Skynet wrote:James.A. wrote:Hello people!
Just joined the forum, so: first post! ...
I started learning French about one and a half year ago. I manly wanted to be able to read in the language, so I didn't paid particular attention to listening or speaking until about six months ago. Now I can read everything and I can understand about 60%-70% of the spoken language.
Welcome to the forum!
If I may ask, how did you manage to achieve that level of French reading competency in just 1.5 years? That is phenomenally impressive!!!
Hello people!
Ok, today, instead of writing my log, I will answer Skynet's question by telling you how I started learning French.
I always wanted to learn French. I really love how the language sounds. I love the history of the country, the people, the culture... everything! The time came the April of 2017. I started with the assimil method. I have to admit that I didn't pay particular attention to the instructions. I did two or three lessons everyday and I tried to learn them almost by heart. First I was listening the recordings and then I repeated every sentence a lot of times, almost mechanically, until I felt that I really really understood the sentence. After that I was trying to translate the English text into French, which is usually forbidden when you are on the first wave. By lesson 40, I was bored to the point of depression. And then I thought about my real goal for learning French: to read Les Misérables from the original. That was always my goal for learning languages. When I got my English C1 certification I was 17 and I couldn't even watch a film without subtitles. And then I didn't concern myself with it for 2 years. Then I thought that it would be nice to read Jane Austen in English and that was the moment that I really learnt English. And then I never read anything in Greek again! I only started learning Russian in order to read War and Peace, my favourite book of all time (Which I didn't manage... YET!) and I started learning French for reading Les Misérables! So what the hell was I doing parroting without thinking stupid phrases about vacations and airports?
I downloaded a pdf of Les Misérables from the library of Quebec (it is NOT illegal!!) and I started reading... And then I found out that I understood nothing at all, which was to be expected, of course, but I am usually a stupid person. So, after I admitted the obvious fact that it was too difficult for me (it took a lot more pages than it should have for me to admit that. I'm not proud of that), I decided to built up to Les Mis starting from Le petit prince. So I bought a copy and I started underlining the words that prevented me from understanding the main idea and searching for them in my favourite site of all times, WordRefence! I was taking a note of them in the margins of the pages and then I was continuing with the book. In the meantime I was studying French grammar. I was not learning it by heart, I was just making myself comfortable with the concepts, the declensions etc. It took me two or three weeks to finish le petit prince. And then I bought a second hand French edition of a book called "Le testament de Judas". The story was about an ancient manuscript discovered in the deserts of north Africa and the dirty game that the Vatican played in order to suppress the teaching of that priceless book. You know, Da Vinci code, but with less success and more murders. I really didn't like it. It was the French translation of an English "international thriller" that nobody ever read and it was translated into French because the first two and a half pages took place in Paris and the editor could write with big letter in the front cover the first words of the first chapter: "À Paris c'etait la pire des saisons", deceiving that way most cunningly the chauvinist Parisian who wanted to read about Paris and only about Paris. I guess the existence of chauvinist Parisian is just a myth because nobody read it in France neither. Anyway, it doesn't matter. I started it and I did the same thing that I was doing with Le Petit Prince. I quit in page 90 and I never got to point where National Geographic bought the rights for the testament of Judas and nobody died.
After that, I bought the first proper book that I completed in French. It was called "Le palaquin des larmes" and it was WONDERFUL! It was the true story, narrated in the first person, of a Chinese woman that was married in the age of 13 with a much older and stupider man. She then escaped and came to France where she became a concert pianist. I am a pianist so I really felt connected with her, despite the fact that, admittedly, I am not a Chinese woman nor have I been married at 13 with a much older and stupider man nor have I ever been able to utter a single Chinese word, not for lack of trying. So I started doing the same thing. I was underlining words and phrases that I didn't understand and I was noting the meaning. By page 100 the strange words were fewer and fewer and by page 150 I decided that I knew enough. I put my pencil in the drawer and, for the first time I was just... reading. In French! When I finished the book, the November of 2017 had come and I was confident that I was ready for the big one! Les Misérables!
I bought it for 20 euro. It is a wonderful two tomes edition by édition Folio. I run home (I actually took the bus, but running is more dramatic) I sat by the window and for a moment I watched as the cold autumn wind, like a medieval witch, made dancers out the dead leaves with its icy magic spells (I live on the fifth flour. I can't even see the trees, let alone the leaves. What can I say? I love drama and cheesy phrases...), and I finally opened the book! Oh, what a wonderful feeling it was touching the wonderfully soft pages, white as cotton! What a joy it was reading the words of that gigantic symbol of French literature, the words of Victor Hugo himself, exactly as he had wrote them almost 200 years ago! Oh, what a marvellous moment! There was only a single problem. A problem so tiny and insignificant that I don't know why I mention it... I didn't understand anything in the first page. Well, almost anything. At least I was getting the main idea. So I took the above mentioned pencil out of its drawer and I started doing the same that I did with all the other books. It was Christmas and I was in page 100 when I advanced to the next step. Jean Valjean has just met the cruelty of the people of Dean and I could read without my phone nearby. By February I finished the book.
I read a lot more after that. Le chat by Simenon, L'étranger by Camus, Dora Bruder by Modiano, Bridget Jones: L'âge de raison (yes, I read that too...
). And that's the story of my studies of the French language. But it really doesn't matters because I have never spoken a word in that language. I know no one that speak it and finding a French language exchange partner online is a little bit easier that turning lead into gold.
Well I wrote a lot! It's a good exercise for the NaNoWriMo that will start in a few days! I will write a 20.000 short story words in English, which is not my native language. I hope it won't be a disaster!