Learn how to ask the price of something
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Eric: Hi everyone, and welcome back to PolishPod101.com. This is Lower Beginner Season 1 Lesson 20 - That's Daylight Robbery in Poland! Eric here. |
| Marzena: Cześć. I'm Marzena. |
| Eric: In this lesson, you’ll learn how to ask for the price in Polish. The conversation takes place at a computer store. |
| Marzena: It's between Felipe and a woman. |
| Eric: The speakers are strangers, so they'll use formal Polish. Okay, let's listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Felipe: Przepraszam, ile kosztuje ten komputer? |
| Kobieta: 3000 (trzy tysiące) złotych. |
| Felipe: Trochę za drogi. A tamten duży czerwony? |
| Kobieta: 1800 (tysiąc osiemset) złotych. |
| Felipe: Ja mam tylko 1500 (tysiąc pięćset). |
| Kobieta: To może tamten biały? Jest mały, ładny i kosztuje tylko 1300 (tysiąc trzysta) złotych. |
| Felipe: O, tani. |
| Eric: Listen to the conversation one time slowly. |
| Felipe: Przepraszam, ile kosztuje ten komputer? |
| Kobieta: 3000 (trzy tysiące) złotych. |
| Felipe: Trochę za drogi. A tamten duży czerwony? |
| Kobieta: 1800 (tysiąc osiemset) złotych. |
| Felipe: Ja mam tylko 1500 (tysiąc pięćset). |
| Kobieta: To może tamten biały? Jest mały, ładny i kosztuje tylko 1300 (tysiąc trzysta) złotych. |
| Felipe: O, tani. |
| Eric: Listen to the conversation with the English translation. |
| Felipe: Excuse me, how much does this computer cost? |
| Woman: 3000 zl. |
| Felipe: It's a little bit too expensive. How about that big red one? |
| Woman: 1800 zl. |
| Felipe: I only have 1500. |
| Woman: Then maybe that white one? It's small, nice, and costs only 1300 zl. |
| Felipe: Oh, cheap. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Eric: Marzena, do Polish people like buying electronics? |
| Marzena: It obviously depends on the person, but in general, yes. |
| Eric: What are the most common ways to purchase electronics? |
| Marzena: There are quite a few ways to shop for electronics in Poland, but recently online shopping has been growing in popularity. For example, one of the most popular and cheapest ways to buy things is through auctions called Allegro. |
| Eric: Many Poles shop there for all kinds of products, and that includes electronics. |
| Marzena: Another way is using a website called Ceneo which compares the prices of the product and stores that have it available. |
| Eric: And if someone is not into online shopping, are there some famous chain electronic stores in Poland? |
| Marzena: I think that the most popular and cheapest one is probably MediaMarkt, which is located in every big city. |
| Eric: I think a very good way of shopping is checking the product at a store in your city and after seeing it in person check the price online - in most cases that will save you a large amount of money. |
| Marzena: Could be. But before doing so always remember to check the reviews of the store and product written by other customers. |
| Eric: That’s good advice. Okay, now onto the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Eric: Let’s take a look at the vocabulary from this lesson. The first word is.. |
| Marzena: komputer [natural native speed] |
| Eric: computer |
| Marzena: komputer [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: komputer [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: złoty [natural native speed] |
| Eric: złoty, the Polish currency |
| Marzena: złoty [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: złoty [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: drogi [natural native speed] |
| Eric: expensive |
| Marzena: drogi [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: drogi [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: czerwony [natural native speed] |
| Eric: red |
| Marzena: czerwony [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: czerwony [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: tylko [natural native speed] |
| Eric: just, only |
| Marzena: tylko [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: tylko [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: biały [natural native speed] |
| Eric: white |
| Marzena: biały [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: biały [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: mały [natural native speed] |
| Eric: small |
| Marzena: mały [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: mały [natural native speed] |
| Eric: Next we have.. |
| Marzena: kosztować [natural native speed] |
| Eric: to cost |
| Marzena: kosztować [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: kosztować [natural native speed] |
| Eric: And lastly.. |
| Marzena: tani [natural native speed] |
| Eric: cheap |
| Marzena: tani [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Marzena: tani [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 word is.. |
| Marzena: trochę |
| Eric: which means “a little” or “a bit” in English. You can use this word in many different contexts, for example you can say… |
| Marzena: Trochę się spóźnię |
| Eric: “I'll be a bit late.” |
| Marzena: Trochę za dużo zjadłam |
| Eric: “I ate a bit too much.” |
| Marzena: Trochę za luźny ten sweter |
| Eric: “This sweater is a little bit too loose.” |
| Marzena: Trochę often occurs with za when you say something is too much or literally too little, meaning not enough. We saw this in the sentence with the sweater, where it was too loose - trochę za luźny. |
| Eric: The same usage was presented in the dialogue. Felipe said… |
| Marzena: trochę za drogi, meaning “a little bit too expensive.” |
| Eric: Can you give us an example using this word? |
| Marzena: Sure. For example, you can say.. Trochę za słona ta zupa. |
| Eric: ..which means “This soup is a bit too salty.” Okay, what's the next phrase? |
| Marzena: To może... |
| Eric: which means “then maybe” or “so maybe.” This indicates us changing our mind. |
| Marzena: When we wanted something and it turns out to be impossible or not as we wanted it, we often say to może to show the change, and to propose something different than we said earlier. |
| Eric: Like in the dialogue when Felipe wanted to buy a laptop and the lady was proposing different models, when he refused she started with… |
| Marzena: to może, |
| Eric: ...suggesting that she took into consideration what he said and was about to propose something else. Marzena, can you give us an example using this phrase? |
| Marzena: Sure. For example, you can say.. Nie chcesz iść do kina? To może obejrzymy coś w domu? |
| Eric: .. which means “You don't want to go to the cinema? So maybe we'll watch something at home.” Okay, now onto the lesson focus. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Eric: In this lesson you'll learn how to ask for the price in Polish. Let’s start by reviewing the demonstrative pronouns. |
| Marzena: In Polish, these are called zaimki wskazujące. In this lesson we'll concentrate on the most important ones which you can use when you point at things. For example, ta książka |
| Eric: Meaning “this book.” When you use the demonstrative pronouns in Polish, the first rule to remember is that you have to choose a different demonstrative pronoun depending on the grammatical gender and the grammatical number of the noun which follows. This means that you will use different words before masculine, feminine, and neuter nouns, as well as in front of singular and plural. |
| Marzena: For “this,” if the noun is masculine, use ten, and if it’s feminine use ta. If it's neuter gender, use to. |
| Eric: Listeners, in the lesson notes you can find all the forms for “that,” “these,” and “those.” Another thing to keep in mind is that demonstratives also change their form according to the cases. Now let’s go back to the main topic, which is asking for prices in Polish |
| Marzena: The simplest question you can ask is Ile to kosztuje? |
| Eric: which in English is “How much is it?” If you see something you like and want to ask the shop clerk how much it costs, you can start with… |
| Marzena: przepraszam, which means “excuse me,” to grab the clerk's attention. |
| Eric: Then use the phrase… |
| Marzena: ile to kosztuje? |
| Eric: So, altogether the phrase will be… |
| Marzena: Przepraszam, ile to kosztuje? After this, the shop clerk will usually answer by saying just the price of an item, for example... |
| Marzena: Piętnaście złotych. |
| Eric: “Fifteen zloty” or |
| Marzena: Sto złotych |
| Eric: “One hundred zloty.” In our dialogue we had a slightly different version of the question, which used a demonstrative pronoun. |
| Marzena: Right. Felipe said Przepraszam, ile kosztuje ten komputer? |
| Eric: which means “Excuse me, how much does this computer cost?” Marzena, let's break down this phrase to see the meaning of each word. |
| Marzena: Sure. First we have przepraszam, meaning “excuse me.” It is followed by the pronoun ile, meaning “how much.” The next word is the verb kosztować, “to cost,” in its third person singular form kosztuje. Then we have a pronoun ten, “this” and the noun komputer, which means “computer.” |
| Eric: So, altogether we have... |
| Marzena: Przepraszam, ile kosztuje ten komputer? |
| Eric: “Excuse me, how much does this computer cost?” |
| Marzena: We use the pronoun ten, meaning “this,” every time we want to be more specific when asking "how much is it?" and are referring to a certain type of object. |
| Eric: As we said before, we first need to know the gender of the noun. Let’s try with "watch." |
| Marzena: In Polish "watch" is the masculine zegarek. So it would be Przepraszam, ile kosztuje ten zegarek? |
| Eric: "Excuse me, how much is this watch?" |
| Marzena: "Skirt" is a feminine noun, spódnica. So it would be Przepraszam, ile kosztuje ta spódnica? |
| Eric: "Excuse me, how much is this skirt?" |
| Marzena: In the case of a neuter noun, like krzesło meaning “chair,” we will use to. Przepraszam, ile kosztuje to krzesło? |
| Eric: which means “Excuse me, how much is this chair?” And finally, if we ask about a price of a few similar items, like “these t-shirts,” “these apples,” or “these toys,” we have to add the plural form of “these” before the noun. |
| Marzena: Which is te. For example, Przepraszam, ile kosztują te jabłka? |
| Eric: “Excuse me, how much are these apples?” As we mentioned before, the answer will most likely not be a full sentence but just the price, exactly as we heard in this lesson’s dialogue. Now, we have one other point to cover here. In the dialogue, colors were mentioned when Felipe was talking with the shop clerk. Sometimes it helps to specify the object we’re interested in. |
| Marzena: In Polish, color names are adjectives and have to agree with the gender of the noun they are referring to. For example “white” in the singular form can be biały, biała, białe and in the plural biali, białe. |
| Eric: Let’s remember that in the singular form there are three genders – masculine, feminine and neuter. While in the plural, there are only masculine and non-masculine. Listeners, be sure to check out the complete list of colors in the lesson notes. |
Outro |
| Eric: Okay, that’s all for this lesson. Thank you for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! Bye! |
| Marzena: Do usłyszenia. |
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