Sunday, 24 March 2019
Jadę do Gdańska w kwietniu! I'm going to Gdansk in April!
Hi guys, dzień dobry! I've just booked my next trip - I am going to Gdansk in north-east Poland for six days in the first week of April. Yes I've been to Poland before, having visited Warsaw in 2013. The last few trips have been to Malta, Georgia and Italy, I suppose Poland will be more similar to Georgia in that it is Eastern European but Gdansk is about 2800 km from Tbilisi, so there culture and the whole feel of the city will feel quite different. I had been toying with either Zadar in Croatia or Gdansk in Poland for a while, but when I finally got round to looking at flights to Zadar, the cheap flights I had found a few days ago had gone and the price had more than doubled from around £57 return to £129 return but the prices for Gdansk had stayed the same, so it was really on that basis that I thought, oh well, Gdansk is a much bigger city anyway and mind you I've been to Croatia before anyway, so let's give Gdansk a go. Then I spoke to some of my friends who have been there and they all had great things to say about Gdansk, which made me think I'm actually going to really enjoy it there. I've splashed out for a nice spa hotel in the center of Gdansk anyway and so at least I am looking forward to relaxing in the spa everyday after the sightseeing so that would be great. After having done due diligence all week for my new clients, I do deserve this break! I'm studying Polish now and am looking forward to this trip.
After this shitshow of a Brexit you might suddenly need a Visa to travel to Poland.
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DeleteSorry reposting because of a typo:
DeleteNo you're wrong Choaniki - in a worst case scenario, I will no longer be able to work in Poland or be able to retire in Poland. But I will still enjoy visa-free access to Poland as a tourist.
Let me give you a simple comparison: as a Singaporean, you enjoy visa free access to the UK even though you don't have the right to live here long-term or work here. We have this arrangement with Singapore because we want to welcome Singaporean tourists. Likewise, we all recognize that tourism is mutually beneficial and all parties still want tourism to continue after Brexit regardless. So many jobs (hotels, airlines, restaurants, shopping etc) rely on tourists and no one is going to slay the goose that lays the golden egg just to be spiteful. Certainly, in the case of Poland, do you know that the UK sends more tourists to Poland than any other country apart from Germany? Even Russia is third behind the UK. British tourists do spend a lot of money in Poland. The tourism industry in Poland is hugely dependent on British tourists like me going to Poland and spending a lot of money there - if they decided to give us the middle finger by insisting we apply for a visa, then I'll say forget Poland, I might just go to another country instead. Poland doesn't want that to happen - Poland wants me to go there and spend, spend, spend.
So Poland has everything to lose and nothing to gain by insisting that British tourists need a visa to travel to Poland - at the end of the day, it's all about sustaining jobs and making money. We'll put politics aside for now.
In fact countries like the UK and Poland only impose visa restrictions on third world countries like citizens from India and China because they want to make sure that the people who visit are bonafide tourists and not going to arrive at tourists then overstay as illegal immigrants. That's because we already have a massive illegal immigration problem here in the UK, that's why it is a pain in the butt for any Indian national to try to get a visa to visit the UK.
DeleteHowever, Brexit or not, the UK is still a LOT richer than Poland. The UK voted for Brexit mainly to kick out all the Eastern Europeans from places like Poland who came here to work for higher wages. So Poland is really not worried about British illegal migrants coming to steal their jobs in Poland because wages in London, Manchester and Birmingham are still a lot higher than in Warsaw, Krakow and Gdansk.
What will be more interesting to see is if the UK will start imposing visa restrictions on Polish people visiting the UK post Brexit.
I'm following the news with interest. The revoke article 50 petition is being ignored. Also all other options have been voted down in parliament.
DeleteIn the case of the US and UK, the moral of the story is that it doesn't matter what the politicians do as long as the economy is robust and people have jobs. It's a shitstorm both in the US and UK everyday when it comes to politics and it is amazing that our economies are still doing okay regardless.
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