{"id":465,"date":"2009-01-10T17:08:22","date_gmt":"2009-01-10T21:08:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/?p=465"},"modified":"2009-01-10T17:08:22","modified_gmt":"2009-01-10T21:08:22","slug":"co-sie-tutaj-stalo-what-happened-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/co-sie-tutaj-stalo-what-happened-here\/","title":{"rendered":"Co si\u0119 tutaj sta\u0142o? &#8211; What happened here?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the comments to the previous post, Yellerbelly made a very valid point regarding \u201c<strong>co si\u0119 sta\u0142o?<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He said that he thought it meant <em>\u201cwhat\u2019s wrong?\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>I think it\u2019s a reflection of our collective Polish psyche that something so innocent as <em>\u201cwhat happened\u201d<\/em> can imply <em>\u201cwhat\u2019s wrong?\u201d<\/em> in our language. Just goes to show you that we, as Poles, always expect the worst.<\/p>\n<p>Let\u2019s take a closer look at \u201c<strong>co si\u0119 sta\u0142o?<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>co<\/strong> &#8211; what<\/li>\n<li><strong>si\u0119 sta\u0142o = sta\u0142o si\u0119<\/strong> \u2013 happened, 3rd person singular, neuter, past tense<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Now imagine this:<br \/>\nYour teenage daughter calls you and with a serious dose of panic in her voice says, <em>\u201cDad, please don\u2019t be mad\u2026\u201d<\/em><br \/>\nYour immediate reaction is \u201c<strong>co si\u0119 sta\u0142o?<\/strong>\u201d which here can be translated as <em>\u201cwhat\u2019s wrong?\u201d<\/em><br \/>\n<em>\u201cI totaled the car,\u201d<\/em> your daughter answers.<\/p>\n<p>And this:<br \/>\nYour teenage daughter calls you and says, <em>\u201cDad, ohmygod, you\u2019re not gonna believe this!\u201d<\/em><br \/>\nYou ask \u201c<strong>co si\u0119 sta\u0142o?<\/strong>\u201d and here it simply means <em>\u201cwhat happened?\u201d<\/em><br \/>\n<em>\u201cI got accepted to Stanford!\u201d<\/em> your daughter squeaks happily while you\u2019re frantically trying to calculate in your head how on earth you\u2019re going to pay for it.<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<strong>Stawa\u0107 si\u0119<\/strong>,\u201d as this verb looks in its basic dictionary form, also means <em>\u201cto become.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>For example, when in one of my moments I misspelled the name of the street I live on, and then can\u2019t figure out why the mail is not getting to me, I can say \u201c<strong>ostatnio staj\u0119 si\u0119 coraz g\u0142upsza i g\u0142upsza<\/strong>.\u201d \u2013 <em>I\u2019m becoming stupider and stupider lately.<\/em> Duh!<\/p>\n<p>So, when you see this verb used in <strong>any other form<\/strong> than 3rd person singular, neuter, past tense, it will most likely mean <em>\u201cto become.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>In that 3rd person singular, neuter, past tense \u2013 \u201c<strong>sta\u0142o si\u0119<\/strong>\u201d \u2013 it will most likely mean <em>\u201cto happen.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>And while we\u2019re on the topic of \u201c<strong>sta\u0142o si\u0119<\/strong>,\u201d here\u2019s a handy Polish saying:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Co si\u0119 sta\u0142o, to si\u0119 nie odstanie.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Literally, it means something like <em>\u201cwhat happened\/what\u2019s done, can\u2019t be undone.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n<p>So, when your daughter totaled your car and is crying over the phone, after asking her if she\u2019s OK, you think to yourself \u201c<strong>co si\u0119 sta\u0142o to si\u0119 nie odstanie<\/strong>, but next time she\u2019s definitely NOT borrowing MY car.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>And speaking of, have you noticed what happened here?<br \/>\n\u201c<strong>Zauwa\u017cyli\u015bcie co si\u0119 tutaj sta\u0142o?<\/strong>\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The blog got a face-lift. Do you like the new design? I love it!<\/p>\n<p>And now we\u2019re also on Twitter!<br \/>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/polishlanguage\" target=\"_blank\">Polish Blog on Twitter<\/a><\/p>\n<p>So between blog posts here, you\u2019ll be able to find me there, twitting away.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the comments to the previous post, Yellerbelly made a very valid point regarding \u201cco si\u0119 sta\u0142o?\u201d He said that he thought it meant \u201cwhat\u2019s wrong?\u201d I think it\u2019s a reflection of our collective Polish psyche that something so innocent as \u201cwhat happened\u201d can imply \u201cwhat\u2019s wrong?\u201d in our language. Just goes to show you&hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"post-item__readmore\"><a class=\"btn btn--md\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/co-sie-tutaj-stalo-what-happened-here\/\">Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[7556,7568,2603,166,306826],"class_list":["post-465","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-vocabulary","tag-reflexive","tag-sie","tag-twitter","tag-verbs","tag-vocabulary"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/polish\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}