Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]

What does it mean if (in a work context) someone is referred to as a 'hare' ?

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]


to land on one's feet?

History / Why do Polish people hate to be called Eastern European? [120]


Stop trying to ship Poland and Russia... it's not gonna happen. The most that can be hoped for is - as little contact as possible and impersonal politeness when contact can't be avoided. Expecting anything more than that is just crazy.

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]


defein: "a multi-kulti-people"

Food / What do non-Poles think about eating the following Polish foods? [1450]

edit: frying breaded cutlets in enough oil that's hot enough (and not too hot) cooks the breading (and the meat) in a way that is less greasy than shake 'n bake

Food / What do non-Poles think about eating the following Polish foods? [1450]


I love US culture, I really do. Where else in the world do people cite the directions on the box as a guide to cooking?

It's like a dear friend years ago who was living in Warsaw and was happy when they received 'real' pancake mix from the US... although all the ingredients need for US style pancakes are easily available in Poland, in fact I just made some a couple weeks ago which were very nice with no box whatsoever.

The problem is that whatever side just spent 20 minutes sitting in its own fat on a baking pan is going to be a soggy mess... frying breaded cutlets in enough oil that's not enough cooks the breading (and the meat) in a way that is less greasy than shake 'n bake, both sides are crispy and surprisingly non-fatty. If a fried cutlet is fatty then something has gone wrong.

Food / What do non-Poles think about eating the following Polish foods? [1450]


nasty, nasty stuff.. and baking breaded things is just so wrong... the breading on the bottom side is moist and nasty...

Food / What do non-Poles think about eating the following Polish foods? [1450]


that would be weird, the flour creates a barrier to the egg and the egg binds the breadcrumbs together to the flour, that's why, when made properly, the outer layer comes off the meat.

there are other ways of doing it but they're not common in Poland...

Food / What do non-Poles think about eating the following Polish foods? [1450]


Americans either don't know that word or think it's a type of pie at Christmas... the US expression is ground meat (or ground cutlet maybe for kotlet mielony).

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]


a lot more polite than my crude American version "he pulled that out of his @ss"....

which leads me to.... "it doesn't rip (one's) @ss"

History / Modern myths and legends about communist past in Poland [250]


When I first visited Poland in 1984 there was a 24 line in front of an appliance outlet. I was told that those in line (dozens if not hundreds of people) had shifts they had to wait to keep their place in line (there were never more than 7 or 8 people there but they were always different...

The sweet, sweet bounty of socialism!

Food / What do non-Poles think about eating the following Polish foods? [1450]


Odd, is bread Polish? Potatoes?

I used to lurve cod livers, but haven't had any in years... now I'm hungry...

Study / Various education and school issues in Poland. Opinions, stories, controversies. [1006]

When learning back before the internet and during the cold war so materials were scarce... I was dissatisfied with textbook explanations, which seemed to be based on the kind of things that Polonists learn... which won't be that helpful for learners. So I applied my linguistic training and made my own analyses...

I've had the chance to be involved in teaching Polish a bit to learners and they invariably find my explanations of aspect, cases etc far more comprehensible and useful than textbook or Polish class explanations... Polish is a language where good explanations can speed up the learning process immeasurably...

Study / Various education and school issues in Poland. Opinions, stories, controversies. [1006]


Well Polish doesn't have Germanic style modal verbs... móc, chcieć, musieć are just normal verbs that can combine with infinitives.
It does have some impersonal modals like trzeba, można and one oddball semi-modal pseudo-verb 'powinien'

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]

that's what shock therapy was for... most people eventually caught on, but the beton never did... guess which party they vote for?

Language / Extremely Hard - Polish the hardest language to learn [226]


Yes, a native speaker who hasn't used the language in a long time might hesitate in borderline cases but the basic distinction is as natural as 'the' and 'a/an' is for English speakers (which non-natives need to learn rules for, rules which don't always work).

For native speakers the language doesn't describe reality, it _is_ reality, for Rich Polish is obviously a foreign system the rules of which seem arbitrarily and needlessly complex while English is his reality. No non-native speaker attains smooth fluency without some kind of formal study as many fossilized and non-idiomatic forms clog up the flow.

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


Not even remotely restricted to the inner (or outer) party which, again, you would know if you were really Polish....

History / Heritage of partitions still present in Poland [107]


several years ago I edited an academic article that suggested that the wielkopolska region's higher level of development pre-dated the partitions (there was some prussian influence too, but it wasn't the decisive factor) at present distinct wielkopolska values are more limited to the city of Poznan (as the commies disliked said values and did what they could to dilute them...)

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


Which killed more people in the 20th century nationalism or communism (inherently anti-national)?

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


he's not a nationalist he's a totalitarian...

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


There's a couple of things going on, there's a push to reorient people's political loyalty away from fellow citizens and towards governments and/or along class lines. It works differently in different countries and in different settings but the message is the same: People who care about ideas like citizenship or civic values are losers and/or dangerous.

If the EU doesn't bring working class Brits immediate benefits then that's because they're stupid losers and the winners shouldn't care about them.

If the French working class can't keep up with the unfair tax burdens that Macron is heaping on them then they're stupid losers and you shouldn't care about them.

If the Greeks never should have been allowed into the Eurozone then they're stupid losers and you shouldn't care about them.
It's all about neoliberalism and dissolving all attachments beyond the individual's desire to consume... (getting a bit advanced here)

Zygmunt Bauman has a lot on it in books like wasted lives... you might not like his communist past but he was one of the most important thinkers of the last 50 years. Phillip bobbit writes about some of the same issues...

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


Of course. Part of that includes nationalist projects like increasing use of Ukrainian over Russian (one reason the Polish government has invested a good amount of money in promoting Ukrainian... and Belarusian although the results so far haven't been so great for the latter, which is a shame cause it's fun to listen to...)

Support modern Ukraine's western aspirations means letting go of some grudges against the Ukraine of decades or centuries ago which is more than some can bear...

I tend to think that their experience in Poland (and some other neighboring countries) can be of practical use to Ukrainian temporary employees - Czech, Slovakia and Poland are all examples of how it's possible to move forward past communism and communist ways of thinking and to modernize while still remaining unique - the UK and US and Germany are all too different in terms of language and culture so it's easier to disregard those examples but the western Slavic countries are close enough to provide possible models (imperfect, yes, but models still)


yes, you're a victim of brainwashing if you equate nationalism and war.

nationalism doesn't require war and doing away with nationalism doens't prevent war - they're separate concepts....

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


patriotism is impossible without nationalism

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]



no, you mistake normal levels of benign nationalism for weird radical nationalism...

if you want Poland to exist as an autonomous entity with its own language, culture and laws.... then you're a nationalist and deforming the language to make 'nationalism' bad serves no good purpose.

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


If it weren't for obsessed nationalists there would be no Poland. There is nothing wrong with nationalism and the recent campaign to turn it into a slur is degradation of language.

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


Exactly, not least because they're traveling a longer road than Poles had to. The Orange revolution was something like 1989 for Poland (or 1980...).

One of the reasons I've been in Poland so long as that witnessing the transformation (from country still reeling from communism to the emerging civil society found now) at ground level is so interesting. It's not recommended for those with weak nerves and it's hardly a story of linear progress, it's very much two steps back for every three steps forward and the whole process shuts down for long periods of time before lumbering back into motion.

The election of Zelenskyj is probably a step backward but setbacks are an inevitable part of the process. The election of PiS was partially a setback (we'll see how bad at the end of the month) but the process, once started, takes more than a few setbacks to halt.

Those who see the world in terms of decades (or centuries) old political, religious or ethnic grudges are like people who go to the Louvre in sunglasses...

History / Polish attitudes towards ex-Soviet republics joining NATO [116]


Ukraine is already under attack (and occupation) by Russia, which is as belligerent as it has always been.

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]

it's the same in English... although the order is usually carrot and stick (does the order say something?)

Has 'to have something in one's little finger' been here yet?

Language / Game - guess Polish idioms/sayings in direct English translation [1756]


In my (US) dialect they're all seeds except for peaches (pits), plums, cherries and mangoes can also have pits but I think seed is more common.

Speakers of monocentric languages (like Polish) who learn a polycentric language (like english or spanish) is they want a word/expression that works everywhere and... they often don't exist.

News / Petition for War Crimes Reparations for Poland [126]


They couldn't be so successfully corrupt in a vacuum, other EU leaders aided and abetted the fraud because they wanted a big roll out for the Euro...

As the old saying goes, you can't cheat an honest man....