When the wife’s away…

Having a young family, the opportunity to be a nocturnal party animal doesn’t happen very often. However, the family have left me again for two weeks to fend for myself in this big, scary world and as a few colleagues were hitting the nightclubs, I thought I would join them. Especially as I knew that my sweet little 5.30 alarm calls would not be present the following morning.

The evening started in the Old Town where a stage had been set up for a Summer Jazz Festival, which certainly drew the crowds out. That and the temperature was a muggy 25 degrees so it was a good reason to be outdoors. Here are the crowds in the market square last night around 8pm:

As we couldn’t get near the stage and the combined body heat of a few thousand people had risen the temperature by a few degrees, my friend and I popped round the corner for a pizza. By the time we ventured out, the storm clouds were moving in and people were scampering away like mice, leaving the poor jazz singer looking rather dejected. As one of my colleagues is new to Warsaw, we thought we would treat him to what surely has to be the biggest Marguarita in the city (sold in flower vases! - see photo), and took him to ‘The Mexican’. The problem is they go down far too easily and by the time you’ve had a couple (or even 4), your ability to focus and walk vertically has completely left you. So a good place to start a night out then!

By this time the thunderstorm had passed, leaving pools of water everywhere, but the air feeling much cooler. Next stop, the ‘Opera Club’, a nightclub situated under the Grand Theater Opera House among the brick tunnels and archways of the basement where ‘Happy Hour’ starts at 3am. Access is via a spiral staircase, giving the impression of really venturing under the city - quite an amazing place. Of course, once you’re down there, it’s all hardcore dance music and Red Bull fuelled, scantily clad girls girating against each other and anything else standing nearby. Having said this, there was a really good atmosphere here and none of the drunken brawling or beer throwing antics found in the UK. People were genuinely having a good time and enjoying the dancing, rather than the drinking.

Left here about 4am and decided to have a night-cap in supposedly one of the classiest clubs in the city, Cinnamon. A first time for me, and somewhat different to where we had just left. This is one of the ‘places to be seen’ and you feel this when you walk in. It’s all about style and fashion and attracts all the celebrities. The bar staff all have intricate looking tattoes on the left side of their faces (one can assume they are not real, but they are quite effective) and frequently climb on to the bar to join some of the spaced-out girls to girate to the ear-splitting dance beat. Clearly any inhibitions had been left outside on the street.

Following a quick breakfast of scrambled eggs at my friend’s place (washed down with a vodka and apple juice) I managed to crawl into bed around 7am. When we left Cinnamon, it was still heaving with people. I don’t think this place ever closes - or maybe it does once their supply of Red Bull is expended.

A bit Cleesy, but still hilarious!

John Cleese has been asked to appear in another TV advert for the Polish bank, BZ WBK. The first one was more popular than expected and apparently more Poles than ever before took out loans from the bank during the period the advert was aired. Here’s the advert in full:

The town that Cleese says his aunt is from, ‘Pcim’, does exist and resides slightly below Kraków. The townsfolk were quite upset with the use of their name in the advert, possibly due to Cleese not having an aunt there. But the advert turned out to be quite good for the town and it’s now on the tourist map. So now they’re all being very quiet in the town of Pcim, raking in the tourist money, watching lots of Monty Python re-runs, laughing raucously and looking forward to the next instalment. I believe the town have requested another mention and his phantom ciocia in Pcim will also be featured in the ad.

The last time Cleese used the German gags was in Faulty Towers in 1975. One of my all-time favourite comedy scenes was when Basil is talking to the German guests in the dining room. The dialogue goes something like this:

German Guest: “Vill you stop talking about ze var!”

Basil: “Me? You started it!”

German Guest: “No, ve did not start it!”

Basil: “Yes you did! You invaded Poland!”

Here’s a collection of clips from the episode. Well worth watching - the above clip is at 4:10. Enjoy.

Sweet & Sour

The two sides of my eldest son - I’m not sure which one I prefer!

Beijing’s big clean-up

17 days to go until the kick-off ceremony for the 2008 Beijing Olympics and China are finalising preparations. It appears that security is their biggest concern and the Chinese authorities have implemented ‘a few rules’ for spectators. These include:

1. No swearing

2. No streaking

3. No cross bows (?!!)

4. No animals

5. No banners larger than two metres by one metre

6. No gambling

7. No demonstrations

8. Lip gloss, sunscreen and fountain pens are allowed, but only in small quantities (I wonder how many people will smuggle a few fountain pens in just for the hell of it!)

The propaganda ministry has also produced a booklet for Beijing residents telling them how to behave when they meet one of the 500,000 foreign visitors expected in the city during the Olympics. I wonder if any of these carry prison sentences?

1. Don’t pick your nose

2. Don’t yawn or scratch your head

3. Don’t pick at your clothes or shout

4. In conversation they should wear a smile and not stare too long or do anything to make visitors feel uneasy (I think seeing a strange chinese man smiling at me is the one thing that would make me feel uneasy)

According to the press, surface to air missile batteries have also been deployed around the main Olympic venues. This is obviously in case Bush decides to pay a visit.

One hundred thousand People’s Armed Police and Special Forces Units have also been called into the capital to ensure these rules are adhered to. Is this how to make the foreign visitors feel special?

One of the most extreme measures they’ve taken is to aim to reduce the amount of smog over the city and improve the air quality within the next few weeks. Factories have been temporarily closed and constuction work has been halted until the Games are over. Today saw Beijing ban 1.15 million cars from driving in the city centre for two months, with the threat of a 100 yuan fine (that’s about €9.50) if this law is broken. The system works on the number plate ending which means certain cars can only enter on allocated days of the week. Ageing vans and lorries which are considered ‘heavy polluters’ were banned completely from 1st July.

The authorities are worried visitors will get a bad impression of the capital city if the air is thick with smog. Maybe true, but at least they’ll be getting a realistic one!

It all sounds too ‘controlled’ to me, with the emphasis being on everything running smoothly and without incident. The whole area is going to be over-policed and I imagine it will be quite daunting to be anywhere near the Olympic venues. Judging from the way they’ve been protecting the torch on its rounds, I’d say the biggest threat is from the security forces themselves. One step out of line and you’ll ‘disappear’ until the Games are over…and come home with a few bruises no doubt. If it looks like trouble is heading your way, just remember the song by Monty Python and smile while you sing…!

Home alone

I always look forward to having a couple of weeks to myself in the summer when Lucy and the children go to her parent’s summer house in Kaszuby. Two weeks when I can have my very own batchelor pad! I can do, eat and drink what I like and sleep until lunchtime at the weekends - and no-one’s there to stop me, or ask me at 5.30am if I could take the children out of the bedroom for a couple of hours. Bliss.

But as I’ve never actually lived on my own before, the home alone time always seems to turn into an unplanned ‘crash diet period’ due to my inability to consciously feed myself, and create a mess in the apartment comparable to a local authority dumping ground (of course it’s always tidied and appears spotless upon my wife’s return).

For example, I’ve just done 3 loads of clothes washing, washed up 12 glasses (and I haven’t even had friends around!), 8 plates and half of our cutlery set. The frying pan had to be soaked for the best part of 3 hours before I could even contemplate touching it with a scrubbing pad. Not too sure what the combination of orange and yellow semi-solid mixture was plastered to the bottom of it, but I’m sure a small proportion of it is now sat festering in my arteries. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve really tried to eat healthily over the past week…I even bought a bunch of bananas (yet to be eaten). And it’s not that I can’t cook. I can, and when I do, my gastronomical talents are praised. But I think most people will agree, cooking for several people is very different from cooking for one - especially when a bowl of cereal or a pizza from the freezer will stem the hunger pains. Is this what I missed out on not moving away to University? Maybe these are the student ways of living I never experienced… you see - you’re never too old!

My saving grace was the frozen home-made soups that Lucy left me in the freezer. Cooking time - 5 mins, defrosting time - 1 hour. My wife obviously understands the limits of my self-preservation capabilities.

Well, they’re all returning tomorrow, so that’s good news! I’m now fed up with the peace and quiet and want the noise and chaos to return. But enough of this - I have 3 loads of washing to dry and iron and need to consider my next meal (all out of Nestle Cheerios).

Poland’s own ‘Cannonball Run’

Today saw the start of ‘Rage-Race 2008′ which left from Warsaw at 8am this morning and will finish in Gdansk on Saturday. This is Poland’s version of the Gumball Rally, but is more in line with the Burt Reynolds film mentioned above, complete with ‘The Sheik’. In fact a whole Hummer full of ‘em turned up…

It costs around 3500 zl to enter for the 3/4 days and consists of driving some 2500 km through Poland via Lublin, Wrocław and Poznań. The route is not known to drivers until they set off, and includes various activities along the way, such as a few hours letting rip on a race track. I’m not sure my X-trail would qualify for this event, even if I tried to disguise it with a few well placed stickers (specifically covering the ‘dci’ badge on the boot lid).

Here’s a work colleague of mine in his 6.0 L V8 650 bhp(!) Corvette C6R. He says it’s ‘not slow’. It doesn’t feel slow when you sit in it - even when it’s not moving.

The ‘Ferrari Modena 360′ line-up, with one being driven by a Polish celebrity - ‘Vito’ somebody or other I think…

One of the stars of the show - a Lamborghini Gallardo. Rare in Poland I’d say.

Another one of the stars of the show - forget ‘police arrest’, how about ‘please arrest’ (me). I’d go quietly - honest!

‘The Sheik’ lives!

One of my favourites: the Audi RS4.

And finally - the event is known for its colourful characters. Here’s one dressed in bright red.

Do you think it would be a good idea to stay off the roads in Poland over the next few days? I think so too.

(Spidey is putting a CB aerial on his M5 in order to keep in contact with 7 or 8 Smart cars which are driving ahead of the race members to keep an eye out for police speed traps. Clever eh?).

More photos in my photo gallery.

Urszula Dudziak plays in Warsaw

Urszula Dudziak played to a crowd of a few hundred last night in the Park marsz. E. Śmigłego-Rydza (I’m not sure if this is the general name for the Park - sounds slightly officious to me), and I was asked along by a friend. Having no idea who she was, but told to expect jazz, I was somewhat surprised when she started to ’sing’.

Her most popular song was the 1976 hit ‘Papaya’, which went down particularly well last night and had all the over 60’s on the front row happily clapping along reliving their crazy disco days.  Here’s a taster from when she played in Budapest some time ago:

Unconventional I think you’ll agree. Sounds like the opening to ‘Magnum P.I.’ - but she’s worked with the likes of Sting in the past, and she seems to be very popular in Poland. ‘Papaya’ has experienced a resurge over the last year or two, especially in the Philippines where the ‘Papaya Dance’ has become quite popular in a very funky / camp kinda way.

Here’s the Philippine Army dancing to the remix version. It starts about 2/3rds of the way through the video. Maybe these moves are all part of some new hand-to-hand killer combat technique. Either way, it’s serious competition for the ‘Macarena‘…

Two years later, in the Czech Republic, a song was released called “Jozin z Bazin”. It seems Eastern European 1970’s songs are all the rage at the moment, as this one also has a big following in Poland. Probably because the guys in the video are complete nutters (looks like an elderly Ewan MacGregor on the right!).

Feel free to sing along:

I drive Skoda 100 to camp here on Orawa
So I hurry, take a risk - go through Morawa
The monster lives there, comes out of the bog
Eats mostly Prague citizen, its name is Jozin (Joseph)

Chorus: Jozin from the bog creeps through swamp
Jozin from the bog closes to the village
Jozin from the bog edges its teeth
Jozin from the bog bites, strangles
To defend Jozin from the bog, who could imagine, only works a plane with manure (white powder)

I was driving through the village on road to Vizowice
The village mayor greeted me, said to me during drinking Sliwowica
‘The one who will bring Jozin dead or alive
gets my daughter and a half of National Agrarian Farm

Chorus

I said: ‘give me a plane and powder, mayor,
I’ll bring you Jozin, I see no trouble about that’,
Mayor helped me, in the morning I went up in the sky
The powder from the plane prettily fell on Jozin.

Chorus

Joe Swamp is now all white
Joe Swamp escapes from the bogs
Joe Swamp has turned to stone
For Joe Swamp, this is the end
I caught Joe and now I have him, woohoo!
Cash is always good so now I’m selling him to the zoo

Sounds like they had a little too much of the white powder before they started writing the lyrics…

Warsaw developers begin to feel the crunch…

It’s starting and the last quarter of 2008 was the worst so far. All the efforts of the developers to maintain house and apartment prices by offering huge incentives such as kitchens, expensive floors and even cars is now unsustainable! In Q1, according to this article, 8,800 apartments were sold in Warsaw and in Q2, only 5,600 - the lowest figure for a year and a half.

Still no visible admission from developers that prices will fall though. Market analysts suspect that this will happen soon, and when it does, it will be downhill from there! There have been some cuts of up to 10%, but this is not yet widely acknowledged by all developers.

You have to feel sorry for the speculators that bought 1-2 years ago and are now trying to sell. Or do you? With requests for 400,000 PLN as a cash deposit, I certainly don’t. Welcome back to reality, people!

But this is only the beginning.

Poland and Ukraine given three months for 2012 qualification

Michel Platini, the head of UEFA was in Poland and Ukraine last week to speak with government heads regarding the preparations for the European Championships in 2012. Eight venues are due to stage the matches - Warsaw, Poznań, Wrocław and Gdańsk in Poland, and Kiev, Donetsk, Lviv and Dnipropetrovsk in Ukraine.

This has been a hot issue in Poland since April when Poland and Ukraine jointly won the bid to host the Championships in four years time. However, there are many conditions and criteria that both countries need to meet before UEFA are happy to give the all clear for the Football Championships to proceed, and the deadline is September 2008 for final approval. Recently Spain and Italy have been highlighted as the possible replacements should Poland or Ukraine (or both) not be ready in time. Even Scotland has shown interest and made it clear that should they be given the position of hosting the football, they could have all the infrastructure and stadiums ready in time. But will Poland and Ukraine pull the stops out in time? Much of the population (and media) thinks not. It would be potentially embarrassing if they do not rise to the challenge and take this opportunity to prove to the rest of Europe that they have the foresight and organisational capabilities to meet the challenge.

So at what stage are these countries at? The three main issues are the stadiums, infrastructure and accommodation. Due to the large amount of foreign and domestic investment that is currently fuelling Ukraine and Poland, the potential problem area does not seem to be accommodation. Investment in, and demand for, hotels is strong and current and future market requirements are there to meet an increasing supply of hotels in the major cities that have been chosen to host the tournament. Platini did not show any serious concerns over this issue.

The main problem for both countries seems to be the development of their infrastructure; this being the (slow) speed of road building. Poland currently has 1,000 km of new roads and 2,000 km of express-ways planned for completion by 2012. A spokesman from the Transport Consultants Group (TOR) in Poland recently said:

“We will manage to finish at the most 75 percent of planned road works by Euro 2012”

An honest statement, accept when you consider what Poland has achieved over the last three and a half years between Rucosin near Gdansk and Grudziądz. The 90-km A1 motorway will probably be completed this autumn, taking a total of 43 months to construct. The cited reason for the delay? Copious amounts of red tape and time delays in acquiring the land needed for the roads. It seems Poland is a long way down a steep learning curve and need to up the pace considerably! But with this sort of experience, the question is how they are going to do it? Austria were more advanced, more experienced and possibly less proud to ask for help in their preparation for 2008. Is the experience within Poland to carry out these large projects in such a short timescale? And if not, will Poland ask for technical assistance? The media say Spring 2009 is the deadline for acceptance of tenders and land acquisitions if the targets are to be met.

Ukraine is in a similar position. The main problem being highlighted is the degree of corruption and dishonesty amongst high ranking officials. It seems the preparations are being seen as a great opportunity to invest billions of dollars and misappropriate funds in the meantime. Vadym Kolesnikchenko, a Regions lawmaker, was quoted as saying in the Kyiv Post:

“In terms of Ukraine’s Euro 2012 preparation, nothing is being done….although there is a great fight in terms of who and how much money will be stolen. Real preparations won’t start until officials decide how much will fall into pockets…to whom and how much”

It seems Poland has the advantage. Plus, as a European Union member (unlike Ukraine) Poland can count on some $105 billion from its fellow members for stadium construction and improvement of roads. Poland also has a head start in hotel and airport infrastructure. It seems the estimated figure required by Ukraine to complete all roads, airports and rails improvements, as well as complete the stadiums is around $25 billion. The source of this capital is not yet known. Maybe a ‘2012 Donation Helpline’ should be set up for those local billionaires that have not already contributed. Pledges over $5 billion most welcome.

It seems that both countries are facing similar challenges regarding their ‘flagship’ stadiums in Warsaw and Kiev. The stadium in Warsaw has been used for many years as a bazaar (nicknamed the ‘Russian Market’ due to the fact that you could allegedly buy anything here from cars to handguns). There was a huge protest when the government shut down the market to enable plans to go ahead for the stadium’s redevelopment. Ukraine had a similar problem with a shopping centre adjacent to the stadium in Kiev which blocked emergency exits from the stadium. The centre’s developer has since been compensated and demolition work has begun within the last two weeks. Now all they need is an architect to plan the stadium’s renovation.

It seems that both countries are a long way off from satisfying Platini’s requirements. Over the next three months, Poland and Ukraine have to submit a plan to show that progress is being made and the pace will be increased to meet UEFA’s requirements. Both countries are in dire need of infrastructure investment and a focussed approach to structural growth. The target for 2012 gives both governments the incentive they need to improve the attraction of Poland and Ukraine as investment destinations. Poland is well positioned in Europe to benefit the most, but investors hesitate due to the poor road conditions and low speed rail connections.

If a negative decision is made by UEFA in September, then the incentive for rapid infrastructure development disappears. This could have a severe impact on economic and structural growth for both countries in the coming years. It will be interesting to watch how Poland and Ukraine approach this in the next few months.

Penny pinching bureaucrats

A new initiative from the Polish Health Ministry: bicycle tax.

Apparently riding a bicycle in Poland is extremely dangerous and there are many bicycle-related injuries which are costing the taxpayer millions of zloty each year!

This obligatory insurance would cost approximately 120 zł per annum and they estimate around 20 million Poles would be obliged to pay it. A nice little earner by the sound of it - especially if they tax those learning to ride; say those that ‘fall’ into the 3-6 year old bracket. As the Fakt article rightly said:

“It is probably only a matter of time before bureaucrats also come up with the idea that pedestrians should also pay a tax in case they break a leg, bearing in mind the tragic state of our pavements”

Maybe the Polish government are taking a few chapters from the “Big Red Colouring Book of Unusual Ways to Tax Americans”. Here’s a few more real tax laws from the US:

1. Playing card tax: The state government in Alabama has levied a 10-cent tax on the purchase of a playing card deck that contains “no more than 54 cards,” plus the retailer must pay an annual license tax of $3 and a fee of $1, according to the Alabama Department of Revenue.

2. Blueberry tax: Anyone who grows, purchases, sells, handles or processes the fruit in the state of Maine is subject to a penny-and-a-half-per-pound tax.

3. Illegal drug tax: In Tennessee, when you acquire an illegal drug (even “moonshine”), you have 48 hours to report to the Department of Revenue and pay your tax, in exchange for which you’ll receive stamps to affix to your illegal substance. The stamps serve as evidence you paid the tax on the illegal product.

The loophole here is that you need not provide identification to get the stamps and it’s illegal for revenue employees to snitch you to the tax authorities. I assume you pay tax by the kilo. And wouldn’t most of the tax offices have CCTV anyway? And I assume you would have to take the drugs in with you to get them weighed. Or do you just sign a self-declaration form?!

I’m sure there are many more wacky tax laws out there, and I’m sure the Polish government are looking hard to find them!