Breakdown of Kiedy szef miał czas, my nie mieliśmy czasu.
mieć
to have
nie
no / not
my
we
szef
boss (m)
czas
time
kiedy
when
Questions & Answers about Kiedy szef miał czas, my nie mieliśmy czasu.
Why does the verb change its stem vowel from miał to mieliśmy?
The verb mieć (to have) has an irregular past tense. The stem vowel changes depending on who is doing the action. It uses an 'a' (miał) for most singular forms, but changes to an 'e' (mieliśmy) for masculine personal plural forms (meaning 'we', when the group includes at least one man).
If 'we' referred to a group of only women, would it still be mieliśmy?
No. If the group is entirely female, you use the non-masculine personal form. For the verb mieć, this form keeps the 'a' stem, making it miałyśmy. The 'e' stem (mieli-) is strictly for groups with at least one man.
Why does the word for 'time' change from czas in the first half to czasu in the second half?
This happens because of the negative word nie. In the positive first half (miał czas), 'time' is the direct object and takes the accusative case. But in Polish, whenever you negate a verb that normally takes the accusative, the object flips to the genitive case. The genitive form of czas is czasu.
Do we really need the pronoun my here, since mieliśmy already means 'we had'?
Normally, you can drop pronouns like my (we) in Polish because the verb ending tells you who is acting. However, including it here creates a strong contrast: the boss had time, but we did not.
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