When one becomes a blogger certain arcane powers are bestowed on one by the hidden kabal of semi-reptilian, semi-bovine multi-dimensional beings who own and run the interweb thingy. In a horrid and blood soaked ritual that takes place at a secret location beneath the janitor’s closet in E wing of the Googleplex the new blogger acquires several super-hero-like abilities. Among these are the power to believe that the entire world is probably interested in reading your inane rantings, the power to smile smugly whilst saying “you really should read my blog you know,” and the power to ’see’ what other, lesser, mortals are searching for on the internet. Of course I’m taking a grave risk by telling you about this but I’ve taken the precaution of balancing an empty beer bottle on my doorknob and the whole place is rigged to blow at the touch of a cunningly concealed toggle (what do you mean you’ve never seen Conspiracy Theory?). If you’re a blogger and you don’t remember this, it’s all down to the MKultra-style mind-fiddling tricks they deploy. There is a cure, but you need large quantities of obscure intoxicants and a couple of weeks of free time to put it into practice.
By performing certain ‘clicking’ actions in a certain order on certain ’screens’ that are known only to the initiate the blessed blogger may gain access to a certain sacred ‘document’ known as ‘blog stats’ (I wouldn’t expect you to understand – it’s pretty advanced stuff). Buried deep within this hallowed document is a paragraph headed “These are terms people used to find your blog.” Therein may be found vast and disturbing knowledge of the average web surfer. In other words, “these are the things that some poor sap somewhere typed into Google and then ended up on your blog.” I intend to answer some of these queries in full.
In no particular order they are as follows (all are completely genuine search engine queries):
1. “Are polish people generally short?”
I’m tempted to say, “Yes they are all generally short of change,” but I suspect that’s not what the questioner had in mind. I have to say I’ve experienced a bit of a revelation in regard to this point recently. The ever-delectable A (who will probably kill me when she reads this) is certainly of diminutive stature. For many months I took great pleasure in pointing this out to her by the simple expedient of holding objects at the limit of my tiptoe reach and observing that she couldn’t reach them without recourse to a step ladder. My how I laughed, until she discovered that a carefully placed blow with the knee tended to collapse my superior position. From the floor I observed, in my defense, that she was indeed remarkably short and, moreover, that knee strikes of that kind were explicitly outlawed by the Geneva Convention. “Look around you” she said “you’re the freak. Everyone else around here is my height!” And do you know what, she was absolutely right. The next time I went out on the street I had a good look, and it’s true. Almost everyone, especially the women, barely came up to chest height. I started to feel a little like Gulliver and took more care about where I was treading.
The short answer: yes, most Poles are short-arses. Or possibly I’m a freaky giant from freaky-giant land.
2. “Polish facial characteristics”
We’ve been through this one before. No, there are no unique facial characteristics that enable you to identify a Pole (unless you count scowling and staring). Most Poles believe that they can spot another Pole on the streets of London or Chicago just by glancing at them. I say once and for all that this is total nonsense. It’s all down to body language and clothes. I’m glad that’s finally settled and expect to hear no more about it.
3. “How to meet Polish people”
Go to Poland. Or Camden Town. Or Baron’s Court. Or Chicago. You won’t be able to move without tripping over them. I suspect the subtext behind this query is actually ‘how to meet gorgeous Polish women.’ Since almost all Polish women are gorgeous, it’s less of a problem than it may first appear. On the other hand there’s a big difference between ‘being on the same street as’ and ‘meeting.’ Chatting up a Polish woman on the street or in a pub is next to impossible, unless she’s previously spent six months in Camden Town, Baron’s Court etc.
4. “Are polish people rude?”
Yes. Next.
Ok, sorry I should I go into this a bit more carefully. When I first came to Poland I was appalled at the way people constantly barged into me on the streets. It took me months the realize that this was actually my fault. Polish people pass on the opposite side to English people, as they drive on the opposite side. Amazing but true. It was me who was barging into them. Once I had figured this out I smiled benevolently at pedestrians and marveled at the ease with which I was able to walk down the street. I was happy right up until the point somebody barged in front of me in a queue or blithely allowed a door to swing shut in my face. The simple truth is that ’street’ manners in Poland are generally appalling. If someone doesn’t know you, fancy you, or want something from you they’re likely to treat you with about as much respect as they might a rabid mongoose. It’s a jungle out there. Once I had realized and understood this I began to ‘go native.’ I’m a fairly big chap and entirely capable of winning in a pavement game of chicken. Nowadays, if the local barge merchants don’t get out of my way they tend to end up sprawled in the gutter. This is particularly amusing if they happen to be frail young lasses in high heels.
If I may stray into seriousness for a moment I think the root cause of this is that Poles are extremely judgmental. If they don’t know someone and that someone isn’t dressed from head to foot in pure mink/stepping out of a Mercedes SLK/emerging from a government office at that moment they tend to assume that they are scum. Poles are hypersensitive to social divisions (read: money). In truth the national flag should be pure green, because jealousy and envy are the driving forces behind most social interactions. Poles will bang on endlessly about how courteous and hospitable they are as a nation, but what this actually boils down to is three things:
1. giving up your seat on the bus to a female who is either a) pretty or b) likely to give you a severe ear-bashing if you don’t;
2. inviting people around to your house and plying them with food and drink in order to demonstrate that a) you have expensive stuff in your house and b) that you can afford to ply people with food and drink;
3. sucking up to people who may be able to do you a favor at some unforeseeable point in the future (elsewhere this is known as bribery).
By crikey I’m in a wicked mood today!
5. “Poland shop cigarettes”
Yes, there are shops and cigarettes in Poland – often in the same place. Most of these cigarettes have, in fact, been smuggled across the Ukranian border secreted in the undergarments of Polish grandmothers, but this doesn’t effect the taste significantly. I once knew a guy who worked in a massive American Tobacco plant somewhere in Poland. He received 20 percent of his wages in the form of cigarettes and took great delight in distributing them with gay abandon.
6. “Did poland ever have any colonies?”
Hmmm… tricky one. Basically, no. Poland never had colonies in the same sense that France or Italy or Germany or Britain (ahem, largest empire in history, ahem) did. Having said that, for much of the Middle Ages Poland was substantially bigger than it is now and it’s kings ruled over huge parts of what are now the Ukraine, Belarus, Germany, and Slovakia. Much good it did them. Of course today large parts of north and west London could be considered Polish colonies. I’m just waiting for the Polish Protectorate of Baron’s Court to be declared. It will do us all good and I intend to apply for citizenship immediately (see 3 above).
Flowing from this is the perennial question about Poland’s geographical ‘bad luck.’ As I indicated above, Poland was doing screamingly well for a long time in the Middle Ages and was known as one of the richest kingdoms in Europe. Somehow everything went pear-shaped following the Reformation and Poland has been invaded, partitioned, or occupied about once every three weeks since then. The standard response to this poor showing usually refers to the idea that Poland is surrounded by “powerful neighbors” and was thereby “doomed” to repeated invasion and occupation. This is a steaming pile of horse phooey as far as I can make out. Almost all countries are surrounded by “powerful neighbors.” France is “surrounded” by Germany, Britain, and Italy but has somehow managed to get through the centuries without dissolving into a vague concept for hundreds of years at a time. Britain is “surrounded” by France, Holland, Scandinavia, and Ireland. Germany is “surrounded” by France, Scandinavia, and Poland. How come the Germans aren’t complaining that they’ve been subjected to consistent and unsporting invasion?
7. “Poles drink?”
Yes, I believe I have occasionally seen them do so. It was all pretty lilly-livered and unprofessional stuff so I don’t like to cause embarrassment by going on about it.
8. “Pictures of polish people”
I suspect that whoever typed this in ended up directed to my slightly wicked picture of the traditional Polish drunk. I do hope it didn’t put them off at all 
.
9. “Crazy polish women”
I’m too scared to comment on this, although I should point out that it turned up 14 times (I just Googled it and discovered there’s a YouTube vid titled ‘Crazy Polish WomAn’ which may explain a lot, although she’s clearly not Polish – she would have been armed if she was).
10. “Types of homes people of Poland live in”
Bizzarely this one comes up all the time. I can only imagine that there’s a school system somewhere that requires its students to write “600 words on the average domicile of the Polish person” or some such nonsense. It was the repeated appearance of this query that inspired me to write Where do Polish People Live, but the whole subject turned out to be a lot less interesting than I had originally envisaged.
11. “Jews responsible for World War 2″
Errmm… I think, on balance, that a couple of minutes considered thought generally points fairly strongly towards the conclusion that this is unlikely. I don’t say this often but – WTF!?
Dear Author,
It is me, you historical conscience, again.
Re: the Middle Ages
Do you really think that the 15th and 16th centuries, when Poland was so big and – supposedly – powerful, were part of the Middle Ages?
Poland seems to be generally believed to have been constantly lagging behind the Western powers but, trust me, the Rennaisance was in full swing here too at that time.
Re: the rudness of Polish people or, rather, the question of savoir faire
Actually, I have met a considerable number of foreighners in my life and, many a time, I have been unable to come to terms with their absolute lack of table manners or manners in general. They do not let me go first through the door ( I am spoilt, I admit) or shut it in my face when I expect them to hold it for me. If I have to dine with some American or English people (sorry, my dear friends), I need to prepare myself for all sorts of suprises at the table. Holding a knife like a pencil is just one of their little sins …
Eating with Polish people seems to be less stressful but, certainly, there are appaling exceptions.
Re: are Polish women crazy?
Yes, we are. I do not dare leave home without my shining, though second hand, armour and I am always armed to the teeth in case a big foreigner fancies me sprawled in the gutter.
Jolanta
(definitely on the short side)
Jolanta: Remarkable restraint considering my rudeness. I was having a bad day; sometimes being a stranger in a strange land just gets you down.
I researched my historical comments thoroughly by glancing at a couple of amateur websites and dimly recalling something I read in a book once. I thought Poland was rich in the Middle Ages too…
I think my point about manners was that although the niceties are in place there doesn’t seem to be anything genuine behind them. People hold doors open for ladies, but don’t actually have any respect for them. It all seems to be more show than substance. Table manners are a good example, they don’t actually matter in any sense, but it doesn’t stop people gasping with horror when someone uses the wrong spoon. It’s seen as a sign of poor upbringing (i.e. poor social standing) more than anything else. I would prefer people not to push into queues or stampede for a newly opened checkout as a much greater priority than holding their knife in the correct way.
Evidence of my status as a freaky giant is mounting.
Dear Author,
1. Table manners.
Of course, in the long run it matters more if one is kind-hearted and pleasant to be with than the mere fact that one is proficient in using all sorts of cutlery, choosing the right glasses for the right wine etc. However, there are a number of decent people who seem to be capable of both.
By the way, I hope you are not against good upringing, are you?
2.Street manners.
Each time I come back from abroad I keep smiling at people on the street for a while but, after a day or so, I stop because it dawns on me that the passers-by find me strange, to put it mildly. Perhaps in Poland being polite in the street means looking ahead (hence the collisions on the pavement), not meeting anybody’s eye and keeping a neutral (but not hostile) expression on one’s face?
On the other hand, that ever-present smile on American faces may be just a facade, don’t you think?
I have noticed that a lot of Polish people fall over themselves to help a foreigner in distress. It suprises the foreigner so much sometimes that he or she even offers money in return!
I myself jump to foreigners’ rescue on the street, on the tram or on the train and I am often told that such behaviour would be very unusual in their own country. I have been offered money by Dutch, American, Swedish and English people and – to their amazement – I have never accepted it.
So, is something wrong with the foreign attitude or do I look that poor?
3. Queue manners.
If you had joined a five-mile queue for the toilet paper / meat / tea etc. just once some twenty-five years ago, you would know now that either you fight for it or you do not get it. Bearing this in mind, you might be more inclined to make allowances for the ways of the people who are over forty. There is no excuse for the young generation, though (perhaps it is genetic?).
4. Historical references.
I do recommend the books by Norman Davies for a start.
5. I do agree with your comment on question no.11.
Regards
Jolanta
As for distintive Polish facial characteristics – I too used to think that there are none. And then somebody suggest that I look at cheekbones.
[...] title, I’m referring to a brain fever that seized me the other day as I was writing “Eleven things you always wanted to know about Polish people and weren’t in the least bit disin…” I’m afraid I was terribly rude and unfair about Polish manners. I’m usually [...]
Dear reader,
1. No, I’m not against decent upbringing, but I am against judging people who haven’t had one (whatever that means). My point was that there seems to be an awful lot of social judgment in this country. The distinction between the educated urban elite and the (supposedly) uneducated rural ‘peasantry’ seems particularly marked and unfair. I’m afraid I can’t be dissuaded from the view that being seen to be ‘well brought up’ and economically comfortable is of overwhelming importance here. I know one can claim that good manners and generosity are marks of good character that transcend economic barriers, but I’ve seen too many examples of ’simple’ people being scorned for their simplicity to honestly believe that this holds true.
2. I’ve thought about this one hard in the past couple of days. I’m afraid I’m still convinced that the average person looks at the clothes and the demeanor first and then decides how polite they are going to be. In almost any anonymous social meeting the Polish party always seems to be judging how rich and important the person is before deciding how to react.
3. The subject of queue manners occupies many hours of conversation among Brit ex-pats in Poland, believe me. It’s our number one horror. The weird thing is that British queue manners and Polish queue manners developed under almost identical conditions. Deep in the days of WWII rationing in Britain just thinking about jumping a queue was sufficient to get you sent to the gallows. There is some absence of common feeling in Poland that promotes an ‘every man for himself’ mentality. By the way, 20-east has also written about this.
17. I’ve added a new post that goes some way to explaining my rather vociferous mauling of Polish manners in this one.
Island,
Where to start?!?! (I’ll be brief)
1/ Agree with Jola, you can distinguish Poles from others with about an 80% accuracy. It takes quite some time to be able to do it, but it is possible.
2/ LOL! I had exactly the same street walking problem as you describe when I first arrived. I now have that problem when I visit the UK.
3/ We’ve never met but I think you must be over 1.8m tall?
4/ Rudeness. I think they can be considerably ruder in public situations where they clearly have no idea who you are. In any other, more private situation, I would say they are more polite. (than Brits) To Jola’s point, the entire world is more “genuine” than your average American, although there are exceptions.
5/ Colonies. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth must be the closest. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_lithuanian_commonwealth
Generally on the issue of search terms that end up at one’s blog, I have the same fascination and same weird results. The strangest I ever had was something like “exploded view of a deconstructed chair”. Go figure!
Dear Author,
When I suggested that you make certain allowances I did not mean that you should accept jumping the queue but that you be a little bit more tolerant towards those pushing mercilessly the fellow “queuers” and standing so close to one another that you are bound to guess the contents of their stomachs. Personally, I hate it as much as you do (as I am fairly small in stature and easy to get overlooked in a queue) but I try to understand the origins of such behaviour.
In the past, if I recall it correctly, jumping the queue would result in the “jumper’s” immediate death. In order to prevent such unfortunate incidents people used to set up “queue committees” and to make a list of all those standing in a line; they would regularly check who was present and if you were unlucky, they would strike you of the list ( I am talking about those several-day-or-week-long queues for building materials, furniture, hosehold appliances etc.). By the way, the period of rationing in the UK seems to have been a little shorter than the communist era here …
My parents and my friends’ parents are, in most cases, the so-called first generation intelligentsia. Most of them are university graduates; they have never been rich and, under communism, they were state employees, teachers, doctors, engineers. They could not give us much in the material sense but they gave us something which I can only term as “decent upbringing”. As a result, I do not judge people by their financial status but by the way they think and behave.
My grandfather, a small holder so small that he had to become a travelling stove maker to provide for his family, endowed his six children with his gentle manners and a good upringing too.
And please, show mercy and do not imply that people abroad do not judge their countrymen by their clothes, cars, houses and other status symbols!
Jolanta
Grammar lesson for the authors of your search engine queries:
The word “polish” means blask, połysk, lakier, pasta, płyn etc., something with with you shine things like shoes, furniture, etc.
The word “Polish” is the adjective referring to Poland.
I’m SICK of seeing the two words confused with each other.
It may be that MS Word’s Spellcheck, which changes ‘Polish’ to ‘polish’ by default, is to blame. People of all nationalities think that Bill Gates Knows Better, and, deferring to his greater wisdom, switches to lower case.
It may be that Poles themselves, used to a language which has Proper Nouns but not proper adjectives, simply apply the same rule in English.
It may be PEOPLE DISSING MY COUNTRY (in your questions 1, 4, 8 and 9).
Dear Baduin and Scatts,
You seem to have got me (?) wrong. The terms “Slavic / Slavonic” refer to a linguistic category, not a racial one; thus, there cannot be any distinctively Polish / Russian / Czech facial features, if we are to be serious about it, of course.
The notion of “the Slavic race” (certainly inferior -Untermensch) was popularised some seventy years ago by … guess whom.
Jolanta
All: Yes, I think Scatts mis-attributed the ‘Polish facial characteristics’ comment to you Jolanta.
This whole issue has become something of a bugbear of mine since the argument previously broke out in the comments to What is Poland Anyway? This is what I think: yes, it is possible to identify Poles on the streets of London or Brits on the streets of Krakow without hearing them speak, but this is emphatically not because of any facial characteristics. Any Pole who’s lived in the UK and any Brit who’s lived in Poland will recognize the phenomenon. You see someone or, more usually a group of people, walking down the street and you are immediately and absolutely sure they are countrymen of yours.
I contend that there are several things that allow you to form this opinion, usually correctly, but that facial characteristics isn’t one of them. Body language, style of clothes, hairstyle, gestures, facial expressions yes, but not physical facial characteristics. Carefully look at the faces of Polish people on the street next time you go out then look me in the eye and tell me honestly that there are some common and universal features. It just isn’t the case. Yes, of course we all know Polish girls with slightly close-set or broad-set eyes and killer cheekbones (or whatever your favorite is), but think about it, we also know Polish girls who have neither of these things (I know, I know, but I’ve never had the inclination to closely study Polish male physiognomy).
As Jola quite correctly points out the notion of purely Polish racial characteristics is both absurd and faintly nauseating. It could only really be entertained in a country where 99.9 percent of the population is white and culturally homogeneous. I’ve certainly been in situations where I was immediately sure that a person with African or Asian racial characteristics was British, or American, or French, or whatever. In other words, a Brit who happens to be black is as immediately obvious to me as a Brit with ginger hair and bad teeth in the same way that one can spot an Algerian-Frenchman or a Turkish-German. It’s not in the face.
As I mentioned in the previous discussion a Japanese-American called Dyske Suematsu conducted a very interesting experiment that goes right to the heart of this issue. He wondered if it was really true that Japanese, Chinese, or Korean people could actually identify their fellow countrymen simply from a photograph of the face. The answer: no, not any better than an Eskimo guessing on pure chance. I’d love to prove that this is also the case with Poles, Czechs, and Russians, but have yet to summon the time or enthusiasm to carry out a similar operation.
By the way, I do not mean to imply that anyone who has commented on this is in any way racist or bigoted, but I do think there are some dangerous concepts lurking behind this whole idea that need to be brought out into the open and heavily stomped on.
Michael: I’ve often thought that it must be highly annoying to Poles that they can be mistaken for poles or that being Polish might imply that you can bring a shine to leather footwear. I am aware of the grammatical distinction and apologize if I’ve allowed it to slip through in the past.
Are you implying that I’ve dissed your country? Well, yes I have and I intend to continue doing so as long as I feel like it. I have of course also heaped praise, and very deliberately.
scatts: (I can’t help but find your nick vaguely, well, scatological… please supply some alternative explanation that I can get behind)
2) It’s so true. People back in Blighty never believe me and often conduct complex experiments to prove me wrong. Of course the results are slightly skewed by the fact that they take place on Kentish Town High Street where you’re as likely to be walking past a Somalian fresh off the boat, or a Pole, or a Lithuanian, or an slightly lost Russian billionaire, as a you are a born-and-bred Englishman.
3) I’m a little over 1.8 m (6 foot 1 in old money) which is by no means exceptionally tall in the UK. I lived in Warzsawa for a couple of years and I suspect that down here in the south people are generally a bit shorter. I’m sure it’s the result of to too much walking up and down mountains, it wears their legs down.
4) Rudeness. Yes, there really is something in it. There is a moment of judgment that precedes the decision to be polite or not. As a typical scruffy Englishmen I think I often fail to make the cut.
Search terms are indeed fascinating. I’m just worried by the fact that the chap who typed in “Jews responsible for World War II” ended up with me. And by saying that I have of course just doubled the chances that it will happen again. Self-censorship enters a new era–you dare not mention the phrases that you don’t want to be associated with…
scatts: going for the record on self-commenting, but it just occurred to me to mention DarthSida who blogs in English about living in the UK. I will get around to blogrolling him just as soon as I can figure out what the hell he’s going on about.
Hello to this blog, everyone, everyway
Hope you’ll pardon me a personal intrusion into your interesting topic:
=> island1
I was living in the UK for a very, very short of time, albeit long enough to make me feel like launching a London-about blog. Back in Poland, I’d want to comment on [inter alia] miscellanies of / in British media / life – either to keep pace with the UK should I return there – or to keep pace with my English (leid).
J
Keep on putting your thoughts down… keeps me laughing and checking your big words…
sorry will miss Krkw for New Years… maybe another time when warmer.
blessings,
L
I’ll sort of skip the whole “race” thing except to say I appear to have mixed up Jola & Baduin. Also to say I do honestly think there are such things as Polish faces, same as there are English ones. Lastly, for something I’m skipping, doesn’t “99.9 percent of the population is white and culturally homogeneous.” apply to Poland more than……any other country you can think of?
As for my nick. My surname is Scattergood (as per the “who me” section of the blog). When everyone eventually grew out of calling me “scatterbrain” at school they settled on “scatts”. I still have many friends I have known for well over 30 years and so this nick has sort of stuck. Although it does have certain shitty connotations, it has been my nick since before computers were available to the general public so I saw no need to re-invent myself especially for virtual purposes.
darthsida: Hi to you too. Your intrusion is quite welcome.
Thanks for the clarification. In skipping through your voluminous blog(s) I admit I missed the point where you ceased to be a foreigner and came back home.
Lon: Actually the weather is unseasonably warm (again), but it is terrifyingly gray, damp, and gloomy. I’ll keep putting in the big words as quickly as I can pick them at random out of my Big Boy’s Book of Hard Words
scatterbrain: aha… I have that feeling you get when somebody tells you something you’ve previously figured out and then forgotten. I do remember looking at your Who Me and this occurring to me before. I have to say your About page has significantly more information and significantly less cod Latin than mine. You can make up your own mind as to whether this is a good thing.
But WHY do you think there are such things as Polish faces, or for that matter English faces? It just isn’t true! You CAN identify people of your own nationality, or of a nationality that you know well, but it’s not the face that allows you to do this. Why do I say this? 1. Because studies have shown it just isn’t true (Dyske Suematsu’s experiment is just one easily accessible example). 2 Because non-white British people (or Americans) still look like Brits or Americans to me.
Rant over.
1. faces: the thing that gives Polish people out is deifinetely hair cut. usually very bad. this, however does not usually apply to women.
2. rudeness: there is something in what Island1 says about lack of genuine respect behind the gestures. i’m impressed with how observant you are. i think i’d generally agree… but not with one point. manners and money are not that connected. at least not in Poland.
in uk it’s different, and i think it comes from the general attitude of the British “working class” towards education of any kind. in poland poor and uneducated people still have a huge respect for the educated and education. that’s one of the reasons it’s usually the university professors who comment on things on tv, not “an average Pole”.
poor people in Poland also know the manners and pass them to their children, like other things they want to teach them
what i meant is that manners are not a reflection of your bank balance, but of your education/mentality
very interesting.
i’m adding in RSS Reader
[...] you prove me wrong, you have to, well, just admit it, to yourselves: Polish guys are beautiful. PS Island, if you’re reading: there are some Polish facial characteristics. (Except for those making us [...]
[...] mustache, snor, wąs, wąsy, ūsai Unique Polish facial characteristics were denied their existence. Or it’s said, admittedly, if there’s anything unique about Poles, [...]
You are right about the Middle Ages. Poland was indeed quite powerful during the Middle Ages (the monarch was the third wealthiest in Europe, just check out what remains of his former tapestry collection at Wawel) and Renaissance, and the “Rebirth” actually made its way from Italy to Poland before it did to other parts of Europe).
Also, yes, Poland did have colonies, in mainland Europe. And if you count Tobago, which was colonized by the Courlandians which were then a fief of Poland, you can count a remote colony as well. But it quickly fell to the Dutch and Poland was too embroiled in its own internal affairs to give a hoot.
And one more thing! How tall are you? You must suffer from giganticism, because the average Polish height is 176cm, hardly what one would call short.
Bob: Courlandians eh? Sounds interesting I’ll have to find out more.
176 cm may be the average but believe me there are and awful lot of short people down here in Krakow. Maybe they’re all 2 meters tall in Gdansk to bump up the average.
Why are u pissin off polacks. What are you a british Pri**?
Stop sayin bad things, and say somethin about urself that u guys are ugly as f***, ur teeth are as big as rabbits and u guys have no manners at all.
island1: Being an American, I wanted to find out my “genealogical roots”, and I actually went as far as having a DNA test done. I was surprised when the results came back “Polish”, especially since I have traced all my ancestors back to the England (to the 1500’s). In an attempt to find out more about Polish people, I ended up reading your blog. I think you are absolutely hilarious and a fantastic writer. You should come here to California and become a comedy writer!
Genene: Thanks, glad you enjoyed it. Now tell me you’re the head of a major studio and want to offer me a job.
Good luck with the Polish roots thing. Plenty of interaction between England and Poland even before 1500; Hanseatic League traders and all that.
If you’re interested in Poland do click over to Polandian; a collaborative blog where most of my stuff appears these days.
But you Brits (or English is maybe more accurate) are obsessed with queueing. You have to admit that it is more than a little silly to queue for a bus, when there almost always is a place for everyone. But I also agree, that the Poles could learn a little from the English, but there’s no need to go to either extreme.
Hmm about height.
Let’s maybe u r taller than poles ;p
Average height of polish men is 174 cm
And i am 157cm.
Small?
most polish i met abroad are rude (not in poland). they talk about other nationalities like they are superior. talk about asians not speaking good english when they themselves were poor in english. they look down on you – they look at your clothes, your car, your everything. even casual parties they dress like they’re going to an Evening Ball. They are very much concerned about money. money money money.
Wrong about the height bud,
Most of the people in my POLISH family are above 6ft tall, women ranging from 5′8″ to 5′10″
I myself am 77 in. tall and damn proud to be
I am a first timer to Poland currently sitting in a hostel thinking how did I end up reading this fascinating blog when I’m in a foreign country (another story for another day).
I have to say that I’m of the friendly type and smile at someone if they look at me in the eye (walking down street, in a bar, anywhere pretty much) and I get scowled at quite regularly.. Why is this?
Is it because I 185 (with sun streaked hair and a definite surfer image I’ve been told)?? Are people here heightists or is smiling at a stranger not acceptable here.
I’m of the opinion that a lot of people here in Wroclaw don’t really meet many other people than drunken british males looking for good looking polish women to ravage who in turn look out for british males and avoid them at all costs… again just an opinion but could it be true?
Oh and by the way.. Drinking Guide… what a brilliant blog!
1. I am proud to boost the average to 193 cm (six foot four, as we say in Chicago). I have no idea whether the polish food my babcia served, the fumes of Chicagoan traffic, or some ingredient in my school lunch did it, but I’ve outgrown my entire extended family. In my humble opinion, Poles are no shorter than most other races once corrected for nutrition, Masai and Pigmies aside.
2. The facial characteristics might be subtly there, but I believe much of it is culturally learned. Perhaps we Poles can sense others with our minds?
3. On the subject of courtesy, I believe we generally are cautious, but not rude. Last I checked, our tourists do not have the unfortunate habit of stealing signs from our neighbours.
http://www.utterpants.co.uk/news/world/rudesigns.html
4. On the subject of alcohol: simply check the Polish ranking in beer consumption per capita – it is difficult to find an adult (or teenager) in Poland that has not imbibed two drinks in the past twenty four hours.
5. Historically, all of Eastern Europe could have been speaking Polish by now if not for two unfortunate tendencies: poor allegiances and worse bureaucracy.
Our neighbours (with Lithuania as a major exception proving the rule) generally either allied against us and then divided up the resulting spoils of crushing us (multiple times), or our allies were content to sacrifice us in the hope of appeasing their enemies (see: Roosevelt, Churchill, although the Sudetenland felt this, too).
Our politicians may have been even more lamentable; after the strong monarchy Poland initially possessed faltered and a legislative government took over, we Poles have been (pardon the pun) shafted. If it wasn’t the horridly mistaken liberum veto policy of the sejm (one vote against negates the entire vote, ad infinitum), it was the puppeteering of the Soviet government. After the Kaczyński twins left office, the most common complaint I hear about Polish politics is that it isn’t even entertaining anymore.
Polish women,
Great in bed but deadly in all matters of the heart. They are cold as hell and razor sharp. No wonder Polish men have a reputation for heavy drinking…..I have had a few encounters and been close to hitting the hard stuff my self. Polish women have no idea what they want (even less so than other women) but they are damn sure that all the problems in the world are your fault and they are going to get even with you for it…well in advance.
I am seeing a Polish girl now (it took me a year to recover from the last one) and frankly………she is ………hell on toast! Great looking though. Lets see. What the hell am I doing. I just never learn.
Dear idiots,
You have no clue what your saying! First of all any country can be rude and just because poles don’t open the door for your spoiled ass doesn’t mean there rude! Gosh, your being rude right here and very selfish expecting everyone to move for your big BRITISH ass.You think every country has to bow down and kiss your feet when you strut down the street. I’ve been to Britain and theres all sorts of ignorant and selfish people. BTW I’m not polish, I just think you’re stupid.
This is the strangest website….. It appears to be based on nothing factual or intelligent at all. What a waste of time!
I think this website should be a study in the pitfalls of stereotyping.
You guys are wrong on so many points I think it’s not even worth writing about?
I guess I’ll address a few….. Poland was dominant in Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries.
Poland is the 19th tallest country in the world. (according the the chart I read). From my personal observation the people in the north seem to be a bit taller than the ones in the south.
As an expat living in a foreign country (Japan) I completely understand both the need to vent on apparent differences and the feeling of being judged by everyone around you.
I’m under the impression that all expats, everywhere, feel that the people in the other nation are judgmental because manners are essentially culture- culture that you did not grow up with, culture that you may never completely fit into. Truth is, we are being judged. This happens everywhere.
That being said, I was disappointed that the author would merrily engage in some serious stereotyping despite having suffered under so much stereotyping himself.
Commentors, too- I’m rather sick of being judged because I’m American. Just like the Polish are sick of being judged for being Polish; same for the British. Come on, people.