J’Apprend Le Français

I'm learning French. It started with Duolingo, 1000 days ago. I know that number because the app gamifies your streak, and this morning I reached that milestone. Almost three years! C'est dingue.

I had always wanted to be able to speak and read something other than English. I can get by with my Spanish in a pinch, but it's rudimentary. I have German ancestry, so I had tried that for a short while. That didn't take either. But I love French music, French philosophy, French artists. Turns out I also really enjoy the French language. It’s like a sister tongue to English, so much shared between them. The more you learn of French, the more you end up understanding about English. The history of the two languages are so intertwined.

In December of 2021, I ran into a friend downtown Brooklyn who was having a one-on-one lesson with her French teacher. Having had a year with Duolingo myself at that point, stumbled through some passable français avec eux ... with them. I really liked the challenge, and I really liked the teacher, so we agreed to start lessons the following January. That was almost two years ago, and I can now spend a full hour conversing in ~rough~ french. Trés inégal. J'écorche le langue.

I listen to a few French podcasts for five to twenty minutes, most days. I'm slowly working my way through Sartre's Le Nausée in French (I've read it twice in English). I occasionally put on an episode of French TV on Netflix. And I listen to French music, from time to time. I'm getting a little better at understanding it. When I hear it on the street, en passant, I catch most words and generally understand the subject. That's fun!

Next is finding ways to speak French with more people than my teacher. In restaurants, at work, etc. There are French speakers all over my neighborhood in Brooklyn. I'm almost one of them.