Remember how proud I was of myself when I learnt the ‘hack’ to pronouncing Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz?
Well that was a short lived folly!
People are no longer impressed that I can say ‘Grzegorz Brzęczyszczykiewicz‘, it’s been met with ‘Oh! but can you say…’ Or ‘Yes but you will never be able to say…’ and so forth.
Polish people are so adamant that their language is the hardest or one of the hardest. They take so much pride in that ‘fact’, in spreading that limiting belief, and I don’t think it works in their favour.
“The more people understand of your language, the better they can interpret your culture, history etc. and the more likely they are to convey it correctly to the rest of the world.” The great Tamka AD60
The thing with trying to prove everyone wrong by learning how to pronounce things, is that there will always be something else to pronounce, and what always seems to escape these challengers is that they phrases they ask you to repeat aren’t just pronunciation tests, they’re actually tongue twisters.
Imagine going around to people who are learning English and asking them to repeat: “Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers. How many pickled peppers did Peter Piper pick?”. That would be a pretty prickish thing to do, but that is what most polish people I meet do to me, and I know they aren’t being dickish, but it sure does make me feel like a bit of a show monkey.
So if you’re in a similar position as I am, here is probably the first tongue twister that you are asked to say : W Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie.
Which means: In Szczebrzeszyn a beetle sounds in the reeds.
It is from a famous poem written by Jan Brzechwa, and what Poles will not tell you is that they themselves have trouble saying it and it is known as one of the hardest phrases to pronounce.
The one thing that always makes me smile is thinking that there is the wonderful song sang by Mama Afrika (Miriam Makeba) called Qongqothwane, which was so difficult that Europeans named it ‘The Click Song’. Like the Polish poem it also speaks about a beetle. Whenever I reach this conclusion in my head, I think actually maybe beetles are the real problem here?!
Anyway back to the struggle of tongue twisters, if you’re asked to say this phrase ” W Szczebrzeszynie chrząszcz brzmi w trzcinie.” you can try some of the following tactics:
- Getting on the moral high ground and asking how many poles can actually say it?
- Say ‘Sure, right after you say a tongue twister in one of my home languages?” (Next time I am giving them this : “Igqira lendlela nguqo ngqothwane. Sebeqabele gqi thapha bathi nguqo ngqothwane!”
- OR try and pronounce it with my below best effort below:
“v sh-tche bz-he shyy-nyeah hshon-sh-tch bzh-mee v tzhcheenyeah “…mmm yeah…what was option 2 again?
If all this fails, do what I often dream of doing, get halfway in and suddenly stick out your tongue letting a dense stream of drool fall from your lips. While Poles will be concerned for you, they will also be immensely happy, because their language is so hard it caused you to have a brain malfunction, and that is what they have been trying to tell you all along!
Are there any tongue twisters you need my non-existent help saying or want to know the origins off? What are the challenges most often given to you?
Let me know,
Tamka
PS: I cannot possible mention the great Miriam Makeba and leave you with no chance to discover her, or rediscover her, or just listen once again to one of the most beautiful songs that exist…
Then I Tasted Pierogi 