Say this when you expect to see the person again in the near future. See you later! See you tomorrow! Have a nice day! Introducing yourself and others It is not enough to greet people and ask how they are; you also need to introduce yourself and find out what their names are. The purpose of this section is to help you do just that. In French, when you want to say My name is. The following table shows all the forms of appeler in the present tense. Refer to Chapter 2 for general information on French verbs.
My name is. If you want to know who that person over there is, you ask Qui est-ce? Who is that? That is. To introduce someone, you say any of the following:. Let me introduce. Here is. In either case, the meaning is the same: Delighted! Of course, on the playground or at a gathering of young people, you may hear these expressions instead:. Et lui, qui est-ce? And who is he? And who is she? Track 2. My name is Marc Sauval.
Claire: Ah, monsieur Sauval. Je suis Claire Rivet. Ah, Mr. I am Claire Rivet. Delighted to meet you! Mrs Rivet, let me introduce you to my wife, Christine. You may want to ask, for example, whether the bistro around the corner is good, whether the banks are open on Mondays, or whether the train is running on schedule. And what about asking how someone is? Well, you can ask all these questions simply by following the guidelines explained in the following sections.
Informal and formal ways to ask questions You can form a yes or no question in French in four ways. The first three are very informal, and the last is more formal. This expression takes on the translation of whatever the question is.
The statement Paris est une grande ville pah-ree eht-ewn grahNd veel Paris is a big city becomes Est-ce que Paris est une grande ville? Is Paris a big city? Does he speak French? Using inversion In this method, you switch the places of the verb and the subject pronoun and add a hyphen between them.
Consider these examples:. Tu aimes la musique tew ehm lah mew-zeek You like music becomes Aimes-tu la musique? Do you like music? Formal: Comment allez-vous? How are you? Are you well? Informal: Comment vas-tu? How is it going? Is it going? Of course, others may well want to know how you are. In those cases, they naturally expect you to reply, albeit without going into lengthy details about. A short phrase will do, such as the following:.
Fine, thank you! I am well, thank you. This is a more formal response. Not bad! Of course, you can also answer negatively. The negative in French has two parts: ne nuh which you place in front of the conjugated verb and pas pah not , which you place after the conjugated verb.
To do so, you simply follow your answer with either the formal Et vous? Both mean And you? As Chapter 2 explains, aller is an irregular verb, which means that the stem is different throughout its conjugation:. To do so, you use the interrogative adverb comment koh-mahN how in the following ways:. Comment est-ce que vous allez? Comment allez-vous? Martin: Bonjour, Madame Leblanc. Hello, Mrs Leblanc. Very well, thank you, and you? Later, after Madame Leblanc has made her purchases, she prepares to leave the store.
Martin: Au revoir, Madame Leblanc. Good-bye, Mrs Leblanc. Have a nice day. Leblanc: Au revoir, monsieur. Good-bye, sir.
Girl: Salut, Michel. Hi, Michel. How are you doing? Boy: Pas mal. Et toi? Not too bad, How about you? His name is Thomas. Girl: Salut, Thomas! Hi, Thomas! Friendly greetings The French touch a lot more than the Anglo- times, and sometimes up to four times! You Saxons do in greeting others. The handshake even see a large amount of cheek-pecking is not restricted to the first meeting between between high school students arriving at school two persons, for example. Instead, most people in the morning!
On a more informal level, their children to you before they are sent to women friends kiss lightly on each cheek when bed. They may tell the children Dites bonsoir they greet each other or say good-bye. Male family members may kiss one Immediately, the little ones might go around the another, too. If you travel to different parts of dinner table giving a kiss to all the guests and France, you may be surprised to discover that expecting a kiss back.
See whether you can put them back where they belong in the dialog below. Now fill in the missing words in this dialog between an elderly woman and a teenage boy with a teenage girl. Elle vient des Etats-Unis. Oh, bonjour Lucy. C ounting and being able to express and understand numbers is an indispensable part of everyday life. One of the most important uses of numbers is to tell time. How else can you keep track of appointments or plan trips?
In this chapter, we show you how to do all of that — use numbers, dates, and time — one step at a time. Fortunately, French numbers follow a pattern, much like numbers in English. Counting up to 20 The following list shows the numbers un uhN one through vingt vaN twenty :. The pronunciation of some numbers changes when the number is fol- lowed by a vowel, a mute h check out the mute h in Chapter 3 , or a consonant.
The following list explains:. After all, if you want to make a special purchase like an exceptional bottle of wine, for example, it will surely cost more than 20 euros! With what follows, you can handle almost everything number-related.
For numbers 20 through 69 You form the numbers 20 through 69 in French much as you do in English, counting up from each tens number, until you hit the next tens number and then starting over. For example:. Also when another number follows 80, the s in vingt is dropped. If you travel to Switzerland or to Belgium, you may be happy to know that the old — and easier — forms of septante sehp-tahNt 70 and nonante noh- naNt 90 are commonly used instead of the French soixante-dix and quatre- vingt-dix.
Some parts of Switzerland use the forms huitante wee-tahNt or octante ohk-tahNt for For the numbers and up After you hit , counting to a thousand or even hundreds of thousands is a breeze. Just indicate the number of hundreds or thousands and count up as you do in English.
In the preceding list, notice that you drop the s in cents when another number follows it. Finally, un does not precede cent or mille when you say one hundred or one thousand.
Go to Chapter 7 for info on giving and getting directions in French. Also, whereas English uses the superscript th or st or rd to indicate ordinal numbers 5th, for example , in French, the superscript is the letter e: 9e, 4e, and so on.
Table lists the ordinal numbers from first through twentieth, but you can go as high as you like. Here are the rules for forming ordinal numbers:. Table Ordinal Numbers, from 1er through 20e Abbrev. French Pronunciation Abbrev. Approximating quantities Sometimes you want to approximate the numbers instead of being very exact. You can do the same in French by adding the suffix —aine ehn to the cardinal numbers.
Je voudrais une dizaine de croissants. I would like about 10 croissants. There are about 20 students in the class. Using the Calendar and Dates France, the United States, and many other countries around the world use a similar calendar, one that has seven days and twelve months.
Yet countries differ in how the date is presented. In English, the month comes first, followed by the day of the month, followed by the year. In French, the day of the month comes first, followed by the month, followed by the year.
Imagine how funny or embar- rassing it would be if you were invited to an important event on and you showed up on August 5, ! Even though a week has seven days, the French refer to a week as huit jours wee zhoohr 8 days and to two weeks as quinze jours kaNz zhoohr 15 days.
The reason is that if you count from Monday to Monday and you include both Mondays, then you have 8 days, and if you continue counting to the following Monday the third Monday , you have 15 days. Unlike English, the days of the week are not capitalized in French:.
When referring to a particular day, state the day without an article: je travaille samedi zhuh trah-vahy sahm-dee I work [on] Saturday. But if you want to say I work on Saturdays, you have to place the definite article le luh the in front of the day of the week, like this: je travaille le samedi zhuh trah-vahy luh sahm-dee I work on Saturdays.
Placing the definite article le in front of the day s of the week is like adding an s to the day s of the week in English.
Knowing the names of the months Just like the days of the week, the months of the year are not capitalized in French. Here are the months in French:. To say that something is happening in a certain month, you use the preposition en ahN in in front of the month. My birthday is in December. En janvier, je pars pour la Martinique.
In January, I leave for Martinique. Je reviens en avril. I am coming back in April. Setting specific dates When expressing a specific date, use the following construction:. You use this formula to express all dates, except for the first of the month, when you use the ordinal number.
Here are a couple of examples:. The following are some important dates in some French-speaking countries:. Remembering the seasons The seasons in French are masculine and, unlike in English, require the definite article:. Juliette: Ma soeur va se marier au printemps. My sister is getting married in the spring. Corinne: Ah oui. Quand exactement? Oh yes. When exactly? Juliette: Le 6 avril.
April 6. What day is it? What time is the ceremony? At a. How many people did you invite? Juliette: Une centaine de personnes. About a hundred people. Words to Know ma soeur mah suhr my sister. Quand kahN-tehg-zah-ktuh-mahN When exactly? Quel jour? What time is. Telling Time in French One of the most important and frequent uses of numbers is, of course, to tell time.
The French use both the familiar hour clock and the official hour clock to tell time. Il est huit heures. Il est neuf heures. Il est une heure. Therefore, you need a way to indicate time past and before the hour, too.
To indicate time past the hour, you can simply follow the phrase il est. To express time before the hour 10 minutes to. Il est huit heures dix. Il est huit heures moins dix. For example: Il est neuf heures et quart. For example: Il est huit heures et demie. For example: Il est neuf heures moins le quart. To distinguish between a.
Il est 10 heures du matin. It is in the morning [a. It is in the evening [p. In North America, we abbreviate time in the hour:minute format: for example, or In France, time is abbreviated differently. Instead of using a colon to separate the hour from the minutes, you use a lowercase h. For example, becomes 11h For example, 10h30 means a. Using the hour routine In Europe, as well as French-speaking Canada, the use of the hour clock, or military time, is very common.
So is p. To say what time it is in the hour system, simply add the number of minutes to the hour. Il est 11h15 [onze heures quinze]. Il est 16h10 [seize heures dix]. Track 3. Pierre: Claire, quelle heure est-il? Claire, what time is it? Claire: Il est 10h10 dix heures dix.
Pierre: Il est 10h10 dix heures dix? Claire: Oui, nous sommes en retard. Pierre: Oh non! Oh no! Hurry up! Words to Know Il est. Quelle heure est-il? What time is it? In hour format In hour format A.
Just try counting the number of times a day you mention your home and family to your coworkers or friends. The same is true of people everywhere, which is why these topics are often the first you tackle when you learn a new language.
Most of the time, these verbs are interchangeable, but habiter refers to space, whereas vivre refers to time as well as space. But when you talk about where you live, you use the verb habiter, as these examples show:.
I live in a house. I live in an apartment. Nous habitons en banlieue. We live in the suburbs. Vivre is an irregular verb, so when you talk about space, stick to habiter for now because it is regular and easy to use.
Regardless of whether you live in a private house or an apartment, various rooms have a special and particular function. The following sections introduce the basic rooms of a house or apartment and list the furniture and appliances each may contain.
In France, the stories of a house or an apartment are counted differently than in the United States. The French also use the Anglicism le living luh lee-veeng. Not only is it the place to prepare and eat home cooked meals, but it is also the place where family and friends gather to discuss their day, to make plans for the weekend, or to talk about the weather. Here is a list of what you may find in a typical kitchen:. In France, the kitchen is not usually counted as part of the rooms of the house.
Here is a list of some of the things you may find in a bedroom:. La salle de bains literally means bathroom, or a place to bathe. It does not necessarily have a toilet. If you are looking for the restroom, be sure to ask for either les toilettes or les W. Here are some things commonly found in la salle de bains:. You also often find un bidet uhN bee-deh a bidet in French bathrooms.
She has posted an ad and found another student who is interested in sharing the apartment. The two meet to discuss the situation. Track 4. Where do you live now? I live in the suburbs, but I would like to be closer to the university. Where is the apartment located? The apartment is in the 5th district, near the Sorbonne. How many rooms are there? There are three rooms: a living room, two bedrooms and the kitchen. Is the apartment furnished?
Yes, there is a sofa, a chair, a coffee table and a television in the living room and a bed, an armoire, and a nightstand in the bedroom. Is the kitchen equipped? Yes, there is a fridge, a stove, and a microwave. How much is the rent? Suzanne: euros par mois. Words to Know la banlieue lah bahN-lyuh the suburbs. Whatever the meaning, however, the verb is always in the third person singular: a.
Discussing Daily Routine with Reflexive Verbs A reflexive verb is one where the subject performs the action on itself. For example, in the English sentence I cut myself, the subject I is performing an action cut and the receiver of that action is myself, which refers back to the subject.
Reflexive verbs are much more common in French than they are in English. In particular, you use them when you want to describe what you do in the morning to get yourself ready for the day.
Reflexive verbs are regular verbs check out Chapter 2 for the conjugation of regular verbs , except that they have an added pronoun — the reflexive pronoun — before the verb. In the infinitive form, the sign of a reflexive verb is the pronoun se suh , which means oneself, but can also mean myself, yourself, and so on, depending on the pronoun in the conjugation.
After you wake up, you have to get out of bed. In French, you use the reflexive verb se lever suh luh-vey to get up. The accent grave on the e makes it sound like eh rather than uh without the accent.
Here is the conjugation of se lever:. For example, you can say. Il se douche. He takes a shower. Nous nous brossons les dents. We brush our teeth. She is getting dressed. Appendix B has verb tables you can use for easy reference. The following sections explain the proper term and the kinds of foods eaten during a typical meal in France.
Of course, not all meals are eaten at home. You can find information about dining out in Chapter 8. The traditional French breakfast is usually made up of the following:. You can also get les tartines ley tahr-teen slices of bread with some kind of spread , like le beurre luh buhr butter or la confiture lah kohN-fee-tewr jam. A traditional French breakfast may include pastries like le pain au chocolat luh paN oh shoh-koh-lah a chocolate croissant , le chausson aux pommes luh shoh-sohN oh pohhm applesauce-filled danish , or le pain aux raisins luh paN oh reh-zaN raisin bread.
Common lunch items include. Dinner time! As in North America, the biggest meal of the day in most French homes nowadays is dinner. French families usually eat dinner around or p. The French are more formal when sitting down to dinner, and even on a weekday, the dinner consists of at least an appetizer, a main dish, and a cheese platter. Le plat principal is usually followed by a salad, a cheese platter, and a dessert.
Setting the table If you take the trouble to plan and prepare a home-cooked meal, you want to sit down at a properly set table so that you can enjoy it. Check out the conjugation of the verb mettre:. For example, you can say ils mettent le couvert eel meht luh kooh-vehr they are setting the table.
And just what do you set on the table? These items:. The verb manger is a regular —er verb except for the first person plural nous form.
Chapter 2 shows you how to conjugate regular verbs. Check out the conjugation:. Although manger is a regular —er verb, boire is another matter. The following table shows you how to conjugate this irregular verb:. We eat vegetables every day. I drink coffee in the morning. Following are a couple of examples:. For breakfast, I have bread and jam. Faire is an irregular verb refer to Chapter 2 for more on irregular verbs.
Faire is a handy verb because you use it in many expressions. You also use it when talking about the weather Chapter 6 , travel Chapter 13 , and other things. Here is a list of household chores and errands that you use faire with:. Check out the conjugation of the regular verbs in Chapter 2. Another regular verb associated with cleaning is the verb ranger rahN-zhey to arrange, to straighten up, to tidy up : Je range ma chambre zhuh rahNzh mah shahN-bruh I tidy up my room.
The ultimate verb for to clean in French is nettoyer neh-twah-yey. This is a stem-changing verb because, although the endings are regular, like those of parler, the y changes to an i in all forms except for the nous nooh we and vous vooh you forms. Check out its conjugation:. For example, you can say, Je nettoie la salle de bains zhuh neh-twah lah sahl duh baN I am cleaning the bathroom.
Instead, the subject — you — is understood. Table shows examples of —er, —ir and —re verbs in the imperative form. Notice that you drop the final s of the tu form of all —er verbs in the command form. For example, tu parles tew pahrl you speak becomes parle pahrl speak. This is not the case for —ir or —re verbs. You stay here. Stay here! You frahN-seh! Speak French! Mangeons des frites! You finish your milk. Finish your milk! You are doing veh-sehl! Do the dishes! You are sey dey!
Choose a CD! You give back vruh! Give back the books! Ne fais pas la cuisine, sortons! Morrissette, for dinner. Madame Seiffert is talking to her two teenage children, Charles and Josephine, to organize the work to be done. Help me clean the house. Charles: Pourquoi, maman? Why, Mom? Morrissette is coming to dinner this evening. Charles, clean up the living room.
Josephine, do the dishes. Charles, vaccuum the living room. Josephine, clean the bathroom and the toilet. And what else, Mama? You two Set the table. Charles: Et toi maman, fais la cuisine. And you, Mom, cook! No matter where you go, one of the topics of conversation is about family. People may ask you whether you have brothers and sisters, grandparents, cousins, children, and so on.
Of course, many families go beyond immediate family members to include the extended family. When you talk about aunts, uncles, grandparents, and others beyond mom and dad and brother and sister, use these words:. When you talk about your family members, you undoubtedly have to use possessive adjectives, like my, our, your, and so on.
You use possessive adjectives the same way in French as you do in English. Because the possessive adjective agrees with the noun and not with the person, there is no difference between the French words for his and her.
Table lists the possessive adjectives. In English, you can refer to a whole family by making the last name plural: the Millers or the Whites, for example. So Monsieur et Madame Texier muh-syuh ey mah-dahm tehk- syey Mr. Texier are Les Texier ley tehk-syey. These examples use the feminine, singular noun la soeur:. Finally, here are some examples using the plural noun les grands-parents:. Although you should remember that you use mon mohN for the masculine version of my and ma mah for the feminine, there is an exception: When a feminine singular noun begins with a vowel or a mute h, you use the mas- culine singular possessive adjective mon, ton, or son.
Take the masculine singular word ami ah-mee friend and the feminine singular amie ah-mee friend , for example. To say my friend, regardless whether that friend is male or female, you use mon for both the masculine and the feminine form — mon ami and mon amie — because the word amie starts with a vowel. Whenever a word starts with a vowel or a mute h in French, an alarm should go off in your head, alerting you that funny things may be happening.
This is one of them. Check out Chapters 2 and 3 for more on nouns that start with a vowel or mute h. W e present French in the context of daily life. We show you how to ask key questions, keep up in casual conversations, order in a French restaurant, request assistance and identify items you want while shopping, ask for directions, make plans for nights out, communicate with coworkers, and much, much more.
Although it can lead to more serious discussions, small talk generally deals with innocent subjects such as what you do for a living, your likes and dislikes, the weather, and so on. Basic Questions and Polite Expressions As Chapter 3 explains, you can ask a yes-or-no question in French in numerous ways: make your voice rise at the end of a sentence, place est-ce que ehs-kuh in front of the sentence, or invert the subject and the verb.
When you make small talk, however, you want to ask questions that elicit more than a yes-or-no answer. Using key question words To get specific information, you need to know these key question words:. You can use these question words on their own, just as in English, or you can use them in sentences. Qui est-ce? Who is it? Comment vous appelez-vous? Where do you live? How old are you? Saying please, thank you, and excuse me, as well as a few other universal phrases, mark you as a considerate person and one worth getting to know.
So use these following expressions liberally:. Excuse me. I am sorry. You are welcome. Je ne comprends pas. Je ne sais pas. Can you speak more slowly, please? Can you repeat, please? One moment, please. Exhausted, she collapses in her seat and is about to fall asleep when a young man addresses her.
Track 5. What is your seat number? Amanda: Je ne sais pas. After Amanda moves to her assigned seat, their conversation continues. Zhuh-mah-pehl pah-treek, ey vooh? My name is Patrick, and you? Delighted sir. My name is Amanda. Where are you going? I am going to Nice first, then to Toulon to see my daughter. Patrick: Vous venez souvent en France? Do you often come to France? Oh yes, I love France. Patrick: Combien de temps restez-vous en France? How long are you staying in France?
Amanda: Un mois. A month. And you, why are you going to Nice? Patrick: Pour le travail. For work. To use them correctly, remember these rules:. Notice that it can have slightly different meanings depending on the context. Stating Your Preferences One of the ways in which you get to know someone or they get to know you is by expressing likes and dislikes.
When you say in French that you like to travel, that you hate waiting in line, or even that you love a certain film, you use verbs of preference. These verbs include. To say that you like or hate something in French, you use the definite article the — le luh , la lah , and les ley — even though the article may not be necessary in English.
Check out these examples:. I like coffee with milk. We prefer foreign films. They hate noise. For example, Je suis professeur zhuh swee proh-feh-suhr means I am a teacher, professor.
Although not exhaustive by any means, this list includes many common occupations. Notice that some professions have only one form for the masculine and the feminine. As a rule, nouns and adjectives that end with an e, for example — dentiste — are the same regardless of gender. Check out Chapter 2 for more on the transformation of nouns and adjectives.
Some professions on the preceding list do not have a feminine form because the gender designation is a remnant of the sexist days when certain professions were mostly filled by men, which is no longer the case in the 21st century. What is your profession?
What do you do for a living? What company do you work for? Voyagez-vous souvent pour votre travail? Your profession is interesting. Where do you work? My office is in Paris, but I often go to Nice on business trips. Patrick: Je suis informaticien. I am a computer scientist. I work for a computer science company. Is it a large company? No, it is very small. There are only ten employees. Chatting about the Weather Another great topic for small talk is, of course, le temps luh tahN the weather.
As a matter of fact, one way to designate small talk in French is with the phrase parler de la pluie et du beau temps pahr-ley duh lah plwee ey dew boh tahN Literally: to talk about the rain and the nice weather.
In countries of great weather contrasts, like Canada, weather is a constant topic of conversa- tion. Under more temperate climates, like that of France, the weather is still a favorite topic, especially if you want to complain about it.
Check out Chapter 4 for more details on the seasons. You can also ask about the weather with the question Quel temps fait-il? To answer this question, you use Il fait. Throughout the world, the temperature is not stated in Fahrenheit but in Celsius centigrades. Notice that all the weather phrases start with il.
Track 6. In Nice, the weather is nice and warm, and the temperature is 30 degrees. Patrick: A Nice, il fait toujours beau! In Nice, the weather is always nice! Even in winter? Patrick: En hiver, il pleut un peu, mais il fait doux. In winter, it rains a little, but it is mild. And in New York? In winter, it is very cold and it snows, and in summer, it is very hot and humid. Patrick: Et au printemps et en automne?
What about spring and fall? The weather is pleasant. In every language, the weather is the source of many proverbs.
Here is one of those French proverbs: Une hirondelle ne fait pas le printemps ew-nee- rohN-dehl nuh feh pah luh praN-tahN One swallow does not make the spring. Deciding to Keep in Touch As you get to know your new acquaintances better, you may want to exchange addresses or phone numbers.
To trade contact information, you can use these phrases:. What is your address? Give me your phone number. In this day and age, you are likely to want and give an e-mail address. In France, each time you make a call, even locally, you have to dial the two-digit area code which begins with a zero, like 01 or 02 followed by eight numbers that are stated in groups of two 04 94 37 08 56, for example. To call a French number from the United States, dial , the code for France 33 and then the number directly, skipping the 0 of the area code 33 4 94 37 08 56, for example.
Now, identify the weather conditions shown in these images, using the provided word bank. W hen you set out for a trip, you probably have a pretty good idea of all the things you want to do and the places you want to see. In those situations, you need to know how to ask for directions. Where do you go for the phrases and questions that let you get to where you want to be? Right here. Where is the Louvre? Where is the Victor Hugo Square?
Where is the bathroom? But, as mentioned previously, another verb, se trouver, is also very fre- quently used to ask where questions:. Where is the Louvre [located]? As all the preceding examples show, where questions follow this construction:. Where is this bus going? Where does this road lead? To the zoo. Where is the concert? In the park. At the museum. I am going to Lille. They are in Montreal. The follow- ing list shows these combinations and provides a sample sentence using that construction:.
Sylvie is going to the museum. Guy wants to go to the cathedral. The Martins go to St. Go to the traffic lights! There are the offices! Of course, people are always using expressions that convey the same meaning but with fewer words. Le voici! Where is the museum? Here it is! Where is the university? There it is! Where are the offices?
There they are! And you need to know these other prepositions when someone is giving you directions or when you want to give more specific directions to others.
Here are some example sentences using these prepositions:. The restaurant is between the post office and town hall.
The movie theater is across from the hotel. The bakery is next to the museum. Le Bonjour, monsieur. Je peux vous aider? Zhuh puh vooh-zey-dey? Hello, sir. Can I help you? We want to know where the Cathedral of Notre Dame is.
Is it far from here? We want to walk. Leave the hotel, turn left, and keep going straight ahead. John: Et ensuite? And then? Le Toit de Dinant. Le Cerf Vert. Relax Sax Appartment. Le Cottage mosan. L'Inattendu Appart Dinant Centre. L'Entre ciel et Meuse. La Merveilleuse. Chambres La Belle Vue. Les hauts de Meez. Autrefois chez Lina. Les rives de Sax. Le bord de Meuse. Beautifully renovated farmhouse with an enormous private garden. Riverside Cottage Dinant.
Voisins du kayak. Hotel Aquatel. Stylish Cottage with Fireplace in Dinant Belgium. Fermes du Bonheur. Chez Peponne. Castel de Pont-a-Lesse.
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