Learn Polish: To jest miasto, gdzie dorastałem. - This is the city where I grew up.

Yes! In this sentence, gdzie (where) acts as a relative pronoun, which makes the phrase sound very natural and slightly less formal. You could also say To jest miasto, w którym dorastałem (This is the city in which I grew up), and it would mean exactly the same thing.

Why is there a comma before gdzie?

In Polish, you must always put a comma before a relative clause, which is the part of the sentence that adds more information about a noun (in this case, miasto). While English often drops the comma before words like 'where', Polish punctuation strictly requires it before connecting words like gdzie, który, or że.

English uses the completed past tense 'grew up'. Why does Polish use the imperfective verb dorastałem?

When talking about where you spent your childhood, Polish focuses on the continuous process or duration of growing up in that location, not just the completed result of reaching adulthood. That is why we use the imperfective verb dorastać (dorastałem) rather than its perfective equivalent dorosnąć.

How would a female speaker say this sentence?

The past tense ending -łem in dorastałem indicates a male speaker. A female speaker would change the ending to -łam and say To jest miasto, gdzie dorastałam.