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The Language of the French |
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Written by Pooja Subramanya
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Friday, 26 December 2008 00:41 |
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We looked on with amusement again and again throughout our stay in Paris as (most often) Americans and (quite often) British tourists would get steadfastly snubbed by the French when they were attempting to communicate.
These tourists would approach a Parisian and launch into a stream of authentic English (or what passes for it these days) right from the start. The Parisian in turn would react in the same way each time – a subtle stiffening and deliberate slowing down of body movements and a very real drop in the ambient air temperature, followed by a scathing look up and down the tourist through slitted eyes. Then the old up-turn of the nose with a sniff, and a simple “Non!” when asked desperately if they at least understood a bit of English. The tourists didn’t know the secret you see. To get the French to talk to you, we discovered that you have to trick them into it. Here’s how to do it, with a guaranteed 95% success rate. You see, the French categorise people into two sections. Those-Who-Can-Speak-French, and Those-Who-Can’t. You have to make sure you fall into the former, or at best the hazy middle ground. You MUST begin in French: “Bonjour Mister/Madame!” (and this must be said in as perky a manner as possible). Then get into the real question: “Ou est la Boulangerie, cest vous plait?” They now think that even if you are a dead give away as a foreigner due to your hideous accent that at least you know a little bit of their blessed language. They move to reply in French, and you don’t understand a word, but by this time it’s ok, because at least they’re speaking to you and being quite friendly about it too. That’s when you whip out the big guns: “Excuse moi, parle vous Anglias?” They freeze. You have now caught them off guard – they have already revealed that they can be friendly and helpful, but now you want them to speak the devil-tongue on top of it. But they are all essentially lovely and extremely polite people, so to thank you for at least attempting their language, they smile coyly and say, with that to-die-for accent, “a little”. Once you’ve had a chat and you know everything you needed to, do them a favour and say “Merci”. It’s the very least you could do.
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Last Updated ( Friday, 26 December 2008 00:49 )
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