Help your fluency in a nifty way

[Viktor77]

Ärligt talat, det är tämligen oroande för mig att läsa orden “East Prussia” / „Ostpreussen“ i den moderna sammanhang, därför att i dag, i Polen, denna identitet existerar helt enkelt inte.

To be honest, it's quite unsettling for me to read the words “East Prussia” / „Ostpreussen“ in the modern context, because today, in Poland, this identity simply does not exist.

Je joue avec le feu d'identité ici mais les Polonais ont effectivement construit une nouvelle histoire à Wroclaw (je ne sais pas pour la Prusse-Orientale) où l'histoire de la ville n'est plus fortement allemande mais fortement polonaise--"rightful Polish clay" comme on dirait dans Polandball--en exaggérant le rôle de la dynastie Piast dans l'histoire de la ville et diminuant près d'un millénium d'histoire allemande, n'est-ce pas?

I'm playing with identity fire here but didn't the Polish effectively construct a new history for Wroclaw (I don't know about East Prussia) where the history of the city is no longer strongly German but strongly Polish--"rightful Polish clay" as one would say in Polandball--by exagerating the role of the Piast dynasty and diminishing nearly a millennium of German history?

Genau wie das Hinterpommersch überlebt Niederpreußisch nur in der Diaspora. "Plautdietsch" oder "Mennonitenniederdeutsch" ist ein lebendiger ostpreussischer Dialekt. Es gibt sogar einen Spielfilm auf Plautdietsch, den ich voll und ganz empfehlen kann: "Stellet Licht". Der Film spielt in Mexiko, aber die Hauptdarsteller stammen auch aus Kanada und Kasachstan.
Just like East Pommeranian, East Prussian survives only in the diaspora. "Plautdietsch" or "Mennonite Low German" is a living East Prussian dialect. There's even a whole feature film in Plautdietsch that I can wholeheartedly recommend, "Stellet Licht". It takes place in Mexico, but also features lead actors from Canada and Kazakhstan.

J'aimerais bien mais j'ai peur que je ne comprenne rien! Cependant, je trouve intéressant que les Ménnonites soient venus de cette région et aient parvenu à maintenir leur dialecte depuis près d'un siècle.

I would like to but I'm afraid I won't understand a thing. It do find it interesting though that the Mennonites came from this region and have managed to maintain their dialect for nearly a century.

[linguoboy]

J'aimerais bien mais j'ai peur que je ne comprenne rien! Cependant, je trouve intéressant que les Ménnonites se soient venus de cette région et aient parvenu à maintenir leur dialecte depuis près d'un siècle.

Man weiss es nie, bis man es versucht. Niederdeutsch ist nicht so fern von Niederländisch.
You never know till you try. Low German isn't that distant from Dutch.

Tatsächlich sind die Mennoniten in Friesland entstanden. (Der Menno war in Witmarsum geboren.) Diejenige, die Plautdietsch sprechen, haben es nur nach der Uebersiedlung in Preussen im 16. Jahrhundert erworben. Sie haben es behalten, insofern als ihre Gemeinschaften von der grösseren Gesellschaft abgeschottet worden sind. Die Mennoniten, die ich als Kind kannte, sprachen nur Englisch.
In point of fact the Mennonites arose in Friesland. (Menno was born in Witmarsum.) Those who speak Plautdietsch only adopted it after settling in Prussia in the 16th century. They've only maintained it to the degree that they've been cut off from larger society. The Mennonites I knew as a child only spoke English.

Es könnte fur dich wohl interessant sein, die niederländischen Lehnwörter in Plautdietsch rauszufinden.
You might enjoy looking for the Dutch loanwords in Plautdietsch.

[Viktor77]

Man weiss es nie, bis man es versucht. Niederdeutsch ist nicht so fern von Niederländisch.
You never know till you try. Low German isn't that distant from Dutch.

Tatsächlich sind die Mennoniten in Friesland entstanden. (Der Menno war in Witmarsum geboren.) Diejenige, die Plautdietsch sprechen, haben es nur nach der Uebersiedlung in Preussen im 16. Jahrhundert erworben. Sie haben es behalten, insofern als ihre Gemeinschaften von der grösseren Gesellschaft abgeschottet worden sind. Die Mennoniten, die ich als Kind kannte, sprachen nur Englisch.
In point of fact the Mennonites arose in Friesland. (Menno was born in Witmarsum.) Those who speak Plautdietsch only adopted it after settling in Prussia in the 16th century. They've only maintained it to the degree that they've been cut off from larger society. The Mennonites I knew as a child only spoke English.

Es könnte fur dich wohl interessant sein, die niederländischen Lehnwörter in Plautdietsch rauszufinden.
You might enjoy looking for the Dutch loanwords in Plautdietsch.

Hmm, merci pour cette information. Je vais chercher ce dialecte. Je pense que tu as raison concernant les Ménnonites. Je me souviens d'une fois quand j'étais ado quand j'ai entendu des Ménonnites parlant un dialecte allemand, mais à part ce seul moment, je n'ai entendu que l'anglais quand je voyais au supermarché, etc. Par contre, les Amish parlent toujours son dialecte, au moins dans le Michigan, mais on ne voit pas souvent les Amish en dehors de leurs communautés. Les Ménnonites sont plus orientés vers la société actuelle, si je ne me trompe pas.


Hmm, thank you for this information. I'm going to look up this dialect. I think you're right about the Mennonites. I remember one time when I was a teen when I heard some Mennonites speaking a German dialect, but apart from this one moment, I've only heard English when I saw them at the supermarket, etc. On the other hand, the Amish still speak their German dialect, at least in Michigan, but we don't often see the Amish outside of their communities. The Mennonites are more oriented towards contemporary society, if I'm not mistaken.

Vu que tu connais tant sur les dialectes allemands, connais-tu le dialecte que mes ancêtres allemands d'origine de Posen auraient parlé à l'époque? L'époque dont je parle c'est just avant le tournant du siècle. J'ai plusiers ancêtres de cette région qui ont choisi à immigrer aux Etats-Unis à cette époque-là. Je me réjouirais d'en savoir plus sur leur dialecte.


Given that you know so much about German dialects, do you know the dialect that my ancestors from Posen would've spoken long ago? By long ago I mean right before the turn of the century. I have several ancestors from this region that chose to immigrate to the US back then. I'd really enjoy learning more about their dialect.

[linguoboy]

Les Ménnonites sont plus orientés vers la société actuelle, si je ne me trompe pas.

Es hängt davon ab. Die Mennoniten gliedern sich in mehrere Sekten, davon eine Minderheit als "Altmennoniten" bezeichnet werden.
That depends. Mennonites are divided into several sects, a minority of which are designated "Old Order".

Vu que tu connais tant sur les dialectes allemands, connais-tu le dialecte que mes ancêtres allemands d'origine de Posen auraient parlé à l'époque? L'époque dont je parle c'est just avant le tournant du siècle. J'ai plusiers ancêtres de cette région qui ont choisi à immigrer aux Etats-Unis à cette époque-là. Je me réjouirais d'en savoir plus sur leur dialecte.

Wenn ich mich nicht irre, eine Art von Schlesisch. Ich denke, dass die Isoglosse, die Ostniederdeutsch von Ostmitteldeutsch trennte, wenige Kilometer nordlich von ehemalige Posen gelegen ist.
If I'm not mistaken, a form of Silesian German. I believe that the isogloss dividing East Low German from East Middle German ran a few kilometers north of the city formerly known as Posen.

Aber ich weiss sehr wenig über die deutsche Gemeinschaft in Posen. Es konnte auch sein, dass sie von anderswo übersiedelt hatten, wie die Mennoniten.
But I know very little about the German community in Posen. It could also be that they immigrated from elsewhere, like the Mennonites.

[Viktor77]

Wenn ich mich nicht irre, eine Art von Schlesisch. Ich denke, dass die Isoglosse, die Ostniederdeutsch von Ostmitteldeutsch trennte, wenige Kilometer nordlich von ehemalige Posen gelegen ist.
If I'm not mistaken, a form of Silesian German. I believe that the isogloss dividing East Low German from East Middle German ran a few kilometers north of the city formerly known as Posen.

Aber ich weiss sehr wenig über die deutsche Gemeinschaft in Posen. Es konnte auch sein, dass sie von anderswo übersiedelt hatten, wie die Mennoniten.
But I know very little about the German community in Posen. It could also be that they immigrated from elsewhere, like the Mennonites.

Danke schön. Après notre discussion j'ai décidé de chercher davatange ces ancêtres et j'ai découvert qu'en fait ils sont venus de Wloclawek, d'une petite ville appelée Modzerowo à côté de la Vistula. Mais ils étaient allemands avec des noms allemands mais un nom de famille polonais (Pankonin). Un de mes ancêtres avait le nom Wendelin. Je n'ai jamais entendu ce nom mais c'est vraiment beau. Bref, je ne savais pas qu'ils y avait des allemands à Wloclawek, ce qui est vraiment loin en Pologne, ce n'était pas du tout la Prusse à cette époque...et ils ont quitté le pays en 1910. Je veux en savoir plus! C'est amusant. J'aime beaucoup faire de la généalogie.

Danke schön. After our discussion I decided to further search these ancestors and I discovered that they in fact came from Wloclawek, from a little city called Modzerowo along the Vistula. But they were Germans with German names but a Polish surname (Pankonin). One of my ancestors was called Wendelin. I've never heard this name before but it's really pretty. Anyway, I didn't know there were Germans in Wloclawek which is really far into Poland, it wasn't Prussia at all back then...and they left the country in 1910. I want to know more! This is fun. I really like doing genealogy work.

[Pole, the]

I'm playing with identity fire here but didn't the Polish effectively construct a new history for Wroclaw (I don't know about East Prussia) where the history of the city is no longer strongly German but strongly Polish--"rightful Polish clay" as one would say in Polandball--by exagerating the role of the Piast dynasty and diminishing nearly a millennium of German history?

Ja. Min poäng är att Ostpreussen är här inte mer. I Polen, denna term har endast en historisk betydelse. Därför det känns konstigt att läsa om det i dag.

Yes. My point is, the East Prussia isn't here anymore. In Poland, this term has only a historical significance. That's why it feels weird to read about it today.

But they were Germans with German names but a Polish surname (Pankonin).

„Pankonin” låter inte extremt polska.

„Pankonin” doesn't sound extremely Polish.

Anyway, I didn't know there were Germans in Wloclawek which is really far into Poland, it wasn't Prussia at all back then...

Wloclawek var ganska nära den preussisk- och tysk-ryska gränsen mellan 1815 och 1914

Wloclawek was quite near the Prussian/German-Russian border between 1815 and 1914.

[linguoboy]

Danke schön. Après notre discussion j'ai décidé de chercher davatange ces ancêtres et j'ai découvert qu'en fait ils sont venus de Włocławek

Die diakritischen Zeichnen sind nicht unwichtig!
Diacritics are important!

Du solltest etwas über die Ostsiedlung erfahren. Deutsche Ansiedler spielten eine Schlüsselrolle in der Urbanisierung Osteuropas.
You should learn something about the Ostsiedlung. German settlers played a key role in the urbanisation of Eastern Europe.

[hwhatting]

Jestem zajęty gdzie indziej parę dni i nagle mamy kupę postów!
Je suis occupé ailleurs pour quelques jours et tout d'un coup nous avons un tas des postes!
Ik been een paar dagen ergens anders bezig en opeens hebben we een heleboel posts!
I'm busy eleswhere for a couple of days and all of a suden we have loads of posts!

@ Imralu: Thanks for the explanations!

Nur "Aust" und "Stoaw" haben mir Fallen gestellt. Ich bin mit Dialekten vertraut, in denen langes a zu oa wird. Demzufolge hab ich am Anfang "Stoaw" als "Stall" verstanden und als ich "Stall" sah, war ich ratlos gemacht.
I was only tripped up by "Aust" und "Stoaw". I'm familiar with dialects in which long a becomes oa, as a result of which I thought at first "Stoaw" was "Stall". Then when I saw "Stall" I was left clueless.

(the other ones are okay)

Dziękuję!

I wonder if there are still old Germans who know how to speak these dialects, people who were born there.

Well, they would be 80 or older right now, so probably not many...

I read that the Post-War German population saw this population as a stigma, but I'm not sure why (except that the Nazis got a lot of support in these regions [this was also the case for refuges from Silesia]). So it wouldn't surprise me if they assimilated to German east and west dialects to hide their roots.

The Nazi Support was not the reason. There were two things - immediately after the war, they were refugees - people showing up in rump Germany, asking for food, shelter, and jobs. That thing tends to make the local people hostile*1), so the refugees from the East tried to blend in. The other thing is that those who tried to keep up their identity were often quite revanchist in the post-war years, demanding their old home regions back, which didn’t fit with the general mood of German political and intellectual life, which was geared towards reconciliation with the nations Germany had attacked.

*1) Mini-rant: From what my elder relatives told me, many locals looked at them the same way many Europeans now look at Syrian refugees. That makes me wary of all those supposed cultural differences often given as a reason for hostility towards refugees - the cultural differences are real, but you'll find people being hostile towards people showing up in their neighbourhood asking for food, shelter, and jobs even without there being significant cultural differences.

Have you visiting Elbing? Do you want to find their house, if it's still there)?

I have't visited, and with my grandfather being dead, I wouldn't even be able to find the house, if it still stands. He never wanted to visit, always said "The Poles probably have let it all go to the dogs, and that would only make me cry." (Apologies to the Polish members of the board for quoting that classical German prejudice about Poles being lazy and disorderly.)

Ich hab ein Leseverständnis des*1) Niederdeutschen erworben, was unter Deutschsprachigen nicht üblich ist.
I've acquired a reading knowledge of Low Saxon, which isn't common among German-speakers.

*2) vom doesn't fit the register you use here, and it could also be understood as "through" or "by means of" here.

Another person who lined in Wroclaw said the same thing, that everything has become Polish except that sometimes one rents an apartment and the taps say "Kalt" and "Heiß." Or while removing the façade of an old building an old sign appears, like "Bäckerei" or "Schneider." It's fascinating how much we erase history.

I'm playing with identity fire here but didn't the Polish effectively construct a new history for Wroclaw (I don't know about East Prussia) where the history of the city is no longer strongly German but strongly Polish--"rightful Polish clay" as one would say in Polandball--by exagerating the role of the Piast dynasty and diminishing nearly a millennium of German history?

I've been living and working in Wrocław for almost a year in 2002/2003, and if you walk through the old city, which the Poles have done a marvelous job of restoring, you’ll see many German inscriptions. Nothing has been swept under the rug, it’s just that the German inhabitants had fled or been expulsed and the city was settled by Polish refugees from their own lost Eastern territories. They put their own stamp on it, and as many of them came from Lwów, Wrocław has been called a resurrected Lwów. You’ll find restaurants with Eastern Polish cooking and, in the Rotunda, a panoramic painting that had been salvaged from Lwów.
As for the identity, Wrocław had several of them over the course of history; I’d recommend you to read Norman Davies’s “Microcosm”, a book that fittingly was published in English, Polish, and German editions.
In any case, a Polish and a German identity came into conflict only in the age of Nationalism; still in the late 18th century, the German burghers of the West Prussian cities saw themselves as loyal subjects of the Polish Commonwealth and protested against the 1st partition of Poland that incorporated them into the Prussian Kingdom.

Man weiß es nie, bis man es versucht. Niederdeutsch ist nicht so weit weg vom Niederländischen.
You never know till you try. Low German isn't that distant from Dutch.

Tatsächlich sind die Mennoniten in Friesland entstanden. (Der Menno ist in Witmarsum geboren.) Diejenigen, die Plautdietsch sprechen, haben es nur nach der Uebersiedlung nach Preussen im 16. Jahrhundert erworben. Sie haben es behalten, soweit als ihre Gemeinschaften von der weiteren Gesellschaft abgeschottet waren. Die Mennoniten, die ich als Kind kannte, sprachen nur Englisch.
In point of fact the Mennonites arose in Friesland. (Menno was born in Witmarsum.) Those who speak Plautdietsch only adopted it after settling in Prussia in the 16th century. They've only maintained it to the degree that they've been cut off from larger society. The Mennonites I knew as a child only spoke English.

Es hängt davon ab. Die Mennoniten gliedern sich in mehrere Sekten, wovon eine Minderheit als "Altmennoniten" bezeichnet werden.
That depends. Mennonites are divided into several sects, a minority of which are designated "Old Order".

Wenn ich mich nicht irre, eine Art von Schlesisch. Ich denke, dass die Isoglosse, die Ostniederdeutsch von Ostmitteldeutsch trennte, wenige Kilometer nordlich vom ehemaligen Posen verlief.
If I'm not mistaken, a form of Silesian German. I believe that the isogloss dividing East Low German from East Middle German ran a few kilometers north of the city formerly known as Posen.

Aber ich weiß sehr wenig über die deutsche Gemeinschaft in Posen. Es könnte auch sein, dass sie von anderswo übergesiedelt hatten, wie die Mennoniten.
But I know very little about the German community in Posen. It could also be that they immigrated from elsewhere, like the Mennonites.

Du solltest dich über die Ostsiedlung informieren. Deutsche Ansiedler spielten eine Schlüsselrolle bei der Urbanisierung Osteuropas.
You should learn something about the Ostsiedlung. German settlers played a key role in the urbanisation of Eastern Europe.

[linguoboy]

Support for the Nazis was not the reason.

I was living and working in Wrocław for almost a year in 2002/2003, and if you walk through the old city, which the Poles have done a marvelous job of restoring, you’ll see many German inscriptions. Nothing has been swept under the rug, it’s just that the German inhabitants had fled or been expelled and the city was settled by Polish refugees from their own lost Eastern territories....As for its identity, Wrocław has had several of them over the course of history; I’d recommend you to read Norman Davies’s “Microcosm”, a book that fittingly was published in English, Polish, and German editions.

Danke für die Korrekturen, HaWe! Das war ein Arsch voll schlechtes Deutsch, das du durchwaten musstest.
Thanks for the corrections, H-W! That was a shitload of shoddy German to wade through.

[Pole, the]

Jestem zajęty gdzie indziej parę dni i nagle mamy kupę postów!
(that is comprehensible, but it quite unidiomatic; I would rather say something like Nie ma mnie raptem parę dni, a tu nagle pojawia się pełno postów;
in Polish być is quite often used in the sense of “be present”)

* * *

*1) Mini-rant: From what my elder relatives told me, many locals looked at them the same way many Europeans now look at Syrian refugees. That makes me wary of all those supposed cultural differences often given as a reason for hostility towards refugees - the cultural differences are real, but you'll find people being hostile towards people showing up in their neighbourhood asking for food, shelter, and jobs even without there being significant cultural differences.

Det är ganska intressant.

That's quite interesting.

I have't visited, and with my grandfather being dead, I wouldn't even be able to find the house, if it still stands. He never wanted to visit, always said "The Poles probably have let it all go to the dogs, and that would only make me cry." (Apologies to the Polish members of the board for quoting that classical German prejudice about Poles being lazy and disorderly.)

Jag tror att det är också en klassisk polsk fördomar.

I think that's also a classical Polish prejudice.

I've been living and working in Wrocław for almost a year in 2002/2003, and if you walk through the old city, which the Poles have done a marvelous job of restoring, you’ll see many German inscriptions. Nothing has been swept under the rug, it’s just that the German inhabitants had fled or been expulsed and the city was settled by Polish refugees from their own lost Eastern territories. They put their own stamp on it, and as many of them came from Lwów, Wrocław has been called a resurrected Lwów. You’ll find restaurants with Eastern Polish cooking and, in the Rotunda, a panoramic painting that had been salvaged from Lwów.

Jag har varit i Wrocław kanske sex gånger och jag håller med! Dessutom är det inte bara den östra polska identiteten, det finns också en ukrainska.

I have been to Wrocław six or so times and I agree! Also, it's not only the Eastern Polish identity, there is also a Ukrainian one.

[hwhatting]

Danke für die Korrekturen, HaWe! Das war ein Arsch voll schlechtes Deutsch, das du durchwaten musstest.
Thanks for the corrections, H-W! That was a shitload of shoddy German to wade through.

Ach wo... you write quite well and idiomatic, most what I corrected are cases where you mix up registers, or simple slip-ups. Advanced mistakes.

I think that's also a classical Polish prejudice.

Zabawne. Tylko mogę powiedzieć, że pracowałem razem z Polakami, i stwierdiłem, że to jest przesąd, a nie jest prawda.
Funny. I can only say that I have worked with Poles, and I found it's a prejudice, not the truth.

[Viktor77]

I don't really want to keep writing in French but I have so little time lately....

Tout d'abord, merci, Linguoboy, pour le lien. Je m'intéresse énormement à découvrir davantage sur l'histoire de ma famille et les conditions économiques et politiques qui ont abouti à tel et tel événement.

Merci à Hwhatting, aussi. Je pense que je me suis trompé dans mon analyse de Wrocław. Je n'y suis jamais allé, mais j'ai failli y aller quand je préparais mon voyage en Pologne (lequel j'ai annulé pour des raisons compliquées).

Aussi, on a ces mêmes blagues pour les polonais-americains ici. Les pauvres polonais, toujours la cible des blagues.

Aujourd'hui dans un de mes groupes de lecteurs on parlait de la territorialité et comment les sentiments du territoire perdu se manifestent chez différentes cultures en Europe. On a parlé des Hongrois qui déplorent toujours la perte de la Transylvanie. Les Polonais de Lviv/Vilnius. Les Finlandais de la Carélie. Etc. Il y a toujours ce narratif de "auparavant on était..." à l'exception d'Allemagne. Les allemands ne déplorent pas la perte des territoires de l'est (pour autant que je sache, Hwhatting peut nous éclairer davantage là-dessus). J'ai des idées pourquoi (la guerre, une culpabilité collective), mais de toute façon c'est intéressant.

First, thanks, Linguoboy, for the link. I am greatly interested in discovering more about my family history and the economic and political conditions that led them to such and such event.

Thanks to Hwhatting, also. I think I was mistaken in my analysis of Wrocław. I've never been there, but I almost went there when I was preparing my trip to Poland (which I canceled for complicated reasons).

Also, we have the same jokes for Polish-Americans. The poor Polish, always the butt of jokes.

Today in one of my reading groups we talked about territoriality and how feelings of lost territory are manifested in different cultures in Europe. We talked about the Hungarians who still mourn the loss of Transylvania. The Polish of Lviv/Vilnius. The Finns of Karelia. Etc. There is always this narrative of "before we were...," with the exception of Germany. The Germans don't mourn the loss of the eastern territories (as far as I know, Hwhatting can enlighten us more). I have some ideas why (the war, a collective guilt), but still it's interesting.

Je suis occupé* ailleurs pour quelques jours et tout d'un coup nous avons un tas des postes!
I'm busy elsewhere for a couple of days and all of a sudden we have loads of posts!

*I know your English is present (though I'd suggest perfect "I've been busy") but in French I'd use imperfect "'J'étais occupé."

[linguoboy]

*I know your English is present (though I'd suggest perfect "I've been busy") but in French I'd use imperfect "'J'étais occupé."

Das klingt für mich schlechter mit dem Perfekt. Ich muss die Antwort komplett umschreiben, damit sie idiomatisch wirkt.
Perfect sounds worse to me here. I have to completely rewrite the response to make it idiomatic.

[Viktor77]

*I know your English is present (though I'd suggest perfect "I've been busy") but in French I'd use imperfect "'J'étais occupé."

Das klingt für mich schlechter mit dem Perfekt. Ich muss die Antwort komplett umschreiben, damit sie idiomatisch wirkt.
Perfect sounds worse to me here. I have to completely rewrite the response to make it idiomatic.

Dat is zo, maar ik weet niet wat we doen kunnen.

"I was busy elsewhere for a couple of day and then all of a sudden we got loads of posts!" Wat denk je erover?

You're right, but I don't know what we can do.

...What do you think about that?

[linguoboy]

...What do you think about that?

Ich meine, es war schon okay, wie es war.
I think it was okay as it was.

[Salmoneus]

I've been living and working in Wrocław for almost a year in 2002/2003

ahHA! Finally, after so many yeas, hwh makes a stereotypical L2 error! Finally!
["was living and working". If it were just working, I'd actually probably prefer "I worked in Wroclaw for almost a year", but with "living" it has to be the continuous.]

That's the only major error; the other errors LB points out are stylistic or debateable or minor - in each case, LB's version is better, but for several it's not clear that your version is actually ungrammatical, just not so idiomatic. "The Nazi support", in particular, probably would be prefered to "the support for the Nazis" by newspaper writers...
...oh, and in case you look it up: "to expulse" actually IS a verb, meaning exactly that. It's just hardly ever used these days (though the meaning is clear).

On Viktor's correction: he probably feels that "I'm busy and all of a sudden" is informal, which it is. His proposed perfect and preterite solutions are more formal and hence more "correct". I disagree with LB in disapproving of the perfect per se. However, the particular construction you're using, aiming at comic irony, demands (like a lot of comedy) the narrative present, so you were perfectly right in what you said originally.

"I have been busy for a few days and suddenly we have received a lot of replies" - good for explaining to your boss why you have just discovered a stack of emails waiting for your attention.
"I was busy for a few days and all of a sudden we received..." or "I had been busy for a few days..." - good for explaining the issue to friends later, in hindsight
"I'm busy for a few days and all of a sudden we get loads of replies!" - good for acting exasperated or surprised for comic effect.

Likewise, if you began a joke "so this man walks into a bar and the barman says...", Viktor would probably object that "A man walked into a bar..." is better English...

[Viktor77]

J'ai certainement une préférence pour le passé simple, mais je pense que le problème dans cette phrase était plutôt sylistique. Il se peut que le "elsewhere" me pertubait. J'arrive sans problème à lire la phrase comme Sal l'explique, mais ce n'était pas le cas les 5 dernières fois que je l'ai lue.

Certainly I have a preference for the past, but I think the problem in this sentence was more stylistic. It's possible that "elsewhere" was bothering me. I can read the sentence as Sal explained it without any problem, but this wasn't the case the first 5 times that I read it.

[linguoboy]

ahHA! Finally, after so many yeas, hwh makes a stereotypical L2 error! Finally!

Du hättest mich mit einem Feder umstoßen können.
I was fully from the socks.

[Pole, the]

Zabawne. Mogę tylko powiedzieć, że pracowałem razem (*) z Polakami, i stwierdziłem (better: odkryłem, przekonałem się), że to jest (*) stereotyp (or: uprzedzenie), a nie jest prawda.
*) Not wrong per se, but superfluous.
Funny. I can only say that I have worked with Poles, and I found it's a prejudice, not the truth.

(I mean, the same sentiment could be shared by a Polish person as well, so there is probably nothing wrong with expressing it.)

[hwhatting]

(I mean, the same sentiment could be shared by a Polish person as well, so there is probably nothing wrong with expressing it.)

Tak i zrozumiałem.
C'est que j'ai compris.
Dat is wat ik verstaan heb.
That's what I understood.

ahHA! Finally, after so many yeas, hwh makes a stereotypical L2 error! Finally!

Du hättest mich mit einem Feder umstoßen können.
I was fully from the socks.

I thought that at least British English would use the perfect here, but it seems I was wrong...

[Imralu]

I've been living and working in Wrocław for almost a year in 2002/2003

ahHA! Finally, after so many yeas, hwh makes a stereotypical L2 error! Finally!
["was living and working". If it were just working, I'd actually probably prefer "I worked in Wroclaw for almost a year", but with "living" it has to be the continuous.]

I would actually say "I lived and worked" here ... but I don't know about the state of my English anymore these days.

[finlay]

I've been living and working in Wrocław for almost a year in 2002/2003

ahHA! Finally, after so many yeas, hwh makes a stereotypical L2 error! Finally!
["was living and working". If it were just working, I'd actually probably prefer "I worked in Wroclaw for almost a year", but with "living" it has to be the continuous.]

I would actually say "I lived and worked" here ... but I don't know about the state of my English anymore these days.

俺も。日本語では進行形に、「住んでいた」と言うのかもしれないけど、英語は違う。
me too. i'd use continuous 'sundeita' in Japanese, but not in English.*

現在完了形は、現在につながっているものなんだから、もしそんなにタイムフレームを含んだら、過去形になる。
present perfect is used for things connected to the present (seems obvious when written down), so if you include a timeframe like that, it should be the past tense

というより、もし現在完了形を使えば、「ヴロツワフにほとんど1年間住んでいる」となるから、ちょっと違う。正しく「ヴロツワフに1年間住んでいた」と言いたいでしょう。
that is to say, if you use the present perfect, you're saying you're living there now, but it's a bit different - you want to say you lived there for a year, in the past, for it to be correct.

*As for this, if you use past continuous in english it's usually not the main focus. I was living and working in Wroclaw when I met the strange old man who sold me the magic beans, something like that.

[Salmoneus]

*As for this, if you use past continuous in english it's usually not the main focus. I was living and working in Wroclaw when I met the strange old man who sold me the magic beans, something like that.

That's fair enough. I think I was lead to the continuous because a) the implicit suggestion that it was while living and working there that he discovered what he went on to tell us, and b) "living" as the intro to stories is almost always continuous in my experience, probably because it normally is the background information for the main story.

But, it's hard to say. Not present perfect, anyway.

Past perfect, of course, is fine, but that really does require and "and then..." (I had been living in Wroclaw for four years when...). Unless you're Raymond Chandler, of course.

[hwhatting]

Czas przeszły dokonany nie jest doskonały.
Перфект - не совершенный.
Perfekt nije savršen.
Perfectum non est perfectum.
Le passé composé n'est pas parfait.
Il perfetto no è perfetto.
El perfecto no es perfecto.
Het perfectum is niet perfect.
Das Perfekt ist nicht perfekt.
-miş'li geçmiş zaman kusursuz değildir.
Перфект кәміл емес.

The perfect is not perfect.
(In some languages the pun works, in some it doesn't.)

[finlay]

完了形は完璧じゃない
Kanryoukei wa kanpeki ja nai

Kinda works, the first kanji 'kan' is the same