Posts in September 2009

Barb’s Trip to Poland and Chipmunk Diplomacy

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Sep
30
2009

Today we have another report from our fabulous guest blogger - Barb from Canada.

Enjoy!

I recently returned from a short trip to Poland with my head (and heart) bursting with impressions and perceptions. Since my last trip occurred over 25 years ago, to say things have changed would be a little bit of an understatement.

It was a trip that mixed both business (confirmation of citizenship- stwierdzenie posiadania obywatelstwa polskiego) and pleasure, so the types of interactions with native Poles varied quite a bit. I would like to write a post about the citizenship aspect of my trip (with Anna’s permission of course - yes, please!!! Actually, no, not “please”, you MUST!!!) at a later date, so this post will be a little more general.

Język polski: With the sole exception of a teenage girl working the counter of a Subway sandwich establishment, I managed to interact in Polish with enough mastery of the language that no one felt compelled to switch over into English. I felt like this was a huge accomplishment. It still rankles that the Subway worker had the gall to ask me “big or small?” I naturally ignored her and asked that my sandwich include: pomidory, swieży ogórek, sałata, i musztarda. My proficiency with the language varied/depended with the time of day (feeling tired - zmęczona), emotional state (a heightened emotional state - podekscytowana) and of course the amount of alcohol consumed. My efforts were warmly received and my interactions were all very pleasant and sometimes brought smiles.

On one occasion, I was taking a commuter train to Sulejówek from Warszawa and was on the phone with my uncle. I was trying to convince him to meet me in the courtyard of a nearby church. It was the end of the day and I was struggling with the proper declension (przy kościele, koło kościoła, itd). As I was the only one speaking accented Polish in a rather crowed compartment, many people tuned into my conversation. As I valiantly tried to get the declension right, I noticed many folks starting to smile, and to hide it unsuccessfully.

People were kind/helpful (uprzejmi) everywhere I went, including dreaded institutions like the post office (poczta) and Urząd Stanu Cywilnego. I lead a rather charmed existence, it seems.

Polish pride: It really is challenging to interact with Poles in their native land and to successfully navigate through the minefield of making comparisons/comments about your own country without inadvertently triggering that prickly Polish pride. After a while, I learned it was best to confine my comments about Canada to two subjects: legal blood alcohol limit (0.08 grams versus 0.02 grams in Poland) which was met with resounding approval and the universal appeal of Canada’s small woodland creatures, namely chipmunks. For anyone not familiar with the charm/cuteness of this creature (urocze stworzenie), please view the attached link. Another neutral topic was the similarity of our coinage (monety). How can you offend anyone with more cuddly Canadian animals, namely engravings of loons or polar bears?

I must confess to developing an affinity for some strictly Polish “wildlife” i.e. wściekły pies, but that is an entirely different story. :)

Old town in Warsaw, photo by Barb

PS. Barb, so are you officially Polish now?

 
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September Picture Post - Photos of Poland

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Sep
27
2009

Hi guys!
After all these very serious discussions this month (because what to give a foreign mother in law who’s a snob and has everything is a serious discussion indeed) we deserved a more relaxing subject. And I realized that we haven’t had a proper picture post in a very long while. Shame on me.

But this time, I thought we should try something different. Instead of looking at my lousy photos of store names and advertising billboards, I want to show you the country as other people see it. Other people, who are actually very skilled at using cameras and taking gorgeous photos, as well. And some of them even provide informative commentaries in English. So it’s a win-win situation, right?

We’ll start with one of the most picture-perfect cities in Poland – Toruń. Glenn Standish over at Toruń Daily Photo Blog (the original English blog on Toruń) does a magnificent job at showing the city as he sees it.

photo by Glenn Standish

And he writes about it in English, too, which is always an awesome combination.

Then we move on to Yellerbelly’s Warsaw Daily Photo Blog. Also with gorgeous photos and also with short write-ups in English.

photo by yellerbelly

And I just love how he talks about Warszawa stuff that we should all know but somehow never think about anymore, like the story accompanying the photo of a manhole cover on ul. Miodowa.

And rounding up today’s selection of photo blogs from Poland is Łódź Daily Photo by Frank de Jol.

No text, just photos, and all of them magnificent. Łódź is definitely one of my favorite cities in Poland (“one of” because it has to compete with Gdańsk for this honor), and when I look at Frank’s photos I always end up thinking, “Gee, I never knew it was THAT beautiful.”
So, please go and take a look!

If you like this idea, I will feature three new photo blogs from Poland next month. That way even those readers who have never been to Poland will get a chance to see our beautiful country.

 
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On News and Ice Tea

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Sep
24
2009

Just the other day I was asked what (if any) Polish equivalents of these words would be, and frankly, I didn’t have a clue.

All the Poles I know refer to ice tea as “ice tea” and news is “news”, or sometimes “nius”. I checked with a couple of dictionaries, and asked a couple of people, and one of those people referred me to “Poradnik Językowy” vol. 5. A practical Polish language handbook, of sorts, published by PWN. In this book a bunch of really smart people (though not as smart as Profesor Miodek, I think) dispense language advice. It’s a compilation of questions asked by ordinary Polish speakers with answers by the very highly educated Polish language experts.

I’m not sure whether I like this book or not. It’s useful, that’s a fact, but some of those very smart people are so traditional and orthodox when it comes to our beautiful language that sometimes it’s hard to take their learned opinion seriously.

But, to my surprise, there was an entry on “ice tea” in there (page 331) and “news” (page 335).

First of all, there’s this misconception in Poland that ice tea is just hot tea that got cold, but that’s OK, I guess. Not everyone in Poland needs to make ice tea the way I make it. The real issue seems not how to make it, but what to call it. There’s “kawa mrożona” (ice coffee) in Poland already, so what’s wrong with “herbata mrożona”? Absolutely nothing, apart from the fact that it sounds a little goofy. And besides, most Poles I know refer to this beverage as “ice tea” anyway.

The author of the entry on “ice tea” agreed that “herbata mrożona” would be an OK Polish “Polish” equivalent and left it at that.

The “news” bit was a little more complicated. Apparently, it’s a Polish word these days, and it’s even been assigned a gender – masculine, to be exact. In plural it’s “newsy”. The author also advocates that the Polish spelling of the word should be “nius”. Because since we already have “mejl”, we might as well have “nius.”

See? That was easy!

Oh, and don’t forget, “news” and “newsy” decline like any other normal Polish noun would. So you’d say “Przeczytałam (I read) ciekawego (interesting) newsa,” if you’re talking about just one bit of news.

 
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Reader’s Question About Polish Surnames

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Sep
21
2009

A while back Sue Wilson left this comment, but due to my computer troubles (which, thankfully, are over now as I’m a proud owner of a brand new MacBook) I only managed to see it last weekend. I’m sorry Sue!

I thought that Sue’s question was interesting, and actually, because she is not the only one confused about this –ski/-ska issue when it comes to Polish surnames, I thought it would be good to share her comment here on the blog. I hope you don’t mind, Sue.
Here it is:

Is it common practice for a married woman whose husband’s surname is Kaliszewski to be Kaliszewska? My mother in law stuck with -ski yet addresses cards to her grand-daughters as -ska. Is the -ska only for single women or can married women use that form too?
I’m recently married to a Kaliszewski & as I am wife number 2 I’d quite like to use -ska to differentiate myself from wife number 1 who is Mrs K-ski. But obviously would not want to use -ska if that is associated with single women! I do appreciate the chaos that i will have by having a surname different to my wedding certificate but I’d quite like to follow Polish tradition with the feminisation of my surname if that is ok for married women to use!!
Many thanks!

Now onto my answer.
The endings –ski and –ska have absolutely nothing to do with one’s marital status, but with the gender of the person.
So, a –ski IN POLAND is always a male, and a –ska – a female.
As I’m sure you’ve noticed I emphasized the “IN POLAND” bit, because it is important. Things work a little bit differently in other countries.
In the US (and other English speaking countries), a woman who takes her husband’s name after marriage takes HIS surname with no allowances made for her gender.

So, if you marry a guy named Kaliszewski, you, as a wife, become Kaliszewski, too. Now, if it were in Poland, you’d be Kaliszewska, because last names ending in –ski follow Polish rules similar to adjectives.

If you are determined to be a Kaliszewska in the US, I think the only way to accomplish it would be through a legal name change – from Kaliszewski to Kaliszewska.

Does it make sense?

I’m sure that Barb in Canada, who also has a masculine version of a Polish last name, can add her trzy grosze on this subject.

 
Posted under Culture, Grammar, Polish Language
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Polish Gifts - polskie prezenty, part 2

Posted by Anna Ikeda
Sep
17
2009

I would like to thank you all for your gift suggestions. They were all great. And it made me realize that the people I’m stuck buying gifts for are spoiled, ungrateful brats.

I tried the wycinanki once, beautifully framed and simply gorgeous and they were met with a “what the heck is this garbage” type of disapproving looks. I did the dolls in hand made folk costumes, and they ended up as donations for some charity auction.
If I ever gave kapcie as gifts, I’d probably have those kapcie shoved down my throat.
Bursztyn (amber) was also greeted with suspicious looks, and the only thing that saved me was the fact it was set in silver. But after perfunctory thank-yous, it was delegated to a storage box somewhere and never seen again.

Krówki were tried, spat out and promptly re-gifted to an unsuspecting neighbor. Ptasie mleczko didn’t fare any better. I ended up eating it all by myself. And liking it. Very much. Thank you.

Books, especially of the coffee table type, as long as they had plenty of beautiful, large format photos in them, were welcomed warmly. Books with actual writing in them are not an option. The people I buy for are not exactly illiterate, but they don’t speak much English, and finding stuff about Poland in their own native language in Poland is rather impossible. And one time when I did find something, about Zamek Królewski (the royal castle) in Warsaw, the translation was laughed at but did provide hours of unadulterated, if unintended, fun and enjoyment.

Alcohol was never an option, those people don’t drink. I’d probably be strangled with a sports scarf, and a t-shirt would be cut into small squares for dusting the bookshelves.

So now you see my problems with gifts from Poland. I think I’ll try śliwki w czekoladzie (chocolate plums) next time and hope my MIL chokes on them. Porcelana (china) is also a great suggestion. I was thinking maybe kryształ (crystal), but is that a Polish gift? I think it’s more Czech than Polish, but I might be wrong.

What turned out to be a great gift and a surprising hit were Polish pickles – ogórki (cucumbers), buraczki (beets), śledzie marynowane (pickled herring) and grzyby w słoiku (a jar of marinated mushrooms). It wasn’t easy getting it through customs, and it was intended as my own stash, but it became so popular that I finally gave up and started gifting moje własne zapasy (my own stash).

So there you have it. And now that Christmas is coming up, I dread the season. It’s time to think about ordering gifts again.

 
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