Suggestions and complaints

[Moo2]

I take my hat off to anyone who can speak another language let alone write in it! And what are a few spelling mistakes amongst friends?

[Bedlam]

"like"

[johnro]

Frozzie your comments put truth to our thoughts when travelling through France last year, we found people in the south of France more willing to provide help with directions etc than those in the Nth (in fact rude comes to mind!!!!)  We put it down to my knowledge of the French language just didn't cut it despite studying it for 5 years!!!!

[Frozzie]

robyn the north of france is very rural and alot of small villages and its very cold and flat so doesnt attract alot of tourists or even 'outsiders' wanting to live there so they arent as welcoming...in the six years I lived up there they kept wondering why an australian lived there...ie what on earth would I want to live there and even DH was called the parisien ..if you arent of several generations you were considered a stranger so that gives you an idea....they are nice enough people but its the same as small country towns, ie very clicky and not that accepting of outsiders..so I can see as actual tourists not getting the warmest of welcomes but it wouldnt be personal its mainly due to a lack of understanding and general fear...i worked in a bank for a while and alot of the clients would freak out about my accent and make out I was speaking another language even though I spoke quite well at that stage...I have found in my experience that people who dont travel alot and dont come in contact with foreigners on a regular enough basis have a very negative image of them and are often the harshest judges...i put it down to ignorance and let them go on their way...even today I speak the language fluenty and write very well as well and I still get the odd idiot, also kids often make comment but to them I just explain that I wasnt born in France and my language when I was little was not the same as theirs and the penny drops and they get all curious...not at all the same beast as ignorant adults but unfortunately every country has them...tahts just life!  No point wasting time worrying about them 

[nola276]

I don't know if this has been suggested before, but it would be great if there was a special thread for "Meals For Two".  I always seem to have so much food over.

[nazar]

frozzie how long you been in france ?

sounds like you been there a while and if you dont mind me asking why did you move there?
 do your children speak engish and french  sorry l not shore how old they are
 
 my friend has a german born  husband and  ozzie born  mum and she wishes her husband spoke more german to there kids when they were younger as they are in high school now and only speak engish but had wished dad spoke german to them 

[tarasis]

I know I'm not Frozzie, but we did that. I have spoken English to the kids since day one and my wife has spoken German to them (though she is English) and they both speak both languages; though they started speaking a but later than other kids. My son, 6, happily interchanges between the two depending on who he is talking too and indeed translates for me when I need it (more often than I like).

Both kids have gaps in their English and swap to German for those bits (at least when talking to me). It's quite incredible to watch.

[nazar]

 l bet it would be incredble to watch
 where were you born tarisis
its great that the kids speak both  different langages
and what brought you to  germany now
l just wonder there no reason for it

[cookie1]

Nola a lot of us have that problem and our freezers eat well. I usually half most recipes or similar. eg if it is a pasta dish I'll make all the sauce but reduce the amount of pasta to 200g as that is enough for 3. DD lives at home while she is saving for her house.
Other meals I halve the entire thing and yet others I cook the full amount and put half in the freezer.

[Frozzie]

frozzie how long you been in france ?

sounds like you been there a while and if you dont mind me asking why did you move there?
 do your children speak engish and french  sorry l not shore how old they are
 
 my friend has a german born  husband and  ozzie born  mum and she wishes her husband spoke more german to there kids when they were younger as they are in high school now and only speak engish but had wished dad spoke german to them  

nazar i have been living over ehre for 11 years now and i moved here because of DH (he is french and his career etc was in france so i thought why not)...basically ti was so much easier for me to live in France than to live in oz...plus DHs englihs wasnt at the level it is today workwise so i think he would have had some trouble with his career had we gone to oz first off..

my kids are DS 6 and DD 3..DS speaks both languages but DD mixes them and speaks franglais lol or frenglish..which DS did too when he first started school.apprently its quite normal particularly when they have such strong roots here ie family etc who are french and me being the only foreign influence in their daily life but ina year or two DD will be like DS and speak both languages athough when we travel DS still doesnt understand why some people dont understand either french or english lol...i think its because here between his class mates he is quite special speaking two languages lol but has no idea how mnay languages there are out there..he is only 6 so he has time to come across the many languages of the world!

i think its such a gift to take advantage of a situation of living with two cultures..we always have spoken both languages to the kids...DH speaks to the kids in frenchy unless i find they are slacking off in english then he speaks to them in englsh and i speak english to them unle"ss we are with company who dont speak english which can be often as it just gets too many questions and you end up just translating everything..probably not the best idea but hey i dont have rellies just across the channel who can visit when they like to influence the kids language speaking.. Im very proud of DS as he speaks english to me and I have been trying to get him to continue speaking english french oops to his sister as well... she insists on speaking french..its hard for kids when young who go to school and speak a foreign language as alot of the other kids who dont speak any other languages find it strange at frist and can make alot of comments so many kids who dont have a regular influence of their foreign families tend to disregard the foreign language to them...i have had to fight to keep DS speaking english but now he understands its an advantage but didnt always understand it...he will learn another language at school as its compulsory so he will start out i life with 3 languages..wish i had would have made life alot easier at one period of my life!!

[Bonsai]

Wow Frozzie that's a great effort. I work with a  lot of families where English isn't their first language and it's incredible how quickly kids pick up a new language whereas adults have to work really hard to manage to learn. Enormous amounts of arabic speaking families have to study so hard go get a grasp of English (which is a terrible language to learn) whereas their kids at daycare or school learn it so easily. I think it is because of the elasicity of small brains and the fearlessness they have in trying out new languages.

Wish I was bilingual !

[Cuilidh]

My parents didn't speak English until they went to school and I always regretted that they never taught me their first language (Gaelic).  Having more than one language doesn't weigh anything and I am told that young kids can easily learn more than one language - as Bonsai said, they are fearless.  I think adults probably analyse a new language too much and are probably a little hesitant about making mistakes amd embarrassing themselves as well.

My congratulations to everyone who encourages their kids to speak more than one language!

[cookie1]

My DH's parents were European. When they came here they couldn't speak English and when he went to school he couldn't speak it either. Ma-in-law tells a funny story of how he tried to teach the children at school his language instead of him learning English. He now speaks very little of his parents language (mainly swear words) although he can understand it.

[Frozzie]

haha cookie    actually some of the first words in french i learnt and pronounced well were swear words    I was with a female friend of my now DH in paris and I dont know she thought thats what she would teach me lol

kids under 5 absorb any kind of learning like a sponge and like everything else as we get older it gets harder...i dont tink its because of fear just the ability is not the same....and i think adults over analyse things in general so another language becomes a big problem...i was lucky in the sense that nobody i knew spoke english or very little so i was thrown in the deep end and it was horrible at first..like listening to a bunch of noise and not understanding much but bit by bit i could communicate and got better and better...i think you never stop learning ...i love being able to speak another language..DH speaks three grrrr i wish i spoke more..and plan to learn others but at least other european langauges have a lot of similarity so should be easier than learning english to french for example or vice versa..i learn new words often....some slang too...especially with DS at school with his friends...i pick things up all the time and usually have to end up asking DH what does that mean lol!!

[goldfish]

Hi . . more a query than anything . . . the time on my computer reads now 4.41PM . . .  and the time on the user info window of the forum shows 5.41 AM - I'm in Sydney . . are we really all that far apart?   I used to wonder at the various forum contributors who seemed to be suffering from acute cases of insomnia!! (like me!!)