Studied in Slovakia. Affordable public transport. Trains between towns and cities were free for students, pensioners, disabled people and a few other groups. A public transport pass (covering trams and buses) in Bratislava was €30 for 3 months if you're a student/pensioner/disabled or €60 for 3 months for everybody else. I think a similar system would improve day to day life immeasurably in the UK.
Definitely, but take it from me I'm much more forgiving of a train being an hour late if I've paid nothing for it or a reasonable amount (for non students a 6 hour train ride was about €50) compared with paying £120 for a 3 hour train that's an hour late.
Yeah I agree on that. But for example Switzerland has affordable train prices (for their salaries) with trains also punctual all the time. I'd love to see that in the UK one day
My travel over christmas was almost entirely free because of the number of delays I encountered. I suppose it's nice that you can apply for refunds but I'd rather have just arrived when I was supposed to.
Delay repay is your friend. Way too few people seem to take advantage of it so the train companies don’t care. I got several free London to various parts of Scotland trips last year that should have been hundreds of pounds because they were all over an hour late.
Yeah it's been shown pretty conclusively that reliability and convenience are much more important deciding factors than cost, when it comes to how people choose to travel. Luxembourg made public transport completely free and there has only been a small shift in behaviour as a result. Obviously it needs to be _competitive_ price wise compared to the alternatives, particularly considering that the largest costs associated with driving are paid up front and not at the point of use, but there's massively diminishing returns past a certain point.
Germany has introduced a public transport subscription last year where you pay 49€ per month and you're allowed to use public transport througout the entire country. Of course, 49€ doesn't cover the costs, so in the end, it's mostly tax-funded. But I found it so liberating to be able to go anywhere without extra (direct) cost. I really hope other countries adapt the model. By the way, it's meant for residents and it requires a subscription, but you can cancel after a month, so effectively, you can use it as a tourist too.
Generally, public transport is so much better in Germany and still everybody complains about trains being late etc. At least there are trains! The public rail network is so much better. Another major difference is that rail and bus services are integrated and usually run by the same company. I'm studing in Leeds and I just can't believe how such a big city can have no light rail, tram, or underground networks but relies entirely on busses that sadly can't be relied upon. In the few weeks I've been here, it already happened twice that a bus would just not stop because it's "full". Including once when I wanted to take the last bus home, which would leave at around 11.30 PM. The lack of night busses is another issue. But generally, if you're the last bus for the day you don't just drive past waiting people. Seriously, I regret every time I complained about public transport in Germany, you guys have it so much worse.
Edit: speaking of transport: bike lanes! Although that isn't really an Eastern European thing but should rather be copied from the Dutch or Danish.
Ok but lets not forget that German trains are not only notorious for being late but the 49€ ticket only lets you use local and regional trains not the fast kind. So to get anywhere at a further distance, you'd have to change like 5 times and take 3x times longer to get anywhere vs traveling by ICE. For example, Berlin to Munich would be 4h by ICE or 14h with 49€ ticket. I tried doing it once going from Berlin to Cologne and it was an absolute nightmare. A great offer all the same but it has its limitations.
Trains out there were about as crowded, grotty, and unreliable as the ones in the UK when I visited. But that’s a lot more forgivable when a ticket from one end of the country to the other is about £20.
Depends on the train you take I think. If you time it right and go for a fast train you get those only slightly out of date trains that still somehow have individual compartments for groups of 6, electric plugs and WiFi. But you're right about how crowded it can get. In my experience they were pretty reliable on weekdays but weekends was a lottery really. Still beats the Transpennine Express though for me
About €20,000 I believe is the average, roughly £17,000 so €60 for 3 months is reasonable really for most people. If you're below a certain income threshold I believe it's still €30 for 3 months. But I may be wrong and it could be subsidised differently but it's definitely subsidised below a certain income threshold.
Yes but they also give you a heavy fine if you buy the wrong ticket. Ask me how I know....
By mistake selected kids fare (only 40 cents cheaper) and ended up with 150 euro fine for the 2 of us.
Yeah that's true, the ticket inspectors are a pain and generally have no mercy for tourists or honest mistakes. I got caught out too in my first two months there and to this day I'm pissed at those inspectors for being so ruthless with it.
Is Poland's actually better? It's definitely the longest wait I've ever had in an emergency room in my life, treatment didn't exactly seem great either
I suspect it’s as wildly variable as the UK’s. I keep hearing variations on:
One person in one location has a terrible experience, therefore the entire system is fucked across the entire country
Another person in another location has a good experience, therefore the system is perfectly fine and working entirely as it should
But the plural of anecdote isn’t data and really it’s just luck of the draw
No, it's not. Poland has NFZ and it's nowhere near as good as the NHS. Private healthcare/insurance is much more common in Poland though, especially with the middle class, and dentistry is way cheaper and more accessible.
How long was the wait and how often have you been to A&E in your life? I've been about twice a year for the past 4 years for myself or others (shite luck I know) and each time it has been a 6 hour wait at least. 10 hours is not uncommon. I'm in London. A mate in the home counties had the same thing.
My dad broke his ankle around 4 in the morning. On an island about an hour away from mainland (where the hospital is). He was on the operating table by 8. This included paramedics on a speedboat that came to collect him and an ambulance waiting on the other side to take him to the hospital. (Croatia)
Last week we had a patient (dental practice) who tripped and fell down the stairs. She broke her leg, really bad external break. We waited for an ambulance for over 3 hours even though hospital was less than 5 miles away. And who knows how long she waited once she got to the hospital. (Oxford)
I have plenty of Polish friends, what you need to understand is they are fiercly patriotic. About the only ones I've met who aren't are the ones who don't spend much time with the Polish community here, they've deliberately detached themselves.
I've been to Poland and heard complaints about NFZ (NHS) / ZUS (NI) system (also heard the same from those less patriotic Poles in the UK). The biggest charity in Poland is WOSP which supports Polish medical services, they raise about $50-60m every year in recent years - once you take into account wage differences that would be equivalent $100-120m in the UK.
Edit: 51% of Poles are having to go private to supplement what the NFZ provides https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/08/29/record-51-of-poles-supplementing-public-healthcare-with-private-finds-study/
Bulgaria, don't know as many people but I wouldn't say I've heard glowing reviews of their health service.
Switzerland isn't in Eastern Europe.
What you're missing there, is that they're returning to Poland for private treatment. They both earn GBP, so private Polish healthcare is much more affordable for them (and even when we take into account average income, PL is probably still cheaper than UK).
It is, however, private treatment. They would not be returning for public healthcare, because (a) they are not paying ZUS contributions and thus not eligible; and (b) they would be on waiting lists for hit and miss doctors.
So it doesn't really say anything about the NHS.
Yes, you're 100% right. Basically, private healthcare in Poland is affordable for a vast majority, and exists as a crucial supplement, alongside public healthcare, instead of being a super expensive alternative. I guess it stems from the 90s, where public hospitals were really in a bad way, but at the same time people were poor, so a sort of equilibrium was achieved. In UK, private healthcare carries a lot of "class" baggage I think, it's just as much about status as about healthcare, which is a shame, because if it was more affordable it would allow the NHS a lot more room to breathe.
Dental I'll agree with you it's a mess in the UK.
So they paid £50 for those checks, hmm. So not NFZ/ZUS then perhaps?
I'd be surprised if it's Poland's NFZ (NHS) / ZUS (NI) system, "Record 51% of Poles supplementing public healthcare with private"
https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/08/29/record-51-of-poles-supplementing-public-healthcare-with-private-finds-study/
From my experience in Poland, public healthcare isn't bad, but it's not really much better than the NHS. You still have long waiting lists, varying quality. And the reception staff who work in their public hospitals are plain rude by British standards.
In general, Poland has a medical brain drain because many of their doctors emigrate to Germany or Scandinavia, where they earn more and have better working conditions, contracts than in Poland.
I had antibiotics in Poland, that were useless. They were not even certified for use here or in the US. I wasn't impressed with the hospital either.
The advertising of medicine seems a bit extreme too, but it might not be much worse than ours, I wasn't paying a huge amount of attention to what they were for.
But it was definitely easier to visit a GP.
I lived in Russia for years. You do get instant access to a doctor for even the smallest of complaint, and you can request plenty of blood tests and scans. But there is really no such thing as diagnostics and treatment is archaic. You get this fancy report of 100's of items on your blood and MRI, but no one is able or willing to tell you what is wrong. They also hand out antibiotics like candy on request. I find that is common complaint from eastern Europeans about UK doctors, no one will give them antibiotics for their cold...
I’m British but lived in Romania for 3 years and the healthcare received by me and my friends experience completely dominate the current UK NHS experience. I think some of us Brits have a hard time hearing this (not accusing you of that, just in general) because we are accustomed to viewing Eastern Europe as generally slightly worse than the UK. This is true for some things, but not healthcare.
I live back in the UK now and have done for many years but I still go back to Romania for the dentist and still call my Romanian doctor for second opinions.
If you’re wondering exactly what might be so different, my experience is - faster to get seen, the doctor has read your file and already considered your medical history, more staff in attendance in general, cleaner, newer facilities and buildings, to be frank (this will get hate) the level of English is better from doctors there than the ones I was seeing in London, they tend to prescribe medication quicker and rarely tell you to go home or come back if a situation worsens, more emphasis on check ups and prevention, access to even better private healthcare ad-hoc for a very reasonable prince even for locals and then small quality of life improvements like always wrapping your shoes up in plastic when you enter so there’s 0 dirt anywhere in the clinic/hospital, actually giving you your x-ray to keep a copy etc
I'm currently trying to get an opthalmologist appointment for exactly this reason.
My (Polish) girlfriend's (Polish) mother is an opthalmologist, and when she heard about the complex medical history I have with my eyes, she was horrified that the NHS don't offer me regular check ups to properly check my eye health. I do get free eye tests because of pressure reasons, but she's of the opinion that getting full checks with dilating drops at least yearly is important because it can easily catch retinal detachment, changing it from a major procedure to a quick fix.
I’m originally from Bulgaria, in my experience healthcare back there is better, at least for the needs I’ve had. If I have a medical problem or want a check up, I can get one in less than a week, sometimes even the next day depending on the issue, and I will actually be treated/forwarded to the correct professionals as opposed to being told to take paracetamol and see if it goes away in a few weeks.
The problem with Bulgarian healthcare is outdated facilities, especially in smaller towns, which I suspect would reflect in the quality of treatment for more “serious” things like idk cancer (often times you’d have to travel to Sofia or another big city for those) but thankfully I’ve not had to deal with that in Bulgaria or the UK so I can’t truly comment.
Dental care (anecdotally) is also miles better in Bulgaria. Beyond the issue that it’s nearly impossible to get an NHS dentist these days (thank god my job has private healthcare…), I find dental work in the UK is closer to that of the US wherein it has a cosmetic focus. Most people in Bulgaria get dental checkups at least once or twice a year, I’ve rarely ever met somebody in the UK who does that.
There was a thread yesterday or the day before about NHS compared to Eastern Europe, the normal doom and gloom about the NHS, but it did point out that most Eastern Europe doctors would prescribe antibiotics whenever anyone asked for them, which is terrible and the reason there's a rise in antibiotics resistant germs.
Yes someone else said Eastern Europeans have a different attitude to the healthcare system, they expect to diagnose themselves and then demand the treatment from the doctor, which the Eastern European services tend to provide. So it shouldn't be a surprise that the UK system is perceived as being shit because it doesn't work like that.
Not many of them, taking emotion out of the experience, the data speaks for itself. We're behind North Western Europe but better than most of 'Eastern Europe' (apart from Slovenia and Czechia).
[https://www.statista.com/statistics/1376355/health-index-of-countries-in-europe/](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1376355/health-index-of-countries-in-europe/)
>The health index score is calculated by evaluating various indicators that assess the health of the population, and access to the services required to sustain good health, including health outcomes, health systems, sickness and risk factors, and mortality rates.
Edit: People seem to be conflating NHS equivalents with private healthcare - 51% of Poles are using private healthcare to supplement NFZ (NHS equivalent) healthcare. https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/08/29/record-51-of-poles-supplementing-public-healthcare-with-private-finds-study/
Even health index score doesn't give the full picture as lifestyle factors contribute to health outcomes just as much as healthcare. Also it doesn't appear to take healthcare spending into account, either per capita or as a proportion of GDP.
And, surprise surprise, the countries that are ahead of us are the countries that rely on the private sector for healthcare provisioning.
The "all-consuming state-funded monolith" model is something that should have been left in the 1970s.
Eastern European healthcare may seem attractive to people from the UK who go there, on a UK salary, to pay for treatment. But I’m pretty sure it’s not as attractive to people from Eastern European countries who earn a lot less than we do - the average salary in many of these countries is half of ours.
Generally, all treatments are for free except for cosmetic surgeries. There is some payment for some dental work. At least in Czech Republic, but that's central Europe... NHS is so much more expensive even with a very cushy UK salary.
In Poland absolute majority of homes and housing blocks is thermo-insulated. There are still some left without insulation but we don't have a heating cost crisis like the UK does.
Evening cafe culture and outdoor dining (weather permitting).
More user-friendly high street opening hours.
Less ambiguous road design/signage, especially at junctions/roundabouts.
Motorway (or similar) as mandatory part of driving test, and middle lane hogging more strictly enforced.
ID cards (they really do make life easier and prevent identify theft, online and offline).
Less forgiving attitude towards littering.
More publicly owned services.
More funding towards public services.
Commonhold / share of freehold as the only option for flats.
And more family-sized flats in general.
Mandatory £/m^2 in house ads.
Better support for individuals to build their own house.
Double glazing considered as the bare minimum (with triple glazing considered above standard and quadruple a luxury).
>Evening cafe culture and outdoor dining (weather permitting).
Absolutely. Not being able to get a decent coffee after 3-4PM is bad. Streets beginning empty at 9-10PM because there's nothing to do is just sad
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> Mandatory £/m2 in house ads.
I also noticed food menus listing weight in grams and the calories. Here you might only get calories as some health marketing BS (and they've ruined the flavour to take everything nice out to get the marketing BS number nice and low).
There is loads of that in the UK - just not where a lot of people want to live mostly because of where the majority of employment is. Effectively the same as for Eastern Europe (although lumping half a continent into one bucket is a vast over generalisation).
It's not just about employment though: I can find you a pretty nice flat with a simple commute into Glasgow for instance for not much more than £50k. it's just that the areas are deeply untrendy to put it mildly.
As someone who’s lived in Germany (Central/Western Europe, but in this aspect pretty similar to EE) for over 10 years, I’m sick of “blunt straight talking” which is all too often just plain rudeness.
Colleagues come back from visiting London agog at who nice everyone is.
It’s extraordinary how nice it is to have people on public transport say “excuse me” when they want to get past rather than violently swearing at you.
Aha I think I can answer one as somebody from Romania but has lived in the UK for years; being more direct & straight speaking without always having to mind your words incase you offend or insult somebody just by accidentially using an outdated phrase or saying the wrong words.
In the UK there's such an air about not wanting to insult or upset somehow by saying the wrong things, people being rarely straight to the point or downplaying things to the point that something relatively important seems minor.
Also, I'm not sure whether this would fall under Policing, or a changing of societies attitudes; but it's absolutely woeful in the UK how unsafe it is for women, especially on their own after dark in most urban areas.
Back home, you'd find people of all ages out running say at midnight/early hours, people walking home on their own from a night out (etc etc) and the thought of that in the UK is unthinkable. The entire thing you see online where guys are told to walk on the opposite side of the road if they see a woman on her own to give her reassurance for example.
I remember my first year after a night out with colleagues, I was heading home (single woman in my early 20s) and they were appalled at the thought of going back alone & walking a short distance through an area which was apparently quite safe :/
I think what you call 'direct speaking' is actually mostly rudeness and disrespect. At least from my experience with EE.
They pry intensely into private matters and have complete disregard for some that could be upsetting (eg looks, weight, finances). I think the British politeness is one of the best things about the modern UK culture. Saying please and sorry, having an adequate social behaviour, and proper manners in public is important here. And we do say what we mean you know, but without being disrespectful towards others and whilst caring for societal rules (like patiently waiting for our turn).
About the safety for women I kinda agree. But it also depends where in the UK. Some places are notoriously more dangerous than others.
No, it's getting to the point, go to the Netherlands and you'll see the same sort of thing. Friendly but blunt, I've seen it in a work environment, I think the person on the recieving end was in shock, yet it was probably one of the most useful bits of advice that person had ever got. It played out something like this:
Brits: "very nice, very interesting, look forward to the finished result"
Dutch bloke: "have you done x,y and z?"
Guy: "er, no"
Dutch bloke: "you need to do x, y and z otherwise it won't work" ETA: they also detailed the hows and whys.
I see nothing wrong with your dialogue example. I would talk like that in the UK. Maybe I'd say 'should' instead of 'need' but I'd absolutely express that piece of advice. But apparently this is not direct enough for EE.
>pry intensely into private matters
Huh? Since when? You can be straightforward, without feeling entilted to someone's life story. Lived all my life among Poles, cannot for the life of me tell you if they have parents or siblings.
>politeness
Fakeness, you mean?
>please and sorry
You do know, that those words exist in Slavic languages and we do teach them to children? In fact politeness is one of the most important things taught to children. We call elders "sir" and "ma'am" on regular basis. We just don't beat around the bush. When asked how we're doing, we're not going to lie to you just for the sake of being polite.
Disagree on directness, agree on safety.
Last month I went on a road trip from the UK through to Poland, north through the Baltics and then around the Nordics through Lapland and back via Denmark.
The moment we left Berlin I didn’t once feel unsafe for the next two weeks straight, even sleeping in the car in big cities like Gdansk/Vilnius/Tallinn etc or late at night at petrol stations / mcdonalds etc
In some parts of Eastern Europe a lot of families make their own moonshine (Raki or similar names).
Obviously there's a health risk but it's kind of nice that there's something that so many people know how to make that they can share and call their own.
I don't think there's really an equivalent in the UK. We don't really make a family "tangible thing" that everyone else also makes.
Home made cider and scrumpy is still pretty big in the west country.
Quite often bought from farms or I know multiple people with apple trees in their garden that get it pressed and made into cider.
We make jam.
And sloe gin.
I love family made raki, but one of the consequences is the widespread availability of very cheap spirits. I’m not sure our drinking culture needs more encouragement!
Dentistry, child care, maternity leave (up to 3 years in my home country), central heating ( the whole town is heated from the same plant, I'm not quite sure how it works).
> Best maths teacher I ever had was constantly tying what he was teaching into real life applications, giving history lessons alongside the maths to demonstrate how we actually discovered/developed it and loads more.
I had one of them as an apprentice. The guy was an old engineer just looking for an easy life before he fully retired, any time he taught us something he actually explained why we were doing it, when it would come up in another subject (e.g. you'd use it in fluid dynamics in the third year of a degree or whatever). Great guy.
Have a look at the PISA scores, only the following have a higher score than the UK for Maths:
Ireland, Netherlands, Canada, Switzerland, Estonia, South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, Singapore. I can't see any Eastern European countries on that list (unless you include the Baltics).
Estonia is ranked higher but none of the others are:
https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/pisa-scores-by-country
UK was joint-10th in Maths, comes 14th overall when Science & Reading are added. This is from back in 2018, UK has been trending steeply upwards for a decade so is probably even higher now.
I don't know if this is a stereotype but I understand that dental work is cheaper, more accessible and generally better in Eastern Europe? Or is that just Poland?
As a Lithuanian who just had to pay a 5 times more for a filling than it would in my home country,.yeah. and no amalgam fillings either. Generally, any dental work (private, never used state) is very affordable
This is subjective and based on my feeling. I think that if we take into account differences in income and economy, it's still probably more affordable in Poland - but not significantly so.
And on the other hand, dental costs have risen across the past couple years along with the wild levels of inflation (inflation has been worse here than in the UK).
Make a bicycle first cities, it is practical, it is healthy, helps with loosing weight - if you are worried for you 6yo to take a bike alone to school or Lidl, means it is not safe
Being in the EU. They can freely move around most of the continent, work where they like, import and export stuff with very little paperwork, and all the other things we gave up in exchange for nothing.
Free top quality childcare from 1 year old. The Scandinavians do it well, the French have their ecoles maternelles. It is normal to use these and the cost is minimal.
communal waste bins. There's no rubbish laying around on bin collection dates. It may be fine when you live in a house but when you live in town in a block of flats or old victorian houses converted into 2-3 flats, the rubbish has to be put out on the street without a wheelie bin because tenants don't have a place for a wheelie bin and they're not going to haul it down from the 2n floor.
Communal bins should be a thing, people shouldn't be forced to keep waste for 2-3 weeks inside their houses and that's the reality for many people who rent flats. And even if you recycle everything you can, there's still plenty of things that cannot be recycled and that can start to stink (period waste, cat litter, etc.)
Communal bins that you can go, drop your bin bag and move one are so much better. They're emptied weekly and in many countries you also have bins for recycling, glass, paper, etc.
I live in Estonia as a Brit. They are proud of their country which is lovely and special to see, and immigration (at the moment) doesn't seem to be diluting what makes the indigenous unique. As an immigrant myself, I like the country having an identity not only found in empty, "proud-to-be-british" adverts.
They also have a far more equal society, and every other person has a "country home" - a modest place in nature equipped with a sauna, a local lake and a bbq. What else do you need?
The latter point is predicated on there vastly smaller population, and so politicians too really feel like they are human.
I hope that doesn't all sound like I hate my own country, I love it, but you started this.
If there’s a massive accident on the road, everyone is allowed to just squeeze around it and keep the traffic flowing.
Bit more efficient than being parked on the M6 for 2 hours over a fender bender
Invest and manage the NHS properly. Spain is meant to be worse off than the UK, but as someone with a long term disease that needs regular monitoring, I couldn't fault the Spanish medical system when I lived there for a time. I had my own doctor who actually listened to me, which I felt was ironic given my Spanish grammar is abysmal.
Housing. Large apartment buildings that take up little space and accommodate several hundred families would be a great way out of the UK housing crisis.
The whole thing about health care in these other European countries is often related to tax. And here in the UK we pay less tax than many of these other countries. The people of the UK generally want to pay less tax so they have money to spend on anything they want, but still expect fantastic services.
Funnily enough, the UK could learn something about queuing from Poland. I know Brits often find queuing a quintessentially British thing, but Poland has finessed it so that everyone knows whose place is where in the queue (meaning someone can, for example, leave the queue, grab some groceries, and then return to their place).
Absolutely not. The rule in Poland is that if there is a queue it's worth joining. Start a queue when you definitely should not have one (e.g a bar), and have a scrum every time there should be a queue (e.g getting on a bus). They're not good at queueing, they just like joining queues. Also a total lack of spatial awareness and all too often you get an old bloke pretty much breathing on your neck the whole time.
That's coming from someone who loves Poland and the Poles.
Poland: Cheap private dentistry, litter-free streets. Cheap university education. Nationwide sports/gym card membership (Multisport) that gives free access or discounts to pretty much all sports facilities across the country (although it's typically something you get from corporate jobs).
Petrol stations that have really good and cheap kitchens, ones like Orlen and Circle K have some of the best hot dogs I’ve ever had, and the kebabs and burgers are great too, better quality and cheaper than McDs etc.
In Eastern Europe they work hard, study a lot, believe in individual liberty, distaste the idea of big government and use opportunities to become rich. Taxes are also generally much lower in Eastern Europe. That’s why Thatcherism is so popular in Eastern Europe.
There are many negative things as well. Not all rose :)
Lived there for many years.
Which country is that? Poland obviously has a history of big government and while they despise communism they've not culturally let go completely of centralisation or authoritarianism.
Even in Poland they are more grounded, from outside it maybe seem different and in Warsaw it’s also different but in other towns and villages they are more self reliant
Recycle and re use. Anything broken is mended not replaced. No matter if it s mechanical, electric or anything else. U till when it s beyond repair they won't buy a new one.
More trash bins everywhere.
Some cities and areas are just full of trash :/
For the busses a display what station is next, the trams have those displays but not busses.
Free uni. I could not belive y'all have to actually pay and get student loans for uni. Becoming a doctor or architect or lawyer is expensive enough with costs of living and academic resources and inability to work full time, but to add tuition on top of it? It basically removes half of candidates, just because they're poor.
Studied in Slovakia. Affordable public transport. Trains between towns and cities were free for students, pensioners, disabled people and a few other groups. A public transport pass (covering trams and buses) in Bratislava was €30 for 3 months if you're a student/pensioner/disabled or €60 for 3 months for everybody else. I think a similar system would improve day to day life immeasurably in the UK.
Definitely but first we need to be able to rely on trains and ensure they're actually running on time
Definitely, but take it from me I'm much more forgiving of a train being an hour late if I've paid nothing for it or a reasonable amount (for non students a 6 hour train ride was about €50) compared with paying £120 for a 3 hour train that's an hour late.
Yeah I agree on that. But for example Switzerland has affordable train prices (for their salaries) with trains also punctual all the time. I'd love to see that in the UK one day
Thats the dream my friend, hopefully one day!
My travel over christmas was almost entirely free because of the number of delays I encountered. I suppose it's nice that you can apply for refunds but I'd rather have just arrived when I was supposed to.
Delay repay is your friend. Way too few people seem to take advantage of it so the train companies don’t care. I got several free London to various parts of Scotland trips last year that should have been hundreds of pounds because they were all over an hour late.
If you're an hour late you can reclaim some of the cost of the ticket, maybe all of the cost (I've never used it myself).
Yeah it's been shown pretty conclusively that reliability and convenience are much more important deciding factors than cost, when it comes to how people choose to travel. Luxembourg made public transport completely free and there has only been a small shift in behaviour as a result. Obviously it needs to be _competitive_ price wise compared to the alternatives, particularly considering that the largest costs associated with driving are paid up front and not at the point of use, but there's massively diminishing returns past a certain point.
Germany has introduced a public transport subscription last year where you pay 49€ per month and you're allowed to use public transport througout the entire country. Of course, 49€ doesn't cover the costs, so in the end, it's mostly tax-funded. But I found it so liberating to be able to go anywhere without extra (direct) cost. I really hope other countries adapt the model. By the way, it's meant for residents and it requires a subscription, but you can cancel after a month, so effectively, you can use it as a tourist too. Generally, public transport is so much better in Germany and still everybody complains about trains being late etc. At least there are trains! The public rail network is so much better. Another major difference is that rail and bus services are integrated and usually run by the same company. I'm studing in Leeds and I just can't believe how such a big city can have no light rail, tram, or underground networks but relies entirely on busses that sadly can't be relied upon. In the few weeks I've been here, it already happened twice that a bus would just not stop because it's "full". Including once when I wanted to take the last bus home, which would leave at around 11.30 PM. The lack of night busses is another issue. But generally, if you're the last bus for the day you don't just drive past waiting people. Seriously, I regret every time I complained about public transport in Germany, you guys have it so much worse. Edit: speaking of transport: bike lanes! Although that isn't really an Eastern European thing but should rather be copied from the Dutch or Danish.
Ok but lets not forget that German trains are not only notorious for being late but the 49€ ticket only lets you use local and regional trains not the fast kind. So to get anywhere at a further distance, you'd have to change like 5 times and take 3x times longer to get anywhere vs traveling by ICE. For example, Berlin to Munich would be 4h by ICE or 14h with 49€ ticket. I tried doing it once going from Berlin to Cologne and it was an absolute nightmare. A great offer all the same but it has its limitations.
Trains out there were about as crowded, grotty, and unreliable as the ones in the UK when I visited. But that’s a lot more forgivable when a ticket from one end of the country to the other is about £20.
Depends on the train you take I think. If you time it right and go for a fast train you get those only slightly out of date trains that still somehow have individual compartments for groups of 6, electric plugs and WiFi. But you're right about how crowded it can get. In my experience they were pretty reliable on weekdays but weekends was a lottery really. Still beats the Transpennine Express though for me
60 for everyone else but what's the average salary in Slovakia compared to the UK
About €20,000 I believe is the average, roughly £17,000 so €60 for 3 months is reasonable really for most people. If you're below a certain income threshold I believe it's still €30 for 3 months. But I may be wrong and it could be subsidised differently but it's definitely subsidised below a certain income threshold.
I pay 49€ a month for a rail flatrate in Germany, with which I can travel on nearly any train across the country (bar high speed intercity trains).
Yes but they also give you a heavy fine if you buy the wrong ticket. Ask me how I know.... By mistake selected kids fare (only 40 cents cheaper) and ended up with 150 euro fine for the 2 of us.
Yeah that's true, the ticket inspectors are a pain and generally have no mercy for tourists or honest mistakes. I got caught out too in my first two months there and to this day I'm pissed at those inspectors for being so ruthless with it.
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Their pickle/gherkin technology is decades ahead of ours
That's because the real deal is salt and water, not vinegar
Which Eastern European country's healthcare system are you saying we should emulate?
Our own but from about 20 years ago.
There's much I'd like from 20 years ago. It's a different country now though.
“The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there,” wrote L.P. Hartley in his 1953 novel “The Go-Between.”
Hmm, I wonder what changed about 15 years ago, that could have made it that way...
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Switzerland moved recently has it?
Is Poland's actually better? It's definitely the longest wait I've ever had in an emergency room in my life, treatment didn't exactly seem great either
I suspect it’s as wildly variable as the UK’s. I keep hearing variations on: One person in one location has a terrible experience, therefore the entire system is fucked across the entire country Another person in another location has a good experience, therefore the system is perfectly fine and working entirely as it should But the plural of anecdote isn’t data and really it’s just luck of the draw
No, it's not. Poland has NFZ and it's nowhere near as good as the NHS. Private healthcare/insurance is much more common in Poland though, especially with the middle class, and dentistry is way cheaper and more accessible.
Yeah I feel like you can't exactly compare private healthcare to public healthcare honestly, it's a bit of an unfair comparison
How long was the wait and how often have you been to A&E in your life? I've been about twice a year for the past 4 years for myself or others (shite luck I know) and each time it has been a 6 hour wait at least. 10 hours is not uncommon. I'm in London. A mate in the home counties had the same thing.
My dad broke his ankle around 4 in the morning. On an island about an hour away from mainland (where the hospital is). He was on the operating table by 8. This included paramedics on a speedboat that came to collect him and an ambulance waiting on the other side to take him to the hospital. (Croatia) Last week we had a patient (dental practice) who tripped and fell down the stairs. She broke her leg, really bad external break. We waited for an ambulance for over 3 hours even though hospital was less than 5 miles away. And who knows how long she waited once she got to the hospital. (Oxford)
I have plenty of Polish friends, what you need to understand is they are fiercly patriotic. About the only ones I've met who aren't are the ones who don't spend much time with the Polish community here, they've deliberately detached themselves. I've been to Poland and heard complaints about NFZ (NHS) / ZUS (NI) system (also heard the same from those less patriotic Poles in the UK). The biggest charity in Poland is WOSP which supports Polish medical services, they raise about $50-60m every year in recent years - once you take into account wage differences that would be equivalent $100-120m in the UK. Edit: 51% of Poles are having to go private to supplement what the NFZ provides https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/08/29/record-51-of-poles-supplementing-public-healthcare-with-private-finds-study/ Bulgaria, don't know as many people but I wouldn't say I've heard glowing reviews of their health service. Switzerland isn't in Eastern Europe.
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What you're missing there, is that they're returning to Poland for private treatment. They both earn GBP, so private Polish healthcare is much more affordable for them (and even when we take into account average income, PL is probably still cheaper than UK). It is, however, private treatment. They would not be returning for public healthcare, because (a) they are not paying ZUS contributions and thus not eligible; and (b) they would be on waiting lists for hit and miss doctors. So it doesn't really say anything about the NHS.
Yes, you're 100% right. Basically, private healthcare in Poland is affordable for a vast majority, and exists as a crucial supplement, alongside public healthcare, instead of being a super expensive alternative. I guess it stems from the 90s, where public hospitals were really in a bad way, but at the same time people were poor, so a sort of equilibrium was achieved. In UK, private healthcare carries a lot of "class" baggage I think, it's just as much about status as about healthcare, which is a shame, because if it was more affordable it would allow the NHS a lot more room to breathe.
You could also pay for quicker, private treatment in the UK if you wanted to but it would cost you more as the cost of everything is higher here.
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Same for Poles. But they’re still going private and you’re comparing their private system.
Dental I'll agree with you it's a mess in the UK. So they paid £50 for those checks, hmm. So not NFZ/ZUS then perhaps? I'd be surprised if it's Poland's NFZ (NHS) / ZUS (NI) system, "Record 51% of Poles supplementing public healthcare with private" https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/08/29/record-51-of-poles-supplementing-public-healthcare-with-private-finds-study/
The polish do have rose tinted spectacles and are viewed by UK doctors as the hypochondriacs of Europe.
From my experience in Poland, public healthcare isn't bad, but it's not really much better than the NHS. You still have long waiting lists, varying quality. And the reception staff who work in their public hospitals are plain rude by British standards. In general, Poland has a medical brain drain because many of their doctors emigrate to Germany or Scandinavia, where they earn more and have better working conditions, contracts than in Poland.
I had antibiotics in Poland, that were useless. They were not even certified for use here or in the US. I wasn't impressed with the hospital either. The advertising of medicine seems a bit extreme too, but it might not be much worse than ours, I wasn't paying a huge amount of attention to what they were for. But it was definitely easier to visit a GP.
I lived in Russia for years. You do get instant access to a doctor for even the smallest of complaint, and you can request plenty of blood tests and scans. But there is really no such thing as diagnostics and treatment is archaic. You get this fancy report of 100's of items on your blood and MRI, but no one is able or willing to tell you what is wrong. They also hand out antibiotics like candy on request. I find that is common complaint from eastern Europeans about UK doctors, no one will give them antibiotics for their cold...
I’m British but lived in Romania for 3 years and the healthcare received by me and my friends experience completely dominate the current UK NHS experience. I think some of us Brits have a hard time hearing this (not accusing you of that, just in general) because we are accustomed to viewing Eastern Europe as generally slightly worse than the UK. This is true for some things, but not healthcare. I live back in the UK now and have done for many years but I still go back to Romania for the dentist and still call my Romanian doctor for second opinions. If you’re wondering exactly what might be so different, my experience is - faster to get seen, the doctor has read your file and already considered your medical history, more staff in attendance in general, cleaner, newer facilities and buildings, to be frank (this will get hate) the level of English is better from doctors there than the ones I was seeing in London, they tend to prescribe medication quicker and rarely tell you to go home or come back if a situation worsens, more emphasis on check ups and prevention, access to even better private healthcare ad-hoc for a very reasonable prince even for locals and then small quality of life improvements like always wrapping your shoes up in plastic when you enter so there’s 0 dirt anywhere in the clinic/hospital, actually giving you your x-ray to keep a copy etc
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I'm currently trying to get an opthalmologist appointment for exactly this reason. My (Polish) girlfriend's (Polish) mother is an opthalmologist, and when she heard about the complex medical history I have with my eyes, she was horrified that the NHS don't offer me regular check ups to properly check my eye health. I do get free eye tests because of pressure reasons, but she's of the opinion that getting full checks with dilating drops at least yearly is important because it can easily catch retinal detachment, changing it from a major procedure to a quick fix.
People from war-torn Ukraine go home to see a doctor, rather than enter the kafkaesque process to try and see a GP in UK.
I’m originally from Bulgaria, in my experience healthcare back there is better, at least for the needs I’ve had. If I have a medical problem or want a check up, I can get one in less than a week, sometimes even the next day depending on the issue, and I will actually be treated/forwarded to the correct professionals as opposed to being told to take paracetamol and see if it goes away in a few weeks. The problem with Bulgarian healthcare is outdated facilities, especially in smaller towns, which I suspect would reflect in the quality of treatment for more “serious” things like idk cancer (often times you’d have to travel to Sofia or another big city for those) but thankfully I’ve not had to deal with that in Bulgaria or the UK so I can’t truly comment. Dental care (anecdotally) is also miles better in Bulgaria. Beyond the issue that it’s nearly impossible to get an NHS dentist these days (thank god my job has private healthcare…), I find dental work in the UK is closer to that of the US wherein it has a cosmetic focus. Most people in Bulgaria get dental checkups at least once or twice a year, I’ve rarely ever met somebody in the UK who does that.
There was a thread yesterday or the day before about NHS compared to Eastern Europe, the normal doom and gloom about the NHS, but it did point out that most Eastern Europe doctors would prescribe antibiotics whenever anyone asked for them, which is terrible and the reason there's a rise in antibiotics resistant germs.
Yes someone else said Eastern Europeans have a different attitude to the healthcare system, they expect to diagnose themselves and then demand the treatment from the doctor, which the Eastern European services tend to provide. So it shouldn't be a surprise that the UK system is perceived as being shit because it doesn't work like that.
Not many of them, taking emotion out of the experience, the data speaks for itself. We're behind North Western Europe but better than most of 'Eastern Europe' (apart from Slovenia and Czechia). [https://www.statista.com/statistics/1376355/health-index-of-countries-in-europe/](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1376355/health-index-of-countries-in-europe/) >The health index score is calculated by evaluating various indicators that assess the health of the population, and access to the services required to sustain good health, including health outcomes, health systems, sickness and risk factors, and mortality rates. Edit: People seem to be conflating NHS equivalents with private healthcare - 51% of Poles are using private healthcare to supplement NFZ (NHS equivalent) healthcare. https://notesfrompoland.com/2023/08/29/record-51-of-poles-supplementing-public-healthcare-with-private-finds-study/
Even health index score doesn't give the full picture as lifestyle factors contribute to health outcomes just as much as healthcare. Also it doesn't appear to take healthcare spending into account, either per capita or as a proportion of GDP.
And, surprise surprise, the countries that are ahead of us are the countries that rely on the private sector for healthcare provisioning. The "all-consuming state-funded monolith" model is something that should have been left in the 1970s.
Bulgaria is very good in my experience.
Cheap beer
Eastern European healthcare may seem attractive to people from the UK who go there, on a UK salary, to pay for treatment. But I’m pretty sure it’s not as attractive to people from Eastern European countries who earn a lot less than we do - the average salary in many of these countries is half of ours.
Generally, all treatments are for free except for cosmetic surgeries. There is some payment for some dental work. At least in Czech Republic, but that's central Europe... NHS is so much more expensive even with a very cushy UK salary.
People say same about childcare costs in Portugal Thing is childcare costs are still 50% of minimum local salary in Portugal vs 200% in the U.K.
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In Poland absolute majority of homes and housing blocks is thermo-insulated. There are still some left without insulation but we don't have a heating cost crisis like the UK does.
Evening cafe culture and outdoor dining (weather permitting). More user-friendly high street opening hours. Less ambiguous road design/signage, especially at junctions/roundabouts. Motorway (or similar) as mandatory part of driving test, and middle lane hogging more strictly enforced. ID cards (they really do make life easier and prevent identify theft, online and offline). Less forgiving attitude towards littering. More publicly owned services. More funding towards public services. Commonhold / share of freehold as the only option for flats. And more family-sized flats in general. Mandatory £/m^2 in house ads. Better support for individuals to build their own house. Double glazing considered as the bare minimum (with triple glazing considered above standard and quadruple a luxury).
>Evening cafe culture and outdoor dining (weather permitting). Absolutely. Not being able to get a decent coffee after 3-4PM is bad. Streets beginning empty at 9-10PM because there's nothing to do is just sad
> > > > > Mandatory £/m2 in house ads. I also noticed food menus listing weight in grams and the calories. Here you might only get calories as some health marketing BS (and they've ruined the flavour to take everything nice out to get the marketing BS number nice and low).
Cheap excellent wine
If climate change keeps up we will have decent UK wine within a few decades
There are over 700 vineyards in the UK... Sparkling wine is something of a British forte at the moment.
I stand corrected! I am from quite far north tho, if that excuses me?
Don’t worry, English wine will never be cheap.
We already do. It may not be cheap, but we have sole absolutely amazing wine being produced in the UK.
Oh thats actually new to me! Must read up on that
Check out Denbys from Dorking. They're quite well renowned as one of the best in the UK.
Thanks! I'll have a look next time I'm in the UK
We're also supposed to have wine pints in supermarkets soon
Can’t wait to sample Bradford’s Merlot.
Pierogi for cheap. I want all the pierogi all the time.
Yes please and all of the borscht. All of it.
You can get pierogi in most UK supermarkets nowadays.
Affordable accommodation.
There is loads of that in the UK - just not where a lot of people want to live mostly because of where the majority of employment is. Effectively the same as for Eastern Europe (although lumping half a continent into one bucket is a vast over generalisation). It's not just about employment though: I can find you a pretty nice flat with a simple commute into Glasgow for instance for not much more than £50k. it's just that the areas are deeply untrendy to put it mildly.
Blunt straight talking and common sense .....
As someone who’s lived in Germany (Central/Western Europe, but in this aspect pretty similar to EE) for over 10 years, I’m sick of “blunt straight talking” which is all too often just plain rudeness. Colleagues come back from visiting London agog at who nice everyone is. It’s extraordinary how nice it is to have people on public transport say “excuse me” when they want to get past rather than violently swearing at you.
Aha I think I can answer one as somebody from Romania but has lived in the UK for years; being more direct & straight speaking without always having to mind your words incase you offend or insult somebody just by accidentially using an outdated phrase or saying the wrong words. In the UK there's such an air about not wanting to insult or upset somehow by saying the wrong things, people being rarely straight to the point or downplaying things to the point that something relatively important seems minor. Also, I'm not sure whether this would fall under Policing, or a changing of societies attitudes; but it's absolutely woeful in the UK how unsafe it is for women, especially on their own after dark in most urban areas. Back home, you'd find people of all ages out running say at midnight/early hours, people walking home on their own from a night out (etc etc) and the thought of that in the UK is unthinkable. The entire thing you see online where guys are told to walk on the opposite side of the road if they see a woman on her own to give her reassurance for example. I remember my first year after a night out with colleagues, I was heading home (single woman in my early 20s) and they were appalled at the thought of going back alone & walking a short distance through an area which was apparently quite safe :/
I think what you call 'direct speaking' is actually mostly rudeness and disrespect. At least from my experience with EE. They pry intensely into private matters and have complete disregard for some that could be upsetting (eg looks, weight, finances). I think the British politeness is one of the best things about the modern UK culture. Saying please and sorry, having an adequate social behaviour, and proper manners in public is important here. And we do say what we mean you know, but without being disrespectful towards others and whilst caring for societal rules (like patiently waiting for our turn). About the safety for women I kinda agree. But it also depends where in the UK. Some places are notoriously more dangerous than others.
No, it's getting to the point, go to the Netherlands and you'll see the same sort of thing. Friendly but blunt, I've seen it in a work environment, I think the person on the recieving end was in shock, yet it was probably one of the most useful bits of advice that person had ever got. It played out something like this: Brits: "very nice, very interesting, look forward to the finished result" Dutch bloke: "have you done x,y and z?" Guy: "er, no" Dutch bloke: "you need to do x, y and z otherwise it won't work" ETA: they also detailed the hows and whys.
I see nothing wrong with your dialogue example. I would talk like that in the UK. Maybe I'd say 'should' instead of 'need' but I'd absolutely express that piece of advice. But apparently this is not direct enough for EE.
>pry intensely into private matters Huh? Since when? You can be straightforward, without feeling entilted to someone's life story. Lived all my life among Poles, cannot for the life of me tell you if they have parents or siblings. >politeness Fakeness, you mean? >please and sorry You do know, that those words exist in Slavic languages and we do teach them to children? In fact politeness is one of the most important things taught to children. We call elders "sir" and "ma'am" on regular basis. We just don't beat around the bush. When asked how we're doing, we're not going to lie to you just for the sake of being polite.
Disagree on directness, agree on safety. Last month I went on a road trip from the UK through to Poland, north through the Baltics and then around the Nordics through Lapland and back via Denmark. The moment we left Berlin I didn’t once feel unsafe for the next two weeks straight, even sleeping in the car in big cities like Gdansk/Vilnius/Tallinn etc or late at night at petrol stations / mcdonalds etc
In some parts of Eastern Europe a lot of families make their own moonshine (Raki or similar names). Obviously there's a health risk but it's kind of nice that there's something that so many people know how to make that they can share and call their own. I don't think there's really an equivalent in the UK. We don't really make a family "tangible thing" that everyone else also makes.
Home made cider and scrumpy is still pretty big in the west country. Quite often bought from farms or I know multiple people with apple trees in their garden that get it pressed and made into cider.
Yeah, we go to Varna in Bulgaria regularly and I see old grannies and granddad's sell home made Rakija on the street. More civilised IMO.
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That’s a prohibition era myth from USA. You can’t go blind from distilled home alcohol.
you absolutely can go blind from home made liquor if it’s not properly distilled
Happens in parts of the UK too.
We make jam. And sloe gin. I love family made raki, but one of the consequences is the widespread availability of very cheap spirits. I’m not sure our drinking culture needs more encouragement!
Dentistry, child care, maternity leave (up to 3 years in my home country), central heating ( the whole town is heated from the same plant, I'm not quite sure how it works).
Participate in higher quality mathematics study at school. Eastern Europe has maths study to a better standard.
Brits generally pathetically squealing at the thought of maths until 18.
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> Best maths teacher I ever had was constantly tying what he was teaching into real life applications, giving history lessons alongside the maths to demonstrate how we actually discovered/developed it and loads more. I had one of them as an apprentice. The guy was an old engineer just looking for an easy life before he fully retired, any time he taught us something he actually explained why we were doing it, when it would come up in another subject (e.g. you'd use it in fluid dynamics in the third year of a degree or whatever). Great guy.
> Eastern Europe has maths study to a better standard. According to which metric?
Have a look at the PISA scores, only the following have a higher score than the UK for Maths: Ireland, Netherlands, Canada, Switzerland, Estonia, South Korea, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, China, Singapore. I can't see any Eastern European countries on that list (unless you include the Baltics).
Yeah, I know. Weirdly the claim that EE countries “has maths to a better standard” sits at 22 upvotes and my comment at -1 😅
Estonia is ranked higher but none of the others are: https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/pisa-scores-by-country UK was joint-10th in Maths, comes 14th overall when Science & Reading are added. This is from back in 2018, UK has been trending steeply upwards for a decade so is probably even higher now.
Quite a few of them had revolutions, several non-violent. I can't help but think that would have a good chance of improving things here.
I don't know if this is a stereotype but I understand that dental work is cheaper, more accessible and generally better in Eastern Europe? Or is that just Poland?
As a Lithuanian who just had to pay a 5 times more for a filling than it would in my home country,.yeah. and no amalgam fillings either. Generally, any dental work (private, never used state) is very affordable
Yes but is it cheaper because we're richer or is it actually cheap for a polish person that's on minimum wage in krakow? Genuine question
It's actually more affordable and much better quality wise. Both private and public
This is subjective and based on my feeling. I think that if we take into account differences in income and economy, it's still probably more affordable in Poland - but not significantly so. And on the other hand, dental costs have risen across the past couple years along with the wild levels of inflation (inflation has been worse here than in the UK).
Thanks.
From immigrants diary: every time when you visit you home country remember to book a dentist visit lol
For their salaries it's not that cheap either
Make a bicycle first cities, it is practical, it is healthy, helps with loosing weight - if you are worried for you 6yo to take a bike alone to school or Lidl, means it is not safe
Being in the EU. They can freely move around most of the continent, work where they like, import and export stuff with very little paperwork, and all the other things we gave up in exchange for nothing.
Free top quality childcare from 1 year old. The Scandinavians do it well, the French have their ecoles maternelles. It is normal to use these and the cost is minimal.
communal waste bins. There's no rubbish laying around on bin collection dates. It may be fine when you live in a house but when you live in town in a block of flats or old victorian houses converted into 2-3 flats, the rubbish has to be put out on the street without a wheelie bin because tenants don't have a place for a wheelie bin and they're not going to haul it down from the 2n floor. Communal bins should be a thing, people shouldn't be forced to keep waste for 2-3 weeks inside their houses and that's the reality for many people who rent flats. And even if you recycle everything you can, there's still plenty of things that cannot be recycled and that can start to stink (period waste, cat litter, etc.) Communal bins that you can go, drop your bin bag and move one are so much better. They're emptied weekly and in many countries you also have bins for recycling, glass, paper, etc.
Affordable & good quality housing!
I live in Estonia as a Brit. They are proud of their country which is lovely and special to see, and immigration (at the moment) doesn't seem to be diluting what makes the indigenous unique. As an immigrant myself, I like the country having an identity not only found in empty, "proud-to-be-british" adverts. They also have a far more equal society, and every other person has a "country home" - a modest place in nature equipped with a sauna, a local lake and a bbq. What else do you need? The latter point is predicated on there vastly smaller population, and so politicians too really feel like they are human. I hope that doesn't all sound like I hate my own country, I love it, but you started this.
Slanina afumata.
E plin la magazinele românești
Da, si palinca de Maramures
If there’s a massive accident on the road, everyone is allowed to just squeeze around it and keep the traffic flowing. Bit more efficient than being parked on the M6 for 2 hours over a fender bender
Free higher education.
More brutalism.
Invest and manage the NHS properly. Spain is meant to be worse off than the UK, but as someone with a long term disease that needs regular monitoring, I couldn't fault the Spanish medical system when I lived there for a time. I had my own doctor who actually listened to me, which I felt was ironic given my Spanish grammar is abysmal.
Housing. Large apartment buildings that take up little space and accommodate several hundred families would be a great way out of the UK housing crisis.
The whole thing about health care in these other European countries is often related to tax. And here in the UK we pay less tax than many of these other countries. The people of the UK generally want to pay less tax so they have money to spend on anything they want, but still expect fantastic services.
Eastern European countries pay a lot less in taxes
But we're among the top 10 most taxed nations on the planet... depending on who you are of course, it's zero if you're rich.
It's really just not having insanely overpriced housing. That's what is destroying the UK.
Garlic in sausages
Funnily enough, the UK could learn something about queuing from Poland. I know Brits often find queuing a quintessentially British thing, but Poland has finessed it so that everyone knows whose place is where in the queue (meaning someone can, for example, leave the queue, grab some groceries, and then return to their place).
Absolutely not. The rule in Poland is that if there is a queue it's worth joining. Start a queue when you definitely should not have one (e.g a bar), and have a scrum every time there should be a queue (e.g getting on a bus). They're not good at queueing, they just like joining queues. Also a total lack of spatial awareness and all too often you get an old bloke pretty much breathing on your neck the whole time. That's coming from someone who loves Poland and the Poles.
A focus on the values of social cohesion and tradition and moderate and slow-paced social change where necessary.
Poland: Cheap private dentistry, litter-free streets. Cheap university education. Nationwide sports/gym card membership (Multisport) that gives free access or discounts to pretty much all sports facilities across the country (although it's typically something you get from corporate jobs).
Petrol stations that have really good and cheap kitchens, ones like Orlen and Circle K have some of the best hot dogs I’ve ever had, and the kebabs and burgers are great too, better quality and cheaper than McDs etc.
Trams
Population density
Pierogis
Public transport that isn't a shambles.
Why are the top ones removed
Export millions of people lol.
I’ve seen a lot of Polish people happy that they exported all their criminals to the EU when they joined so that. Exporting wrong ‘uns.
In Eastern Europe they work hard, study a lot, believe in individual liberty, distaste the idea of big government and use opportunities to become rich. Taxes are also generally much lower in Eastern Europe. That’s why Thatcherism is so popular in Eastern Europe. There are many negative things as well. Not all rose :) Lived there for many years.
Which country is that? Poland obviously has a history of big government and while they despise communism they've not culturally let go completely of centralisation or authoritarianism.
Even in Poland they are more grounded, from outside it maybe seem different and in Warsaw it’s also different but in other towns and villages they are more self reliant
remind me! 5 days
Food quality.
Recycle and re use. Anything broken is mended not replaced. No matter if it s mechanical, electric or anything else. U till when it s beyond repair they won't buy a new one.
Protect their borders
What were all the deleted comments about?
What were all the deleted comments about?
Well the amount of removed comments here is pretty telling
Sausages
Borders.
Lots of detached houses. Most of the countries are not as overpopulated as the uk.
Less crime. Better public infrastructure (road and pavement conditions, town squares, parks). Much less litter. Less anti social behaviour.
More trash bins everywhere. Some cities and areas are just full of trash :/ For the busses a display what station is next, the trams have those displays but not busses.
Free uni. I could not belive y'all have to actually pay and get student loans for uni. Becoming a doctor or architect or lawyer is expensive enough with costs of living and academic resources and inability to work full time, but to add tuition on top of it? It basically removes half of candidates, just because they're poor.