Saturday night we had the opportunity to host a couple from France at our home. I used to be a French teacher at Bethpage Junior High School 25 or so years ago. We have several French speaking people in our neighborhood, but I have rarely taken advantage of the opportunity to speak with them in their native tongue. So when this couple showed up it was a shock. My wife does not speak French, the husband spoke almost no English and the wife was about the same. It was an exhausting evening, trying to carry on a two hour conversation, totally in French.
Surprisingly, it turned out pretty well. We were able to share ideas, discuss family and generally carry on a semi-intelligent conversation. Actually, they were impressed with my accent, my sentence structure and my overall ablilty to speak and understand. The experience made me think that if could spend a week immersed in French, brushing up on my vocabulary, I could get back to being fluent. It was a tiring but fulfilling experience.
Who knows, maybe one day I will have my books translated into French. I would love to do a book tour in France, visiting all the beautiful spots and enjoying the fabulous food and world class wines. "La Joie de Vivre" is Simple Happiness to me in French.
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