What it is like being an English speaker living in Poland

The land of drunken whispers is how I used to refer to Poland before learning how to speak Polish. I use that term loosely because my Polish is actually quite terrible and my nickname was Google translate, to my defense it is the 3rd hardest language to master. It is really hard to live in Poland without speaking Polish, most people don't speak English, it is mainly the younger generation that speak English. I remember the first week in Poland I built up the courage to go to the shop nearby, unfortunately it was one of those where you have to ask for what you want at the counter. It was like playing charades with an angry bear, I could she was not impressed but remained to be polite, right at the end she asked if I would like a plastic bag, phonetically it sounded like "shat car my bitch". I stood for a few minutes trying to figure out what was going on, she speaks English, then I was like who's the bitch, bitch. She looked at me threw my stuff in bag and shook her head, needles to say I never went back.

Later that day I found out what was really going on and started to learn Polish, it was either that or starve, but seriously Poland is a beautiful country and the people are usually quite understanding. In Poland they have a saying, "The guest is king". It is actually quite overwhelming when you go for visit to someone's house they will try and feed you to death, there will most likely be a beetroot soup which is awesome and most certainly vodka and beer, and Poland has some amazing beer.

Good jobs in Poland are hard to come by and that is why there are so many Polish abroad, while I was in Poland I had a few jobs and none where good at all. I think it was even harder not being able to communicate properly, but at least I had work. I mainly worked in workshops, I was once asked for wd 40 and the guy said voo da, which is wd, but in Polish it sounds like water, so I gave him a container of water, and he gave me a strange look.

I saw some really cool stuff while in Poland.

Yes those people are fishing.

And those ships are stuck.

This is a frozen sea, I was walking out when two police officers stopped me and told me to turn back, naturally I asked why. The police officer asked me politely not to be such an idiot.

Although living in Poland was tough I must say I had some real adventures, I still go back once a year for holidays and have an excellent time.