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

Spot on, Milo!

Off-Topic / Random Chat Thread [508]

@Pawian, Polish still is not my native language! Thanks just the same for the kudos:-))
Watched an old 35 mm print of "Popiol i Diamenty" the other day, bez angielskich napisow.
Most of the dialogue I could understand...basically. On an idiomatic level??
All I know is that when I originally saw the film in college with the requisite subtitles, I
realized even way back then that the English didn't do justice to the original.

Language / I'm native Polish and I hate my own language. [106]

Spot on, elizabethwilliam!
Hate a language as one well might, I can't tell you all how many times
I've encountered Europeans typically who merrily claim to love English
and who even prefer speaking it to their native tongue.

Most of the time, their English is nothing more than a hodge podge of
vulgarity and substandard grammar, easily rationalized as representing
the "English of today" LOL

Because a tree is sick from acid rain or decay, do we therefore justify
its sickness and decay as somehow healthy? Or do we instead try to cure
it by eliminating the root disease?

Simple exposure to sound, textured, and rich English usage will cure the
language from the illness of slovenly indifference.

A language like a person is nothing more than living tissue and much English
nowadays is dead from the neck up!!

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

You can say that again, Rich! Glad to hear you finally admit it.

Off-Topic / Random Chat Thread [508]

Ahemm, Rich. 'Scusez moi, but Buckley was a rock-ribbed, Catholic conservative!
I'd think you'd emulate everything about him :-)

The fact that I have a vocabulary which hasn't been dumbed down by drug abuse
is what irritates you. That's really the bottom line, admit it or not.

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

Correct, Milo! English has become the global language of miscommunication.
Examples?? I wouldn't know where to start.

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

A random sign in a Gothenburg hotel dining room (in English, not even in the native language of the country!):

PLEASE DON'T HAVE CHILDREN AT THE BAR

Indeed, perhaps a hospital would be a more suitable venue.

Directions at an outdoor rest stop in Germany's Black Forest.

BATHROOMS FOR EITHER MALE OR FEMALE OR BOTH SEXES!

Last time I looked, I had only one:-) If the signage person had meant "UNISEX TOILETS", when
in the name of Creation didn't they bloody say so?!!

OUR LIFT MAKES YOU RIGHT NOW UNBEARABLE!

Perhaps vaguely comprehensible, but geez, why not get right the first time?

Need I go on? And the kicker is that those in these different countries don't even
see the ridiculousness of it.

Off-Topic / Random Chat Thread [508]

Right on, AntV!

UK, Ireland / "Strange " English language.. [81]

Or "little dream" aka "drzemka", really more "little snooze", ha-ha!

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

Well now, with LGBTQ and transgenders, perhaps not!
lol

History / Why do Polish people hate to be called Eastern European? [121]

Often in English, "Scandinavia" and "Nordic" are lumped together, although
for example, Finland, while technically Scandinavian is NOT Nordic owing to its
language:-)

UK, Ireland / English/British rudeness - what do Polish people think about it? [117]

When first in the UK on a teen tour of England during the late '70's,
I found the average Londoner more politely snide than out-and-out rude
or in your face nasty.

Then again, I was a teenager and everything seemed new and exciting.
Remember though being corrected when I called a Yeoman Warder
a "beefeater" (think of the Scotch brand) and being somewhat upbraided
when I referred to England as "being in Europe". I learned that to Brits,
England is England and Europe is "the Continent"!

Off-Topic / Random Chat Thread [508]

Pray tell, Rich, we're all bursting with curiosity.

Off-Topic / Random Chat Thread [508]

If I'm a weasel, what then does that make you?
I detect more jealousy in your remarks than anything else.

History / Why do Polish people hate to be called Eastern European? [121]

Do you fully understand the meaning of "Western" or are you simply trolling again?

UK, Ireland / English/British rudeness - what do Polish people think about it? [117]

Nevertheless, a significant pre-Brexit experience, don't you think?

History / Why do Polish people hate to be called Eastern European? [121]

@Hr.Grunwald, every Finn with whom I've had contact does NOT consider themselves a "Nordic",
even a "Scandinavian" (Scandi), but instead a (proud) Finn, albeit an unwilling Swedish speaker
as their unofficial second aka colonial language after the Vasa period, even if most seem to show
a greater facility with Swedish than English:-)

Off-Topic / Random Chat Thread [508]

A sense of humor and being a forum troll are incompatible.

History / Why do Polish people hate to be called Eastern European? [121]

Oh, quite the contrary, Hr Grunwald! You might have misunderstood my
post. Both Jews AND Arabs are Semites, ergo, to be "anti-SEMITIC" in
theory means to hate Arabs as well as Jews.

Kindly await private message:-)

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

Thank you, jon. At last somebody's steering the discussion back to the original conversation thread!

History / German Sprache aka speech in Polish films [16]

In the Resistance Era film "Zakazane piosenki", the German
officers are naturally all played by Polish actors with thick Polish
accents! In one scene, a high-ranking Nazi whose plans to attack
Warsaw have been scuttled, exclaims, "Donnerwetter, verflixt nochmal!"
with such a heavy Polish pronunciation, the subtitles actually have to
appear phonetically below on the screen in order that viewers can understand
what is being saidLOL

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

Actually, I find German academic writing for example, sometimes with those extended adjective constructions,
much more difficult than any Polish sentences I've encountered!

Polish is challenging to foreigners for her counting quirks, perfective/imperfective verbs and
morphological permutations, German for her often dizzying sentence length, myriad plural varieties, above all,
random grammatical gender assignment. Thank heavens I learned the latter as a kid. It made learning Polish
some thirty years hence far easier.

Genealogy / Jewish Roots of Poland [637]

Nice riposte there, Alien.

UK, Ireland / "Strange " English language.. [81]

@Milo, if you deny the conventional British class system, then I do suggest
you review your history! Moreover, I never denied that the US and the UK have
tried to understand each other. Need I repeat the famous quote of Shaw, that
Britain and America are two countries separated by a common language?

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

Rich, as I've always maintained, such remains YOUR particular issue with your Polish
mother tongue, not mine!

Off-Topic / Should people be free to cut their hair and dye it as they want? [16]

While I'm not a member of the Morality Police Force here, I feel anyone is
"free" to dress as they feel. Whether this reflects an aesthetic standard or
merely some infantile, repressed personal rebellion or not, remains a separate
question:-)

UK, Ireland / "Strange " English language.. [81]

@jon, I've described what is known historically as the "Class System".
One has but to read standard English literature from "Tom Brown's Schooldays"
by Dr. Matthew Arnold up through the mid-20th century to understand the term.

Trust you're being funny.

Law / The right to own guns: would you support such legislation in Poland? [2810]

Ahemm, gun makers pay millions in taxes each year, what are you talking about?

UK, Ireland / "Strange " English language.. [81]

It all depends on where or when one's grown up. I take it you're fairly young
or perhaps grew up outside England, maybe in Scotland, during the '60's.

UK, Ireland / "Strange " English language.. [81]

Agreed.
Then again, there is a tendency nowadays for "gaslighting" aka
making the other person think they're a little off, even stupid, merely
so that the gaslighter can laugh at that person!

For instance, if a somebody makes a remark about someone's brogue, to which that person
responds that there's no such thing as a brogue, what does that mean, and so forth,
merely to gently tease the first person, this is undoubtedly what jon's doing here.

He's an intelligent, articulate, interesting poster, therefore, well aware of the concept of
class system, but simply feels like kidding, that's all.