In 1964, a movie entered American cinema screens Greek Zorba (title oryg. Zorba the Greek), American-Greek comedy drama directed by Michael Cacoyannis, made on a fresh canal Greek Zorba Nikos Kazandzakis.
In PRL, its premiere took place in January 1967. Basil – a calm Englishman, the artist moves to Crete, to the country of his ancestors. He's trying to restart a fallen household mine. In the harbor, a certain Alexis Zorba, a Greek, is attached to it – he proposes that he take it with him and aid with everything.
Bitter Zorba
Cretans in the movie Greek Zorba They appear almost as a society suffering from bipolar disorder. They fall constantly from manic states (then they wear them, enjoy, avenge, warmly greet the guests) into depressed states (then sit down, fade away, look blind in the unknown). On the another hand, Alexis Zorba is individual completely free, independent of standards, a surviving monument to life itself, which, whenever he can draw from it, brings quite a few good to man. To the classics passed his ecstatic dances, celebrated moty voucher: "a beautiful disaster", “A man without a small madness cannot live normally”, “the god gave us hands to take”. The phrase is peculiarly celebrated “What a beautiful disaster!”who said Anthony Quinn starring as Alexis Zorby in this film. For the movie character speaks these words with characteristic laughter, looking at the collapsing construction of a cable car for the transport of wood he had previously built with large enthusiasm. In fact, the movie Greek Zorba is simply a bitter song, bringing a imagination of a planet in which it is highly hard to live your life.
Thousands of Gomulka dwellings
At the same time, at the turn of 1966 and 1967, in the Polish People's Republic, for governments Władysław Gomulka (ps. “Wiesław”), who held the regulation in Poland as the 1st Secretary of the KC PZPR (in 1956–1970), began the implementation of a large-scale housing program for Poles, in which tens of thousands of fresh housing units were built in Poland, transferred free of charge to the working class. In Gdańsk and Elbląg many flat blocks were built according to the Polish task of young architects and constructors, which took the first place in the nationwide architectural competition, gathering the expectations of the Polish national state – the post-war reconstruction period. The thought was to build a lot, rapidly and cheaply. The building (a multi-family flat block) was designed so that it provided for the anticipation of installing an elevator over time in each recently built block. At the time, the mediocre Polish state of the post-war country could not afford to equip four-story buildings with elevators.
Carcinogenic slag
In fact, these buildings were characterized by simplicity of style, utilizing innovative technology, consisting of fast and reliable build-up of load-bearing walls. Liquid concrete containing a certain, well-established proportion of shredded blast furnace slag was poured into the linings where the armorers placed steel reinforcements. In time it besides turned out that the slag contained in the concrete has radiation properties. The radiation properties of blast furnace slag are determined by the presence of natural radionuclides specified as potassium K-40, Ra-226 councils and Th-232 track. As a byproduct of iron metallurgy, slag is typically characterized by a low level of natural radioactivity, allowing its wide usage in construction. However, increased incidence of malignancy has been confirmed in residents of buildings with walls made of slag. And this is where Alexis Zorba should be quoted: “What a beautiful disaster!”.
Funding Trap
Systemic changes in Poland caused drastic increases in housing prices. Old Gomulkowska flats in dreary nightmare blocks went up. mediocre old residents who are not always in debt by themselves are evicted from these apartments. For example, a pensioner who had no cognition of the functioning of investment funds, encouraged by the mirage of easy and fast profits, joined them. After any time it turned out that due to the deficiency of contractually declared cyclical contributions as an investor, she was bid and evicted from the apartment. Another young, educated female in the same building faces akin consequences. For the same reason, participation in a akin investment fund.
We're building fresh lifts!
In the old blocks, young, darts, creative owners, who have frequently purchased an flat on loan, force the modernization of buildings by building passenger elevators in them. In their desire to prosecute their innovative ideas, they engage voluntarily in the boards of housing communities. It would not be surprising, but that their management is frequently caricatured. For example, first, an investment was made in the form of building an elevator and then, after the completion of this investment, efforts to fund (Sic!) for months, not allowing the residents of this community to usage the elevator to pay off the bank debt on their behalf. Furthermore, they do not realise that, erstwhile undertaking the management of the housing community, they presume responsibilities with the benefit of the existing inventory of outstanding cases.
Dangerous place on the board of the community
I have individual experience in this regard. In 2005, without suspicion of deception, I inadvertently agreed to represent the board alone in the housing community. After little than 3 months of management, I received a letter from the Regional Inspector of Construction Supervision, in which the items for the express renovation under the rigor of punishing me as the board of the community, a fine of PLN 50,000!
Eugeniusz Zinkiewicz
