Bolesławiec Mayor Piotr Roman presented prizes and distinctions on Thursday evening. For the sake of the event and its standing, the reference to promotion ought to be removed from its name. Among the recipients are people who may not have intended to promote anything, but who did something valuable that year. Like Jadwiga Bobek (president of the Society of Friends of Children) and her team, to whom the entire county owes the operation of a food bank. Like the teachers, educators and caregivers who ensure a high standard of education for children, pursue further training and seek innovative, effective teaching methods. Or the young people taking part in international academic competitions. The promotion is minor for the city, but it is certainly worth highlighting.
The same applies to Azart-Sat and the Provincial Hospital for the Nervous and Mentally Ill. The former beneficiaries apparently received the prize for collecting 50 litres of blood during the December “Give Blood with Azart-Sat” campaign. Or for not giving the mayor a headache last year, unlike us.
Does the provincial hospital deserve the prize? It is true that the name Bolesławiec is associated with it more than with the city of ceramics. And throughout the entire region! But the justification tells us that the hospital was honoured because it obtained EU funds and launched funds to improve its image. And by improving its own image, it primarily influenced the positive image of the entire city—we were informed in the justification. No one can challenge such a justification.
An exceptional act of promotion was honouring the experiments of Nanolaboratorium Nantes. Nano is something even smaller than micro, which aptly reflects the level of the laboratory’s scientific achievements. In its basement, it produced “nanowater” using cold plasma, which anyone can obtain by buying a glass lightning ball on Allegro. “Nanowater”, of which few people have heard, supposedly does not freeze even in thirty-degree frost. The greatest innovation, however, is not the water itself, but its only application so far: making money from nanowater-based cosmetics.
They also managed to award the president of a Polish-Canadian company producing navigation software for ships and boats. It is possible that this maritime GPS has a function that directs every sailor—whether they want it or not—to Bolesławiec… Now that would be city promotion. There is no mention of this in the justification, however. Instead, there is an assurance that simply buying the program is enough to see other boats on the waters of the “entire world”. It is astonishing that the military has not yet classified this technology.
All in all, the best joke is giving the gala the title “The Mayor’s Awards”. Why? First, the mayor is not the only person who nominates candidates. Second, he does not choose them (during the gala he insisted that he had not influenced the panel). Third, he does not pay for the awards out of his own pocket. He is merely a beautiful decoration on the stage, like the flower he presented to the laureates. Immediately after Janina Piestrak-Babijczuk kissed them. The gala was worth seeing for those kisses alone.
(editorial information ii)
