Posts in April 2009

Fifth Anniversary of Joining the EU

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Apr
30
2009

Tomorrow is the fifth anniversary of the enlargement of the European Union. Yes, it’s been five years already since the day Poland joined “Europe”. This, and the swine flu seem to dominate the news today. But, frankly, people are more interested in the flu than in the anniversary. It’s amazing how quickly we learn to take such momentous events for granted.

I asked a few random people about how much their lives have changed since Poland became a member of the EU. Their answers certainly gave me food for thought. Younger kids (well, I call them kids, anyone younger than 30 is a kid to me, OK?) don’t seem to remember any other Poland than this European one. If you’re 20, five years is a very long time indeed. They are too busy planning their studies abroad to have time to ponder how quickly the fortunes of Poland had turned.

Then, there are those who kvetch that the EU is highly over-rated. That life was better in the olden days. As you can imagine, this is a somewhat older generation.

Personally, if someone had told me twenty years ago that one day a Polish passport would be a highly coveted commodity, I would have laughed myself silly. But this day is here now. And I’m definitely not laughing anymore.

Poland has been changing so fast that sometimes it’s hard to keep up. And it shows no signs of slowing down. The next step – adopting the euro. When it will happen, I don’t know. Do I think it’s a good idea to join the eurozone? I’m not so sure. But I am sure that we will adapt. If anything, the last ten and five years showed the amazing resilience and adaptability of our country.

Many in Poland complain that Poles are not very flexible and open to changes. I disagree. And anyone, who’s been looking at the country from the outside, can confirm my opinion. I see nothing but constant changes. Not always for the better, but that’s how we learn. We’ve been in the EU for only five years. During this time we had no choice but to achieve what took older members many more years. True, Poland is a work a progress and we still have a long way to go. But at least we are going and getting somewhere. So, happy fifth anniversary Poland!

Have a wonderful long weekend, enjoy the glorious weather, and I’ll see you back here on Monday.

 
Posted under Culture, History
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Polish Sense of Humor or Lack Thereof

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Apr
28
2009

I went to Grycan today (yeah, czas na lody – time for ice cream) with one of my pals and he (oh, hi Martin!) had some interesting things to say about how he perceives our (as in: Polish) sense of humor. But before I proceed any further, just to make things absolutely clear - Martin is German. That will explain many things, I’m sure. I hope.

He reads this blog and he even left maybe two comments once upon a time, sometime last year. But he’s been a keen, faithful reader since this blog began, and because he was passing through my town this week, we decided to meet for coffee (or rather - ice cream).

So, we ate ice cream and talked. And here’s the kicker – based on the comments left on this blog by my Polish readers, Martin says that we, as a nation, give the impression of having no sense of humor whatsoever. What puzzles him is that Poles have a great sense of humor if one deals with them in person, he says.

Apparently, judging from the comments on this blog, we come across as a dull nation obsessed with grammar and taking immense pleasure in pointing out other people’s (Poles) mistakes. He says that this linguistic one-upmanship can be rather amusing for an outsider to watch.

Yikes! Are we really THAT bad? If so, I sincerely apologize, just in general on behalf of all my Polish readers and commenters.

But then Martin went on to say that fortunately, Polish people are quite delightful and funny when you talk to them in person. Now, that’s better! With that, I can completely agree.

What I think the problem is, is that Poles have a very specific sense of humor, one that is not so easily understood by non-natives. Of course, that a sense of humor can be country-specific is true of pretty much any nation in the world, even including Germans.

I’d be the first one to admit that we tend to laugh at things that may seem… well… strange, I guess. Anyone (anyone foreign, that is) who has ever tried to watch “Sami swoi” knows exactly what I’m talking about. My husband to this day doesn’t understand what’s so funny about this film.

So, here’s a very serious question to my non-Polish readers – do we, Poles, have a sense of humor? Or don’t? And how does it come across to foreigners?

  • poczucie humoru – sense of humor
  • dowcip (masc., plural: dowcipy) – joke (the kind you tell others)
  • kawał (masc., plural: kawały) – literally: piece, lump (rather larger), colloquially: joke (the kind you tell others).
 
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Na poczcie - At the Post Office

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Apr
26
2009

I had to go to the Post Office yesterday and managed to make a total fool out of myself in the process. And all this shame and public humiliation could have been avoided, if only I had paid closer attention when reading blogi (blogs) by foreign expats in Poland.

So, this is what happened. I had with me the packet I wanted to send, I had with me the appropriate address form, already filled out too – I wanted to send my packet as EMS, which in Poland is known as Pocztex, and bravely made my way to the window.

I don’t normally frequent post offices, because there are better things in life than waiting in looooong, sloooooow moving lines. But post offices in Poland are kind of fun, in a weirdly interesting kind of way. They not only handle the usual post-officy business, but also provide banking, insurance and who-knows-what-else services. And apart from stamps, you can also purchase a wide range of items there: facial tissue packets, bus tickets, pantyhose, books, and even cemetery candles. My local post office also sells condoms (and this is not a joke), probably because you just never know when you might need one, right?

One thing that Poczta Polska (Polish Post Office) cannot do, however, is to accept bank cards and credit cards. In other words, you either pay in cash or not at all.

So what do you do if you end up like me, standing at the stamp window without enough złotys in your wallet? Just ignore the sour look of the stamp selling lady and the annoyed sights of the people waiting in line behind you and ask “W którym okienku jest bankomat?” (In which window is there an ATM?)

I was sent over to window number 3 where a “bankomat” lady informed me that yes, I could withdraw cash there. I handed her my bank card, she swiped it, I punched in my PIN code and expected her to give me the money.

Not so fast! She wanted my dowód osobisty (ID card) first. I didn’t have it with me. I had my paszport (passport) though. Nope. Not good enough. It had to be dowód osobisty or nothing. When I asked her why she needed it, since I obviously knew my PIN and the name on my passport matched the name on my card, she couldn’t really answer me. “Przepisy,” (rules) she said.

I told her to cancel the transaction, told the lady at the stamp window to hold on to my packet and ran outside. There were eight banks in the immediate vicinity of the post office. I went to the nearest “real”ATM, withdrew some cash (no dowód osobisty necessary) and returned to the post office. I proceeded straight to the postage stamp lady and attempted to finally send my packet on its merry EMS way.

THEN, and only then she informed me that she was all out of those special Pocztex plastic envelopes, that she couldn’t accept my packet packaged as it was (a normal bubble-wrap padded envelope), and that I had to go and find me a different post office.

Ahhhhh, it’s great to be back in Poland.

 
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About the Mammas and the Pappas - in Polish

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Apr
23
2009

The other day I was discussing motherhood with one of my friends. No, I am not planning to have a baby, I have two cats and I’m quite happy with them for the time being. However, my friend has a baby and we were going over the joys and perils of motherhood and the problems of fatherhood. And then we started to marvel at just how gloriously illogical this language of ours is.

Because take a look at this:

Motherhood is “macierzyństwo”. But fatherhood is not “tacierzyństwo” but “ojcostwo”.
Maternity leave is “urlop macierzyński”. And what about paternity leave? Until very recently there wasn’t even such animal in Poland. But now that there is (and will be officially official at all places of employment beginning next year for all new fathers who want to take advantage of it) what do we call it in Polish? Urlop tacierzyński.

But that’s not all. That’s just the beginning of problems with dads.
Ok, mom and dad are two of the first words that a child learns, or so I hear. In Polish those words are easy: mama and tata.

You’d think that it must be pretty hard to screw up something to easy and so basic that every Pole older than 9 months knows it, right? Wrong! Because in reality it’s not that easy, trust me.

While the plural of “mama” is of course “mamy” – every child knows that, what is the plural of “tata”? Automatically, we wanted to say “taty”. We even called a friendly elementary school teacher to see what she had to say. How does she tell the kids to ask their moms and dads to come to the meeting, for example? She tried to cheat and said: “mamy i ojcowie” (moms and fathers).

But how do you say “dads” in plural without cheating and using “fathers” instead? Does “tata” even have a plural form? Yes, it (he? LOL) does.

The correct plural of “tata” is “tatowie”. I know, you don’t have to tell me. I don’t see any logic in it either. The plural of “mama” is “mamy” but the plural of “tata” is “tatowie”. Apparently, that noun follows the same pattern as “dziadek – dziadkowie” (grandfather – grandfathers) and “wujek – wujkowie” (uncle – uncles). Yes, but those masculine nouns don’t end in “a”. And those masculine nouns that do end in “a”, such as kierowca (driver) or doradca (advisor) have plural forms eerily resembling those of “mamy” – kierowcy (drivers) and doradcy (advisors).

So, let’s review:

  • mama (feminine) – mamy (feminine, plural)

but

  • tata (masculine) – tatowie (masculine, plural)
  • urlop macierzyński – maternity leave

but

  • urlop tacierzyński – paternity leave

but

  • ojcostwo – fatherhood (also paternity), oddly enough, grammatically this noun is neuter in gender.

but

  • macierzyństwo – motherhood (also grammatically neuter)

And those are just the linguistic problems, we’re not even talking about smelly diapers here!

 
Posted under Grammar, Polish Language, Vocabulary
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Polish Present Tense

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Apr
21
2009

Of course, since last time I bravely announced that the next post would be about grammar, I put on my procrastinator’s hat and have been doing everything possible to put it off for as long as possible. But then today my friend said “you’re stupid, the sooner you explain this grammar stuff, the sooner you can devote your time to more interesting things – like visiting me, for example.” And then she went on and actually did the grammar explaining as well:

“It’s really simple, OK? In English they have this whole bunch of useless tenses, the one with ‘do you blah blah’ and the one with ‘ing something something’ and then the one with ‘been ing whatever, anyway you know it and besides who cares? All your people really need to know that in Polish all this nonsense turns into one normal present tense, just how gods intended it to be in the first place. End of grammar lesson, now, when do you come visit me? I kup jakieś ciasto po drodze, OK? (and buy some cake on your way)”

(Now, if all Polish teachers could be like that! Wow!)

Unfortunately, I’m sure that now “my people” are staring at their computer screens and thinking “come again? ing blah something whatever? huh?”

So, let’s go over it again. And this time let’s use a handy example. How about the one from the previous post, the one about “Ja uczę się polskiego”?

In English you can say the following things:

  • I study Polish.
  • I’m studying Polish.

and

  • I’ve been studying Polish.

And yes, “uczyć się” can be translated into English as both “to learn” and “to study” and don’t listen to Poles telling you otherwise.
In Polish the verb “studiować” (to study) is used almost exclusively when referring to higher education, as in “I studied psychology at Harvard.” - Studiowałam psychologię na Harvardzie. (no, not really, I’m not that ambitious.)


But a sentence such as: “I’ve been studying Polish for two years” can be translated into Polish as “Uczę się (języka) polskiego od dwóch lat.” So for today, we’ll stick with “to study – uczyć się”, OK?

And see what happened above?

The “been ing whatever” (I’ve been studying Polish by myself) became simply “Uczę się polskiego od dwóch lat” in Polish.

By the way, here’s a little something worth remembering. In English we say “for two years” while the Polish equivalent is “od dwóch lat”, which when translated back to English means “since two years.” Which explains why plenty of Poles say it like that when speaking English.

And how about “I study Polish when I have time.”?
Uczę się polskiego kiedy mam czas.

See, again just a regular present tense in Polish. Nothing fancy.

So how about “I’m studying Polish, be quiet.”?
Uczę się polskiego, bądź cicho.


And again the “ing something something” became the same old boring present tense in Polish.

And voila! My friend was absolutely correct. And it only took her 15 seconds to explain this issue. Man, I have a lot to learn… Now, what kind of cake should I buy? I’m thinking “drożdżowka” (yeast cake).

 
Posted under Grammar, Polish Language
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