Your Funniest / Strangest / Sadest Moments with the Polish Language

Hi Everybody. Have no idea whether there had been a thread like this or not. If so, admin will move it soon enough. I also thought of posting it in the off-topic lounge, but these should be strictly language moments. If I'm luckier than with the smileys, admin will leave it in the language section ;) If not, then he'll move it anyway. Whatever happens, here goes my funny moment.

We had South Africans taking part in a fair in Poznan. On the stand, we taught them a few basic Polish words - the thank you's and you're welcome's and so on. If you say 10 cows in Afrikaans, it is "tien koeie", pronounced: [tin kuje]. This is close enough for Afrikaans speaking people to learn "dziękuję" relatively easily. On Saturday, late afternoon, as the day moved on and we became more and more tired, the one lady forgot about ten cows, and knowing that it was some farm animal with four legs, replaced the cows with donkeys (especially for Osioł). So she started saying to people [tin donkis] in stead of [tin kuje] - and then couldn't understand why they look at her in such strange ways :)

Would be interesting to hear your moments.

Reminds me of "Krowa Maciora!" as an alternative to swearing.

and meaning?

Cow Sow

Aha , the lady of mystery...I have had my friends from the KGB , Polish inteligence , and German state security trying to discover your secrets , all to no avail....Makes you more interesting i suppose...Anyways back to the thread....In response to my friends 14 year old daughter asking me thought of her new jeans..i said...SUPER DOOPER , meaning great...of course in Polish dupa means something else entirely...oops..! My next , even worse muppetry , was when i was telling my group of students (all girls from 12 to 16 years old ) that i needed a low price car to drive in Poland...I said to them i need a CHEAP CAR...I am not even going to try to explain what they thought i was saying , but it caused a fit of giggles....It was quite embarrassing when one of the 12 year olds explained what cheepcar meant in Polish...OOOPss....

oh wish had been there to witness that??

Not had any yet .. but i guess would be my attempt at speaking first time polish other than hello goodbye and that .. in order words stringing a passable sentence together .. learning on your own is a tad difficult at times .... and i didnt cover speaking much in the year one polish course i did last year mainly reading and listening!!!!




super a$$ .. giggles aplenty tonight



what does it mean then? if cant post here PM it me!!

That's very similar to polish word "tynkuję" (tynkowac = to plaster, tynkuję = I am plastering).
If [tin kuje] is pronounced like [tynkuję] most likely you would get a strange look as well.

LOL - i know this one



So who's going to enlighten me?



It was just weird at the time. Only that evening at dinner in Restauracja Bamberka on Stary Rynek, she said [tin donkis] to the waitress who brought the menus. We thought she was joking, and then we all broke to pieces when she told us what was actually going on! :D

Cipka

sounds like cipka which is fanny ;)

Just be grateful you dont have any friends called Hughie.

You got it...i wasn,t going to say it.....

or Piers lol

My bf goes around and says chicken fille what he thinks he says in polish is czekaj chwile-
-wait a moment.

One time i was telling some of my friends about my trip to Belarus....I drove from UK to Belarus and Moscow in an old Landrover....It became apparent from the amazed stares of some of the girls at our table that they thought i had gone from UK to Moscow on a bycycle (ROVER ) Jeez , it was bad enough in a Landrover...!

That's fanny UK.

my friend askd how to say i love you in Polish, so i said it was kocham cie. he tought it sounded like cock amateur

Do you know the song..WHEN THE GOING GETS TOUGH....My Polish girlfriend was absolutly convinced they were singing GO AND GET STUFFED....if you listen to it it does sound like she could be right....

Just opposite way:


Once I said to my friend that I saw hitchcock on the way...I meant hedgehog.

Or when we drove through some vilige I shoted laoud: Look puppy horses!

I still dont know how do you call small horses(babies) in English, just coudnt find in the dictionary rigt now.

i said have a watch instead of have a look

Small horse...pony , or foal....

Pizda and chips.

( Unfortunately its only the rude ones I remember )

wrong


correct

When i first came to Poland i saw several of those old ZUK trucks around the place...Even when i looked closely i was convinced the first letter was an F , and not a Z.....I know better now , but to me they will always be F**TRUCKS....


Well i can hardly argue with a four legged expert....

LOLMAO ... :D that gave me an instant giggle now if i see one tomorrow i will automatically think of that!

must be "cipa" (could be phonetically spelled chipa)

My first days in the US, vistited my aunt in NJ. We went to a supermarket, and at one point I wanted to draw auntie's attention to some product so I called out: ciocia! A few heads turned in what looked like disgust. Well, they were Hispanics and in Spanish slang "chocha" is not such a nice word for vagina.



Years eariler, I liked tuning in to some short wave radio stations and to listen to broadcasts in various languages. One night I stumbled upon some language that not only did I not understand but I couldn't even tell what lingustic group it belonged too. Intrigued I kept on listening and eventually, after about 20 minutes - Eureka!!! It was Radio Tirana with their very own version of Polish language.

Thanks guys, good to know. Nowdays actually all the young animalas I call puppy like puppy elephant, puppy cats and so on just for fun....

LOL



:D

I once told a girl ty bardzo ladna divka.Then I was told that divka means slut in polish.I knew this word from czech in which it means girl.

:P...