Posted: Thu Feb 22, 2007 12:16 am Post subject: Poland
I'm going to Poland next week for a few days to stay with the family of the girl we hosted last year. Although I've been to Poland before, and although it's a school trip, and although I've done similar things in France and Germany before, I'm actually much more nervous about going to stay with Polish people, mainly because I can't really speak or understand any Polish. Basically, Kasia, my Polish 'partner' speaks excellent English and good German, her father speaks reasonably good German, her mother has just started learning English and her younger brother has also started learning English and German more recently. So I'm hoping that I'll be able to get buy, using Kasia as an interpreter when necessary.
Next week!!! I didn't realise it was so soon! I hope you have a great time, I really love the sound of Poland and I would like to go there one day Imagine if you fall in love with Poland too, and want to start learning Polish!
Enjoy the trip.
If it hasn't changed within the last 7 years you should do well in Poland with just English and German. Most people (in bigger towns anyway) have reasonably good German or English.
Enjoy the trip.
If it hasn't changed within the last 7 years you should do well in Poland with just English and German. Most people (in bigger towns anyway) have reasonably good German or English.
That should be okay then, although I always feel that it's rude not to speak the native language of the place where I'm visiting. Actually, when I was in Wroclaw before, I spoke in German and I got replies in German, although they didn't seem very happy about it at all. I'm sort of guessing that that was because they thought that I was German.
I too find it nice to be able to say at least some sentences in the language of the country I visit. But it is not always possible. I found the people always are a little more friendly when they see you trying to use their language and then are more open to carry on in another language.
I had always the conception that German was a kind of buisiness thing in Poland. Now my relatives live mainly in Świnoujście and Szeczin and so very close to Germany and. There it might be a little more like that than further in the country. Since we never used German there I'm probably the wrong person to tell about that.
What's more is that the relationship between Poland and Germany was a little tense over the last years. Especially in the cities that have been German in the time before 1945 (not solely so but I think a little more than elsewhere) one often found some anti-German attitude, and Wrocław has been Breslau as far as I remember.
I've always wanted to go Świnoujście/Swinemünde and Szeczin/Stettin because it must be extremely fascinating when the inhabitants' relationship to their town doesn't go further back than 1945. They're all like strangers there in a sense. Grandparents couldn't/can't tell their grandchildren "when I was a kid, there was a witch living in this house" etc., because the grandparents come from what today is Belarus etc.
BTW the population shifts that took place in Germany's eastern areas after WW2 is one of my favourite tragedies, because it's so hard to say who were villains and who were victims. People born in Bohemia, East Prussia, Silesia etc. who today live in Germany and are slightly bitter for the loss of their childhood homes and perhaps a little irredentist in their hearts, how they must hate their parents', whose support for Hitler led to them, innocent little children, having to flee the dear Pomeranian home, with its long sandy beaches, clear blue lakes and cute little brick towns.
And what do you say to the fact that the association of Germans expelled from the Czech Sudetenland has their own youth organization!!!:
http://www.sudetendeutschejugend.de/ _________________ Wer fremde Sprachen nicht kennt, weiß nichts von seiner eigenen. = Those who don't know foreign languages, know nothing of their own. (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe)
It was a miscarriage of justice to have seized Teutonic lands after the war, even if admittedly, these lands had a Slavic history. _________________ Hillary Clinton is an acquired taste which I have clearly yet to acquire.
After WW1 also!! This caused very much discontentment I think and contributed to WW2.
True. Weren't Eupen and Malmedy part of the 2nd Reich?
All the Ostkanton region was in Germany until Versailles 1919.
benjamin wrote:
Ek hoop dat Pole volgende week baie goed sal wees. Ek het nu 'n bietjie Pols geleer, so ek hoop dat ek 'n bietjie met hulle sal kan praat
Ik hoop dat je een heel leuke tijd in Polen zal hebben. Zeker zul jij met hun kunnen praten!! volgens mij is goededag zoeits als den dobre, of niet? Maar verder kan ik in het pools helemaal niks zeggen Wat heb je al geleerd?
Dankie! Partymaal verwar(?) ek Afrikaans en Nederlands.
"verwar" is the right word, but it should be: Partymaal verwar ek Afrikaans met Nederlands.
And here's the thing... the right preposition is "met", but many Afrikaans speakers would indeed say "en"... So your version will be accepted as correct as well. _________________ Toe ek jonk was, het ek al die antwoorde geken. Nou verstaan ek nie eens die vrae nie.
I wish I'd ever bothered to learn Polish spelling, i could provide you with some everyday vocabulary especially swear words
LOL !!
Polish spelling look absolutly impossible!!! krzpyrsczk something like this They don't like vowels and the finnish don't like consonants. Before I've learned dutch I foudn that it looked weird as well, but now because I know it, it don't.
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Imagine if you fall in love with Poland too, and want to start learning Polish! 
Wat heb je al geleerd?