Food / Polish Milk, Just not the same [54]


or bags

Life / God parents (chrzestni) in Poland [8]

Step one: Become fabulously wealthy. Then ....

Step two: ese your power to secretly manage her financial downfall. After she's reduced to eating cat food and just before she's about to be evicted....

Step three: call up and ask how she's doing, casually mention your fabulous wealth and how you want to make sure everybody's doing okay.

Step four: Listen to her pour out her troubles.

Step five: laugh!

or

Step five: Bail her out but make said help dependent on listening to you bitch for an hour a day about how she should have called more often.

Life / Warsaw Vs Krakow which is best for raising family and working in? [21]


Why would there be?

To the extent they exist they're international and send people to Poland from other countries rather than recruit locally (except for Polish staff).

My advice is to use connections (a way of life here). Try to get jobs teaching business English which can make you contacts.
You might also hunt around in headhunter offices but again, knowing someone is key and without knowing Polish it'll be hard to make the right kind of contacts.

Failing that try to find out where expats working for intl companies hang out and start hanging out there too.

Law / umowa o dzielo z prawami autorskimi [10]

tk, how long have you been


how long have you been here? I always say that living in Poland is wonderful assertiveness training for wimpy English speakers, you either learn to stand up for yourself or you wind up with footprints on your forehead.

I've often heard of private school owners who try to guilt trip their teachers (putting on the "how could you?! i thought we were friends!" face when the teacher does something vulgar like ask to be paid. Pay no attention to it.

Language / WHY IS @ CALLED MAŁPA IN POLISH? [13]

My favorite term for @ is zavináè (rollmops) from Czech and Slovak.

Real Estate / Accommodation - Legal advice request [15]

My best advice is to talk to the people you're renting from. Chances are they'll be as eager to get rid of her as you are.

Dont expect much from the legal system: Maybe see lawyer but put your expectations on very low. Polish law is drafted to benefit Poles over foreigners in terms of housing. Plus unless you're pretty fluent in Polish you wont get much help. Most Polish lawyers' English is limited to "Polish regulations say [you're screwed]" if you know Polish well enough you can get past this, but otherwise you're defenseless.

One thing that might work in your favor (but which is probably pretty alien to you) is the power of gossip and reputation. You need to ruin hers (probably worse than being arrested but she's brining it on herself).

I'd contact her parents and ask why they didn't do a better job of raising her and do they have good idea of what kind of shame she's bringing on them?

Also mention to anyone you come across in the neighborhood that she's a freeloading parasite. Hint that you suspect she's moonlighting as a prostitute and that you're scared of what her dangerous acquaintances could do.

Mention how much you regret ever knowing such a person (old ladies are your best allies here).

Language / Anyone use "SERWUS"? [46]

I've seen serwus in Polish textbooks for foreign learners printed in the 60's and 70's but I've never ever heard it in real life.

I think I have heard it a few times in old movies but I wouldn't swear to that.

In Hungarian it's abbreviated to szia and used (especially) as an informal farewell that sounds remarkably like the American 'see ya'. (Hungarian sz = s)

Work / Little Help finding out right to leave 1 yr contract. [15]

The real value in having native speakers (for any language) is that they live in the language and don't regard it as a set of grammatical rules to be navigated and vocabulary to be built up. They also have information that can be useful that even the most impressively fluent second language speakers lack.

On the other hand, most native speakers function best when dealing with more advanced students who are more likely to benefit from the particular knowledge they have (and students can also benefit from the knowledge the native speaker doesn't have). But sending out a native (with no command of Polish or real knowledge of how things work in Poland or how most Polish people learn) to work with beginners is ..... not wise.

ABRUPT CHANGE OF TOPIC CAUSED BY StOOPID FORUM POLICIES ABOUT DOUBLE POSTING!!!!!


I don't buy it. You're just being lazy.

Just remember the less Polish you know the more defenseless you are and the more dependent you are on the mercy of people like your boss....

Lack of interest is no excuse, sit down with your textbooks and make the effort and the interest will come.

Plus you set a horrible example for your students and colleagues. How are they supposed to respect you as a language teacher if you're incompetent at language learning?

Food / Most important meal of the day (Polish breakfast recipes) [13]

I would never have flaki for breakfast or as a hangover cure. I absolutely will gulp flaki down after drinking too much (it's more a hangover preventitive than a cure).

My former routine after too much premium or krakus (prestige vodkas of the early 90's)

1. stagger into kitchen
2. pop open jar of flaki
3. slurp into pan
4. heat till boiling
5. wait a minute you pathetic drunk or you'll burn your tongue!
6. slurp down flaki
7. fall into bed
8. wake up to a bright and beautiful world!
9. resist gagging while dealing with empty flaki jar

Love / In his eyes. I have a good friend who is Polish, he lived in Bialstok. [7]

Hard to say as there's conflicting or ambiguous info.

It's not _that_ hard to keep in touch by internet in Poland. Even if there's no connection at home there are plenty of internet cafes around.

Asking about things your'e interested sounds like polite conversation of the kind anyone in Poland can maintain (and which Americans often can't for some reason).

How good is his English? calling you 'girlfriend' in English is too ambiguous, the overall context you describe makes me think he was thinking of koleżanka (friend who's a girl) and not dziewczyna (girlfriend).

Go to confession to you? In other words he sees you as a priest-substitute and you think he might mean that romantically? brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Polish people tend to maintain closer physical presence than Americans and have more eye contact.

Looking at you when he thinks you won't notice is the one thing that seems to unambiguously indicate interest.

If I had to give advice, I'd suggest doing something that makes it obvious that you're interested if he's paying attention and which he can act on if he's interested too but which he won't notice (or can diplomatically ignore) if he isn't.

Language / PRONOUNCING NASAL VOWEL "Ę" IN FINAL POSITION? [11]

IME there's final -ę and there's final -ę

I've noticed that some people do have some degree of nasality some times. This isn't the 'full' nasal pronunciation (actually a nasalized -eu not heard much besides się when stressed) but -e with some nasality (almost like French final -in).

One thing I've read (by a very distinguished polonist) is that pronouncing the full -ę all the time sounds stilted and hypercorrect while avoiding all final -ę nasal sounds is too informal. The ideal pronunciation is to nasalize some -ę's and not others. This writer didn't indicate exactly which -ę's should receive nasalization, the suggestion seemed to be that it was up to the speaker.

One thing I've kind of noticed is that first person -ę is maybe more likely to be nasalized when it would otherwise be identical with the third person, so piszę and chcę are more likely to receive nasalization than muszę or kupię.

Language / WILL "TĄ" REPLACE "TĘ" SOON? [14]

IINM about 20 years ago tą kobietę was considered incorrect while speaking. For at least 10 years it's been considered okay in everyday speech but not approved of in very formal speech or any writing. I think within ten or 20 years it will be approved for written use to alongside tę which will linger on in extremely formal usage.

Also IINM the old instrumental plural ending -y was required in writing a long time after it was displaced by -(a)mi in speech.

Language / Why Polish people use so many words to describe a situation? [122]


or zabłądziłem się?

Language / Why Polish people use so many words to describe a situation? [122]

A linguist weighs in with answers from the world of linguistics!

Polish and English lexicalize things differently and often a vague or general word in of the two will be divided into several more precise words in the other. I know of no research that systematically investigates the issue to see if either language systematically prefers words with narrower or broader semantic scope. Until such research is carried out, we're left with anecdotes and vague impressions which differ from person to person. There's nothing wrong with conversations about anecdotes and vague impressions but they're frustrating for linguists (who usually decline to participate).

Which language has more words is a meaningless question:
First: you have to define 'word' in a way that fits both languages and that's a lot harder than it might seem and then you have to figure out how to count them which is also problematic (are czytać and przeczytać one or two words? is pick up one or two words?)

Second: how many words a language has is a useless question after a certain point. The personal vocabularies of speakers are not determined by the language they speak but mostly by the person's intelligence and educational levels.

That said, there are some things that can be said with some certainty.

English dictionaries (not to be confused with wordstock) are the largest in the world partly because of a highly honed dictionary making tradition and partly because once a word makes into the OED, for example, it's never taken out even if no one has used it in 200 years. Speakers of most languages don't consider a word that's not been actively used for that long to be part of the language while English speakers largely do.

If you compile the total active vocabulary of all varieties of English the word count will likely be higher than in Polish no matter how you count them. If you restrict vocabulary to a single country (how most English speakers deal with the language) the word count will be more similar.

English words are generally less derivationally flexible than Polish words. Polish speakers mine the derivational processes of the language that just don't exist in English so you can create new words that make sense and are immediately understandable. English more has to extend meaning of old words without changing them or import new words (which English can do more easily than Polish).

Concepts like 'rich' or 'poor' vocabulary are qualitative judgments of personal preference and have no meaning in linguistics.

Even highly educated English speakers are far more used to encountering unfamiliar words while reading or from TV or radio than Polish speakers are (mostly due to geographical diffusion and very thick dictionaries). Mostly if we understand them in context we forget them right away and we only learn/remember them after encountering them several times.

Love / what does it mean when a polish boy calls me 'girl'? [38]


that doesn't ring any bells with me for Polish, but if he was writing in English it could be it was something he learned at some time as English (or American) slang or he might just be trying for what he thinks is a casual tone in English.

Probably no big deal either way.

Life / muslim community in poland [430]


He was a muslim? First time I've heard that claim, do you have any evidence?

Life / Can an American in Poland renew American Passport here? [18]

I renewed mine in a "consular agency" (not even a full consulate) in Poland. Quick and easy.

Life / muslim community in poland [430]

I'm not a fan of the biblical times argument though Israeli Jews have a right to exist and a right to a state (that too many would gladly deprive them of).

The Palestinians do have some legitimate complaints but the problem is they don't want peace, they want an overwhelming military victory (which is not in the cards).

Politically the Palestinians have not yet matured enough to realize that actions have consequences so they do things like elect a party that vows to never negotiate with Israel and then get upset with the Israeli government for not negotiating (this is rational?)

And they haven't figured out that Israel's Achilles heel isn't violence but non-violent civil resistance (but again they want a violent victory, not peace).

And they haven't figured out that most Arab governments wouldn't treat them any better than the Israelis do* and only use the Palestinian issue to distract attention from their own failings.

As for Spain, it was once Muslim but isn't now. The idea 'once Muslim always Muslim' is something that Muslims need to seriously get over if they want non-Muslims to take them seriously. And how on earth do you suppose Muslims going to 'reclaim' Spain?

*probably worse other Arabs have already killed many, many times more Palestinians than Israelis have, hell, Palestinians have killed many times more Palestinians than Israelis have.

Life / muslim community in poland [430]


oops that should be Khuffar, the plural of khaffir or non-Muslim.

Life / muslim community in poland [430]


I'm neither Christian nor Muslim and feel free to criticize all wackos regardless of religion.

One crucial difference, with your example. The crazy people that killed their babies and froze them were not claiming to act on Christian principles and when crazy Christians (like Fred Phelps) do crazy things, there's no shortage of Christians publicly denouncing them. Too many terrorists claim to be acting on Islamic principles as do too many purveyors of other social ills (like honor killings). But too many Muslims (who are good people) are too hestitant to criticize crazy Muslims in public.

This is maybe partly because this is because Islam stresses a private conscience, micromanaging the adherents daily behavior, while not acting against social ills that cannot be addressed through purely religious principles.

It also might be partly because Islamic practice doesn't recognize social groupings beyond the family AFAIK. There is the individual, the family and the only social division recognized in Islam is between Muslims and Kufar.

Food / Nalesniki [23]

Also remember that the first naleśnik or two are usually bad but they prepare the pan for the rest.

USA, Canada / Married a Mexican guy in USA - can I Divorce him from Poland? [16]

AFAIK if you're married you're married and immigration status has nothing to do with it.
On the other hand, immigration officials can decide the marriage isn't grounds to stay in the US.
It's best to not try to take the easy way out and to assume you're married until you've gotten the divorce.

If you're tempted to try to pretend it never happened you're giving him a lot of power to show up where and when you least expect it to make your life miserable.

Do what it takes to resolve things legally and following the rules.


Let me guess, each one thought the other was legal?

Life / muslim community in poland [430]


IIRC the fuss with the puppy was raised by one or two obnoxious loudmouths and then carried on by PC non-Muslims. Most Muslims quite sensibly didn't care.

As for the second point. The problem is that Christianity and Islam are both expansionist religions. Part of what this means is that they only thrive when believers have a feeling that their number is growing. The collapse of Christianity in much of Western Europe pretty closely coincides with the idea of not trying to convert the world. Believing Muslims don't want the same thing to happen to their religion.

Interestingly the number of believers doesn't actually have to expand as long as current believers feel like the number is expanding (in other words perceptions are more important than reality). US Christianity (much more robust than European versions) maintains an illusion of continual expansion by (basically) converting and reconverting the same people over and over again and this is not unheard of in some Muslim circles too (as is making it difficult or dangerous for Muslims to convert to other religions). Another tactic when Muslims are in the minority (practised in a lot of western Europe) is to self-segregate as much as possible and whenever possible get the majority to grant them concessions.

Life / muslim community in poland [430]

I think ash came here with a reasonable question and was attacked by some unhinged people at which point he became aggressive too.

I have nothing against Muslims (IME they're mostly pretty nice people) but some aspects of Muslim behavior just do not mesh with modernity (whether Islam or the non-Islamic parts of the cultures or modernity are at fault is another question).

So I think there's something not quite right about him dating a non-Muslim (and he showed her a great deal of disrespect that was unnecessary and did his case no good whatsoever). What's worse is his dating a non-Muslim when Muslim women are not free to date non-Muslim men. The freedom to choose one's mate is a fundamental human right and Muslims want to systematically deny that right to half of their population. Even if only one or two per cent of Muslim women would ever want to marry a non-Muslim they absolutely should have that right and it should be protected by the state.

ash (and asmaani) if you had to choose, which would you want your Muslim sister to marry:
1. a man who calls himself a Muslim but doesn't respect her, threatens her and even beats her?
2. a Christian who's kind and respectful to her?

Life / muslim community in poland [430]


It depends on what you mean by 'practice (your) religion'. Muslims from the same country or language group do have contact with each other in Poland and there are meeting places for prayers (one less than 1/2 kilometer from where I live).

Actually according to Wikipedia, there are mosques in Poland (though the article doesn't distinguish mosques and prayer hourses)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Poland

On the other hand, it is basically impossible to live in Poland as a Muslim in precisely the same way as in a Muslim majority country (or predominantly Muslim neighborhood) or to order your life so that you have contact mostly or entirely with Muslims so if that's the way you want to live then Poland is definitely not for you. You still might want to visit, in which case you might be interested in the NE where there is a small Polish Muslim (Tatar) community.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tatar#Polish_Tatars

Life / muslim community in poland [430]

As for your question. I've known a number of Muslims happily living in Poland but it's hard to call them a 'community'. For one thing Polish infrastructure is such that ethnic minority neighborhoods will not happen for a long time. For another, Muslims in Poland come from a number of different countries with different traditions within Islam and speaking different languages and aren't necessarily interested in associating with other Muslims just because they're Muslims. A lot of recent Muslim immigrants are small business people who don't have much time for socializing anyway.

As for halal meat, either find it imported or forget it. AFAIK there is no halal slaughterhousse (maybe in the NE of Poland where there's an indigenous Muslim minority). The most popular and common meat in Poland is pork but chicken, turkey and beef are easy to find (less so mutton and/or goat which have never been popular here).

I don't know of any mosques (again, there are only a few Muslims in Poland and they come from different traditions so there's no big feeling in most of them to get together to build mosques) there are places they meet for prayers but you'd have to be here and know people to find those.

Love / Are (most) Polish unmarried people virgins? [60]

AFAICT viriginity at marriage has never been the norm in Poland. Expecting at marriage is much more common (note high percentage of VPB's - visibly pregnant brides).

Language / Which case for adjectives? [47]

"Mike'a książka"

'książka Mike'a' is better. IME the apostrophe is used primarily:

a) between a 'silent e' and the ending (Mike'a, software'u etc) I think it's required in these kinds of words.

b) after a word final -y (Kennedy'ego, Romney'a) I think its more necessary in the second but I could be wrong

Using it after nonce loans (ending in a consonant) happens but isn't necessary and it might be considered incorrect. My idea is that it's definitely incorrect once a loan has become nativized, "ma powera" not "ma power'a".

Life / I am in Poland on a tourist visa and have been here for 2 years.. [53]

From what you've written there are two basic options:

1. Try to legalize your stay (which may not work and will result in you getting kicked out).

2. Keep on until they catch you or you have to cross the Schengen border for something and you definitely get kicked out.

My advice is to try to legalize your stay and get a residence card (yeah it's a bureaucratic hassle but it beats being thrown out).

The good news is that the current laws weren't put in place to keep out Americans so that works in your favor.

1. Go to the embassy if you haven't and find out what your options are. I doubt that you're the only one in this particular situation.

2. Go to the foreigner's office and tell them the situation. Accept that you're going to be yelled at for screwing up because .... you screwed up. If you admit your guilt and apologize (and can demonstrate you are not and will not be a drain on the Polish economy, if you haven't been paying taxes then things will be much more complicated) if you haven, then I'm pretty sure it can be worked out sooner or later (though you might have to leave the country for a bit - perhaps combining that with a visit to your mom).

3. Stop putting things off. The longer you don't do anything the worse it'll get.

Language / LASKA- CHICK, BABE OR BIRD? [12]


You probably shouldn't. The word also some pretty specific ..... connotations as well.
It's used to refer to oral pleasure received by a man and by itself can also refer to a specifically male protuberance...