Confronted with French alphabet prononciation

The same 26 letters, but in French they are pronounced differently compare to English. I didn't get to learn how to pronounce them probably because when I went to the French school here I started at level II. So, one of the biggest challenges while talking on the phone in my earlier years here was to be able to spell my name correctly, in French.

Today, there are certain sounds I still don't know if I pronounce them correctly. I still have problem with "G" and "J", as it seems to me that they sound exactly opposite when pronouncing them in English.

These days Aelig likes to write. She would ask me how to spell certain words like father and mother and she would write them down. One day she asked me to spell her classmates' name, and I couldn't because for some of them I have never heard of so didn't know how to spell. The other day I was deep into my reading so when she asked me how to spell "Elouan", a common Brittany name, for some reason I pronounced the letter "U" in English. She kept asking for confirmation, and finally told me that she didn't know how to write "U", that "U" didn't exist. Ops, I quickly corrected my mistake, and told the opportunity to tell her that in English all these letters have a different pronunciation. Well, she didn't look convince.

She is very keen into names now. She told her father that in his name, there are two "A". It was wrong as there was only one "A" in hubby's name. She revealed that in "PAPA" (father in French), there are two "A". We finally realized that she thought the word father and mother in French is our name. We tried to explain to her but she hasn't quick grabbing the concept yet. And, she writes only in capital letter.

Sadly, she refuses to learn how to write in Mandarin. I don't know when she would be able to write father and mother in Mandarin. It does seem that writing in alphabet is so much easier than writing in Mandarin.

Learning French is a continuous process

Learning French is a continuous process. I hear words that I don't understand everyday. Sometimes I finished by getting the meaning, sometimes I just let it go. Here is an expression that I have heard several times and finally understand what it means.

Le mouton à cinq pattes = The lamb with five legs.
My team has been looking for someone who has a special skill on a specific domain. We have been looking for this five-legged lamb without success. It means someone with a very special skills that is hard to find or non-existent.

I was finishing a report and I needed to describe to my boss the pie chart I prepared. I realized that I didn't know the French word for pie chart, so I turned to my coworker, showed him my monitor and asked him what was the word in French. He replied : "Camembert". Camembert is one kind of cheese in France. I felt so confused, why was he telling me a cheese when I was asking him about a chart? He laughed, explained that pie chart = camembert in French.
Ok now I know.
And it makes sense.
In English it is called pie chart, pie is one kind of foods.
In Mandarin it is called a biscuit chart, one kind of foods as well.
The French loves cheese, and cheese is also a kind of foods.

 I'm enjoying the learning process.

The language we speak

Now that we are living in France, a lot of people feel amaze that me and hubby still speak to each other in English. They think that for my sake, we should switch to French so that I can pick up the language as fast as possible.

The idea of switching to French only crossed my mind once. At that point I did not work and stayed home most of the time. I can go without speak any French for a long period. However, despite the fact that I don't speak good French, hubby chose to speak English with me, as it is the language when we first met. I gave in as most importantly, both of us want to practice our English as much as we can.

By going back to the workforce, I interact more and more with the French and have to speak French almost everyday. Even though it would still be logic to speak French at home, I still think that having a break from French is necessary for me. I do not want to force myself too much. I think my energy quota of learning a language has long run out in Malaysia, having to learn three languages and different dialects at the same time. So, sure I could have spoken better French if I spoke French with hubby, but, just give me a break, let thing comes naturally.

I like the way we are now: speak English for serious stuff, tease each other with French or Chinese. One day we were teasing each other with mixing up the three languages, I got totally confused by what hubby was trying to say: shoe. Coincidentally the sound of "shoe" is quite close to the French "chou" = cabbage or the Chinese "shu" = book. I had to ask him three times to get what he wanted to say. It's fun speaking "rojak" = mix language again like what we do in Malaysia! :-) Sometimes hubby would come out with words in Malay (satu roti canai!) and Hokkien(my family language) by imitating the persons he learnt the words from and it really cracks me up!.

Street language in the office

It has been 6 weeks I'm in the French corporate world, and I'm just so disturbed by the street language using in the office. I don't know how long I could resist before I become one of them.

I'm not sure whether it applies to all the fields and in all offices, but the one I'm in, I keep hearing words equivalent to "fuck", "shit", "bitch", "slut", "holy cow"...something that my French professors prevented us from saying, but something that the French themselves employ in their daily life.

Maybe because I was mostly working with women or people were kind of polite, I hardly heard anyone around me saying all these. When people got angry at their work they will usually say "Gosh", "oh my God", "oh dear"... or "alamat" in Malay.

For a country who tries so hard to protect their language from the invasion of foreign languages, it is just too astonishing that they allow the street language permeating into the corporate world and slowly into schools. The president as well got caught saying bad words to his people. So who's next? Are we going to hear a judge saying "slut" in a court session? I really hope someone is doing something to "purify" this beautiful language.

Have you been called "my duck"?

One day, my brother in laws got home and was greeted by his mother who calls him "my duck", in French. I don't know why it made me laugh. I just couldn't associate him, a grown up man with this endearment term, although it is just an affectionate name from a mother to a son, just like "sweet heart" in English.

I realized that the Asians have been imitating a lot of endearment terms from English, but it is mostly used between couples, like "darling, sweet heart...". I have not yet heard an Asian mother calls her kid like that, at least not those in my social circle.

I don't know whether I will one day call my kid some French endearment terms like "ma puce (my flea)", "mon chou (my cabbage)", "mon lapin (my rabbit)"..., but surely I won't call him/her mon canard (my duck) or mon poulet (my chick). The reason? Well, if you know the Chinese culture well, duck and hen have double meaning...

Duck = male prostitute
chicken = prostitute

How could I call my own child "prostitute"?

Cute rabbit

This rabbit is a pet of my friend. I have never seen such a cute rabbit until I came to France. Well, French people, they eat rabbit too, but not this one certainly. :-)





In French, "mon lapin (my rabbit/bunny)" is a term of endearment, use between couple or between family members.

Wish me shit shit shit!

One exam down and two more to go. Just finished the power point slide for tomorrow's presentation, and I really don't know how I will perform since it is going to be in French. In France when wishing someone all the best, they will say "merde, merde, merde." = Shit, shit, shit.

I thought that since they told me "shit shit shit" then the more shit the better. So one day I told hubby that "I wish you plenty of shit" in French. He laughed so hard because it meant that I wish him full of shit.

So please just wish me shit shit shit but not full of shit ok? :-)

How to write like a French in 3 months?

Guys,

If you know of any secrets in improving the writing skills for a language you pick up 2 1/2 years ago as an adult, let me know.

I feel ashame of my French level especially the writing part. This becomes critical as we are all looking for an internship, and I just couldn't produce a nice motivation letter or CV without asking hubby for help.

It has important consequences. I got kicked out for an internship opportunity while everyone in my class who applied for it got called for an interview. I know this could be from many reasons, the fact that I'm older than the rest of the class, that I'm married and no kids (company doesn't want to risk hire a woman who will get pregnant soon), that I'm Asian (the are bunch of French looking for job)... and that I don't write good French.

The reality is cruel, as long as I don't speak and write good French, I'm nobody in this country.

I love kaki!

Autumn is my favorite season since a lot of fruits are available at this time. One of them is "kaki", the French name for persimmon. Isn't it amazing how a word can mean completely different stuff in different language? Kaki = foot in Malay and persimmon in French. It also mean one type of color, kind of dark green like shown in the photo, in French.


When I was living in Austin, across my apartment there was a shopping center. They actually planted some persimmon trees there. I found it so weird to plant fruit trees in a shopping district, but was aiming to steal some of the persimmons when they got ripen. Unfortunately I never had the chance since I moved to France before autumn.

Another case of same word different meaning. The word "patron" means boss in French. So when hubby first arrived in the USA, one day he wanted to park in front of a cinema, but he saw a signboard saying that "reserve to patron only". He thought oh the parking spots were reserved for the "boss" only. Eventually he parked somewhere else. Later only he realized that patron = customer who pay visit to the business, and since then he dared to park in the "boss" area. :-)

Go cook yourself an egg!

It always amazed me the way some French expression formed. I learnt from Samantha's blog about this expression:

qu'ils aillent se faire cuire un oeuf = that they go cook themselves an egg = go to hell

It's used when someone keep annoying you and at the end you just ask him/her to go to hell. What does it have to do with cooking an egg? I love egg very much and I really don't mind to cook myself an egg. hahaha