The first few months after we moved to Geneva passed in a confused flurry of school runs, digging out essential items from the bottom of endless boxes, and getting lost with the help of my GPS car navigator. These pressing priorities, as well as the fact that no nursery would take my 6-month-old baby, meant that I couldn't join any formal French courses. Therefore, I decided would “learn by doing”, immersing myself fully in the turmoil of real life, picking up fluency as I confidently went about my daily routine: toddler and baby music classes, supermarket trips, post office errands etc.
The results were indeed tangible, if somehow patchy. Within a few weeks I could sing “Les Petits Poissons” faultlessly, name at least 20 different types of French and Swiss cheese and count to 30. Unfortunately, I soon realised it was impossible to put all this newly acquired linguistic knowledge to any practical use within a coherent adult interaction.
There was no escaping the more traditional route, and so I nervously picked up the courage to enrol in a French course at my local community college. Niveau debutant, mais oui. Mixed feelings thudded within my chest as I walked through the glass doors of the building for my first lesson: excitement, fear – and dismay, when I found myself surrounded by hundreds of boisterous teenagers. Is this what it would feel like to go back in time for a chance to re-live your teenage years with the benefit of 25 years of hindsight? What an epiphany, when your life starts imitating corny comedy movies!
I opened the door to classroom 310 with some trepidation. The first fellow student I glimpsed was a Thai Buddhist monk clad in orange, sitting in the front row and smiling serenely at everyone who came through the door. I took this to be a good sign, however unexpected it might have been, thinking that if I failed to become fully fluent I could still give nirvana a shot.
This was how I began to fall in love with this beautiful, albeit impossible-to-spell language. Unfortunately, the feeling was not exactly reciprocated, but this has never stopped a girl giving her heart away with abandon. How could I resist the elegance of a language that makes everything sound more gracious and slightly more mischievous than it actually is? A linguistic paradise where ladies cannot possibly have a moustache, but only a little “duvet” on their upper lip. Or where the word “essence” is used for petrol when there is certainly nothing pleasant or appealing about its smell.
When we first arrived in Geneva and I was contacted for various “rendez-vous”, my foolish vain self was convinced my feminine charms had travelled well across borders. Another revelation was the use of the word belle-mère for mother-in-law. I had been trying to coin a fitting definition for my mother-in-law for years, but certainly was never gracious enough to think of her as a “beautiful mother”. I admit I soon started to nurture a niggling doubt as to whether this sophisticated language is really too elegant to tell or just supremely sarcastic.
But I know that not all hope is lost, even for a recalcitrant mature learner like me. Even when most things seem too difficult to pronounce and fluency an unobtainable goal, I just need to look out of the window of our classroom, which faces the glimmering white peaks engraved against the luminous blue sky, to feel my chin and spirits lifting. After all, as our wonderfully encouraging teacher Anne-Lise says, almost 60 per cent of French words are the same as in English. So when you are stuck, why not try to pronounce the English word you know with a French accent?
(This article was originally published on the 2009 May/June issue of the Geneva Times)
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