Poland has become the focal point of this week’s edition of The Guardian’s New Europe mini-series, which over the past three weeks has focused on Germany, France and Spain. This obviously makes me happy. This means that Poland is no longer just a supplier of sexy baristas and enthusiastic plumbers. It’s a country people want to explore and get to know better.

So has Poland succeeded in its attempt to readjust to the new reality, to being part of the European Union? How are the Polish enjoying the New Europe? What should the British know about and maybe even learn from the Poles? This, I hope, The Guardian will show us on its pages over the next few days.

Timothy Garton Ash, who knows Poland inside-out, and who has seen it many times before when it was still a Communist country, writes that Poland is getting to grips with being normal and gives countries like Egypt hope. (Coincidentally, he also mentions the widely-used English words I wrote about in February). You can see modern-day Poland through the eyes of a typical young family from Krakow, read about what life is like for young people in Poland and how the country prepares for Euro 2012.

There’s a great gallery of images from Warsaw by David Levene, there is some Polish business, lots about the Polish culture and Polish food. There is also an article on Polish stereotypes. Are Poles really homophobic?

This week The Guardian will also publish podcasts focusing on Poland and football, and Polish literature; there will be a look at how emigration has changed the face of Poland and how new waves of emigration could continue to do so. Also, something close to my heart, a look at the Free Silesia movement (many Silesian people will declare “Silesian” as their nationality in this year’s census – something I should perhaps write about more soon).

The Guardian did a great job. They are even sending someone to Krakow and they will explore the city solely based on tips received via Twitter. (You can tweet your tips to @BenjiLanyado)

A few years ago I set out to write this blog and tell the world more about Poland than a few old stereotypes. I’m glad that in 2011 a major British newspaper does the same.

Spread the word…

This time it’s all about the latest news.

thenews.pl is run by Poland’s equivalent of the BBC World Service, Polskie Radio dla Zagranicy. It’s published entirely in English and is mainly focused on Poland or Poland-related issues.

You can also listen to English-language bulletins there and the site also offers Polish press reviews translated into English.

If you are really into all things Polish, you’ll find their micro-site on the upcoming presidential election particularly useful.

I found the new site particularly useful during the recent floods. While the BBC and most British media outlets completely ignored the disaster (American and Middle Eastern news outlets seemed to be more interested), thenews.pl had regular updates on the situation.

And just out of curiosity: HOW MANY of you are actually interested in daily news about Poland in English and is the existence of such service justified? I’d love to read what you have to say.

When I started this blog, I wanted people to change their view of Poland. Out with the old, in with the new.

Glad things are changing. There are more and more Polish cultural events in the UK, I see more and more people who come to London just to visit – not to work – and 2010 also looks promising for the Polish economy.

Out of all European Union states, Poland was the only country which actually enjoyed a positive economic growth in 2009. And people are beginning (at last!) to look at Poland in a different way:

Outsiders often have fixed ideas of Poland: a big, poor country with shambolic governments, dreadful roads and eccentric habits. Old stereotypes die hard, but the facts paint an increasingly different picture. By the grim standards of recent centuries, Poland has never been more secure, richer or better-run.

This is the beginning of a great article I found in The Economist last week. Horse power to horsepower is a must-read for anyone interested in economy, politics and, er, Poland, of course. I’m not going to quote from it extensively here, just wanted to share the link with you.

But I’ll repeat myself: glad things are changing!

Image of Warsaw © jesuscm via Flickr, used under Creative Commons licence

I should perhaps dedicate this post to everyone who still complains about the Royal Mail in Britain.

Have you ever tried its Polish equivalent, Poczta Polska? No?

I’ve just read a post on one of the Wall Street Journal blogs dedicated to Central and Eastern Europe about the weird experience that is Poczta Polska. And I couldn’t agree more.

Malgorzata Halaba describes her frustrating experience of using Polish post offices, which somehow have failed to notice that the Communism collapsed some 20+ years ago.

Just to clarify, I think that Poland has largely made massive progress when it comes to customer services, something we all thought would never happen.

Every time I go back I am mostly positively surprised by how some places – even within the public sector – have changed and improved their services. There’s still a long way to go, but, unlike even 15 years ago, it’s not unusual to be greeted by a polite smile and served in a nicely lit, clean office.

However, it would seem the Polish Post Office is till trying to catch up. Quite often the service is still bad, and many post offices – presumably to improve their income – have turned into part-time markets, selling everything from stockings to board games and washing powder.

The author of the WSJ post compares her experience of using post offices in Warsaw to a journey in time – back to the 1960s:

It warms my heart every time I have to pick up a registered letter. Usually, after waiting the required 20 minutes, I approach the window and hear an angry bark: “What the does the letter look like? Is it large?”
How am I supposed to know? I wasn’t the one who sent it. I watch the nervous clerk produce three cartons of letters and start to shuffle through them in search of mine – sometimes without success. “Come back in an hour, or better tomorrow,” is what you might hear in the case of misplaced letters.

Yep, sounds like the post office I remember. Although I have to say, I found the post offices in Warsaw particularly bad, so hopefully things have in fact improved elsewhere.

But just like the Royal Mail lost its monopoly in 2006, its Polish equivalent will go through a similar process in 2013. So expect some changes there.

Until then, don’t be surprised if instead of stamps and envelopes your local branch will try to sell you some lovely stockings.

Image of Polish stamps © Florence Craye, Flickr, used under Creative Commons licence

These are his own words by the way. Of all people on this planet Stephen Fry would be the very last person in my opinion to express disparaging remarks about other nations. Yet, quite uncharacteristically for him, he did. Publicly.

How did that happen? Stephen revealed everything today on his blog, where he wrote:

I was asked to appear on Channel 4 news to comment on the Conservative Party and their decision to ally themselves in the European Parliament with the Polish Law and Justice Party, a nationalist grouping whose members have made statements of the most unpleasantly homophobic and antisemitic nature. I usually decline such invitations, and how I wish I had done so on this occasion.

As I always say, trust your gut instinct. But anyway:

Words tumbled from my lips during that interview that were as idiotic, ignorant and offensive as you could imagine. It all been proceeding along perfectly acceptable lines until I said something like “let’s not forget which side of the border Auschwitz was on.”

Ouch. This is quite a stupid thing to say, in the heat of the moment or otherwise, Stephen.

The Polish government has been trying for years to eradicate the tendency of the Western media to refer to Auschwitz as “Polish concentration camp”. Yes, geographically Auschwitz is in the city of Oswiecim, which is in Poland. But that’s it. Everyone knows – and the government in Warsaw has been trying to reinforce that message – that it was a Nazi camp, in which thousands of Poles were murdered.

So it shouldn’t come as a surprise that any suggestion – intentional or not – that it was a Polish camp will be met by anger. To say the least.

But Stephen Fry knows that and he did realise he’d done something really bad.

Once the interview had been transmitted I started to receive the odd invitation to talk on Polish radio, explain myself to Polish journalists and make apologies to the Polish people in general.

And this is where Fry’s genius lies. He admits the whole storm initially got him riled even more and that he refused to apologise. But he eventually admits it was a rather irresponsible thing to say, bearing in mind the (still) sensitive nature of the subject and the public outcry following his comment. So he apologised today on his blog:

I take this opportunity to apologise now. I said a stupid, thoughtless and fatuous thing. It detracted from and devalued my argument, such as it was, and it outraged and offended a large group of people for no very good reason. I am sorry in all directions, and all the more sorry because it is no one’s fault but my own, which always makes it so much worse. And sorry because I didn’t have the wit, style, grace or guts to apologise at the first opportunity.

I hope my fellow countrymen – used to seeing cynical politicians who get offended and offend on purpose and without any apology – will see Stephen Fry’s post for what I’m sure it is: a genuine apology for a genuine mistake.

After all, as Stephen Fry himself says:

My father and squadrons of school teachers correctly reminded me throughout my childhood and youth, “Stephen just doesn’t think.”

If only all people who offend by mistake had Stephen Fry’s class and style.

Image © chase-me via Flickr, used under Creative Commons licence

Remember, it’s a collaborative playlist, which means you can add and share with others your favourite Polish tracks – and in fact a Myslovitz lover must have added their entire back catalogue as all ofa sudden the playlist seems to be very biased towards Myslovitz

Anyway, keep adding, keep sharing and enjoy it.

And it’s a real shame I didn’t have a chance to blog more as there have been many events recently.

So what have I (you) missed? If anything?

• the famous Polish philosopher, professor Leszek Kolakowski, died in Oxford aged 81.
• more Poles die in Ireland and Northern Ireland
• Poland is the sixth biggest spammer in the world

All a bit depressing, eh? So maybe I haven’t really missed much after all…

But hey, there is one positive story:

• Poland’s jobless rate down, retail sales up

So the green shoots of recovery are visible. In Poland at least.

The first one is called ‘A postcard from Poland’ and is a massive collection of photographs depicting what Poles were doing today at midday, twenty day after the collapse of Communism. Gazeta wants to create a gigantic archive which it wants to share online, but also with museums and archives across Poland.

As a photographer I love this idea. Images can be much more powerful than words and no doubt today will bring a few fantastic, emotional, funny or simply stunning shots. I’m looking forward to browsing the archive – and I guess if you’ve never been in Poland, the ‘postcard’ might be a good place to start exploring the country and its people.

The other project launched by Gazeta.pl is Gazetopedia.pl – which is a cross between and online archive spanning twenty years and a social networking or user-generated site (by the way, the word ‘gazeta’ itself means ‘newspaper’; Gazeta Wyborcza, nowadays often perceived as a left-leaning, liberal paper, was the first independent daily paper in Poland launched roughly a month before the June elections). Users can browse every single front page of Gazeta Wyborcza (the precursor of Gazeta.pl), have a look at a timeline of Polish and world events from the past two decades and modify the pages to give them a unique look and feel.

Browsing though the front pages I came across one article from 20th June 1989, which describes how Poland was left without sugar and flour as factories didn’t manage (allegedly) to produce enough of them to satisfy the demand… Those were the times.

Today’s report comes from Poland, where Dymond speaks to people who’ve directly benefited from the EU expansion – either by expanding their existing businesses or by travelling abroad, acquiring news skills and transferring them back to their home country.

One of them, Dobrawa, who worked in London for the years before returning to Warsaw to set up her own hair salon, asked about what she thinks about the call for “British jobs for British workers” replies:

“British people, I’ve got nothing against them, but I do think that they don’t respect jobs. They are too fussy. They would love to be put on a high position and get good money for less hours and everything. In my country, everything that we have is made by hard work.”

Perhaps a bit harsh and simplistic, but even some British TV documentaries I’ve seen in recent months prove there’s a grain of truth in this claim.

Have a look at the whole report from Poland – and other In search of Europe reports – here.

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