Some of us took French for years in school but it doesn’t necessarily prepare you for a visit to La Belle Province.
Here are 19 signs. I will give the translation at the end of the post.
Les réponses
FRENCH PROVERB
“À bon chat bon rat.” ― (Tit for tat.)
Miles Hearn
Thanks for the French flavour Miles. That A. Louer guy must be one heck of a salesman! His names on every rental I see!
Félicitations pour vos talents en traduction, Miles! Bon séjour dans la Belle Province.
Wonderful, Miles! As a Montrealer living in Toronto for the past 47 years, these made me sigh happily…a little taste of home. As we used to say, “bien le fun!”
Wow. My French needs a tune-up. What a practical way to improve your French vocabulary! Thanks for the translations.
Well, we were taught Parisian French in school, for one thing (in my day, anyway). For another, Thank God so many English words come from French! But I didn’t do as well as I thought I was doing. Well, I haven’t used French for a very long time–I was last in Quebec (Montreal) in 1980, and when I found out how bad I was in French, I stuck to English chains and stayed in the vicinity of McGill! I concluded then that given my lack of French, I would be better off staying in Toronto. I completely respected (and respect) Quebec’s right to its language and culture, but I didn’t think I would be able to do very well, there.
One use I got for what little French I have was when the last T.V. channel to show opera on a regular basis was a French station, and I tried to follow the subtitles in French, with mixed results. Thanks for the language lesson/refresher, Miles! (Use it or lose it, I guess.) Mais, ou est l’oiseaux? (I can see you wincing–no, I don’t have a French language dictionary handy!)
Better you should have asked, “What is the mystery language”?
“où sont les oiseaux”, apparently. Could have been worse–I suppose! Do the birds twitter and tweet in French in Quebec? (They may groan, hearing that one)
I really enjoyed your post, by the way!