Posts from June 2008

The Mythical Polish Plumber

Posted by Anna 8 Comments
Jun 16 2008

My favorite politician, Nicholas Sarkozy went to Poland a few weeks ago and chatted with the Polish honchos in charge, namely, with one of the ducks – Lech Kaczyński. (The surname “Kaczyński” comes from the word “kaczka” which means “a duck” in English.)

While in Poland, my favorite politician made the announcement of opening the French job market to the 10 countries that joined the EU in 2004. And that also includes Poland.

This immediately made me think of the mythical Polish plumber. You see, the French are very afraid of Polish plumbers. Not sure exactly why. Maybe they have a phobia of Slavic men brandishing pipes and plungers. But when Poland joined the EU, there was much concern in France over Polish plumbers heading west.

Unfortunately, the French forgot that their difficult language is not as popular among Slavic plumbers as it used to be, and worried needlessly. The plumbers spoke mostly English and went to Ireland and the UK instead.

Read More »

One Town Three Names

Posted by Anna 15 Comments
Jun 13 2008

Poland has had a complicated history. And that’s a boring historical fact. What’s not boring is how that history affected the names of all sorts of places. In certain regions of what is now Poland, people sometimes lived in three different countries, all within the span of a lifetime, and without ever leaving their home town. Each time when a place got new sovereign overlords, the first thing the new honchos did, was to impose a new national language. That in turn resulted in a change of the local name.

Anybody, who’s ever tried to research their Polish genealogy, knows how annoying this whole name changing business can be.

For example:

Hirschberg – Jelenia Góra
Allenstein – Olsztyn
Breslau – Wrocław
And the most infamous of them all: Auschwitz – Oświęcim.

Read More »

Poles vs Poles

Posted by Anna No Comments
Jun 9 2008

The Euro Cup 2008 frenzy has started. TV programming has been rearranged, matches are replayed at nauseam by every news outlet imaginable, newspaper sports pages have swollen to twice their normal size and people on the streets proudly strut in their national colors. Yep. It’s all soccer. All the time.

Soccer, or football, as we call it over here, is definitely the most popular sport in Poland. Polish fans are famous for their enthusiasm and support. But yesterday’s match tested even the most ardent football enthusiasts. Poland played with Germany during the Euro Cup 2008. And lost. 2 to zip.

No big deal, you may say. Happens all the time. Nah, it doesn’t! You see, both goals were scored by a native Pole, who now plays for the German national team. Lukas (“Łukasz” in Polish) Podolski. He was born in Poland and holds dual nationality. And get this, both times the ball was passed to him by another Pole, who now also plays for the German national team – Miroslav (“Mirosław” in Polish) Klose.

Both guys moved from Poland to Germany when they were kids. Back in those days Poland was still under the communist regime. Both sets of parents were athletes and wanted a better future for their children. Germany, being right next door, seemed like a logical place to settle. In Klose’s situation, the issue was not all that complicated – his father was a Polish-German himself. But as he said in interviews, even now he still speaks Polish at home.

Such emigration was a common occurrence. Germany, the US, Canada, and many other countries benefited from the many talented people, who were leaving Poland in droves during those days. Their kids are now musicians, actors, scientists, writers.

Fast forward to a few years later. Poland is now a member of the European Union. The kids who left the country with their parents are now strapping young men. They also happen to play excellent soccer. German soccer. Sometimes against Poland.

Soccer/football = piłka nożna
Soccer fans = kibice

Cases in Polish: Nominative

Posted by Anna No Comments
Jun 3 2008

Because Polish nouns have seven (yep, you read that right – SEVEN!) cases, covering all of them in just one entry would be a bit of an overkill. To make it easy for all (but especially for me!), we’ll do them on a case-by-case basis.

But first things first. What is a “case” anyway?

(Warning! Warning! Boring grammatical stuff ahead!!!)

In Polish, as in other Slavic languages, certain words such as nouns, adjectives and pronouns change their endings. And just how a certain word changes is not random, but depends on its role in a sentence. This complicated process is called declension, because the words “decline” to show “case”. Confused yet? I am! I never liked grammar…

So, let’s start with the easiest case of all – the NOMINATIVE case (in Polish – MIANOWNIK). That’s the basic noun, just as it appears in a dictionary. And that’s the case you use when a noun is the subject of a sentence.

Read More »

Back to the Top