Language / Dzięki temu...... ? [8]


Temu in "sto lat temu" is different than temu in "dzięki temu". In the latter, it is the dative case of the zaimek wskazujacy ten/ta/to: dzięki czemu? dzięki temu! In the former, temu is an idiomatic word equivalent to the English "ago", although it definitely takes its root in the zaimek ten/ta/to. See the following sentence: minęło sto lat od tego [czasu/wydarzenia] = zdarzyło się sto lat temu.

UK, Ireland / Britain... What the Poles did for us. [444]

Having not read any of the posts of this thread except the one quoted above, and not going to read any of them, either, I must say I agree with everything you've just said about Harry ...

Genealogy / Seeking Czarniecki family members and ancestors from Lublin, also Margiewicz, Danilowicz and Andrulewicz [77]


What's wrong in Mickiewicz having a Jewish mother? Which Polish people do not like to hear it? Being Polish, I can see nothing strange in it, and I'm also pleased to hear about it; although no more or less pleased than if he had a Polish, North American or Zimbabwean mother.

Genealogy / Please help me trace my surname origin - Gurklis [9]

It may be a surname of Lithuanian origin.

Work / Teaching English in Krakow -- how to find students? [52]

As a native speaker of Polish living in Poland, I'm sure it's possible. But I wouldn't advise you to charge as little as 20 zł an hour. People may get suspicious as to your abilities to talk as a native if your price is so low. On the other hand, you may get uninterested to give conversations during which you have to follow closely what your student says and make corrections to his talk for that price. You will have to arrange topics for the conversations as well, since it won't be good just to say to them "Let's sit down and talk, what would you like to do talk about with me?" In my view, some 35-40-45-50 zł an hour should perhaps be fair for that. Anyway, it is just what I would have accepted for having some pratice in "guided" conversations at my level of English from an inexperienced teacher like you.

Work / Teaching English in Krakow -- how to find students? [52]


It seems people don't realise the difference between knowing the language by themselves and explaining it to others. Still, I think that an apt native speaker is able to partly do the job well without any formal qualifications in teaching, though I believe such qualifications are an obvious advantage.

I support the view of Harry (as Seanus would say: "Harry has a good point here") that the native language of the learner should be "forgotten" as much as possible, ideally "entirely" forgotten, in the process of teaching him any foreign one. Personally, I gave up using bilingual dictionaries at some stage of my learning English, passing to monolingual ones only. (I stepped even further up in that direction trying not to use these either in learning my second foreign language, French.) Some concepts, however, are extremely difficult to teach. One such example is teaching to use properly the definite/indefinite articles of English for which case the interference of the student's native Polish language is so strong that he is "bound" to make mistakes, regardless of whether his even highest-qualified native teacher of English only uses English in the classroom.

Work / Teaching English in Krakow -- how to find students? [52]


Six years for teaching people a single aspect of the language is either ridiculously long or it is - given the omnipresence of this aspect in the language and its strangeness to the Polish learner - ridiculously short. But since six years is so close to the biblical "seven years", let's agree it is a good compromise ...

There should be nothing to mystify the student about the Canary Islands versus 'Japan' without 'the' describing a group of five islands. By saying 'Japan' we mean an entity-country, saying 'the Canary Islands' we mean 'a group of islands named Canary' regardless whether they constitute a country or not. The case is somewhat similiar to the Polish usage of "w-na" with regard to 'island' as opposed to 'country'. For example, we'd say: "byłem w Irlandii", meaning first of all the country of Ireland, though it is an island as well, but we'd say: "byłem na Grenlandii", as Greenland is first of all an island, not a separate country.

UK, Ireland / The Daily Mail - coverage of the Polish people [161]

When I lived in Britain in 1981 staying with British friends with no Polish connections, I once bought The Daily Mail and brought it home. " 'The Daily Mail' is not allowed here" (that is, at their home) - they told me.

UK, Ireland / The Daily Mail - coverage of the Polish people [161]


You are somewhere near the truth. In fact, my friends read no newspapers, had no TV set at home, but as very well educated people indeed, they used to listen to BBC 4 for information and entertainment (the "Weekending" programme, for example, which I adored as well and learned English through it). But if British Parliament had passed a law obliging every household in the UK to buy at least one newspaper a day, I'm sure that my friends - Labour supporters born in Manchester - would have surely turned to the "Manchester Guardian" ...

By the way, I still remember a story in The Daily Mail of 1981 in which they were describing a pub owner, dedicated Conservative supporter, cutting out a full-size silhouette of Mrs. Thatcher, the then British PM, and sticking it on the door of the ladies' loo in his pub with a pair of orange pants, his wive's old ones - as he explained, down the silhouette's legs. Then three Tory ladies came in for a drink, saw Mrs T. hanging on the door of the loo with her pants down, were so outraged that they demanded removal of the Iron Lady from the door, but first of all, removal of the pants. The owner had firmly refused this demand and asked the ladies out, so the orange pants had luckily stayed up - or rather down! - until The Daily Mail reporter arrived to make a photo of it. His customers - fervent Conservative supporters - found it extremely funny, he said. The mother of my other friend, a Labour supporter, found it extremely disgusting, however, when she saw that picture in the paper I brought along to her house. I did not hear Mrs T. making any comment on this incident later on.

UK, Ireland / The Daily Mail - coverage of the Polish people [161]


Yes, I am. Parliament is free to pass any bills it needs or thinks relevant. Some people will not comply with the bills passed by Parliament, so Her or His Majesty prepares fines, also prisons wait ready for them. My friends as law-abiding British subjects would certainly comply and - given the choice - would buy The Guardian. If Parliament were to force them to buy a daily copy of The Daily Mail, they would most probably refuse and would risk to be sent into prison instead.

The British sovereign is under the control of British Parliament either. If Parliament passed a bill to end the monarchy in Britain and ordered the Queen to get beheaded, she would have no other choice than sign the bill and put her head under the axe. Such is the logic of the constitutional monarchy in the UK, whether you like it or not. The power by Parliament over the monarch was once revealed to the monarch in full in the course of British history, with the most deplorable effect on the latter, so Queen Elisabeth II prefers to sit quiet in one of her palaces, signing every bill that Parliament kindly passes her to sign.

Language / The finer points of Polish grammar - 1 (podróżni) [22]



I'm afraid you are right, Mr Fuzzywicket (by the way, I've always asked myself if we should put a comma after 'Mr'; you have, wheras I have not). Please notice that the sentence "Obaj podróżni wysiedli w £odzi" is correct by all means. I'm sure you know how to complete the sentence "Obie podróżne .................... w £odzi".

News / Zloty exchange rates - is this just speculation? [87]


Could you please specify any figures? What's Poland's deficit now and who says it should be double this figure and why?

Real Estate / Do we need to get a UK solicitor or a Polish one? [19]


This case is very simple and you shouldn't have any trouble resolving it. The property passes onto heirs apparent which in the typical example will be the spouse (half of value of property) and the children (the other half divided between them in equal parts). If your mother was the only established owner of the property and did not leave a testament, then heirs apparent are the children, that is you and your sister. You have to get the property into your names either by a court act (which here would be an "administrative" one really) or with a notary. You may contact a notary yourself without hiring any lawyers acting on your behalf if the case is that simple as you say. It would be best for you to contact a Polish notary, "kancelaria notarialna", where they speak English. The maximum level of fees charged by the notary cannot exceed limits set by the Ministry of Justice for particular types of action.

Law / How will the Zloty be against the British Pound over the next 6-12 Months [45]

Investor Jim Rogers, chairman of Singapore-based Rogers Holdings who co-founded the Quantum Fund with George Soros, said he is shunning sterling because of the U.K.’s trade deficit. “Things are pretty bad for sterling for the long, long, long term,” Rogers said in an interview with Bloomberg Television today. “I cannot imagine buying sterling back unless it gets really cheap.”

“I doubt I will own sterling in my lifetime,” said Rogers, 67, who predicted the start of the global commodities rally in 1999.

The U.K. trade deficit unexpectedly rose in January to the widest in 17 months, reaching 8 billion pounds ($12 billion).

-------------
My message of 6 Nov 2006 (zloty/sterling rate as of that day was 4.74) in this thread said:


The sterling is at 4,33 zloty as of today; the first quarter of 2010 is not over yet, however.

News / Is Poland the only high minded country of Cental and Eastern European countries? [41]


I've just found this entry in my "Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English" book:

high-mindedadj having or showing very high esp. moral standards, perhaps too high; -lyadv, -nessn [U]

News / Is Poland the only high minded country of Cental and Eastern European countries? [41]


Actually, after you've typed "high-minded" into thetimesonline search engine, you get 951 results as of today. The adjective has usually been used there with nouns such as 'seriousness', 'ambition', 'generosity' and others, or with reference to individuals and personalities.

The closest example of use of this adjective to the way it's been used in the title of this thread was in the review of the book by Nicholas Penny "National Gallery Catalogues: The 16th-Century Italian Paintings, Volume II: Venice 1540-1600" by Jonathan Keates in The Sunday Times of April 27, 2008:

"From the siren Serenissima, wicked old Venice full of sex, masks and money, we flee to the uncluttered austerities of high-minded Florence, to detox with bracing doses of Giotto and Fra Angelico."

But true, it was the only such use in connection to a country or a city that I've found in the list of searched results.

Real Estate / Do we need to get a UK solicitor or a Polish one? [19]

If you want to sell property such as a house or flat to someone you need a proof stating that the property is your own. Change in ownership of such property needs the confirmation by a notary (akt notarialny). If you go to a notary and say the property is yours now as your mother who owned it died, they will ask you to bring them a court sentence stating who are heirs apparent and in what proportions heirs apparent will own the inherited property.

For some time now, these are notaries who may establish heirs apparent themselves in place of courts. So you may do the two things under one roof: (1) get the official statement as to who is entitled to inherit property and in what proportions, (2) having got this statement, get one or more of akt notarialny for (each) individual property(ies). Then you may sell it (under the roof of the same notary, if you want).

I have been through this procedure some years ago before the changes in law, so I had to go to court first to get a stwierdzenie o nabyciu spadku, then I had to go to a notary to get the akt notarialny. I did not need any lawyers for that and the cost was little. Lawyers will be needed in case you shall dispute your right to property with someone else.

News / Is Poland the only high minded country of Cental and Eastern European countries? [41]

As the thread begins to slide off into irrelevant topics such as the US visa problems for Poles or Tusk being not especially high-minded, I'm asking the mod to close it.

News / Is Poland the only high minded country of Cental and Eastern European countries? [41]

Seanus

If you refer to the adjective "high-minded" as 'having or showing very high esp. moral standards, perhaps too high' in your last post, I should only add that by 'high moral standards' we should refer not only to religious standards, but moral standards universal to mankind. These are actually embedded in every monoteistic religion on this planet, and there are many of those who do not observe them in either of these religions. Likewise, if someone is an atheist, she or he may also follow such universal moral standards, without giving any money to a church.

News / Is Poland the only high minded country of Cental and Eastern European countries? [41]

I'm delighted by this! By the way, couldn't you disagree with Crow that Tusk is a worm? (By the way, Crow is another fellow who shows his disregard not only of Prime Minister Tusk, but also for indefinite articles in English.)

News / Is Poland the only high minded country of Cental and Eastern European countries? [41]


I cannot say I am not aware of it. Undoubtedly, using slavicized English is your "plus" (one of the many) ...

UK, Ireland / The Daily Mail - coverage of the Polish people [161]


And here again: my friend ... told me ... on several occasions ... Poles trying to catch swans ... police did not come ...

There has never been any tradition of eating swans in Poland! It would be good if you could report at least one officially documented case of Poles catching and eating swans instead of telling us about your friend who told you something about police who did nothing.

UK, Ireland / The Daily Mail - coverage of the Polish people [161]


Common knowledge is often reflected in common sayings. One of such in Poland is: jedna baba drugiej babie wsadziła raz w dupę grabie ...

UK, Ireland / The Daily Mail - coverage of the Polish people [161]


These immigrants are not creating stereotypes, it is The Daily Mail which is creating stereotypes of Polish people on the basis of these immigrants.

UK, Ireland / The Daily Mail - coverage of the Polish people [161]


Yes, it does. If the Daily Mail (and other sources) did not create and propagate the said stereotypes, repetedly presenting the behaviours of some (!), these people could not fuel any of such, even if they wanted to.

Language / średniozaawansowany prodręcznik do nauki polskiego [8]

Just a little correction which you perhaps may find useful. Although you put the word "intermediate" before the "coursebook/textbook" noun in English, in Polish you should say: "podręcznik do nauki polskiego dla średniozaawansowanych".

Good luck for you in finding an appropriate book!

Law / Kaczyński doubts the Euro currency will survive [49]

I strongly doubt that euro will be abandoned altogether, nevertheless I was shocked when the case of nearly-bankrupt Greece emerged. This is a case demonstrating that the concept of "trust" is understood differently in different European countries. What I mean is in fact a certain opposition between "northern" and "southern" Europe, or to put it another way between the "protestant" and the "Latin or Catholic" Europe, with the UK, the Benelux, Germany and Scandinavia being in the former, and Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece in the latter (France in between perhaps). The CEB bankers now say of Greece: 'we couldn't have supposed they would be cheating us', and I am inclined to believe them as they indeed would have never assumed the Dutch or the Swedish could have been cheating them, so they thought the same of the Greeks.

The line between "northerners" and "southerners" in Europe cannot, of course, be very precise. But there is something in it within this case of the euro crisis. I remember my English teacher telling me her experience with other students in her classes in London where she used to learn English in an international group of people. Their British teacher used to remind the Spanish students of the group: Tomorrow the lesson starts at 10. And listen, you Spanish people, when I say at 10, I mean at 10, not a quarter past ten or at half past 10! Where is Poland in that division between "north" and "south"? I'd say somewhere in between, though since the time of the currency reform by Mr. Grabski in 1924, and thanks to the financial reform of Mr. Balcerowicz later on, I'd say Poland is closer to the "north" than to the "south" of Europe in terms of public finances and the central banking thing.

Real Estate / How are Poland's properties priced? [51]


No, it isn't worth investing in Polska. If I were you, I would just go to the Detroit area and buy as many houses valued at 1 dollar each as I could afford ...

Law / Kaczyński doubts the Euro currency will survive [49]


It sounds familiar in the sense that Brussels has waken up from its winter sleep (you can check for yourself that winter is over and spring is around). Unfortunately though, when Brussels slept, the Greek bear together with one of the American grizzlies, Goldman Sachs, decided to rob Brussels of its honey pots during that winter time. Now Brussels is back at its senses, but being half-asleep after waking up from its long dreams of grandeur, mistakes the Polish bear for the Greek bear.

Language / The usage of "dwoje" [11]


To see how the numerals dwoje, troje, czworo, pięcioro etc. are used, compare the translations into Polish of the following two English expressions:

"The Sign of Four" (the title of a novel by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle featuring the fictional detective Sherlock Holmes) is translated into Polish as "Znak Czterech" (four men being involved in the title plot).

The 'Gang of Four' (the name given to a leftist political faction composed of four Chinese Communist Party officials) is translated into Polish as 'Banda Czworga' (they were not all men, but one of its members was a woman, Mao Zedong's last wife Jiang Qing).