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Lesson Transcript

Cześć! Jestem Joanna.. Hi! I’m Joanna.
Welcome to PolishPod101.com’s “Polski w 3 minuty”. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Polish.
In our previous lessons, we learned how to use the verbs być and mieć. In this lesson, we’re going to learn how to turn these two verbs into their negative forms in order to say "I'm not" and "I don't have."
So let's take an example. Imagine you want to go out to eat something with your Polish friend. You ask him if he’s hungry, and he answers. Nie jestem głodny, “I’m not hungry”.
Then, you ask him if he has a car to use to go somewhere else and he says Nie mam samochodu. “I don’t have a car”
Let’s look at these two negative sentences:
Nie jestem głodny.
[slowly] Nie jestem głodny.
Nie mam samochodu.
[slowly] Nie mam samochodu.
Did you catch some similar words in these two sentences? Right! In each sentence, you have the same word, nie. This word means “not”, “don’t”, “doesn’t” or “no”, depending on the sentence.
We will use this word to create negative sentences. It’s very simple because we just add nie in front of the verb and that’s it!
First let’s practice that with the verb być, “to be”.
How do we change an affirmative sentence into a negative one? Here are a few examples:
I’m hungry - Jestem głodny.
I’m not hungry. - Nie jestem głodny.
I’m from Germany. - Jestem z Niemiec.
I’m not from Germany. - Nie jestem z Niemiec.
I’m in the class - Jestem na zajęciach.
I’m not in the class - Nie jestem na zajęciach.
I’m sad. - Jestem smutny.
I’m not sad. - Nie jestem smutny.
Very easy, isn’t it?
How do we create a negative sentence using the verb mieć, “to have”? Let’s try doing it together.
I have a car. - Mam samochód.
I don’t have a car. - Nie mam samochodu.
I have a dog. - Mam psa.
I don’t have a dog - Nie mam psa.
I have siblings. - Mam rodzeństwo
I don’t have siblings - Nie mam rodzeństwa.
So now, how would you say "I don't like sweets?" For reference, “I like sweets.” is “Lubię słodycze.” Just put nie in front of lubię.
Nie lubię słodyczy.
[slowly] Nie lubię słodyczy.
Did you notice that the ending of the word słodycze, “sweets” changed into słodyczy? In Polish there are 7 noun cases. So if we turn affirmative nouns into negative ones, we change them from accusative into genitive and that’s why the last letter in słodycze is different.
Now it’s time for Joanna’s Insights.
To negate adjectives is very easy, because the only thing you have to do is add the word nie, which means “not”. When it comes to nouns it’s more complicated since in Polish we have cases. There are 7 of them and they make the ending of nouns different depending on the case. It may seem very confusing and difficult at the beginning, but don’t get discouraged! With a little bit of practice you’re going to be a great Polish speaker!
Get ready for the next lesson because we are going to learn how to use adjectives in Polish.
See you in the next Polski w 3 minuty lesson. Do zobaczenia!

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