I know some of you hate the Twitter with a hot tweety passion, but I wanted to let you know that I’m giving away digital copies of Lessons in French today, courtesy of Sourcebooks Casablanca. So if you’re online, watch for hastag #lif and see what crazy trivia I come up with today.
This week we’ve done French idioms (Faire une carte de France? I better see that in a romance novel REAL soon), animal husbandry, bulls in fiction, and Regency insults and trivia. Oh, and Great Moments in Women’s History, with your host, Napoleon Bonaparte.
But suppose you want a digital copy, and don’t have the Twitter? Can’t use it at work? Aren’t interested? How about we give away a digital copy here? Sure, why not! Leave a comment with your favorite foreign language phrase, and it can be French or any other language, and the translation, and I’ll pick one winner at random to receive a digital copy of Lessons in French. Comments close in 24 hours. Bring on the funky foreign phrases!
LOL A@ Laura. Research purposes 🙂
poser un lapin a quelqu’un: to stand someone up
Je suis un canard.
I am a duck.
My sister asked me how to say this when we were in high school, why I do not know, and it is one of the few phrases I consistently remember.
Illegitimi non carborundum
or “Don’t let the b*stards wear you down.”
Sounds like “Chort vas mee!”, which means “the devil take me” in Russian.
Transliteration of a Family Saying in Ukrainian:
Kapusta Sera Sera!
Bitter Cabbage is Bitter. (Just as meaningful as Que Sera Sera, and much more fun to say.)
Kapusta is both cabbage and sauerkraut.
Si viene esta puerta, te mata. If you come through this door, you will killed. (A sign I saw on a door once, I won’t say where.)
My 2nd choice is roughly paraphrased Ovid. “Sunt certi fines ultra quos virtute inveniri non potest.” There are certain points, beyond which virtue cannot be found.
My family and I used to speak nonsense French at each other while we were learning it in high school. My favourite was always “Je m’appelle pomme de terre.” I am called potato.
Making fun of all the phrases and nouns we had to learn. 😀
Donde queda la biblioteca? Where is the library?
Comme ci, comme ça = Some of this, some of that
It’s very useful. “What did you think of the restaurant?” “Eh, comme ci, comme ça—my steak was a bit tough, but the chocolate-raspberry cheesecake was to die for” or “Did you like the movie? Eh, comme ci, comme ça—the plot was stupid but it did have Johnny Depp in it…” or “How are you feeling today? Comme ci, comme ça—my cold is clearing up, but I’m still a little sniffly.” (Note, in all cases, your hand should be held out in front of you and rocking side to side when you actually say Comme ci, comme ça.)
Ho sento, no parlo Català molt bé.
I tried (with kinda pathetic results) to learn some Catalan while visiting Barcelona. That phrase probably got the most use: “I’m sorry, I don’t speak much Catalan.”
My husband and I took our mother’s to London and Paris a few years ago. My husband speaks German well but no French while I’ve had way too much French to be able to speak as little as I do. He started saying that he only needed to know a few things, like how to tell the waiters to bring him food. I made the mistake of teaching him a few words and 5 years later he still says this phrase all the time:
Viand! Maintenant! Ici! Vite, vite!
Translated as “Meat! Now! Here! Hurry, hurry!”
Sigh. But I have to admit that it does rank right up there with my favorite foreign language phrase of all time.
German: Ich Liebe Dich-I love you
German: Ich Hasse Dich, Dickhead- I hate you dickhead…seems like it’s the same wherever you go huh?
A classic:That’s What She Said, a couple different ways.
French: C’est ce qu’elle dit.
German: Das ist, was sie sagte.
Spanish: Que es lo que dijo.
By far my favorite quirk of the French language is how you say “I miss you”
Tu me manques.
Which literally translates to “You are missing from me.”
It makes my sentimental heart sigh every time.
Cinta ku – that’s Malay for ‘my love’!
I love when french people say, with their typical, elegant supponence, haughtiness
“Jamais couché(e) avec, that means I don’t know him or her ( never bedded him or her).
So far
Take care, every- bitchy- one
Vivienne