’s huge, it’s been picked on a lot through history, it has a Slavic language with seven cases, it’s supposed to be cheap, it still reels a bit from the effects of communism (people expect too much to be provided by the govt).

2. What do you think of Poles?
* Down-to-earth & fiery.

3. Do you have any desire to visit Poland?
* Actually I’m going to Wroclaw later this month!

Hmm, it looks like really all eyes are on Poland these days. I’m a Pole myself, but living in Holland and I have learned more about Poland after I left it. Poles just love to complain about everything: weather, politics, economy, etc. you name it. Temporary fixes seems there to stay forever. People work really, really hard there, but I have no idea where all this energy goes. The Dutch are lazy as hell and are one of the most prosperous nations of the World. Poles work all day long and still dream about the West’ richness. Not for long I hope. All in all, Poles have nothing to be ashamed off and I pretty sure that good times are ahead of Poland.

Speaking of being “homophobic”, I would like to support “proud_pole” on that. I have nothing against gays, but “Adam” is certainly paranoid about Poland being “homophobic”. There are far more important issues facing Poland then thinking about gays all the time.

I hear Poland is not yet lost…

J, in my feedreader your blog title has changed to Germans Suck – with a subheading: they really do.

Change of winds? Hacked site? Did I miss a rantorama post somewhere?

i’m polish and really ashamed of both our president and a whole bunch of homophobes inhabiting my beautiful country

J, I hope you won’t object to me observing that the proud_pole’s comments really only serve to reinforce my impressions about Poland.

I sometimes see advertisements telling me to visit Poland; that you can have a great gay time in Poland, but then I feel the undercurrent opinion so eloquently expressed that Poland “will never tolerate any deviation like homosexuality.”

Places that tolerate deviation are the best places to visit: London, New York City, Amsterdam, and Berlin. The opposite, never tolerating any deviation, makes Poland sound like Iraq, Iran, or Saudi Arabia.

I certainly won’t be visiting Iraq, Iran, or Saudi Arabia any time soon. You can decide what that says about Poland.

(And yes, I reiterate my earlier statement: some US States are homophobic and I do my best to avoid them.)

J: Congratulations on being listed in the “From the Blogs” portion of the CNN article, “Playing poker with the Polish powerbrokers“.

I’m hoping the homophobia there is not really severe, as the friends I’m going with on my upcoming trip are two gay guys…

tqe/Adam – We, Poles support traditional structure of marriage – women and man.If you dont respect it,you eventually musn’t visit us.And stop with this “hompohobia” thing,cause its pathetic.Its nothing but propaganda of oversensitive gay who forcefully wants to enforce his viewpoint.

Cn Heidelberg – Don’t believe adam’s propaganda.We are not bloodthirsty assassins of all gays.Yes, we have strictly conservative point of view on “love” and all this stuff, and if you are on our soil,we require you to respect it.But if your friends dont flaunt with their sexuality too much,they wiil reminisence your trip very positively, and i assure that they will want to come back to Poland all the time.We are very hospitable country for sure

Daniel – Dont exaggerate,we dont complain more than people from other countries.Besides that, we still have a lot of to complaing about,but dont make us very nagging people,cause its false.

Daniel – Moreover,notice that our country have been through a lot in our abundant history.World War Second,which took place in our territory and we Poles were very engaged in (Im not sure that Americans know that during WW2 Nazis killed much more Poles than Jews during the Holocaust…).Long years of Communism regime…We dont have the same start as Holland, so its no wonder that Dutch people live better than average Pole.It will take time to chase rich West countries.

1. I actually don’t know much except I think it is only a 1 hour drive to the border from Berlin. I also know that the city with the 2nd largest Polish population (behind Warsaw of course) is…give up? CHICAGO – my home town!

2. I really thought my Polish friends in high school were quite nice and very friendly. Their food was so delish I would do anything to get myself invited over for dinner….

3. I would love to visit.

1. I don’t know much about Poland, other than it is a former eastern bloc country. Being married to a Russian-German, I believe I had as much a comprehension as I can as to how things were and are.

2. The west-side of Cleveland also has a high Polish population … and not sure if it’s a Cleveland thing or not, but lots of poor jokes too (all untrue BTW).

3. I would gladly visit – but it’s not in my top countries. (But that’s only because I prefer to see more of Germany first, then countries where my family originates, then the extras)

Michael, I spent three years living there and loved it. I think your opinion about Poles not caring how a job is done is mainly for the older generation – not the 20somethings of today. I do agree that Poland is going in the right direction. I was pleasantly surprised last weekend to see how the main tourist area of Warsaw had been cleaned up in my two years of absence.

CN, I hope you enjoy Poland as much as I do.

Daniel, the Dutch sound like the Germans. I also noticed that Poles were hard workers when I lived there.

Ian, I had a bad evening after I got home and changed it for a bit.

Bzz, the tricities area is definitely lovely – Gdansk is wonderful as is most of Poland.

proud_pole, I agree that your country has had a rough time. In fact, I wrote this after spending Millenium Eve at the various concerts in Warsaw:

In the distance, I noticed a large Polish Flag on a rod being waved by someone (it was the size of one that would be carried by a person in a parade). I thought to myself, “With all that Poland has been through, go ahead and proudly wave that flag. The fact that you are able to at all is a miracle.”

Yelli, I do hope you get a chance to visit Poland. I agree that the food is quite good.

Alice, I didn’t know he was a Russian German. I made a post about Russian Germans a year or two ago and said that they were generally friendlier than ‘regular’ Germans (and other stuff).

@ tqe/adam – glad you’ve dropped by again to say your piece. Just as I tell my friends that the articles they read about Germany being full of neo-nazis don’t reflect reality for 99.9% of the country, I wouldn’t let the presence of a few knuckle-dragging twits stop me from visiting Poland. I get the impression p_p is big on talk but small on action.

Hey J. I’ve been watching the CNN thing and it’s very interesting.

1. I know virtually nothing about Poland but I’ve heard from many Polish people that the scenery is great and the food is fantastic.

2. The Poles I have met in person have been lovely – very friendly and warm hearted. However (and this is NOT my opinion), Poles as a group have been stereotyped and tend to have a bad reputation in the area I live in and you’ll often hear the phrase – “Heute gestohlen, morgen in Polen” in reference to cars being stolen and sent over the border. I know this will send p_p into a rage, but that’s just the way it is.

3. Yes, I would love to visit, especially after watching the CNN reports.

I grew up in Chicago – the second largest “Polish” city in the world after Warsaw. So, I grew up with a lot of exposure to Polish people. In fact, you often hear announcements in Polish at O’Hare Airport in Chicago.
I have to admit that the Poles were pretty much the brunt of jokes when I grew up, but I don’t think it was mean-spirited. It’s kind of like how Finns are the brunt of jokes in the upper-peninsula of Michigan.
We actually plan of visiting Poland next year. Our sister-in-law is of Polish descent, and we’re planning (fighting back with…) a trip to Poland and Finland next year to balance the constant travel to Italy we’re forced to endure with our Italian-American spouses.

christina- heh, I dont claim that all Poles are saint ,its obvious that there are always some black sheep in flock.Stereotypes are mainly untrue but they arise from some observations so they have a grain of truth too,no one can deny it.In Poland we say if women are prettier than cows only a bit,that means you are in Germany.And during my stay in your country it turned out to be a truth (I hope it will not send you into a rage ).

I will not pariticpate in any discussions with gays who have some big complexes and troubles with themselves,it’s not my problem. I dropped my statement above,so dont provoke insulting me,cause it’s worthless.

1. quite a lot i guess. as i am very interested in history in general.

2. i don’t like to generalise. i don’t think there is something as “the polish”. (and i really hope proud_pole is not very typical – i hope it for poland). but it seems that antisemitism, homophobia and so on still have strong support there. i hope this will change with progress.

3. i would really like to travel former “pommern” and danzig because my familiy-roots lay there.