Breakdown of Dziewiątego sierpnia jedziemy do Krakowa na naszą rocznicę.
na
on, at / to (motion toward) / for (a meal) / for (waiting for)
nasz
our
jechać
to travel
do
to
Kraków
Krakow
sierpień
August
dziewiąty
ninth
rocznica
anniversary
Questions & Answers about Dziewiątego sierpnia jedziemy do Krakowa na naszą rocznicę.
Why is it dziewiątego instead of just dziewiąty?
To say "on the [number] of [month]" in Polish, we use the genitive case for both the number and the month. Dziewiątego is the genitive form of the ordinal number dziewiąty (ninth). If you just said dziewiąty, it would mean "the ninth" as a subject, not "on the ninth".
Why does the month sierpień change to sierpnia?
When expressing dates, the month takes the genitive case because we are literally saying "the ninth day of August". Also notice the spelling change: the letter e in sierpień drops out when we add the genitive ending -a, making it sierpnia.
Jedziemy is present tense, but this trip is happening in the future. Is that correct?
Yes! Just like in English (we are going to Kraków in August), Polish often uses the present tense of motion verbs like jechać to talk about fixed plans in the future.
Why does Kraków become Krakowa here?
The preposition do (to) always requires the genitive case. For the masculine city name Kraków, we add the ending -a. Notice the vowel shift: the ó changes to a regular o when we add an ending, so Kraków becomes do Krakowa.
Why do we use na naszą rocznicę and what case is this?
This is the accusative case. We use the preposition na plus the accusative case to express the purpose of a trip or an event you are attending, like going "for our anniversary". Both the pronoun nasza (our) and the noun rocznica (anniversary) take feminine accusative endings, becoming naszą rocznicę.
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