Ask a Pole

[gay_Aleks]

Link to video.

Either you love Belarus, or Belarus loves you!

 

[Domen]

(There's a chance that part of my family is from the area, historically, but I don't know if they were Germans or Poles.)

I have sent you a few PMs concerning this. But there is one more thing that I forgot to add - if your family comes from Polish-German borderlands then in most cases you can quite accurately predict their nationality by checking what was their religion. For example the city of Poznań according to the German census of 1910 (last one before the World War) had 156,700 inhabitants, including 101,000 Roman Catholics, 49,400 Evangelicals and 5,600 Jews.

Great majority of Roman Catholics in the city of Poznań were Poles while great majority of Evangelicals, Germans.

 

[Domen]

What attractions are there in Poland? (By attractions, I mean key tourist places in Poland)

Other users have already mentioned a lot of places.

But it also depends what do you like to sightsee and how to spend time.

If you like historical monuments, then from which historical period?

E.g. if you like histories of royal dynasties go on a "Piast graves tour":

http://www.poczet.com/foto/groby.htm#zwierzchni

Photos and locations in the link above.

 

[Domen]

The Poles got a huge part of Prussia and Germans were moved out en masse.

And before that, the Germans got a huge part of Poland, incorporated it into Prussia, and Poles were moved out en masse.

Germans expelled around 1 million Poles from western and northern regions of Poland into south-central Poland during WW2:

http://s3.postimg.org/3qil6m437/Expulsion_of_Poles.png

Source:

Piotr Eberhardt, "Political Migrations On Polish Territories (1939-1950)":

http://rcin.org.pl/Content/15652/WA51_13607_r2011-nr12_Monografie.pdf

Piotr Eberhardt is a Polish professor of geographic sciences and also a historian:

https://www.igipz.pan.pl/member.html?show=29

 

[Domen]

The map of almost 1 million Poles expelled from areas annexed by the III Reich to General Governorship that I posted above, does not include Poles deported to Germany to forced labour, who later returned to Poland after WW2. That number included 1,500,000 Poles according to this link:

http://www.heimatverein-haltern.de/page4_1933_UNRRA.htm

But according to wikipedia even more - 1,600,000 (including 1,400,000 forced labourers):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Forced_labour_under_German_rule_during_World_War_II

The liberation of Germany in 1945 freed 11 million foreigners, called "displaced persons" – chiefly forced labourers and POWs. In addition to POWs, the Germans had seized 2.8 million Soviet workers to labour in factories in Germany. Returning them home was a high priority for the Allies. However, in the case of Russians and Ukrainians, returning often meant suspicion, prison, or death. The United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), Red Cross, and military operations provided food, clothing, shelter, and assistance in returning home. In all, 5.2 million foreign workers and POWs were repatriated to the Soviet Union, 1.6 million to Poland, 1.5 million to France, and 900,000 to Italy, along with 300,000 to 400,000 each to Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia, the Netherlands, Hungary, and Belgium.[5]

Here is the map from first link:

http://www.heimatverein-haltern.de/images/1945_05_14_Life_Karte.jpg