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Post by chicchantal on Jul 18, 2008 15:11:50 GMT -5
I was eight. I learned it till it was 23 and then had a hiatus. But I'm sort of trying to pick it up again a bit more now, I catch myself reading books in French and writing all the new vocab in the back, so I can look it up. Does anyone else do this?
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Post by Jody on Jul 18, 2008 15:40:34 GMT -5
I don't remember how old I was but it was in 7th grade and I continued until I graduated high school, 6 years total. I can read much better than I can speak. I'm very self-conscious of accents.
Even worse was taking Latin from a sister who was Castilian Spanish and spoke with the characteristic lisp. My Latin is terrible!
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Post by luckyluc on Jul 18, 2008 15:50:59 GMT -5
Well since my mother use to sing ALL the time, I would said since Day 1.
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Post by framboiseetrose on Jul 18, 2008 16:04:51 GMT -5
I was 16 when I studied it for a year. My teacher was an older French lady whose chin shook whenever she gave a lecture. She was always catching me talking when I tried to answer somebody's question. It only lasted a year. Picked it up again in the late 70s when I was more serious but I still have this odd accent which I'm afraid will never go away..............
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Post by Becky (Berkeleytravelers) on Jul 18, 2008 16:42:27 GMT -5
I must have been 13 or 14, as I was in my first year of highschool.
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Post by Shoesy on Jul 18, 2008 17:19:26 GMT -5
I was in ninth grade, and that was many moons ago.
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Post by annettecinca on Jul 18, 2008 18:32:11 GMT -5
I learned my first French words when I was 10, from a cousin who lived in France for a few years...then no more until I hit 40 and fell in love with Paris Looking back, I wish I'd taken it in high school
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Post by Shoesy on Jul 18, 2008 22:54:36 GMT -5
Annette - When I think about certain subjects that I learned in high school, I sadly ask myself why I even bothered because I remember nothing at all. That is especially true of math subjects. Honestly, the only math I remember is what I learned in elementary school..........up to 4th grade to be exact. I remember loving my French classes, though I never felt completely comfortable conversing. However, I was able to comprehend what I was reading on a level that I found satisfactory at the time. Now I can barely put a few words together to make a sentence, except for some very common expressions of course.
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Post by annettecinca on Jul 18, 2008 23:43:59 GMT -5
True Shoesy, you make a good point! I don't remember much of what I learned in high school either (Shorthand, for example!). But I bet some of what you learned in school is lurking in the recesses of your brain somewhere just waiting to be let out!
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Post by Sarastro on Jul 27, 2008 21:30:53 GMT -5
My 4th grade teacher, Mdm. Kannah, tried to teach her class French. While I did indeed learn some basic French, she also taught us how to write music as well as to sing several songs in French. One song had been lodged in my mind for 30 years. I learned the lyric phonetically. One day about 15 or so years ago I was driving from Tours to Paris and decided to take the old roads. I remember the first line of the old song:
Orléans, Beauchancy, Notre Dame de Paris, Ven dome.
On the old N route, I first noticed a sign for the cathedral de Beaugency, south of Orléans. Certainly the old song was really:
Orléans, Beaugency, Nortre Dame de Paris Ven Dome.
I had been singing what I remember from my youth of this song to French friends for years and no one had ever heard it before; or maybe I had not really remembered it correctly from when I last heard it at 10 years of age.
Continuing northward and soon thereafter, I saw a sign for the old cathedral at Cléry, Notre Dame de Cléry. I had obviously mentally changed this to Notre Dame de Paris. Now the lyric were once again corrected:
Orléans, Beaugency, Notre Dame de Cléry Von Dome.
It was not long until I drove past Vendome and noticed a sign for the old church. Clearly what I had remembered and had been singing to myself for many, many years was more accurately:
Orléans, Beaugency, Notre Dame de Cléry, Vendome
A short melody, the lyric of which described the primary cathedrals and churches around the city of Orléans.
About this time I had made friends with a woman who had grown up in Orléans. I mustered the courage to sing to her asking if she had heard the song I had learned as a youth nearly 4 decades earlier.
Of course she said, it's taught in all of the schools where she had been raised. It's a short melody about the most cherished churches in the Orléans area.
Imagine how overwhelming this information was - the haunting mystery had now been resolved. Through the years, I had altered the words somewhat but the melody I had remembered precisely.
I had questioned my recollection many times during this period but was very pleased to have now an accurate account of both the music and origin of the song.
Unfortunately, Mdm Kennah died before I was able to properly thank her for her influence on a young 10 year old boy. She had given me the gift of appreciating the French culture and language and the seeds she planted continue to grow and flourish as I return year after year to France.
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Post by ouiparis on Jul 27, 2008 22:42:04 GMT -5
30.
Sarastro, thanks for sharing this lovely story.
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Post by Anne on Jul 27, 2008 23:44:27 GMT -5
Sarastro, this lovely song is is a very famous Middle-Ages one, it is called "Le Carillon de Vendôme" :
Mes amis, que reste-t-il A ce Dauphin si gentil ? Orléans, Beaugency, Notre-Dame de Cléry, Vendôme, Vendôme !
Les ennemis ont tout pris Ne lui laissant par mépris Qu'Orléans, Beaugency, Notre-Dame de Cléry, Vendôme, Vendôme !
It is about future king (Dauphin) Charles VII during the 100-years War : before Jeanne d'Arc came in, the only towns that he still owned were Bourges, where he had what was left of his Cour, plus the above-mentionned ones .
Last time we were in the Loire Valley area, I wanted to stop and visit Vendôme just because I had loved this song as a child .
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Post by Sarastro on Jul 28, 2008 0:15:32 GMT -5
Thanks Anne,
I should have been singing to you all of these years.
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Post by Megan on Jul 28, 2008 2:20:11 GMT -5
I was 12 - in my first year of High School. Our teacher was Mr Martin who regularly declared that it was far too hot for lessons and would spend most of the lessons sitting at his desk smoking !!! In hindsight he was a raging alcoholic but we thought it was wonderful as we got off lessons. We were also the only French class in the whole school so there was a range of acadmemic levels - I remember Carolyn Wong getting 103% in an exam once ( How do you get 103%) Needless to say I spent most of the two years with him laughing and talking with my mates down the back of the class and not taking a word in. Something I now regret as my French is shocking and i have absolutely no confidence in speaking it so will go out of my way to avoid it past Bonjour, Merci, Au revoir ( mind you if Sebastien Chabal decided he wanted to start up a conversation I certainly would find it in me to at least attempt a bit more !) I am there for 5 weeks over Christmas and am filled with silent dread as to how i will manage . You know that accent at the end of Paris Je'Taime - well I think it was modelled on mine - and if any of you know what the Kiwi Twang is like ( no vowel sounds at all ) it is truly something awful to listen too and has the ability to have a Frenchman in tears with the massacre of the language . However I do remember his love of France and a lot of the time he used to spend the whole three hours a week that we had telling us about the joys of France and I made up my mind then that as soon as I could I would get there - 5 trips later I know exactly what he meant
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Post by afds on Jul 28, 2008 4:26:46 GMT -5
20, did a couple of years at the local Alliance Francaise and wasn't too bad at it. Then I had to learn Italian during my first posting in Rome, and it totally wiped out my French, because they are very similar languages but Italian is much easier since the pronunciation is phonetic. And the moral of that is...I have a lazy brain
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Post by Megan on Jul 28, 2008 4:35:38 GMT -5
AFDS
I agree with you re Italian - after my dismal performance at French I did a couple of summer papers of Italian at University and although I am nowhere near fluent or even semi fluent I found it a lot easier as it is phonetic. I guess I am just not good at languages - and my brain is less than lazy !!!
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Post by Jody on Jul 28, 2008 4:43:49 GMT -5
Isn't it funny how the songs we learned in French class as children roam around in our heads. Christmas to me always brings Un flambeau, Jeanette Isabella to mind. It remains to this day my favorite carol. I know every child who ever took a French class can still sing Frere jacques!
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Post by afds on Jul 28, 2008 5:38:55 GMT -5
And sur le pont d'Avignon...
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Post by Happygoin on Jul 28, 2008 6:43:45 GMT -5
OMG!!! Demarais! I started French lessons in the 4th grade. My 4th grade French teacher, Miss Sloan, taught us Un Flambeau Jeannette Isabelle! I've been torturing my friends annually with my horrid, off-key rendition, all in French of course. I loved Sarastro's story, because like him, I know I'm singing half of the words wrong, but don't know what the right ones are. (I also loved Sarastro's story because I've always regretted not thanking several of my teachers for various inspirations before they passed on) I took French from 4th to 12th grade...surprising that it's not better than it is
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Post by Shoesy on Jul 28, 2008 6:48:45 GMT -5
Happy - How was it that you got to start learning a second language when you were in 4th grade? I realize that you're quite a bit younger than I am , but it seems like your school system was MUCH better than mine.
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