Job Discussion Forums

afowles · Joined: 02 Jan 2004 Posts: 85 Location: USA

Well, I've been out of Poland for just over three months now after living there for three years. Now I'm in Jeju-Do, South Korea.

Things I miss (in no particular order):

1. Polish beer. Oh so good.
2. Fresh produce.
3. Non-fermented cabbage. Ever try kimchi?
4. Performing arts
5. Bar Mleczny
6. Cognates
7. Pubs with dance floors. Not discos, but pubs with dance floors.
8. The Turkish-owned kebab places
9. Cheese
10. Girls (4 beauties sitting around a table, bored because nobody is talking to them. what a conundrum!)
11. Coffee from Hania at Dom Wikingow
12. Hania at Dom Wikingow
13. Going into the Dragon at 4 AM and finding it full
14. Tatry
15. Baltic
16. All the long weekends!!!
17. redsoxfan
18. Oliwka pizza with redsoxfan
19. Krakow
20. The square on a summer night

Things I don't miss:

1. Money-grubbery
2. Walking into a shop and feeling like I've committed a crime by existing
3. Vodka piss everywhere
4. Constantly patting yourself down for fear of being pickpocketed
5. Tram drivers that think the brake is for sissies
6. -30 C
7. Pan Dreszik
8. Zloties
9. Paying a zillion dollars for anything imported
10. The brothers
11. That apathetic, sheepish look on so many faces
12. Getting squished into a second class train compartment with bumpkins eating fried chicken and feeding the scraps to their dog, also in the compartment
13. Waiting for 45 minutes to buy a train ticket, and not being able to buy one online
14. Farce being substituted for satire
15. Profilingua leaflets
16. Split shifts
17. Feeling like WWII never really ended
18. Hearing about the golden age of Poland, when it stretched from sea to sea
19. Those signs in the Krakow train station. STOP DEVIATION
20. Medication nation
21. Endless rationalization of utter nonsense

Poland: you walk in fresh, you come out jaded. If you ever come out.

Wild Bill · Joined: 29 Aug 2006 Posts: 37

Stick it out in the ROK for a year and you will need three years BACK in Poland to recover. You'll see.

BindairDundat GotdaTshirt · Joined: 30 Aug 2006 Posts: 63 Location: DC

Top ten list on the minds of many Americans any given Sunday night:
10."The babes should be coming over to talk to me any minute now."
9."What a couple of geeks."
8."I am gonna save some money."
7. "Why she ain't calling me?"
6."Going out every night shouldn't be a sign that I have no friends, now should it?"
5. "After the second night, I gave up going out on weekdays because I have to teach early morning."
4. "Okay, I'm just going to sit here by the bar and I will try to not rock back and forth or staring at that group of girls."
3. "I won't ask for her phone number this time."
2. "Part of a grand plan not to ask for her phone number."
1."Chicks no longer dig me."

Welcome back to Poland. No one cares even if you say you are what you drive.

BindairDundat GotdaTshirt · Joined: 30 Aug 2006 Posts: 63 Location: DC

... in Poznan" I forgot to add...

"No, I pay first"--"No, let me pay this one"--"No, I'm paying this one"...
And the list goes on and on...

Grrrmachine · Joined: 27 Jul 2005 Posts: 265 Location: Warsaw, Poland

Bindair; I must admit, I have absolutely no idea what you're going on about.

afowles · Joined: 02 Jan 2004 Posts: 85 Location: USA

I think it's biffinbridge in disguise.

BindairDundat GotdaTshirt · Joined: 30 Aug 2006 Posts: 63 Location: DC

I'm sorry if this high falutin sense of humor went over your head. There is nothing to dislike about Poland. I think it is the best country to live in at the moment.
I'll lay that Afowles misses Poznan big time. On the list of things he doesn't miss about this country, I find myself missing most of them. What a peculiar thing is to put ourselves on the spot and make fun of each other. We Americans are the most celebrated to make fun of in such places. Don't take yourself so seriously.