Day 14: Francais

For those of you who are wondering: no, I am not a fluent speaker of French. Not yet.

The very best thing that could have happened for my language skills is that Nathalie went to Switzerland for a week. Because she is our own personal United Nations, i.e., one of those enviable polyglot Europeans who speaks French, German, Spanish and English, when she’s around, she translates for everyone. In her absence, I have been forced…yes, FORCED…to speak French with Paul, Suzette, Ieta and even the woman who owns the toy store in the villa complex.

Ayam, la dame qui est proprietaire du magasin de jouets (the lady who owns the toy store), trades 30 minutes of French for 30 minutes of English on an irregular basis. She is much, much more fluent with English than I am French and has also had an interesting life as a Lebanese living in Francophone Africa, so we have more than a slight tendency to just yak in English. But every bit helps.

And yesterday, while Paul and I were on our road trip, we talked back and forth in an exchange of French and English. I had my dictionary handy for the big words like “return” and “shoe” and “postman”. I'm not completely clueless. I did remember "chaud" and "mouton" and "bureaucrat," all of which came in very handy. (See yesterday's blog.)

Today, Suzette and Ieta assumed the role of Grand Inquisitors. During lunch they quizzed me thoroughly, asking hard questions, like “Do you have this fish in the United States?”. In exchange, I insisted on teaching them useful American idioms like “Wowie Zowie!”

But I am making progress and have little doubt that within six months, I will be singing the well-known round, “Frere Jacques,” well enough that at least Seal will join me.