🧵After Russia shat itself with Biden permitting (well too late) Ukraine to strike military targets deep inside Russia with his weapons, some of the people got a little bit panicky, including some of my friends. Here is a little thread for them: (1) I don’t blame my friends. Not everyone keeps close tabs on the political situation, and the internet is full of Russian propaganda, propagated both by Russian bots and useful idiots in the West. (2)

My dad's friend used to live in Magnitogorsk. He was a journalist in the Soviet Union who met and married a Russian woman and they moved there in Gorbatchev times.

He sometimes visited us when returning to Poland, and I recall one story he told us in the 1990s.

🧵

1/x

https://twitter.com/Daractenus/status/1847953508387139630

In the 1990's the life in Russia was even more shit than today, many elderly people were literally starving. So in Magnitogorsk they had some allotments, which were quite big, and grannies and grandpas were cultivating potatoes there and so on.

But as the crime was rampant, 2/x

I am watching a movie clip about Elon Musk's Tesla Cyber cab and I am going to tell you why it is a completely stupid vehicle.

Yeah, here we go again, I just had a Deja Vu moment:

This guy just don't understand vehicles that are not toys should. 🧵

https://x.com/TOrynski/status/1600968577246711808

(1) So, let's start from the beginning: what would you like your Taxi cab to be?
- a boxy, shaped vehicle that is easy to get in and get out, accessible also to elderly and people on wheelchairs, that can take you and your friends or family from A to B?

I left UK two years ago today. This is the last picture I have taken on British soil. Why would I take a picture of a van in Dover, the place I drove a van through hundreds of times? Because I was bored and had too much time on my hands

A threat🧵 During my 18 years in Scotland, most of the time I worked as a truck driver. But for some 5 years, during my gap year, through the rest of my studies and for some time after, I worked as a van driver for a company doing time-critical deliveries all over EU and beyond. /1

Spoke with one of my friends in Glasgow today.

She's planning to return to Poland. According to her, EU people are moving back to EU left and right as "everything in Britain is collapsing". Some of our common friends are also planning to or have already moved. 1/x - she says she is the only person in her work who still has access to a dentist, as dentist surgeries are so overwhelmed they refuse to see patients even privately
- she says that the rents in Battlefield, where we both used to live, are so high that people who earned... 2/x

Someone reminded me of that thread today, so ill tell you something.

I live in Finland now. Some time ago I left my job hoping to get another one. It didn't worked out and I became unemployed.

(A secondary thread).

https://twitter.com/TOrynski/status/1672012117426294789

After looking for a job for some time I went to local equivalent of Job Centre as I found online that unemployed people might get free language courses. 1/

An interesting discussion is brewing up between Poland and Ukraine.

We all want Ukraine wants to join Europe in all ways possible. So some years ago they started building a standard gauge railway. It was supposed to reach Lviv by last year.



(1)strefabiznesu.pl/ukraina-buduje… Now, the new idea of Ukrainian minister of agriculture is for Poland to build a Russian gauge railway from Ukrainian border to ports in Gdańsk, as well as in Klaipeda in Lithuania.



(2)pb.pl/ukraina-chce-s…

There have been iots in Warsaw today. The "protesting farmers" were throwing cobblestones at the police. Police had to detain some of them.

That gave PiS the chance to make comparisons with Martial State and accuse @DonaldTusk of destroying democracy.

You need the context 1/x

https://twitter.com/MorawieckiM/status/1765387195324481620

Let's start with the tag in Morawiecki's tweet. It says "Coalition of 13th of December". Why?

The elections that PiS lost took place on 15th of October. Therefore the winning coalition called themselves "coalition of 15th of October".

But thanks to @AndrzejDuda's actions...2/x

I don't buy this bullshit with "Russian people don't protest against Putin because they are afraid to die". Do you know why?

They volunteer to go to special military operations in their thousands. Knowing what survival rates are. 1/x That means they are not afraid of dying. They are willing to die for Putin, or for money - as I guess this is a major incentive to sign for the army as pay in Russia is so shit that if you are from some shithole in the middle of nowhere, it's the only chance to make some... 2/x

You might have noticed that many pro-Ukrainian pundits and self proclaimed "Eastern Europe experts" have recently came attacking the new Polish government for their take over of public media, accusing them of destroying a valuable TV channel TVP World.

This is my take on this 🧵 So let's paint the background here. TVP was formerly a polish public broadcaster, a Polish equivalent to BBC so to speak. After PIS took power in 2015 they conducted an illegal takeover of Polish public media and turned them into an awful party propaganda tool. It needs to be /1

WHAT ARE THE PROTESTS ON POLISH-UKRAINIAN BORDER ABOUT? EXPLAINER THREAT:

1. How road transport in the EU works (simplified)

Transport companies from any country could transport stuff inside their own country, or between any two countries in the EU. They can't transport 1/x goods within other EU country (that is cabotage, but there are some exceptions.

2. How road transport between EU and non-EU countries work (simplified)

Transport companies from non-EU countries can only transport goods between EU and their country - so imports and exports 2/x

In this interview, a Polish military analyst Michał Fiszer calls for Europe to stop pretending Russia invasion on Ukraine has nothing to do with us. It's worth reading if you can, if not, so I will give you some digest in English 🧵

wiadomosci.gazeta.pl/wiadomosci/7,1… 1. "We are where Europe was in September 1939. People back then also weren't aware it's the World War. They thought "Ok, Hitler invaded Poland, but that will be eat, why would he need to go anywhere else?"

With over 99% votes officially counted, the situation is clear. Poland begins turning back towards European values.

Do you know what will be the most memorable moment of that day for me? (1)

🧵 It will be this short clip of Kaczyński turning up to the polling station to vote. He had to mix with the pleb, which he virtually never does, which was humiliating enough for him. He barged in with his bodyguards and expected to be served straight away but not this time... (2)

So what is the deal with the beef between Poland and Ukraine?

1. Polish government failed to organise transit of Ukrainian grain. Either because they are bunch of incompetent fools, or because some of their cronies realised that they can make a huge money selling this grain... ...in Poland instead of exporting it further as it was the original intention.

2. The grain flooded Polish market, bringing prices down and farmers got understandably pissed, which is not good in the election year.

3. To recover from this fiasco, Government banned import...

Imagine, you are living in a delapitated shithole in a falling-apart wooden building that was deemed unsafe for habitation a generation ago and you still believe it's all because the West is envious of what Russia has:



(you can translate subtitles) They say here, one year of Ukrainian invasion costed Russia 3 times more than it needed to solve the housing problem by providing emergency housing to everyone in Russia who needs it.

How is that people can't add 2 and 2 together and realize that every rocket Russia sends to...

Those, who are surprised to see @pontifex siding with Putin remember that this is not a new thing.

It's a little remembered fact but on 1st of September 1939 Poland was invaded not only by Nazi Germany but also by Slovakia. Slovakia occupied small parts of Spisz and Orawa 1/x - respectably East and West of Nowy Targ.

While this was not really a significant historical event, it was part of the activities of the First Slovak Republic, a puppet Nazi state. Why I am writing about it in the Pope's context you might ask? 2/x

I looked into comments under article about Operation Brain that says trucks are being stacked on M20 to prevent tourists from being stacked in the queue. The article is in the Polish portal about road transport that is largely read by drivers and other people from the industry 🧵 "they should introduce 'operation brain' - for themselves".

"Are they out of their minds?"

"Let those tourists bring the goods back themselves on the way back, this is not the way to treat people who deliver goods to them"

"It wasn't that bad, I waited 25 min to enter port...

I just checked a Polish job board for work abroad.

I found job offers for a nurses, paramedics and midwives in England, starting €2200/month.

And for nurses in Ireland starting from €2700/m. And you can get much more in 🇩🇪🇨🇭 or 🇸🇪.

Why would any EU citizen chose England?

https://twitter.com/LarryMadowo/status/1679561428770889772

(all prices at this job board are given in either euro or polish złoty)

Funny story.

I had a car accident in 2008. Some driver rear ended me when I stopped at the red light.

I got no help whatsoever, because it happened 2 weeks *before* my 24 months of continuous residence in the UK was completed.

A wee thread:

https://twitter.com/mikegalsworthy/status/1671972179532029952

A guy drove into my car at New Gorbals in Glasgow. We were just heading home as my then partner was preparing to fly to Poland. Car was drivable still, but had no lights, no rear window and the bent metal was scratching my wheel.

1/

I've noticed a new worrying trend of how Russian propaganda is leaking into Poland and how Poles slowly turn against Ukrainians. I heard it in person too, but let me use one example which, I think, will make a good case study (a 🧵): 1. This is a Facebook profile of a Polish transport industry portal. The article talks about a fleet of new Iveco light trucks for the Ukrainian government presented at the picture of the bodybuilder in Kiyv. The author points out to the destroyed building in the background.

I am watching this movie about a bit come back of trams to French cities and have to say one of the good things about communist Poland is that due to being poor and unable to afford buses... ...while at the time had a very limited need for extra traffic lines due to scarcity of private cars, at least in the big cities (but also in some small ones) trams remained and sometimes the networks were even expanded. So while other cities start from scratch, we're well ahead!