patrick.net

mell says

That's not true. Standard of living in many German, Swiss or Austrian cities is magnitudes better than in the US.

Sorry pal.

But, these countries are all in the beginning throes of acute demographic collapse. And they are all export model economies, which is going bye-bye because of de-globalization even w/o the acute demographic collapse that is going to kill them anyway.

US is not facing demographic collapse. Demographic hardship, yes. For about 15 years.
After that, the Boomers die off and the Millennials enter their peak earning years. Europe and Asia do not have anything like the Millennials demographically.

North America is also secure and can be energy independent. Europe and Asia can not.

Doesn't matter what you think of their cities. In less than 10 years from now, they will be like Detroit & Baltimore..or California at best, in the good parts.

Patrick says

I have to admit that there are tons of really hot Polish women

You lucky bastard. Send some nudes.

mell says

Poland is doing quite well, btw., so is eastern Germany. Hungary, you name it. The US hasn't lost yet, but the next one or two elections will be crucial. There's still time.

Agreed.

I get a deep sense of "Exhaustion" from Woke BS.

I also think COVID really reset everybody's brains about health, and people are more skeptical of "Shoot it up, pop the pill in mouth, and go back to sitting and shoveling in the food" healthcare.

Thanks Patrick for 'boots on the ground', very interesting.

More thoughts from Poland:

Krakow is a really beautiful city, well worth visiting. Yesterday we saw the Wawel, which is the castle and former capital of Poland before the merger with Lithuania, when they moved the capital to Warsaw. Then we had dinner in the town square, which is the nicest town square I've seen anywhere in Europe or the world.

Now I'm finally seeing foreigners like Indians, Arabs (in full garb), and some blacks, but I think they are all tourists. Our cab driver was Polish, unlike in America, where every cab driver seems to be foreign.

I asked the more about Ukraine. They are definitely on the side of Ukraine, but think that America is trying to get Ukrainian gas and oil. This never occurred to me. I said I thought the war was promoted by US weapons makers because most of US "aid" to Ukraine is really payments to Raytheon, Lockheed, etc. They had not thought of that.

They pointed out several big new SUV's with Ukrainian license plates. Who are these "refugees" with $50,000 cars?

There was a Ukrainian demonstration in the town square:

Patrick says

They pointed out several big new SUV's with Ukrainian license plates. Who are these "refugees" with $50,000 cars?

IT outsourcing chiefs and people who made warbucks and intelbucks, I would guess. I bet they're very patriotic away from the warzone.

BayArea says

Patrick: Tell us about communication.

I found that in the bigger cities, English is common.

What about the small village where your grandmother is from?

I’m fluent and can communicate in either language but think in English.

Yes, English is everywhere now, where it was completely absent 35 years ago.

In my grandmother's village, people try to speak English to me, but not many are fluent.

It's kind of funny how I've had people just start talking to me in Polish, assuming I am Polish, but others spoke English assuming I'm a tourist. I heard one group of tourists speaking American English and asked where they are from. South Carolina. They asked about me and I said I was from Chicago, but visiting relatives I have here. Then I heard one of them say to another, "That one grew up in Chicago!" Lol.

steverbeaver says

I need recipe for exemplary (good) Polish dish that I can make here, and advisement on best Polish beer that I may find stateside. Have a nice trip!

@steverbeaver The classic dish (which my grandmother also made) is Gołąbki (sounds like golompki):



I've had it twice already, and just been here 3 days.

My cousin's husband says the best exported beer is Żywiec:

WookieMan says

I know Eastern Europeans in general liked to drink, didn't realize that they might have it at breakfast. Hard stuff too? That's insane.

That was 35 years ago, and I suspect it was intended to reduce the hangover the assumed I must have had from my welcome party the night before.

Booger says

Patrick says

some graffiti,

What % of the graffiti is in English?

@Booger I saw just a few instances of graffiti in English. One was "Fuck Putin".

Booger says

Patrick says

It's pretty hot, in the 90s.

Any air conditioning?

Yes, my cousin had it in her house, and they have it in the hotel I'm in now.

The tour of the Wawel did not have it, so that was pretty hard, being about 92 degrees with high humidity.

BayArea says

I hope you have time to visit Gdańsk and Krokow (check out the salt mines as they are out of this world).

We are going to see the salt mines today.

Trollhole says

US is not facing demographic collapse. Demographic hardship, yes. For about 15 years.
After that, the Boomers die off and the Millennials enter their peak earning years. Europe and Asia do not have anything like the Millennials demographically.

European countries actually started putting the brakes on mass immigration because a nation of young troublemakers is worse than a shrinking one. Many millenials and immigrants in the US (not all) are a net burden. Go to Luzern, Vienna, Zurich, or most German cities and you know what advanced standard of living for families is (UK, France, Spain etc. not so much). The US has very nice pockets, potentially nicer if you are wealthy, but on avg. it has fallen behind. Only a change in politics can reverse that. Even Japan as the eternally "dying nation" is doing remarkably well (standard of living among the highest) cause it's close to impossible to immigrate and woke is not existent.

Soo, Pat, if your country was invaded by genocidal fucks, would you send your wife across the border in the $50K car you had at the moment or you'd stop at some lot to exchange it for a beat-up 30 y.o. Corolla? I mean, only poor people can flee the invading hordes, so one must pretend to be poor, right?Or what exactly thar car comment was implying?

I mean that the refugees here do not seem particularly desperate.

Btw, one reason Krakow has so many beautiful young women is that there are many universities here. I didn't know that earlier.

Polish people also seem to use a lot more perfume and cologne than Americans.

Patrick says

I mean that the refugees here do not seem particularly desperate.

You are used to
seeing economical migrants here in the US claiming they are "refugees". If people are not economical migrants but are fleeing an actual hot war, why should they all seem to be desperate? Some surely are, but affluent people flee from wars too. It's not like Soviet bombs can tell rich from poor and spare the former...

War is always used as an opportunity to go after people who were not with the ones in power. Wouldn't be surprised if the anti-Zelensky faction left early. But really anyone with money who wasn't in on the grift.

What's the primary style of beer in Poland? Or the most popular?

It seems like lagers are very popular.

But I've been here on only a few days so I don't really know.

GNL says

Patrick says

I have to admit that there are tons of really hot Polish women

You lucky bastard. Send some nudes.

A lot of them do not wear bras. It's hard not to look, but I'm with my wife so I try not to.

Booger says

Patrick says

Everyone who could challenge Nazi power was systematically killed

Everyone who could challenge Communist power was systematically killed.

You are right. Them too.

Everyone here is aware that the Russians killed all the officers in the Polish army, the massacre at Katyn. 25,000 people.

And no one was ever held to account.

Traffic is horrible in Krakow, even in the middle of the day. Don't bother trying to drive anywhere.

Nowhere to park either.

I just saw a gay flag, first one.

Patrick says

You are right. Them too.

Everyone here is aware that the Russians killed all the officers in the Polish army, the massacre at Katyn. 25,000 people.

And no one was ever held to account.

Every country engages in war crimes.

How many people killed in Nagasaki and Hiroshima? Neither city had any military value.

My family oriented aunt is Polish. She is married to my uncle, who is a surgeon and an asshole with regard to how he treats his family members. Tell your relatives that we are proud of their immigration officials.

I just saw someone wearing a mask.

Just one person, no one else among all the people in Krakow.

From my experience, lager would be the most common beer type.

12oz portions are also laughable there.

It could be seasonal though. Lagers are great summer beers. Winter I'd bet on something stronger and darker.

mell says

That's not true. Standard of living in many German, Swiss or Austrian cities is magnitudes better than in the US. These are not exceptions, they are becoming the norm. Asia is not far behind and will overtake the US if its stays on the given path. I agree that esp. European nations do aid to their own downfall with unfettered mass immigration etc, but the US is currently declining faster under xiden, no doubt about it, esp. since leftoids have taken a foothold in most big cities and the still nice touristy rural areas. If you are single maybe the US still wins out, but if you're raising a family it's far behind already.

Meanwhile, on Planet Reality:

Euro zone economy grew JUST 6% over the past 15 years.

US grew 82%.

By 2035, the gap between the US and EU will be as large as that between Japan and Ecuador is today.

But hey! I am sure Ecuador has some nice cities too.

That will happen when you attempt to print your way out of a recession... But the Euro is doing no better, as in Europe the bailouts are by country, not bank..

Patrick says

I just saw someone wearing a mask.

Just one person, no one else among all the people in Krakow.

Did you point and laugh?

Patrick says

I just saw someone wearing a mask.

My wife and I have gone on to Vienna, Austria. I've seen two people wearing masks now, one in full hijab. Lots of Arabs here, and even more Turks.

The Turks finally did succeed in invading Vienna.

I may have missed it above but what all countries are you visiting?

Patrick says

I have to admit that there are tons of really hot Polish women, far more than I expected. Much better than the US.

For sure not many hot Polish women in the US.

@Patrick

Are there White males in commercials?

This doesn't make sense because unlike Europe, the US sent all their industrial operations - entire factories, the equipment, including the foundation bolts to China.

So, where is this higher GDP coming from?

The_Deplorable says

So, where is this higher GDP coming from?

Creative Accounting and Financialization. Although in fairness, we do have the vast majority of IP still.

SunnyvaleCA says

Patrick says

I have to admit that there are tons of really hot Polish women, far more than I expected. Much better than the US.

For sure not many hot Polish women in the US.

Few polish people period on the west coast, many in NY/Chicago/Midwest

The_Deplorable says

This doesn't make sense because unlike Europe, the US sent all their industrial operations - entire factories, the equipment, including the foundation bolts to China.

So, where is this higher GDP coming from?

We didn't sent all of our industrial operations, just most our lower tier and a lot of our middle tier industries. Our high tier mostly stayed and grew.

High tier = higher value. That means higher GDP.

But industrial development in and of itself doesn't matter when it comes to GDP. If it did, then the heavily industrialized USSR would have been a juggernaut 2-3 times higher GDP than us.

What matters is the value you produce by what you do. Sure, manufacturing can deliver a lot of GDP...but not as much if is constrained by government. And Europe's economy is stifled by regulation/welfare state bs compared to us. As we are compared to Asia.

But demographic collapse in Asia is putting an end to that disparity and in Europe it will just kill whatever little growth prospects they have. 40% of the EU population will be retirees. China will be just as bad or worse. Russia and Ukraine worse of all.

India has the best prospects and is geopolitically sitting pretty sweet, but for the corruption and caste bullshit.

BayArea says

I may have missed it above but what all countries are you visiting?

Poland, Austria, Czecia