1st Nov

this day has already started to affect my mood a bit:-(.

:-))))

they, "POLISH BIRDS", lost:-)))!!!

:-))))

they, "POLISH BIRDS", lost:-))))!!!!

Am back to gloomy Warsaw

no comments

Swining London:-)

am so happy to be here!:-)

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallejujah!!!!!!:-)

I am able to create smth!!:-)))), any doubts???? Pls have a look below:

Szczotki Pędzle
ul. Tamka 45b,
www.szczotkipedzle.pl , Open daily: 10.00 – 21.00



Two sisters, who definitely wouldn’t be happy with a corporate full-time job, decided to have their own business. That is why they opened a Café – Szczotki Pedzle where previously there was a brushes’ shop. The young girls kept its name and the doors, making this cosy spot even more unusual. Currently instead of the brushes we may buy, for example, a delicious sandwich with mozzarella and dried tomatoes for 5 PLN. Don’t worry, be happy – there are other snacks but the nice prices remain and also commerce’s feng shui from the past. The posters are “hot products” in Szczotki, they are designed by a boyfriend of one of the sisters. Many people come back and communicate a strong will to buy them. Another level of the love to art there stems from the neighbourhood of Warsaw University and Warsaw Musical Academy. Soon its students will perform their first concerts and shows using their own instruments and we never know perhaps the brushes as well. Szczotki Pedzle also make friends with children, dogs and bicycles and help letting them in. In addition a good selection of Twinings tea can satisfy each Pole and a typical Polish breakfast, that will be very soon served, is going to make many Brits happy.
This café is so charming and interesting at the same time that everyone wishes to live close by and pop in on a way back home or meet a good friend or sit quietly and read a book or… There are so many ors which may be sum up to one simply be there!

A small note about me:

Italian - restarted to learn:-)

Conclusion: blue is over, am back to "my real myself":-)

Welcome back Nikuś:-)

It was a cool event - last year:-). My ex accompanied me there, hmmm - have I already "recovered" from this break-up?

Praga welcomes a recycling design

Project Praga, a former Polskie Zaklady Optyczne, Saturday and Sunday Dec, 16-17, more info at www.projectpraga.com

For those who care about the environment it is a must - the fourth edition of Project Praga. For those who do not want to commit to the movement it is a chance to convert into a correct religion.

On spot the artists will use their artistic skills and transform all the shabby look commodities into fancy gadgets and desirable items.

The project will also host fashion designers who will present their recycling collections at the end of this ecological feast.

Hesitating is a proof one does think yet in terms of environment it is a lack of sensitivity.

I do love Interconti:-))))))), it's so sad I am a VIP at Radisson:-(

7th Heaven at Interconti

RiverView Wellness Centre beats out all the fitness spots in town with its breathtaking view from 43th and 44th floors. At night while jacuzzing one dreams to sing after Sinatra : " I'm number one, top of the list, king of the hill, number one".

This club offers a wide range of fitness and wellness activities including stress management, weight loss and swim & fun academy for kids. The group trainings are divided into three categories: power, balance and inner energy. The instructors are well educated and experienced. A label of the equipment - Technogym - stands for high quality and additional fun like watching television or listening to music while exercising.

The fee may kill all the pockets of yours yet water and apples are served for free:-).

Some burning ecological issues:-)

Monika Kupiec: Is Poland dirty from ecological point of view?

Andrzej Jagusiewicz: Poland is not a dirty country ecologically; I can only admit that there are still a lot of discrepancies between the old EU-15 countries and the new members, so called EU-12, including Poland. They stem from the differences between market economy and centrally planned one. Poland has still some homework to do, which is explicitly mentioned in the Accession Treaty. The latter relate in first instance to such areas as water quality, waste management, air quality and industrial pollution.
But going back to your question, the state of the environment in Poland is quite satisfactory as compared to other EU member States, in certain aspects even better, which can be best explained by less intensive socialist economy and by a more environmentally friendly approach to spatial planning. Lower domestic income in the past has proved to be our environment's ally. What is really "dirty" is ecological behaviour from quite large part of our citizens. For example statistically we produce little domestic waste per capita, but if you compare the same quantity of waste to our income then we are the champions among the EU or OECD countries. So we must dispose them somewhere and quite often illegally making your question at least locally founded.

MK: Why Warsaw's inhabitants can't drink tap water? When it will be possible?

AJ: But you can...only it's not tasty, because it's chemically treated. Now seriously, there is a clear link between the quality of the Vistula River and that of the tap water. More pollution load to rivers means more effort to "produce" a tap water. So if we build waste-water treatment for all communes with more than 2.000 inhabitants (equivalent in terms of waste water volume) by 2012 according to the Accession Treaty, one of our homework, and if our rivers achieve according the EU Framework Water Directive a good ecological status by 2015, then I am sure a tap water will be drinkable.

MK: What needs to be done in order to enable Warsaw's inhabitants to separate garbage?

AJ: First of all, I am sure that they are completely unaware that the Warsaw Municipality is ready to fine them for non-compliance with the necessity not only to collect wastes, but to separate and to put them into the right containers (5 different colours for specific wastes). According to my interpretation of the Law on Self-Government and the Waste Act such containers are integral part of the pro-environmental infrastructure of the communes (collectivities) and must be widely available to the citizens. So far I have not seen one neither on the Warsaw streets nor inside the waste rooms of the blocks of flats. So first we are lacking a proper infrastructure to collect let's say separated wastes. Secondly, throwing waste at public places is quite popular and gets so far unpunished. Look at the surroundings of the shops selling beverages, which are polluted by empty cans or bottles, look at the bus or tram stops where you always find domestic garbage and look at the drivers throwing through the windows on the streets their cigarettes. So secondly we desperately need environmental education.
In addition Warsaw Municipality eliminates street containers accusing citizens of not using them properly. Let say differently, they have never been in Warsaw regularly emptied and their density is perhaps good for a small town, but not for the capital city. Another accusation can be addressed towards the cooperatives or collectivities managing the blocks of flats. It's their basic duty to make various containers available in the waste rooms or on the yards for their dwellers. Also numerous supermarkets could play a good educational role, particularly in the first stage of the compliance with the new law. Making shopping may be a good opportunity to dispose in the right way waste. We see a lot of slogans, untargeted campaigns, random billboards instead of target-oriented and educational effort through TV channels or radios. So to sum-up: information, education, proper infrastructure and only then punishment. This is my recipe.

MK: What do we breathe in Warsaw?

AJ: I am sorry to say but we breathe air of a bad quality. Warsaw is a "red city", which means that it exceeds of the EU air standards almost everywhere. The situation is particularly critical with respect to particulate matter of less than 10 microns diameter (PMıo). These particles are directly inhaled to our lungs and can do a lot of harm to our respiratory system. Moreover, they are extremely toxic, because they can carry dioxins, heavy metals and hydrocarbons emitted by combustion processes and transport. The most striking example is the monitoring station located at the crossroad of Aleje Niepodleglości/Nowowiejska where for almost half of a year the air exceeds of EU daily PMıo standards. Warsaw needs urgently an air protection programme. To take seriously the new EU challenge the Warsaw Municipality must do much more to its citizens. In first instance it has to manage better city traffic, introduce clean and silent public transport e.g. buses running on CNG (compressed natural gas), restrict access for private cars to the city center through pay-toll system, establish the pedestrian areas and finally ban coal as fuel for heating and cars not meeting the recent EU emission standards.

Will I ever write smth better than this????!!!!!!!

TOLERANCE AND LAW

"Tolerance. That is what Poland needs to improve" says Elmi Abdil, a refugee from Somalia. "Tolerance ... for people to have more tolerance for people who have a different skin colour, a different culture. It is very important" says Elmi's friend and compatriot, Abba M.Shair.

Elmi arrived in Poland in 1996 after a long and complicated voyage. He jumped on a boat in Somalia and together with some friends reached Dubai. His next stop was Syria. He finally came to Poland after three years of living in Moscow, a time he refers to as "a nightmare". The perpetual smile on his face flickers, but does not die. We are talking in his falt in a four-storey building in Warsaw's city center. " I am so slim because I walk the whole flight of stairs every day", he jokes and points to his stomach.

According to opinion polls conducted by TNS OBOP - just two weeks after last year's International Refugee Day - most Poles didn't understand how to define a refugee. And even with the word's negative connotation, according to the authors of the Global Language Monitor website, the word refugee, although politically incorrect in the USA, is widely used with other understones. It has started to mean a lucky person who managed to save his/her life from a global catastrophe, like the recent tsunami or hurricane Katrina. It is also frequently applied to the likes of Albert Einstein, Marlene Dietrich, Czesław Miłosz, Thomas Mann and Josif Brodski.

Elmi, of course, is not of that kind stature. His first home in Poland was Dębak refugee centre near Warsaw - the biggest and at the same time the most important institution of its kind in the country. Elmi did not mind. "It was quiet and I had a bed to sleep in" he recalls.

Residents at a refugee centre get shelter, food, medical care, travel expenses needed to finalise the legal procedure for obtaining refugee status, a Polish language course and even a little pocket money. The refugee status all of them must obtain to remain in the country is very difficult to get. In 2000, only 335 of 6 860 applicants actually received it. Elmi waited nine months for his decision. Many other foreigners are not so lucky - epecially Chechens, who are by far the largest ethnic group among Poland's refugees. In fact, in 2005 they made 91 percent of Poland's registered refugees, up from 81 percent in 2003. As much as they would like to continue their flight to Germany, Austria and beyond, European Union regulations prevent them from doing so, and they are, often forcibly, returned to Poland.

Elmi, however, is content with his life here. He smiles as he tells his story. He has lost nothing of his good humour and openness, continues to make new friends, often by doing favours to people he barely knows.

The Polish Humanitarian Organisation helped him find his first job - washing dishes at the Tam Tam restaurant.

"It is a pity" he says. " I work, and sometimes a Pole comes and says "Look, they employed an African and we do not have the work". We've been hearing this all the time, it's very sad".

According to the TNS OBOP study, 67 percent of Poles believe that refugees increase unemployment.

"What we miss is tolerance" Abba cuts in. "If you make 600 zlotys, you can manage if there is tolerance. What it's all about is to accept another human being and not to say "Shit, some African's come to our country."

Official recognition and a job do not end a refugee's problems. Doctor Maria Siwiak-Kobayashi, a psychologist who has been working with refugees in the Centre for Personality Support and Development points out that refugees often suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder. This is a severe psychological problem that often affects those who have experienced a tragic event in their lives, such as a war. Many children and adults continue to sleep on the floor under their alloted beds for months after arrival to their new country, as they are afraid of shootings in the night.

"Everywhere we go, our suitcase goes with us and in it we carry ourselves" says Siwiak-Kobayashi. "Leaving one country does not mean we leave our emotional problems, we simply take them with us."

Being a refugee always means living in a crisis situation. Their legal situation is one problem. For whose who get official refugee status, the next challenge is to intergrate into their new society. For whose who fail, a nightmare begins.

Doctor Siwiak-Kobayashi says that a critical phase takes place four to five months after arriving in a new country. After an initial period of relief, the stress returns. This is the time when they need professional help the most.

Nowadays, Elmi feels great. However, things weren't always as rosy as his sunny countenance would suggest.

"The most painful bit was when I started to understand what people were saying in Polish" he says.

For an instant, the smile fades and there are tears in his eyes. Other Somalis he met at the Dębak centre have left Poland and gone to live in the West. He visits them sometimes.

"When I go abroad on holiday, I miss Poland, I do not know what made me stay in Poland. I feel I have to be here" he says.

Today he is in between jobs, but says he is not worried.

"We arrived in Poland as refugees and the Polish stae has to accept us, you don't have to give ( a man) money, give him a paper so he can look for a job" he says.

Tellingly, one of his former jobs was at the Quo Vadis club. Quo vadis? Where are you going?

I've changed my mind

my yesterday's "blog strategy" doesn't seem to be so wicked today:-(, it has some potential and that's all:-(.

Life couldn't be better:-))))))

I am so happy cause I have found out an excellent, perfect, wonderful, lovely, fascinating ect.:-) subject for my blog!!!!:-))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

This subject can be even a reason to live for:-))).

Soon my first post within this beautiful "blog strategy":-)

Even I can't wait:-)

Guys to be interviewed:-)

Wade Robson and Jude Law - two first people who are on my list to be interviewed:-)