• Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Stuff

Jeroen Kemperman

My stories about moving to Paris, france and other things I find interesting or useful

Feed on
Posts
Comments
« How to cross the street in Paris… I’ll look you in the eye!
One year in France: France is changing and so am I »

Visit my chamber IV – If you are looking for my key…

May 20th, 2009 by Jeroen

It has been some time now since I’ve written anything. I have been making less language mistakes worth mentioning and life has become a little more “normal”. However recently I’ve been at it again and so I present to you number 4 of my language mistake series. Not suitable for our younger readers.

As with most language mistakes they have to do with sex. Not that I talk about that all the time, but the French just have a lot of words that deal with the subject. Let me just share my recent mistakes with you. 

Monte

During lunch we were talking about motor bikes. One of my colleagues might buy one in the future. I wanted to ask him to show it to me (us) when he does. So I said: tu vas nous monter?. this caused a lot of laughter. Apparently the verb monter  means to mount (for example a horse) and also has a sexual meaning (to mount someone… ahum). I should have said: Tu vas nous montrer? this means: to show. 

Coulliette

Again at work. One time I wanted to tell my colleagues where I would put the key to my cabinet for emergencies. I wanted to say that I would put it in the dresser under my desk which would have been “caisson” or perhaps “buffet” (I am far from a French language expert). However I said: “Couilliette” which means I would put the key in the little testicle.

So if you are looking for my key you know where to look for it ;-) .

In any case I can assure you that I have moved it :-D  

 

 

P.S.

As always remember that in my experience the French really appreciate any effort you make to learn French. So please do not let this post discourage you from doing so.

Bookmark and Share

Posted in Uncategorized, language

Comments are closed.

  • Tags

    about bureaucracy car clochard comunication culture customer care; shopping introduction language languange living in franc living in france organizing paris PowerPoint prejudice presentations religion service software thinking
  • Bookmark and Share
    • Blogroll

      • Robby Bradford’s personal website
      • The Bridge international church in Paris

Jeroen Kemperman © 2010 All Rights Reserved.

Free WordPress Themes | Fresh WordPress ThemesTechnorati Profile