Local Poles taking advantage of foreigners living in Poland

This can and does happen. The solution is to keep your mouth shut and have a Polish partner negotiate for you. When the client realizes where the money is coming from, he will wise up.

Or, you could make yourself familiar with 'the Polish way' before you start.

Queues:
Queues can be as bad in Poland as much as they can be elsewhere. The answer is to get there early and 'go with the flow'. Don't feel singled out. If there is any pushing, and I know there always is, You don't have to be a Brit to get elbowed.

I will say that a lot of the frustration is not caused by the people in the queue, but by the organization that caused the queue. A lot more could be done in Poland to improve customer relations. And yes, we have discussed this before.

- But there's also lots of bad driving here.



- Well, if the British start knocking Polish drivers for bad driving, why can't I knock the British drivers a bit?



- Yes, but some British and other foreigners go to Italy and view Italian drivng positively, whereas they view exactly the same Polish driving negatively. I disagree with such a double standard.

I rest my case

I have to agree with you on this Harry ..... driving in certain parts of Italy can be quite manic also, but driving in Poland is very hazardous ..... one just has to look at all the crosses at the side of the road which signify a fatality or fatalities.

I have done a lot of driving in my time ... 27 years in all , and driven through many european countries, America and Canada and in my opinion driving in Poland is the most dangerous. There are more boy racers and lunatics on the road ...... much more than I have experienced in UK ...... unfortunately :o(

The British take safety into consideration.They sacrifice speed to safety always discussing how to make roads,crossroads and traffic signs in such a way that to allow minimizing of accidents.Poles rely on driving skills and common sense.

- Wow, what a different perception of things different people can have, and what mysterious causes are of this. :) As we say in Poland: kazda sroka chwali swoje gniazdo (one praises one's own, puts down outsiders).



- In principle, perhaps, yes, but not always in reality. Come to UK and see with your own eyes.



- Yes, in UK there are no such crosses, but does it signify there are no fatal road accidents? No crosses = no accidents?

Poland is the best. Everything is splendid and it's like a real life version of 'The Big Rock Candy Mountain'. Thank you God for creating this 'Raj na ziemie'.

...............unlike..........

The UK, land of Satan, dark even in the daytime. A Hogarthian nightmare. Evil lurks round every corner. The 'Ripper' gliding through an East End pea souper, Malcolm McDowell and his posse, resplendent in Bowler hats, boots and tights loitering around in the underpasses, just waiting. Where the children of JPII are ritually humiliated, forced into a life of cleaning and prostitution and occasionally roasted on open fires.

Right, we seem to have cleared all that up.....

Everyone happy now! Where are the Sunday papers :0)

Not a good idea when you have two tons of car and no experience.

As said before: Polish folk don't have a tradition of the road.

Also, we are now seeing better roads and more road signs, which means someone has realized that there is a problem. Tougher police actions would also help, as well as public information in the media. Drivers have to be made aware that they are the cause of their own problems, in some cases.

- Of course not, but Poland isn't as bad, compared to your own country and countries, as you and similar to you paint her. And you paint Poland so badly because you mindlessly and slavishly accept and stick to what your own media psychopaths and liars put into your heads about Poland and Poles. Do you notice any relation between your media image and your own image of Poland and Poles?

I think the problem is that foreigners in Poland often behave like pussies made with thick dick, who let others push them around and later they spread their frustration around saying crap about "rudeness" or even "racism". You either are a pu*sy and then should shut the hell up or you fight for your own. Being a pu*sy and blaming for that everybody around is not really a good thing.

EU effect.There are directions for that.
If you notice on the whole the road and railway network is better in the west and north Poland where there were Germans.It is much worse in the East where there have been Russians.Actually by looking at maps of it,you can accurately know where the borders lay 90 years ago.

- I've never said that; don't put your own blown-out-of-proportion words into my mouth, pal. Its your own image of Poland that looks more like the alleged image of UK.

See how it tastes when your own country is being harshly criticised? And you, bastards in this board, have been doing it to my country all the time. Never saying anything positive about my country and people. Coming to my country with a horrible arrogant attitude, expecting that we will kiss your unwashed feet. You're destroying your own national image with us, you know? If I were you I'd care about it.

no. i meant my experiences of customer service in prague was that it's the worst i've ever experienced and the people who were working there seemed to make a point of being rude and deceitful. but it's my experience thus my opinion. if you don't like it or agree with it, cheers to you, no asked you to.


although what you wrote doesn't make sense on paper, i get the "spirit" of your post. but what the heck is your point?

when did i write "my" driving culture was superior? how is commenting on stupid driving in one place condoning stupid driving in another place?

no i'm not. what did i write here that would lead you to start with the racist language?

It's wierd with types like you, like anything you deem to be a "negative" observation suddenly makes the observer racist. it's not the case at all, dumb driving is dumb driving and i've met plenty of Poles that have concurred with my observations, do they become Polish racists by your merits as well? is it possible for you to be anymore thin skinned and insecure?


i agree with you for the most part but sometimes, when i see so many intelligent people do things that are so obviously counter productive i start to wonder if there aren't elements of truth to the whole eq arguement.


exactly i'd say poles are very skilled drivers but the decision making process when weighing the risks and rewards just leads to the obvious conclusion that there is overcompetitiveness on the roads here.

- Then I misinterpreted your words, but they were ambiguous.



- That's another story, but saying that it's the worst driving in the world or even in Europe is a gross exaggeration.

It is czech humor actually,difficult for the foreigners to interpretate.For example fat women in tourist places,irony to the customer,challenging every aspect of him.To me it seemed humor but I do not think most foreigners viewed it the same way.
In comparison to that Poland looks like heaven.In Poland there is actually customer service which is non-existant as concept in Germany.In the latter the employee has more rights than the customer,all shops clos by 14.00,nobody offers any assistance(except in mobile phone shops),nobody smiles etc.
However the public sector is much better in Germany than in Poland.(it works).

In all seriousness I think you make quite a few valid points in your postings but don't you think you are sometimes a bit over the top? The words 'blown-out-of-all-proportion' could well be directed at some of your stuff.
I'm not very sure if I'm right or not but I think one difference is that, generally, when the UK is criticised, Brits don't take it personally and don't go on whacked out rants. Also, I have to say that I have read a lot of positive stuff about Poland on these Forums. I'm sure you'll agree?
I am still curious as to why you don't live in Poland as you are such a staunch defender of your country? You would probably make a great populist politician!

The road casualty figures speak for themselves.

its not a mystery that some British landlords or British employers etc. take advantage of Polish people here in UK (especially the Poles who dont speak English) - just because they are immigrants and "don't belong here" so they might as well make some money out of them and then tell them to get lost. but its so terrible when a foreigner goes to Poland and gets so cruelly conned for a few złotys that he cannot possibly afford. in my opinion - fair enough.

The polish con style is embarassing,not just the con action itself.A same or greater con by an Italian would even produce a pleasure because the Italians are excellent con-artists.

any examples because i dont really know what sort of conmen in Poland you came across? im not a foreigner in Poland so i dont think theyd try to target me.

southern-hmm i'll definitely try to adopt some of your perspective the next time i go, it's not really that i found it so completely horrible, just that my worst experiences were there. cheers for the tip.But really, in the end, customer service shouldn't make or break my day. "Oh no, someone was rude-" whoop dee doo; as long as i don't let anyone swindle me it's all just static.


and even if you had interpreted them correctly, what would it be to you if i liked czech customer service or not?


right, mate, show me where i put that in writing or even suggested that.

- You've got to be kidding? How about even your own posts? How about Wroclaw Boy's posts?



- I live in Poland whenever I can, but I often work abroad. I can afford living both in Poland and abroad. There's nothing 'populist' in what I write - at least no more populist than in your own posts.

They are not conmen like in South Europe.They can for example change your money for fewer zlotys than they should and then claim that their ratio(!) is that.Or the ticket inspector will ask for a bribe to let you in the first class vagon when paying ticket for second class.Or the hotel receptionist charging breakfast while knowing that you will check out in the night.Such small cons.

- I don't know Czech customer service; I've never been to Prague and don't intend to go in the neatr future. But I know e.g. customer service in Canada (can be horrible, grumpy, insulting) and UK (more or less the same, but still better than in Canada).



- No, you didn't say it literally, but it can be concluded from your post.

until you put down in one post what i wrote here and give a good f'n explaination how your interpretation could be logically concluded from what i wrote then no sir you are completely and utterly wrong and mistaken on this matter.cheers.
*edited* what comparison did i make to polish drivers and the rest of the world? go back and read what i wrote, come back and apologize. cheers.

- If so, then - believe me, friend! - a great sigh of relief from me! Forget my other posts. Cheers.

It is simple.Puzzler is used to people finding CR better than Poland.(like Michal).So he supposed that Foreigner did the same because Puzzler had no experience of czech customer service to suspect that the sentence meant something different.

apology accepted. in your defence i think you might have missed the bit where i specifically wrote that i couldn't compare polish drivers to the rest of the world.



that's just it though, who is someone to call me a racist even if i had found something in CR that I liked better than in Poland? In this case i didn't but there are other things that i do, in fact, there's tons of crap i like and dislike about other countries as well but j.h christ people get defensive here when ya write something negative about a small aspect of life here.

- The sentence is ambiguous. No, I don't have any experience of Czech customer service, only once a Czech consulate abroad - they were fine.

so either fight or accept what you feel to be crap treatment? yes, a very progressive approach to the 21st century.

It's funny cause on the face of your arguement it's so compleletly wrong, yet if people did adopt that approach more often we'd live in a world much less tolerant of people trying to cheat others (hypothetically). There's so much to agree with and disagree with in the approach you put down there. It's really a fine line imo, some stuff is worth the hassle of a fight and whatever direction the fight goes and other stuff is just healthier to blow off in a different avenue of life.