I firmly believe in complaining. Whenever you pay for a service or rent a property, you have a reasonable baseline expectation. When that expectation isn’t met, it’s not just okay to complain—it’s necessary. I complain often, and I am not ashamed of it.
Why do I do it? Because money doesn’t grow on trees. Nobody has ever randomly stopped me on the streets of Bytom to hand me free envelopes of cash. If I pay for something, I expect what was promised.
Lately, though, complaining has been an uphill battle for me. The language barrier has been my biggest obstacle. Thank goodness for DeepL translating my lengthy, passionate diatribes into Polish (and to be fair, that’s on me because I haven’t been practicing my Polish grammar as diligently as I should, but that’s another story).
In all my years living in Poland, one of the most fascinating cultural quirks I’ve noticed is how rarely people complain publicly. In the United States, complaining is practically an Olympic sport. If an American gets lukewarm coffee or poor service, the manager will hear about it before the receipt even prints.
Here in Poland? Complete radio silence. People shrug, internalize the annoyance, or vent privately over a beer. Is it historical conditioning? Fear of causing a scene? Polite resignation? It’s hard to say. But if you’re reading this, consider this my permission slip: speak up. Service providers aren’t doing you a favor out of the goodness of their hearts; it’s a business transaction.
“Politeness is about respect. Assertiveness is about self-respect. You don’t have to surrender one to have the other.”
Let me tell you about my latest endeavor. We had a persistent issue with a commercial tenant in our historic building. This person routinely propped the heavy front entrance door wide open all afternoon to “cool down” their shop. To me, that was an open invitation to every opportunist in the neighborhood.
Sure enough, someone walked right through the open door and stole my bicycle.
We contacted the building administration countless times. Our complaints fell on deaf ears. Frustrated with the endless blame-shifting and bureaucratic shoulder-shrugs, I finally sat down, fired up my translator, and sent them an unvarnished reality check.
The email went something like this:
“I want to preface this message by expressing how disappointed I feel by your total lack of urgency in addressing security in our building.
A few months ago, someone entered the property and stole my bicycle because the entrance was left wide open. The commercial tenant continues to leave the door propped open daily. We have reported this repeatedly, and your inaction has achieved nothing.
It must be great for your marketing to frame pictures of our historic building in your head office and profit from the prestige it generates at our expense. Since you promote it so heavily, we expect you to keep it secure and habitable.
Consider this a courtesy notice: if anything further happens to my property or my family due to this negligence, I will be pursuing direct legal action against your company.”
Do I sound like an American “Karen”? Maybe. Do I care? Not even a little bit.
Passive acceptance and blame-shifting are what keep things from getting fixed. Standing up for your space and your investment isn’t aggressive—it’s just taking ownership. Stay tuned for round two!
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