Joined: Jan 2008 Gender: Male Posts: 11,454 Location: Krak`s Town, Lesser Poland
News about Poznań « Thread Started on Jul 21, 2011, 6:25pm »
Poznan rated best-run city in ranking 19.07.2011 13:56 An annual ranking by a leading newspaper has anointed Poznan as the best-run city in Poland, in a far-reaching survey of local governments across the country.
A gala was held on Monday by the Rzeczpospolita paper, attended by President of the European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek, who noted that “the next challenge” was not so much the full partaking of EU funds “but their effective use.”
2011 marks the last year of the main EU investment fund boost, meaning that local governments will have to tighten their belts from next year.
Municipalities are customarily divided up into three categories for the ranking, with major cities, then the so-called urban-rural municipalities (which combine towns and villages), followed by purely rural municipalities.
Areas were assessed according to various criteria, including the growth rate of property expenditure (net of EU funds) per capita in the years 2007-2010, local government debt relative to income in the years 2007-2010, growth rate of own revenues in the years 2007-2010 and the value of EU funds per capita.
Top of the rankings in the urban-rural category – for the fifth time in a row – was Mszczonow, central Poland, whilst Stepnica on the north west coast won in the rural sphere. (nh/jb)
Ranking
City Municipalities (functioning on full ‘powiat’ district status) 1. Poznan 2. Sopot 3. Leszno 4. Zielona Gora 5. Szczecin
Re: News about Poznań « Reply #1 on Jul 21, 2011, 7:38pm »
Bo,
It is great to hear that the city where my grandparents lived, my cousins live, studied and worked and where our Forum friend Zooba lives is doing so well. I heard it in 2006 from a lady from Warsaw too. She was very complimentary about Poznan. Good organised, good administration, good local authorities, hard workers, good management, trade and production (Industry) and disciplined in her view. This was a Varsovian lady. Is it because there were always International conferences, trade fairs and business in this city (even under communism)? I visited the city several times as a child and teenager. Never went back after 1987 (the last time I was there). I must have been completely changed. My babcia lived in Ulica Adama Mickiewicza in Poznan inbetween the Jana Henryka Dąbrowskiego boulevard and ulica Juliusza Słowackiego. It was near the little Poznan Zoo, the cinema, the railtracks (we walked along the ana Henryka Dąbrowskiego boulevard to the city centre over the bridge crossing over the railwaytracks - Most Teatralny). My babcia's appartment block was nice in a typical 19th century fin de siecle or early 20th century neighbourhood with Claccicist and Jugendstil kind of buildings. I came from a quiet provincial agricultural area of the Netherlands and came into a large city as a child with in my memory 24 hours traffic. I had never seen a large city in the Netherlands or Belgium before in was in Poznan, so Poznan made a great impression on me. Busses, trams, taxi's, these communist era trucks and little busses and Star trucks, pedestrans, and a nice atmosphere. Next to that large state hotels (Orbis), congress halls, Museums, Bar mleczny, sams (supermarkets), cinema's, galleries, café's, restaurants, ice-cream shops (that nice Polish ice, lody), beautiful parks, theatre's, gothic and baroc churches, an Opera house, a nice Old town square like in Krakow, and a beautiful region around it were we went swimming in small lakes, fishing, and enjoying the countryside. There was a lot of family stil left in that time. My babcia and dziadek, a sister of my babcia, my aunt and her husbant, the brother of my babcia, my "uncle" and his second wife, his daughter and her husbant who was a theatre actor and a very humoristic guy -in my view- and thier two daughters, my cousins, who are probably the one of the few who are stil alive. I lost contact with them. Next to that we new a girlfriend of my mother and her Polish-Russian husbant who was an architect, a great comedian too and an exellent mix of Russian and Polish elements. Those were differant times. The Polish Peoples republic was stil there and the people lived their lives, and enjoyed their private lives, the black market, the official things which were good and eachothers company, which the communist system could not take away from them. For some old people their careers were broken, due to the fact that they did not want to join the communist party for good positions. Other uncles ended up in prison in the fourtees, because in this trade and industrial city they started to trade in metal and Cereal. That was a crime in those days, because it was Capitalist. Luckily their prison sentence was "only" one or two years. I always remembered some things from Poznan, and for a long time having been there I though I understood something about communism and living under communism. Later I found out I knew little, that you had to live there, and experiance it from a day to day basis to understand it. I remember though the Communist bureaucracy, the militia, the grey green and grey blue uniforms in the street and sometimes the colones of ZOMO (Zmotoryzowane Odwody Milicji Obywatelskiej) who raced through the city towards some disturbance somewhere in 1984? I never read something about things that happened in 1984, but I remember that large colone of grey blue militia busses that drove to the city centre. There must have been something going on back then. And I don't think that it were Hooligans, you did not have them in that period. Well, I think we will never know.
I liked Poznan very much and the city was nothing less than Warsaw, the second Polish city I knew in that time. I only visited those two large Polish cities in that period. Other things I saw back then were the Polish country, the shabby Polish highways and ugly concrete communist farms, and beautiful landscapes, villages, towns, churches, cathedrals, monastries, palaces, castles, lakes, lands and mountains. One vacation we spend in the mountains South of Poznan. I don't know excactly where because I was maybe 5 or 6 years old in 1975 or 1976. In 1984 as a 14 year old boy and in 1987 I went back to Poznan. 1987 was a depressive year in Poznan. We were there in the summer, there was some sort of crisis going on. At night a lot of people were drunk in the street and during the daytime you saw alcoholism too. People with bottles in brown bags which they bought from windows in streetwalls in the city centre. What I liked was the fact that there were so many family gatherings with large tables full of family members. That there was a lot of good Polish food, dinners, lunches, brunches, Polish drinks, cosyness, togetherness. One day we at at my grandparents house, my babcia was an exellent cook (in Western Europe she could have been a professional cook in a french restaurant. I knew no one who could cook that delicious as my babcia), the next day at the house of my aunt and her husbant and the third day at the house of the brother of my babcia. We as Westerners with our hard currency could also go to the state hotel restaurants and to the restaurants in the old city centre. As 17 and 16 year old kids my sister and I went to a Polish disco in Poznan, and I liked the Polodisco music of that time. It sounded like Italian music to me. I am glad that Poznan is doing so well! I have sweet childhood and teenager memories of that city.
She was very complimentary about Poznan. Good organised, good administration, good local authorities, hard workers, good management, trade and production (Industry) and disciplined in her view.
Yes, I saw a difference between Poznań and Wrocław, for example.
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Is it because their were always International conferences, trade fairs and business in this city (even under communism)? Pieter
It is because they were Germans` direct neighbours and subjects - in order to survive as Poles against Germanisation, they needed to be well-organised.
She was very complimentary about Poznan. Good organised, good administration, good local authorities, hard workers, good management, trade and production (Industry) and disciplined in her view.
Yes, I saw a difference between Poznań and Wrocław, for example.
In my view the differance between Poznań and Wroclaw is that Wroclaw was the German city Breslau and therefor a Polonized German city and Poznań at some time was a Polish city occupied by Prussians (Germans) who called it Posen? I remember Poznań as a Polish city with some German influence (architecture, mentality and well organised - Polish family and friends told me the Poznanians are Poles with German disciplin, grundlicgkeit and very organised. But in the same time very Polish and not German. They are respected for their organisational skills and trade or business qualities). But ofcourse Poznań in the seventees and eightees was very Polish, because I heared only Polish in the streets, Boulevards, in its parks and squares, in its Museums, art galleries, restaurants, pubs, discotheques, shops, Sam (supermarkets), because it was and is a very Polish city. I remember the Polish Patriotism of that time, it was very strong under Communism. I remember Józef Piłsudski and objects that symbolised pre-war Polish Patriotism were Popular. When my babcia died, some good Polish people came to buy some things, because we had to sell the furniture and antiquities of my Polish grandparents, because we could not take anything to the Netherlands, because it was prohibited to take anything from before 1945 out of Poland by the law of the Polish Peoples Republic. Ofcourse we smuggled some valuables outside Poland, but it was very dangerous and risky. I remember those people asking for Patriotic symbols, images, books and etc.
Is it because their were always International conferences, trade fairs and business in this city (even under communism)? Pieter
It is because they were Germans`direct neighbours and subjects - in order to survive as Poles against Germanisation, they needed to be well-organised.
Yeah, I believe you and know my history. During the Polish partititions, Western Poland was occupied by the Prusians who called Poznań Posen, and tried to 'Germanise' it like the rest of the territories they occupied. Czarist Russia wanted a Russification of the part of Poland they occupied.
Poznań is among the oldest cities in Poland, and was one of the most important centres in the early Polish state, whose first rulers were buried at Poznań's cathedral. It is sometimes claimed to be the first capital of the kingdom of Poland. Poznań is now Poland's fifth largest city. It is the historical capital of the Wielkopolska (Greater Poland) region, and is currently the administrative capital of the province called Greater Poland Voivodeship.
Poznań is an important centre of trade, industry, and education, and hosts regular international trade fairs. It was the host city for the United Nations Climate Change Conference in December 2008, a key stage in the creation of a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. Poznań was a candidate city for European Capital of Culture in 2016.
Dramatic History
In the second half of the 17th century and most of the eighteenth, Poznań was severely affected by a series of wars (and attendant military occupations, lootings and destruction) – the Second and Third Northern Wars, the War of the Polish Succession, the Seven Years' War and the Bar Confederation rebellion. It was also hit by frequent outbreaks of plague, and by floods, particularly that of 1736, which destroyed most of the suburban buildings. The population of the conurbation declined (from 20,000 around 1600 to 6,000 around 1730), and Bambergian and Dutch settlers (Bambrzy and *Olędrzy) were brought in to rebuild the devastated suburbs. In 1778 a "Committee of Good Order" (Komisja Dobrego Porządku) was established in the city, which oversaw rebuilding efforts and reorganized the city's administration. However in 1793, in the Second Partition of Poland, Poznań, came under the control of the Kingdom of Prussia, becoming part of (and initially the seat of) the province of South Prussia.
The Prussian authorities expanded the city boundaries, making the walled city and its closest suburbs into a single administrative unit. Left-bank suburbs were incorporated in 1797, and Ostrów Tumski, Chwaliszewo, Śródka, Ostrówek and Łacina (St. Roch) in 1800. The old city walls were taken down in the early 19th century, and major development took place to the west of the old city, with many of the main streets of today's city centre being laid out. In the Greater Poland Uprising of 1806, Polish soldiers and civilian volunteers assisted the efforts of Napoleon by driving out Prussian forces from the region. The city became a part of the Duchy of Warsaw in 1807, and was the seat of the Poznań Department - a unit of administrative division and local government. However in 1815, following the Congress of Vienna, the region was returned to Prussia, and Poznań became the capital of the semi-autonomous Grand Duchy of Posen.
The city continued to expand, and various projects were funded by Polish philanthropists, such as the Raczyński Library and the Bazar hotel. The city's first railway, running to Stargard in Pommern (now Stargard Szczeciński), opened in 1848. Due to its strategic location, the Prussian authorities intended to make Poznań into a fortress city, building a ring of defensive fortifications around it. Work began on the citadel (Fort Winiary) in 1828, and in subsequent years the entire set of defences (Festung Posen) was completed.
A Greater Poland Uprising during the Revolutions of 1848 was ultimately unsuccessful, and the Grand Duchy lost its remaining autonomy, Poznań becoming simply the capital of the Prussian Province of Posen. It would become part of the German Empire with the unification of German states in 1871. Polish patriots continued to form societies (such as the Central Economic Society for the Grand Duchy of Poznań), and a Polish theatre (Teatr Polski, still functioning) opened in 1875; however the authorities made efforts to Germanize the region, particularly through the Prussian Settlement Commission (founded 1886). Germans accounted for 38% of the city's population in 1867, though this percentage would later decline somewhat, particularly after the region returned to Poland.
Another expansion of Festung Posen was planned, with an outer ring of more widely spaced forts around the perimeter of the city. Building of the first nine forts began in 1876, and nine intermediate forts were built from 1887. The inner ring of fortifications was now considered obsolete and came to be mostly taken down by the early 20th century (although the citadel remained in use). This made space for further civilian construction, particularly the Imperial Palace ("Zamek"), completed 1910, and other grand buildings around it (including today's central university buildings and the opera house). The city's boundaries were also significantly extended to take in former suburban villages: Piotrowo and Berdychowo in 1896, Łazarz, Górczyn, Jeżyce and Wilda in 1900, and Sołacz in 1907.
Second World War
During the German occupation of 1939–1945, Poznań was incorporated into the Third Reich as the capital of Reichsgau Wartheland. Many Polish inhabitants were executed, arrested, expelled to the General Government or used as forced labour; at the same time many Germans and Volksdeutsche were settled in the city. The pre-war Jewish population of about 2,000 were mostly murdered in the Holocaust. A concentration camp for perceived enemies was set up in Fort VII, one of the 19th-century perimeter forts (the camp was later moved to Żabikowo south of Poznań). The Nazi authorities significantly expanded Poznań's boundaries to include most of the present-day area of the city; these boundaries were retained after the war. Poznań fell to the Red Army (assisted by Polish volunteers) on 23 February 1945 following the Battle of Poznań, in which the German army conducted a last-ditch defence in line with Hitler's designation of the city as a Festung. The Citadel was the last point to fall, and the fighting left much of the city (particularly the Old Town) in ruins.
Due to the expulsions of Germans from Polish territory (and the fact that many Germans had left as the Soviets advanced), Poznań's post-war population was almost uniformly Polish
Re: News about Poznań « Reply #4 on Jul 25, 2011, 7:30pm »
Tufta,
Have you ever been to Poznan and did you like the city. I know that Bo visited the city, I showed Bo's images to my mother when I was at my parents place.
What is your opinion about Poznan as a Varsovian? How do Varsovians look at other Polish cities? In the Netherlands the people of Amsterdam are a little bit arrogant, they look down on other cities, because they are the capital and the largest city. Ofcourse they are right, says Pieter the peasent from the provincial peasent town of Arnhem. (Everybody outside Amsterdam is considered a peasent by the city patriotic Amsterdam people).
Do you have the same city patriotism in Poland, except Hooliganism? Do most Poles see Poznan as the disciplined, well organised, Modern city as the Varsovian friend of my mother?
Re: News about Poznań « Reply #5 on Jul 25, 2011, 7:35pm »
I like the fact that I saw the old Poznan element I rembered, the Prussian castle in the city centre, the two crosses monument for the 1956 victims, but in the same time the new buildings, skyskrapers, soccer stadium and new infrastructure. I am very curious how Poznan is nowadays. I have my reasons to visit the city again in the near future.
Have you ever been to Poznan and did you like the city.
Yes I have, both privately and on business.
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What is you opinion about Poznan as a Varsovian?
It is the only city in Poland which matches Warsaw, and which is truly (sorry Bo!) 'respected' by arrogant Varsovians.
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How do Varsovians look at other Polish cities? In the Netherlands the people of Amsterdam are a little bit arrogant, they look down on other cities, because they are the capital and the largest city.
It is exactly the same in Poland. However, I have observed that the most arrogant nowadays are those who came to live here very recently. The 'old' ones are somewhat arrogant too, but this is kind of 'warm' arrogance.
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Ofcourse they are right, says Pieter the peasent from the provincial peasent town of Arnhem.
Well, that's the way to win the hearts of 'big city dwellers', to have no complex
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Do you have the same city patriotism in Poland, except Hooliganism? Do most Poles see Poznan as the disciplined, well organised, Modern city as the Varsovian friend of my mother?
Yes, Poles do. Except people from Krakow. They'll do anything to prove they are second to Warsaw and noone else :)
Have you ever been to Poznan and did you like the city.
Yes I have, both privately and on business.
Did you visit Poznan as a Polish tourist from Warsaw, or did you have a cultural, historical, regional/local, social, personal interest in Poznan? Let me explain a bit more. I was in Poznan as a kid and teenager and never felt like a tourist, because I was there as a familymember of my babcia and dziadek (Kotowicz), aunts and uncles (Pantoflinski) and two cousins (Joasja kalinowska), and I did not experiance tourism at that time. We lived inbetween the Poles, and during our stay lived as Polish kids with their grandparents and parents, except we did not speak the language of our grandparents and the other Polish family. Poznan for me was like I was in the cinema and climbed into the screen and disappeared into the movie I was watching. Poznan the city where the bussy boulevards and streets were. I saw Poles living their daily lives, doing their jobs, having their social lives with their families and friends. It was no vacation time. As a kid you are small and not so notable. You could go to the grocery of communist supermarket (sam) and buy bread, milk, eggs and butter. And that in itself was exciting, because you payed with Polish money, you did something so that you were part of where you were and you could walk to the place and back home. There was not the fear for little kids like today that you would be kidnapped and abused by pedophiles, or something like that. We also went to the Zoo by ourselves or with my Polish mother, who was Polish at that moment, because she spoke Polish and we were almost like a Polish family, because we did not have to speak. I watched and watched, observed people, listened to them speaking, watched pedestrans walking over the sidewalk, pedestrian crossing, people in busses and trams, cars, taxi's, this Peoples republic time stile trucks and SUV's.
People sitting on benches reading newspapers, magazines or books, or romantic couples in one of the parks or cinema's. I remember the smell of the city and the light and the pollution. A mix of Tilia trees, coal, the two-stroke engines of the East-Block cars and the heavy truck and bus traffic in the city, and just the smell of old buildings, houses without ventilation systems and the cosy smell of a lot of people living together in a small place in a building.
In those communist days, most families had limited space in one room appartments with shared kitchens, bathrooms, coolrooms (my grandparents did not have a refrigerator. I stored a lot of images, sounds, smell, feelings, and observations of forms, buildings, houses, roads, boulevards, squares, churches, theatres, Museums, cinema's, shops and state hotels into my memory. Poznan was an important experiance for me and my sister. We learned that there are differances in the world. That there were good things about these differances and bad things. It enriched our lives, and we knew more than other Dutch kids, because we travelled behind the Iron Curtain, experianced a people with another language, culture and system.
Somewhere we knew that we were connected to it, but in the same time we were differant, and that was strange in itself. But it was a good experiance, we had a good time there, and Poznan and Poland was settled in our hearts, mind and soul. Noboday can take away that experiance from you. We were no tourists, we were kids, we were family and we were half Polish, we were the kids of our mother who was in her homecountry, she probably at that time left that country 8 or 9 years before we came there. Poznan was part of our life because grandpa and grandma lived there.
It is the only city in Poland which matches Warsaw, and which is truly (sorry Bo!) 'respected' by arrogant Varsovians.
Maybe it is like Amsterdam and Rotterdam, Warsaw being Amsterdam and Rotterdam being Poznań. They are arch rivals, and aren't particulary fond of eachother, but Amsterdam people will recognise Rotterdam as the second city, when they can be or play the role as number one city.
How do Varsovians look at other Polish cities? In the Netherlands the people of Amsterdam are a little bit arrogant, they look down on other cities, because they are the capital and the largest city.
It is exactly the same in Poland. However, I have observed that the most arrogant nowadays are those who came to live here very recently. The 'old' ones are somewhat arrogant too, but this is kind of 'warm' arrogance.
I think it is the same in Amsterdam too, some of these newcommers (former peasents ) very quickly learn the Amsterdam singing accent of Dutch or after a few months speak the Amsterdam city dialect. I lived for two years in Amsterdam, but never became a fluent spreaker in the Amsterdam accent or dialect. Many import people in Amsterdam are like me, they keep speaking general Dutch.
What do you mean with warm arrogance, arrogance light ( ), a humanistic sort of irony or mild sarcasm?
Ofcourse they are right, says Pieter the peasent from the provincial peasent town of Arnhem.
Well, that's the way to win the hearts of 'big city dwellers', to have no complex
I bounce some ironic or sarcastic humor back to the Amsterdam people. We small towns people know how to defend ourselves with humor against the ocean of witt, mockery and arrogance of the Amsterdam people, and actually people from other large cities too (Rotterdam and The Hague).
Do you have the same city patriotism in Poland, except Hooliganism? Do most Poles see Poznan as the disciplined, well organised, Modern city as the Varsovian friend of my mother?
Yes, Poles do. Except people from Krakow. They'll do anything to prove they are second to Warsaw and noone else :)
Krakow is in the Dutch sentence like the Hague or Utrecht, large cities, but in the eternal competition between Amsterdam and Rotterdam they are always the third and fourth city. I loved Krakow by the way and the city was not less interesting than Poznan or Warsaw. I loved Krakow!
Have you ever been to Poznan and did you like the city.
Yes I have, both privately and on business.
What business did you did in Poznań, Polish internal market trade? Building or buying and selling something in Poznań? I know that Poznań is a commercial and trade centre, so with the EU European championship it will be important to keep the city in a 'good light'.
Did you visit Poznan as a Polish tourist from Warsaw, or did you have a cultural, historical, regional/local, social, personal interest in Poznan?
Both, Piotr
But - in contrast to your family and your fantastic memories , I have none of these from that great city.
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Maybe it is like Amsterdam and Rotterdam, Warsaw being Amsterdam and Rotterdam being Poznań. They are arch rivals, and aren't particulary fond of eachother, but Amsterdam people will recognise Rotterdam as the second city, when they can be or play the role as number one city.
I think in Poland it is more like in Austria or France - there's the capital and there's 'all the rest'.
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What do you mean with warm arrogance, arrogance light ( ), a humanistic sort of irony or mild sarcasm?
By warm arrogance I mean that in fact they are mild in heart. And they understand the total nonsense of such divisions But, yes the like to mock, pull the leg, be ironic.
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but in the eternal competition between Amsterdam and Rotterdam they are always the third and fourth city. I loved Krakow by the way and the city was not less interesting than Poznan or Warsaw. I loved Krakow!
Yes. very well said Pieter. Kraków 'inside Planty', or 'Old city; is unique in the European meaning. Just as is Kazimierz Dolny fro instance.
Re: News about Poznań « Reply #11 on Jul 26, 2011, 12:38pm »
Tufta,
Being in Poznan was great in the seventees and in 1984 (as a 14 year old boy) and 1987 ( a 17 year old teenager who loved to go to the Polish discotheque in Poznań). But for that teenage boy and his 13 year old sister Carine, it was even more exiting to go Warsaw in 1984 for the first time. We were provincial kids from a small coastal town back then. My parents and we were not backward, we got a cultural, historical and educational upbringing. But we did not know the larger Dutch cities in the North or the centre of our country. We saw some large Belgian cities like Antwerp, Ličge and Brussels. But in Poland we saw really large cities for the first time in our life, because Poznan was maybe the first large city we saw. Okay I was in London as a five year old boy with my parents, but that was only once. Warsaw was the first city with over a million citizens I saw. And I think we went by train from Poznań to Warsaw. Warsaw made a great impression on me as a 14 year old boy. It was larger than Poznań. It had huge roads, huge buildings, a traffic that was even bussier than the bussy traffic of Poznań. The nice thing of Warsaw for this 14 year old in 1984 was the fact that it had an unique combination of old and new. It was amazing that that "old" city which was completely destroyed, managed to rebuilt its old town and Royal Pallaces. There was a certain energy in Warsaw, the culture of the Capital, and that combination of Old Varsovians, New Varsovians, foreigners, and the merger of that all that made the Polish capital special. I liked the space in the city, the Pallace of Culture (even if that was political incorrect to like it), the National Museum with all the old masters (fine art), Park Łazienkowski and the meetings with my mothers familymembers and friends. Here were more of my dziadek Kotowicz family members, where in Poznań the Pantoflinsky family of my babcia lived. In Warsaw was my mothers youth, this was the city where she was born and raised, and lived the first 10 years of her life from November the second 1934 when she was born there until august 1944 when she had to leave Warsaw to a Polish youth camp run by nuns outside the city. In that way she and my aunt survived the Warsaw Uprising, my grandparents stayed in Mototow and miraculously survived the war and unted with their children at the end of the war in Poznan. My mother went back to Warsaw after her Polytechnic study, to work for an Urbanistic bureau in Warsaw (architects, technical drawers like my mother and planners, controllers and accountants). I thinks she lived and worked in Warsaw from halfway the fiftees until 1967 when she married my father and moved to the Netherlands.
So we were back in Warsaw, the city of her youth and young professional life. Maybe due to that fact the city was special. There were strong family roots there. The city my grandparents, mother and aunt could have stayed if the war did not have driven them out. Actually their house stayed in tact, but after the war the area became occupied by the UB ( Urząd Bezpieczeństwa ), because they lived right next to the Więzienie mokotowskie, otherwise known as Rakowiecka Prison.
My grandparents experianced terrible things during the wartime in that area where they lived. They were themselves under constant threat and it is really a miracle that they survived the war. Several times they were threatened by the German SS, Ukrainians or other Nazi thugs. But they were strong and sensable people, who did the right thing at the right time and in that saved their own lives and probably the lives of others too.
Back in Warsaw in 1984 I saw the New Warsaw, but in the same time the scars, wounds and suffering of the past. I could feel it back than, and I could see and hear it. People who lost loved ones, fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers, cousins, nieces, nephews, aunts and uncles, grandparents. Yes, there were people missing, people who did not survived the Uprising, people who did not came back from the East, Katyn, the Gulach, Kazakhstan. I remember the differance between the Warsaw family, the Kotowicz family, who had roots in North-Eastern Poland, near the Lithuanian border (there are also Polish-Lithuanian roots there. Polish Szlachta from Lithiania), and the Poznań family, the Pantoflinsky (who had roots in Southern Poland and Western-Poland -Poznań). The Varsovian Kotowicz family was more anti-Russian (the Sovjet attrocities in Eastern Poland, 1939-1941, and the entire war for the Poles who were deported to Siberia or Kazakhstan), and the Poznanian Pantoflinsky family (who experianced the Nazi brutality in Poznań) were more anti-German. Ofcourse the Kotowicz family in Warsaw and North-East Poland experianced both terrors.
In the old town of Warsaw I saw the exellent black and white movie about Warsaws history, before the war, fantastic images of a vibrant, modern and elegant and sophisticated city, the destruction of the war, and the rebuilding of Old Warsaw after the war. In Warsaw I remember a light, white Bar mlezny, where they had delicious cheescake. I loved the two royal palaces we visited and the parks. And I was just fascinated by the large city, because I already back then loved architecture, buildings, churches (from the inside and the outside. Also going to Polish mass ofcourse). The old FSO Warszawa cars, the Czech Jawa motocycles, FSO Polonez, Western European cars, Lada's, Wartburgs, Polski Fiat 126 and 125, the star trucks, the smaller type of transport busses and the communist time taxi's. In both Poznań and Warsaw I remember you had the communist type of square, monotomous, unfriendly public officials (probably Polish communists), but in the same time had some relaxed people in galleries, pubs and the better restaurants. That you had to wait a long time to be served was in our opinion part of life under communism. Under communism you have to wait long for your meal, even if the restaurant was empty.
I remember the Polish trams which drove along the Wisła river, under or next to the old town. In august 2006 I was back in Warsaw and the city had radically changed. The old town was the same, but the new city around the central station and the palace of culture had changed dramatically, with new skyskrapers, office buildings, new architecture. And I liked it, there was a new Warsaw skyline, and the combination with the palace of culture was great. My mother had an appartment in one of the communist era flats built around the palace of culture in the fiftees or sixtees. Her appartment was on the ninth floor, and we stayed there in 1984, because when she left a cousin of her rented the appartment. So that was the reason that we could use it in 1984. Being in Warsaw in 1984 was great, but staying in the centre on the ninth floor of a large flat building was great. An aunt of my was living in the street where general Jaruzelski lived and she lived opposite to his appartment. We visited her. She was a party member and a pariah in the Polish family, but my grandparents and mother kept contact with her, even though they were anti-communist. Family was family. Next to this I met a lot of Polish family, friends of my mother and old colleages of her back then. I think today a lot of these people will be dead, because they were middle aged people back then. I did not met them in 2006, because I had no adresses and am not very good in names of people.
My mother had an appartment in one of the communist era flats built around the palace of culture in the fiftees or sixtees.
This must be 'Osiedle za Żelazn± Bram±'. I think I've posted some pictures from there a while back. A lot of friends from my youth lived there with their parents in those incredibly small apartments. Overall that neighbourhood was not bad at all, a lot of university workers lived there. Now it is becoming a place where mostly newcomers to Warsaw live, young people, also a lot of ppl from Asia.
Re: News about Poznań « Reply #13 on Jul 26, 2011, 11:50pm »
Tufta,
Yes, it was a small apartment, but on a very nice location in the heart of the centre of Modern Warsaw. Close to the central trainstation, the most important boulevards, shops, supermarkets, and a nice lang walk or bus/tram drive from the Old town.
It was nice for a single like me (seen from todays perspective, because back than I was stil a member of a warm and cosy family), but to small for a family of four or five. I liked the view on Warsaw and the Palace of Culture, and the feeling of waking up in the Middle of Warsaw. That was a great feeling, reality and experiance. Being in the heart of Warsaw in 1984.
I did not knew Prague, Budapest, Krakow, Vienna, Zürich, Paris, Rome, Florance, Piza, Venice, Copenhagen, Berlin, LA, New York and Cape Town back then. I had only seen Amsterdam, Brussels, London and Poznan back then. Berlin I did not know, because we only drove through it or along it.
Re: News about Poznań « Reply #14 on Jul 29, 2011, 5:55pm »
Poznan trade city
Poznań is a city steeped in artistic and trading traditions, with many schools of higher education, museums and avant–garde theatres. It is also the site of the Poznań International Trade Fairs. The city of Poznan is Poland’s fifth largest city and the capital of Wielkopolska. Its population is over a half of a million residents. The city is Poland’s fourth largest industrial center and is situated between Berlin and Warsaw, three hours drive from each city.
Poznan is city that is committed to the development and promotion of sustainability and environmental protection. Poznan has hosted the UN conference in 2008, which dealt with the issue of the impact of weather changes on the planet.
Poznan's trade traditions
Poznan is famous nationwide and abroad for the Poznan International Fair held here since 1921. Thus, it is one of the European towns with the longest trade fair traditions whose origins date back as far as 1254 when Poznan was granted a privilege by Przemysl the First. Those commercial traditions of the city were developed by the generations to follow, making Poznan not only an industrial and commercial centre, but an organiser of international trade exhibitions. It was the Union of Merchant Associations, an organisation consisting of Eastern Pommerania and Greater Poland merchants, that during their congress held in Poznan in 1917 put forward an idea of creating a company specialising in holding trade fairs targeted at specific areas of business activity. This is how the Poznan International Fair came into existence.
Poznan Fashion Fair 2011 - new form of style
The first Poznan Trade Fair, known as ''General National Exhibition'', presenting the economic and cultural achievements of Poland, took place at the fairgrounds of the Poznan International Fair in 1929. It was visited by as many as 4.5 million people. Four years later the first international fair was held in Poznan. Before World War II the Poznan International Fair was regarded as one of the leading fairs in Europe. The years to follow marked the development of both the fair programme and infrastructure.
Poznan International Fair – Opportunities for Business
Nowadays, the Poznan International Fair is the oldest trade fair in Poland, one of the most prestigious trade fairs in Europe and the 21st largest fair in the world. Annually, over 50 trade events take place here within the fair grounds of over 110,000 m˛ indoor and 35,000 m˛ outdoor exhibition space. The exhibitors come from all over the world. According to the Polish Trade Fair Corporation, 75 % of foreign ventures present at the Poznan International Fair are the European Union members. The main advantages of participating in the trade shows are mainly the opportunity of learning about the European markets and of establishing international co-operation. There is a wide selection of trade shows to choose from depending on a company's business profile, e.g. International Construction Fair, Power Industry Exhibition, Property and Investment Salon, Dentistry Fair, Science for the Economy, etc.
Yes, Poles do. Except people from Krakow. They'll do anything to prove they are second to Warsaw and noone else :)
I agree about Poznań being the second major city in Poland worth visiting and even living in, just after Warsaw. Kraków is the third, next Gdańsk and Wrocław in the last place.
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