Follow-up

From what little I've seen of the night life in Radom, I know one thing hasn't changed in moving here: I still prefer to hang with friends in pubs than spend the night dancing in a club.  We went out for a little while with a couple of co-workers to see what things were like and discovered that you are required to check your coat at the door regardless of where you go.  At least that was optional at home.  The one club that the girls decided to stay at wanted 20 PLN just to check your coat and pay the cover charge.  Since it's not really my thing or Sarah's, we just offered to take the other girls' coats back to our flat and let them dance the night away on a much smaller budget than the coat check would have allowed.  On the way up to this place, we also noticed a lot of people smoking on the landings, and neither of us could breathe by the time we got to the top of the stairs.  At any rate, it sounds like they had fun.

Today was a little better.  One of our Polish co-workers organized a little meet-and-greet with some of our other colleagues at the pub we had considered going to last night, but had decided against because we didn't want to check our coats.  We met everyone there tonight and had a pretty good time.  The food was to die for, and the selection of non-alcoholic drinks was actually very decent.  It has a small dance hall just off the main dining area, so you have the choice of hanging out where you can still hear the conversation, or going to dance among the loud music and flashing lights.  There is a non-smoking section on the upper floor and a smoking section in the basement, by the entrance to the dance hall.

It's still a little strange to me that people can smoke in public places here, when you consider that it's illegal back home.  They were selling duty-free cigarettes on the plane, there were smoking booths at the airport in Frankfurt, and people seem free to smoke everywhere here.