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Gary’s TAC 2013 - PAX | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5210 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes  Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 73 of 160 06 June 2013 at 4:05pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm flying to Paris, probably spending a night there, then going to a place near Nantes for a music festival. The festival ends on the Monday and I'm flying back from Paris on the Wednesday; I'm not sure yet what I'll do for these couple of days afterwards, if I'll spend them in the region or go back to Paris. So my plans are still a bit vague...
These days I get through about one book (English or otherwise) every few months, so stocking up on them didn't really cross my mind. I'd like to read more but I just don't have the time. I might still be tempted to look around the bookshops in Paris if I have time though, it's something I didn't manage when I was there last year. Yeah, I finished watching Les Revenants a couple of weeks ago. I agree, I was also a bit disappointed about all the unanswered questions; I guess it was an obvious set-up for the second series. Films and series with unclear and mysterious endings are a bit of a pet hate of mine; maybe I'm old-fashioned but I like a nice happy ending, or at least one that ties the rest of the story up rather than leaving me guessing about everything. I went to French meetup last night. It was good, it definitely rekindled the enthusiasm and motivation that I've been losing a bit recently. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5210 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 74 of 160 10 June 2013 at 11:04am | IP Logged | |||||
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The last week has mostly just been more of the same: plenty Italian, not enough French. While technically and academically speaking, my French is by far the stronger language of the two, I'm really starting to feel more comfortable speaking Italian. I've maybe said this before, but it's becoming even more true. Especially now that I have a few more Italian friends and I hear and use the language in real life almost every day, even if I only say a sentence or two. I still make mistakes, I still hesitate, I'm nowhere near fluent, but at the same time, basic "how's it going" or "let's meet at bar X at 7pm tomorrow" type conversations are starting to come naturally to me in a way that French never has. I think my accent is even improving of its own accord thanks to all the real-life exposure, which as you'll know by now if you've read my log, has certainly never been the case for my French.
I'm starting to think that the language being something personal to you and a real part of your life has an effect that's very hard to replicate with any amount of study and input. That sort of everyday social language is becoming one of the biggest weak points in my French. But with the rate at which my social circle has been expanding recently, it wouldn't surprise to meet some more French speakers soon. I did go to a French picnic at the weekend; it was organised by a group that welcomes French people who arrive in the city, and they invited the Meetup group members as well. It was the first time in quite a while that I had been with a big group of native speakers, so it felt a bit strange. I chatted a bit but it just wasn't really my "scene", it seemed to mostly be families and so on, and there was nobody I really connected with socially. Still, it did make the language a bit more "real" to me - seeing groups of friends speaking to each other, and parents interacting with their children, are still quite novel experiences for me in French. It did feel like being in France for an hour or two. Good food included. Films: I watched Hors de prix (stupid romantic comedy, but I'm getting desperate for "realistic language" exposure here!) and started watching Entre les murs, an interesting semi-autobiographical story account of a teacher's year in a Parisian high school, which has some nice realistic interactions although the pupils use a lot of slang that I'm not familiar with and probably don't need to be familiar with. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5535 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 75 of 160 10 June 2013 at 1:31pm | IP Logged | |||||
This is one of the huge benefits I get from speaking French with my wife. I may often struggle to discuss books, business or politics fluently, but these basic "B1 topics" feel utterly natural. It's a mixed blessing—I'd hate to be weak at these topics, but they're not enough by themselves. I found Les Revenants over on SensCritique (where my list of things to read and watch is growing beyond all control, which is a good thing). The reviews seemed a little mixed, so I didn't add it to my list yet. Compared to other series that you've watched, how difficult was it to understand the dialog without subtitles? I'm searching for some kind of stepping stone between native kid's cartoons and Engrenages. Edited by emk on 10 June 2013 at 7:05pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5210 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 76 of 160 10 June 2013 at 6:17pm | IP Logged | |||||
I can see what you mean. I don't think my case is too bad - if I were to move to France or make friends with some French people, the "socialising language" gaps would probably fill themselves in fairly quickly.
I'll need to check that site out at some point. I watched most of it with subtitles; I think I'd have been just fine without them, but it has quite accurate French subs and I don't like to look a gift horse in the mouth. I find listening and reading at the same time to be very helpful so I tend to use subs if they're available, even if I don't really "need" them. Also it's hard to say because it's been about a year and a half since I last watched Engrenages, and I think/hope that my listening comprehension has improved reasonably since then! But I reckon it's easier - less specialised vocabulary and the speech seems a bit slower. A bit of phonetic reduction (stuff like "quequ'-chose" instead of "quelque chose") but nothing that really impedes understanding apart from perhaps at a few bits where people mumble or there's noise. Edited by garyb on 10 June 2013 at 6:19pm 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| pesahson Diglot Senior Member Poland Joined 5731 days ago 448 posts - 840 votes Speaks: Polish*, English Studies: French, Portuguese, Norwegian | Message 77 of 160 10 June 2013 at 7:01pm | IP Logged | |||||
I've watched most of them without subtitles and I was fine. My level is lower then both of you guys here, so I think you should give it a go emk. I can't compare it to Engrenages because I only watched one episode of it long time ago. It really bored me. Does it get better? Should I give it another go? 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5535 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 78 of 160 10 June 2013 at 9:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
Ah, nice. I've added it to the list of French stuff with accurate subtitles. Thank you!
Engrenages is basically a French knock-off of The Wire. To be honest, it's not the kind of show I can evaluate easily without really giving it a chance. It was the first French series I ever bought, and between the large cast, the interwoven plots and the street slang, I have a lot of trouble getting far enough into the series for it to "click". It does, however, generally make it onto lists of the best French series. Probably if I just sit down and watch several episodes of Engrenages with and without subs, I should be able to make some real progress. But I still have a lot of really interesting series I want to finish first. (Am I the only one who can watch many French TV series without major problems, but who nonetheless gets absolutely destroyed by a large fraction of French movies?) 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5210 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 79 of 160 17 June 2013 at 12:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Only a couple of days before I go to France, but my motivation for French has still mostly been quite low. Maybe just because I've been so busy and focused on other things like work and music recently, so it hasn't hit me yet. At any rate, it seems like a couple of months ago I was making great progress and feeling really motivated, but recently that's all died down and if anything I'm feeling decidedly negative towards French, especially compared to Italian.
My Italian learning appears to be going exactly "as it should": I use it regularly, and my understanding, usage, and pronunciation are improving in a way that, at least for the moment, seems more steady and linear than anything I've experienced before in post-beginner-level language learning. While with French it's always ups and downs, and my opportunities to use it are too irregular, too "artificial" (meetups and exchanges as opposed to socialising and friendships), and with too few native speakers. It seems like I don't have any real use for the language, so I have to keep creating excuses to continue learning. It feels like, even if I can express things quite well, my active skills will never truly be "solid", and I'll never get consistently good at that damn accent and pronunciation, unless maybe I were to live in France for some time. On the other hand, I could probably learn Spanish to as high a level as I'd realistically want without leaving my city, and probably the same for Italian although certainly with more difficulty. In terms of utility, I like to joke that the most useful thing about learning French has been that it's made Italian easier for me, and in turn, the most useful thing about learning Italian has been that it helps me to understand Spanish. I might just be seeing the grass as greener on the other side yet again, or feeling the effects of the ups and downs a bit too much again, who knows. Maybe spending a week surrounded by French will bring back my motivation. And I'm probably long overdue an epic plateau in Italian that'll knock me off my current streak of positivity towards it. The recent progress has been a bit too good to be true. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| garyb Triglot Senior Member ScotlandRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5210 days ago 1468 posts - 2413 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, French Studies: Spanish | Message 80 of 160 27 June 2013 at 2:17pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I just got back from France yesterday, so it's time for the post-trip update!
The plan was: arrive in Paris in the early evening, stay for the night, go to the music festival for the weekend, then come back to Paris the day after and stay for another two nights. Things started off badly: due to a thunderstorm, Charles de Gaulle airport had to close, resulting in a four-hour delay. I was meant to be meeting my friend in Paris and a couple of his friends for dinner, but I didn't get into the city until after midnight. So I ended up just getting a kebab and eating it at the hostel, where I chatted to a few of the other guests. Hostels obviously aren't the place to go if you want an immersion experience, since the lingua franca amongst the guests and staff is generally English. I did use a bit of French though, to ask for directions to the hostel and to order my food. While on the train, I suddenly realised that I had forgotten to bring my festival ticket. I'm a bit of a disaster when I travel, but on the plus side it gives me some nice challenges to use the language. It's a printable ticket, so my new mission was to find somewhere where I could get online to download and print it, or failing that, try to sort things out with the festival staff. I asked a staff member at Nantes railway station if she knew of any nearby internet cafés or anything like that, which she didn't, but I made the most of it and had a decent conversation about my situation, the city, and the festival, all in French. I then got another train to the village where the festival takes place, where I continued the mission. I found the tourist information office and asked there, where they directed me to a stationery shop. Then on the street an old man came up to me, saying I looked lost and asking me if I was looking for something, and he directed me towards the shop. The shop couldn't help me, as they didn't have an Internet connection, but they told me about a computer shop that might be able to help. Again we had a decent conversation. I found the computer shop, where I explained my situation to the guy there and he let me use his computer and printer. Interestingly, a few minutes into the conversation he asked me "vous parlez français?", even though the conversation up to then had been entirely in French; I think he really meant "do you feel that you speak and understand well enough to continue the interaction in French?". Of course I said oui and we continued. I was amazed at how friendly and helpful everyone was, considering on one hand all the "rude French" stereotypes and on the other the stereotypes about heavy metal fans. The man who asked me if I needed help obviously didn't think I was some sort of antisocial devil-worshipping drunkard. I imagine that me knowing French did help a lot, as opposed to your typical tourist who expects everything in English. Unfortunately, the festival itself, while top-notch as always from a musical perspective, wasn't quite as friendly. The last few years, it was easy to get chatting to other people and I had quite a few good conversations, but this time round, people just didn't seem as open and the conversations I had with people outside my group were brief. Seems that that festival gets a bit less friendly every year, which is sad: every year I go there my French is much better yet I have much less chance to actually use it. It was still linguistically interesting though, for all the little interactions and challenges. I've mentioned before that one of my biggest challenges is when someone comes up to me and starts talking or asks me something, since unlike in a conversation there's no context. I'd say that I understood first time round about 50% of the time, although often after a couple of seconds of processing time. If I didn't understand the first time, I'd say "pardon" and in 90% of cases I got it the second time. Following that, after my response to their question, they'd switch to English in maybe 50% of cases. I've said it before - contrary to what one may expect, in my experience, in "official" interactions with staff in shops, at stations, etc., people are very happy to continue the conversation in French, but in social/casual interactions, they're often quite insistent on switching to English the moment they realise you're not a native speaker. But all these numbers are still much better than a year ago. Understanding "out of the blue" is a difficult skill; to put it in perspective, even in if someone comes up to me and says something at full speed in English, I often don't understand everything straight away and I need to ask them to repeat. Always important to remember that we're not aiming for perfection! And it's maybe a bit needless to say, but it's worth making sure that you pronounce "pardon" with the correct sounds and intonation so that they at least repeat in French! The trip back to Paris all went smoothly, and that evening I went to the Couchsurfing meeting. I asked the barman where the Couchsurfing group was, and he said (in English; it was a British-style bar with English-speaking staff) that it was basically the whole bar. I joined one group of people, who turned out to be French. I spoke with them a bit, but it was difficult as they were clearly good friends and already in their own conversation. Still, it was a nice opportunity to see a proper conversation between young French people in real life. Then they left, and the relatively small pub kept getting busier and busier; there must have been well over a hundred people there at the peak around 10-11pm. Socially it was quite challenging, since you just had to go up to people and introduce yourself and start talking. It seemed to be half French people and half international people, and of very varying levels of friendliness. In terms of languages, my experiences of people continuing in French versus switching to English were very similar to what I described for the festival. Several people told me that it's extremely unusual for them to meet people from English-speaking countries who speak French, even living in Paris. I'm still trying to figure out exactly which factors go into triggering the switch to English. Accent, mistakes, and other giveaways? More specifically, giveaways that I'm not just a foreigner but an English speaker in particular? Not seeming at ease in the language? People just being keen to practice their English? Thinking they're being helpful? I realise that trying to pass for a native speaker is an unrealistic aim, but I think you have to convince people that you're competent enough to continue the interaction in French, and for many French people, the standard is very high. And another thing I've said before: most French people of my age (20s) that I meet are actually very functional in English. Some speak none or little, but they're the exception. There was a "polyglot evening" on the following day; from what I gather, they happen at least three times a week. I didn't go though, as I instead met up with the friend who I had been supposed to meet the previous week. We had a nice chat in English and French; his English continues to amaze me, it's clear that he spends a lot of time on it. Apparently there are often over 100 people at these polyglot evenings, which is very different from our relatively small, calm, and infrequent meetup groups here! It seems like it would have just been quite like the Couchsurfing meetup - lots of people crowded into a small bar, and quite socially challenging. But with more languages of course. It's definitely something I'd go to if I were to spend more time there: I imagine I'd get pretty good at my languages, and it would boost my social skills quite quickly. During the day, I did some exploring by foot and by bike (Vélib is a pretty good system, and people even came and helped me find nearby stations without me having to ask!). For lunch I went to a crêperie, and had a good chat with the waitress. I also checked out Attica, a language learning bookshop that I had seen mentioned on the forum. I asked a staff member for advice on advanced Italian books, and looked at a few. Unfortunately none of them were really what I was after - it just seemed to be lots of revision of stuff like verb conjugations and articles, as opposed to difficulties in usage; I've still not found the Italian equivalent of Grammaire Progressive Perfectionnement. I think textbooks and courses generally miss the mark when it comes to "advanced" materials. But it was another good opportunity to use my French and have a nice conversation. Apparently they do good business; between that and the popularity of the polyglot evening, Paris must have a lot of keen language learners! And it was a cool experience actually seeing Assimil books and courses in a physical shop - for us Assimil is like some sort of undiscovered secret that you can only find online. I also overheard another customer having a nice language geek conversation with the assistant about the differences between French and Chinese. I also noticed a big bande dessinée shop a few doors down from Attica. I'm sure all the other French learners here will hate me for it, but I didn't go in - I've still not gotten into the whole BD thing. I keep meaning to check some out, but I've just not gotten round to it. I could've looked for some of the ones that have been recommended in Emk's log and so on, but it just didn't cross my mind at the time. Anyway, I suppose these would be two important destinations for any HTLAL members going to Paris. Both are on rue Richard Lenoir, 11e. In conclusion... I think I enjoyed Paris a lot more than the music festival and I wish I had spent more time there. It was exactly what I was needing, especially with my recent loss of motivation: something to make the French language more real to me and to rekindle my enthusiasm. And overall I found Paris quite friendly, despite its reputation. It's the sort of place where I could very happily spend a few months, although people say it gets too much after a while, which I can understand. And moving forward: I think my plan is much the same as before: keep working away on French until the end of the year. In particular, keep up the effort on accent improvement and general spoken and conversational ability. I'd still love to actually converse more but I still don't think that's very realistic, but I can at least keep getting exposure to spoken language and keep up the other work. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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