We left the U.K. a week ago today and arrived at the maison of my beau-parents, which is located in a tiny village called L'Isle Jourdain, between Poitiers and Limoges. Since my mari and beau-parents are basically fluent in French, I decided I should try to make an effort to really try to learn la langue français.
I've attempted to learn French off and on since I was about 15 years old. The most seriously I took learning it was when I lived about 30 minutes from the French border town of Strasbourg, at which point I actually bought two textbooks for Elementary French 1 and 2. Generally though, I would simply ask my handful of French amis how to say a handful of basic sentences, just so I could say things like 'je ne comprends pas' (I don't understand), je parle français un petit peu (I speak a little bit of French), j'ai soif (I'm thirsty), or j'ai faim (I'm hungry).
When it comes to reading and writing French, I've been able to pick it up quite quickly due to my Spanish background. Not only is the grammar similar, there are also several cognates like facil and dificil. I've also been informed that nearly thirty percent of the English language comes from French, so cognates like intelligent and stupid come easily as well. However, the production skills of listening and speaking are a whole other can of vers.
When it comes to pronunciation, it seems there are so many exceptions to rules, that the only real rule is that there are exceptions. It's frustrating for me because I feel as if regardless of how well I can read or write in French, it will always be obvious that I'm not a native as soon as I open my mouth.
Of course, I guess I can't complain too much. Compared to English, French is a proverbial walk in the jardin as far as exceptions are concerned. I learned in my TEFL certification course how many exceptions there are in English and came to understand regardless of a rule, there will always be an exception.
In the end, I suppose I should get an 'A' for effort. At least I can actually kind of speak in some form of broken French, unlike my favorite interpreter.
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