"Cześć!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All Saints Day (November 1st) in Poland.

posted by: Oborski at 17:15 | link | comments |

Bigos & Chips 3…

FAREWELL TO SEPTEMBER…

We are approaching Warsaw after a long tiring drive from the northern lakes.

 

It is a hot mid-Summer Sunday morning approaching noon and I am drifting somewhere between sleep and wakefulness in the front passenger seat.

 

Suddenly I am startled out of that cloudy dream world of half wakefulness.

There are ghosts by the roadside.

 

We are indeed passing a cemetery and full leaved branches from the graveyard trees overhang its railings and place the roadside footpath in deep shadow.

 

There, in the shade, rests a platoon of cavalry! The mounted troop is at a standstill. The horses are at rest.

 

To the front their officer is tall, slim, languidly relaxed his sabre casually dropped at his side. It is as if the old sepia photographs have miraculously taken colour and come to life. Everything is as it should be - the distinctive long tight highly polished Polish cavalry boots; field brown uniforms; zigzag insignia; and those distinctive square Polish Army caps.

 

The lances carry pennants of amaranth.

 

Amaranth is a peculiarly Polish colour - a deep shade of red, which has been touched with purple. It is the colour of fiery skies in the moments before sunset. It is also the colour of Poland’s national twilights and sunsets.

 

Amaranth was the colours of the banners of the Polish Legions, which fought in vain for a free Poland under the Emperor Napoleon.

 

Amaranth was the colour of so many pre-war cavalry pennants and of the identifying markings of the elite First Jozef Pilsudski Cavalry Regiment.

 

Zbigniew Herbert had remembrance of such things when he wrote his “Farewell To September”:-

 

“The days were the colour of amaranth
shining like the lance of an uhlan
Over the megaphones was sung
an anachronistic ballad
about Poles and bayonets
A tenor struck like a riding-whip
and after every verse
a list was published of live torpedoes
Who nota bene
through six years of war
were to smuggle lard -
pitiful unexploded bombs
The commander raised his eyebrows
like a mace
and chanted: not one button
The buttons mocked:
We shan't give we shan't give the boys
sewn flatly on to the heath”

 

To Poles cavalry have a special significance - the triumphant knights of Wladyslaw Jagellon triumphant over the Teutonic Knights at the battle of Grunwald; the winged Hussaria of Jan III Sobieski saving Vienna from the Turks; the Polish Lancers seizing the mountain pass at Sommo-Sierra in the face of Spanish cannon; the victorious cavalry of Pilsudski annihilating the mounted Soviet hoards in the “Miracle on the Vistula” in 1920; and the doomed heroes “sewn flatly on to the heath” in the early days of that September of 1939.

 

Indeed it is on the morning of August 15th - “Soldiers Day” - the anniversary of the “Miracle on the Vistula” that our ghosts have chosen to make their remarkable manifestation.

 

Polish cavalry were the cherished symbol of Polish independence and military glory in the bittersweet interwar years of the Second Republic.

On this Sunday morning, two years before the end of the 20th Century these horsemen may be the reality of flesh and blood but at the same time they are truly only the faintest of passing ghosts - a tiny fractured image of past glory and sorrow - a fond reminder of what was and what is no more - and yet, for a moment, the heart beats stronger.

 

These ghosts will always trouble me. As an Honorary Consul of the Republic of Poland I must smile politely yet again at that oft-repeated question “and did Polish cavalry really charge German tanks in 1939?” or even “did Polish cavalrymen really think that German tanks were made of cardboard?” I smile knowing that however clearly I answer these questions today they will be asked with equal earnestness tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow, so inseparable have these myths become from the very name of Poland.

 

Actually the latter myth is quickly nailed in all its glorious absurdity as every pre-war Polish Cavalry brigade actually had an armoured troop attached to it and had experience of working with tankettes and motorised units in the Spring manoeuvres of 1939 in the months leading up to the outbreak of war. Contrary to popular western imagination cavalry units only accounted for about 10% of the pre-war Polish army and cavalry units were intended to deploy and fight on foot. The horses, much loved in displays, were in reality simply to facilitate fast movement across difficult terrain and large distances.

 

And what of those cavalry charges? That legend of Polish Cavalry directly charging German tanks was happily propagated by the Germans as an indication of pure Polish stupidity and interpreted elsewhere somewhat more generously as the ultimate demonstration of foolish over-romantic Polish heroism. What then was the truth?

 

On the 1st of September 1939 the 18th Polish Lancer Regiment had suffered heavy losses in its defensive action against the German 20th Motorised Infantry Division. By late afternoon, with a company of tankettes of the 81st Armoured Troop the 18th Lancers were holding the most northern Polish positions near Chojnice while the remainder of the Pomorska Cavalry Brigade fell back southward.

 

The Regimental Colonel Kazimierz Mastelarz had already sought permission to fall back across the Bzura River, which was in his rear to a more easily defendable and less risky position. Permission had been refused. By late afternoon Mastelarz decided he had no choice but to take some sort of active initiative on his own. Abandoning the broken down tankettes he mounted half his men giving him a force of less than two normal line squadrons. He aimed to outflank German infantry positions and take them from the rear. At about 7.00 in the evening the Poles came across a German infantry division in a forest clearing. Determined upon a surprise attack Mastelarz swept into the clearing with a mounted sabre charge that annihilated the German units only to fall foul in turn of German armoured cars, which had chanced on the scene. The Polish Cavalry were no match for automatic cannon fire and some twenty cavalrymen, including Mastelarz, fell as the Poles hastened to withdraw to safety.

 

The following day the scene of the action was visited by Italian war correspondents who happily believed the stories of their German hosts that the Poles had died charging German tanks. The story may indeed have actually originated as a German jibe at the willingness of the Italians to believe anything they were told and may only later have mutated into a useful propaganda jibe to demonstrate Polish military recklessness and foolishness.

 

Such was the origin of the legend.

 

Other skirmishes between German armour and Polish Cavalry saw the Poles deploying anti-tank rifles from dismounted positions.

 

While the myth lives on Steven Zaloga and Victor Madej (“The Polish Campaign 1939”) note sadly “it has long since been forgotten that, on the evening of 1 September 1939, one German motorized infantry division was on the verge of retreating “before intense cavalry pressure”. This intense pressure was applied by the 18th Lancers, which had already lost 40 percent of its strength in the day’s fighting, and was only a tenth the size of the opponent.”

 

Poland’s military tragedy in 1939 lay not in the foolishness of its soldiers and commanders. The Poland of 1939 had existed as an independent state for just twenty years. Poland had just twenty years in which to recover from the destruction of the First World War and the preceding century of partition. Despite the fact that Poland spent a higher proportion of its budget than its neighbours on defence that sum was dwarfed by the riches of those neighbours. The Poles did what they had to do. They planned for a limited defensive campaign to slow down the invader while awaiting the promised immediate military action from western allies. They were defeated by the weakness of the Polish economy, the strength of their foes and the non-arrival of their allies.

 

I hope that Kazimierz Mastelarz and his fallen troopers rest peacefully unaware of the manner in which their heroism has been posthumously distorted to suit the convenience of myth.

 

We speed on towards Warsaw and the ghosts along the road side give way to the huge American style advertising hoardings which have mushroomed to pollute the closer approaches to the capital city.

posted by: Oborski at 23:57 | link | comments |

The News Today for Polish Radio...

Kwasniewski stresses success of transformation...

President Aleksander Kwaœniewski has said Poland has been successful in its economic and political transformations over the past 14 years. Addressing a meeting of some 180 politicians, academics, journalists and the clergy, Mr Kwasniewski said he was aware of the many pathologies in social and political life and the mood of pessimism among Poles. Most speakers were highly critical of the country’s political elites. According to Mr Kwasniewski, the year 2005 – the year of parliamentary and presidential elections and the first year of membership in the EU - will be extremely important for Poland.

Polish prime minister Leszek Miller has conferred with his Portuguese counterpart Jose Manuel Durao Barroso in Lisbon. They expressed the hope for an expansion of economic cooperation between the two countries once Poland joins the EU and pledged to introduce instruments facilitating the development of contacts.

Poland has rejected as a pressure tactic charges by some EU partners that Warsaw was egoistic in rejecting key provisions in the bloc’s future constitution. Foreign minister Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz told a press conference Poland would not yield on its opposition to some provisions of the constitution. He reiterated that Poland would not abndon the Nice voting system, which, in his view, reflects such EU values as solidarity and compromise. Poland rejects a new majority voting system for the enlarged EU intended to replace the Nice Treaty which gives a more favourable weighted voting arrangement for Poland.

The presidents of Poland and Germany have urged an ‘honest European dialogue’ on European war refugees and expellees in a joint declaration issued in the Polish city of Gdansk. The declaration comes in the wake of an angry row over plans by the German expellees association to build a Berlin-based centre documenting the fate of ethnic Germans forced to leave eastern Europe following Hitler’s defeat. The plan met with strong opposition in Poland. In an interview for the Polish Press Agency, the EU commissioner for enlargement Gunther Verheugen described the proposal to build the centre as undelicate.

Poland’s police chief, general Kowalczyk, has resigned following accusations that an undercover police operation was leaked to a local gang by politicians of the ruling Democratic Left Alliance SLD. Local media and politicians have alleged the general changed his story over the source of the tip-off to SLD councillors in the town of Starachowice to protect his superior, deputy interior minister Sobotka. Sobotka has already resigned over the case and has been charged by prosecutors with leaking state secrets. Both deny any wrongdoing. Interior minister Janik survived a parliamentary no-confidence vote demanded by the opposition over his handling of the affair.

The independent Monetary Policy Council has left the central bank’s key lending rates unchanged for the fourth consecutive month. The decision came as the value of the national currency, the zloty, plunged to record lows vis a vis the euro in recent days.Most analysts believe the decision was dictated by market uncertainty over doubts as to whether the government will be able to control next year’s deficit.

Some two a half thousand physicians from 44 countries took part in the 9th European AIDS Conference which has just concluded in Warsaw. Of some 1,8 million people infected with HIV/AIDS across Europe, about 1.2 million live in the East, primarily Russia, Ukraine and other former Soviet republics. Poland was identified at the conference as a positive example to follow. Swift reaction to the onset of HIV infections in the mid-1990s has meant that cumulative infections totalled 7300 at the end of 2001.

Edward Hartwig, the grand old man of Polish photography, has died in Warsaw at the age of 94. He achieved international reputation before the war. His honours include the gold medal for sports photography at the Rome Olympics in 1960.

posted by: Oborski at 23:46 | link | comments |

HEARD IN PASSING...

From Warsaw Voice...

"Due to the certificates stating that they're students, they will have no problem with obtaining visas for a long-term stay in Poland."
-The owner of an escort agency in a locality in Podkarpacie region, explaining why he ordered his Ukrainian and Belarusian employees to enroll in college

"Maybe I'm old-fashioned, but I can't stand the sight of two men kissing."
-Primate of Poland Cardinal Józef Glemp, asked for a commentary on the initiative of the Democratic Left Alliance (SLD) concerning legalization of homosexual partnerships

"If we treated the SLD rankings [in public opinion polls] like stock exchange listings, there would be no talk of buying such shares; the risk of taking a loss is very big."
-Dariusz Nawrot, a stock exchange analyst, commenting on the dropping popularity of the ruling left over the last year

"He tells me that I must look like an elegant Cracow woman and inspects me before leaving the house. Sometimes I have to change, and sometimes I stay home."
-Nelli Rokita, wife of Civic Platform (PO) leader Jan Rokita, on how her husband molds her public image

"I want our entrepreneurs to be the best; but hey, guys, stop cheating and stealing."
-Vladimir Kolesnikov, Russian deputy prosecutor general, asked about the alleged government campaign against the richest businesspeople

"He had bad luck. He put his photo in a Russian passport that he bought on the black market; the document formerly belonged to a man wanted for murder."
-A Latvian border guard on a Moldovan citizen arrested while trying to cross the Russian/Latvian border with fake documents

posted by: Oborski at 03:52 | link | comments |

Polish Radio News...

Poland’s foreign minister Wlodzimierz Cimoszewicz has said that Poland will not yield to pressure to change its stand on the new constitution of enlarged Europe. Speaking at a news conference in Warsaw, minister Cimoszewicz said that at the intergovernmental conference Poland was acting in the interest of the bloc, its cohesion and solidarit. It was not guided – as it is sometimes potrayed – by egoistic objectives. „Our stand is clear and its change is inconceivable”, minister Cimoszewicz declared, adding that any pressure exerted on Poland would be useless. Poland, as well as Spain, are against the voting system proposed in the draft constitution, which would reduce their voting power compared with the arrangement adopted under the Nice Treaty of 2000. There is no unanimity either as to whether the preamble to the constitution should contain an invocation to Christian tradition.

Interior minister Krzysztof Janik has survived a no-confidence vote in the parliament. It was demanded by the opposition over his handling of an information leak scandal concerning an undercover police operation against politicians from the ruling leftist SLD suspected of links with a criminal gang. An investigation is under way in the southern city of Starachowice, where SLD councillors cooperated with a gang dealing in drugs and stealing cars. Meanwhile, a new Polish police chief has been appointed. Leszek Szreder, who headed the force in Gdansk, replaced Antoni Kowalczyk, whose resignation was accepted by the prime minister this morning. Observers attribute his resignation to the fact that he came to be associated with the Starachowice tip-off scandal. Earlier, his boss, deputy interior minister Zbigniew Sobotka had resigned over the scandal. Both deny any wrongdoing. Kowalczyk changed his testimony on the tip-off, first saying he had not told Sobotka of the planned action and later saying that he had.

A declaration presenting a Polish-German stand on expulsions has been presented by Poland’s president Aleksander Kwasniewski and his German opposite number Johannes Rau in the port city of Gdansk. It calls for honest dialgue and says that each country has the right to commemorate its expellees but the memory of the past must not be allowed to divide Europe today. The German expellees union has been forcing through controversial plans to create a centre against explusions, focusing on the fate of Germans expelled from Poland and former Czechoslovakia after World War II. President Kwaœniewski denied a Czech press report that the two presidents criticized the post-war expulsion of Germans from the then Czechoslovakia. No such opinion can be found in the declaration, the president said.

Taxi drivers in Poland have again blocked streets in Warsaw in protest against the finance ministry plans to make them install fiscal cash registers in their cabs as of the new year. Cabbies also staged such protests in the mid-western city of Poznan and in Czêstchowa in the south. Taxi companies and invidual taxi drivers are arguing that the present system of cash and mileage meters is suitable enough to calculate VAT for their services. And that the installment of fiscal cash registers will only amount to unsubstantiated costs on their part.

Twenty nine Polish tourists injured in a coach crash in Egypt are returning to Poland on board a military plane. The decision to bring them home was taken by prime minister Leszek Miller after a meeting with health minister Leszek Sikorski. They will continue treatment in hospitals in Warsaw. Six tourists and the Egyptian driver died in the crash, said to have been caused by speeding.

posted by: Oborski at 23:37 | link | comments |

Bigos & Chips 2

 

WOLF’S LAIR...

 

Ketrzyn, known until 1945 as Rastenburg, in the north of present day Poland is a quiet little town known to the wider world solely because of its close proximity to Hitler’s ‘Wolf’s Lair’ which must be one of Europe’s strangest tourist destinations. Here deep in the Mazurian forests is the place from which Hitler presided over his doomed Russian campaign. The core 27 acre complex included private bunkers encased in metres of thick concrete for Hitler, Goring, Himmler, and Borman as well as quarters for other senior officers, guests and the SS plus the necessary operations room and support facility. At one time this heavily defended core sight was carefully camouflaged by a suspended screen of vegetation which was changed to match the passing of the seasons. Further separate complexes of bunkers for the army and the luftwaffe fanned out over a forty kilometre radius from the central site. The core site was carefully mined in case of the need to abandon it if the worst came to the worst. Indeed in 1945 the retreating Germans did indeed hurredly attempt to destroy the complex. In the event the explosives only succeeded in partially destroying the site.

 

  Today Wolf’s Lair is a strange and peculiar contradiction. There is something somehow singularly inappropriate about the café, shop and other facilities at such a peculiarly malevolent site. Today there are the empty shells of bunkers in lesser or greater states of ruin. Some are almost intact. Others send out great twisted slithers of metal reinforcement. Huge beams and enormously thick slabs of concrete lie at odd or preposterous angles. One stairs down narrow staircases which lead nowhere down into the ground.

 

  Guides are leading tour groups around. On the day we are there no English speaking guide is available. We follow on behind a guide who is talking away in both German and Polish. His party seems to consist of a mixture of both nationalities.

 

  The huge ruins are clearly marked in several languages - ‘do not enter’. Nevertheless the guide invites you to “come in” and so you tread carefully between the pillars and fallen slabs examining the cold empty interiors. Here is these strange and awful surroundings you can begin to feel the paranoia and evil at the heart of the Third Reich. In this environment of dense overbearing forest and enormous concrete bunkers it would be impossible to retain any sense of reality or even any meaningful perception of a normal outside world. For those who worked there day by day for months at a time and who rarely if ever escaped from the oppressive atmosphere, pressures and political intrigues it must have been a deeply debilitating environment gnawing at sanity and at the ability to function. It is a ghastly evil and mercifully self destructive folly.

 

  We stop at the bunker where Hitled survived the a bomb attempt on his life in the July of 1944. There is a relatively new memorial to Stauffenberg and the other conspirators who lost their lives in the aftermath of the attempt.  The Guide explains what happened in German. He then repeats the story adding in Polish “when this was unveiled I was invited to be here but I didn’t come - they were still Germans”. He tells the Germans in German that “at least 5,000 people were slaughtered by the Nazis in the aftermath of the conspiracy”. He tells the Poles in Polish that “at least 5,000 people - no I mean Germans - were slaughtered by the Nazis in the aftermath of the conspiracy”. Afterwards we buy the guide a beer in the little bar on the site. He has no sympathy for Germans who come back to the old East Prussia lamenting the loss of their homes. His family were driven out of Vilna. Fifty years later his bitterness and resentment is as fresh as if it happened yesterday.

posted by: Oborski at 16:42 | link | comments (1) |

Polish Radio News...

Six Polish tourists and their Egyptian driver died in a coach accident 50 kilometers from Cairo yesterday evening. A group of 30 who survived the crash were taken to hospital and are reported in stable condition. Kazimierz Wera, Polish consul in Cairo, said that the identity of a few of the coach passengers still remains to be verified, as the wounded persons had been quickly transported to several of the Egyptian capital’s clinics. Polish consular authorities have not yet had the chance of contacting them directly. Police is investigating the cause of the accident.

Warsaw’s downtown area has been paralyzed by taxies. Drivers from all over Poland have come to protest against finance ministry intentions of introducing obligatory fiscal cash registers in their cabs as of the new year. The taxi companies and individual cabbies are opposing the requirement on grounds that the present system of cash and mileage meters is suitable enough to accurately calculate VAT for their services. They claim the whole exercise will only amount to bearing unsubstantiated costs. The introduction of fiscal cash registers has already been postponed twice for successive years. Now, the finance ministry is displaying a tough stance, warning that those who will not install the mandatory equipment will have their permits revoked. Meanwhile, Varsovians are promised to remain stranded in city center traffic jams throughout Tuesday!

The Sejm, lower house of parliament, has started its three day session. One of the top points on its agenda today is the no-confidence vote for interior minister Krzysztof Janik tabled by the opposition Law & Justice. The party has motioned to hold the minister accountable for the developments in the scandal in Starachowice, were local government officials involved in criminal contacts had recieved a tip off coming from a high level interior ministry leak about a covert police sting operation against them.
Another important issue debated by the House is a project proposed by the opposition Civic Platform to establish a Remembrance Center of European Nations under the auspices of the Council of Europe. It is meant as an alternative to the planned Berlin based Center Against Expulsion advocated by Erika Steinbach, the head of the German Expellees Union.

European affairs minister Danuta Huebner has admitted that Poland still has much to do before May 1st next year, its planned accession date into the EU. Speaking on Polish Radio, Huebner reflected on the European Commission report evaluating this country’s state of legislative and organizational preparedness for Union membership. Although the document is to be officially released next week, the European affairs minister said she is fully aware of its contents, as data for its analyses have been supplied by the Polish side. The government is therefore aware of the critical appraisal of certain areas which still need to be focused on. However, Huebner reiterated Poland’s capabilities to complete all required works according to the EU approved timetable.

And finally, a brief look at the weather map of Poland......... The northern belt and northeastern provinces are overcast with rain and snow bearing clouds. The remaining regions are bright, though early morning fogs have tested driving skills and maturity of many motorists. Daytime mercury highs ranged from 3 centigrade in the east to 7 degrees in the west. Winds weak to moderate, southwesterly , getting strong and gusty along the Baltic coast, up north.

posted by: Oborski at 16:31 | link | comments |

"All the air is fragrant with the smell"...

Read all about the national dish - Bigos!

posted by: Oborski at 01:19 | link | comments |

From Warsaw Voice...

HEARD IN PASSING...

"This is the dumbest thing under the sun. I don't think we're a nation that would let itself be cheated this way."
-Danuta Wa³êsa, former Polish First Lady, upon learning that Jolanta Kwaœniewska, the wife of the current president, scored the best results in unofficial polls prior the upcoming presidential elections

"This is the seventh time I have stated my age. I consider this 'badgering the witness'."
-Aleksandra Jakubowska, 49, head of the prime minister's political cabinet, interrogated by the special parliamentary commission investigating the "Rywingate" scandal, at the beginning of the latest round of questions

"The Arabs have adopted a system of values that suits them. For example, there are 200 police officers employed [by the coalition authorities], but 250 show up on payday. They can see nothing wrong in the fact that they have added some names to the list, particularly if the brother of some important sheik is involved-obviously, he can't be left out."
-Lt. Col. Adam Hamasgu³a, an officer in the international division in Iraq, on problems with cooperation with local residents

"He behaved like a man. Immediately upon his return to Poland he reported the incident and submitted his resignation."
-A police officer from Wa³brzych on one of his supervisors, deputy commander of the city police, who, while on a private visit to the Netherlands, was caught red-handed while stealing perfume and was fined 150 euros

"The book is selling very well. Whenever we get in a new supply, we sell out. In the opinion of the buyers, it teaches English grammar in a great and funny way."
-An employee of a Warsaw bookstore on the English language textbook recently published in Poland, which illustrates the use of passive voice with a series of examples with the verb "to rape"

"The same night that visas were introduced, the owner closed his business. This is definitely a sign that very hard times are coming."
-A trader from a bazaar in Terespol on the Polish/Belarusian border, on the disappearance of a currency exchange office that was adjacent to his store

"We analyzed the detective novels that appeared in the bookstores in 2000 and we found that out of 200 books, the functionaries of our ministry were depicted as positive characters in only seven. The rest had thieves, Mafioso and gangsters as positive heroes."
-Boris Grizlov, Russian minister of internal affairs, at a meeting with writers at the Union of Russian Writers

"New, luxury apartments are being constructed nearby. We hope that our future clients will come from there, so we wanted to present them with our offer."
-An employee of the cemetery in Czêstochowa, on why an "open house" was held at the cemetery

posted by: Oborski at 01:06 | link | comments |

Bigos & Chips 1

Z TO Z (PROBABLY VIA ‘Z’)...

 

The English horror of the Polish language (all those consonants and all those ‘z’s) was well expressed recently in an English magazine cartoon which can be summarised in words as follows:-

 

Map books of the great cities of the world:-

London A-Z

London (cab drivers edition) A-B (via Z)

Vatican Alpha – Omega

Baghdad Z-A

Milton Keynes A-Zzzzz

Warsaw Z-Z (via Z, Z and Z)

 

In her glorious ‘Xenophobes Guide To The Poles’ (OvalBooks) Ewa Lipniacka notes ominously “there are reported cases of foreigners managing to pronounce Polish words, but not many”. The critical differences between English and Polish pronunciation are that in Polish there is a far, far higher ratio of consonants to vowels than is the case in English and in Polish every letter is pronounced and emphasis is always on the penultimate syllable. Contrary to English misconceptions Polish is not all ‘z’ and ‘s’ but a lot of it is. Combinations such as ‘sz’, ‘cz and ‘rz’ are notoriously difficult for native English speakers. Beware of any Pole who wants to teach you to say in Polish “a bus is buzzing in the reeds” as it is thought to be one of the most difficult foreign expressions in the world for a native English speaker to attempt. Beware also of smiling Poles who would teach you the off useful word of greeting. If an otherwise completely respectable elderly English lady comes out with a particularly foul piece of Polish abuse it is a clear sign that she had a Polish boy friend with a badly misplaced sense of humour during World War II!

 

By contrast the Polish terror of English is expressed in the wartime Polish joke about the Polish soldier who shot himself on the top deck of a London bus. He had struggled nobly to master ‘through’ ‘threw’ and ‘though’. To Poles English sounds slurred and pronunciation ill defined. Thinking he had at last mastered the English language he was finally driven to suicidal despair when the bus drove along Oxford Street passed the Academy Cinema which was displaying a huge sign proudly proclaiming “Lawrence Olivier’s HAMLET – PRONOUNCED SUCCESS!”

posted by: Oborski at 00:27 | link | comments |

Polish Radio News...
wiadomosci 26.10

Four teenagers have died from poisoning with the deadly carbon monoxide from a faulty gas heater. The bodies of two fifteen year old girls and two 18 year old boys were found in a flat in Chorzów, southern Poland. A post mortem examination is yet to be held, but policemen say that carbon monoxide poisoning is the most likely cause. Presence of the gas was detected in the flat, long after the windows have been opened.

A heated dicussion has been provoked in Poland by a newspaper report that the European Commission will give Poland poor marks for its state of preparations for accession. According to the authoritative Rzeczpospolita daily, Poland is the least prepared country of the 10 new members states, which will join the EU in May 2004. In a report which the EC will publish on November 5th, fifty areas of the community law will be pinpointed in which Poland has delays.
Head of the parliamentary European committee, Józef Oleksy said the report will be studied carefully. He admitted in a program of the private Radio Zet station, however, that the pace of preparations may have slowed down after the Copenhagen summit, and blamed big state institutions in charge of various sectors which need to be adjusted to EU requirements. Deputy parliamentary speaker Tomasz Na³êcz noted that similar problems had been experienced in the past by Greece and Spain, and the head of the opposition Civic Platform parliamentary group Jan Rokita blamed Poland’s political circles for failing to create a strong government which would prepare the country for EU membership.

Minsk has demanded the extradition of successive businessmen supporting Belarussian opposition from Poland. Vladymir Vasilko and Siarhiy Litvin own the biggest chain of wholesale magazines, supermarkets and food production plants in Minsk, and are known to support financially opposition deputies. After persisitent controls in their firms, in September, the two businessmen moved to Warsaw and planned to set up shop here. Minsk accuses them of economic crimes and wants to charge them with involvement in an organized crime group.
The two men were placed in an extradition prison on October 10th. So far Polish courts have refused the extradition of Belarussian opposition activists or businessmen supporting them financially, for fear of political repressions and unjust trial.

A four year old girl, who was bitten by a viper, is in intensive therapy in a hospital in Szczecin, northwestern Poland. Her parents first claimed the viper got into their cottage and bit the girl in the leg. But it turned out that her father has kept the viper in a glass jar since the summer and apparently let his daughter to play with it. Vipers are the only venomous snakes to be found in Poland.

The guardians of a four year old boy found walking aimlessly in a park in the southern city of Wroclaw have contacted the police. It turned out that the boy went out while his mother’s live-in friend was asleep and the mother was at work.
The boy, wearing only a thin shirt, underwear and slippers, was spotted by a woman in a park.

Finally, the weather in Poland, which is shaped by a high pressure area , with rather cold air flowing in from the northwest. It has been a rainy, gloomy day in Warsaw. Rain and sleet prevailed also in northern and northeastern Poland.
The outlook for tomorrow: clear skies in western regions. Elsewhere moderate to heavy clouds. Sleet and snowfalls are expected locally in the southeast, along the central Baltic Sea coast as well as in northeastern and eastern Poland. Maximum temperatures are expected to range from 2 degrees Celsius in the easternmost regions of the country to 6 degrees in the northwest.

posted by: Oborski at 11:26 | link | comments |

M/S Pilsudski Weblog...

Visit our new M/S Pilsudski weblog!

posted by: Oborski at 19:50 | link | comments |

Polish Radio News...

 

Poland’s health minister Leszek Sikorski has said the main problem of the health care sector is shortage of funds, compared with the needs. The minister stressed, however, that the financial plan for 2004 guarantees the same level of health services as this year.

Presenting a report on the condition of the National Health Fund, minister Sikorski said the shortage of funds is that medical services provided above the set limit have not been paid for. Next year, outlays on medical services to insured patients will rise by 1.54 percent compared with 2003.

Health care workers from the southern Polish region of Silesia are protesting in Warsaw against the government policy towards this sector. The participants are demanding an increase in outlays on health care and calling on labour minister Jerzy Hausner to abandon plans to scrap extra pay for work on holidays, benefits and increase working time without increasing pay.

Polish president Alexander Kwasniewski, now on the second and final day of his visit to Moldova, will address the parliament and meet people of Polish extraction in Kishinyev today. President Kwasniewski declared support for Moldova’s EU aspirations and its efforts to obtain the support of European structures in resolving the problem of Transdnester – a self-proclaimed republic where Russian and Ukrainian troops are stationed. The Polish president also presented Poland’s fifteen year long experience of democratic and free market transformations.

Polish and foreign experts have gathered in Warsaw to discuss the sources of success of fast growing countries and the causes of failure of countries which have not managed to boost their economic growth. Also examined are benefits connected with accession to the European Union.
Opening the two-day conference, president of the National bank of Poland, the architect of Poland’s transformations initiared fifteen years ago, Leszek Balcerowicz noted that more countries failed than succeeded in trying to reduce the distance separating them from rich countries. Today, the debate focuses on the economic successes of Scandinavian countries, China and Chile, as well as the failure suffered by Argentina. The Warsaw conference is attended by renowned experts, representatives of foreign central banks and international institutions.

The Polish senate has adopted the bill on biofuels without introducing any amendments. The bill will now be sent to the president. When it comes in force, filling stations will sell fuels, containing up to five percent of bio-components, as well as biofuels, in which the amount of bio-components will be above five percent. The law also regulates matters connected with the production of biofuels and bio-components. Plans to introduce of biofuels have generated much controversy in Poland. Car makers are against them, arguing that biofuels will damage engines. Research conducted at the Warsaw University of Technology does not provide a clear answer. Biofuels are not expected to worsen the performance of car engines, but the study was to short to determine the impact of biofuels on engines in the long run.

The well-known Polish boxer Andrzej Golota has turned up in court in the Baltic seaside resort of Sopot, where he is facing charges of physically assaulting a man. The trial could not be continued for several months as the boxer did not appear in court. Today Golota reiterated that he did not feel guilty and accused his victim of trying to syphon out 100 thousand dolars in compensation from him. The incident happened in October last year at the entrance to a hotel. The man was paying his taxi fare when Andrzej Golota, who wanted to drive up to the hotel entrance, came to him and hit him several times in the face, a witness said.

posted by: Oborski at 19:46 | link | comments |

All Saints Day...

In the Polish traditio we are placing candles and flowers on the graves of four young Polish Airmen buried at St.Cuthbert's Church, Donington, Albrighton, Shropshire at Noon on Saturday 1st November. Afterwards we will be retiring to The Old Bush Inn in High Street, Albrighton. All welcome.

posted by: Oborski at 15:40 | link | comments |

Independence Day...

The Polish Community in Kidderminster is celebrating Polish Independence Day (11th November 1918) at the Polish Ex-Servicemens Club, St George's Terrace, Kidderminster at 5pm on Sunday 16th November. Learn mor