Apples in European Languages – Pommes Frites Anyone?

Yesterday I suffered a severe shock while lunching at Le Galapagos!  I ordered boiled fish with a mushroom sauce, green beans and steamed apples – a fascinating combination, you will agree – but when the food arrived I searched in vain for the apples.  I summoned my long suffering waiter and asked him sternly what had happened to the apples.  At first he failed to comprehend my question, but when I explained that I expected apples (fruits!) he was quite crestfallen and admitted, shame-facedly, that the menu card had lied!  ‘Pommes Vapeur’ should have actually read ‘Pommes de Terre Vapeur!’

Yes ladles and gentlemints, this is yet another instant of a European native taking liberties with apples.  ‘Potato’ in French is called ‘Pomme de Terre’ – apple of the earth.  Some local German dialects have the same idea – Erdapfel (earth apple).  So next time you order Pommes Frites (in German Pommes for short) let me warn you that you will not receive fried apples, but ordinary chips (French fries if you live in Oregon or any of the other, lesser, United States).

The apple has always played a central role in the fruity universe of northern Europe, I suspect because it grows there abundantly and keeps well into the winter.  Pears rot, peaches are demanding, plums turn mushy and get eaten by wasps, grapes remain tiny and sour, berries are strictly seasonal – but the apple grows to perfection all over northern Europe and continues to thrive in our larders until well into late winter.  That is surely the reason why the fruit used by Eve to tempt Adam was translated as ‘apple’ into German, French, and English – the original pomegranate meant nothing to our ancestors.

The apple was a great staple of northern European food supplies, especially before the newfangled imported current staples arrived.  Pre-potato Europeans lived on porridge, apples, cabbage, pulses, bread, miscellaneous roots, and the odd bit of protean here and there.  So when new fruits and vegetables arrived on the scene the apple was pressed into service for the creation of names for them.  ‘Loveapple’ or Liebesapfel is an old word for tomato.  Pineapple is the English word for Ananas (in French and German).  Apfelsine is the German word for orange. 

But the usage of ‘apple’ in creating names for other objects is not limited to fruit & vegetables.  Adam’s Apple refers to a part of our anatomy, located on the neck – the German Adamsapfel and the French Pomme d’Adam.  Then there is the French Pomme de Pin – pine cone.  And the German Pferdeapfel – the round end product of a horse’s digestive process.  Or the German for eyeball – Augapfel; the English phrase ‘Apple of my eye’ reminds us that this usage was known in English as well.

A woman with a certain bodyshape is referred to as ‘apple-shaped’ – we could just as easily say ‘blueberry-shaped’ or ‘orange-shaped’, but the apple remains our main fruity reference point.  Then there is the word Pomander – a hollow pottery ball filled with potpourri and hung inside a wardrobe to discourage moths (doesn’t work, by the way) – the ‘pom’ refers us back to French apples.  Interestingly enough, while the German and English words for ‘apple’ are almost the same, the French ‘Pomme’ is quite different.  I am operating without a proper dictionary here, but suspect the French version comes from the Latin – surely the goddess Pomona has lend her name to the fruit, or vice versa?  Indeed, speculating here with the benefit of not being hampered by a dictionary in my flights of fancy, is ‘Pomegranate’ also related to ‘Pomme?  Does it mean something like ‘Apple with lots of pips’?  I vaguely seem to recall that Pomona was into pomegranates …..

Moving on, we come to ‘pompous’ – might I suggest this word is related to ‘pomme’ and related to its round inflated shape?  How about ‘pomade’, the stuff men put into their hair to make it look shiny – like a shiny apple ….  And while I am sticking out my neck, what about translating ‘Madame Pompadour’ as Mrs Hard Apple (dour = dure?), perhaps a French version of ‘Tough Cookie’?  Incidentally, the famous producers of macaroons, Ladure, picked a bad name for their ware – it suggests to me that their macaroons are dry and tough!  Or what about ‘Pompier’ – fire fighter?  Their red uniforms are strongly reminiscent of apples, no?  What do you mean, French fire fighters don’t wear red uniforms?  Maybe they did in the past?

Oh well.  I guess I lost the momentum.

What (not) to Buy in La Bourboule

The shops in La Bourboule tend to cater to the lowest common touristic denominator, and mainly specialise in walking sticks, pottery with flowers, postcard, and similar stuff which loses its appeal rather quickly.  There are one or two shops that are a bit more up-market, and I try to avoid them.  There is also a flea market which I can’t avoid since it is on the way between my hotel and the Thermes and Le Galapagos.

Yesterday I almost bought a large cooking pot there, of the type called ‘marmite’.  It is a pot which is bulbous and greater in height than width and used for cooking stews.  This one was huge and made of cast iron.  It looked like the kind that used to contain eternal stew – it sat on a corner of the stove and any food that had no obvious other use was thrown into the pot.  Whenever anyone was hungry they dipped into the pot.  I love that sort of thing, especially in theory.  I seriously considered buying this monster and shipping it to Oxford for a small fortune – the pot itself was dirt cheap.

After much soul searching I bought a cashmere sweater in the most expensive shop in town instead.  It has been very cold, and I shivered even wearing a cardigan and a heavy shawl.  The cashmere is very good quality, I believe.  Made in Mongolia.  I tend to stick to Scottish cashmere, but this pullover does feel very good.  Not soft and fluffy but soft and buttery, if you know what I mean. 

Every time I go to La Bourboule I buy a golden leaf for one of my cardigans.  It is a little ritual – one leaf for every visit.  This time I bought a ‘houx’ leaf – that is ‘holly’ in English.  To make them they use real leaves and coat them in gold – the leaf remains inside!  I was a little disappointed when I found out they are actually made in Canada ….

I also buy books in La Bourboule, to help me learn French, and sometimes DVDs.  The selection in the shops is usually limited, especially at the end of the season, which is when I show up.  However, at the flea market there is often a good selection, and much cheaper that in the shops, of course.  This time I bought six, but I think I shall leave most of them in the communal area of the hotel – they are useless for learning French.  If the actors speak too fast, or use too much slang or strange accents then the movie is no good to me, so I shall watch ‘Svengali’ and ‘C’est pas mois!’ only once.  ‘Le crime de l’Orient Express’ is also unsuitable – the accents of some of the actors, especially Poirot, are insupportable.  ‘The Scorpion King – the Return of the Mummy’ proved an unexpected success.  Although I am fascinated by the scorpion king himself – he is half man half scorpion - I have all sorts of problems with the storyline.  Imhotep is supposed to be a bad guy?  Anubis is on the side of evil?  And the ease with which the soldiers of Anubis can be dispatches is laughable.  Nevertheless I can understand the language quite well.  It is the old story for me – the less believable a storyline the more slowly people talk and the better I can understand them.  I know all sorts of words about witches and evil queens and lost orphans and dragons and murdered corpses hidden inside of trunks and such like, but they are strangely unhelpful in getting by in modern day France. 

The books, too, are difficult to choose.  If they are too simple I learn the most, but get bored very quickly.  Also they mainly consist of pictures.  A few days ago I bought an old favourite of French children, ‘Methode Boscher ou La Journee des Tout Petits.  It rather reminds me of my first school book, Tür und Tor, aka Tut tut tut ein Auto.  I remembered that sentence for 45 years!

In the Methode Boscher there is a page for every letter, for every sound, and there are lots of examples and pictures.  Lots of algebra, too!  Unfortunately, strangely, this very basic textbook contains words which are not listed in my 50,000 word dictionary!  ‘Je achete un joujou’ – what on earth is a ‘joujou’?  I suspect it isn’t anything very important, but it bothers me that I don’t know!  I am struggling on nevertheless.  One day, when the children in the local school have fully taken me into their hearts, I will ask them.  Today they told me that my way of counting on my fingers had resulted in a risky gesture ….  I daren’t ask yet what a joujou is, I don’t want to acquire a reputation as a pervert … Some time ago when I asked someone – a grown up, I should add – what a trüdücül was (it is spelled differently, incidentally) I was told it was a very unladylike word.  It was the last name of a family in the movie Spaceballs, how was I supposed to know?  Learning French is full of tribulations!

PS   If you wonder whether I bought the four foot stuffed crocodile, I did not!  Folly has its limits, even with me.  What really stopped me was my fear of customs officials, actually.

Funny French Movie: Comme un Chef

As all my faithful readers know, one of the numerous ways I am trying to learn French is by watching French movies.  Or, more usually, the French version of English or American movies.  Because, alas, it is almost impossible to get funny French movies abroad.  French movies are supposed to be serious, high bow, depressing, and challenging.  I am not overly fond of such movies!  Learning another language is difficult enough without emotional hardship.

For this holiday I had brought along the movie, 84 Charing Cross Road, a wonderful movie with Anne Bancroft and Anthony Hopkins, about an American struggling author who buys difficult to find books from a London book shop.  I had already read the book, so had a head start in understanding the movie in French.

However, the movie, though wonderful in every way – it has an ancient looking bookshop full of old books, a middle aged slightly eccentric New York lady writer, old fashioned clothes and furniture from just after WWII, and so on and so forth, it cannot be said to be wildly funny.

But since I am on holiday, I feel entitled to the odd laugh here and there, and thus rootled around the la Bourboulian newsagents for another DVD I might watch to augment my visual holiday experiences.

What I found was ‘Comme un Chef’, a Daniel Cohen movie starring Jean Reno (of Les Visiteurs fame) and Michael Youn (never come across him before).  Last night I watched it for the first time, with English subtitles to get an idea of the story line – the next 68 times will be with French subtitles, of course.

This is one of the most amazingly funny movies I have ever seen!!!!  A must see for anyone who loves cooking, eating, going to restaurants, or watching cookery programmes.  And there are any number of happy endings, every loose thread is tied up and brought to a satisfactory conclusion.  I love love love this movie!

It actually cost me Euro 20, which is pretty hefty for a DVD (you can have your pick for half that price of any number of classics) but boy is it worth it!  I wish everyone who hates French movies for being elitist and challenging would watch it.  Not that they will get a chance; because really good French movies never seem to get translated into English or even sport English subtitles, and ‘Safari’ and my all time favourite ‘Le Crime est Notre Affair’ are impossible to recommend to friends, because even if they speak French it is rarely good enough to understand these movies. 

‘Comme un Chef’ is unusual in that it actually has English subtitles, so I can recommend it to all and sundry and say – Watch This Movie!  Unless you like dark, difficult, challenging, soul-searching, morose, virtuously negative, ‘Noir’ movies – then you must avoid it like The Plague.

Sometimes I wonder whether the reason why funny entertaining French films never make it into the English speaking world is that the French cultural establishment, anxious to maintain an image of French cultural superiority, conspire to prohibit their exports?  The notion that all French films are sophisticatedly artistic and incomprehensibly depressing is about as true as the one that all French people are pencil thin and exquisitely dressed – not true!  French movies can be funny, French people are just like everyone else – some thin some fat, some good some bad, some helpful some bloody minded, some – sorry, where was I?

Ah yes, go watch the French film ‘Comme un Chef’!

PS  New camera has arrived, much better photos than the old one!

Learn French with Hermes – A sailing we will go!

That’s ‘a sailing’, not ‘assailing!’ by the way!

The other day I had a little look at my blog stats, and noticed that my most popular posts are the ones involving Hermes scarves.  The ‘How not to learn French by buying Hermes scarves’ is an all time favourite and still scores hits despite having been penned quite some time ago.  And would you believe it, after looking at the Hermes posts my indulgent visitors move on to read my other musings as well!

So I decided to write a few more posts about my scarves, in the hope that they will (a) aid the absorption of a bit more French by the scarf loving public, and (b) hook a few more random visitors who will haunt the pages of my blog.

I am starting with a recent acquisition, which is extremely useful for learning French because it has French words written all over it.  Of course it could be counter-argued that the words the scarf depicts are pretty useless nowadays – all about sailing ships which are few and far between these days – but the sort of people who buy Hermes scarves to learn French are unlikely to be sensible enough to be distracted by this little detail.  Nevertheless I have endeavoured to increase the utility of this post by throwing in a few proverbs with a nautical origin, and also by quoting – in full! – the scarf description I found in the little booklet I was given when I bought this scarf.

Therefore I present to you Cheval de Mer!

The scarf depicts a three-masted frigate with 32 Canons.  Next to the masts and sails are written the terms that denote them, and the image of the ship is surrounded by ropes tied into knots, which are also named.  I note that I have disregarded the accents etc – too difficult with my keyboard.  But I note that ‘mat’ has a roof accent.

French	English
Cheval de Mer	Seahorse
Mat	Mast
Grand mat et voiles	Main mast and sails
Grand Perroquet	Main topgallant
Grand Hunier	Main topsail
Grand voile	Main sail (I think)
Mat de Misaine et voiles	Fore mast (not mizzenmast!) and sails
Petit Perroquet	Fore topgallant
Petit Hunier	Fore topsail
Misaine	Foresail
Mat d’Artimon et voiles	Mizzenmast (!) and sails
Hunier	Topsail
Brigantine	Spanker (?)
Fleche	?  means arrow, so presumably arrowshaped sail
Voile	Sail
Noeud	Knot
Corde	Rope
Noeud de chaise	Double knot
Beaupre et Grand foc et Faux foc	Bowsprit and ‘Jib’ sails

 

What Hermes wrote about the scarf, Printemps – ete 2012 (Spring – Summer 2012)

Les fregates sont des navires de guerre inventes au XVI siecle, tres legers, rapides et maniables.  La beaute de ces vaisseaux comme celle de leurs plans impregnent ce carre dont la composition n’obeit qu’a l’unique contrainte de l’harmonie.  Cette pure creation est baptisee Cheval de Mer, en hommage a la tradition equestre de la maison.  L’hippocampe, charmant petit poisson, doit son nom a sa ressemblance avec les chevaux : sa tete couronnee devient figure de proue symbolise le navire et protege l’equipage.  « Trois mats grees en carre et un beaupre a l’avant avec deux ou trois focs et une brigantine en antimon …»  Les mots de la navigation, aujourd’hui comme hier, racontent a eux seuls une histoire, l’evasion …

Frigates are war ships that were invented in the 16th century as very light, quick and easy to handle.  The beauty of these vessels and of their plans permeates this scarf whose composition obeys no laws except the constraint of harmony.  This pure creation is called Cheval de Mer, in homage to the house’s equestrian tradition.  Here too is that most charming of equestrian fish, the seahorse: its crowned head becoming the figurehead, symbolising the ship and protecting the crew.  “Three-masts squared-rigged and a bowsprit at the fore with two or three jibs and a mizzen sail …”  The vocabulary of the sea, today and yesterday, recounts a story of travel and adventure in itself.

The scarf was designed by Christian Renonciat.

And here a few nautically inspired proverbs:

Il fait fleche de tout bois – It is all grist to his mill

Avoir du vent dans les voiles – to be three sheets to the wind (ie drunk)

And , at last 'voile noir' – a blackout!  I wonder whether the people of la Bourboule would understand ‘rideau de voile voir’ (blackout curtains)?

How to learn French the hard way – By knitting waistcoats!

Over my three years of not learning French I have acquired all sorts of useful wisdom, which I am going to decant into my blog for the benefit of the masses.  I analysed my failures and came to the conclusion that there is one main reason why I did not learn much:  Because learning languages is boring!  Any of the methods I tried would have resulted in my learning French if only I had stuck with it.  And why did I abandon all these methods?  Because they required endless repetition to etch new grooves into my ossified brain, and I got bored after the sixth or tenth repetition.

People believe that children can learn more quickly because their brains are younger and more malleable, but I believe the real reason is that they are small and powerless and can be forced into doing as they are told.  If things get boring in school a child can’t just get up and make a cup of tea and switch off the teacher.  Children are stuck in school day after day in the most incredibly boring lessons, without getting paid.  After struggling for a few years even the most rebellious tend to throw in the towel and start to listen to the teacher occasionally and even do their homework.  As a result they eventually absorb enough information to scrape by.  Those who don’t come a cropper in all sorts of ways, but you get my drift.

That’s how I learned English, sort of.  Not real English, you understand.  Just the usual basic horrible being able to get by sort that gets you a D and is irritating beyond belief to all native speakers.  But it provided a basis on which I could build when I went to America and actually needed to speak properly because I went to university.  I still remember the shock when I opened my first textbook:  I only knew about half the words in it, and the words I did not know where the important ones!  But well, I knuckled down and dictionaried and at the end of the term three months later I knew 90% of the words in that book!

The way to learn a language properly is by immersion and exposure after one has absorbed the basics.  I learned English by reading and listening on a grand scale, and that’s how I planned to learn French.  But for English I had the basics from my school days, while for French I had nothing.  And since I am now strong and powerful, no one can force me – for my own good – to spend endless hours in boring pursuits (except at work, but I get paid for that).

So what’s a body to do?

This is where the waistcoats come in.  The principle is similar to that of counting sheep to go to sleep.  The idea is to quiet that part of the brain that gets bored easily and wants to do something new and exciting.  By counting sheep the excitable brain gets distracted, and while it is busy counting, another part of the brain takes over and dozes off.  By the time the excitable brain part notices what is going on the body is asleep, and so the excitable bit seeks refuge in vivid dreams.

Anyway, imagine listening to the same CD by Michel Thomas a dozen times.  The man is a good teacher, but can be very patronising and authoritarian, and I hate that.  So not only am I bored because I have listened to him a dozen times already, but I am angry at his tone as well.  So I switch off and play solitaire instead.

However, now envisage the same scene with the addition of knitting a waistcoat.  Whenever I get irritated or bored I focus my attention on the knitting until I calm down.  The regular click click of the needles also has a soothing effect, of course.  Once I calm down I listen to the CD again.  The knitting keeps the excitable part of my brain engaged, so it can’t complain too much about having to listen to the same CD over and over again.  It has to be a simple pattern, because something complicated like a sock would be too distracting.  The idea is to do something simple, just enough to engage the excitable bit of the brain so it doesn’t run off to do something more interesting, without being so distracting that I stop learning the new language.

Of course this does not have to be knitting.  You could try whittling or painting your toenails or riding your exercycle.  The important part is that whatever you do will not engage you so much that you cease to pay attention to learning French.

I have knitted about a dozen waistcoats in the last year, and slowly my labours are paying off.  Of course the good people of La Bourboule will be the final judges of my progress, but I have managed to absorb a modicum of grammar recently, and my vocabulary has become extensive, if patchy.  I now know what ‘colocataire’ means – roommate – how cool is that?  And when someone claims to be ‘mi-homme mi-pizza’ I know that he is half man half pizza – I have been watching the movie Spaceballs in French for quite a few times now.

I am making progress, at long last.  What I am going to do with all those wretched waistcoats is anybody's guess. 

How not to learn French - Lessons 7 to 10

How not to learn French - Lesson 7 – Reading a French Grammar

When I desperately want to learn something, I read a book.  Sometimes it gets a little ridiculous – I once read a book about ballroom dancing and expected to be able to dance afterwards (it did not work).  Then there was the mathematics book I copied from front to back in the vain hope of absorbing enough maths to get me through high school – I learned nothing, but my teacher was so moved by my efforts that he gave me a D and I managed to scrape through. 

Given this troubled history, it will surprise no one to hear that I read an entire French Grammar front to back, hoping – vainly, as usual – to learn French grammar that way.  The book sported ‘Dummies’ somewhere in its title, so I figured it would work.  But it did not.  Instead of admitting defeat I decided that I obviously was not dumb enough to learn anything from this grammar, and read another one, an Introduction to French Grammar.  This book was even thicker and quickly got very complicated.  While I managed to understand what they were on about, I did not manage to remember anything!  Then I reflected that it was a silly idea anyway, because if I had to remember and apply 500 pages worth of grammar every time I spoke French I would find myself very quickly without an audience.

I well remember a man I once knew, who tried to engage me in German conversations.  One could positively hear how his brain was working to create a perfect sentence, and although every sentence he enunciated was indeed perfect, I usually ran out of patience before he had managed to make his point.

So I decided to give up the French Grammars as a dead loss, and tried yet another approach.

How not to learn French - Lesson 8 – Buying appliances with French instruction manuals

I happened on this approach after I had bought a radio in La Bourboule.  It was one of those complicated digital affairs, which requires various sophisticated operations to set the alarm, find a radio station, switch an internal light on and off, predict the weather, set the volume, and heaven knows what else.  Since I am used to radios that just turn on and off, permanently tuned to Radio 4, this presented me with a serious challenge.

Having tried for an hour or so to get the thing going by sole use of my innate wit, I turned my attention to the instruction manual, which was in French, Spanish, and Japanese, which all elude me.  What’s a person to do?  I decided to knuckle down and learn French by deciphering the manual.

Although I managed to learn enough to operate the radio, I cannot wholeheartedly recommend this method, partly because the words thus obtained have little application in everyday life – well, my everyday life, but principally because the grammar is atrocious.  Apparently these manuals are usually translated by the pre-teenage children of the production manager of the factory where these electronic devices are produced, and while I have the highest regard for their linguistic precocity I must regretfully conclude that it does not yet suffice for the task on hand.

Lest you think that I malign them – after all I did manage to get the radio working – I should add that I finally discovered a German and English version on the back of the manual, and although these version were pretty pitiful as well, between the two of them I managed to glean what information I needed.  That’s why I know about the awfulness of the grammar, by the way; I was in no position to judge the French version.

It is rather unfortunate that I cannot recommend this method, because there are so many instruction manuals blighting everyone’s life.  Justifying their existence by utilising them for linguistic purposes would really take the sting out of their loathsomeness, but alas I cannot in good conscience advise this course of action.

Sighing deeply, I turned to the most pleasurable approach to date.

How not to learn French - Lesson 9 – Spending time in Paris

Finally, I hear you say, a sensible approach to learning the French language.  I should have done that in the first place.  Go somewhere crawling with natives eager to teach me their language, and fluency will surely follow soonishly.

Hah!

Double Ha!

Cubed and to the power of n (I learned some math, you know!) Hah!

Paris is full of natives who want to practice English!  Trying to learn French from them is like drawing teeth or wading through treacle, ie theoretically possible but too exhausting in practice.  As soon as people hear you are fluent in English they look at you hungrily and say something in English.  When they hear that I live in Oxford they get really excited, because when they learned English in school they used the Oxford English Dictionary, and now they consider Oxford to be the source and guardian of all that is excellent in the English language.  When I was once stupid enough to confess that I used to work for the OUP and helped compile the dictionary their enthusiasm knew no bounds, and they quickly concluded that I was a rare gem whose perfect English must not be endangered by learning French.  For the rest of that day, whenever I tried to utter something in French they listened politely for a minute or two before guiding me firmly back to the language of Albion.

No, trying to learn French in Paris is like selling coals in Newcastle.  Don’t even try!

 

How not to learn French - Lesson 10 – Reading French Books

This was my last abortive attempt to learn French.  Remembering how I had learned English all those years ago, I bought a few French books which I had read so often in English that I practically know them by heart, and settled down.  The idea was that I would not have to look up unknown words all the time because, knowing the English version, I would already know what every words meant.

Well, it did not work that way.  Although I read entire books, I learned very few words, because, although the two languages are very similar, they are not translated words by word, and anyway my memory is so truly sievelike that I forgot every word almost as soon as I learned it.


How not to learn French - Conclusion

I had comprehensively failed to learn French, despite having used every method I could think of.  Incidentally, I have not described every attempt I made to learn French in this little series.  There were also language CDs (three different types), newspapers, the language lab of the university, reading the jokes in carambar wrappers, etc etc.  Nothing worked.  I had failed.

Now, I am nothing if not persistent.  To me NO! is simply a shy person’s way of saying yes, and a defeat is just a signal to try a different approach.  But I had tried every approach!  What could I do?

Stay tune for my new series, Learn French The Hard Way With DB!   I shall kick off soon with my first sure-fire way to learn French by knitting waistcoats.

Au revoir & bonne journee!

How not to learn French - Lesson 6 – Listening to French Songs

I have not written recently about not learning French, and since I have actually come across one or two useful methods for learning languages I must get the negatives out of the way pronto!  Expect a few more posts on this subject soon.

French songs.  Only yesterday a friend who heard about my fruitless attempts to pick up the lingo suggested listening to French songs.  It is a common suggestion, like watching French movies and reading French children’s books, and excellent in its way.

Unfortunately it only results in success if actual work is involved!  I am not into work.  I have to do it all day long in the office, and then there is laundry and cleaning and taking out the rubbish and frankly that’s enough for me.  I want to learn French without lifting a finger!  It’s nice to have a dream.

Early on in my French learning attempts I actually bought a number of CDs with French songs.  Charles Trenet, Edith Piaf, and of course Jacque Brel.  Most of the songs are, of course, about love and heartache.  As a result I spent most of the time crying into my hanky and bedewing the dictionary, which is not conducive to the learning experience.  As for singing these songs myself, why it was impossible!  Every time I tried to sing about little birds in their nests (J’attendre toujour et la nuit j’attendre toujour ton retour, etc) I dripped hot and cold.  Take it from me, singing and crying don’t mix.  I abandoned those CDs pronto.

Then I came across a songster whose songs did not make me cry – Thomas Fersen!  Every morning before I get up I listen to Radio France Inter for a half hour in the vain hope of absorbing some language skills into my drowsy sub-conscious, and for a while they featured a song which I could not understand but which had a wonderful melody – Felix.  All I could make out was the refrain, which went J’ai jouis jai jouis j’ai jouis, so that’s what googled for.  It was a bad experience, because I mainly hit porn websites.  J’ai jouis means I enjoy.

Anyway, after two days of patient searching I found a You Tube clip with the song and became an ardent fan of Thomas Fersen.  Great melodies, and intelligent texts.  Almost impossible to understand, unfortunately.  And since he is hardly known outside of the French speaking world, hardly any texts are translated.  I did my best, but full comprehension continues to elude me. 

Consider, for example, Le Chat Botte, one of my favourites.  First I thought it was about someone working in a pub, but slowly I cottoned on to the fact that it was in fact a song about someone working in a shoe shop.  It is about women coming into the shop with smelly feet and thinking their feet are smaller than they really are.  And they all want crocodile pumps – I think so, anyway.

As usual in my French learning attempts I went with the certainty of a sleep walker for the toughest lyrics possible.  I googled Thomas Fersen, and apparently he is known for his intelligent elegant verses.  I should have gone for lullabies!

I think he sounds great, even to non-French speakers.  I did try to copy and paste the lyrics from Le Chat Botte, but did not succeed, ditto for links to his songs.  You'll have to google them if you are interested.

Eh, did I mention that I did not learn much French by listening to him?  I did find out that Felix is about a French President who died in office and in-elegant circumstances.  It is kind of difficult to stay innocent when learning French!

Stuff Parisians Like / Dessine-moi un Parisien

Some time ago I came across a totally hilarious blog (see link below) about the Parisians by Olivier Magny, who lives in Paris and runs a wine bar. Very close to the mark, by all accounts and in my own limited experience.

Favourite posts include one about clothes – always black, or at least dark blue or grey, colours which have the decency of looking like black. That post hit a real nerve with me, because I have a problem with the ever present black and its reputation as being classy and tasteful and slimming. Personally I would never wear a garment because it is slimming, thereby acknowledging that I am too fat – if I am too fat I lose weight, and anyway I decide what too fat is, and I am just fine, thanks a lot!

As to classy and tasteful, any fool can buy black. Wearing all the colours of the rainbow without them either clashing with each other or oneself, now that is classy and tasteful! It takes a long time to learn which colours suit one and which ones go together well, and the process of putting together a perfect outfit is quite an art. Wearing black is just a cop-out, a cheap option by those who seek to avoid making a real effort.

It is also of course completely conformist; I should hate to look exactly like everyone else! Men of course do this in most of the western world, limiting themselves to standard suits in black, blue, and charcoal grey, teamed with light shirts. The only individuality they permit themselves is in the choice of their tie, and even those tend to be predictably boring. Few men have the audacity of MDL, bless him, who once showed up in a beautiful yellow jacket for an official group photo of the staff at the government agency where he works, while everyone else wore somber grey suits.

I also like the posts about the Parisiennes who, contrary to popular opinion, are incredibly prim and proper and fear nothing more than being thought of as ‘easy’, the one about going to the cinema on Sunday afternoons, the recent craze for old style baguettes, the word ‘putain’, etc etc. Great blog, the only problem is that Olivier seems to be rather busy recently so few new posts. I blame that wretched wine bar!

Anyway, the blog was turned into a book last year, both in English (Stuff Parisians Like) and in French (Dessine-moi un Parisien). I bought the French version, seeing as the English can be read on the blog (link below).

http://www.o-chateau.com/stuff-parisians-like/full-list-of-stuff-parisians-like.html

By the way, I am not being paid to recommend this blog, I just really like it!

How not to learn French - Lesson 5 - Watching French Movies

As all the other things I tried to learn French, this seemed a great idea at first.  Spend an evening at the flicks watching one of those avant garde French films, and effortlessly learn the lingo by letting it seep into your sub-conscience, thus combining pleasure with utility.  Unfortunately there were a few problems.

Firstly, I hate avant garde movies!  I have enough problems in my real life, thank you very much, and don’t need it in my time off from reality.  I want easy laughs and cheap merriment!  Difficult to come by in the French movies available outside of France.  The reputation of the French for being sophisticated and stylish and ‘out there’ means that any French movie that caters to my kind of tastes is dismissed as a non-French aberration and not stocked.  Actually, there exist hilariously funny and entertaining French movies – like Safari – but it is almost impossible to get hold of them in Anglo-Saxonia.

Of course, one can order them on Amazon.fr, and I have done that, but again have experienced a few difficulties.  (a) How do you find out about these funny French movies, which no one talks about except in French, which you don’t yet understand?  If you ask French friends, chances are they won’t tell you, because they don’t want to ruin their sophisticated image abroad and instead recommend the usual boring irritating problem movies to you.  (b) Every time I order something from Amazon.fr my credit card gets refused with some incomprehensible – well, French – blurb, to the effect that my card doesn’t work.  A week later I receive whatever I ordered in the post.  Go figure!

The other option is to watch American or British movies using the French language track, and/or French subtitles.  Again, this is fraught with difficulties.  The main being, that the people who translate the language track and the ones who translate the subtitles don’t communicate, which results in two different versions of the film.  So if you were hoping to learn how to correlate the written and spoken word in French by watching these movies you can forget it.

OK, let us assume you have gotten your hands onto some movies in French and are ready to spend an evening at home educating yourself.  This is what happens.

First attempt.  You watch the movie in French with English subtitles – hey, you want to understand what’s going on, right?  And what about your loving partner/cat who watches it with you and has no interest in learning French?  Exactly.  The trouble is, you focus on the subtitles and stop listening to the spoken words, except as a sort of background music.  Result, No French Was Learnt. 

Second attempt.  You watch the movie in English with French subtitles.  You become caught up with the action and quickly cease to pay any attention to the subtitles.  Even when you do read the subtitles occasionally, they rarely correspond word for word with the language track.  Result, No French Was Learnt.

Third attempt.  In a desperate effort to salvage the Learn French by watching Movies option, you watch the film in French with French subtitles.  You understand nothing, get bored, and give up.  Result, No French Was Learnt.

Actually, there is a way of learning French by watching French movies, and I have done it (to an extent).  I shall discuss it when I start my series, How to Learn French in Ten Difficult Lessons, sometime in the new year.

For now, watch French movies by all means.  Just don’t expect to learn French that way.  Your experience will be exactly the same as trying to learn French by listening to native speakers or taking French lessons.  OK, that was my experience, it may be different for you.  But this is a blog series for people who have tried everything to learn French and wonder why they did not succeed.  It is not a blog for people who have tried to learn French and have succeeded.

I am sorry – well, perhaps a tiny bit – if I sound defeatists and negative.  I am tempted to blame it all those avant garde French movies, but alas I have not watched any for decades.  It is just that I have been told so often how easy it is to pick up a foreign language.  All those comments by friends & relations - You have learned French for three years now, aren’t you fluent yet?  No, I am jolly well not, my French is still abysmally awful and I resent the implication that it is my own fault for not having tried hard enough.  Sure, if all you want is say Please and Thank you and Hand over a pint & a pickle sandwich, yeah I can do all that, but that hardly counts as speaking a language.

Learning a language properly is hard work and takes a long time.  Unless you have a really good reason to do it, don’t even try.  If you want to find out more about another culture, read a few books about it.  If you actually go to another country, learn to say in the native language, ‘I am terribly sorry but I can’t speak your language.  It is a scandal and an insult to your great culture, but my tiny brain couldn’t handle it.  Please do forgive me.’  Usually they reply, ‘Hey, no problem, I speak English!’ 

Of course, if you actually want to live in another country, or spend a considerable amount of time there, you must learn the language!  It could be a matter of life and death.  Just imagine being stuck up a lonely mountain side during a walking holiday in a backwater where no one speaks English, with an injured friend rapidly bleeding to death, unable to call for an ambulance!  That’s what I mean about being motivated; it is precisely this scenario that determined me to learn French.

How not to learn French - Lesson 4 - Buying Hermes scarves

I love scarves and wear one every day.  Sometimes wool, usually silk, sometimes small or large, usually medium.  They are marvelously useful, in my opinion.  If I feel warm, I pull the scarf away from my neck.  If I feel cold, I drape it around myself in generous folds.  Much better than continually taking one’s pullover on and off.  I started out in my twenties, hunting for scarves in thrift shops, and occasionally receiving one as a gift from my Mother, completely unaware that even my best Liberty scarf was as nothing compared to the beauty of an Hermes one.

I might have remained in this blissful state of ignorance indefinitely, had I not taken to visiting France.  It was only a matter of time until I came across an Hermes shop during my wanderings around Paris.  I saw, I succumbed, I read the price-tag, I shrank back in horror, I looked again at the glorious designs and colours, I cautiously inched my way back to the scarf counter, I retreated again scandalised by such ludicrous cost for a piece of silk, I was reeled in again by the sheer beauty of the scarves, etc etc ad infinitum.  I knew it would be madness to buy such a scarf, an indefensible extravagance, a luxury not meant for us non-millionaires.  Besides, did I not have up to a hundred scarves already?  I had no excuse, and I knew it.  Sighing deeply, I smothered my scarf-lust and turned to leave the shop. 

Then I saw a remarkable thing:  each Hermes scarf had a title; a French title!  Might I not utilise this little shred of French for learning the language?  Hitherto the language had completely eluded me, so surely I would be justified to spend a small fortune to learn French?  Why of course I was!  The spiel was made, money changed hands, and I left with my first Hermes scarf.

Back home I laid out my new treasure, sat before it in a reverend attitude, and immersed myself in contemplation.  People tell me they queue for hours to see an exhibition of paintings by the Impressionists, or brave the crowds for a glimpse of the Athene of Phidias.  Me, I just look at my scarves.  Because, as you have guessed, I did not stop at the first one.

A friend calculated that I paid an average of £25 for each word, and predicted that I would either go bankrupt and learn French or survive financially intact and remain Frenchless.  But this did not deter me - I decided that I would rather know French than be rich.

A good example of learning French by scarf is one that depicts all manner of fantastic early planes and balloons, and is called Les Folies du Ciel.  I learned the words for folly and heaven, and had an illustration of how to form the plural of le and la and de.

La ronde des heures is another favourite.  It has a little rhyme on it:  Parmi les fleurs je compte les heures (among the flowers I count the hours).

Then there is l’Instruction du Roy – En l’exercice de monter a cheval.  Instruction for the king – an exercise (manual) for riding a horse.

One of my favourite language learning scarves is L’ombrelle magique – the magic sunshade (interestingly enough, the French l’ombrelle does not mean umbrella).  This scarf tells a story.  Each scene is depicted, and has some French words describing it.  So here it goes:

L’Ombrelle Magique (the magic sunshade)

Il etais une fois (once upon a time)

Un prince solitaire (a prince who was a loner)

Amoureux des oiseaux (who loved birds – or maybe he was beloved by birds)

Un beau jour (one beautiful day)

Le brouillard le surprend (he was surprised by fog)

Perdue dans la foret (lost in the woods)

Il demand son chemin (he asked the way)

Un vieil ermite lui repond (an old hermit answered)

Prends cette ombrelle (take this sunshade)

Quel que soit ton chemin (wherever you are?)

L’ombrelle te conduira chez toi (the sunshade will guide you home)

En route pour un voyage (while travelling)

Aux quatre coins du monde (to the four corners of the world)

Magie!  L’ombrelle soudain se change (Magic!  Suddenly the sunshade changed)

En princesse menehould (into a beautiful(?) princess)

De retour au palais (they returned to the palace)

On celebre l’amour! (to celebrate their love – see photo above)

As mentioned before, my French is pretty lousy so my translations must be taken with a pinch – or even a pound! – of salt!  By the way, I have not been able to find 'menehould' in any dictionary, but surmise it means something like many hold (hold being a German word for beautiful/attractive).

And finally, Dame de Coeur a Vous l’honneur!  A wonderful scarf featuring some rather unusual playing cards.

So, is buying Hermes scarves a good way to learn French?  Well, I learned all the words depicted on my scarves, but I hesitate to recommend this method on account of its expense.  Also not everyone is interested in scarves.  But personally, I cannot find it in my heart to regret my purchases – they are just too beautiful, and whatever sorrows might trouble my heart vanish when I contemplate my ‘wearable works of art’.  And that’s more than can be said for any book of grammar I ever encountered.

How not to learn French - Lesson 3 Taking French Lessons

Taking lessons in a foreign language is generally assumed to be the best way to learn it.  Initially I, too, had made this fallacious assumption and decided to enrol in an introductory French course.  The urge to learn French seems to run deep in the subterranean level of the English psyche, because no sooner had I announced my intention to enrol in a French class that several of my friends decided to do likewise.  Great, I thought, we can do homework together and generally encourage each other.  Full of hope and expectations I signed up for the class and paid my fees upfront.

Unfortunately my friends’ enthusiasm was short-lived.  Having encouraged me to go ahead with the venture, they considered their job done, and left me to it, never signing up to the course themselves.  Never mind, I thought, I have enthusiasm for three and brains for five, so I’ll crack this French thing – in a year or two I’ll be reading Le Monde!

Eager to get a head start before classes began, I bought all the books needed for the course and settled down to do some serious studying.  That’s when I discovered that the books were all in French.  No English whatsoever.  Apparently that’s the new modern method of teaching languages.  The theory goes that if you force someone to read enough words in a foreign language, eventually the penny will drop and they’ll end up being fluent.

Before the course even started I had read all the books cover to cover – twice.  And understood nothing.  Oh well, I thought, that’s why I am taking a class – the teacher will explain things to me!  I put the books aside and waited for the classes to begin.

The teacher was adorable and taught me my first French insult in break time:  Mechant Crapaud (Nasty toad).  Unfortunately she taught French the modern way.  She spoke almost exclusively in French for most of the class, so I understood nothing.  Then she played us a story on tape, also in French.  I understood nothing.  Then she taught us some grammar, which I immediately forgot – I always forget grammar, it is my one intellectual defect.

The second part of the lesson was different.  We were divided into groups and told to talk to each other in French.  Unfortunately we spoke either no French at all or very bad French with a heavy English accent, so succeeded only in contaminating each others scant French even further.

I stuck it out for three or four lessons, and then dropped out.  I had learned nothing, absolutely nothing.  It was a thoroughly dispiriting experience.  I had hoped for something along the lines of this:  This is a knife!  C’est un couteau.  See this fist?  Voir cet poing?  You get the idea.  Simple useful words in easy sentences, said in both English and French, and repeated until they became firmly entrenched in my memory banks. 

After I dropped out I tried to do lessons at home, by listening to the CDs by Michel Thomas, who teaches languages by the deductive method.  It is a good method, and I did manage to remember a little, but his bullying and patronising manner put me off, and after the second CD I stopped listening.  I also found his accent rather annoying – I already have traces of German, English, and American accents, the last thing I need is a Polish one to contaminate my French even further.

I did obtain another CD of introductory French, which used English to explain the French I was supposed to learn, and I managed to absorb a modicum of French.  Again, no grammar, but I learned to count and say a few simple sentences after having listened to the CD about twenty five times.  Not a total loss, but considering that I longed to discuss Kant’s categorical imperative and world trade with my French friends not very satisfactory, either.

I finally concluded that taking French lessons, whether in a class or by interacting with a CD, was not a good way for me to learn French.  But, ever undaunted, I had already identified another method of (not) learning French.  Stay tuned for the next instalment!

PS  I hope whoever reads this isn't going to be mad enough to believe that the occasional French words and sentences I quote in this blog are actually correct French - I sometimes get lucky, but don't bank on it!