{"id":276,"date":"2008-10-08T12:41:05","date_gmt":"2008-10-08T16:41:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/?p=276"},"modified":"2014-06-10T14:52:24","modified_gmt":"2014-06-10T14:52:24","slug":"polish-letter-writing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/polish-letter-writing\/","title":{"rendered":"Dear Sir\/Madam: Writing Letters in Polish"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday I got an email from somebody, and I just about fell over while reading it. Luckily, I was sitting on a bed.<\/p>\n

The email began with the words \u201cSzanowna Pani!<\/a><\/strong>\u201d which would be something like \u201cDear Madam\u201d but much more pompous. \u201cSzanowna Pani<\/strong>\u201d ??? People still use this expression? Even young people? Dang, I must be so out of the loop, it\u2019s scary. I have never heard this phrase being used by anyone younger than, say 65 years old, and not wearing a suit. The guy who wrote the email was about my age (and I\u2019m not THAT old yet) and he wasn\u2019t even a total stranger. True, this was his first email to me, and it was about business, and he did try to make a good impression, but still\u2026 I thought he totally overdid it with this \u201cSzanowna Pani<\/strong>\u201d stuff. This is the kind of language I see on papers from the Tax Office (Urz\u0105d Skarbowy<\/a><\/strong>), not from somebody who\u2019s my peer.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>On the other hand, I can\u2019t really blame him, Polish can be a very formal language, heck, Polish IS a very formal language. And people may take offense when they\u2019re not addressed properly.<\/p>\n

A few months ago I was out with a group of friends and strangers, foreigners and Poles. I chatted with one lady in English, turned out she was Polish, so I switched to Polish. Because in English, I addressed her as \u201cyou\u201d, I didn\u2019t even think twice about using the same form in Polish \u2013 \u201cty<\/strong>\u201d. She was my age and we were in a foreign country. Yet, her response was an icy stare and an even icier \u201cJa z tob\u0105 kr\u00f3w nie pasa\u0142am<\/a><\/strong>\u201d (I didn\u2019t tend cows with you) which is a nasty warning to a person talking to you (me in this case) that he\/she has breached the magical Pan\/Pani<\/strong> barrier. Apparently, that means you\u2019re only allowed to use \u201cyou\/ty\u201d to people with whom you were tending cows at some point in the past, or somesuch. I should have begun referring to that woman as \u201cSzanowna Pani<\/strong>\u201d for the rest of the evening, but unfortunately I totally forgot about this ancient phrase.<\/p>\n

Somehow the male equivalent \u201cSzanowny Panie<\/a><\/strong>\u201d (Dear Sir) and the plural \u201cSzanowni Pa\u0144stwo<\/a><\/strong>\u201d are easier to stomach, it\u2019s only that unfortunate \u201cSzanowna Pani<\/strong>\u201d that rubs me the wrong way. Maybe because it\u2019s a sign I\u2019m getting old? Dunno\u2026<\/p>\n

So, how do you maneuver this minefield of Polish courtesy expressions? I asked several people and got several answers. This is more or less the general consensus:<\/p>\n