Jeudi - Thursday

I’m encouraged: conversation is getting easier… :)

Today I learned something new about the process of acquiring a foreign language: sometimes, altering your personality is a necessary part of the process. It isn’t easy for a shy person to learn French! All of the consonants and vowel sounds, especially those at the ends of words, are essential, and to ensure that native Francophones understand you, you have to pronounce them strongly and deliberately. If they aren’t clear, the native speakers can’t make the necessary distinctions for masculine/feminine and singular/plural words. For that matter, they may not be able to determine which word you’re using at all. So, you just have to swallow your timidity and say it like you mean it. It reminds me of one of my pastor’s favorite quotations from Strunk & White’s The Elements of Style: “If you don't know how to pronounce a word, say it loud! If you don't know how to pronounce a word, say it loud!”  

I think that this compulsory confidence just might be a good thing…because I’m with Will Strunk: it’s better to be wrong than irresolute.

In other news, I think I’ve found my new favorite place to go in Vieux-Québec: Le Marché de Vieux-Port. It’s like a farmer’s market on crack. Seriously, the variety of vendors was amazing. You could find just about anything you wanted there: saucisses (sausages), fresh bread, crepes, glass and amber jewelry, alpaca wool clothing, goat’s milk bath products, locally produced honey, chocolates, cheeses, meats, fresh seafood, fresh flowers, more types of fruits and vegetables than you could imagine (blueberries & raspberries, especially), canned jellies and preserves, cranberries and cranberry products, and lots and lots of maple syrup and maple butter. And then there were the wineries. Tell me: how many Arkansas farmers’ markets have winery stands where you can taste whatever you like? Porto rose, cidre glacée, mistelles, liqueurs, and plum wine, strawberry wine, raspberry wine, black currant wine, maple syrup wine, and even saskatoonberry wine…I’m sure I tasted about 15 different kinds. And then there was the exotic import store, with gourmet teas, spices, oils, nuts, grains, and confections from all over the world. Their spice collection was stored on a wall that looked like a huge card catalog. I haven’t seen anything like it.

Me and the spice wall.  I was impressed.  Can you tell?

Me and Megan by the cranberry stand

Oddly enough, that was where the animateurs took us for our final obligatory excursion. We took the bus to the Vieux-Port area, and after walking in the rain for ten minutes to get to the market, we were all rather soggy. But, I didn’t mind once I saw what was inside. Our assignment was rather simple: to gather responses to a list of questions they gave us. Each one corresponded to a specific vendor, so all we had to do was find the right stand and pose the question. By the time my team made it around to most of the vendors, they were already familiar with what we were going to ask, so it wasn’t difficult at all. When we had all finished, the animateurs left us at liberty to do whatever we wanted, and Megan and I decided to stay and explore the rest of the market. I didn’t have any cash on me, so I didn’t purchase anything, but I took good mental notes of what I wanted to return for. We even found several vendors who were willing to speak French with us. The two that I thought were the most friendly and the easiest to practice with were the women at the amber jewelry and cassis wine booths. The woman selling the jewelry was from Brazil, so she spoke French with a bit of a Portuguese accent. It turns out that her husband is Polish, so Megan and I discussed our Polish heritage with her for a few minutes. We learned that the Polish alphabet is pretty much impossible…so I don’t think that language is going at the top of my list of languages to learn.

Yay, the gummy bear kid!

Wow...

Oh, btw, it’s funny to watch the native francophones try to figure out our idioms and word-plays. David was wearing a shirt that said, “Practice safe lunch. Use a condiment!” It took the animateurs the entire bus ride to figure it out.

Speaking of the bus ride, Megan and I both made an interesting discovery as we were conversing in French on the bus: we’re both Trekkies. She grew up watching TNG with her grandfather, just like I grew up watching TNG with my mom. Don’t ask me how, but I seem to attract these kindred spirits. We also spent a lot of time discussing tattoos, make-up, and difficult vocabulary. For instance, “to realize.” Do you know how complicated it is in French to say, “I didn’t realize that.”? Seriously! “Je ne m’en suis pas rendue compte.” Juh nuh mon sweep ah rondoo compt. :P I think I’ll figure out another way to say the same thing. I’m sure the rest of the people on the bus found our little practice session entertaining though. I mean, how funny would it be if we heard someone on a bus in Arkansas saying, “I didn’t realize that! I realized that! I realize that. No, I didn’t realize that! I didn’t realize that!” It’s like the story Nick told me the other day about his experience in a restaurant with some of his friends. They were conversing in French, and naturally, the other people in the restaurant could overhear parts of their conversation. One of the girls started to tell a story about a monkey, but she couldn’t remember the word for monkey in French. So, the other students started trying to remember it. “Singe? Songe? No no, I think it’s singe. Oui, c’est ca. Singe, singe!” Imagine if you were sitting in the restaurant, and all of a sudden you hear, “Monkey! Monkey! Yeah, I think so. Monkey monkey monkey!” That cracked me up.

Just for the record, I’ve decided that I could easily live on French food. Give me some bread, cheese, wine, and chocolate, and I’m good.