Polish Language and Culture Class

Okay hello, longtime no posting. Today I'm gonna write again about some of my experience few weeks ago. But there is something different that I am trying to write my post in English haha. Actually I am not confidence with my english especially when I was in school but then I forced my self to like learning English and made it in fun way by listening to music look at to the lyric, reading an english news, listening to the radio, watching movie and also add some international friends that I met on learning english group on facebook.

I wanna tell you about Polish and Language culture class that I followed 4 times in Atma Jaya University. It was held once a week during a month. Actually I am more interested and curious about the culture rather than the language cause I think Polish language is hard enough to pronounce, so many consonant everywhere in a one word haha.

The keynote speaker is Miss Lucyna Boryczko, I think she is from Poland Embassy to Indonesia. During the class, we learnt some basic Polish greetings like Dzien dobry/czesc (good morning), Jak sie masz (how are you), Dziekuje (thank you), Milo mi (nice to meet you) etc. Sorry actually  I can't write some Polish alphabet through my laptop's keyboard so I just write the letter as it is haha. Why in the beginning some main city at Poland like Krakow, Warsaw, Bydgoszcz and Gdansk were located along side Vistula River the longest river there. Cause the function of the river as the transportation in the past. And I just known that in Polish, a city could be a singular like Warzawa or plural like Katowice. We were told a brief history of Poland when Polish Nation was baptized at the first time and became a Christian, first University in Poland Jagiellonian University, battle in Poland, Poland under occupation, WW 1, WW 2, first slavic elected to be a Pope (Karol Wojtyla John Pope II), until the collapse of the communism in Poland.

Atmosphere during the class

Vistula River the longest river in Poland where the earliy main cities located.

I also know some Polish culture like picking a mushroom is a popular thing to do there, history of the Polish National Emblem the White Eagle. Based on the legend, there were 3 Slavic Ancestors. They are Lech (founder of Poland), Czech (like this name we can guess that he was founder of Czech) amd Rus (also according to the name, he was founder of Russia). That was the time when Slavic Nation spoke the same language and live in one area.  Poprawiny Tradition (Second day the wedding party) it means that if a couple married they could make a party or receptiom until 3 or 4 days. Ms. Lucyna said that nowadays the tradition is still exist in rural/village area coz less expensive. Meanwhile in the big city no longer followed by the young couple. I will post both of full stories later by taking the photo of the print out coz I am too lazy if I have to write it down it by my self haha. In fact there are another tradition and legend/myth that were told but I only share them that I got the print out.

The story about the legend of White Eagle Polish National Emblem. 

Poprawiny a Polish Marriage Tradition.

I also asked Ms. Lucyna on several occasions at the class first abouy Economy of Poland. As we know in communist country usually everything was owned by the state. How about in post-communism era today in Poland? Is still there state-owned enterprise in Poland? She answered that yes there are still a few state company but not many. The example is post mail company Poczta Polska. But she also said that it is very bad in service haha.

And in another chance I asked about religion during communist era. I asked it before watching film titled Pokidoki (Afterimage) a film by Andrzej Wajda. It is about painter living under Polish Commusist Government. Usually a communist state is an atheist state, but I wonder why Polish remains more than 80% in Roman Catolicism. The catholic culture is so strong in Poland. she said that in her opinion, under communist era, Catholic church didn't cooperate with the government. They helped people such as provided food that received from western Europe or United States of  America. If Catholic church was in cooperate with the government, maybe we are not so catholic right now she said.

In the last meeting we learnt about human body parts and tried to memorize it with a song. Later we back to learn about Polish culture, even Ms. Lucyna wore a traditional cloth from Krakow because she is also from that city haha. We red some Polish famous poet, this meting was like a workshop, we also practiced dancing Polish traditional, national Krakowiak and modern Papaya dance. The last one she said it was very popular in Asia. We were told about Pisanki, Easter ornamented egg. The pattern also applied at the wall even nowadays in underwear woman's lingerie haha. We also were told about Polish modern cultures like Barberque Party (I think it is also popular in many countries), disco polo and Conrad Festival the largest literary festival in Central europe.

A Polish poem translated to Indonesian and English.

Learnt dancing traditional dance together.

And almost in the last but not least, she told us about popular sport in Poland. I was just a little shocked that football is not one of the most polar sport there, but I think Poland is better than the other Euro 2012 host country Ukraine. Because after became a host at Euro 2012, Poland was always played at football World Cup. The popular sports are ski jumping, athletics, motorsport speedway and Formula One/F1. The last was also interesting for me because I have been watching F1 since I was a kid. If we look at to Germany, it is no wonder F1 is popular there cause they have several F1 World Champions names like Michael Schumacher, Nico Rosberg and Sebastian Vettel. But I know exactly Poland has the one and only first ever F1 racing driver named Robert Kubica. Poland also has never hosted F1 Grand Prix yet. It made me curious and I asked her why. Unfortunately she had no idea about it. It's okay for me haha.

We took a picture at the first meeting of the class. One flag can be for two countries 🇮🇩 🇵🇱. Just turn it around haha. 

My self tried to answer who the famous Polish people is. I said Robert Kubica, the first car racing driver who compete and won in Formula One.

Okay that's all about my experience at Polish Language and Culture class. Honestly this event gave me more fun and interesting information about Poland. I hope would be interesting for you who read my blog. Thank you!

*Language class is going to be continued from April until mid of July but the schedule change to weekdays. I can't join cause even though my house is in Jakarta but now I work at 30 km away from here. Really want to join this program indeed :(