Dear French,
You suck.
I’ll get to the love part in a minute, but first, let’s just be clear: I hate you just way too much of the time. And yet…
Ahhh… So much of life is tucked away inside the words “and yet.” (Once, in primary school, I read a poem translated from Chinese that finished “and yet, and yet, and yet…”
At the time, I thought, “What a meaningless ending?” But I have lived in those words and carried them with me all these years – I couldn’t tell you anything else about the poem. But the whole universe is contained within ‘and yet’.)
The crux of it is that the things that frustrate me are also a part of the things I love about you.
Let’s take even the most basic of phrases, the beginning and end of all interactions.
To say ‘hello’, we have ‘bonjour’. From the oft ignored, slightly nasal ‘n’ to the notoriously difficult ‘r’ drawn out from the back of the throat, a beginner is likely to be exposed from the get-go. But let’s put that aside for now. Breaking ‘bonjour’ down into its components, it more literally means “good day”. In English, saying ‘good day’ to greet someone is rather literary and old-fashioned – but that is something I am rather fond of about you, French. It is important to understand the literal meaning though, because it is not ‘hello’ and so at 5pm – sorry that’s 17h to you, French – and beyond, that word is useless. And French, do you know how your people defend you? My goodness. I don’t need a watch to know when it’s gone five – I just say hello to a French native and see if they correct me or not!
“Bonjour!” (I know there shouldn’t be an exclamation mark, French, but I just can’t help myself. I am not at the skill level of limiting myself to the French vocal range. I’m not cool or suave, or any other stereotype about the French – I speak with exclamation marks!)
“… Bonsoir.”
“Bah, oui, bonsoir.” (I can say ‘Bah, oui, bonsoir’ in, I think, a very French way now, given how many times I’ve said it.)
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We change from “good day” to “good evening”. Again, I find this rather charming. However: as an absolute beginner, it was a bit inconvenient that I had to know two words to communicate one idea. It’s love/hate, French, love/hate.
But we charge onwards – we are coming to one of my favourite things, French.
Because “goodbye”? Oh, there is so much in saying “goodbye”.
Let’s see… first, there’s some variation of “au revoir”, which is a bit more utile (look! A French-English word!), an all-occasions word, and literally means something like “until the resee-ing”, making it more “see you later”, in translation if not in tone. There’s no need to question tu/vous levels of formality, or worry about potentially being rude. Nice and simple, très facile. But that’s not my favourite thing. No, it’s what comes after. Almost without fail, French speakers never just say “au revoir”. During the day, it’s “au revoir, bonne journée.” Which bring us to another challenge of yours: gendered words. Some people get caught up on the word “gender”, which really has very little to do with anything. They could just as easily be considered ‘Group A’ and ‘Group B’ words with no real difference, and generally it ends up being about how smoothly it slides off the tongue.
Has this made it any easier for me in learning to read or speak you, French? No. No, it has not. So, you know, cheers for that.
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However, it does something very nice, French, something that I do enjoy very much.
“Bonne journée” is the feminine form of “bonjour”, which, broken down into its components, is masculine. Always the masculine form to greet, as in hello, and the feminine for goodbye: “au revoir, bonne journée.” It’s exactly the same as “goodbye, have a nice day.” And thus we come to my favourite part. In the evening, the phrase is “au revoir, bonne soiree.” Now to a French person, this is just “goodbye, have a nice evening.”
But I am not a French native.
To me, a soiree can still be an elegant evening party. It is, again, a bit literary in nature, but as established: love, love, love. I mean, books are where I live. And it means that every time I wish someone “bonne soiree” I have a little moment of delight, as I wish them a good party. Sometimes I entertain myself by dreaming up what sort of party I think they would like to go to after their shift ends or they are otherwise done with their day. Big party, small, wine and cheese – or perhaps, they are going home to children’s tea party followed by a story before bed time. It can be hard to know who you are speaking with – but I have no qualms about making it up.
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There’s one other thing I love about these expressions – it’s as though the conversation has bookends. “Bonjour” to “bonne journée” and “bonsoir” to “bonne soirée”. We are back where we began: wishing good days for our friends and our strangers.
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You really can be quite charming, French. And I can’t get too mad about the difficulties because languages are not for the new learners – languages are living and breathing, crafted every day by native speakers looking to communicate, to entertain, to connect.
It can just be hard to keep up with that tide, French, and your numbers and complete lack of a present progressive tense (how I miss the English gerund when speaking French*) are easy to attack when I’m drowning. So I guess what I’m saying is even when I hate you, I still love you, and I’m sure you’ve still got more for me to discover.
Au revoir et bonne soiree,
*P.S. ”en train de” doesn’t have the same feeling and you know it