British In Poland

Last night I called our local restaurant to get a pizza delivered. Their menu says "free delivery" on it and we only live about 500 metres away. Of course I could have gone and collected it, but I was feeling lazy. Plus what's the point if they offer free delivery?

The following short conversation impressed me so much I thought it worthy of a blog post:

Me - hello can you deliver a pizza to me?
Her - no, there's no driver
Me - OK, but this is the 11th time we've ordered from you, and only once have you been able to actually deliver. Either you say there' s no driver or there's no car. What's the point in putting "free delivery" on your menus if you can't offer delivery?
Her - to be honest I don't care. Complain to the boss. If you want your pizza come and collect it

Although shocked at what she said, afterwards I thought it was brilliant. There's no American-style customer service here, no false smiles and pretending to care. At the end of the day she doesn't give a toss and said so which I think is fair enough.

In a funny way that's one of the things I like about Poland...

One of my first observations since arriving in Poland was of course the people and how they differ to Brits.

I must say that I like Polish people (which is a good thing given that I now live here) but they differ from Brits in a number of ways:

• They will insistently wait for a green man before crossing the road. What is that about? Maybe I lived in London for too long....
• They don't have much of a sense of queuing (although that probably applies to most Europeans and not just Poles).
• 99.9% of them are classic white-skinned typical Poles. I notice this more when I go back to the UK and see how many different ethnic minorities we have in the UK.
• They don't hold doors open for each other (or thank you if you do for them)
• They like drinking vodka from shot glasses, where as Brits generally mix vodka with juice or lemonade etc..
• They are polite in other ways such as giving up seats on public transport for elderly or pregnant woman. Something which I think has died out in London.
  

If you can think of anymore (or as I do too) drop a comment and I will update this list....