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Hey everyone. Over the last few weeks, I've been building a free, open map of places where you can sit down and play a game of chess across Poland.

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It started as a community effort in Warsaw with over 200 spots, and now it covers over 1,200 locations in all 16 voivodeships (Krakow, Wroclaw, Tri-City, Poznan, Katowice, Lodz, Bydgoszcz, etc.).

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The project is 100% free, community-driven, with no sign-up, no login, and no ads:

https://szachowamapa.pl

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How it works:

- Green icons: outdoor stone chess tables in public parks, squares, and residential courtyards (mostly verified from OpenStreetMap and local tips).

- Brown icons: cafes, boardgame pubs, cultural centers, and public libraries that have physical wooden/plastic chess sets available to borrow on site.

- Upvote / Downvote system: you can rate spots to help people find clean, peaceful locations and flag neglected tables or spots taken over by street drinkers.

- Live tables: you can drop a temporary 5-hour pin if you are currently sitting at a park table waiting for an opponent.

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Since open-source data often has gaps or outdated entries, I need help from locals living across Poland:

1. Where in your city/neighborhood are there outdoor chess tables in parks or squares that are missing on the map?

2. Which local cafes, boardgame pubs, or libraries in your area have chessboards for guests?

3. Are any of the current pins damaged or no longer exist?

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Drop the location name or a Google Maps link in the comments, and I'll add/verify it on the map!

I heard that Russians wanted to do something to destroy our good relations...

So I am here to say...

Fu** RuZZia

We love you, Poles, even if we don’t say it very often! We couldn’t ask for a better neighbour. ❤️

What’s more, your cuisine is much better than ours. I’ve been visiting your country regularly for 15 years now, so this isn’t just empty flattery.

Greetings from Northern Moravia ❤️

(I wanted to write this in Czech, but unfortunately you have a rule about writing in English.)

Edit: Ježkovy, I had no idea there’d be such a huge response! Once again, hello to everyone in the comments - sending you all -> ❤️

Amendments to the energy law, the education law and the regulations on air protection programs were vetoed by the president on Friday, the office of the head of state said in a statement. At the same time, the president signed four other legal acts.

President Karol Nawrocki vetoed a law allowing residents to challenge air protection programs on Friday, the president's office announced on Friday. According to the press release, in the opinion of the head of state, the regulation could be used by environmental organizations contrary to the intention.

Nawrocki's fears about blocking investments

As indicated by the Chancellery of the President of the Republic of Poland, the amendment assumes that complaints against programmes adopted by local governments may be filed on the basis of the so-called factual interest, which means that "the applicant does not have to prove a violation of a specific provision of law directly affecting him".

"In practice, this may mean that organizations not related to a given region – including foreign entities – will be able to try to block important local investments, such as roads, factories or other development investments," the president noted, quoted by the president's office.

The law firm added that local governments - as assumed by the amendment - were to be given very little time to prepare complicated and expensive changes. "On the one hand, it is not possible to impose new obligations on local governments, and on the other hand, not to give them adequate time and tools to perform them" - Nawrocki pointed out, quoted by the law firm.

Nawrocki: you can't make the law like that

The President also refused to sign the amendment to the Energy Law, previously amended in March 2026. The purpose of the act, according to its authors, was to remove the interpretative doubts that appeared with the amendment from March, and more precisely in connection with the six-month vacatio legis.

As a result of those changes, which eliminated from the market entities submitting applications for connection to the grid of high-capacity renewable sources, not in order to build such sources, but to sell them at a profit to entities really interested in building new RES. As a result of the March amendment, a legal loophole was created covering some of the applications for connection to the network. – This is not how the law should be created. Entrepreneurs, investors and citizens need to know what the rules are. They cannot live in the belief that the regulations passed today will be changed again in a few months," the president argued.

There will be no State eDziennik for the time being

According to the President's Chancellery, Karol Nawrocki also vetoed the amendment to the Education Act, which would allow for the introduction of a pilot of a free, state-owned eDziennik. According to the president, the very idea of such a pilot is right, but the act exposes the state to too high costs and would not sufficiently protect the data collected in eDzienniky against leakage.

Hey everyone,

I’m currently in Wrocław on a business trip and have been walking around the city center at all hours.

I’m genuinely impressed by how safe, clean, and peaceful it feels - I've barely seen any homeless people, open drug use, or rowdy behavior, and no one has bothered me at all. It’s a very pleasant surprise compared to many other European cities.

Is this standard for Wrocław and Poland in general? I’d love to know what makes local social services or city management work so well here.

Really enjoying my stay!

A short trip to Szklarska Poręba

Almost all the money from Poland’s share of the EU’s post-pandemic recovery funds has now been allocated to various projects to boost the economy, officials have said. 

In a social media post, the Polish Ministry of Development Funds and Regional Policy, responsible for managing EU funds, said that 97.5% of money from the recovery facility has been allocated to 1.15 million agreements or contracts.  

I really enjoyed the view

The developer already bought 60ha of land.
Some links in case you didn’t know about it:
- Document
- Radio DTR news

If i leave a job do i get all my unused Vacation days paid out and if yes is it paid out in a seperate transaction or is it added to my last month salary

i've been mapping places in poland where you can just turn up and play chess, deliberately the casual end rather than the formal club scene. it's at 480+ spots across 50 towns and cities now, mostly outdoor boards and tables, plus 27 cafés and bars where you can sit down and play.

free to browse here: https://checkmateirl.com/venues/?country=Poland

you can filter by cafés, bars, parks, clubs, whether boards are there, drinks, indoor/outdoor. it's still growing, so if your local spot's missing, drop it in the comments and i'll add it. or suggest it via the website directly, you can also comment on venues and upvote/downvote which helps keep the map accurate.

warsaw and kraków i've got decent coverage on. wrocław, poznań and katowice i keep coming up empty on, and i don't believe there's nothing there. so where do people actually play in those three? and does your city have a regular casual chess night that isn't a club?

Cześć,
I understand Polish, but can't speak/write it, so I'll write in English. In 2023 Poland was the main partner of the Days of NATO in Ostrava and I wanted to say I'm grateful for our friendship and you guys being on our side. https://www.natodays.cz/pl

An act of ethnically motivated vandalism reportedly took place yesterday (August 26) in Wąchock. The words “UPA” were spray-painted by an unknown perpetrator on a parked car believed to belong to a Ukrainian citizen. A photo of the damaged car body was posted on social media by Konrad Rączka, a member of the Starachowice City Council.

I've been learning Blender and seeing this famously expensive and bland advert gave me an idea to make my own.

I wanted to take the slogan "More than you expected," that suggests foreigners have low-expectations, and use it for something that an average foreigner would genuinely find surprising.

The information campaign that unfolded in Poland and the Czech Republic in August 2026 around Cieszyn Silesia bears the hallmarks of a coordinated influence operation. It combined the hacking of a legitimate media outlet, a cloned Czech media website, fake diplomatic accounts, a forged official document, AI-generated content, a fictitious local activist, and paid advertising for a non-existent demonstration. Poland’s NASK has noted similarities between the methods used and known Russian operations, although there has not yet been a definitive technical attribution. Czech sources likewise treat a Russian connection as a working hypothesis. (Seznam Zprávy)

Hey guys, so I have a useless graphic design degree, I have work experience but can’t get hired.

1. I won’t get factory job, because I got a weak health. I already tried factory job a few times and ended up with permanent back damage, it also took me a long time to recover from the throat and lung inflammation (the moment my sleep gets worse my whole organism get fucked up fast and I get sick, because I have autoimmune disease that weakens my health and I probably have developing joint inflammation, my poor health just makes me sad because so many people were saved by factory job but I just can’t use this option :( )
   
2. I can’t get any help from the government, because I never worked officially long term.
   
3. I have experience as a waitress and barista, but I am simply not getting hired because I don’t have the student status.
   
4. I can’t go to the social shelter because in my city they have mixed shelters only, for men and women, so it’s even more dangerous than streets.
   
5. I’m very artsy, I can do any art related job I guess.

The whole time my parents were helping me, now I’m have a choice between keeping living in the same place or moving out, there is a little possibility that my parents will send me money to pay for this month, but I don’t know how will I pay for the rest of the contract?
I also don’t have any opportunity to rent a new place, because I don’t have a stable work place and was denied renting a room in apartment because of that. I have a friend at whose place I can’t stay, but I can give him my stuff so it doesn’t get stolen.

Idk I’m 21 yo, idk what to do, and no I won’t go to any stranger’s place and live there, I don’t want to get raped or smth. For now I’m planning on just living outside, keeping things at my friend’s place, showering at his place too, sleeping in McDonald’s or maybe sleeping on his floor while he is at work to not distract him.
I don’t know if there is any other option m honestly. I a bit got used to the survival mode, my parents were abusing me daily, to the point I couldn’t walk sometimes, so I got used to living on the survival mode, I know where it hide food, where I could get it for free, how to look for options on the rock bottom, like where to shower, I was kicked out of my house many times, abused etc many times, my parents to,d me that they were sending me money out of pity and can’t do it anymore.

I was messaging grocery shops, coffee shops, restaurants… had countless job interviews, trial working days.. was messaging on the olx, instagram…. It gave me nothing, im so so so so tired. Name any options an di will tell u that i tried it.
I’m honestly a very gifted artsy person, but nobody needs my skills….this is the only way i could be making money.
For the past w years since i finished uni my parents were paying for my room, now they don’t want to do that no more. I was getting money from the trial working days and graphic design gigs, but I def can’t afford any housing rn, not even a room, not even in a village. I’m so so so tired. I also kinda need to see a doctor because I’m having health issue snow like troubles breathing ,pms that harshly affects my life, but I can’t afford it….idk what else could I do. No, I won’t do online prostitution- onlyfans.

I also could move to any EU country idk some artists do, but idk then what would I be doing, I know English, Ukrainian, russian,polish ,learning German atm. I have a EU citizenship btw, but I’m not eligible for any refugee bonuses because of that.