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  What it means

  Literally: “to walk on thin ice.” The image is of crossing a frozen surface that is too fragile to bear weight safely — one wrong step and you fall through. Figuratively, “stąpać po cienkim lodzie” means to be in a precarious or risky situation, especially in social or professional contexts where one wrong word or move could cause serious harm. It is used when someone is navigating a sensitive topic, a fragile relationship, or a situation fraught with legal or political risk. Example: “Kiedy rozmawia z szefem o podwyżce, chodzi po cienkim lodzie” (“When he talks to his boss about a raise, he’s walking on thin ice”).

  Vocabulary

  • stąpać — to step, to walk carefully (imperfective)
  • po — on, across (preposition + locative for surface traversal)
  • cienkim — thin (instrumental/locative adjective form of cienki)
  • lodzie — ice (locative of lód)

  Grammar note

  'Stąpać po cienkim lodzie' uses 'po' with the locative case — 'lodzie' is the locative of 'lód'. The adjective 'cienki' also takes the locative form 'cienkim'. The verb 'stąpać' is imperfective, describing an ongoing state of risk rather than a single moment. 'Chodzić po cienkim lodzie' is also widely used and means the same thing.

  Cultural context

  The expression is shared across many European languages — English has the identical 'to walk on thin ice', German has 'auf dünnem Eis gehen'. In Polish it is fully colloquial and used across all registers from casual conversation to political commentary. It conveys both danger and the need for extreme care and tact.

  Intermediate

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