how do i change my Polish last name

I got a very nice Polish last name when I got married . . . but my husband laughed at me when I suggested it be "-ska" not "-ski" legally. :^( Apparently English-speaking Poles in English-speaking countries just don't do that, as a rule. He said only one of his 7 sisters ever tried to go by "-ska", and it never quite stuck.

The name is "Lakowski" and of course English-speakers pronounce the "w" as "w" not "v" - my father-in-law always responds, "There are no cows here!"

try living with nowiski...the thing i hear more than people calling me dirk is "Nowiski...SUCKS FOR YOU!!" or "If that was my last name i'd change it to YESwiski" I just stand there with a blank face.

If it was me, I'd stand there with a poker face and say, "Wow, that is a funny one. I never heard that one before. Thanks." Then walk away.

Easy for me to say, though.

In reality? It'd probably be slappin' time. (At least after, oh, #50.)

Maybe it's the Irish in me?

Hi Krysia,

The only problem is many of the Polish surnames are a mile-long! YIKES!

FGS, i have more Ls in my name than I would like but im stuck with what i have, FS get over it! what in a name?

Yeah, sometimes i do that. It's funny cause some of them really think its the first time i've heard that.

When i was younger i hated my last name, cause i had never met a -ski (or any other person with a polish name), but when i got in high school i started loving it. I wouldn't want anything else. At the tattoo shop i frequent (once or a twice a week for 2-4 hours...at least!) i'm know as the "Pole" or "the Pollock" (sp?) whats funny is the guy that calls me that is Polish!! he said he used to speak polish alot with his grandmother till he was 7, but it pretty much stopped when she passed away, i guess his parents didn't bother speaking it with him. anyways, the point is...i love my last name. haha

When I was growing up in small-town Texas, I loved/hated being Catholic with an Irish name. There were very few of us Catholics in town, and though people didn't make fun (this was the '70's), you still felt "different". Other kids would ask you totally weird things they'd heard about Catholics from their grandmothers or something. And they were all named "Anderson", "Johnson", "Smith", etc. But as I got older I liked it better because I didn't mind being "different" so much, especially b/c I got out of school on St Patrick's Day to go do Irish dancing in Dallas! (This was WAY before "Riverdance" - LOL!!)

Hmm, now that I'm thinking about it, totally ahead of us Irish and Mexicans, probably the most exotic last name in my school grade belonged a boy named Wischnewsky. He was a very nice boy, also a talented athlete and popular, but NO ONE could spell his last name. When I was yearbook editor, I finally memorized it - now I'll never forget it.

I can't remember when the first time i met another -ski was. I met other people with polish heritage, but they all had "normal" american names. I think one of the first -ski's i met was at basic training, i Solarsky, i asked him if he was russian, cause i thought because the y it wasn't polish, then he told me it was polish. I was like "Finally!" i know a guy in the army from Chicago who speaks polish, and i try to talk to him in polish when i see him, but i don't know enough to really hold any conversation. He always asked me about russian and we try and compare russian to polish. which is fun...i guess