COVID queuing brings back memories of communist days in Poland
​7min   Audio Postcard DRAFT.
Tape in bold (Polish) Female field interpreter 

Suggested host intro:
For the first time Americans are experiencing waiting in long lines to get groceries.
But before the fall of communism waiting in lines was the norm for most people in Poland. Now, because of the Corona Virus, many in former communist countries are finding themselves queuing for essentials once again.
Jake Warga (WAR-guh) went to a market in Warsaw to ask older people what it was like the last time they had to queue for the shop.

START:
JW: There’s a LOT different between then and now, between communist times and capitalist times here in Poland.
But you have to wait in line once again in this age of...corona capitalism?. And that’s bringing a lot of memories back for older Poles. Most of the memories not so good,

There would be queue committees and a person like a sheriff that wrote down the names of people who stood in lines and once an hour or less you had to confirm you were still in the line
Memories are coming back for 75 year old Jacek.
Jacek, Jacek Ludwiczak. Age 75.

He’s at a local market area in Warsaw to buy something for his cat, mainly an excuse to get out of the apartment.
It’s been 30 years since capitalism replaced communism in Poland, a period known as “the transition”
There is no capitalism in Poland actually, it’s difficult to say what we have here, just like we didn’t have socialism in the 80s before. There are social conditions that make people look at each other with a distance and hostility even.

There’s a bit of language confusion as I wave my mic between him and the interpreter.
Turns out he’s talking not about the loneliness of virus restrictions, but the new way of life that came after the transition to capitalism
Even before the virus the way people lived together was not the same anymore. The level of living and technology everything went further but in terms of the social being together things got worse. 
Capitalism: It’s like a rat race: a new TV a new car everything must be new new new. There is no time for social contact
There is no more going to someone’s to have a vodka together.

Jacek thinks more about the old communist days, like many I talk with with a little hint of fondness. (notstalgia)
Back in the 80s the level of living was not that high. but then you wouldn’t have any people looking for food in the bins, there were no unemployed people, there was a big social security system in the work places, there were special funds for holidays for the employees.
Even though the wages were not that high there was this sort of social backup that would give people a sense of security

I hear a bit of nostalgia for communist times because the transition to capitalism required a huge mental shift, from the many to the self:
The mentality is that I am the one that’s important, other people I don’t care but it’s important for me to have money
(JW: that’s capitalism!) da, that’s capitalism

There was this guy in the 19C called Karl Marx
Turns out Jacek has all the books by Marx back at his home, where his cat waits patiently. He also has Lenin and Stalin but tells me it’s Marx that’s being rediscovered.
(JW: Do people read Marx today?) Yes, there’s been this sort of return to Capital by Marx for the last few years.
I have to admit I’ve also read a lot of Marx, both in grad school and in real life. In Capital, Marx says, maybe hopes, that a revolution will come from class struggle. That is, when the haves have more than the have nots, when exploitation becomes intolerable. It can also be a revolution created by awareness of your own condition in the world. And in this part of the world there’s been a lot of struggle in the past, and now in the present,
(is there going to be a revolution here?) It might happen. The lack of happiness is quite high in Poland and the European Union did not work. not expecting a kind of revolution with barricades and people fighting with each other but maybe a mental revolution

I ask if Corona Virus is that revolution for Marx, or the spark in that it helps reveal the disenchantment of capitalism, especially its failure to care for the masses...the people. The proletariat?
It’s not a revolution the way we actually see it but there might be something like that happening. Very soon we will have very high unemployment. People are already loosing their jobs and employers have no regrets in letting people go.

(JW: What would Marx say today?)
That his theories are being put into place. That the director of Tauron, polish energy has a salary of a million zloty compared to a regular employee that earns 2.5 to 3000 zloty.
Partly Misses the times back then. Some people call the current system capitalism with the face of a wolf. And you only need to see how some of the employers treat their employees to see why.
As we talk the US death count increases as the for-profit health care system and social safety net falls, or we begin realizing there was not much of one.

He really likes the US and I have a lot of sympathy for the US about what is happening there, the situation in Poland is very good compairing to the situation in the US
Marx might say the virus is exposing the lies of Capitalism. And it can be seen more clearly from a distance, and from people who have lived under different social systems, both the good and the bad from each.

I ask what will be different after all this
The rate of divorces will definitely get higher when it ends

​END 7min