In
any language being able to talk about geography, and countries and
their capitals in particular, is a really great way to get involved in
conversation. From asking people 'skąd jesteś?' (where are you from?),
to describing your wakacje (holidays) abroad, this language is common,
useful and fun to learn in Polish. What's more, since 2004, Poland has
been a member of the Unia Europejska (European Union), so it's now more
important than ever to be able to talk about the countries on the
continent. What better place to start then, than with a journey (in
Polish of course) around Europe, starting right at home, in the
Rzeczpospolita Polska (Republic of Poland). We'll also try and look at
some of the most useful travel related vocabulary along the way.
To
say you are travelling somewhere in Polish you'll need to use the first
person singular form of the verb 'to go by transport', which naturally
can be used for any journey where you will be travelling by samolot
(plane), pociąg (train), samochód (car), autokar (coach), or any other
form of transport that isn't foot.
So, let’s first head to
Poland's południowy (southern) neighbour, Słowacja (Slovakia), where
we'll be staying in the stolica (capital), Bratysława (Bratislava): Jadę
z Polski na Słowację, gdzie stolicą jest Bratysława (I am going to
Slovakia, where the capital is Bratislava).
With this basic
sentence you can see how it's possible to describe any trip you want to
take, just with a little practice and some extra vocabulary. Other
countries that border Poland include Niemcy (Germany), to the zachód
(west) gdzie stolica jest Berlin (where the capital is Berlin), Białoruś
(Belarus) and Litwa (Lithuania), to the wschód (east), gdzie stolicami
są Mińsk i Wilno (where the capitals are Minsk and Vilnius), Ukraina
(Ukraine), to the południowy wschód (southeast), and Czechy (The Czech
Republic), to the południowy zachód (southwest).
From these you
could easily travel to Węgry (Hungary), gdzie stolica jest Budapeszt
(where the capital is Budapest), Rosja (Russia), gdzie stolica jest
Moskwa (where the capital is Moscow), and many of the kraje (countries)
in Europa Zachodnia (Western Europe).
If you are travelling with
other people, as a group, you will need to alter the verb to reflect the
new plural subject. You will still need the verb 'to go' (jechać), but
this time in its first person plural form: Jedziemy z Francji do
Hiszpanii (We are going from France to Spain). You'll also need to
change the tense of the verb is you want to talk about a trip you took
in the past, using the perfective form to express a completed action:
pojechałem z Włoch do o Grecji (I went from Italy to Greece).Talking
about travelling and places you have visited is just one dimension of
this vocabulary. However, as a foreign speaker in Poland, it's a great
way to get to know people and really good vocabulary to have. Polish
people will, for the most part, be very interested in where you're from
and where you have been, so it's best to be prepared. Naturally these
are just the basics, and there's five whole more kontynenty (continents)
to explore, from Azja (Asia), to Ameryka Północna (North America),
Australia (Australia) to Ameryka Południowa (South America) and Afryka
(Africa) too, which means plenty more countries and capitals to get on
that vocabulary list!The differences between Polish and Slovak are roughly
comparable to the differences between the German and Swiss German
dialects (75% of the vocabulary similar or the same), the Ga.p between
Polish and Russian is like Spanish and Italian (55-60% of the vocabulary
the same or similar) and the gap between Polish and Bulgarian is as
wide as between English and Dutch (40% of the vocabulary the same or
similar). The most similar to Slavic languages are the Baltic Languages:
Latvian and Lithuanian, but only 3% of the vocabulary is similar.
Polish has many words borrowed from German, French and English – but
there are numerous words that are "false friends" among Slavic
languages. Polish is a Western Slavonic language with about 40 million
speakers mainly in Poland. There are also significant Polish
communities in Lithuania, Belarus and Ukraine, and significant
numbers of Polish speakers in many other countries, including the
Czech Republic, Germany, Slovakia, Latvia, Romania, the UK and USA.
Polish is closely related to Kashubian, Lower Sorbian, Upper Sorbian,
Czech and Slovak.
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