America

When I attended the American Studies Association Conference in San Antonio this fall, the cover of the conference information book was a snide cartoon about American attitudes towards foreigners. It mocked authority, raising up instead the plight of the lowly. I think, if I had to describe American Studies, I would say it's learning to think critically about American Institutions and Americanness. This includes history and literature and politics. It also includes a lot of liberal minded academics making sarcastic comments about the problems in America.

Despite the reputation Americans have for blindly thinking that they're the best, I've rarely met people who are that way. I've encountered ignorance about other countries and ignorant assumptions. My cousin's husband, upon hearing that I was going to Poland, made a particularly uninformed comment about "those communist countries" that isn't really worth repeating because it makes my blood boil. Many people that I know have a tendency to underappreciate the big because they're too busy protecting the little from the tyranny of the majority.


I'm embarrassed now to admit that I was among the camp that thought snidely of America. I mocked it.


Until I went abroad. While in Poland last summer, America was the solution to everything. In America, I didn't have to worry about being quiet on buses because pick pockets target foreigners. In America, I didn't have to put my change in a dish on the counter while paying at stores because in America, we hand each other our change. In America, the internet was reliable, wireless, and available as soon as I arrived to school - not days later. In America, I could buy diet coke that tasted like diet coke and shop owners could break 100 zolty bills (approx. $30). But, in America, the ATM would never doll out money that couldn't be used because of its size. In America, there was air conditioning. I never really pushed myself past the distrust of Poland back to reality. There was no reason. By the time the wonder of a foreign country died down, I was only a couple weeks from arrival in Chicago (where by the time I picked up my luggage, five very friendly airport workers made me remember how welcoming a service-driven economy could be).

Fruit Vocab

There are plenty of lists out there for learning Polish. I found one that lists the 3000 words you should know after studying Polish for a year, but I've never been very good at reading dictionaries. It seemed rather dull to me. All the listings. It gives you no basis for remembering the words the way flashcards or full sentences do. So, I opted to think of vocabulary I need that's not necessarily in the "Hi, How are you?" categories that Polish covers. The most important, I think, is food vocabulary. Otherwise, how do you know what flavors to get at the corner pastry stand.

What flavor is it?
Jaki to smak?


Apple ... Jabłko
Coconut ... Kokos
Pineapple ... Ananas
Mango ... Mango (I love an easy one!)
Papaya ... Melonowiec
Grapefruit ... Grapefruit
Orange ... Pomarańcza
Lemon ... Cytryna
Lime ... Limonka
Gooseberries ... Agrest (What are gooseberries anyway?)
Blackberries ... Jeżna
Cranberries ... Żurawina
Blueberries ... Czarna jagoda (Not to be confused with blackberries!)
Strawberry ... Truskawka (I got a lot of strawberry lody last summer because I didn't trust myself to order anything else with proper pronunciation)
Raspberries ... Maliny (Good to know for piwo z sokiem malinowym)
Nectarine ... Nektarynka
Pear ... Gruszka
Cherry ... Wiśnia
Bananas ... Bananów (Or Kiść bananów for a bunch of bananas)
Apricot ... Morela
Watermelon ... Arbuz
Avocado ... Awokado
Plum ... Śliwka
Peach ... Brzoskwinia
Sweet cherry ... Czereśnia
Bilberry ... Borówka
Currant ... Porzecza
Fig ... Figa
Date ... Daktyl
Grape ... Winogron
Kiwi ... Kiwi
Pomegranate ... Granat
Raisin ... Rodzynek


I figured I might as well post these here as I was compiling my list for my flashcards, especially since I'm unlikely to figure out a post on the ways numbers work in Polish anytime soon.

Milk Bars

It's been a slow week for language learning. I tired of Rosetta Stone, so I've only forced myself through one lesson this week. I'll start back on that soon. I got distracted by one of Joss Whedon's wonderful series - Dollhouse. After Veronica Mars disappeared from Netflix Instant before I could watch it, I felt compelled to begin my TV show watching in earnest. Then a cold worked its way through my family, hitting me pretty hard. Summer colds are always the worst. I'm very close to finishing my scrapbook for college, so I'm using free time to do that. Last,  but not least, I got a real (paying) job! So my time is super limited.

Since I didn't learn anything about the Polish language, and I still don't understand the ways numbers change well enough to write about it, I'll write about Milk Bars.

I really really want to go to a Milk Bar (bar mleczny), I read about these in Rick Steves' Eastern Europe (even though Poles will tell you that Poland is obviously CENTRAL Europe) and a girl who received the Fulbright two years ago told me that Milk Bars are not to be missed.

Back in Communist times, the government subsidized food at the milk bars, and luckily for the poor traveler, Poland still foots the bill for most of a milk bar meal. Evidently they're likely to have more traditional meals as well. Which is a win for someone hoping to experience "authentic" Polish culture. I really want the traditional experience, something I'm worried about finding since I'll be living in Warsaw.

Warsaw is just so much more of a city than where I was staying in Lublin last summer. Lublin is the sixth largest city to Warsaw's number one position. Warsaw is also three times the size of my hometown. It's nearly impossible to move around my hometown without a car, so I wonder how that will work. I assume Europe has their public transportation down.

Milk Bars can go two ways - they can be "authentic" (I usually put quotes around authentic because real authenticity is measured in so many ways. It's impossible to be entirely authentic by some standards) or they can be touristy. I love kitschy touristy things, but when I say I love those - I mean the Wieliszka salt mines, not milk bars.

I'm looking forward to some traditional Polish food experiences. I thought I'd use this summer to learn to make blueberry pierogi. That's not going to happen. I hope my roommate can cook!

Polish Links

I'm an eternal organizer.  So, when the bookmarked links in my "Polish Resources" got out of hand, I separated them into two files - Polish Language Resources and Poland Information.

Then those each got out of hand. So Poland Information is now divided into saved news articles about Poland, Polish transportation websites (as if I'd be able to sort through them with my limited Polish anyway), Polish lit resources (primarily websites where you can download Polish ebooks that are Kindle compatible), and Polish culture resources (since I've really no idea still exactly how to behave in Poland).

But I swore to try and focus this blog on Polish language learning in case someone as brave as I am (haha) stumbles across it while trying to do their own Polish thing.

So I had to divide those resources into:
Dictionaries (Obvious, but I thought it'd be smart to have several bookmarked. Rumor has it UPitt's is the best.)
Charts and Lists (Some are not very helpful - such as the website with the list of Polish curse words. Of course I want to know those, but I highly doubt that will be the most useful thing I learn in the course of my language study).
And finally, Most Professional in Appearance and Best in Content

The last category is the most important one. While my charts and lists include this website with its declension charts and this one with the ever important keyboard layout for the Polish International Keyboard are super important, they're resources to aid the learning that could come from the others.

I already talked about LiveMocha, University of Pittsburgh's resources, Mission Europe, and the fun but not entirely useful Do You Know Polska?

So here are three other useful resources.
I Kinda Like Languages has a beginning Polish lesson that's interactive in that you must fill in the blanks. This could be frustrating at first, as I know the likelihood of doing poorly increases when you have a fill in the blank test as opposed to a multiple choice (at least when there's no word bank). However, I learn so much quicker when I have to produce things myself instead of just picking the correct phrase out of a lineup.

U.S. Department of State's Foreign Service Institute has a beginning Polish handbook that features some great, outdated facts about Poland. However, the language hasn't changed as much as the culture in the past fifty years. So I'd say the book's a good resource, even if I'd start somewhere else. It's a PDF so you can take it with you or print it out a lot easier than some of these other sites.

Scribd has a free beginning language book. You can't download it, which makes me nervous that it will disappear. But it's been there for at least a year now and hasn't gone yet. It's not my first choice, but it would be a supplementary place to go in case you don't understand a concept in another text or need extra work.

Happy learning & Happy Holiday!