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John G. Newman (USA)

Two Polish Moments

Polska has been many things to me. Language has been one of those things.

An earlier, pleasing Polish moment:

The place was a kitchen in Warsaw and the year was 1992.
Moze bedzie padac deszcz. (“Maybe it will rain.”)
Tak. Moze... (“Yeah. Maybe.”)
Zdrowko! (“Na zdrowie!”)
I was a newly arrived US Peace Corps volunteer, aged 29, and my companion was my Host Brother. We were becoming acquainted over some bread, herring, and vodka, and watching a summer night’s sky from a small kitchen table through a small open window. After three shots of vodka and five attempts, I managed to pronounce, in some roughly acceptable way, that consonant cluster at the end of the Polish word for rain. My Brother was pleased; I was pleased.

A later, ruffling Polish moment:

The place was a teacher’s dormitory in Torun and the year was 1998. The snow had melted, and I was looking for signs of spring through another window when something furry flashed across my line of vision. It was a hare, and I was in a city. Quite surprised that a hare would be darting around in an urban area, I rushed to the nearest person to report my sighting. That person was the Pani on key duty at the dormitory entrance.
My excitement must have resembled distress because she immediately asked me the equivalent of “What’s wrong, Sir? What’s happened?”, to which I responded the equivalent of “Something very interesting! Come quickly!”.
I grabbed her hand and dragged her out onto the lawn. I pointed off to the left somewhere and said “There! It was there! A jajac! Truly! A jajac!” Within seconds another Pani had shown up and now the two Panie were listening to me rave on about the hare that I had seen, and, initially, not understanding me. Once I had resorted to hopping gestures, they quickly caught on. Still, for some reason, the Panie, unable to contain themselves, began laughing, somehow both politely and hysterically at the same time.
After a pause for air, one of them said, Prosze Pana, “You mean zajac, don’t you?”. I replied, Tak, tak zajac...albo... jajac, nie...tak... zajac. Pani ma racje, zajac. (“Yes, yes hare...or... ‘egg-creature which can leap’, no... yes... hare. You are right Madame, hare.”)
Still unaware of the deeper idiom-based humor potent in my error, I mildly chuckled along with them a bit before repeating “Yes, it was right here in the grass, near all these buildings. Incredible isn’t it?”. The Panie were entertained; I was ruffled.

In an effort to comprehend better what I’d said, I related the incident to my very verbally competent Polish mother (in-law), who laughed in a loving kind of way, and then later knitted me a napkin with an illustration of my hare carrying an egg and my misnomer written beneath it, as if, perhaps, I’d accidentally called that hare, let’s say, the Easter Bunny. Yes, she’s a very good mother.

Again, Polska has been many things to me. Language has been one of those things.

Thanks for reading.

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John G. Newman lived and worked in Poland from 1992 to 2002, initially in Olsztyn (1992-1997) and later in Toruń (1997-2002). A college instructor by profession, he was sent to Poland and assigned to the English Teacher Training College of Olsztyn (University of Gdańsk) by the U.S. Peace Corps in 1992. Following his (twice extended) tour as a Peace Corps volunteer, he relocated to Toruń, where he taught English and historical linguistics at Nicolaus Copernicus University. Soon afterward, he began doctoral studies in linguistics at the University of Warsaw. He completed those studies and returned to the U.S. in 2002. Though he was born in Seattle, John now lives in Texas with his Polish wife Ela and teaches at the University of Texas at Brownsville as an Associate Professor of Linguistics. (Ela also teaches in the English department at that university.) John and Ela have close ties in Poland, of course, and they travel there every year or so to visit family, friends, and colleagues. They also keep in touch with one other former Peace Corps Volunteer, Michael Ramos, who once, when buying a train ticket in Elblag and hearing the question “Which train?”, uttered, with the confidence of innocence, Niestety pociag. “Unfortunately the train.” instead of uttering Nastepny pociag. “The next train.”, leaving his listener, the woman issuing tickets, to wonder what means of transportation this somewhat grey-haired fellow would have preferred-the horse by chance? (Sorry Michał, I know you tell that one much better than I do!)