An der Nordseeküste

Vorige Nacht träumte ich wieder, dass ich in Deutschland war. Ich nehme an, ich war beim Drehen von noch einem Indie-Filmes, dieser darüber, was am wichtigsten im Leben ist: die Ehrlichkeit. Später bin ich in einem noblen Meeresfrüchterestaurant zu Weihnachten. Ich hab ums Extrablatt gebeten und der Kellner hat ein Gericht aufgetragen und es vor mir hingesetzt. "Das ist nicht für mich," sagte ich, und dabei fiel es mir schwer, nicht entweder "nicht für micht" oder "nich für mich" auszusprechen. Er hat etwas vor sich hingemurmelt, darauf ich protestierte, "Ich habs nicht bestellt, ich hab nur darüber gefragt." Halblaut antwortete er, "Das ist richtig" und hats weggenommen. Danach kam ein mit zwei Glasaalen garniertes Cocktail, und ich entschied mich für ein Aalgericht.

WotD: moth

1. der Nachtfalter, die Motte
2. de nachtvlinder, de mot
3. la polilla, la mariposa de la luz
4. l'arna
5. le papillon de nuit
6. y gwyfyn
7. an féileacán oíche
8. 나방
9. 蛾 é

Example sentences:

1. Letzte Nacht hat das Kätzchen eine Nachtfalter gefangen.
2. Vorige nacht ving het katje een nachtvlinder.
3. Anoche el minino cogió una polilla.
4. Anit el gatet va agafar una arna.
5. Le minou a attrapé un papillon de nuit la nuit dernière.
6. Fe gipiodd Pwsyn gwyfyn neithiwr.
7. Fuair Puisín féileacán oíche aréir.
8. 어젯밤에 괴물이 나방을 잡았다.
9. 昨晚貓捕獲了一隻蛾. Zuówǎn māo bǔhuò yìzhī é

Zabójca w naszym środku

Złapał Koczurek mola wczoraj niedługo przed zaśnięciem. Wpuścił go monshu, gdy wychodził na papierosa. Zwyczajem kotów on go wyzwolił a odzyskał kilke razy zanim go zjadł. Przynajmniej on nie wymiotował później.

Jak matka gotowała

The challenge: Using up the spendy imported meats (sujuk, smoked bacon) I bought last time I made dinner before they went off. Admittedly, as challenges go, it's not much of one.

The solution: Stew! Specifically bigos. Well, The best of Polish cooking calls it "gęsta potrawka myśliwska" (lit. "thick ragout hunter-style") or "Hunter's Stew", but it's pretty clear from the ingredients--sauerkraut, sausage, leftover meat, mushrooms, wine, etc.--that that's nothing more than a fancy-shmancy name for the Polish national dish.

The substitutions: The most obvious is the sausage, of course: Bosnian and made of beef rather than Polish and made of pork. But the balance of the meat is leftovers from the Sunday joint of pork, so I think we're in the clear. (Certainly, the laws of trefut are being rigidly adhered to.) monshu marinated and braised that in wine, so I just used the sauce (thinned with a little boughten vegetable stock) in place of the red wine and bouillon called for in the recipe. I also left out the the fresh cabbage, since I'm not a fan, but now it occurs to me that they could've meant red cabbage as well as white and that would've provided an inviting contrast. Oh well.

The results: We won't know until at least tomorrow since the recipe calls for me to stew it a couple hours tonight, then refrigerate it and reheat tomorrow. Descriptions of bigos say that it peaks on the third day, so it may take even longer to form an educated verdict.

Devil take the hindmost!

While I'm on the subject*, here's something about Polish I just don't get: The placement of attributive adjectives. As far as I can tell, usage favours neither pre-noun or post-noun position. It seems almost every page of my cookbook has examples. Take the Christmas Eve menu on p. 147. The adjective wigilijny (from Latin vigilia "vigil") shows up three times. First in barszcz wigilijny, Christmas Eve borscht (which seems to differ from the usual kind mainly in the substitution of savoy cabbage for regular cabbage, but I digress), then in wigilijna zupa migdałowa, Christimas Eve almond soup, and again in chleb wigilijny, Christmas Eve bread.

Could it have something to do with the gender (feminine for zupa, masculine in the other two cases)? Nope. On page 64, you find szynka pieczona "ham baked" but pieczony indyk "roast turkey". (Don't read anything in to the difference in translations; pieczony, from the same root as piec "stove", is variously rendered "roast", "baked", and in one case, pieczone pomodory, "grilled" [actually broiled].) Besides, there examples involving the selfsame pair of words. For instance, if you look at the Polish Wikipedia entry for "sauerkraut", you'll find that the title is kapusta kiszona [adjective last] but the first line of it reads "Kiszona kapusta – rodzaj potrawy..." ("Pickled cabbage--a kind of dish...").

Now this isn't to say there aren't any pretty straightforward cases. For instance, p. 145 lists both watróbka [sic] kurza duszona w sosie [sic] madejra "liver chickeny† stewed in sauce madeira" and duszone koniuszki szparagowe "stewed tips asparagusy". Clearly duszony w sosię madejra "stewed in madeira sauce" forms a coherent unit whose meaning would be changed if a noun intervened--at least, I assume duszona wątróbka kurza w sosię madejra would carry the same implication as in English, namely that the chicken liver had first been stewed only afterwards sauced with madeira. And both ?duszona w sosię madejra wątróbka kurza and w sosię madejra duszona wątróbka kurza are presumably as awkward as their English counterparts.

In fact, there is a cross-linguistic principle at work here, namely one akin to heavy NP shifting. This term was coined by generative linguists to explain, for instance, why English speakers prefer I gave to Bill the books which my uncle left to me as part of his inheritance to I gave the books which my uncle left to me as part of his inheritance to Bill even though we wouldn't normally say *I gave to Bill the books. In the examples above, the movement takes place within the NP (Noun Phrase) rather than involving the position of the NP within the sentence, but it seems the same underlying motivation is present.

Beyond that tiny insight, however, I'm stumped. I'm sure if you asked a native speaker, they'd probably tell you that the variations are "stylistic" or--the words every learner comes to dread--"It just sounds better that way". But I know there's more to it than that, and I won't be content until I find out what it is.


*If you're one of those tired of hearing about the language, take heart: In a month or two, I'll be nattering on incessantly about something completely different.

†Polish shows a surprising (to me, at any rate) fondness for denominal adjectives instead of nouns in the genitive. So kurzy is an adjectival form of kura "hen", migdałowy of migdał "almond", szparagowy of szparag "asparagus", and so on.