Feeling at Home in a Different Culture

I’ve been casually learning Polish for a handful of years now — mostly because I want to communicate with my wife's family, and partly because I just love languages. But learning Polish hasn’t just been about vocabulary or grammar. It’s been about culture. And, surprisingly, about comfort.

Polish is hard.
It has seven cases, sounds I didn’t grow up with, and word endings that change based on things I didn’t even know could matter. I mix up godzina (hour) and rodzina (family) constantly, even though their meanings couldn’t be more different. But they sound so similar, and Polish has a lot of that — slippery similarities that can trip you up, over and over again.

But the more I learn, the more I appreciate the way Polish sounds.
American English — the language I’ve spoken my whole life — feels, in hindsight, like slogging through mud inside your mouth. Polish?
Polish is like tap dancing. It’s sharp. It’s deliberate. It’s artful.
You can’t mumble your way through it. You have to commit.

And strangely, I like that.

🙃 The Smile Thing

Something else that struck me as I spent more time in Poland was just how comfortable I felt — not because it was familiar, but because it was quiet. In the U.S., I grew up hearing this from total strangers — often men:

“Smile, girl! You should smile more.”
“Are you sad? You’re not smiling.”

I never understood that. Why did I need to smile for someone else's comfort?

By the time I finished college and entered the workforce, I’d internalized it. Smile more. Make eye contact. Be approachable. Be pleasant. Perform all the things.

But in Poland? Smiling at strangers isn’t the norm. People don’t demand it from you. If you’re walking down the street with a neutral expression, nobody comments on it. Nobody asks why you’re not grinning like an idiot.

It feels like permission to just be me.

🧠 Learning a Language, Finding Belonging

So yes — Polish is difficult.
But it’s also beautiful. And grounding. And oddly, it’s helped me understand a part of myself I couldn’t name before.

When I speak Polish — even badly — I feel like I’m allowed to be quiet. To be deliberate. To exist in a culture that doesn’t expect me to perform warmth for strangers. That alone feels like home.

And maybe that’s what learning a language is really about. Sure, master the verbs and pronunciation — but be sure to stumble your way into a new world where something else clicks and you feel less like a stranger - obcy - and more like yourself.