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  What it means

  Literally “a moment, a moment.” A quintessentially Polish expression meaning “just a second” or “one moment please.” The redundancy of two near-synonyms is entirely intentional and charming.

  Vocabulary

  • chwila — moment / while
  • moment — moment

  Grammar note

  Both words mean roughly the same thing — their pairing is a fixed colloquial expression, not a grammatical construction.

  Cultural context

  A beloved quirk of Polish speech. Foreigners learning Polish often find this delightful redundancy one of the most memorable phrases.

  Beginner

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