Learn about the verb "to be"
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Gina: Hello everyone and welcome back to PolishPod101.com. This is Absolute Beginner, season 1, lesson 4, Talking Nationality in Polish. I’m Gina. |
| Joanna: And I’m Joanna. |
| Gina: In this lesson you'll learn all about the verb “to be”. |
| Joanna: This conversation takes place in a cafe. |
| Gina: It’s between Gosia and Alex. |
| Joanna: The speakers are around the same age, so they’ll be using informal Polish. |
| Gina: Let’s listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Gosia: Hej Alex! |
| Alex: Cześć! |
| Gosia: Skąd jesteś? |
| Alex: Jestem z Australii. A ty? |
| Gosia: Jestem z Polski. |
| Alex: Super! |
| Gina: Let’s hear the conversation one time slowly. |
| Gosia: Hej Alex! |
| Alex: Cześć! |
| Gosia: Skąd jesteś? |
| Alex: Jestem z Australii. A ty? |
| Gosia: Jestem z Polski. |
| Alex: Super! |
| Gina: Now let’s hear it with the English translation. |
| Gosia: Hej Alex! |
| Gosia: Hey Alex! |
| Alex: Cześć! |
| Alex: Hi! |
| Gosia: Skąd jesteś? |
| Gosia: Where are you from? |
| Alex: Jestem z Australii. A ty? |
| Alex: I'm from Australia. And you? |
| Gosia: Jestem z Polski. |
| Gosia: I'm from Poland |
| Alex: Super! |
| Alex: Great! |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Gina: Are there many ethnic minorities living in Poland? |
| Joanna: Not many. Poland has one of the smallest number of foreign inhabitants in the whole of Europe. |
| Gina: Why is that? |
| Joanna: Things changed after the Second World War. Before that war, around one third of the population was composed of minorities. |
| Gina: Which one was the biggest? |
| Joanna: Definitely the Jewish community, but unfortunately their population was almost wiped out in the war. |
| Gina: How about now? What are the largest ethnic minorities in Poland, and which regions do they live in? |
| Joanna: I would say - German, Lithuanian, Belarusian, Roman, Russian and Vietnamese. And usually they live in areas such as... ‘Śląsk’ |
| Gina: known in English as “Silesia” |
| Joanna: ‘Pomorze’ |
| Gina: “Pomerania” |
| Joanna: ‘Mazowsze’ |
| Gina: “Mazovia” |
| Joanna: or ‘Podlasie’ |
| Gina: “Podlachia”. Okay, now let’s move on to the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Gina: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson. |
| The first word we shall see is... |
| Joanna: hej [natural native speed] |
| Gina: hey |
| Joanna: hej [slowly - broken down by syllable] hej [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next |
| Joanna: cześć [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Hello, Hi. |
| Joanna: cześć [slowly - broken down by syllable] cześć [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next |
| Joanna: skąd [natural native speed] |
| Gina: where...from |
| Joanna: skąd [slowly - broken down by syllable] skąd [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next |
| Joanna: z [natural native speed] |
| Gina: from |
| Joanna: z [slowly - broken down by syllable] z [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next |
| Joanna: super [natural native speed] |
| Gina: super |
| Joanna: super [slowly - broken down by syllable] super [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next |
| Joanna: być [natural native speed] |
| Gina: to be |
| Joanna: być [slowly - broken down by syllable] być [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Next |
| Joanna: Australia [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Australia |
| Joanna: Australia [slowly - broken down by syllable] Australia [natural native speed] |
| Gina: And last, |
| Joanna: Polska [natural native speed] |
| Gina: Poland |
| Joanna: Polska [slowly - broken down by syllable] Polska [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Gina: Let’s take a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. Joanna, what’s the first word? |
| Joanna: ‘super’ |
| Gina: Just like English. |
| Joanna: Exactly. It’s a very common word among young people. Nowadays anything you like or enjoy can be ‘super’. |
| Gina: Can we hear a few examples? |
| Joanna: Sure! ‘super pogoda’ |
| Gina: literally “super weather” |
| Joanna: Say it when you think that weather is great. Another example would be - ‘super ciuchy’ |
| Gina: “super clothes” |
| Joanna: You can use this phrase when you think someone is dressed really cool, or you simply like the clothes |
| Gina: There are more examples in the lesson notes, so be sure to check them out. |
| Joanna: There’s one more usage of ‘super’ |
| Gina: What is it? |
| Joanna: Whenever you feel like being sarcastic, when you don’t like something, or you aren’t happy about something |
| Gina: I bet intonation is very important here. |
| Joanna: Yes! So when you’re being sarcastic, it should sound like - ‘super’ |
| Gina: Okay, what’s the next word? |
| Joanna: ‘hej’ |
| Gina: Just like the English “hey”? |
| Joanna: When it comes to pronunciation - yes. If we talk about spelling - no. |
| Gina: What is different? |
| Joanna: If in Polish we use some foreign words, some of these sounds are usually written phonetically. So since the letter “j” is the sound matching the English pronunciation, we replace it with a “y” sound. Just like my name! Joanna becomes Joanna in Polish! |
| Gina: That’s some useful information. When we can use the Polish “hey”? |
| Joanna: Just as a way of saying “hi”, but of course only to your friends. And we usually don’t hear adults using that word. |
| Gina: Good to know. Ok, now onto the grammar. |
| GRAMMAR POINT |
| Gina: In this lesson you’ll learn about the most basic verb - “to be” |
| Joanna: Yes, we have already mentioned the Polish verb ‘być’... |
| Gina: ...meaning “to be”... |
| Joanna: when we learned how to introduce ourselves. |
| Gina: Now we’ll broaden our knowledge about that verb. |
| Joanna: In Polish, all verbs are conjugated to one of 8 persons |
| Gina: You can find the table with conjugation of the Polish verb “to be” in the lesson notes. |
| Joanna: Make sure that you master the conjugation, because without it, you won’t be able to continue to study Polish |
| Gina: Let’s tell our listeners how to pronounce every single conjugated form. |
| Joanna: That’s a very good idea. Listeners, please repeat after me... |
| Joanna: ‘ja jestem’ |
| Gina: “I am” |
| Joanna: ‘ty jesteś’ |
| Gina: (pause) “you are” |
| Joanna: ‘on jest’ |
| Gina: (pause) “he is” |
| Joanna: ‘ona jest’ |
| Gina: (pause) “she is” |
| Joanna: ‘ono jest’ |
| Gina: (pause) “it is” |
| Joanna: ‘my jesteśmy’ |
| Gina: (pause) “we are” |
| Joanna: ‘wy jesteście’ |
| Gina: (pause) “you are” (plural) |
| Joanna ‘oni są’ |
| Gina: (pause) “they are” |
| Gina: (pause) Great job everybody! |
| Joanna: Do you remember how to introduce yourself? |
| Gina: Oh no! I forgot! |
| Joanna: Well, I hope our listeners are better students than you, Gina! |
| Gina: (laughs) So, for all those people who forgot, Joanna will say it now... |
| Joanna: ‘Jestem Joanna’ |
| Gina: So the first word is the verb “to be”, followed by your name |
| Joanna: Exactly. In Polish, we usually skip the personal pronoun, so instead of saying ‘ja jestem Joanna’, we just say ‘jestem Joanna’ |
| Gina: In the dialogue, Gosia and Alex talked about where they’re from. How do we ask that question in Polish? |
| Joanna: ‘skąd jesteś?’ |
| Gina: “where are you from?” |
| Joanna: ‘skąd’ means “where.. from”, and then we have the 2nd person singular form of the verb “to be” - ‘jesteś’ |
| Gina: To answer, we just start off with the verb “to be” in the first person singular, and then give the name of the country? |
| Joanna: Almost right! Before the name of the country, we need to use the preposition ‘z’, which means “from” |
| Gina: Let’s hear an example. |
| Joanna: Ok. ‘Jestem z Polski’ |
| Gina: meaning “I’m from Poland” |
| Joanna: In the dialogue Alex said - ‘Jestem z Australii’ |
| Gina: “I’m from Australia” |
| Joanna: Listeners, be sure to check the lesson notes, because you will find a lot more information about how to ask and answer the question about your country of origin. |
Outro |
|---|
| Gina: And that’s all for this lesson! We hope you enjoyed it. Thanks for listening, and we’ll see you next time! |
| Joanna: Papa. |
| Gina: Bye! |
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