nie możesz?! – What? You can’t?!
Jaka szkoda! – What a pity!
Jesteś wspaniała(–y). – You are wonderful.
Kto to jest? – Who is it?
Mam bilet na … . – I have a ticket (for May 1st).
Mieć dość czegoś. – Have enough of something.
Ona jest Polką. – She is Polish.
Staram się o stypendium. – I’m trying to get a scholarship.
Ten sam. – The same.
To nasz dyrektor. – He is our director.
To znakomicie. – That’s brilliant.
Umówić kogoś z kimś.– Make an appointment for somebody with somebody.
Wiesz, Edgarze… . – You know, Edgar… .
Wracam na rok / na dwa lata… .– To return / to come back for a (one) year / for two years… .
Za tydzień / za miesiąc. – In a week / in a month.
zajmować się czymś– to busy oneself with something / doing something
Expressions / Supplementary Phrases
Bardzo cię / pana / panią przepraszam. – I’m sorry. / Excuse me.
Bardzo mi miło pana / panią poznać. – Nice to meet you.
Chciałbym (m. prs.) / chciałabym (nm. prs.) przedstawić kogoś. – I would like to introduce someone.
Co u ciebie słychać? / Co słychać? / Co nowego? – How are you? What’s new with you?
Do jutra. – See you tomorrow.
How does it work?
■ The Nominative (singular)– why and when?
Kto? Co?
The Nominative – the case in Polish declension, which answers the questions: kto?, co?, and which is an independent case; it indicates an independent part of the sentence, i.e. a simple subject or the independent part of a complex subject, e.g. Student czyta.
Structures with the Nominative:
subject predicate
Agata pracuje.
Ona dzwoni.
Marta zajmuje się grantami / rozmawia przez telefon.
■ Function(s)
1. The case of the subject,
2. It occurs after the word to (as a linker), e.g. Marta to recepcjonistka.
3. It occurs in sentences like: To (jest) pan Green. / Edgar to miły chłopiec.
4. It occurs in questions starting with the words: jaki, który, czyj (see the following lessons), e.g. Jaki on jest? / Czyj jest ten samochód?
■ Inflectional endings
■ Interrogative pronoun
kto
The interrogative pronoun kto “replaces” the indefinite noun in interrogative sentences. Example:
Kto jest w Fundacji Nowa Polska?
→ W Fundacji Nowa Polska jest Marta;
Kto pracuje w Fundacji Nowa Polska?
→ Marta pracuje w Fundacji Nowa Polska.
This pronoun refers to persons. When used in questions about a person (or, more rarely, an animal), it contains a request to the interlocutor to indicate that person or to describe them in more detail. It replaces the noun, most frequently the personal noun. INFLECTION: G. /A. kogo, D. komu, I . / L. kim; no plural. For more information, see the table of grammatical cases on page 298.
Kto to (jest) ? → To (jest ) dyrektor.
→ To (jest) dziewczyna.
→ To (jest) dziecko.
■ The noun – grammatical genders.
In the Polish language there are three genders: masculine*, feminine and neuter.
■ Masculine nouns in N. sg. usually do not have any endings (they end in a consonant, i.e. np. bilet, kot, dyrektor, tydzień). There are a small number of masculine nouns with the ending –a, np. kolega, sprzedawca.
■ Feminine nouns in N. sg. usually end in the vowel –a, np. dziewczyna, Polska; rarely –i, e.g. pani.
■ Neuter nouns in N. sg. end in the vowel –o, –e, np. dziecko, życie; rarely in the vowel –ę, e.g. the word imię. Neuter nouns of Latin origin have the ending –um, e.g. liceum and in the singular they are uninflected. For details, see Lesson 9 on page 89.
■ Important note!
*The masculine gender (in the book abbreviated to m.) is divided into three groups. SINGULAR: 1. masculine–personal, e.g. dyrektor (abbreviated as mos.), 2. masculine–inanimate, e.g. bilet, tydzień (abbreviated to m. inanim.), 3. masculine–animate, e.g. kot (abbreviated to m.anim.). PLURAL: 1. masculine–personal (abbreviated to m. prs.), 2. nonmasculine–personal (abbreviated to nm. prs.).
■ Demonstrative pronouns
ten, ta, to
The demonstrative pronouns ten ta, to indicate an object or a property of the object which we want to define more closely, or the one we indicate by means of appropriate gestures. In the plural te – for nonmasculine–personal gender; ci – for masculine–personal gender.
m. ten (dyrektor, podręcznik)
f. ta (dziewczyna, książka)
n. to (życie, dziecko, ćwiczenie)
Examples:
Ten student nazywa się Edgar Betraff. Ta recepcjonistka ma na imię Marta. To dziecko jest małe.
■
