Wojciech Oleksiak

We are all taught at school about communism as a social system, but do we really understand what it meant for those who had a chance to experience it firsthand? Empty stores, propaganda, and censorship, but also a plethora of funny details, born of attempts to make the best out of life.

1. You could hire someone to stand in line for you

The shortage of most common products could make everyday life a nightmare. During many of the frequent economic crises, store shelves would literally be empty. Memories of huge shops supplied with only vinegar and Georgian tea are one of the most commonly recalled flashbacks to the communist period.

Furthermore, most products were subject to a rationing system which made some products available only to the bearers of special cards. All these inconveniences resulted in what is called a ‘queue culture’. People would queue for hours and days to get a washing machine, a pram or a pound of meat. Spontaneous queueing committees watched the order of queues, and retirees would make additional money by being a ‘stander’ (stacz in Polish) – a person who stands in a queue for somebody else.

2. There was 0% unemployment, but a lot of workers with nothing to do

We want to achieve a new and better order of society: in this new and better society there must be neither rich nor poor; all will have to work. Not a handful of rich people, but all the working people must enjoy the fruits of their common labour. 

– Vladimir Lenin

The right to work is a foundation of the communist socio-political system, thus the Polish United Workers' Party put enormous effort into maintaining 100% employment, even if it was only completely inefficient. This is why workers would have nothing to do at work for weeks, and would instead just pretend that they were working. Danuta Nowak, a lathe operator at the Żerań Factory, says:

I worked on the morning shift. I would come to work at 6 AM, punch in, get a coffee, chat with people for hours and have nothing to do until 1PM or so… People were so bored that they often did terribly stupid pranks that not once or twice had serious consequences.

3. Attending parades was mandatory

May 1st, International Workers' Day, was celebrated more uproariously than any other occasion. The most important part of the yearly celebrations was the huge parade that aimed at presenting support for the Polish United Workers' Party and for Communism, as well as the overall happiness and motivation to work.

The celebration was to be joyful, spontaneous and reminiscent of a hoedown. Yet, it was far from spontaneity – the plan was carefully laid out, roles cast and the marching crowd thoroughly controlled by the organisers.

– says Tomasz Leszkowicz on histmag.org.

Because spontaneous participation in the parade was mandatory and absence could bring on unpleasant consequences people used to sign the attendance list and then use every opportunity to escape. Nevertheless, the 1st of May parade was critical for propaganda reasons, and, regardless of its real result, was always proclaimed to be a huge success and proof of the nation’s love for the Polish United Workers' Party.

4. There were inferior quality substitute goods for everything

Petrol was not the only imported good that was missing on the market. Chocolate, good cigarettes, acceptable-quality cars as well as all kinds of innovative products were an unaffordable rarity. Without appropriate resources, domestic producers came up with "something-like" products. Chocolate-like product used vegetable oil instead of cocoa, God knows what was the substitute of quality tobacco in cigarettes like Giewonty or Sporty and the most popular car of the period, the toy-sized Maluch, could, with no offence to its quality, be classified as a car-like product.

5. Dachsunds were crazily popular

This noble breed of dog, the creation of which dates back to the times of ancient Egypt (at least according to its lovers), was by far the most popular of 1980s communist Poland. Ladies walking with two or more dachshunds on a leash was a very common sight, and the breed somehow fitted the mundane reality of the Polish People’s Republic: not too big, not too small, cheap in upkeep and (what is always important in a police state) highly unobtrusive. Surprisingly, dachshunds are almost absent on the streets of present-day Poland. According to a recent ranking of the popularity of dog breeds, they have dropped out of the top 10. Where are you, sausage dogs?

6. There was normal petrol and 'commercial' petrol

In 1988, the Communist economic system of everything being state-owned and state-controlled started to seriously waver. It forced the Polish United Workers' Party to introduce signs of liberalization; one of those was ‘commercial petrol’. How could petrol, one of the most popular commercial goods, not have been commercial before?

Up till then, every driver had a yearly allocation of several litres that they were entitled to buy. After running out of this limit, their car would become useless for the rest of the year unless they bought some petrol on the black market (which was severely penalised). From July 1988, every Polish citizen could buy some ‘komercyjna’ (Polish adjective for commercial) petrol, much more expensive than normal (for the same petrol) and sold in just 64 stations in all of Poland, but free of the rationing system.

7. There was hardly anything to watch on the telly

Television in the Polish People’s Republic was state-owned and carefully controlled by the censorship office. Despite several educational and cultural programmes, the communist powers used it as their main means of distributing propaganda. Programmes like Film Chronicles of Polish People’s Republic or Daily News conveyed messages ordered by the Party and often blatantly blurred the truth. In response, Polish citizens organised massive acts of civil disobedience, such as turning their TV screens to the windows or gathering on casual walks during the Daily News in the times of Martial Law.

8. There were vending machines with glasses attached

This was surely one of the grossest inventions of Communist engineers. This machine was used to serve carbonated water with or without raspberry juice. The ugly part is that it didn’t give disposable plastic cups but had glass cups attached on string. After each use they were only rinsed with water and ready for the next person to use. No wonder it made it into history with the nickname gruźliczanka, which might be translated as tuberculosis-lady.

9. You needed to wait 20 years to have a phone installed

To have a phone line allocated and installed, one could wait as long as 20 years. The deficit of private phones was not only a result of poor infrastructure, it was also very lowly prioritized by the communist power. Less phones means less conversations to control, less conspiracy and trouble.

In the village Sierpowo, from 7.45 AM till 3PM the school phone was used in the office but during afternoons it became a public device (…) numerous visitors who had urgent calls to make would come to use it. People would call ambulances or police or to inform their family about a new child or a death. It was the only phone in a radius of several miles.

– recalls Radek on bufetprl.com

10. There was only one shop selling foreign goods, and it did not accept local currency

Pewex is short for Internal Export Company, and that already should give you an idea of how crazy it was, because:

The term export means shipping the goods and services out of a country.

Pewex was introduced in 1970s to help the country's foreign currency deficit and offered most goods which were unavailable elsewhere (such as toilet paper, jeans, and electronics), but accepted foreign currencies only. The exchange ratio was outrageous and possession of foreign currency in cash was forbidden (it had to be exchanged for bank cheques), but Pewex had no competition and so became one of the most loved shops until the fall of communism.

 

 

Author: Wojciech Oleksiak, 10th March, 2015