"Ona pije wodę."

Translation: She drinks water.

[mnaper]

I don't get when you use pije vs piję.

[Jellei]

Depends on who's the subject. "Piję" is 1st person singular. I drink, I am drinking.

And "pije" is 3rd person singular. He/she/it drinks, he/she/it is drinking.

[MPB_727]

Would this also apply to other words like 'eating' and such?

[JerryMcCarthy99]

Also depends on who's the subject. "Jem" is 1st person singular. I eat, I am eating.

And "je" is 3rd person singular. He/she/it eats, he/she/it is eating.

In general, the verb forms vary per subject (I/he/they) and per number (sing./plural)

[Tom.Hagen]

I am drinking = Ja piję. You are drinking = ty pijesz. He/she/it is drinking = on/ona/ono pije. We are drinking = my pijemy. You are drinking = wy pijecie. They are drinking = oni/one piją

[Ignisssss]

"pić": ja piję, ty pijesz, on/ona/ono pije, my pijemy, wy pijecie, oni/one piją.

[The.Cat]

Now the 'vodka' in Russian makes sense! :D I had an ah-ha moment when I put it all together. Water in Russian, another Slavic language, is voda (which is similar to wodę pronunciation-wise). Vodka comes from voda. I love how they're all connected. :)

[Dahlie5]

Vodka is wódka in Polish. :)

[WesleyT69]

With the English translation, it was translated to both "She drinks water" and "She is drinking water".
How can I know what the sentence means which tense? Is the meaning of this sentence taken within context depending on the situation?

[Jellei]

In Polish we just have one Present Tense. So almost all verbs will work perfectly well for both Present Simple and Present Continuous.

Almost - but right now, you don't have to worry about it.

[eggsdee]

What is the difference between "wode" and "wodę"? Do you use the hooked letter when the word is used with a verb?

[JerryMcCarthy99]

Welcome to the mysteries of Polish nouns. "Wode" is not actually a word (at least not in this context). Perhaps you meant to enquire about the difference between "woda" and "wodę"?

So, "wodę" is indeed used when it is the direct object of a verb, such as when "drinking" is involved; the so-called Accusative case.

However, some verbs force the noun into other cases, such as "potrzebować"("to need") which needs "wody" and "być"("to be") which needs "wodą".

See https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/woda#Polish and 'show' the declension for more details!

Oh, and when "water" is the subject of a verb, you'd use the dictionary form, which is "woda".

HTH...

[Zylbath]

Is it true that the vowels with this hook under it are nasals? It was the case with words before this but in "wodę" I can hardly a nasal. Is there one?

[vytah]

Word-final -ę is commonly pronounced like -e if there is no risk of misunderstanding, like in case of this sentence.

[zim_ek]

Yes, ą and ę are nasal vowels.

[Bruno.Melo.1995]

This really look like Russian

[Alex213076]

Look on Ukrainian,it is more similar

[dVKq17]

I dont get when you use wode vs wodę

[JerryMcCarthy99]

See the answer up the page a bit, where you'll see my explanation from 5 months ago.....

[dominik17p]

In the slow audio i pretty sure it saids je instead of pije

[JerryMcCarthy99]

Which slow voice? The male or the female?

[Jellei]

I think I can agree that the slow female audio is bad, it sounds like "ije".

EDIT: It sounds as if it got better, I can hear it now...

[francis.rod01]

It sounds like the same. I'm learning the two with any problem.

• Она пьёт воду. / Ona p'yot vodu
• Ona pije wodę.

[Sam843608]

Is it me or Russian and Polish are kinda having the same nouns like ON and ONA, CHLEP, JABŁKA and so on?

[JerryMcCarthy99]

Russian, Polish, and other Slavic languages are related to some degree, and consequently have some similar words. (Он. Она. Хлеб.. Яблоко.) . Czech, for example: On. Ona. Chléb. Jablko.

On a recent trip to Slovakia, I found that my fluent broken Polish worked wonders :-)