History / Territories of eastern Germany should rightfully belong to Poland? [161]

Löcknitz must remain German ! - under this heading the German party NPD runs its electoral campaign with an aim of winning 7 seats in the council of Uecker-Randow, Kreis in eastern Germany. According to the newspaper Rzeczpospolita, the NPD fears that the Polish settlers whose number in the Kreis has amounted to one thousand already, could soon challange the German character of this region. About one third of the settlers live in Löcknitz (once known under the Slavic name of £ęknica), town of 3000 inhabitants to be easily reached from Szczecin (Stettin). With houses and flats being cheaper, schools of good quality, and calm everywhere, the region attracts many Poles. "No one is ready to guarantee that if things go on unchanged, the Kreis will end up becoming part of Poland" - says Tino Mueller, leader of the local NPD. He insists the Germans have enough of Polish settlers and are much afraid of Löcknitz following the fate of the nearby Stettin, a "German town taken away from Germany by Poland". Stettin will some time return to the motherland - tells the Rzeczpospolita daily Michael Andrejewski, one of the six NPD deputies to the parliament of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

Hors Heiser, deputy mayor of Löcknitz is of different opinion. "Polish settlers are a chance to the region. They do not take jobs away from us, Germans" - says the man and points to the example of the Polish company "Rago" employing six Germans and three Poles in the nearby town of Pasewalk. Its owner, Jarosław Wieczorek, stands for a seat in the election to the Kreis council which is to be held on the 7th of June. "The NPD has made no comment as yet" - he adds.

Language / Difference between Polish Ł and English W [23]

Interestingly enough, the two variants of the Polish £ can be heard in the English word WELL. The "eastern" version of the sound (LL) was once a norm in the Polish language; actors in the theatre retained this pronounciation until fairly recently (the so-called ł teatralne). The sound LL survived - as it often happens - on the outskirts of the language area; in this case on the eastern outskirts of Polish, that is among the Polish speaking population of Lithuania, Belorus and Ukraine (I remember one of the former presidents of the Republic of Lithuania, Vytautas Landsbergis who is a fluent speaker of Polish, pronouncing it very distinctively). One of my former colleagues in the office who came from a village near Vilnius did pronounce it in this nice way, but she constantly tried to hide this pronounciation to sound more standard and less dialectical. You can still hear the sound LL in the pre-1939 Polish films, songs of Czesław Niemen (who was born in today's Belorus) and also in the language of correspondents of the public Polish TV in the city of Vilna who are wise enough not to hide this formidable pronounciation from their "standard" audience.

The English people pronounce the sound £ very well, indeed. I remember one Englishman asking me "how do you pronounce the letter £ ?", and another Englishman just laughing at his excellent pronounciation of this sound.

Language / LEARNERS REJOICE: NO MORE DUAL NUMBER IN POLISH! [12]

Sing.------------------Dual (only arch.)----Plur. (arch./moderne)

N. (jedna) ręka--------(dwie) ręce---------(trzy, cztery) ręki / ręce
G. (jednej) ręki--------(dwu) ręku----------(trzech, czterech) rąk
D. (jednej) ręce-------(dwu) rękoma-------(trzem, czterem) rękom
Acc. (jedną) rękę------(dwie) ręce---------(trzy, cztery) ręki /ręce
I. (jedną) ręką---------(dwu) rękoma-------(trzema, czterema) rękami
L. (jednej) ręcę--------(dwu) ręku----------(trzech, czterech) rękach

In bold are forms that are not in use any more. The ancient nominative and accusative cases in plural were replaced by the respective cases of the dual. For both the instrumental and locative cases, the dual and plural forms are still in use. We say "mam dziecko na rękach or na ręku". We never say "mam cię w rękach", but "mam cię w ręku" which is an idiomatic expression telling "I am able to control you" in which expression the form "w ręku" fully retains the sense of the archaic dual number: "mam cię w obu (dwu) ręku" (one has only two hands).

Language / Questions about Polish language and grammar - I can help you [16]

A very interesting question to which Kasiula could not find any answer (btw, the name Kasiula has in itself an interesting suffix: -ula). Well, I just wonder if the suffixes named by Polonius are that specific. For example, I can't think of any other word ending in -ciura (as in szlachciura), except the word ciura. "-ęga" seems to convey a pejorative flavour indeed, as in "łazęga", "mordęga", but there is also: potęga, księga (both neutral). For "-ajda", there is: znajda, niedorajda.

Language / Questions about Polish language and grammar - I can help you [16]

Another one of this kind: mitręga. "Mordęga" or "mitręga" are not yet "old-fashioned", but they may be heading in that direction [the root verb "(z)mitrężyć" does seem to me quite old-fashioned, however].

"Szlachciura" is mostly heard in the historical context these days, just as its root noun "szlachcic". Still, they are perfectly recognizable in modern language (probably like the English word "peasant" which belongs to the past, but everybody knows what it means).

In the absence of Kasiula (who has apparently been frightened off by the question of Polonius), I would like to say that "dwojga, trojga ... sześciorga" is the genetive case of "dwoje, troje ... sześcioro". These numerals are used with plural neutral nouns or nouns describing groups of living beings of both sexes. For example, when I read a title in the "Polityka" weekly (the real title, actually): "Economy, Tusku! czyli dzień z życia trojga przywódców", I would expect that among these three leaders that the paper is going to describe, there should be one or two women (in other words, they would never apply such a title if talking of male leaders only in which case the title should be: "z życia trzech przywódców). And indeed, the article discusses the day from the life of Angela Merkel, Barack Obama and Donald Tusk. In the nominative case you would have: "Oto troje (nominative) przywódców (genetive): A.M, B.O. and D. T. (nominative)". Similarly, you would have: dwoje (or better, oboje) małżonków, troje źrebiąt, czworo szczeniąt, pięcioro prosiąt, sześcioro dzieci etc.)

Numerals in Polish is a very complicated question and there could be more to add to the problem. Indeed, you do say: dwoje, troje, czworo (etc.) kobiet (genetive) which is just the other way of saying: dwie, trzy, cztery kobiety (nominative); both expressions mean exactly the same.

Language / Questions about Polish language and grammar - I can help you [16]

Even Polish grammarians do not seem to understand collective numerals in full. For example, in the book "Gramatyka polska" by Krystyna Stachera, Wydawnictwo "Park" 2006, we read that we use them in describing the quantity of:

a. minors (human and animal) [istoty niedorosłe],
b. people of both sexes grouped together [osoby różnej płci],
c. using nouns that do not come in singular [rzeczowniki nie posiadające liczby pojedyńczej].

The book gives the following examples:
1. Pod pomnikiem troje turystów robiło zdjęcia. (b)
2. Do egzaminu przystąpiło osiemdziesięcioro uczniów. (a)
3. W gnieździe jaskółek wrzeszczalo sześcioro głodnych piskląt. (a)
4. Kulig, złożony z siedmiorga sań, ruszył w stronę lasu. (c)
5. Z dwojgiem przyjaciół wybrałam się do galerii sztuki nowoczesnej. (b)
6. Każdy chrześcijanin powinien znać dziesięcioro przykazań. (!?)

The problem with sentence nr 5 is that the noun przykazań, has its singular (przykazanie), so the sentence does not comply with the given principles, yet it is correct (it seems that collective numerals may sometimes be used with objects forming some sort of a "set"). In sentences 2 and 6 you can as well use basic numerals; in this case the noun will be "seen" through its gramatical gender rather than as belonging to a mixed group or to a certain set of objects.

Language / Changes in the Polish Language [11]

The grammar hasn't changed at all, neither has the pronounciation. When I watch films from the sixties, I can hear no difference at all except that some actors may be still pronouncing the dark "£" which is like the English LL in WELL and not like the English W in it. Of course, you will not learn words like "internet", and "komórka" won't mean "mobile phone" yet.

Language / Textbook from 1938 - try these translations. [7]

"Portaczki kąpielowe" is sweet (the real 1939, I would say), but "kąpielówki" or "spodenki kąpielowe" is a modern version.

"Poważny stan" is possibly what we would call "błogosławiony stan" today. If someone said he was "w poważnym stanie", I would think he is in urgent need of medical care and would call for an ambulance.

"Niech zaprzeczy, że nie umiera na marskość wątroby (hepatocirrhosis)" is brilliant. It reminded me of a "my postillion has been struck by lightening" once found in an old English phrase book.

Language / SŁUCHAĆ, or PRZYSŁUCHIWAĆ SIĘ? [53]


Isn't it Queen Elisabeth II speaking the queen's language?

Language / Impersonal verb form [3]

You mean: "Dzieci uczy się dobrego zachowania" means "One teaches children good behaviour" or "Chldren are taught good behaviour"?

"One learns good behaviour through examples" can only be said by replacing "one" with a subject like: "dzieci, dziecko, człowiek, ludzie" here. We don't have "one" in this sense of the word. The sentence will be in active voice.

"One and one's wife", as Prince Charles sometimes said about hiself and Lady Di, can be translated into Polish as "człowiek i jego żona" or "mężczyzna i jego żona", or specifically in this context as "książe i jego żona" which would sound a bit silly in Polish, really.

Language / Textbook from 1938 - try these translations. [7]

This time, the charm of the 1930s can be felt in "wieczna ondulacja" instead of today's "trwała ondulacja". I wonder if there existed an "eternal wave" in the US at that time, as opposed to a "permanent wave" of today.

It seems that "monter wodociągowy" (from your first set of examples) has evolved into "hydraulik" (the famous "plombier polonais" in France).

Language / Jest/To jest - to jest is often abbreviated to just to [24]


Some other examples for you to contemplate the problem:
1. (a) Życie jest cudem. (b) Życie to [jest] cud.
2. (a) Tomek jest komunistą. (b) Tomek to [jest] komunista.
3. (a) Kolokwium jest (wiąże się z) intensywną pracą. (b) Kolokwium to [jest] dużo pracy.
4. (a) Samochód jest biały. (b) Samochód, którym jechałem, był białą limuzyną.
5. "Na początku było słowo, i słowo było u Boga i Bogiem było Słowo." (The Bible, J.1,1)

Work / Move to Warsaw and will teach English (advice needed) [23]

The demand for English language teachers in Poland changes as everything in the economy. Companies try to save money and they often cancel courses in English (or in anything else) organised for their employers. I've heard of a number of companies in Warsaw who has done that in recent months. As for language schools, they might receive fewer pupils so the demand for native speakers which has been quite big and unchallenged in Warsaw until quite recentely may also be vanishing (for that, the best option is to check in the Monday paper edition of Gazeta Wyborcza for the Warsaw area).

News / Euro Elections 4th June - Who will you vote for ? [110]


The UPR, LPR and Prawica Rzeczypospolitej are the so-called "setee parties" (partia kanapowa). The brilliant and most eloquent leader of UPR, Janusz Korwin-Mikke, has been unable to seduce voters with his talk full of charm for several years. (When replaced with Mr. Michalkiewicz, the party turned out to be a little aniti-semite, as far as I can remember). The LPR has slided into some political emptiness when it turned out that they were secretely fond of the Nazi ideology. At present, they try to hide themselves behind Libertas, which is promoted in Poland by the chief of public TV, member of LPR, a certain Piotr Farfał, whom the press portrays as a former nationalist and sometimes a hooligan towards young ladies who wore too colourful clothes. (He no doubt doesn't like Jews or Blacks either.) Marek Jurek and his PR are too few to fulfill one, even not too long, settee in full. I don't think any of these so-called "political parties" may get out of the shadow they are in.

[I'm a Pole living in Poland, have been in the UK three times altogether: once for a half-a- year stay, twice as a tourist.]

Language / Jest/To jest - to jest is often abbreviated to just to [24]

Kolokwium jest dużo pracy - doesn't make sense because the full sentence will read "kolokwium to jest dużo pracy", and the only possible abbreviation of this sentence will be omitting the word "jest" in it, and not omitting the word "to".

"Samochód to jest biały" is a sentence in which the word order has been reversed to a highly unusual one (if ever, it may be found in poetry or in a theatre play). Its proper and very simple version will be: To jest biały samochód.

A very good example of an unnecessary change in word order can be found in Molier's comedy play of 1667 "Le burgeois gentillhomme" ("Mieszczanin szlachcicem"):

----------------------
PAN JOURDAIN:
A teraz muszę się Panu zwierzyć z jedną rzeczą. Kocham się w pewnej bardzo wysoko postawionej osobie i pragnąłbym, abyś mi pomógł napisać bilecik, który chciałbym upuścić u jej stóp. [...] Pragnąłbym napisać więc w owym bilecku: "Piękna markizo, twoje piękne oczy sprawiły, iż umieram dla ciebie z miłości", ale chciałbym, aby to wyrazić w sposób doborowy, żeby to było jakoś zgrabnie powiedziane. [...]

NAUCZYCIEL FILOZOFII:
Można wyrazić po pierwsze tak, jak Pan to powiedziałeś: "Piękna markizo, twoje piękne oczy sprawiły, iż umieram dla ciebie z miłości". Albo: "Iż z miłości umieram dla ciebie, twoje piękne oczy sprawiły, piękna markizo". Albo: "Sprawiły piękne oczy twoje, iż z miłości, piękna markizo, umieram dla ciebie." Albo: "Oczy twoje, iż umieram, piękna markizo, dla ciebie z miłości, sprawiły." Albo: "Dla ciebie, piękna markizo, iż umieram, sprawiły twoje piękne oczy, z miłości."

PAN JOURDAIN: Ale z tych wszystkich sposobów, któryż jest najlepszy?

NAUCZYCIEL FILOZOFII: Ten, którego Pan użyłeś: "Piękna markizo, twoje piękne oczy sprawiły, iż umieram dla ciebie z miłości."

Language / Questions about Polish language and grammar - I can help you [16]

"Dzień dobry, cześć i czołem!
[Pytacie skąd się wziąłem!?
Jestem wesoły Romek,
mam na przedmieściu domek,
a w domku wodę, światło, gaz! ...]

is actually a citation from a very popular Polish comedy film MIŚ. "Czołem" alone is also used in the army as a salutation between troops and commanders: "Czołem żołnierze! Czołem panie pułkowniku!"

Travel / Need assistance planning my travel in Poland [11]

All trains arriving at Warsaw from the western direction will always end their journey at Warsaw East as a rule, and vice versa; thanks to this rule all long-distance and international trains will always stop at Warsaw Central, though not all of them will stop at Warsaw West when setting off from Warsaw. In my view, it is more convenient to go to Ełk by bus in which case you will need to get off at Warsaw West and walk some distance underground to the bus station Warszawa Zachodnia (it is a main bus station in Warsaw integrated with the adjacent train station Warsaw West).

There is a direct bus service from Warsaw to Ełk (several times in a day, I should think).

Travel / Need assistance planning my travel in Poland [11]

pksbilety.pl/Route?source=Warszawa+Dworzec+Zachodni&dest=E%c5%82k

Warsaw - Ełk:
06:00 - 11:15
10:15 - 15:45
11:40 - 16:40
13:45 - 19:10
22:00 - 03:15

How to buy a ticket and places available, please check the site for information (in Polish only).

Language / Już and jeszcze [36]

In the example "to ja już wybieram kino/to ja już wolę iść do kina", the use of "już" is quite specific. It means that of all other options previously mentioned, the speaker is ready to choose "kino", but he is not happy with this choice either. Here, the "już" has nothing to do with its basic meaning of "already/yet".

News / Polish nursery rhyme book says Germans smell and gipsies sell their children... [28]


The problem with them (and possibly with some of the Polish people replying here) is that that when they notice things like that in a German book ("all Polish smell, all Polish are dirty or sell children in the market"), they raise big alarm about the Germans being bloody racists, while when the case is the other way round, they play it down, simply saying that nobody is forced to buy such a book.

The book is disgusting and it should be clearly said so!

Language / Why do you have this weird grammar with y and i? optYka? magazYn? zYsk? why? [30]



OK, your (impossible!?) mission has been completed, but with a slightly opaque conclusion, young man. In reality, Polish is something like a germanic-slavic language in the same way as Slovak is a hungarian-slavic one!

Language / Why do you have this weird grammar with y and i? optYka? magazYn? zYsk? why? [30]


Now I know why the English language uses the spelling "cz" in the word "Czech". Why doesn't it use its own spelling "ch" for it? Does anybody know? A name "the Chech Republic" would look great, wouldn't it?

Language / SZCZ and ŚĆ HARD TO EXPLAIN [19]


What makes them sound differently (sz/ś ; cz/ć ; ż/ź) is the shape of the aperture in the mouth formed between the tongue and the palatum (not the longevity of the sound, as someone in the thread said; closing or not the teeth doesn't matter at all). To achieve this, the tongue changes its shape, with both tip and dorsal (middle) part of it being active at the same time. The difference may indeed sound somewhat unimportant to a stranger's ear (as I am now thinking about it), but it is nevertheless very clear to a native speaker (someone mispronouncing one sound for the other would sound extremely funny, except when she or he is a foreigner). To show the difference in its depths it would be best to have a formal description (which I may find in the book "Fonetyka języka polskiego" just as soon as I find the book itself) of the pronounciation of the sounds. A cross-section filming of the mouth while telling sz/ś would be of great advatage in explaining it as well.

Such short films showing visually the difference in the way English vowels are pronounced (a great problem not only for a Slavic learner) were produced by the BBC for their course of English "Slim John" broadcast on Polish TV. Though these films had proved extremely helpful for me, I occasionally did run into problems, mispronouncing, for example, "ration" for "Russian" (luckily enough, a certain Reverened S.J. of the United Scottish Reformed Church was then by my side to correct me), so I realize what difficulty the sz/ś pronounciation may pose to foreign learners of Polish.

Language / The Dative Case [62]


The prevailing dative ending in the masculine gender seems to be -owi for every noun, regardeless if it is a person or not. The -u ending has survived only in words most often used, for example: bratu, ojcu, księdzu, chłopcu, kotu, psu. Some people might still say the dative koniu, but the majority of them will say: koniowi; the same with osłu/osiołowi. I think some may have already started saying: kotowi, bratowi ...

USA, Canada / Popular US Newspaper offends Poles. [22]

Not being excited at all with who is Jewish and who is not (same with who is Scottish or who is American), I am eager to remind that being Jewish may be defined in either nationality or religion terms. In the former case we use the big letter in Polish (On jest Żydem), in the latter we use the small letter (On jest żydem). Also, according to the Jewish religion, someone is Jewish when his mother is/was Jewish; in this respect Adam Michnik is not Jewish. The decisive factor is whom the person judges himself; I think it's obvious to accept Adam Michnik as a Pole of Jewish origin (I cannot imagine people in America insisting that someone who thinks himself an American of Jewish origin is not an American, but Jewish only).

Confusing this with someone's or their parents political activities is just silly and boring. There exists lots of examples of Poles of Polish (and only Polish) having been communist murderers, just as examples of Jews not having been communists in Poland.

Language / Polish Language Pronunciation - Example Words and Phrases [178]


Following only the voiceless plosives, however. The voiced plosives leave rz unaffected: grzęda, drzewo or brzeg are pronounced: gżęda, dżewo, bżek.

Language / Formal "you" and Informal "you" : which is which? [46]

Capitalizing words in English seems to be an ineresting subject. What comes to my mind is that the English language inherited perhaps an old tradition of capitilizing nouns, a tradition that survived within the German language. The British an American press print capitalized nouns in paper headlines, don't they?

Life / Poles in Poland: How did you learn your English? [60]

This is a very interesting question! In my view it is essential that you combine practice and study. When I started at the age of 15, I acquired good basics of English from a BBC television course, fairly good British pronounciation included (they did exercises in phonetics all the time). At the grammar school I slowed down; since I was the best in class, I thought my English was sufficient. Then I happened to spent half a year in the North of England, surrounded only by locals and not communicating in Polish as there were no Polish people that could be seen in the north of England at that time.

Just as my English progressed much in that period and I was becoming increasingly fluent, I was again forgetting to study it in the "depths" of my own soul. You should do that by all means; reflecting on language peculiarities and typical features (which is even more difficult!) on your own is important as ordinary native speakers cannot point your attention to them.

This time again, I lack oral practice in English but my vocabulary is undoubtedely broader. My French which I study "en autodidacte" cannot go up beyond a certain level; it is the "lack of speaking practice" factor, I suppose, which is to be blamed. Thus, as I said before, combining practice and stydy is essential.

Life / Poles in Poland: How did you learn your English? [60]


Wow, not only Polish people use "advices" ! Dzięki Seanus, dobre rady ... zawsze w cenie!

Life / Poles in Poland: How did you learn your English? [60]


Only "knowledge" will meet the English pattern in Polish (never such a form as "wiedze" for the plural). For the rest : rada - rady, informacja - informacje, mebel - meble.