Quote:
Originally Posted by plbogen
When I was in Poland in 2001 a friend of mine who had been studying Russian, figured he could speak to the Poles in Russian since until 1990 or so it was mandatory to learn Russian in Polish schools. As soon as he uttered one phrase in Russian people would stop acknowledging his presence. Another friend was trying the same thing with German and no one cared and would chat with him in German, of course much less people knew German.
Historically the Russians along with the Germans have been the Poles major enemy. In 1939 I doubt they would have been happy to seen Soviet forces even if it was ostensibly to save them from German forces.
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Relations with Russia have been strained in recent years which would explain your friends experience this is of no surprise to me. The current Polish Governement isn helping to worses the relations, with Russia and Germany. What I am not sure of is.. does Poland not see Russia boiling, and I wonder with all of these current strategical political moves which Poland is making, what it will do when Russia finishes the Gas pipeline that it is building with Germany around Poland and then just turns of the switch to the country as a way of rewarding it for its policies?
While the relations have been rocky, there have also been good times.. In the 15th century, the Russians helped Poland defeat the Tuetonic knights at the battle of Grunwald.