Learning French VIII: important, different

Words ending in "-ant" and "-ent"  in English all come from French. They carry the same meaning in the two languages. They have the same spelling and meaning with only difference in the way they are pronounced.

If you recollect, if a word ends with a consonant, that consonant is silent. Here, these words end in "-t" and this "-t"  is not pronounced. Instead the word pronunciation ends  at the sound of  "-n". The pronunciation of such words, both "-ent" and "-ant" are pronounced as "-aun". 

For ex: words like different or important. 

Lets try to use words in sentences:

It is + not + very + different + that way

Ce + n'est pas + tres + different + comme ça

Going little further on the same line

It is + not + very + different + that way, + but + it is + very + important.

Ce + n'est pas + tres + different + comme ca , + mais + c'est+ tres + important.

Learning French VIII : Je suis désolé, mais

One sentence that every body too often use is "I am sorry". Obviously, one would often need to use it if he try to speak french. So today's lesson is "I am sorry".

I  am    +  sorry  = Je suis désolé

Je  suis + désolé

If you just want to say "sorry", you can use word "désolé". Now you must have notices a sign on the two "e" present in désolé. The signs just implies that alphabet e which is pronounced normally as a "अ " as in Hindi should be pronounced as  ae "ए".

Other important word to remember is "but". This is another word which is often required to connect to sentences. The french word for but is "mais"

So, if we combine these two new words with our earlier learnt lessons, we can create simple connecting sentences.

For example:

I am sorry + but  + it is  + not  + very  + good  

Je suis désolé + mais + ce + n'est pas + très + bon 

Learning French VII : Comme ci, comme ça

Have you heard of an expression "Comme ci, comme ça". It is a french expression that in English would roughly translate to expression "So So". Like in situation where you are not very sure if it is very good or very bad, some where in between of the two, you use this expression, "Comme ci, comme ça".

If we try to look at the literal meaning of the expression, it will split in two parts:

Comme ci = like this

Comme ça = like that

We will try to make use of the second part i.e. Comme ça in today's lesson.

Comme ça as mentioned  would mean "like that" or "that way"

Now combining this new word learnt with previous lessons, if we want to say,

It is like that = C'est comme ça

Here, C'est means it is as we learnt in  an earlier lesson and comme ça as now we know is "like that".

Now using negation in the sentence as we learnt in previous lesson

It is + not + like that (or that way),  would translate to

Ce + n'est pas + comme ça

Learning French VI: pardon, n'est pas, mais

In this post of learning French, we will try to construct few simple sentences using the knowledge we have already gained from earlier post and also learn a few word usages very common among French.

To begin with, one word you will hear a lot while moving around in say crowd is "Pardon". Now, this is once again pretty much an English word. But check for the French pronunciation of this word which comes little bit like say "Paardon" with  'd' little mild.

Many a times we brush somebody while walking, you quickly say "Excuse me" in English. Well, "Pardon" do the same job in French. After "Merci" meaning "Thank You", Pardon is the another most used word by French.

In previous post, we learnt to say "It is good" = C'est bon

What if you want to say "It is not good"?

for negation in the form of not, french word is "pas" with silent 's' as suggested in earlier post.

But in general, an added negation is used along with "pas".

So, translation are:

It is       good =    C'est                  bon

It is not good = Ce + n'est + pas + bon

                         It   +    is not      + bon

Another word you need to know is "Mais" means "But". While you want to join two sentences, you many a times need this.

For example, continuing from our previous lesson if you want to translate the sentence,

"It is good but it is not comfortable"  to french, it will be,

C'est bon  + mais + ce n'est pas comfortable

Learning French V: C'est tres bon

In this part, we will try to make use of some earlier lessons and also learn a few new words which you probably already know.
From earlier lesson, we know,

C'est = It is
Now, "Good"  in French is "Bon"

If we combine these two words, we get

"C'est bon"  which means "It is good"
You will hear French people using this a lot.

If you want to say, 'It is very good'
You say in French, "C'est tres bon".
So,we learn a new word here,
Tres = Very
Now if we combine this with words we learnt in previous lesson, we can make sentences like:

C'est tres comfortable = It is very comfortable
C'est acceptable = It is acceptable

Don't forget different pronunciation of words like 'comfortable' and 'acceptable' as discussed in previous lesson.

"Day" in French is "Jour"

So, if we you want to wish some body "Good Day", You would say, "Bon Jour".

Do you recollect hearing "Bon Jour" somewhere at some point of the time? Pretty sure, yes.

Now you know what does it mean. So, Use it.

Learning French IV : Possible, Comfortable

If I write two words Possible and Comfortable, would you find it difficult to connect to them. Surely not.  You might be surprised to know, these words also appear in french dictionary carrying the same meaning as in English.This brings us to today's topic of discussion, " Similarity between English and French language". If you are pretty much familiar with English language, you will find it much easier to learn and understand French. If you try to read something written in French, with little efforts you might actually succeed in understanding the complete meaning. In short, if you know English, you already have learnt 60% of French.

If the history is to be believed, English is a mixed language (Check the video at the end to know more) made out of the combination of mainly Anglo-Saxon and French. Naturally, word knowledge gained from English will act as a stepping stone while learning French.

So, where does these two languages differ. The difference appears when you try to hear them. If one knows English and he tries to hear French, I doubt he will be able to understand  more than 10 words in the whole conversation although he knows most of words spoken. As it is said, "English is all French, but badly pronounced". Its the way of pronunciation, that separates French from English, making it one of the sweetest language to hear. Even if you don't understand French, you won't mind to hear it as it falls so sweet on your ears.

For example, in French 'i' is pronounced as 'e'. As a result, the word "possible" in french is pronounced as "poss"+"e"+"ble". You would need to use Google translator to understand the pronunciation of "ble" that appears in the end of word "possible". Here, 'b' and 'l' in "ble" need to pronounced together with less of 'b' and more of 'l'.

On similar lines, 'a' is pronounced as 'aa'. So, words like "comfortable" are pronounced as 'comfort'+'aa'+'ble'. If you get these pronunciations correct, you have made your life easier by 60% while roaming around in France.

Enjoy this embedded video to know to making of English.

All these videos in origin are available at
http://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/culture/english-language/the-history-english-ten-minutes?track=378501f80b

Learning French III : Oui, Non, C'est la Vie

Two very important words in any language are "YES" and "NO".One will always require these two words to make small conversations. Even if you do can not speak a language, just understand it little bit, you can make workable conversation by just using these two words. French translations for these two words are:

YES = Oui

NO = Non

As I mentioned in earlier post, if a word ends with a consonant  then that consonant is not pronounced in French. So, Non is pronounced pretty much like "NO" in English. I would advice to use Google translator to understand the pronunciation for "YES" i.e. Oui. To end the post I would introduce to a sentence that is very well known around the world.

C'est la Vie = That's life

Here, C'est = that is

and Vie = life

la used before vie is an article like English has "a" or "The"

Learning French - II - Bon Jour, Merci Beaucoup, Au revoir

To begin with, there are three basic set of words which you will always come across while in France.These are not very alien and you must have come across them some where.

1) Bon Jour -  Good day.

    In France, no matter where you go, who you meet, a known person or a stranger, some times even a passer by on the road you are walking, you will encounter these words coming towards you. French people are very polite and they will always wish you a good day when you meet them for the first time in a day.

Bon Jour  is  kind of equivlent to Good Morning in English

2) Merci, Beaucoup:  Thank you, Very much

     You will start wondering while in France, how many times you hear these words. If you just want to say Thank you, you say Merci, but if you wish to extend more thanks in a sense thank you very much or thanks a lot, you say Merci, Beaucoup. French people are used to use this word a lot. They will thank you even if you allow them to talk to you for a minute.

3) Au revoir -  Good bye

     Its very common to say Au revoir (Good bye) once your meeting with any body, anywhere, any time is finished. Not just to familiar faces, but even to unknown people you deal with, like a shop keeper, you say Au revoir while leaving the shop.

So, three very important words in French

1) Bon Jour

2) Merci, Baucoup

3) Au revoir

Now, I might not be explicitly talking about the pronunciation of words here, so, I will share a simple rule that I learnt.

If a french word ends with a vowel (a,e,i,o,u), then the consonant coming just before that vowel is pronounced. For ex. in case of Merci. Here, i is the last character in the word and preceding one c, so, c is pronounced while saying Merci.

But if the last character is a consonant, then it is not pronounced. Ex: Beaucoup. Here, p is not pronounced.

Try to put these words in Google translator. It allows you listen to their pronunciation and also know  their meanings.

Learning French - I - Introduction

I am starting a new thread by name - Learning French.

I always wanted to learn French and so I joined Alliance Française. But, learning French or any other any language for that matter in institutes like Alliance Française or similar ones could be problematic for some.

Normally, they give lessons which run continuously for two hours. So, five sessions in a week, means 10 hours of foreign language dose, which is pretty much hectic for a normal mind. If you are a dedicated Foreign language learner, you may survive. But if you wish to learn it as a hobby, managing it with your regular routine work, then soon it starts turning into a burden. 

Learning a new language is not easy. You have to remember  new words, their meanings, their pronunciations and  then how to use them in a sentence making sense. By the time you come to senses, understanding first set of words you learnt, you are bombarded with another set. Over the time, it becomes difficult to keep track of what you have learnt and what you are learning.

Later part of this exercise, is to be comfortable with the words when some body speaks it to you. I went through this situation when people are talking to me French and I could not understand a single word, even though I had taken some elementary lessons. So, I started learning it on my own. Making use of internet    lessons, help from colleagues.
One thing, I learnt is learning French or any other language sitting in a class 2 hours per day, 5 days a week is not the way. Its a slow process which automatically comes to you as you spend some small time regularly. Even now, I am not much comfortable with French, but now it hasn't remained totally alien language to me. I am still struggling with the pronunciation part and so the conversation, which is a difficult part if you have been speaking English for some time.I will share some simple French words and their usages as I learnt out of my experience in this thread. The lessons will be designed keeping the audio lessons given by Michel Thomas as a base. He gives a very sensible and simpler way to learn European languages. But they won't be strictly following his lessons. I will be modifying them as per my experience of learning French. It will be a fun exercise to learn some french with out putting pressure on mind.

Looking forward to create a good thread to learn French and share with all.

Je suis Apprendre le Français- sequel

      Some thing interesting is happening. Last time I took a French test conducted by my friends. The question paper then was all about the things they taught me during coffee time. Well, if you check, I did well then. But it was a test conducted by friends. It was no official. Finally, I had a chance to officially attempt a French language test. It was organized by my institute to check the knowledge of different French language enthusiasts and to allot them classes of different level. It included many things:
* multiple choice questions * choose the odd one out
* make use the noun, verb
* listen audio and answer
* read passages and answer
* write story and letter
       It was a difficult task for me to write letter and the story on the given topics. I tried but ended up writing some 3 lines. A disaster to say.So, actually I attempted 80 marks paper and I scored 43 out of it. Well, not bad. As a result I qualified for the second level A2. Which is quite motivating. So, today my classes are beginning and will keep you updated with the proceedings and developments. Wish me luck!!

Je suis Apprendre le Français

Ok. Let me tell you in the beginning itself that learning French is not an easy task. Although it shows close similarity with French, but you if listen and try to understand French with your English background then you will totally fail. To learn a language like French, it's a must that you join special classes where you are taught the real and actual pronunciation of the words.
I wanted to learn join some such class after landing in Paris. But things didn’t worked out although I tried a lot. With time I gave up plans to learn French and was managing with simple words like Bon jour and merci, which you have to use atleast 15-20 times in a day.
But later on when I made some friends, I decided to learn French in a different way managing my busy schedule.
So I told my colleagues to teach me some sentences whenever possible. I will learn them. This way I will learn some sentences plus I will get introduced in a quick and easy way to sentence formation and pronunciation of different words. So even if I learn say 30 sentences, then i am introduced to some 30 verbs which is quite enough to make simple sentences and convey your message.
In this my friend Yasmine started helping me to begin with. With time some more names added with Edith, David, Amy started giving inputs from their side. But as is the case, consistency is very much necessary to make something successful. My busy schedule in between time drifted me away from this practise and it is foolish ness to expect it from others when you yoursel are not upto it.
But recently Yasmine realised this gap and tried reinitiating the practise. But i had lost the path totally. She soon realised that all her efforts are going in vain with me failing to recollect simple sentences and words.
So last week she scared me with the fear of taking an exam. This struck me badly since it has been long time I appeared for any exam. I tried to avoid it some or other way but Yasmine is a tough person to deal with. She along with Edith set up an exam for me and scheduled it for today. I was supposed to sit and prepare for exam on week end but as always is the case, fell asleep all the time i opened my written French notes. People normally have Monday blues, but today morning I had Monday black, blue white, yellow, red and all others you can think of. It was not just the fear of exam that was in but the fact that everybody in the group had come to know about my exam. Infact on Friday everybody tried to make me realize that I had an exam on Monday.
Monday morning was no different. I was feeling all the eyes on me. Everybody wished me good luck on the coffee table. Yasmine was not present on the table. I thought , maybe she is not well and not coming or very busy in work and wont get time to take my exam. But later on I realized that the exam is inevitable. Most of the group members had spend some time setting up question paper fo me. Every body had it except for me. So, if not Yasmine, somebody else would have made me take my exam.
I guess you can make out the kind of tension building up on me. Infact , when i went for lunch, the lady at the counter asked me some routine question. But I heard it as if she is asking, “Are you ready for the exam? ”Was I imagining or was it real?
I think then she understood that I am under a big stress so she asked me just move ahead. Even I moved ahead with out trying to understand what she really asked. I guess you also must have been through this situation at some point of the time.
And then it was the time. Professor Yasmine entered my office. She commanded me to keep all the notes away. Put off the monitor. She changed the password so that I can’t login. Gave me the paper and told me what I have to do. Well i guess that was not enough so she told me that you have only 20 mins to solve the paper and half hour as mentioned and made David keep a check on me. I even doubt she had arranged for some cameras in some corners of my office. I tried to search them through the corner of my eyes but couldn’t find any in that tensed situation. One relief given was spelling mistakes were totally allowed, since this was not the exam of my writing skills.
I tried my best to solve the paper and was writing till the last fraction of last second of last minute when yasmine barged into the office and snatched it out of my hands busy writing those last few important words which you remember only in finishing moments.
So, there my paper was gone and I was waiting for results. Did I tell you the options for my fate after the result. I had to score atleast 10 marks out of 20 to avoid any embarrassing situation. If less than 10, then I am vulnerable to any punishment coming my way. And if more than 10 and efforts appreciated then I may get!!! Yes may get some gift for encouragement.

Well the results were out soon and I am posting the corrected paper here.Yes!!!! I scored 18 out of 20. The two examiners came in my office with the result sheet. Check my performance.





If you haven’t understood last few words in my essay on 2nd page end, I will explain. Towards the end, I wrote in the essay that “the paper was very difficult and not at all simple. And I need a coffee now and that is very urgent”. Well thats what I meant to write. What I actually wrote might be different in meaning. But I guess the examiner understood what i wanted to write, because they came with a cup of coffee in their hand for me.
Professor Yasmine and Professor Edith honoured me with these instant gifts.

They also mentioned that since it was totally unexpected result so they were not prepared with the gift today. This is a compensatory gift and you shall get your real gift tomorrow.
So friends, I am done with my exam. I am going to sleep imagining about the possible gift coming my way. The night after exam and result is so calm. I am going it enjoy it after a long long time.