Category Archives: French

playing hooky

Posted in French, movies & tv by

The Hundred-Foot Journey

Last night instead of going to my weekly French Meetup, I wore the dress I had bought while putting off last week’s session, and I attended the premiere of a Hollywood movie featuring a perfectly Hollywood version of France.

There were more clichés in “The Hundred-Foot Journey” then you could shake a stick at. Three of the most egregious: the quaint village untouched by modernity (not one cell phone or computer in sight, but plenty of vintage books and bicycles); the cozy whitewashed apartment illuminated only by candlelight; and the shy ingénue with saucer-like eyes and magnetic charm – a French twist on the manic pixie dream girl.

But who cares. We dressed up, we walked (by) the red carpet, we spotted Oprah and Helen Mirren, and we were mildly entertained for two hours. And I heard about six lines of French over the course of the movie – so I’m counting that as a de facto Meetup.

Photo: Mysterious/badly lit selfie of my friend Jenny and me in row F. I really need to do better with these pictures…

the meetup chronicles

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Meetup attendees

First, as is my Meetup wont, I delayed and dilly dallied. The result of this procrastination was 1. a très chic little black dress from a boutique within a stone’s throw of the Meetup location, and 2. the sinking feeling that the only French I would be hearing all night would be the lovely refrains of “Bonnie and Clyde.” I spent so long biding my time in the shop that the CD looped and the song played twice.

When I finally arrived at the bar it was 2 hours into the Meetup and I figured if anyone were left they would surely be packing up by now. I tried to make myself feel less guilty by reasoning that LBDs are a very Parisian concept, so even if I hadn’t spoken the language that night, I had still practiced cultural immersion. That logic was not very sound, but I’m happy to report that since there was a small but still-going-strong group of people in the bar, I didn’t have to make excuses after all.

Among the crew were a few people I had met before – Dykeman, Anney and Igor (the Parisian-bred teacher from this post).Dykeman and Rohan at Meetup

Above: Dykeman and Rohan, a student from Beijing who was braving a Meetup after only a month of French study. Inspiring!

Anney at Meetup

Above: Anney’s got a lovely smile, n’est-ce pas?

Here are two fun facts that I learned in the course of our conversation:

  • En fer (of iron), en faire (do it), and enfer (hell) are all pronounced the same way. You have to tell the difference contextually. Also, enfer is almost always proceeded by “the,” as in l’enfer.
  • In English, you’d say, “kill two birds with one stone.” In French, you’d say, “d’une pierre, deux coups.” (Two blows from one stone.) It’s interesting how similar in concept and structure idiomatic phrases can be, while still quite different in language. When I noted the resemblance, Igor joked, “Yes, but the French, we don’t kill” – an inadvertent political commentary.

Igor at Meetup

That’s Igor, above.

Speaking of American gun violence… here’s Luna’s cover of “Bonnie and Clyde” for your evening singalong.

enjoy the weekend!

Posted in French, le week-end, movies & tv, travel by

I’m about to head out for a night on the town but before I do… a couple of links to start your weekend. Design Sponge went all out on the French front today with two fun posts:

– a roundup of gorgeous French home tours

– 24 hours in Paris with someone who knows what’s what

This weekend I am due to have my third chat with my very own Parisian pal, Philippe. So far he has introduced me to Peppa Cochon, otherwise known as Peppa Pig, as well as to this Web series about the adventures of a Frenchman abroad in America. It’s hard to watch as an English speaker because the original English audio under the French voiceover gets distracting, but the delightfulness of the show makes it worth it. I sort of want to rip this concept off and putter my way around France butting into interesting-looking people’s lives and making myself right at home after inviting myself over.

To be fair, Antoine’s show is actually derivative, whether unknowingly or not, of an amazing project from the early days of the Internet, Let Me Stay For a Day.

In any case… here’s wishing you an adventurous and intriguing-person-filled weekend! Or whatever else you’d like it to be…

better hurry up!

Posted in French, learning tools, Spanish by

hourglass

Though this article reveals the side benefit of learning language at a later age, I choose to focus on its glass-half-empty takeaway: time is running out to become proficient in another language. I better get this show on the road if I ever hope to bavarder with the best of them (not to mention hablar or leh-soh-kheh-ahkh – that’s chitchat in Hebrew).

To that end, I spent my last day off finally figuring out Anki and creating flashcards for the fifty or so words I’ve jotted down so far. I also read a random article about the special needs of refugee children who come to France, and I was delighted to discover that I understood every single sentence if not every single word. And tonight I’m going to queue up another episode of Destinos, which has taken a rather boring turn now that I’m about halfway through and she of the scrunchies and pastel pantsuits, Raquel Rodriguez, is back in Mexico after adventures in Spain, Argentina and Puerto Rico. I’m hoping the energy will pick up again soon, once Raquel is reunited with her Porteño love interest, Arturo, who’s en route to join her at the moment. Not that there is anything remotely sexy about them – I have only ever seen them hold hands and stage-kiss and giggle together. I suppose that’s what’s to be expected from a soap opera made for high school students.

(Photo: Swim Parallel, Creative Commons license.)

foreign food festival friday recap: quel désastre!

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the day 1 galette

Today is my last day of a week in the suburbs hanging out with my parents, siblings/siblings-in-law and niece. On Friday I bought buckwheat flour and thought I’d attempt these galettes. I’m not going to link to the recipe I used because the results were horrifying.

The batter was way too thin and looked liked runny sand. The crepes I poured out would neither stick together nor cook through. When I tried to flip them they fell apart and started to resemble roast beef. I gave up and my mother took over with little more success. They came out in circles when she made them but they still tasted the same – like a buttered salt sandcastle. I had wanted to fill the galettes with savory stuff like a fried egg, sauteed spinach and tomatoes, but we spent so much time and effort agonizing over the galettes themselves that there was no energy left for fillings, which I assume would have helped balance out the strong gritty buckwheat flavor.

After that fiasco my mom wanted to throw out the batter but I couldn’t bear to so I added a cup more buckwheat flour to it the next day and tried again.

day 3 galette

With the batter a little thicker, the resulting forms were a little more recognizable as crepes. They still tasted like licking a beach but, bathed in marmalade, a sweet beach. For people who can eat anything, a sweet beach is not really appetizing, but for the gluten-free it’s often as good as it gets, and I soon learned to appreciate the earthy flavor.

the day 2 galette

The batter lasted four days at which point I was finally ready to throw in the towel and just pour the rest down the drain.

Upshot of failed galettes experiment: now I need to go to Brittany to see what they’re really supposed to taste like.

un brin de causette

Posted in French, learning tools by

 

Last week I had my first “language chat,” with a man named Philippe from the suburbs of Paris. We talked for about an hour via Skype call – he spoke in English and I spoke in French. It felt strangely intimate despite the anonymity. I got self-conscious because his English was way better than my French. I had thought that speaking without face to face contact would make me feel less vulnerable but it almost made it worse. I’m telling you, learning another language takes a lot more courage than it seems. You have to lean in to sounding like a fool on a repeated basis.

One thing that I found helpful about being on Skype was that when I struggled to find words and he filled in the gaps for me, I could write them down to practice later. If I ever figure out how Anki works – it requires some technical setting up that in turn requires patience I do not seem to have at the moment – I’ll program those words in as my first set of flashcards.

Philippe and I had a good rapport so we arranged to talk again this week…

It feels just like Jordan described – online dating with linguistic in place of romantic aims.

two weeks in a row, woot woot!

Posted in French, music by

French meetup attendants

I made it to Meetup two weeks running, woohoo! Granted, I first wasted a half hour procrastinating across the street at Macy’s, which is pretty much the most hellish place in New York City aside from Times Square. This says bucketloads about how much I dread Meetups. Hopefully that feeling will subside once I make them more of a habit.

At this particular Meetup I spent most of my time talking to the two lovely folks above. One is the Chinese woman I had met very briefly last week. Her name is Anney and I found out she works in financial services. The other guy is from Mauritania and he told me he would sue me if I used his name on my blog. I think he was joking but better safe than sorry. 🙂

I was talking to him (let’s call him Pierre, because why not?) about our mutual love of West African music. Mine is a surface level love in that I only listen via a Youssou N’Dour Pandora station, and only once in a while – but I am transported when I do. Pierre recommended Baaba Maal, who I’ve just spent the last half hour bopping along to at my desk.

For your own listening pleasure, I leave you with this gem:

the gleaners

Posted in French, movies & tv by

The Gleaners

Last week I killed two birds with one stone – got some French practice in while viewing an acclaimed documentary by Agnes Varda, “The Gleaners and I.” Though it was slow going and I found the first half pretty boring, eventually the meandering, off-the-beaten-path storytelling grew on me.

Gleaners are traditionally people who follow along after the harvest, picking up all the crops that have been missed by the reapers. Taking her inspiration/point of departure from the Jean-François Millet painting above, Varda went out in search of modern day gleaners – not only farm foragers but also trash pickers, junk refurbishers, upcyclers, and artists who find their raw materials on the streets. Between vignettes about these people, Varda added little interstitial bits of weirdness and whimsy – her hand making circles around distant trucks; a lens cap’s “dance” as the camera bumps along on an accidentally filmed walk; a robed judge standing in a field explaining property law. My neurotic brain is drawn to the meta, so the idea of Varda gleaning all her footage for odds and ends to throw into the mix was sort of delightful to me (even when not so delightful to watch).

The slow pace did make following along in French a lot easier. I tried to ignore the subtitles as much as possible, but I should have just turned them off. It’s so hard to avoid your eye wandering down to them even when you can understand most of what’s being said.

If I were really committed, I would rewatch the movie without subtitles and try to glean some new vocabulary now that I know the general story. 🙂

(Let’s face it, I’m not that committed – but I do still want to watch a couple of Varda’s other films that I’ve heard good things about: The Beaches of Agnès and Cleo from 5 to 7.)

(The painting of The Gleaners is by Jean-François Millet.)

model UN meetup

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French meetup June 30

On Monday I attended my second French meetup since starting this blog. I met: a German radiologist, an Iranian realtor, a Parisian teacher/vintage clothing seller, a Lyonnaise digital marketer, a Chinese woman whose occupation I did not catch, and an American artist/art history professor. Quite an eclectic gathering. The flag garlands hanging from the ceiling for the World Cup heightened the international effect. (Hazy, nondescript proof of attendance above.)

One interesting thing I learned at this Meetup, from the Parisian: In French, if you think someone paid far too much for something you’d say “C’est du vol.” This translates approximately to, “It’s a steal” – which is what you’d say in English for the exact opposite, when someone pays far less for something than its actual value. I suppose if you translated the French to, “It’s a rip-off,” instead of, “It’s a steal,” the usage would be the same as in English, but I don’t feel like doing that because then I would not have any fun facts to share.

In other news, in the week since I signed up for the language exchange sites, I’ve received 3 messages from people who want to chat. I have yet to open any of them. Baby steps…

the best of words, the worst of words: dégueulasse & râler

Posted in best words & worst words, French by

Finally, the last of the three French party-goers:

degueulasse.jpg

Emmanuel is a sound recordist by day / artist by disposition. He has a bunch of strange and interesting side projects including a festival of boring films and a psychological danger meter. The intrigue of both were heightened by my inability to fully comprehend them in French – but I liked it that way so I didn’t ask for more details in English.

As is to be expected from a man with various hard-to-describe creative endeavors, Emmanuel’s picks for his best and worst words were similarly abstract and esoteric. He cycled through at least three worst words before settling on his absolute worst worst word. One of them was indifférence, which I found hilariously befitting of an artiste. His favorite word was also chosen with poetic logic. Dégueulasse: it’s not a nice word at all, but that’s part of the reason he likes it.

[Spoiler alert – if you don’t want to know how “Breathless” ends skip the next two paragraphs.]

Emmanuel explained (I think – it was not only that the French was slightly beyond my grasp but that the reasoning was, too): Dégueulasse is a crass word that you wouldn’t really say in polite company. In Godard’s first feature film, “À Bout de Souffle” / “Breathless,” the main character, a petty criminal played by Jean-Paul Belmondo, gets killed by the cops after being betrayed by his love, American ingenue Jean Seberg. As he lays dying he looks up at her and says, “C’est vraiment dégueulasse,” and it’s unclear what she’s feeling but it’s clear she’s feeling something very strongly. Then she asks one of the cops, “Qu’est-ce que c’est, dégueulasse?” but it comes out more like, “Qu’est-ce que c’est, deglasse?” It’s the first time she’s heard the word and she has no idea what it means. And then the movie ends. Honestly, I have always been perplexed by this. I know this last scene has deep meaning but I can’t put my finger on it, which makes me feel dumb and in turn, resentful of feeling dumb. I love “Breathless,” but man do I wish that the ending struck a chord with me in any way, shape or form.

Well, it struck a chord with Emmanuel. He thought that this ugly French almost-curse word, when it came out of Jean Seberg’s mouth in such an alien, foreign fashion, was given a new significance. The beauty of the word and the charm and possibilities of the language were revealed. Which I find amusing because to me the word sounds deeply hideous in that horrid American accent. Anyway…

Now for Emmanuel’s least favorite word. It’s not mignon, indifférence, or metastase, though those are three options he seriously considered before settling on:

raler.jpg

Râler – to whine or moan.

Why? Not entirely sure but it has something to do with the fact that while complaining (se plaindre) carries an agenda and implies that something gets done as a result, râler has no orderly purpose and, like its cousin geindre, is simply moaning sadly to make one’s objections known but to no apparent end. Emmanuel seems to think that the French love to râle about everything, good, bad or indifferent.

There might also be something about the r sound that Emmanuel finds grating but I’m not entirely sure. That part of the explanation was beyond my pay grade. 🙂