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Learning Polish: "No, you can't have my cat"

Learning Polish: "No, you can't have my cat"

Old Nov 27th, 2014, 06:30 AM
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Learning Polish: "No, you can't have my cat"

After three years of living in Poland I'm quite satisfied with the fact that my Polish is finally on a more or less acceptable level, which means that I can have some conversations with the locals without using English, German or out of frustration my own language: Dutch (which never really helped me out in any other country, but okay)

I've been taking Polish lessons and although I'm still on a basic level with speaking, my listening and reading is way better, so I understand a lot. I'm just very quiet when someone asks me something.

Whenever I can I speak Polish -or at least I try/pretend to speak Polish- and usually that makes me feel proud. But not always. Lately I was doing my groceries after a 1,5 hour long Polish lesson, so I felt quite confident. I walked up to the cash desk to pay for my food, drinks and cat litter for the fluffy black hair ball that is called Mika.

Everything went smoothly and I think the cashier thought I was cute with my not so perfect Polish. I gathered all my stuff and lifted the heavy cat litter into the shopping cart when the lady suddenly asked me: "Can I please have your cat?"

A moment of silence went by and I was staring at her all puzzled: "My cat??!?!?? You want my cat?"

Continue reading on polskaaah.blogspot.com
gwensel is offline  
Old Nov 27th, 2014, 09:20 AM
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This reminds me of sitting in a Berlin airport, waiting for our flight to Krakow and pronouncing my "basic Polish survival phrases" from my Rick Steves guidebook to Poland. I thought I was pronouncing them softly, until I looked up and saw that I had a small but appreciative audience, all of them grinning at my slaughter of Polish.
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Old Nov 27th, 2014, 10:07 AM
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LOL! Hope your cat appreciates your faithfulness!!!

Ah the Polish language. I started a year ago and then ventured to Wrocław this August for the summer course at university. Good on you for being able to communicate. I am still struggling horribly.
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Old Nov 27th, 2014, 10:20 AM
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That reminds me of a Nigerian exchange student I met in Poland many years ago, who did not like his dorm room because every morning an "elephant" (słoń) would wake him up.

His room faced east and the problem was the morning sun (słońce).

Mark
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Old Nov 27th, 2014, 12:31 PM
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In Italy, my daughter once told the hotel front desk that there were lots of poor people (poveri) in her room, instead of lots of dust (polvere).
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Old Nov 28th, 2014, 02:52 AM
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Haha thanks for you replies, it's really good to know I'm not the only one with such experiences.

I think it will be a long time before I won't have embarassing situations anymore, so you can expect more blogs from my struggle.
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Old Nov 3rd, 2015, 05:23 PM
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gwensel,

I know this post is a year old but I just ran across this report and wanted to say that I loved the story about the cashier wanting your cat! It's been a struggle but I've been gradually improving with my Polish too, so I know how much work it's taken for you to get to the level that you have! Congratulations!

Daniel from Canada
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Old Nov 3rd, 2015, 06:32 PM
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I have only been to Poland once, but I cannot tell you how many times that phrase arose in our conversations.
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