Using the White/Yellow Pages Successfully
by Jim Cupedro
April 12, 2002
I. Using the Polish White Pages: http://tel.portal.pl/
Note: I strongly suggest using the Polish Yellow pages first.
1. This site is not 100% complete, but it seems to be getting there.
In order to see areas of Poland covered click on the button next to the
Word INFO, (buttons look like planets). You will see a map of Poland
With the provinces color-coded. Red or blue provinces, (most of Poland) will have individual phone listings. Orange just businesses, Black - nothing.
2. To search - from the home page click on "klienci indywidualni".
On this form - you will need to enter a surname "nazwisko" and a city
"miejscowos~c". The surname and city MUST be spelled correctly,
using Polish characters when needed. (See table at the end of this
document.) Also, when entering a city, keep in mind that if someone
with your surname lives in a small village outside of a larger city, you
MUST enter the name of the tiny village, not the larger city.
This database does not appear to be case sensitive, using all lower case
Should work fine. (apparently I need to learrn more about upper and
Lower cases control in Windows!).
3. If you have done everything right and IF there are people by that surname
in the city you have entered, clicking SZUKAJ, will give you up to 20
listings in that town. (If anyone figures out if there is a way to get more
than 20 listings, I would love to hear about it.)
4. About the województwo drop down box
Leaving this box on it’s default setting "wybierz" will look in all
Woj’s. One of my towns is Wojciechów. I’m not sure, but I think that
12 or so exist in Poland. My surnames are not common, so I do not
bother to choose a woj. If your surname is fairly common, and you know
the województwo, selecting this can help to restrict your search.
Polish Characters:
As I mentioned earlier, you must use Polish characters when needed in both the nazwisko and miejscowosc fields. It is not necessary, but certainly is advisable to set your computer to properly DISPLAY Polish characters. I suggest getting the advice of a computer guru to help in in displaying Polish characters, if you cannot see them properly with your current settings.
| Polish Character Keyboard Commands
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Character = [Alt + number] = Description
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a~ = ALT 0185 = a with a hook on it
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e~ = ALT 0234 = e with a hook on it
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o~ = ALT 0243 = o with an accent over it
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c~ = ALT 0230 = c with an accent over it
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l~ = ALT 0179 = l with a slash thru it
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n~ = ALT 0241 = n with an accent over it
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s~ = ALT 0156 = s with an accent over it
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z~ = ALT 0191 = z with a dot over it
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z~ = ALT 0159 = z with an accent over it
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ENTERING Polish characters however is possible, even though they may not be displayed correctly with Western settings. I got lucky with my computer playing around with it and don’t feel comfortable advising on this.
If you do not have another, better way of doing it, the following table of substitutions will work in this website for Polish characters.
POLISH CHARACTERS, (hold down the ALT key while typing these numbers.)
I would certainly be appreciative of anyone offering an easier way to do this.
So to enter the surname Da~browski one without Polish settings could enter d ALT 0185 m b r o w s k I (holding down the ALT key while typing 0185, instead of typing a Western "a") it may LOOK to you like this: "dąbrowski" but it should work.
II. Using the Polish Yellow Pages: www.teleadreson.com
This is a database that is designed to be used to find businesses in Poland.
Please remember: Before you contact someone at work, they may have rules restricting contacts of a personal nature at work, or even against receiving personal mail at work.
This database includes in most cases, names of contacts at businesses. The database covers or attempts to cover all businesses, regardless of size. (I have found a relative who is a proprietor of a general store.)
The database features a full text search which includes the names of the contacts.
The database has Polish and English language versions, (click on the Union Jack for English)
The database allows (by default) a search across all of Poland, and can be easily restricted to one or several new OR old voivoidships.
A search for a surname on this database across all or Poland will not of course tell you everyone who has this surname in Poland; just those people who are main contacts at businesses, large or small. However, it can probably give you a good "barometer" of how the surname is spread across the country.
To search, simply enter your surname in the text box, (Polish characters are not necessary, so for Da~browski, simply enter dabrowski) and click on SEARCH or SZUKAJ. You can control the results in either individal "REPORT" or summary "LIST" format.
If your surname is short, you may get results mixed with names of towns that include the letters of your surname. One of my surnames is BIEL, and simply searching on BIEL will return also cities like BIELAWA. You can stifle this by clicking on the check box labelled "regular expression". Then results will only be exact matches on the letters you have typed in the text box, not on words that begin with what you typed in.
On the other side of this coin, if you leave the box unchecked, and have a really long surname, you can enter the first several letters, and possibly find some spelling variations to your surname.
You can also search this database for a village name. If you know the correct spelling of the village you can enter that, and see what small business, shops are in the village and who runs them. My ancestral village is DONOSY, and searching on that word returns half a dozen or so establishments. If it is a small village, the village name will show up in the listing where you would expect to see the street address.
This is a most enjoyable website to explore, and is a great place to learn about some of the things in every day Polish life.
Even though you do not have to enter Polish characters on this site to search, once you get results, the results page should display the Polish characters.
Then it’s time to move on to the Polish White Pages with some of the data you have received for further exploration.
Just remember, somebody working in Warszawa or Kraków, doesn’t necessarily live in those cities proper.
Related resources:
This article is provided here with permission of the author.
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