Issues about Poland’s Proposed Ban on the Term “Polish Death Camps”

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If the bill, passed by Poland’s lower legislature last week, becomes law, it would become illegal to suggest that Poles were complicit in the Holocaust

Late last week, Polish lawmakers granted initial approval to a law that has sparked grave concerns among Israeli officials and Holocaust historians.

As Ruth Eglash and Avi Selk of the Washington Post report, the controversial bill aims to make it illegal to suggest that Poland bore any responsibility for atrocities committed by the Nazis during the Holocaust. Under the new legislation, individuals could face fines and up to three years in jail for using phrases like “Polish death camps” (rather than “Nazi death camps”).

The so-called “death camp” bill was passed overwhelmingly by Poland’s lower legislature on Friday, the eve of International Holocaust Remembrance day; the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs called it “miserable” timing. Before it can be enacted into law, the bill needs to be approved by the Senate and Polish President Andrzej Duda.

News of the lower legislature’s vote has provoked an international outcry. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told his cabinet that they “will under no circumstances accept any attempt to rewrite history,” as Jeffrey Heller and Marcin Goettig of Retuers reports.

Poland’s deputy ambassador to Israel, Piotr Kozlowski,was summoned to the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Jerusalem on Sunday to account for the bill. Also on Sunday, Netanyahu and Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki spoke on the phone and “agreed to immediately open a dialogue between staffs of the two countries, in order to try and reach an understanding over the legislation,” Netanyahu’s office said in a statement, according to Raphael Ahren of the Times of Israel.

Poland has long resisted acknowledging its complicity in the Holocaust. Polish lawmakers tried unsuccessfully to pass the controversial bill back in 2013, after then-President Barack Obama referred to “Polish death camps” during a speech honoring Polish resistance fighter Jan Karski. Since then, the right-wing nationalist Law and Justice party, which won a solid parliamentary majority in 2015, has been aggressive in its efforts to sanitize Poland’s historical record.

The party leaders’ refusal to acknowledge that Polish citizens played a role in the terrible crimes committed by Nazis is distressing to Holocaust historians.

During World War II, the Poles suffered a brutal occupation at the hands of the Nazis, who saw the Poles as racially inferior. At least 2.5 million non-Jewish civilians and soldiers died before the war’s end, according to the United States Holocaust Museum. However, the Nazis also “drew upon some Polish agencies, such as Polish police forces and railroad personnel, in the guarding of ghettos and the deportation of Jews to the killing centers.” Individual Poles, the museum writes, “often helped in the identification, denunciation, and hunting down of Jews in hiding, often profiting from the associated blackmail, and actively participated in the plunder of Jewish property.”

A notorious example of Polish persecution of Jews is the 1941 massacre at Jedwabne, during which Polish villagers reportedly herded hundreds of Jewish women and children in a barn and set it on fire, burning the victims alive. (Though historians maintain that locals’ involvement in the massacre was a matter of historical record, some Poles have denied Polish complicity).

In a statement, Yad Vashem, the Holocaust remembrance center in Jerusalem, says it agrees with the new bill’s claims about the inaccuracy of the term “Polish death camps,” since these camps were set up by the Nazis. But the statement goes on to write, “restrictions on statements by scholars and others regarding the Polish people’s direct or indirect complicity with the crimes committed on their land during the Holocaust are a serious distortion.”

The party leaders’ refusal to acknowledge that Polish citizens played a role in the terrible crimes committed by Nazis is distressing to Holocaust historians.

During World War II, the Poles suffered a brutal occupation at the hands of the Nazis, who saw the Poles as racially inferior. At least 2.5 million non-Jewish civilians and soldiers died before the war’s end, according to the United States Holocaust Museum. However, the Nazis also “drew upon some Polish agencies, such as Polish police forces and railroad personnel, in the guarding of ghettos and the deportation of Jews to the killing centers.” Individual Poles, the museum writes, “often helped in the identification, denunciation, and hunting down of Jews in hiding, often profiting from the associated blackmail, and actively participated in the plunder of Jewish property.”

A notorious example of Polish persecution of Jews is the 1941 massacre at Jedwabne, during which Polish villagers reportedly herded hundreds of Jewish women and children in a barn and set it on fire, burning the victims alive. (Though historians maintain that locals’ involvement in the massacre was a matter of historical record, some Poles have denied Polish complicity).

In a statement, Yad Vashem, the Holocaust remembrance center in Jerusalem, says it agrees with the new bill’s claims about the inaccuracy of the term “Polish death camps,” since these camps were set up by the Nazis. But the statement goes on to write, “restrictions on statements by scholars and others regarding the Polish people’s direct or indirect complicity with the crimes committed on their land during the Holocaust are a serious distortion.”

Henry Sapiecha

13 things people from Poland have to outline to foreigners

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ARTICLE BY Karolina Goralska

1. Poland is not located in the polar circle.

There are no polar bears roaming free through snow-covered plains. It’s not freezing cold all year long. And no, we don’t all wear those ridiculous fur hats with earflaps. (Well, we didn’t before they became trendy.) Poland has a moderate climate with four properly marked seasons and summer here actually gets hot.

2. We’re not all communists.

In case you missed that moment in history, it’s been over 25 years since Poland transformed quickly and successfully from a communist regime into a Democratic republic. Our parents and grandparents experienced the severe repercussions of a failed attempt to put the noble foundations of Marx and Engels into practice by violent imposition. And so, majority of Poles actually hate as little as the mention of communism.

ooo

3. How we don’t get bored of eating potatoes every day.

Because there are so many ways to eat potatoes! Boiled and sprinkled with fresh dill, accompanying kotlet; baked and topped with a wild mushroom creamy sauce; made into a savory pancake and covered in goulash; pierogi, kopytka, pyzy — how could anyone ever get bored of this variety?

4. Poland is not a tiny country.

Poland is the ninth biggest country in Europe, both in terms of population and territory. Its area is only slightly smaller than Germany’s and bigger than the UK or Italy’s.

5. Poland is not an impoverished country.

Polish turbulent history did affect the country’s economy, but today Poland is one of the fastest-growing countries in Central Europe, with quality education, stable markets and strong foreign investments. Relative poverty still touches about 10% of the population, but this figure is similar to relative poverty levels of any other developed nation.

6. We don’t all live in Warsaw.

There are 38 million people in Poland and Warsaw’s population is less than 2 million. So next time you meet someone from Poland, don’t just ask “Oh, from Warsaw,?” because that’s the only Polish city you’ve ever heard of. There’s a huge chance the Pole in front of you is one of those 36 million who live elsewhere.

7. But we also don’t all live in the countryside.

While farmlands and forests cover 90% of Polish territory, the majority of Polish population lives in cities and towns. We don’t each own a pet donkey, but most of us have a relative with a piece of land and we love spending weekends with them surrounded by fields and forests.

8. We’re not all alcoholics.

We don’t start our day with a shot of vodka for breakfast. Yes, we are proud of how good Polish vodka is, especially that it’s so cheap. And yes, we drink a lot of vodka when we do drink and are proud of how much we can withstand its effects. But, seriously, we really only drink on occasion.

9. Yes, Poland has beaches and yes, it has mountains.

Almost 800 km of seashore and 3 major mountain chains (Carpathian, Sudet and Świętokrzyskie) divided into 44 ranges, exactly. Where you imagined ice-deserts, there are diverse landscapes. Moving sand dunes in the Pomerania region are a curiosity on European scale. We call Masuria “The land of one thousand lakes,” just because there are so many. Poland also has the only Central-European desert, Pustynia Błędowska. There are wetlands in Biebrzański National Park, gorges in Ojcowski, and islands in Woliński.

10. How is it possible to pronounce “W Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie?”

Polish pronunciation may not be easy overall, but this particular sentence is a tongue-twister, hard to pronounce even for native Poles. Polish language uses many consonants, but when they are grouped they correspond to a single sound, which means that you don’t have to pronounce every single letter. For example, “sz” is pronounces like “sh”, “cz” like “ch”, “rz” more or less like “j” in the French “je t’aime.” Sounds easier, doesn’t it?

11. Polish cities are not ugly remnants of the communist era.

Stare Miasto or Old Town, the center of every major city, is surrounded by kamienice, some of which are 700 years old. These beautiful residential buildings are painted in bright colors and decorated with fantastical carvings and sculptures — just look for images of Poznań, Wrocław, or Kraków. Polish cities are testimony to centuries of history. Toruń is full of gothic architecture; Malbork has the biggest in Europe brick-built medieval castle; Gniezno a cathedral from 1170. And all Polish cities are green with parks and riversides.

12. Polish last names.

My last name is Góralska, but my father’s is Góralski. This happens with all Polish last names that end with –ski/ska or –cka/cki (and a couple others). Last names with those endings work like adjectives and adjectives in Polish need to agree in gender with the noun. So the –ski ending is for a male, and –ska for female.

13. Poland doesn’t only produce non-famous people.

Many of the famous Poles are mistakenly thought to be of other nationality. Roman Polański, the movie director, is Polish. Frederic Chopin, created music in Paris, but was born and grew up in Poland. Maria Skłodowska-Curie married a French scientist and worked in France. Joseph Conrad was a Pole (his real name was Józef Konrad Korzeniowski) and he didn’t even master English until he was in his 20s. Nicolaus Copernicus, the guy who first discovered that the sun doesn’t go around the Earth, but the other way round — Polish too!

Henry Sapiecha

 

11 memories you have when you grow up in Poland

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ARTICLE BY>>Karolina Goralska

1. Carp swimming in your bathtub.

Your dad shopped for carp days in advance before Christmas, trying to avoid crowds in shops and make sure to get a big healthy fish. You loved playing with your new pet who had to live in the tub until Christmas and you would spend hours skimming your fingers on the water surface for carp to chase.

Before bathing, you would have to catch the fish in a bucket, drain the tub, wash it, take a bath, wash the tub again, fill with water and release the carp back into it. On Christmas Eve’s morning, you heard splattering and then a heavy chop. Next thing you knew, fried bells of fish meat were served on your Christmas dinner plate.

2. Whining over milk soup.

Your Polish mom always insisted on serving you hot milk, whether in a glass, over cereal, or worst of all, made into soup with fusilli pasta. You didn’t mind the heated milk as much as you hated the skin forming on the surface. You pushed the film of fat to the edge of your plate, but it often stuck to your spoon and you tasted its mucousy texture anyways. Thinking about this gives you shivers to this day.

3. The hateful eyes of the cloakroom lady at school.

Uniforms weren’t and are still not required in the majority of Polish schools, but you needed to change your shoes for clean ones to walk around in the primary school building. You left you regular shoes in the cloakroom guarded by the cloakroom lady, who spotted anybody who dared not change his or her shoes. Tears still well up in your eyes thinking back about how she yelled at you that one day you forgot your clean shoes at home.

4. Setting a rag doll on fire and throwing it into the river.

Every March 21st, you made a doll out of hay, scrapes of fabric and colored paper in class. Then, together with your teacher and classmates you went to the nearest river in the park where you recited a farewell poem dedicated to Marzanna, the doll representing winter. Your teacher set the doll on fire and threw it into the river while you and other kids cheered. This is how you would expel winter and welcome spring. The tradition is now disappearing due to obvious environmental concerns, but you hold the memory dearly, as it filled you with the expectance of warmer weather.

5. Hoping schools would close in winter.

When you were in third grade, temperatures dropped below -20 Celsius degrees one winter and flu epidemics roamed in your city. As a result, all schools closed for two weeks. Every following winter, you hoped that it would happen again so that you could use the additional winter break weeks to stay at home and watch Cartoon Network all day long.

6. Eating dozens of donuts in one day on Fat Thursday.

The name practically obliged you to eat as many spongy dough balls filled with sour cherry or strawberry jam as possible on that day. Your mum additionally made heaps of faworki the night before and you devoured on the sweet crunchy fritter when donuts ran out. Your parents didn’t worry at all about you being hyper on all the sugar.

7. Celebrating spring by missing school.

In secondary school, instead of drowning a doll in the river, you celebrated the first day of spring by escaping from school. Your whole class agreed that none of you would show up for lessons on March 21st. Instead, you went to chill in the park altogether and enjoyed the first warmer beams of sun. Most of your teachers were aware of and accepted this tradition, but some still got mad and tested the whole class on the following day.

8. Weekends in the countryside.

Every few weekends you visited your grandparents or uncles in the countryside and it was a time of complete freedom. You climbed countless trees and ate apples and cherries straight from the branch. You biked to the forest edge and searched for the best spots for poziomki (wild mini strawberries), and once you found them, you cleared all the bushes of the delicious tiny fruit. You played “police and thieves” on bikes with your cousins and neighbors’ kids, chasing each other on the dirt roads in between immense fields of wheat and barley.

When the family made a fire outside at night, you stuck sausages on the end of a long stick and grilled them over the fire until crunchy on the outside and soft inside. You inserted the sausage in between two slices of sourdough wheat bread and devoured the thing in huge bites.

9. Looking for amber at the seaside.

When you happened to be at the Baltic Sea during summer vacation, you spent hours searching for the precious orange stone that the sea abounds in. The souvenir stands along the promenade sold heavy strings of the stone, some of them containing a fly or a small spider. You were totally possessed by the idea of encountering a piece like this. All you ever managed to find was sea glass.

10. Playing outside with no adult supervision.

Growing up in post-communist utopian cities gave you the advantage of lots of green spaces and playgrounds in front of each apartment block. Together with other kids from the neighborhood, you spent hours after school, building “bases” in the bushes, trying front and backflips on trzepak (carpet-beating rack), doing cartwheels on the grass and rolling down the hills, playing klasy and treasure hunt or jumping rope all-afternoon-long.

11. Escaping from church.

Your family went to church together every Sunday morning. When you were in sixth grade, your parents started letting you go to church with your friends. You inevitably used this occasion to evade service, because the mass bored you to death at that age. You met your friends on the block’s corner, started walking towards the church, but never actually arrived to the mass. You found a great hiding spot in some park on the way and just sat and chatted for an hour and one day you even tried your first cigarette. You knew that your parents would question you about the sermon when you got back and you always prepared the perfect answers.

Henry Sapiecha

 

How to piss off someone from Poland

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1. Suggest we’re Russians.

Typical. You see the blond hair, the blue eyes, the big cheeks, you hear the thick accent, and there it goes: “You from Russia?”

Capital offence. Due to certain historical circumstances, we do not like this association at all. Also, because Russia is bigger and everyone’s more interested in what happens there. It’s like Canadians and Americans, or New Zealanders and Australians — only with centuries of conflict and oppression operating as subtext.

Of course, it’s not that we don’t like the actual Russians. We are, after all, nothing if not magnanimous and gregarious, even though they hurt us so much in the past, the evildoers…. But we don’t harbour bad feelings. No, we aren’t prejudiced at all — and if you suggest we are, we’ll take issue with that too!

2. Label our food ‘so-so’.

Poland isn’t known as a gourmet country. We like simple, filling, comforting stuff, like pork chops with potatoes or sauerkratz dumplings, and a lot of thick soups to fend off the winter cold. But anyone visiting Poland should be legally obliged to praise our fare. We are ridiculously proud of the quality of our staples — keep your baguettes and bruschettas, for we and only we are the keepers of the real, natural, nourishing bread in all its shapes and varieties.

Dairy… okay, so we don’t make hundreds of varieties of cheese — we prefer simple white cottage cheese and curdled milk (which is wasted by the rest of the world as milk gone bad) — but we take great pride in complaining about the EU directives which demand that all milk should be pasteurised, when everyone knows only fresh milk straight from the udder can be good. And sausage — we’ll give you pastrami and salami, but in terms of good old sausage with a lot of fatty bits and gristle, we’re the best. Period.

3. Feign (or admit) ignorance of Poland’s location.

“Poland?” “Yeah, y’know, Poland. Erm, Europe?” “Aaah. Didn’t know that Poland was in Europe!”

“You’re from Poland? That’s great! Now, let me show you how to use a fork and a knife!”

“I’ll let you try our national beverage, I’m sure you don’t have it where you come from. It’s called tea.”

“Poland? Wait, that’s where polar bears are from, right?”

All of the above are real-life conversations.

4. Suggest that anyone else has suffered as much as the Poles.

Yeah, so we’ve been through some major crap. The 19th and 20th centuries in particular were not too peachy. Other nations just love to pick on us. Especially the Russians. And the Germans. Unluckily, we’re stuck between the two. We’re always victimised. Poor us. Pat our backs and nod sympathetically. We’ll tell you it’s not that bad, but that’s only because we’re well-mannered and don’t like to belabor the point. But it’s true. And it doesn’t matter that sometimes we can only blame ourselves. It’s still not fair.

5. Imply that other countries are worse off.

On a related point, we do take major pride in being The World’s Number One Victim. In times of peace, when our neighbouring countries are not very obliging in providing a reason, we’ll find our own excuses. “Bad roads in Uganda? Dude, have you seen our roads?” we’ll say with a gleeful smile.

And maybe other governments are corrupt, but no one can be as primitive, classless, and ineffective as a Polish politician! This is why we have such strong characters — because we have to put up with all this nonsense! Change it, you say? Naah — we wouldn’t have anything to complain about then, would we?

6. Dare to imply that Polish people are not the best.

Despite all of the above, just try to concur and join the choir of poignant Polish whiners and you’ll be dealt with swiftly and unmercifully. We Poles are the best. We didn’t have a country for a whole century and in the end we got it back. We can drink so much alcohol it should kill a normal person and still drive a car2. We even had bears fighting for us in WWII3! So yes, we may be the worst country in the world. But all the others are much worse than us.

2 fact
3also a fact

7. Suggest that other nationalities can drink more.

This is the big one. The Death Star of any Pole-befriending scheme you might be hatching. No one has better vodka than we do. And no one — no one — can drink more of it than us. We’re ready to prove it any time, any place, for as long as necessary, until we’re completely drunk, inebriated, plastered, pissed, sloshed, and out of it. But we’ll be the last ones standing.

Henry Sapiecha

10 words that look the same in Polish and English but have totally different meanings

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1. But

In English, you have “but” and “butt,” and they’re very different things. In Polish, but is pronounced “boot” and means simply, “shoe.”

2. Jest

In English, “jest” is an old-fashioned word for joke. In Polish, pronounced “yest,” it’s the third person singular of the word być (”to be”). IS.

3. Pan

In English-speaking countries, a pan is used for cooking. In Polish, you can say, for example, Pan Kowalski or Pan Nowak. In this language, it simply means “mister.”

4. Most

In English, this word is used to form superlatives (the most important thing, for example). In Polish, most is “bridge.” Just keep in mind that the “O” is pronounced like “aw” in “awesome.”

5. Brat

We all know who “brat” is: an unruly, loud, badly behaved child. In Polish, brat means “brother.” And while the meanings of these two words can definitely overlap, not all brothers are brats and not all brats are brothers.

6. Fart

In Polish, mam fart doesn’t mean what you think it means. In fact when someone tells you that, you should be either happy for them because in Polish, fart simply means “good luck.”

7. Windy

In Polish, this word has nothing to do with the weather. The Polish word for “elevator” is winda, pronounced “veenda.” The plural form is windy, making it look similar to the English word describing a certain kind of weather.

8. Herb

In English, herb is something that you use in your cooking. In Polish, it means “coat of arms.” But if you ask me, I find the culinary herbs much more interesting.

9. Chart

Pronounced in a similar manner to the word “heart” but with a rolled R, it actually refers to a certain breed of dog, a sighthound to be exact. It has nothing to do with an actual, English “chart.”

10. Prom

There is no connection whatsoever between the “prom” that all American secondary school children are looking forward to and the Polish word prom, which is actually a ferry.

www.www-words.com

www.www-jokes.com

Henry Sapiecha

You know you are in Poland when…

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ARTICLE BY Karolina Goralska

Photo: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Poland

1. You can’t figure out how to greet other people. Your friend’s grandparents give you three kisses on the cheeks — left, right, and left again. Their father kisses you on the back of your hand in an outdated fashion while their mother gives you a flimsy handshake and their brother just says, “Cześć” from a distance.

2. When people speak, all you hear is “shhh chhh shhh chhh.”

3. You have no idea what the deal is with those ą, ę, ó, ć, ł, ś, ż, ź letters. How are you supposed to pronounce city names like Szczebrzeszyn, Łódź, Wrzeszcz or Trzcianka?

4. There is a flat voice speaking Polish over the original voices in English in movies on TV. It’s the same voice that reads the lines of all characters in the movie: men, women, and children.

5. The Polish voice in movies heavily euphemizes the language. “Get the f*** out from here, you motherf****!” is read in a monotonous intonation as “Odejdź stąd, ty szarlatanie.”

6. You are required to take your shoes off and leave them by the door when you enter someone’s house. You get guest slippers to walk around in inside.

7. Buying bread becomes a mind-boggling decision. Bakery shelves are lined with a selection of bread you have never seen before. You find round brown whole-wheat bread, oval white with crunchy crust sprinkled with poppy seeds, square sunflower seed sourdough bread, rectangular soy or flax seed loaves, as well as croissant-shaped milky rogale and different flavored buns: cheese and onion, 7 grains, pumpkin seed and Italian herbs.

8. Your breakfast is huge. You get your favorite bread, spread some butter on it and prepare open sandwiches layered with ham, cheese or cottage cheese, lettuce leaves, sliced cucumber, tomatoes, radishes and spring onions. You then sprinkle some salt and pepper over. Instead of coffee, you drink hot tea with a slice of lemon in it.

9. You are grateful for the substantiality of your breakfast, because the main meal of the day isn’t until 4pm. Around noon you get “second breakfast” — a piece of fruit, a sandwich, or a sweet pastry and a coffee.

10. All the dishes in typical restaurants contain potatoes. Boiled, mashed, fried or baked potatoes accompany any main course, but there are also kopytka (Polish gnocchi), potato pancakes, pierogi filled with potatoes and cottage cheese.

11. With your meal, you are served a drink of warm strawberry water, a few boiled pieces of fruit floating in it. You learn that it’s called kompot and that it can be made out of any fruit.

12. You eat all kinds of food made out of “rotten” ingredients. Sauerkraut is just rotten cabbage, ogórki kiszone are fermented cucumbers, traditional barszczis made out of beets that had gone bad (now vinegar is used to gives it the sour taste), żurek is a soup based on fermented yeast dough.

13. You are surprised to discover that none of the “rotten” foods make you sick.

14. You go for a walk in the forest and run into people picking wild mushrooms and blueberries.

15. Everyone lives off seasonal fruit in the summer. You eat jagodzianki, blueberry-filled yeast-dough sweet rolls, every day.

16. You can buy beer and vodka in a shop dedicated entirely to alcohol sales. Any time, any day.

17. You order a beer at a bar and you’re asked if you’d like raspberry syrup in it. You decide to give it a try. Your beer is served with a straw.

18. You can never have another type of vodka again after tasting how delicious Żubrówka is.

19. You discover that Polish people indeed make great use of their seasonal fruit when you try nalewki, fruity spirits. Many households produce them for own personal consumption.

20. Zapiekanka is your anti-hangover food. At the end of the night, you eat an entire 50-centimeter long baguette cut open, topped with mushrooms and cheese and grilled, then served with cabbage salad and slices of ogórki kiszone on top and lots of garlic sauce.

Henry Sapiecha

10 ultra totally meaningful Polish expressions

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An Olga Mecking article

1. Masakra, tragedia

Yes, these words mean what you think they mean: massacre and tragedy. But they’re applied to totally different situations. For example, my husband and I went to Cracow once, and we wanted to take the last train to Warsaw, but the lady selling our tickets was rather slow. When she finally managed to print out our passes, she said, “Okay, now hurry up or there will be a tragedia.” This one’s similar to the Croatian word, katastrofa.

2. Bo tak

My favourite word to stop being questioned by my kids all day long: “Why do I have to do this?” Bo tak. “Why is the world round?” Bo tak. It’s the Polish equivalent of “because I said so.” Or simply “because yes” or “because so” — that’s what bo tak literally means.

3. No ba

No ba is used similarly to the English word “indeed”, even if it is way more colloquial. By itself, ba can mean “duh”, as in when someone states the obvious.

Example:
“So, did you win all that money?” “No ba!”

4. No

This little word has so many meanings. Just remember that the “o” is pronounced like in the English word “port”. Depending on the context, this word can mean yes (wanna go to the cinema? Noooo!), be used to issue a warning (no, no, no, most effective when accompanied by a waggling finger), to show sign of agreement (This film was so cool, right? Nooo!), stalling (so what do you think about this problem? No… I think it’s complicated) and many more.

5. No co ty!

This means “don’t exaggerate”.

Example:

“I am sick, I need to go to the doctor.”
“No co ty, it’s just a headache.”

It’s also used to mean “Are you insane?”

Example:

“I asked her to marry me.
“No co ty!”

6. Jak nie jak tak!

Literally, “how not when yes”, this one’s used to offer encouragement: “Of course you will do this. How can you not do this, when you’re totally capable?”

I was telling myself this multiple times while writing this article.

7. Spoko, wporzo

Abbreviations of spokojnie (calmly) and w porządku (okay), they’re used in a similar way — meaning cool, all right, okay, and the like. They’re also sometimes used in the context of “not so bad”.

Example:

How was your exam? Spoko.

8. No nie!

I don’t know how many times I use this to talk to my kids: “No nie, you made a mess again!” This one’s similar to “Oh no”. It can also be used in expressions like “No nie mów” (You don’t say) or no nie wiem (I don’t know).

9. Won! Precz! Spadaj!

These words have the same meaning, which goes along the lines of “please kindly remove yourself from this place”, but put less nicely. I really want to say this to some trolls who, without a doubt, will show up on my articles on Matador Network (including this one).

10. Ojej/Ojejku

Another handy word, this one allows you to express various emotional states, from admiration to panic, surprise to helplessness. For example, when your friend tells you some unexpected happy news, you can react with a loud “Ojej!” If you come back home to find that your laptop got stolen, shake your head and say ojej (it should be pronounced like ‘oyey’). And sometimes, it’s the only appropriate response to my kids wrecking chaos on the house.

P.S. If you point out to me that I didn’t include the most concise of Polish words, also known as the Polish K-word, let me tell you that it’s because I don’t swear.

.

Henry Sapiecha

 

18 signs you were born and raised in Poland

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1. As a child, you ate gooseberries until your stomach hurt.

Your summers involved eating sour cherries and cherries straight from the trees, raspberries straight from a bush and strawberries straight from a plant. And it wasn’t that you didn’t wash the fruit that caused you pain, you just couldn’t stop and ate way too much!

2. Every Saturday you woke up to the smell of a freshly-baked ciasto.

It was either a golden sponge cake layered with whipped cream and strawberries, a rhubarb crumble yeast-cake or a peach cheesecake, which had to be available for any guests visiting on the weekend.

3. You witnessed a domestic animal being killed at least once in your lifetime.

Your grandparents most likely lived in the countryside and you spent many summer vacations at their house. You ran through the wheat fields and got told off for ruining the crops. You climbed trees and maybe broke your first bone by falling off. You also have an unfortunate memory of a chicken running around without its head or pig screams coming from the pigpen. You might have become a vegetarian because of that.

4. You celebrate Easter Monday by pouring water on other people.

The tradition is called “Śmigus Dyngus”, and initially it was boys who would pour water on girls and vice-versa, but now it’s all families that continue the tradition. This is when water guns come into serious use. It doesn’t matter what the weather is like, you’re going to get wet.

5. Your living room was also your parent’s bedroom.

You grew up in a minuscule apartment in a block building. The whole apartment was around 40m2 and not larger that 60m2. In the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s blocks were built across all Poland to accommodate the influx of population migrating to cities. The housing was designed to fulfill only the basic living needs and so the living room was also your parent’s bedroom and you shared a room with your siblings. The kitchen and bathroom were so small that you could barely turn around. The apartment also included a tiny balcony, about a square meter or two of surface, which your mother used for hanging the laundry out and you for playing “string telephone” with your neighbor friends.

6. Your mum is a cooking machine when you visit home.

Arriving at your parents place you find the fridge stuffed with kopytka, pierogi, bigos and gołąbki and your mum tells you “Well, I wasn’t sure what you would like to eat”. There is ciasto for you for dessert, too, whether it’s Saturday or not.

7. Your father can fix anything yet barely knows how to turn on his cell phone.

Your car broke down – call your dad. The washing machine made a noise – he’ll ask you what kind of a noise it is, how frequent and based on that will tell you what the problem is. Your faucet is dripping? He’ll explain step by step how to clean it out or tighten the seals. When it comes to technology, though, he can barely make calls on a mobile phone (no smartphone please!), turn on a laptop, open a browser or type.

8. You walked to school by yourself since you were in 2nd grade.

You were super independent as a child. You played outside your block with friends and your parents only called you home when it was time for dinner (they would lean out from the window and call your name, no mobile phones back then!). You helped with cooking and by the time you were 12 you could cook a full meal by yourself and bake a ciasto. Around that age, you also started picking up your younger siblings from kindergarten, walk them home and take care of them until your parents arrived from work.

9. Your Christmas dinner involves 12 dishes made out of 5 ingredients.

The ingredients are sauerkraut, wild mushrooms, beetroot, fish and poppy seeds. Historically, not much variety of sustenance used to be available in winter months, and so the Polish needed to invent festive food with what they had at hand. In addition, Polish Christmas dinner is eaten on the 24th, symbolically awaiting Jesus’s birth and is meatless. What’s created of the 5 main ingredients are: a creamy wild-mushroom soup for starters, a clove-infused clear barszcz or beatroot soup, pierogi stuffed with sauerkraut and wild mushrooms, łazanki (noodles with more sauerkraut!), and a variations of fish dishes (with carrot and onion cold topping, in cream, fried). For dessert, there is makowiec (poppy seed cake) and kutia (poppy seeds mixed with wheat, dried fruit, honey and nuts). Surprisingly, there are no potato-based dishes, but given that we eat them on every other day of the year, that’s okay.

10. You know that no party is as epic as a Polish wedding.

A typical wedding lasts for two days. The church ceremony is on a Saturday and the party starts right after that. Bottles and bottles of vodka are constantly brought to tables and drunk in shots. The food is served all evening- and night-long. The dancing and the food slow down the alcohol effect and so everyone seems to be cheerfully tipsy and silly, not downright drunk. The second day of the wedding is called poprawiny and it involves more of the same: food, drinks and dancing.

11. Your parents don’t celebrate birthdays as much as they celebrate imieniny, their nameday.

Let’s be honest, here, though. You prefer to celebrate you birthday.

12. You know at least 10 people with the same name as yours.

Name choices are very limited in Poland and so, first names are very repetitive amongst the population. Every other girl seems to be called Kasia, Basia, Ania and Magda and boys are Paweł, Łukasz, Marcin and Tomek. And if an ‘unusual’ name emerges like Maja or Nikola, it quickly catches on and again, many are named with it.

13. You say no when you actually mean yes.

In Polish, there is a word for yes – “tak” — and no — “nie.” But you use “no” when you agree with what someone is saying. The word sounds negative to a foreign ear. “Do you want some tea?” “No”. “Do you like this TV show?” “No.” Or you use it to show that you are listening attentively. Your whole phone conversation might seem like you are disagreeing with someone, but you’re really not: “Halo? No. No. No. Aha. No. No pa.”

14. When you speak Polish, you sound angry.

You got off a phone with your parents and your foreigner friends ask: “What happened, did you just fall out with your parents?” “No, I just told them about my week”. There is something about our tone of voice or the way we use our language that sounds harsh.

15. If you don’t like the top your sister is wearing, you tell her.

You are direct with your friends and family. If you’re at your friend’s house and are hungry, you ask them what they have to eat. You only heard about the need to say things gently to people (or not say them at all) when you started hanging out with foreigners.

16. You offer tea to anyone who comes into your house.

Tea is just as popular a drink in Poland as it is in England (no exaggeration there!) We don’t drink it with milk, though – just plain tea with sugar or tea with a round slice of lemon in it.

17. You complain.

A lot. You complain about the long winter. When the snow starts melting you complain about the mud. And when eventually the summer comes, it is too hot! You complain about the politicians (even though you haven’t actually voted in years) and prices (even though you can afford to live comfortably and you actually own your apartment and a car and live without mortgages).

18. But all of your complaining doesn’t make you an unhappy person.

A complaint is often a conversation-starter. It’s easier to make friends when you can both moan about something together. Then you move on to joyful topics.

Henry Sapiecha

20 of the rib-tickling Polish phrases (and how to put them to use)

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1. A Pole won’t tell you to get lost.

They’ll tell you to “stuff yourself with hay” (wypchać się sianem).

2. Poles don’t snack.

They “take something on a tooth” (wziąć coś na ząb).

3. A Pole never beats around the bush.

He prefers to “wrap the truth in cotton” (owijać prawdę w bawełnę).

4. Polish people are not nit-picky.

They are “looking for a hole in the whole” (szukać dziury w całym).

5. Polish people don’t count their chickens before they’re hatched.

They “divide the skin on the bear” (dzielić skórę na niedźwiedziu).

6. A Polish person doesn’t sulk.

He “has flies up his nose” (mieć muchy w nosie).

7. Polish people don’t mess things up.

They “make bigos” (narobić bigosu) or “brew beer” (nawarzyć piwa) instead.

8. A Pole doesn’t daydream.

They “think of blue almonds” (myśleć o niebieskich migdałach).

9. Poles will not speak bluntly.

They’ll “tell it straight from the bridge” (mówić prosto z mostu).

10. A Pole is not uninformed…

He just “fell from the Christmas tree” (urwać się z choinki).

11. Poles do not simply grin and bear it.

They “put up a good face for a bad game” (robić dobrą minę do złej gry).

12. A bad Polish writer doesn’t waffle.

He “pours water” (lać wodę).

13. A Polish person doesn’t just run away.

He “gives a leg” (dać nogę) or “takes his legs under his belt” (brać nogi za pas).

14. A Pole is never a know-it-all.

Instead, he “ate all wits” (pozjadać wszystkie rozumy).

15. Polish people won’t pull your leg.

They’ll “stick you into a bottle” (nabić kogoś w butelkę).

16. A Pole won’t take you apart.

He’ll “mix you with mud” (zmieszać kogoś z błotem) or “hang dogs on you” (powiesić na kimś psy).

17. A Pole won’t promise you the world.

But you might get “pears on a willow” (gruszki na wierzbie).

18. Polish people don’t run like hell.

They “run where the pepper grows” (uciekać gdzie pieprz rośnie) or “where the devil says goodnight” (gdzie diabeł mówi dobranoc).

19. Poles won’t pester you.

They’ll “drill a hole in your belly” (wiercić komuś dziurę w brzuchu).

20. Polish people don’t bite off more than they can chew.

They “jump at the sun with a hoe” (porywać się z motyką na słońce).

This article was originally published on March 5, 2015. Featured Photo: PolandMFA

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Henry Sapiecha

Do not believe Poland is grey. These images show how beautiful it is.

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Coverage & images by Kristin Kremers

If I were to have colored a picture of Poland before my trip, I would have used steel blue, muddy brown, various greys, and maybe a little bit of green. I pictured Poland as industrial and dreary. Instead, what I found as I explored the country was a palette of many colors: pinks and plums, cardinal reds, and many different shades of green. With my camera in hand, I set out to try and capture some of these colors.

Just outside the Poznań Town Hall in downtown Poznan, I spent an afternoon watching the wedding parades. The couples pulled up in flower-clad vehicles while street musicians capitalized on the opportunity to make some extra money. Little girls, like this one, got to watch fairy tales on repeat with each new bride-groom. The couples entered the Town Hall, tied the knot, and drove off about 15 minutes later. I grabbed a table on the square at the microbrewery Brovaria, ordered a Grodziskie, and toasted the happy couples.

Navy blue, bright red, and a whole lot of locks

The Jordan Bridge is a 100-year-old section of bridge that used to be about 2 km upstream. When the city wanted to build a new bridge to support a tram line, they moved this section north of its original location here. These days, as in many cities around Europe, couples that want to publicize their love come armed with locks, decorated with initials and images, and clamp them to the bridge.

Fading yellow sunsets and sweet pastel buildings

Biking around downtown Poznan at sunset was a dream. I zipped past adorable restored homes and shop fronts, up and down cobbled streets, by churches and towers, and soaked in the last rays of sun wondering if this was all a fairy tale.

Aged yellows and two battling goats

Every day at noon people assembled around Poznań Town Hall to watch as two mechanical goats emerged, cuckoo-style, from the Town Hall clock. They were commissioned by the 16th-century mayor to remind the people of one of their favorite stories: two goats escaped the mayor’s chef, climbed the tower, emerged from the turret, and began battling before a large crowd. The town was so entertained by the goats that the mayor decided to spare them.

A myriad of colors (and ice cream) in downtown Poznan

Wandering around the Old Market Square in the Old City section of Poznan you can find architecture features inspired by Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Classicism and Modern styles. I also noticed the number of ice cream shops and people walking around with cones, especially right after Sunday church. Some of the most interesting flavors I found included lemonade sorbet with parsley, mascarpone with black currant, and yogurt with fresh peaches. Kolorowa was my favorite shop but some others include Wytwórnia Lodów Tradycyjnych, and Marina where they use liquid nitrogen.

Green, green, and more green

With forest covering almost one-third of the city — approximately 70 thousand square meters – there is plenty of greenery to take in. On my second day, I hiked on narrow trails for four hours around Wielkopolska which began at this lookout tower over Lsowa Mountain. Runners and bikers were scattered throughout and people were picnicking along the lakes. I stopped at Castle Island, built in 1830 by the owner of the land as a wedding gift for his sister. When the couple broke up and abandoned the castle it was used by Polish rebels in 1848 to defend against German invaders.

Hazy white castles in the sunset

The original owner of the Rydzyna Castle redesigned the structure in the 19th century based on the calendar: there are as many windows as days, rooms as weeks, representative halls as months and towers as seasons. Today it is a museum, hotel, and a venue for special occasions.

Brown bottles of local brew

One of the first assumptions I had about traveling to Poland was that some form of vodka tasting would be involved. To my surprise, I quickly learned there is a whole other revolution taking place with craft breweries. I tried craft brews flavored with accents like pine, elderberry, coffee, and maple syrup. Some of the best local spots in Poznan include Brovaria, Nepomucen and Browar za miastem. Grodziskie is the only original-style beer produced in the Wielkopolska region of Poznan — it dates back from the 13th century. It is made of smoked malt, is very light and bubbly, and comes with its own champagne-inspired glass.

Brick Orange Castles

I got to spend a couple nights at a castle and it was as good as it sounds. I ate roast duck with apples, walked around manors and moats, sipped polish vodka called Zubrowka, and woke up to a rooster crowing at 6 am. With more than 800 castles, palaces, and manors in the region of Wielkopolska, it is easy to indulge one’s inner prince or princess.

Jet Black and a Locomotive

I grew up watching the PBS television series Thomas the Tank Engine & Friends, so I got nostalgic at the Steam Locomotive Station in Wolsztyn. Seeing this 100-year-old facility with real operators running the trains, loading coals and fixing parts in the workshop, I felt like I was back on the carpet in front of my television set.

Red, White, and Love

Poland is full of much, but what I felt most was history, culture, and love. I was very wrong to picture Poland as cold and grey. Its people are warm, its culture is vibrant, and its history is long – and there are beautiful colors everywhere.

Kristin was a guest of the Polish National Tourist Office.

Henry Sapiecha