Lingua Franca

We all know Brits are rubbish at languages; it's a national characteristic. People blame antiquated foreign-language teaching methods, laziness, lack of will, lack of necessity when all the world understands English, Empire, island isolationism, and probably a hundred other factors. You know what? I think it comes down to sheer embarrassment.

Fairly obviously, one of the major features of living in a foreign land is the need to get by in a foreign language. I long ago resigned myself to the fact that I came at it too late in life and will never become utterly fluent and relaxed in French. Still, by dint of hard work and necessity, I have become pretty competent. By far the biggest hurdle to overcome was my wish to avoid errors at any cost. This can easily lead to saying nothing rather than exposing one's ignorance.

“Into the face of the young man who sat on the terrace of the Hotel Magnifique at Cannes there had crept a look of furtive shame, the shifty hangdog look which announces that an Englishman is about to speak French.”
― P.G. Wodehouse, Luck of the Bodkins 

I have a very dear friend who is Dutch. The Dutch, as we all know, speak every European language "effortlessly". When I first met this friend, we holidayed a lot together and I had plenty of opportunity to marvel at her facility in English (near perfect), German and French. She will happily engage strangers in long, complicated discussions on almost any subject. As my French has improved over the years, I have come to realise that hers is in fact not brilliant; nowadays she often relies upon me to do the understanding bits. Inspite of this, she is still the more chatty, partly because that is her nature, but mainly because she has no qualms about mistakes but ploughs on regardless.

Which brings me to my point: if someone says to me "Do you speak French?", I'll reply along the lines of "After a fashion" or "I get by", or "Not really, but I try". Whereas, the large numbers of French people who know about a dozen words of English seem utterly convinced that they do, indeed, speak English, and are all too ready to demonstrate this fact. This leads to many tortuous conversations where the other party insists upon struggling manfully to communicate with their dozen words, when it is patently clear that sticking to French would be far more productive.

Doctors seem particularly afflicted by this syndrome. When my son was very young, he had various minor complaints which led to numerous referrals to paediatricians and the like. So many times, I have sat across the desk from some medical specialist who, the second he hears my accent, lapses into a strangled pidgin English which makes little, if any, sense. I usually respond to this by merely continuing to speak French, in the hope they will get the hint, when really all I want to do is scream at them "For Goodness' sake, speak properly, man!"

Of course, it is lovely of them to make the effort, and I appreciate it, really I do, but ...

Extended absence

Good grief; the whole month of February seems to have passed me by!

It's truly a wonder how time slips away in this life I lead - there are always so many different things needing my attention and the days pass in a flash.

This time around, the weather is much to blame for my lengthy absence from the outside world. There we were in early February, congratulating ourselves on nearing the end of what had been an exceptionally mild winter, when BAM! in came the snow and the ice and the lowest temperatures since the Ice Age. It was quite a shock, I can tell you. The snow was only average, to be fair, but the extreme temperatures plus a daily bit of afternoon sun meant that it melted and re-froze  for days into a very dangerous road surface.

Once we had got past the let's-build-a-snowman stage, it all became a bit tedious. Many of my clients whose houses are empty were naturally concerned about possible plumbing problems, and were ringing to ask my help. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to do much: the roads were too dicey to get to many of these houses, and in any case there is not much one can do while the freeze is still on, since leaks won't normally become evident until the thaw.

This all lasted for only a couple of weeks, which as winters go is pretty reasonable really, but still it was quite hard going. A poor friend of mine, who is living in a caravan while he carries out renovations, recorded a temperature of -23°c one night. Chilly!!! Thankfully, though, it passed over soon enough and one day we awoke to a proper Spring morning, with sun and birdsong to cheer us all. A couple of days later, we had 18°c on our patio in the afternoon, and it has been pretty balmy ever since, with some really warm days and Spring galloping on apace.

Then I was struck low with an odd form of laryngitis which seemed resistant to all treatment; I kept thinking it was gone but then finding it back again with a vengeance. During this, I was barely functioning at the most essential level, let alone having the energy for blogging.

So, all in all, I have been very lax, for which I apologise. But I am back now and ensuring things are brought up to date.