Breakdown of Zdarzyło mi się spotkać dawnego przyjaciela.
mi
to me
przyjaciel
friend
spotkać
to meet, to run into (perfective)
zdarzyć się
to happen (perfective)
Questions & Answers about Zdarzyło mi się spotkać dawnego przyjaciela.
If I am the one who met the friend, why isn't the verb zdarzyłem or zdarzyłam?
The verb zdarzyć się (to happen) acts impersonally here. Instead of saying "I happened," Polish literally says "It happened to me." The verb takes the default third-person neuter singular form (zdarzyło), and the person experiencing the event is expressed with the Dative pronoun mi (to me).
Why is zdarzyło used here instead of zdarzało?
Zdarzyło is the perfective aspect, which is used for a single, completed event in the past. If you used the imperfective zdarzało, it would mean "it used to happen" or "it kept happening," suggesting you repeatedly bumped into this friend over a period of time.
Why use dawnego instead of starego for "old"?
Why do dawnego przyjaciela end in -ego and -a?
They are the direct object of the verb spotkać (to meet), so they must be in the Accusative case. Because przyjaciel is a masculine animate noun (a living person or animal), its Accusative endings look exactly like its Genitive endings.