Couple of times, on my blog, I mentioned that some of us - Polish emigrants - have inferiority complex typical for emigrants, and it is usually expressed in complains. Since I came to Ireland I have been listening to Polish drivers complaining on Irish ones. In fact Irish drivers are not the best in the world, and even I have seen so many times how Irish people drive their cars. Hover, it doesn’t mean that Irish drivers are worse than Polish ones. Let me say, we are both bad drivers, but we are not the same bad drivers, actually Polish and Irish drivers are like a two pieces of jigsaw, that could create one excellent driver.
Irish drivers lack of the imagination and awareness. Sometimes they seem to drive the car while sleeping. The most terrible behaviour on the country roads is the driving the car, truck or tractor in the middle of the road, having the whit line just in the middle between the wheels. On the country roads that bend like a snake it is very dangerous, especially when many Irish people drive fast new cars (consumption in Ireland is very high - typical for the society that used to be poor), so there is a lot of accidents. The next bad habit typical for Irish drivers is almost complete lack of knowledge when the indicators should be used. It is so often visible (or rather not visible) on the roundabouts. Yet another typical bad behaviour of Irish drivers is parking cars wherever they want to stop. Once - in Birr - I saw old lady who stopped her car on the junction, just before the traffic lights. She just turned off the engine, and went to the shop leaving the car on the regular strip of the street.
Those examples are quite typical and happens regularly. However Irish drivers have one feature that is not typical for Polish ones. It is a culture of friendly driving. Irish drivers let the other drivers go, do not challenge each other, do not try to prove who is the best. Many times being stock in traffic jam I saw the drivers who let go others who were leaving car parks, or driving across the main street. Being pedestrian I like very much the way how the Irish drivers treat people who are passing the street. Many times I just stopped close to the crossing zebras, thinking about something and then realising that the traffic just stopped. Usually when I come back from Ireland to Poland I have to take care about myself, especially when I am crossing the street. In Poland drivers don’t stop when somebody is closing to the zebras. Pedestrians are to wait, not the drivers. No body reduce speed if there is no body crossing. People on the pavements are not taken under consideration of the Polish drivers.?? I saw many times when cars were taking over each other while driving through the crossing places. Actually Polish drivers treat driving as a challenge. The other drivers are the enemies, and one has to show them who is the best, so Polish drivers speed a lot, take over (sometimes 3 cars at the same time) etc. Polish drivers know nothing about the culture of friendly driving, so don’t expect that somebody will let you go if there is a traffic jam. No body will care about you. Living and driving in such reality?? you have to be at least good driver, so we are, but comparing to the Irish drivers, we are not better at all.
accidents bad behaviour bad drivers bad habit birr car parks country roads inferiority ireland Irish culture irish people jigsaw lack of knowledge new cars poland Polish and Irish polish drivers polish people roundabouts traffic lights
I know that some of you was curious why did I stopped updating my blog. The reason is quite simple. I was very ill (bronihical tubes infection) and I was also have been very busy with my new job. I am ok no, so my blog is going to update my blog as often as I can.
It seems that Poland is going to be much more linked with Ireland, helping the Irish culture, and the Irish film makers to make the film about James Connolly (staring Peter Mullan) . According to Onet.eu, Gdansk is going to pretend late 19th and early 20th century Dublin, because the city itself is too modern nowadays, and Gdansk is the one of the few port cities with the original late 19th and early 20th century warehouses made of red brick, very similar to the ones that used to dominate the landscape of the banks of the Liffey river. The film is going to be the most expensive in the history of Irish film industry, and it is going to be partly financed by Irish government and SIPTU (which was founded by James Connolly), as a part of 100 anniversary of Easter Rising.
I like very much the idea of making part of the film in Gdansk. Maybe one day, Irish film makers will visit my home city - Lodz, which is also very old and in some parts reminds Dublin.
dublin easter rising gdansk ireland Irish culture irish film industry irish film makers james connolly liffey river onet peter mullan poland siptu
Published at November 10, 2007
in Poland.
Sometimes on my blog I have been dealing with the things or places in Poland with names taken after Ireland, or more or less related to Ireland. This time it will be something special. As some of you know, I have a new job for an Irish IT company who is working on new big service for people who care and for the non-profit organisations and charities. One of the first Polish non-profit charities I have contacted with was the one of the biggest in Europe pounds for horses - “Tara”. The name is rather taken after the story “Gone with the wind”, however it is related to the Tara hill. Irish Tara was the residence of the high king of Ireland, and Polish Tara is a kingdom of horses, usually the old, disabled and bad experienced ones. Horses are usually being bought straight from the slaughter houses, sometimes they are bought from the lorries that are going to Italy. Poland is a land of horses as Ireland, unfortunately many of our horses are breed in bad conditions and then sold to Italy and France for meat. They have to spend the journey in terrible conditions, crowded over limits in the lorries, without water, air and food. Luckily we have people who are devoting all of their time to save those horses from the death in one of the Italian, French or Polish slaughter houses, to save them from the cruelty, starvation etc. (More info on their website: www.ligon.chorzow.pl/tara)
In Tara there is over 100 horses placed in the old German grange that used to be a communistic state property farm (like Soviet kolhoz). They have plenty of land, meadows for horses and lots of buildings for stables, but the grange was partly destroyed by the former owner - the company who did nothing to renovate it.
The Pound is maintained by 2 people - married couple - Scarlet (that is her real name) and Peter with help of over 1000 volunteers. The horses are neither for sale nor for ride. They are retired, spending rest of their lives in peace. Horses in Tara reach the age over 30.
Here is some photos I took during the visit in Polish Tara:
charities gone with the wind grange horse horses ireland italy and france poland pound for horses scarlet slaughter houses starvation tara tara hill
Published at October 19, 2007
in Poland.
Despite of the attempts of present party in rule (Law and Justice) to limit the access of opposition party to the public TV and Radio, and their attempts and doubtful actions of their anti-corruption bureau against the opposition all election polls shows outstanding advantage of leading opposition party Civic Platform over Kaczynski’s far right anti-everything party Law and Justice. The gap varies from 2 - 3% to 17%. Of course our prime minister - Jaroslaw Kaczynski - can not accept the facts and today he publicly accused all of the poll agencies of fabrication the poll results. Of course polls are only polls, but I am hoping that the accuracy of them is about 2 - 3 points maximum. It is possible that finally we - Poles, in Poland, Ireland, UK, Germany will get rid off the tyranny of terrible twins and their henchmen.
It is 5 minutes to election silence, so there are the latest polls according to Onet.pl, WP.pl and Gazeta.
Unfortunately we are still living in a secret police state where every person against terrible twins can be punished quite easy, especially blogers, who are - according to Polish regulations - publishers of newspapers or magazines I prefer to hide the results of the election polls.
corruption bureau dga election polls gazeta wyborcza gfk jaroslaw kaczynski latest polls law and justice onet pl opposition party pbs pis poland polityka poll rzeczpospolita smg tvp wp pl
Published at October 19, 2007
in Poland.
According to Polish internet portals - Onet.pl and Gazeta.pl, President Kaczynski’s chancery has announced on the website of Public Information Bureau the list of the ordered drugs and medicaments. Among many of them you can find Viagra. Does anybody from president chancery have problem with erection or maybe all of them became weak facing the latest election polls?
Indeed, on the website: bip.prezydent.pl you can find the PDF file with the list of ordered medicaments. Here is the link to PDF: http://bip.prezydent.pl/x.auction?id=8000133
Check the page 81
chancery drugs election polls erection gazeta pl information bureau internet portals kaczynski onet pl poland president public information viagra
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