One of the strangest things in Poland, for an American accustomed to hearing about protection of privacy, civil liberties, and such, is the "Dowód Osobisty," or "Proof Personal" (literally translated), which of course would be more correctly translated, "Personal Identification Document" or some other similar nonsense.

The new card looks more like a standard American driver's license than a passport.

In its old form (shown here), though, it's basically an in-country passport, but it certainly shows Poland's communist roots, as shown below.

Special thanks to Kinga for allowing me to use her dowód as an example.

The first page includes personal data: name, date and place of birth, personal identification number.

For most civil libertarians there's nothing troublesome here.

The next section, however, might cause some problems for the ACLU and other protectors of privacy. It is an area for information about your children, including their birth certificate numbers. And of course, the last column is for that ever-important offical stamp.

Moving on, we get to the page for "zameldowanie," or residence registration. Every time you move to a new city, you have to register there and get the proper stamps.

Starting to sound more and more Red . . .

The further we progress, the more troublesome it gets.

The next section is for employment information. And notice of course that it must be an official stamp to be valid. (The two columns are for hiring and termination — apparently you need proof that you don't work there anymore, too.)

The final section (not show here) is for "Adnotacje Urzędowe" ("Government Notes"). Probably for when you get in trouble . . .