Looking on the bright side

EWA ANDRZEJEWSKA Editor What is a pessimist? An optimist with some life experience – at least according to the author of these words, Polish poet Julian Tuwim. Does this mean that the Central European property scene should only consist of pessimists, considering the two crisis years for the industry that we have just been through? We are entering the New Year with quite a lot of accumulated life experience. However, while listening to the opinions of the key players of the industry who we have asked to summarise the last year and make a forecast for this one, it seems that there are more of the conventional kind of optimists among them – particularly when they assess the future of the Polish, Czech or Slovak markets. But will the Hungarians, the Romanians or the Bulgarians finally be able to see the light at the end of the tunnel this year? Let’s be optimists and believe that they will. These deliberations, the feature article of the issue and the report on the 16th Annual Construction and Property Conference, which took place on December 8th in Warsaw, reminded me of a joke that I hope you will forgive me for quoting. A pessimist cannot see anything at the end of the tunnel, an optimist sees a light, and a realist jumps off the railway track because a train is approaching. December 8th, 2010 was an important day for our company, not just because of the annual conference, which we held for the 16th time. In the evening, during a ceremonial gala we announced the results of the first ever Eurobuild Awards. On behalf of myself and the whole company I offer my warmest congratulations and a New Year toast to all the winners!