"On nie pije wody."

Translation: He is not drinking water.

[Yobama42069]

How dare you not being hydrated >:(

[CarlosBrue]

Why is it wody and not wodę ??

[Wippii]

Because of the 'nie'. Negated verbs usually take genitive (wody) instead of accusative (wodę).

[Aldrost]

Can't we say "he drinks no water"? If I translate this sentence to polish using google translate, it gives me "Nie pije wody". Is this correct? If it is, then isn't my translation equivalent to the given one?

[Frizzank2]

It's because "nie" comes before "pije" so it negates "drinking", changing it to "not drinking." To negate water, just like in English with the word "no", "nie" must come before "wody."

[Aldrost]

I don't think you can say On pije nie wody.

[RinceWND]

But I reckon one can say "On pije nie wodę." (He is drinking not water but something else).

[Jellei]

Well, in theory... it's hard for me to imagine someone actually saying this. And I wonder if it wouldn't be spelled as "niewodę". Generally safer to say that it's just wrong.

[goose36]

How would you say, "He does not drink water"?

[Jellei]

The same. For 99% of the verbs, Polish does not show a difference between English Present Simple and Present Continuous.