Learn to talk about your workplace
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Eric: Hi everyone, and welcome back to PolishPod101.com. This is Lower Beginner Season 1, Lesson 2 - A Lucky Coincidence in Poland. Eric Here. |
| Marzena: Cześć. I'm Marzena. |
| Eric: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to give details about your workplace. The conversation takes place in an apartment building. |
| Marzena: It's between Kasia and Felipe. |
| Eric: The speakers are strangers, so they’ll be using formal Polish. Okay, let's listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Kasia: Pracuje pan dla firmy handlowej? Ja też! |
| Felipe: Nazywa się Good Connections. To jest bardzo duża firma. |
| Kasia: O, ja też tam pracuję! Możesz mi mówić na ty. |
| Felipe: Naprawdę? Ka-ta-rzy-na (trying to pronounce) Możesz to przeliterować? |
| Kasia: Nie, Kasia. K-a-s-i-a. |
| Eric: Listen to the conversation one time slowly. |
| Kasia: Pracuje pan dla firmy handlowej? Ja też! |
| Felipe: Nazywa się Good Connections. To jest bardzo duża firma. |
| Kasia: O, ja też tam pracuję! Możesz mi mówić na ty. |
| Felipe: Naprawdę? Ka-ta-rzy-na (trying to pronounce) Możesz to przeliterować? |
| Kasia: Nie, Kasia. K-a-s-i-a. |
| Eric: Listen to the conversation with the English translation. |
| Kasia: Are you working for a trading company, sir? Me too. |
| Felipe: It's a really big company. It's called Good Connections. |
| Kasia: Oh, I work there too! You can call me by my name. |
| Felipe: Really? Ka-ta-rzy-na (trying to pronounce) Can you spell it? |
| Kasia: No, Kasia. K-a-s-i-a. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Eric: Marzena, do Poles commonly use nicknames? |
| Marzena: Yes. Actually many Polish names have diminutive forms. They can be shorter versions of the name, or just names that imply that the speakers are close. |
| Eric:Meaning that they are mostly used by family members and among friends. |
| Marzena: Right. But it really just depends on how the person introduces themselves when you meet them. |
| Eric: I see. Are diminutives also used for children? |
| Marzena: Yes, they are always used towards children. When they grow up, often people go back to using their full names, but that’s not a rule and it depends on the person. |
| Eric: Can you make a diminutive for any Polish name? |
| Marzena: Yes, you can make one for almost any name, although some may be difficult and not listed on the official list. |
| Eric: Could you give us some examples? |
| Marzena: Sure. For example, for female names, Joanna might be Joasia or Asia, but Walentyna doesn’t have any official diminutives. |
| Eric: What about male names? |
| Marzena: Well, Piotr can change into Piotrek or Piotruś, but Tymon doesn’t have any diminutives. Although I could imagine calling my future son Tymonek or something similar. |
| Eric: Oh, really? It seems like Polish is quite flexible. |
| Marzena: Definitely. And most names without official diminutives are the old ones that you don’t use anymore. |
| Eric: When you introduce yourself, what can you say if you want somebody to call you by your diminutive? |
| Marzena: you could say something like Mam na imię Katarzyna, ale mów mi Kasia. |
| Eric: Meaning "My name is Katarzyna, but call me Kasia." Okay, now onto the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Eric: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary from this lesson. The first word is.. |
| Marzena: też [natural native speed] |
| Eric: also, too |
| Marzena: też[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: też [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: bardzo [natural native speed] |
| Eric: very (much) |
| Marzena: bardzo[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: bardzo [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: tam [natural native speed] |
| Eric: there |
| Marzena: tam[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: tam [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: mówić [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to speak |
| Marzena: mówić[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: mówić [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: móc [natural native speed] |
| Eric: can |
| Marzena: móc[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: móc [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: naprawdę [natural native speed] |
| Eric: really |
| Marzena: naprawdę[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: naprawdę [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: przeliterować [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to spell |
| Marzena: przeliterować[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: przeliterować [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: firma [natural native speed] |
| Eric: company |
| Marzena: firma[slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: firma [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Eric: Let's have a closer look at some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The first phrase is.. |
| Marzena: mówić na ty |
| Eric: meaning "to call by one's name." This is a very useful phrase, especially when you’re staying in Poland, because it’s what you have to say if you want to switch from formal language to informal language with someone. |
| Marzena: The first component of this phrase is mówić, which literally means "to speak," but more naturally is "to call." Next there's the preposition na, literally meaning "on," but in this case it stands for the English "by." And lastly there is ty, which literally translates into the English "you.” |
| Eric: In English it's common to address people as "you", but in Polish, before getting into a more friendly relationship, people are addressed as "Mr." or “Ms.” |
| Marzena: in Polish pan or pani. |
| Eric: So when you want to make a more friendly atmosphere or closer relationship with a person you’ve met, you can use this phrase. |
| Marzena: Exactly. The moment the person you're talking with addresses you using pan or pani, you can just say proszę mi mówić na ty, |
| Eric: "please call me by my first name," or literally “please call me “you”, meaning that they don’t have to use the third person when addressing you, they can directly use the second person instead. Can you give us another example using this phrase? |
| Marzena: Sure. For example, you can say.. Możemy mówić sobie na ty? |
| Eric: ..which means "Can we call each other by first names?" Okay, what's the next word? |
| Marzena: Naprawdę? |
| Eric: meaning "Really?" |
| Marzena: Naprawdę means exactly the same as the English "really?" It's a combination of two Polish words na, meaning "on" or "for" and prawda, which means "truth." So literally naprawdę could be translated as "for real?" |
| Eric: You can use it when you're surprised at something another person has said. Can you give us an example using this word? |
| Marzena: Sure. For example, you can say.. Naprawdę? Wygrałeś na loterii? |
| Eric: .. which means "Really? You won a lottery?" Okay, now onto the lesson focus. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Eric: In this lesson, you'll learn how to give details about your workplace. There are many ways of talking about your workplace or profession. First, let’s have a look at one we heard in the dialogue. |
| Marzena: The structure used was pracować dla…, meaning “to work for...”, followed by the workplace; for Felipe it was firma handlowa, |
| Eric: meaning “a trading company.” Can we review the conjugation for the verb “to work”? |
| Marzena: Okay, I will say the Polish version and Eric will give the translation. First is ja pracuję |
| Eric:"I work" |
| Marzena: ty pracujesz |
| Eric: "you work" |
| Marzena: on/ona/ono pracuje |
| Eric: “he/she/it works” |
| Marzena:my pracujemy |
| Eric: “we work” |
| Marzena: wy pracujecie |
| Eric: “you work” (plural) |
| Marzena: oni pracują |
| Eric: “they work” |
| Marzena: The phrase pracować dla is most commonly used with the noun firma, meaning “company” in English. This feminine noun has to be in genitive form, so together we will get pracować dla firmy. |
| Eric: After that, you can add what kind of company you’re working for. Let’s give some examples. |
| Marzena: Sure thing. Pracuję dla firmy handlowej |
| Eric: “I work for a trading company.” |
| Marzena: Ona pracuje dla firmy budowlanej. |
| Eric: “She works for a construction company.” |
| Marzena: There’s one more way of talking about your job or workplace using the verb pracować meaning “to work.” |
| Eric: This second form is usually used when the job we're doing is not connected to our profession or what we have studied to be. Could you give us an example? |
| Marzena: Pracuję jako kelnerka w restauracji szybkiej obsługi. |
| Eric: "I work as a waitress in a fast food restaurant." |
| Marzena: Of course you can limit yourself to saying, for example, pracuję jako kelnerka |
| Eric: “I work as a waitress,” |
| Marzena: without adding the details about the place, so in this case we would omit w restauracji obsługi |
| Eric: “in a fast food restaurant.” Let’s give another example. |
| Marzena: Pracuję jako kierowca autobusu. |
| Eric: “I work as a bus driver.” |
| Marzena:The easiest and simplest way to tell someone about your job or profession is by using the verb być which means "to be.” Simply say Jestem... and add the name of your job, which has to be in the instrumental case. Using the same example as before, Jestem kierowcą autobusu. |
| Eric: "I'm a bus driver." The instrumental case is used with the names of jobs. |
| Marzena: Right. For now you can just remember that we’re using this form when talking about a job or profession. |
| Eric: Let’s give some other job names in the instrumental case. Let’s start with “manager.” |
| Marzena: Sure. The nominative is dyrektor and the instrumental is dyrektorem. |
| Eric: What’s the Polish for “doctor”? |
| Marzena: In this case, we have both a masculine and feminine version. The masculine version is lekarz, [PAUSE] lekarzem and the feminine is lekarka, [PAUSE] lekarką |
| Eric: What about “bartender”? |
| Marzena: barman is the nominative, barmanem is the instrumental. |
| Eric: Ok, let’s wrap up with some sample sentences using the expressions and rules that we’ve just seen. |
| Marzena: Pracuję dla firmy zagranicznej. |
| Eric: "I work for a foreign company." |
| Marzena: Moja mama pracuje jako sekretarka. |
| Eric: "My mom works as a secretary." |
| Marzena: On pracuje w restauracji. |
| Eric: "He works at the restaurant." |
Outro |
| Eric: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. Thank you for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! Bye! |
| Marzena: Do widzenia. |
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