![]() ![]() « Je NE parle NI NE comprends….(le français/votre belle langue/la langue de Molière/etc.) » In addition to considering different ways to say “French” (the language) to help to reduce your “shame level,” you could also consider using different French negation formations to vary the “I don’t speak” part of your dilemma to try to show not only a bit more creativity but also to show the degree of progress that you’re making as you move down the list: "I am an American" and chances are that your audience will understand you and assume that you don't speak French!] [or (and please note that this is intended SOLELY as a snarky/sarcastic jab AT MYSELF ALONE) you could just say (if it is the case, as it is with me): "Je suis désolé, mais je ne parle pas (encore) la langue de Prost (Alain)." "Je suis désolé, mais je ne parle pas (encore) la langue de Proust (Marcel)."Īnd finally, to a perhaps less literary audience you could say (just kidding with this one, he's a race car driver): "Je suis désolé, mais je ne parle pas (encore) la langue de Molière." or To a literary audience you could say either: "Je suis désolé, mais je ne parle pas (encore) votre belle langue." To a French audience, you could earn some points by saying: Here are some more options that might work depending on your audience: My advice? Make sure to know your verbs – the ones your grannie wouldn’t be horrified to hear.ORIGINAL ANSWER (please see ADDED below for edit) Hopefully the next time I attempt at anecdote at a soiree, it’ll be a little less risqué. I said something like, “Well, if there’s a cute boy, you never know!” But by that point I was the only one chuckling and I seriously think people might have been wondering if I wasn’t, in fact, a prof d’anglais, but a hooker. Needless to say, I was mortified, but I quickly tried to recover my composure by making light of the situation and of myself. But I replaced the “Z” in bronzer with an “L.” For all of you wholesome people out there, bronler means “to give a hand job.” And I was talking in a very animated matter too, because I was thinking, “Damn, I’m really doing well here – telling childhood anecdotes in French!” Everyone stared at me with their mouths agape while my boyfriend proceeded to tell me that I’d just said that I like going to the beach because I could relax and give hand jobs. Maybe I was too proud to the point of losing my concentration.Īs I went on, I meant to say that even though I didn’t swim in the ocean, I still enjoyed the beach because I could relax and suntan – bronzer. ![]() Hell, I even remembered the word for “shark!” I was proud. ![]() I began explaining to a small group of people, in French, why I’d go to the beach but wouldn’t actually go in the water. Yes, it’s irrational, but my overactive childhood imagination (I was convinced that a shark was going to burst through the concrete walls of a swimming pool) has clearly scarred me for life. Towards the beginning of the evening, people were talking about going swimming at the beach the next day, which I wasn’t going to do because of my shark phobia. I was fairly nervous, since everyone at the dinner would be speaking French and although I’ve improved a lot, I’m still not fluent. Friday night was dinner at the boss’s house, and Saturday was a beach day. Last weekend my boyfriend and I went to Cassis for his company retreat. I wish that my most recent faux pas, however, was merely one of a mistaken verb tense or misplaced adjective. You’re trying to carry on a conversation and attempting to a) get your verb tenses right so you don’t sound like Forrest Gump (“I study French since 2 years!”) and b) avoid being blunt to the point of sounding dictatorial (“I must leave immediately!” when you mean to convey that you should probably be going soon). It seems especially easy to do when you’re a foreigner and you aren’t fluent in the language. ![]()
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