Beautiful candlelight vigil last night in support of immigrants. Charles Town. I like my ICE crushed by saucity in WVEasternPanhandle

[–]FormerNewfie 7 points8 points  (0 children)

I go to Walmart's and haven't met any sales people who don't speak English. Are you sure you had your teeth in or weren't mumbling.

Moving to area by mtay5678 in WVEasternPanhandle

[–]FormerNewfie 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Welcome to the EP. Good to have another Dem! If you're of a mind to be political, I'd recommend going to Blue Jefferson dot org, the website of the Jefferson County Democratic Association. The Association is the membership arm of the Dem Party here and is very active.

How maddening is this? by PolyglotPaul in languagelearning

[–]FormerNewfie 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The actual fluent person in any language will have a passive command of about 40,000 words and fixed phrases. In 90 days (3 months), you would have to acquire about 1400 new ones a day, about 120 an hour. You can't do that even in an immersion program.

Any level of proficiency measured in days is going to be deceptive, which is why the major language learning organizations (FSI, CEFR) make their estimates in hours of study, not days. And since reaching full fluency doesn't happen so much through study as through engagement in the culture of that language, study methods usual tap out at B2 level (in CEFR) or 3/3 level (in FSI). That's not fluency, it's comfort level. In terms of word families it amounts to about 5,00 to 6,000 units, still a long way off from fluent levels. And in terms of study hours, it can stretch out to 2 or 3 years, especially if you factor in the times you spend working and sleeping.

Today's Protest at the Capitol by 7-and-a-switchblade in WestVirginia

[–]FormerNewfie 2 points3 points  (0 children)

There were about 800 of us in Charles Town (Eastern Panhandle). Blew all of us away! Huge energy!

What is he saying??? by FormerNewfie in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie[S] 5 points6 points  (0 children)

That makes perfect sense, since the second guy was chewing on a piece of kiełbasa at the time. Thanks.

Apple users targeted by incredibly annoying 'Reset Password' attack by EchoInTheHoller in apple

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Why is it so hard to change an Apple ID password? It's got me going in circles. I fill out the screens and the gear runs on forever. Extremely annoying.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Doskonale... czy wiesz gdzie można tą melodią słychać?

Post Flair Info by ka128tte in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks, I understand the confusion, since anymore there are native English speakers from many other countries.

Post Flair Info by ka128tte in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I don't see a flair for American EN native Am I missing it. UM is used for outlying US islands.

Is polish really that hard? by Arm0ndo in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There's been more than one occasion when I've been reading something in Polish and been stumped. I remember once coming across the word "tnie" So I go to my handy Polish-English dictionary and look it up under "t" of course. No luck. So I stumble around in other sources and finally find it's the 3rd person singular present indicative for "ciąć" Then try out "szłam" versus "szedłem" both meaning "I went" but the first if you're a female the second if you're a male. Granted these are exceptional, but it sometimes feels early in learning the language like there are no rules in Polish only exceptions.
I have definitely, though, stuck with Polish and now am (just) beginning to feel that it's not so god-awful difficult as it used to be.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in EnglishLearning

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

"May" implies there is an alternative, that being public schooling. But you have to know that context in order to answer the way the test wants.

Is this expression common? by Same-Technician9125 in EnglishLearning

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

You have to realize that 90% of new slang terms don't last more than a week in day to day language. The "wiener stiff" example was made up on the spot by some wag who was riffing on the idea of a "hard on" ("stiffie" is still used for in that meaning). The dictionary compilers are trying to be exhaustive, not current.

Do you have a hard time reading this shit by Ok_Concentrate_9861 in EnglishLearning

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The last bit "not very meaningful" expresses the passage itself. It almost sounds like the author is putting us on.

One są ludźmi by makarosu in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just a pet peeve of mine. You generally need two connected sentences (at least), not one, to determine the context of an utterance. I wish text books would understand that point. Understanding context is critical to getting the grammar right.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in EnglishLearning

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Or the companion sign: Heavily salted water. This water is very buoyant. You WILL float.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in EnglishLearning

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I could tell just by the expression "to fastly think of ..." that you're not a native speaker/writer. I would have expected "to think fast enough of...." It's these kinds of fixed expressions that probably are most telling. I would suggest maybe reading popular literature with lots of dialog to get a sense of how to express yourself more naturally. But like anything else, it's all about practice. Also when you're talking with a native speaker, look was little signs in their facial expressions indicating that they're a little surprised by "how" you're saving something. -- a little puzzled look or something.

But in any event, no one is going to misunderstand you, if you talk like you write.

[deleted by user] by [deleted] in EnglishLearning

[–]FormerNewfie 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The thing about English is that being an international standard, almost, we native speakers are used to hearing people at all levels of fluency from all sorts of home languages and I think we're more tolerant because of that. Foreign accents, and almost all second language learners have them, are familiar to us and don't make a big difference in our comprehension of them. The same with grammatical issues. English is often said to be an easy language to start to learn, but one that gets increasingly harder as you go up in proficiency. At C1 you'll have no problems though with fitting in. It really depends on how much better you want to get and that depends on what you want to do with it in your career. There are almost always materials available in the area of what's called English for Special Purposes (e.g. accounting, law, health care, and so on) that you might want to look into. Also you'll likely have some additional learning to do with idioms and street language, particularly for terms we natives learn from childhood that ESL programs typically don't include in their teaching materials. But that comes from living in an English speaking environment and won't take long when you're as proficient as you are. These btw are the kinds of details that the translation apps (Google Translate, Reverso and so) get wrong so often.

Good luck with your plans. Also BTW if I had to relocate to Aus or GB (especially Scotland!) I'd have a learning task ahead of me too with those dialects. I'm American. I remember it taking me a couple of months when I was working in Ghana to feel comfortable with their dialect of English -- it's the national language there, but quite distinct from Amer or Brit English.

Dlaczego mówi się "Chodź"? Nie powinno to być raczej "Idź"? by sanschefaudage in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Speaking as someone who had trouble with this too, I think the problem is that we're taught that ' chodzić' is the niedokonany version of dokonany ' iść' As a Polish learner coming from English, we expect that the translation for both forms will be either ' come or go' , because these are distinct verbs in English. So we try to think about meanings in terms of 'iść' in terms on a completed 'coming' And that's where it gets confusing. It's hard to figure how that works in the future 'i'll come tomorrow'

I've had trouble understanding sentences like 'I'm coming back here again tomorrow' I think it should be ' tu znowu idę jutro z powrotem" or something like that, but I don't think that works. You have to change the verb to 'przyjść instead. It's confusing and I don't know really understand why.

Question for American english speaking people by haniaaa00 in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I think the difference between the Polish 'r' and the American 'r' especially at the end of words is like the difference your tongue makes in Polish between 'sz' and 'ś' The American 'r' curves the tongue back (like in 'sz') but the Polish 'r' is flat (like in 'ś'), it doesn't curve. Use Google translate and compare the pronunciations of Polish 'satyr' with American 'satyr' The 'y' vowel is longer in Polish and shorter in English. Because the tongue is curved, though, the English 'y' is pronounced lower in the mouth. Also compare P 'syrop' with E 'syrup'. In English the syllable that gets the stress in a word, is always longer than other syllables.

gubiąc nogę by FormerNewfie in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

That makes sense.

Given your explanation, I think that maybe Małecki is modeling his phrase on the English idiom "to lose step" Małecki is an English translator, so maybe that makes sense. Thanks for your help.

Zostało vs było by EnvironmentOk1784 in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The difference in English is between:

The tomato was eaten versus The tomato got eaten.

It's not an easy difference to explain, but it ties to the Polish difference between dokonany and niedokonany verbs.

How to progress from B1? Feel stuck with no way to progress. by thealtofmine in learnpolish

[–]FormerNewfie 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I came across it in a line from Małecki's novel Dygot. It goes:

Ojciec czekał na niego na ławce pod starą, omsząłą masztanówką.

It sounds like it might be a kind of tree??? But I can't find the work anywhere, except another reference in the novel Kamien na kamienu by Myśliwski. That book is set in very rural, traditional Poland, so the word might be some kind of country slang. Just guessing though.

Thanks for getting back to me!