Re: OT: Slightly OT: French as a second language

>Attempting to have French as your second language when you are an
American
>can be an intensely frustrating experience.  First off, it's rather rare;
>Spanish is the U.S.'s second language, so my fluency is now terrible from
>lack of use.  Then there's the connotation of French as a "posh"
language,
>leading to its misuse in embarrassing ways...I don't know how many stores
>or products I've seen, or even people I've met, with "French" names that
>are completely incorrect!  Including a co-worker, Montre\ - that's an
>_accent grave_ on the final 'e' - who pronounced her name /m&n.tre/.  It
>took a lot to keep me from pronouncing her name /mQ~ntr_h/... (Is that
>right?  This X-SAMPA is going to drive me to drink...)
>And then there're my American and Canadian friends calling the Que/becois
>"French"...arrrrgh.
>
>--
>  Steve Kramer
I know that Spanish is more common in the US... I just wanted to take
French because it was different, and not so common... One of the things I
hate, though, is that hardly anyone else in my French class really wants
to learn it, so when we have to do conversation or something with a
partner, it's pretty much worthless.
I'm trying to understand the technical description... but I can pretty
much guess what "Montrè" (e acute grave) sounds like, anyway. Speaking of
"French" names, is Cheryl really a French name? Or does it just look like
one?

>My French sucks like a hoover, of course, but today I was writing a story
>about a guy who finds a rip in reality, and steps through it into a
>desert, and returns with some of the sand.  I wanted to make him a Dr,
and
>a fairly pathetic fellow, so of course I fell back on French (sorry,
>Christophe, but I hate your native language, as much as I like you).
Really? I love French. Except when there's a really hard word that twists
my tongue... like I don't think I can say "sûr" right... for some reason
that word's hard to say.
Anyways, that story sounds interesting... :)

>I decided to just name him something that sounded French, and look up a
>suitable name later, so I came up with Bouchon.  Dr. Bouchon.
>
>Then, in revising, I looked it up.  It means "cork; wisp of straw."  Am I
>suddenly psychically picking up the *perfect* French word for what I want
>to say?  Am I tied into the group mind?  Or did I just get lucky?
>
>Past life memories, maybe?
>
>--Patrick
Why does that fit the character? Hehe... maybe you read too much sci-fi...
;)

>In my first year of learning French, I liked it. But after my second
>year, I got possibly the worst teacher I could possibly have got (she was
>so bad, she called a guy a retard in class - that's how bad) and that
>totally killed any affection I had for the language. I mean, to the
>extent that when I mentioned this to a Quebequois that she ripped the
>head off me. I was shocked.
>
>K.
Bummer. I hate teachers like that. Last year's choir teacher (and the rest
of the class) totally ruined that class for me, because of a complete
opposite reason: he was too mice, and let everyone mess around, so we
sounded horrible because out of 70 kids, maybe 20 of us were in there
because we wanted to sing... so, yeah. I don't think I'll take choir
again.



=====
The Aquamarine Demon
Gesám ayi mozuká. Gesám dohíng mozuká. Gesám adohíng mozuká!

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