I have always thought the French language sounds sexy. The guttural R sends shivers down my spine. Especially when pronounced by a lovely young thing with curls in her hair and pouting lips.

Having grown up in Johannesburg speaking English, I decided to make the effort to learn the language. I moved to Dublin and enrolled in evening classes at the Alliance Française. Having achieved basic proficiency, I continued taking classes in Paris. The quality of the education was outstanding, the teachers were enthusiastic, the classes were small, and I enjoyed the company of my classmates.

Initially, I was fixated upon vocabulary, although in hindsight learning words is actually rather easy: you hear the same word thrice and you magically remember it. One tricky aspect is that nouns in French have genders, either male or female. When you learn a noun it is critically important to learn the article+noun couplet. So, the word for banana is banane, but “a banana” is female and therefore “une banane”. Adjectifs change depending on the gender, so a good (as in tasty) banana would be une bonne banane, where bonne with two ‘n’s and an ‘e’ is the female form of good. The French often seem quite unable to separate the article from the noun, so if you do get the gender wrong they’ll often stare at you for a while with a puzzled frown. Basically, just think of the article as part of the word and you’ll be fine.

Verbs are another matter altogether. Can you conjugate? Is it the 1st, 2nd or 3rd group? Who’s speaking here? How many different past tenses can one language need? I think the trick here is to try and learn the rules, but also spend a lot of time listening to people speak. A lot of French people actually struggle with the more advanced conjugations too, so don’t feel bad.

I spent a lot of time trying to line up English and French in my head, but actually unless you intend to become a translator I think this is quite useless. Remember, you are now a little kid again, you’ve got limited command of language, and you’ve got to use what you got. Don’t get frustrated. Just keep learning. Clinging to the comfort of your English foundation simply holds you back.

As an example, let’s start with a random French sentence : Je me souviens avec bonheur la première fois que nous nous sommes embrassés.

Here’s a very literal translation : I [myself] remember with happiness the first time that we [each other] kissed.

Now, the verb “se souvenir” (“to remember”) is reflexive in French but not in English. We don’t say “I remember myself”, as we might say “I wash myself” or “I scratch myself”. For the French the act of remembering is something personal, something internal, something that you do to yourself. In English it sounds somewhat unnatural to “remember with happiness”, it would be better to say “I fondly remember”. The French sentence specifies that “we kissed each other”, however in English this is redundant, we would simply say “we kissed”.

Therefore, a better translation would be : I fondly remember the first time that we kissed. Tricky, wouldn’t you say?

Pronunciation is the real killer, particularly where two vowels sit either side of one vowel in the other language. The tongue has muscle memory and it likes to slip into familiar positions. This is especially noticeable when tired or annoyed. I took classes with a specialist in pronunciation in order to talk like a Frenchman. I came to the realisation that this simply isn’t possible. You might keep them guessing for a while, but eventually you’ll make a slip of the tongue and the game’ll be up.

Honestly, it wasn’t a matter of pride, I just wanted to fit in and be treated like the next guy. Girls have told me that my accent is charming but not jarring and that I should never lose it. So there’s that…

There is a popular myth that says when you move to a foreign country you are surrounded by the language and you learn by osmosis. Sadly this is completely false, because frankly most people don’t have the time to stand around and wait while you stammer your words, hunting frantically for the right combination of verbs, nouns, adverbs and conjunctions, meanwhile they’ve already gone to the bar for another drink. There is only one real way to progress: by taking classes at a good school. That said, language exchanges are great, either organised in a bar, or even better face-to-face through classifieds. I met a lot of friends this way, and these people will actually take the time to listen because they are in the same boat. Also, people learning foreign languages are generally pretty interesting allround.

Don’t snob your fellow expats, you might think they won’t help you learn French, but in reality they know people and they can point out many a potential pitfall. Don’t spend all your time with them either or you’ll turn into an alcoholic.