And then there were four. I’m at class two of my quarter-life crisis resolution to master French, and I already have cause of panic.
At my first lesson, two days earlier, there were half a dozen bright and eager faces ready to learn – an ideal equal gender mix from six different countries and three continents. When I show up to class two there’s just me and three others – were the other two scared off already? Because they all seemed way better than me.
But on with the class. So far, I’m still in the process of learning how much there is to learn. Even the basic greetings I’ve joyfully been throwing at French friends (and long-suffering English ones forced to endure this eccentricity of mine) have been, apparently, wrong.
See, it's all about context – there's formel et informel, and never the pair should mix.
If I greet you as monsieur, I shouldn't go on to call you the more matey toi. But if I start with a salut! using the schoolboy French of vous for a question is likely to be laughed at. If I don't show proper linguistic respect to my elders I'm likely to inflict not insignificant offence. And if I can't get my head round this soon I might as well give up now (okay, I added the last one, but that's how I felt).
At one point the word inconnues was written on the board – unknown, what the whole language is to me.
Still, early days. So far I'm still undercover, and no one in the class has figured out that all those extra scribbles I'm making are being squirrelled away into this online document of my linguistic travails (similar to travailler, work, I note. Lot of that ahead).
Rob Garratt is studying beginners's French at Alliance Française Dubai, a non-profit language and cultural institution established in 1982 which teaches French to more than 2,500 students every year. Find out more at www.afdubai.org.
