Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]

Chaza, Derevon is right. Try to learn whole phrases and sentences rather than single words. A word-for-word translation may to some extent work with very simple sentences, but don't try it on idioms and compound sentences.

Out of the three sentences you provided, the first and the second are understandable though not correct. The last one however is a big mess, no Pole would be able to make heads nor tails out of it.

Once, when in he US, an older Pole asked me to help him with his homework. He didn't speak English and was attending some kind of a language school. I said OK, he brought two beers and off we went.

The sentence in his book read: This is a table.
'What's that in Polish?', asked pan Staszek.
'To jest stół.'
Pan Staszek began counting.
'This=to. Ok. Is=jest. OK. A=stół. OK. Now, what's table?'
'No. A table=stół.'
'Why are there two English words for a Polish one? And if one is stół, then what's the other one for?'
I tried to explain the notion of a pronoun to him, but he failed to understand that for one simple reason: as the word 'stół' had the third position in the Polish sentence, anything on the third position in the English sentence had to be 'stół'.

Well, eventually we moved on to questions and here pan Staszek seemed to regain the lost ground.
'Czy to jest stół? One, two, three, four. Is this a table? One, two, three, four. Great!'
He grabbed a pencil and started underwiriting meticuously:
Is
Czy

this
to

a
jest

table
stół

There was no way to convince him that not everything was right there. It had to be right, as four words equalled four words! The beer was good though.

See what I mean, Chaza?

Happy New Year :)

Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]

Don't worry, you'll make it. But again, try to memorize whole phrases/sentences, not just single words.

Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]


Chciałabym (iść) potańczyć.

"Bym" - 1st person conditional ending - is attached to the conjugated verb "chcieć".
You may also say: Chcę (iść) potańczyć, which is "I want to go dancing".

"Ja" is frequently omitted as verb ending already carries the person.

"I would like" for a female is "chciałabym".

Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]


Just accept that the English construction "go... -ing" is best translated into Polish with the infinitive and don't search for any more synonyms of "iść".

I would like to go skiing - chciałbym pojeździć na nartach
I would like to go shopping - chciałbym pójść na zakupy
I would like to go swimming - chciałbym popływać
etc.

Language / twoj wasz [12]

both are "your"
but ty is one person (single you) so twój is belonging to the one person
wy is plural you - more than one person - and wasz is belonging to wy

Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]


Think along these lines:
I will read (przeczytam) / I will be reading (będę czytać).

Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]

good!

only it's przywitać - the prefixes may vary from word to word, you must check it up every time

and in the past:
przywitałem - I welcomed
witałem - I was welcoming

that's as close as it can get

Language / Which preposition for 'at'? [58]

It can be przy-, prze-, and million other things, that's why I say you need to check it up each time, for every specific verb.

For witać it's "przy" - przywitać.
And don't confuse that "przy-" with the pronoun "przy". Historically they are related, but it's of no use for beginners. For now just treat them separately.

"Prze" is not "will". In the specific case of the verb "witać" "przy" is the prefix that changes it into a perfective verb "przywitać" and that's all there is to it.

"Will" is an auxiliary verb designating the future. In Polish we don't have auxiliary verbs and future sentences are formed using the proper conjugation forms of ordinary verbs. "Przywitam" and "przeczytam" are future forms already, as both verbs are perfective. With imperfective verbs - "witam" and "czytam" - you must add the proper conjugated form of "być": będę witać, będę czytać - this is future tense. So with these expressions you might say that "będę" is the "will" part, as in "I will be reading, I will be welcoming".

and a correction to the previous posts:

przewitać i will welcome

it should be przywitam

Life / POLISH DANCING (how to to this holding hands and such?) [11]


You really don't need to learn to dance krakowiak and polonez in order to do this kind of "holding hands,twirling round kind of dancing" which is danced at weddings and such. It's very very simple, just one step to the right, one to the left, and whirl around. Next time take your chance and ask one of the pretty ladies to teach you that, she should be delighted and you'll be a dancing master in some fifteen minutes :)

Genealogy / THE MEANING AND RESEARCH OF MY POLISH LAST NAME, SURNAME? [4500]

spławiać means to float. Maybe one of your ancestors was a raftsman?

Language / Can accidentally using the wrong gender form cause offence? [26]


Actually it happens in Polish, with family talking to small kids: "Mama jest na ciebie zła". "Nie pluj na babcię, babcia nie lubi, kiedy na nią plujesz". "Daj cioci buzi, to ciocia da ci lizaka", "Chodź, tata teraz zaprowadzi cię do przedszkola" etc.

Food / Good Polish "chrupki" recipe? [8]


what kind of chrupki do you have in mind?

Language / Can accidentally using the wrong gender form cause offence? [26]

oh, but is something else - talking about oneself in the 3rd person vs. talking to somebody in the 3rd person instead of 2nd.
The latter also happens in families, it's slightly archaic but still used sometimes: niech mama pójdzie, niech babcia powie. It's considered to be more respectful than the ordinary "mamo, idź".

As a matter of fact, it's the same form as in "niech pan/pani pójdzie".

Language / Nice Polish phrases to say to men [76]

Kocham Cię i do końca życia będę za Tobą tęsknić. Proszę, wróć tu, gdzie jest Twoje miejsce albo zabierz nas ze sobą, bo umieram z tęsknoty.

Language / Polish Swear Words [1242]

it would be either "o kurwa!" or "o Jezu!", take your pick

Language / 'ucha' [23]


It's correct when meaning not human or animal ears but e.g. pot handles, in the same way as "oka" is correct for the fat floating on the surface of broth.

Genealogy / THE MEANING AND RESEARCH OF MY POLISH LAST NAME, SURNAME? [4500]

sounds like Ukrainian version of Długopolak/Długopolski, meaning "a long Pole" or "coming from Long Poland". There is no such thing as Długa Polska - Long Poland, but the name is a real, existing one, so maybe somebody will be able to tell you more about it.

Language / 'ucha' [23]


are you sure? this came to my mind too, but Chaza asked about endings and not ending, so...


I think you meant parsley

Language / Can accidentally using the wrong gender form cause offence? [26]


Niech żyje Polska!

Work / Teaching English in Zakopane, is it safe? [45]


Yoga and Aikido haven't been spared either. It's the Dominicans who are responsible for the anti-sect propaganda and they really go over the top sometimes. Not that many people treat that seriously though, apart from some die-hard Catholic fundamentalists.

Language / Can accidentally using the wrong gender form cause offence? [26]


Strzygo


Tak myślałem, ale napisałem słowa w błędnej/niewłaściwej kolejności


Good :)


Także pamiętam, że 'pomóc' to czasownik a 'pomoc' to rzeczownik

Anytime :)

Language / Can accidentally using the wrong gender form cause offence? [26]


It's all right, the last sentence was faultless. Do you still want me to lead you to perfection? :))

Polish version: Czy nadal mam być upierdliwa?

Language / Can accidentally using the wrong gender form cause offence? [26]

Wow, you're doing great! Not a single mistake :)

co to jest "upierdliwość "?

I've just come across a nice English expression - "Dutch uncle" - which seems to be the exact equivalent of upierdliwiec.
Upierdliwość then is being a Dutch uncle.

To all the Dutch who might be reading this: nothing personal! :)

Czy ta istnieje?

Definitly it exists. And in this life too. I should know. I can be a perfect Dutch uncle if I choose to.
:)

Genealogy / Where in Poland is the town of Laka? [20]

Ellie

Do you have any idea from which part of Poland your granfather might have come?
Laka most probably was £ąka, meaning "meadow", and there are 7 villages of this name in Poland now.

7 miejscowości w Polsce:
£ąka - wieś w woj. dolnośląskim, w pow. bolesławieckim, w gminie Bolesławiec
£ąka - wieś w woj. opolskim, w pow. nyskim, w gminie Otmuchów
£ąka - wieś w woj. opolskim, w pow. oleskim, w gminie Zębowice
£ąka - wieś w woj. podkarpackim, w pow. rzeszowskim, w gminie Trzebownisko
£ąka - wieś w woj. śląskim, w pow. pszczyńskim, w gminie Pszczyna
£ąka - wieś w woj. zachodniopomorskim, w pow. drawskim, w gm. Czaplinek
£ąka - wieś w woj. zachodniopomorskim, w pow. goleniowskim, w gm. Stepnica

Lauga might also be a distorted form of £ąka, written phonetically by some English-speaking clerk.

Genealogy / Where in Poland is the town of Laka? [20]

Galicia was the part of Poland which fell under the Austrian rule in the time of the partitions. Out of all the £ąkas only one would have been in Galicia then:

£ąka - wieś w woj. podkarpackim, w pow. rzeszowskim, w gminie Trzebownisko
£ąka - a village in Podkarpackie region, Rzeszów district, Trzebownisko gmina
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/£ąka,_Subcarpathian_Voivodeship

This would go along nicely with your grandfather's name, which seems to be most frequent in the very area: moikrewni.pl/mapa/kompletny/tomaka.html

But the other part of the story (your grandmother) is more complicated.
Szwilisa could be Silesia - Śląsk. Then you have 4 £ąkas to choose from:

£ąka - wieś w woj. dolnośląskim, w pow. bolesławieckim, w gminie Bolesławiec
£ąka (Wiesau) - wieś w woj. opolskim, w pow. nyskim, w gminie Otmuchów
£ąka (Lenke) - wieś w woj. opolskim, w pow. oleskim, w gminie Zębowice
£ąka (Lonkau) - wieś w woj. śląskim, w pow. pszczyńskim, w gminie Pszczyna

Only the last two villages from my original list can be now skipped as they're located in what used to be West Pomerania, near the Baltic Sea.

Silesia was under the German rule so the name was probably Germanized back then. Might not be £ąka but something else. There's also a place in Estonia called Lauga.

Can't help you more now. Hope at least some of it makes sense.

Language / WHICH AUNT IS THE WUJENKA IN POLISH? [9]

Come on people, these names are hardly ever used in contemporary Polish, it's just wuj/ciotka. Read what Krzysztof wrote above.

For those who would still like to know just for the sake of it, look at the pink and purple diagram halfway through the page:

pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relacja_rodzinna

Genealogy / THE MEANING AND RESEARCH OF MY POLISH LAST NAME, SURNAME? [4500]


It's a big aristocratic name and hence another possibility: in the 19thc. there were a few armed uprisings and fights with the Russian forces occupying parts of Poland, all of them unfortunately lost. After that, in order to punish the aristocrats who supported these uprisings, the Russian tzar (or tzarina) gave their names to numerous Jews. Lots of Potockis, Czartoryskis and others appeared then. So if you know nothing about your ascendants coming from an aristocratic family, then there are good chances that one of them might have been a Jew.

There are many "real" Potockis' descendants alive now though. You may also look them up in Wikipedia - a lot of important historical figures there.

Language / Polish slang phrases - most popular. [606]

generally, yes.
still what Aga said is correct.

Language / popełnić (extended usage)? [5]

Ironic. Similarly, you hear sometimes "popełnić małżeństwo".

Language / Declension of town names in prepositional phrases in Polish [22]

It's the locative case (miejscownik) of the place name.

A church in Nieborów (kosciół w Nieborowie)
A shop in Lewiczyn (sklep w Lewiczinie) w Lewiczynie
A palace in Warszawa (pałac w Warszawie)
A street in Siedlce (ulica w Siedlcach)
A house in Paprotnia (dom w Paprotni) Paprotnie? w Paprotni; "w Paprotnie" would be correct if the name were Paprotno
A school in Nowy Ręczaje (szkoła w Ręczajach Nowych) w Nowych Ręczajach - why change the order?
also, I think that should be Nowe Ręczaje

Some place names are tricky and problematic even for the natives.