Act 4: Low-fat croissants

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1 Act 4: Low-fat croissants Bonjour! C est moi Jean-Paul, your host for Act IV. Oui, Act IV already! We hope that following Jack and Michelle in their endeavor to learn French is helping you to learn as well. Before you listen to the play, take time to familiarize yourself with the flashcard. Shall we begin? Valérie, our French teacher, is meeting with Michelle today for another lesson. As it turns out, Michelle is a really serious student with a specific goal, or dream... Who are we to say? Let s hope she continues to learn for our great pleasure. Vous êtes prêts? Enjoy Act IV. Introduction Oh bonjour Valérie! Bonjour Michelle! Pardon, I think I fell asleep while studying. Pas de problème Michelle. You see I ve been on this cleanse for 2 days now and I m just exhausted. A cleanse? J aime beaucoup les cleanses. It s a natural way to purify your body, to get rid of all the toxins. What sort of cleanse is it? The one I m on right now, I am trying it for the first time. You re not allowed to eat at all. Not at all? Just drinks. 1/8

2 It sounds a bit drastic. Is it a good idea not to eat at all? Oui, j ai besoin de lose some weight. I ve indulged a bit too much recently. Ok Michelle. I hope you ll be alright for the lesson. If you don t feel good, just let me know. D accord. Je suis prête Valérie. Oh, wait a second, I had a question before we start. J ai une question. Tell me. You remember I told you I want to move to France or, at least, live most of the year there. Oui, oui. I m trying to think of practical steps I can take now to make the move easier. You mean looking for a place to live, transportation, that sort of things? I was thinking more of...where I can find low fat croissants. Low fat croissants? What s that? J aime les croissants mais ils sont full of butter as you know. I can t eat that. It s too fattening. I don t think low fat croissants exist...not in France anyway. Non? Il n y a pas de croissants low fat en France? J ai besoin de low fat croissants! Besoin? Oui...Je suis sûre I could convince a baker to make them. That s what I did here. Really? Really! My baker makes them especially for me. Les croissants low fat! Euh... je ne suis pas sûre Michelle. You could try...i guess. Vous êtes pessimistic. Pessimiste? Maybe... J ai une idée. If it doesn t work, I could always have them shipped from here frozen. Ah ah, voilà la solution! Il n y a pas de problème. Bonne chance Michelle. Ok Valérie, merci beaucoup. J aime parler with you about France. It s helpful, really. Je suis prête. Bien...Shall we? Oui. What did we learn about last time? I learned beaucoup. I learned that il y a des Mcdonalds et des Starbucks en France, that les Français travaillent beaucoup. Ok, what about grammar? Oh grammar! First group verbs. How do you recognize them? They finish in er in the infinitive. 2/8

3 For example... Aimer, parler, écouter, regarder, étudier, habiter... Excellent Michelle. Il y a aussi chercher, demander, travailler, trouver, détester that sounds just like the English verb to detest. Ils sont faciles, these verbs because they re regular. Oui, ils sont réguliers. Vous aimez conjuguer Michelle? Conjugate? Oui. Let s conjugate in the negative form. With ne pas? Oui. Je n aime pas, tu n aimes pas, il n aime pas, elle n aime pas, nous n aimons pas, vous n aimez pas, ils n aiment pas, elles n aiment pas. No hesitation! Parfait! Voilà une étudiante sérieuse. Ah bon? Merci. J aime étudier les verbes. That s a good thing, we have many more to learn, and they re not all regular. Grammar 1: Prepositions with aller Michelle, for today s lesson you have learned le verbe aller and the preposition à. That s a tricky one. It s true, it takes a little getting used to. What does à mean? It can mean at or to. What variations of à do you remember? It could be à la if the following noun is feminine. That s correct. Wait a second! On the street where I grew up, there was this delicious boulangerie called Pies à la mode. Is it the same à la? Oui, it s the same one. The expression à la mode literally means at the fashion or at the way so according to the current fashion or style. Hmm pies à la mode... they made fantastic pies with real butter crust. The apple pie was phenomenal. Wait, wait, wait! Do you know what an apple pie à la mode is? Non. It s apple pie served with a scoop of vanilla ice cream. They made their own honeycomb ice cream which is like burnt caramel in vanilla. It was to die for! So you used to like butter! Oh oui, I was quite chubby at the time. I had to do a lot of cleansing to get where I am now and I m not about to give it up, even for France s delicious croissants! Vous avez raison... Anyways, où sommes-nous? Nous sommes à la. 3/8

4 Oui, we use à la for a feminine noun. Par exemple à la boulangerie or à la maison. What about for a masculine noun? It s au. And plural nouns? Aux avec un x. Parfait. Now, une question difficile. What about if a noun, whether masculine or feminine, starts with a vowel or a silent h? Euh...I can t remember. You would use à l apostrophe. Par exemple à l'hôtel. I have a mental block with the apostrophe. Maybe you need to eat a little, manger. Manger... non, je n ai pas besoin de manger. Merci. Now I will give names of places, so nouns with their definite article in front to show the gender and number and you can put the appropriate à in front. These are complicated instructions. Can you give me an example? Sure, if I say le restaurant, you say au restaurant. D accord? Ah oui, d accord. Ok, la plage, the beach. Euh... à la plage. Je vais à la plage. Je vais à la plage en France. J aime la plage en France, Cannes, Nice... Très bien. You re making complex sentences already. Another one: le marché, the market. So it s masculine and singular so... au marché. Tu vas au marché. Excellent. Let s try l'hôpital. The hospital? Oui. Je n aime pas l'hôpital. Let s still make a sentence with à. So I think I just need to put à in front, à l'hôpital. Parfait. Je ne vais pas à l'hôpital. Je déteste l'hôpital. J ai peur de l'hôpital. Bien, let s try les Champs-Élysées. Ah les Champs-Élysées, j adore les Champs-Élysées! Paris! What will you put in front of les Champs-Élysées? It s plural so aux avec un x. Je vais aux Champs-Élysées. J habite aux Champs-Élysées. Très bien Michelle. It s not so difficult once you get the hang of it. In our second dialog, let s practice the other uses of aller. D accord! 4/8

5 Bon travail Michelle! Grammar 2: Aller in the present As we ve seen in our lesson, aller is an important irregular verb. It s not irregular in all the tenses but it is in the present. I m having you learn the key irregular verbs first on purpose. The regular will then seem to be a piece of cake. A piece of pie à la mode even! You re funny! J ai faim, that's why I m obsessing about food. J aime parler de food. But j aime beaucoup your strategy, do the harder stuff first. Vous avez faim Michelle? Oui, un peu. Vous avez soif? Oui, oh that makes me think, I have something to drink. Allez-y. Allez-y? It means go ahead, you remember? Oui, oui. Un soda? That s how you say soda in French, un soda. Are you allowed to drink sodas during your cleanse? It s ok, it s a diet soda! But it has caffeine. It will boost my mental powers for the rest of the lesson. D accord. Allons-y. Allons-y! Oh by the way, il y a des diet sodas en France? Oui, nous avons des diet sodas. In fact, we say soda light instead of diet soda. These are the tips I need from you! I will sound really French when ordering un soda light au café. Serveur, un soda s il vous plaît! Parfait. Let s cover all the different uses of aller. It means to go. What else is it used for? For saying how you are doing. In English you use to be to express how you are. How are you? I m well, I m fine. I never thought about that! But in French, we use to go. So it s not how are you? but it s how do you go? Exactement. I go well, or I m going well. Funny! 5/8

6 Demandez-moi, ask me how I am. Comment vas-tu? Don t forget to use vous when you address me. Pardon. Comment allez-vous? Je vais bien, merci Michelle. Et vous, comment allez-vous aujourd hui? Aujourd hui? It means today. Ok, aujourd hui, je vais bien, merci. Où allez-vous? Je vais... au restaurant. I wish. Non, non, je vais à la maison. Bien Michelle. You notice a simple way to make a question, by inverting the subject and the verb. Just like in English. Oui. The other use of aller is the near future. Instead of I will in English, you can say I m going to. In French you conjugate aller in the present and you add an infinitive after. Je vais étudier le français. Let s practice a bit of that. OK. Hhmm, let's see...after my cleanse, je vais aller au restaurant. Je vais manger une apple pie à la mode. Bien. Let s use verbs we already know. Je vais habiter en France. Il va étudier le français. Il? Your husband? Oui. Nous allons chercher une maison en France. Nous allons trouver une maison aux Champs-Élysées. Nous allons aller au café. Je vais aller à la boulangerie où il y a des low fat croissants. Il va aimer la France. C est très bien Michelle. Nice sentences. Merci, je vais parler français! Je vais, tu vas, il va, elle va, nous allons, vous allez, ils vont, elles vont... en France! Expressions: Ça va Now, let s work on our new expression. Let s see, how many have we learned so far Michelle? We ve learned ah bon, il y a, voilà, voici. That s great! All are very useful and common in French. Il y a beaucoup de petites expressions en français Michelle. Petites expressions... Small expressions? Exactement. Voici une nouvelle expression, vous êtes prête? Oui, allez-y. Aujourd hui, l expression est ça va. 6/8

7 Ça va. Aujourd hui, l expression est petite. Oui. Those are two words that can say a lot. J aime les petites expressions. J'aime les petits cafés. J aime everything that s petite. Vous êtes petite Valérie. Oui, je suis petite. En français, petit is masculine and petite is feminine. It means short in size when describing a person. Oh pardon, that s not what I meant at all. I meant you re small. Pas de problème Michelle, I am short. Je suis petite.... no, I meant you have a small build and it s cute... mignon. So sorry. Ça va Michelle, ça va. You see how I just used ça va? What does it mean in this context? Oui, it means... "don't worry about it". J ai raison? Oui, vous avez raison. You ll hear ça va mostly used to ask someone how he or she is doing. It s the most common greeting. Ah bon? Oui. Let s remember that it is an informal expression so you wouldn t normally ask your boss: ça va aujourd hui? It would be impolite? Unless you are friends with him. So how would you greet him? Bonjour, comment allez-vous aujourd hui? Très bien. But you could use ça va with your colleagues and your peers. D accord. Can I ask you: ça va Valérie? Hmm, I guess you could. Comment ça va is slightly less informal than ça va so let s use this one with each other. Ok. But I still have to use vous when I address you. Oui, exactement. So comment allez-vous? et comment ça va? are my options. Oui Michelle. How would I ask my husband this: how are you my darling? Euh, my darling... I would probably say ça va mon chéri? Mon chéri? I love mon chéri. J aime mon chéri... Mon chéri... hmmm. Ça va Michelle? Oui, ça va. I m just thinking of the chocolates Mon Chéri. I ate so many when I was in France. Hmm, a heart of cherry, floating in liqueur in a chocolate shell. Vous aimez le chocolat? Oui, j aime les Mon Chéri... Ils sont très delicious. And only 46 calories each. Ah bon? How do you know that? I did my research. I wanted to know how many a day I could eat. 46 calories, ça va. Oui, ça va. Did you know that the Mon Chéri here are filled with hazelnuts instead of liqueur? 7/8

8 You mean, for the American market? Oui. You did do some research. Ça ne va pas Valérie! Pourquoi ça ne va pas? They are 65 calories each. 19 calories more! Non Valérie, ça ne va pas bien! Another reason to live in France! Low-calory chocolates! Ok Michelle, ça va pour aujourd hui. I ll see you next week. D accord. Au revoir. Au revoir! And make sure you eat before next week s lesson. Oui, au revoir! 8/8

Negative sentence structures

Negative sentence structures So far, when making negative sentences, we only used the structure ne pas. There are actually other ways to make negative sentences and to convey other meanings with negative sentences. In this lesson,