A talk I did at the AFUP/sfPot meetup in Nantes at Akeneo's office https://www.meetup.com/afup-nantes-php/events/240837900/)

1. Une présentation par Matthias Noback
Attendre
Entendre
Apprendre le
la
de
du
français
Time for a quick lightning talk on me learning French, also known as: "apprendre le français"

2. "En anglais, s'il vous plaît"
This is the way I used to go around France usually...

3. But at some point in April I was contacted by this guy named Nicolas Dupont, he invited me over for a whole week in Nantes.
Then another week, and another week.
Thanks for that by the way!

4. So I now spend 6% of my year in France.
Meaning that I'll be taking "l'avion" several times to Nantes
And back to "ma maison".
Nantes of course is where "la trompe" is pointing at.

5. 2015: 1.8 million holidays spent in France
Maybe you know this, but France is quite a popular destination for Dutch holidays.
In fact, it's the most popular one. Many of us take "l'autoroute Route du soleil" towards the south every year.

6. Les Pays-Bas
That's when all these Dutch people send postcards to friends and family in our home country,
Correctly adding our country name in French: les Pays-Bas; the countries-low.

7. That's a better name than "Nederland" anyway, which is singular, and designates just one country.
In fact, there are several of these "low" countries.

8. Tin Tin Kuifje
Houppe
1. Well, I was thinking, what do we know in the Netherlands that's French?
2. Tin Tin maybe? But we call him "Kuifje", which is equivalent to "houppe" in French.
3. But then, Hergé turns out to be not a Frenchman, he is from Belgium one of the countries we previously owned.

9. German!
1. What else do we know? Well: du pain, du vin, et, du boursin.
That's not right. It should be fromage.
2. And, this line here is even in German!

10. Of course, everybody is full of prejudice, like, this wouldn't be how you all look like.
I didn't see anyone in the streets who looks like this.

11. Then again, nobody in Holland looks like this.

12. But when you start talking about this apparently half-finished building,
everyone in Holland will tell you: they love it.

13. It's okay, I think every important city has their own unfinished masterpiece, right?

14. Anyway, the family and I will go on holiday to France this year, just like millions of other Dutch people.
This means I'll now be spending as much as 10% of this year in France, which to me was enough to start investing in my language skills.

15. So I downloaded Duolingo.
And it turned out, I remembered quite a bit from school.

16. Also, my girlfriend and I started reading Le petit Nicolas. Good stuff!

17. I already knew this guy of course.

18. It sure seems like many important people in France are "petit".

19. France
M 175.6 cm
F 162.5 cm
Netherlands
M 181 cm
V 169 cm
I looked it up and in fact, the French are on average 6 to 7 centimeters smaller than the Dutch!
Don't know why that is actually.

20. vork fourchette
couteaumes
lepel cuillère
Another thing I noticed when I started relearning French is that we have quite different words for "couverts".
We speak of vork, mes and lepel. You speak of fourchette, couteau and cuillere.

21. It may have something to do with the way we treat the activity of eating in our country...

22. ... and the way you do. Even the boatsmen look like they are eating with dignity.

23. Bonjour!
Je voudrais un
croissant
et une baguette.
Bonjour!
Euh, très bien, merci
Oui, oui,
merci
Au révoir!!!!!!!!!!!
Beuleveuledrapeau
deveulepineatrante.
Commepeujomme
Quanddrummeparde
Flimepejoume?
I still find it very hard to speak French.
It often goes like this...

24. "Bien"
Other things I find confusing are: when people say bièn, or biàn.

25. "Putain"
And as someone learning French, I found that the word you use the most seems to be the word "putain".
Even though I wonder if it's putèn or putàn.

26. Bedankt & tot ziens
Merci & au révoir
With this we come to the end of this lightning talk.
Thanks for your attention.