# piję/wypijam



## Lorenc

Suppose I'm writing a description, using the present tense, of what I did today:

Dzisiaj jest sobota. Wstaję z łóżka o 8:30 i biorę prysznic. Następnie jem śniadanie. 
*Nie jestem głodny, ale ... (1) trochę kawy i ... (2) banan[a].*

Which of these choices are the most appropriate to fill in the blanks, and why?
1A: piję ; 1B: wypijam
2A: jem; 2B: zjadam


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## zaffy

I guess either fits in both pairs, yet I would use the A's


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## lukis421

A's are hands down better. Personally, I'd never use B's. As to why, here's what I came up with (based purely on my understanding of the language):

'Wypijam' implies a completion of the task in question and since you only drink a little bit of coffee (trochę kawy), it doesn't make much sense. What would make more sense would be to say 'wypijam jedną kawę', although it still sounds a little bit unusual. Bear in mind that by saying that you're put a strong emphasis on the fact that you only drink one coffee and you finish it, which might be important to state in certain contexts. Same applies to the banana. The second form becomes more acceptable in contexts where there is restriction involved (I drink one coffee/banana, not two), and even more so in sentences with but:

Zazwyczaj zjadam jeden cały banan, ale dzisiaj nie daję rady. (I usually have one whole banana but today I'm not hungry enough)

I think that unless there is something to contrast the completion of the event, it sounds redundant to use the form 'zjadam', which expresses the completion with more emphasis than 'jem'. You need a reason to emphasize it (contrast, restriction, etc. Would be some of the reasons you might want to do that).

I hope that helps.


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## grassy

Lorenc said:


> Which of these choices are the most appropriate to fill in the blanks, and why?
> 1A: piję ; 1B: wypijam
> 2A: jem; 2B: zjadam


Both pairs are correct.


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## Lorenc

thank you all for the feedback and detailed explanation! I'd asked a Polish speaker and I was told that versions b (wypijam/zjadam) were preferable, which I thought a little surprising (I'd use forms b only in the case of a completed action which repeats itself, e.g. codziennie wypiję kieliszek wina / zjadam rogalika na śniadanie).


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## jasio

lukis421 said:


> 'Wypijam' implies a completion of the task in question and since you only drink a little bit of coffee (trochę kawy), it doesn't make much sense. What would make more sense would be to say 'wypijam jedną kawę', although it still sounds a little bit unusual. Bear in mind that by saying that you're put a strong emphasis on the fact that you only drink one coffee and you finish it, which might be important to state in certain contexts. Same applies to the banana. The second form becomes more acceptable in contexts where there is restriction involved (I drink one coffee/banana, not two), and even more so in sentences with but:


Actually, from a grammatical perspective, it's quite complex. Let's look at the structure and the semantics first:

pić -> wypić -> wypijać (infinitive)
piję -> wypiję -> wypijam (1st person singular)
"Pić" is a basic, imperfective verb with a meaning of consuming liquid, typically directly from a container of some sort - a glass, cup, bottle, etc. - typically without using any utensils.  Without going too deeply into specific possible contexts - it's just 'drink'.

"Wypić" is a perfective verb, meaning basically the same, but also including its perfective characteristics, ie. completeness of the action and a lack of internal temporal structure (which may also be used to imply that the activity was in fact very short or at least uninterrupted). Does it contrast with 'a bit of coffes'? Personally, I do not think so. For example "wypiję trochę kawy i możemy jechać" - is quite ok for me. It does not say that I'll drink a whole mug of coffee, it only suggest that once I'll have had my coffee, I'll be ready to go. The action of drinking a bit of coffee is perfective, meaning that I will need to have finished it before I'm ready - but it does not even imply that I will have consumed all the mug, perhaps it's just a sip or two, as we're apparently in a hurry. And, at the same time, the lack of the temporal structure suggests that I won't be having a good time over my cup of coffee, reading a newspaper or watching a TV show. No - I'll do it as promptly as possible, and we're fleeing. 

BTW - please note that despite an identical suffix and the present time context, the verb "wypiję" is in fact in the FUTURE tense.

But "wypijać"? It's imperfective again,. The prefix "wy-" suggests that the verb has something to do with completeness as well. On the other hand. the infix "-ja-" (along with a few others) is often used to indicate a repetitive aspect - which is also imperfective by definition. For this reason, it would be more natural for me to use it in a repetitive context, for example "rano wypijam filiżanę kawy i zjadam banana" (implying that it's a habit, not something which happened just this morning), "codziennie wypijam litr mleka" (where the repetitiveness is expressed explicitly), etc.

On the other hand, with common words, like drink, eat, go, etc, you may not fully rely on the grammar, because sometimes they are used in a pretty arbitrary manner. 

Back to the original question, albeit I would find As more natural, Bs do not seem to be inherently wrong either. If I wanted to split a hair, I could say that the Bs may imply some sort of a hurry (the atomic temporal structure again, although all the verbs are actually imperfective) or that "some coffee" implicitly refers to a whole cup, or a that you eat one whole banana (based on the completion part) or that the details of your breakfast are in fact parts of your daily routine (or a Saturday routine), based on the "-ja-" infix, etc. However, in an actual spoken language it could  be as well an entirely arbitrary choice, not something Sherlock and Mycroft could build their famous deductions.


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## Ben Jamin

'Wypijam' implies a completion of the task in question and since you only drink a little bit of coffee (trochę kawy), it doesn't make much sense. "
This comment sounds strange to me. "Wypijam trochę kawy i zjadam banana" functions perfectly.
The difference among  *A: piję ; 1B: wypijam* and *2A: jem; 2B: zjadam* lies in the emphasis on duration* (A) and result (B). Both are perfectly grammatical and idiomatic Polish. 

*Not to be translated with a continous tense.


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## Piotr_WRF

_Wypijam trochę kawy_ doesn't sound very idiomatic to me, exactly for the reason @lukis421 gave.


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## Ben Jamin

Piotr_WRF said:


> _Wypijam trochę kawy_ doesn't sound very idiomatic to me, exactly for the reason @lukis421 gave.


You have full right to have your own idiosyncrasies, but don't elevate them to a general law.


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## Piotr_WRF

Ben Jamin said:


> You have full right to have your own idiosyncrasies, but don't elevate them to a general law.


Aren't you overreacting a bit? Where did I say anything about a general law?


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## Ben Jamin

Piotr_WRF said:


> Aren't you overreacting a bit? Where did I say anything about a general law?


You wrote "_Wypijam trochę kawy_ doesn't sound very idiomatic to me". Maybe you interpreted the word "idiomatic" as "being an idiom, an expression that makes no sense when translated literally". I used it in the other other meaning "pertaining to the typical repertory of expressions used widely in a language". Idiomatic expressions don't sound strange to native speakers, so if you understood the term the same way I intended it, then your statement could be understood as "it sounds weird to me, outside of the normal language repertory".
Many users of the WR forums judge expressions in their native language out of their own idiosyncrasies, or of the language spoken by their relatives and friends of the same age, forgetting the wide spectre and richness of the language.
Responding to questions posed by foreign forum users "it sounds weird, my buddies don't speak like this" is misleading them.


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## Piotr_WRF

By writing _idiomatic_ I meant _confirming to the syntactical, grammatical, or structural form peculiar to a language_, Polish in this case. I clearly stated that this is an opinion of mine, which is shared by some foreros here in this thread, though. And this is what the OP wanted to know, an opinion.


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