The Verb Called Try - Just Do It!

“Trying is always enough.” ― Patricia Briggs, Dragon Bones

Recently, I have been speaking and writing more French! Before now, I had always prided myself, whenever I am around the people whom I know can’t speak French or those whom I feel are unlikely to know as much as I do, as one who could speak basic 'française' and hold up a conversation in the language (and Yes I can. Although it’s much easier for me, and I do that pretty well, to read and write than to speak.). However, whenever I get to be among the native speakers of the language or even non-natives who speak it so well, I tend to crawl all the way back to the beginners level. I am pretty sure we all do this, belittle ourselves.
As an instrumentalist, probably the best in your church or area, you are in a jam session, and some strange dude asks to 'test' your instrument (and most of them guys never look like what they play). So you proudly give them and probably wait for them to disgrace themselves plus or minus their family tree and entire village, but instead you end up watching in awe their dexterity and ‘mad’ skills. Then after they are done with their show-offs and hand you back your own instrument, you instantly develop a verbal diarrhea', ejecting all sorts of unsolicited speeches. You be like, boss I am just learning o… blah blah blah (Little secret- I do this too… but sshh, don’t loud eet lol). We should be humble, I know, but there is probably just a thin line between Humility and Low Self-Esteem, as there is between Pride and Knowing your worth, believing in yourself!
Back to my french story, although I learnt the basics and fundamentals of the language in primary and secondary schools, majority of my french is self-taught, as is my oral English. And for those who probably knew me as the best English student in my college days, the trick was oral English (now you know). With about 95% accuracy, I could literally transcribe anything into phonetics and I knew all the principles of ‘oral English’. However, my oral English doesn’t show much in my spoken English, as I still speak like every other average Nigerian (with a tincture of Igbo accent... just a tiny liru bit). No ‘phonay’ in my English, I just sabi theory. And by the way, I think we are taught too much English in Nigeria than those who even own the language.



I was speaking with an American friend (who speaks good American English) and somehow our talk went to the transcription of words. I told her there was a ‘j’ sound in ‘manipulate’, ‘university’ and ‘you’, but she found it quite strange. She argued vehemently and possibly could have bet her salary on it. I softly, like a grammar boss, asked her why she thought we don’t say ‘an university’. Told her it was because the ‘u’ in ‘university’ actually has the consonant diphthong ‘/ju:/’. I could tell that I must have confused her the more so I got a screenshot of the internet search for the word ‘manipulate’ and sent to her, only then did she understand me ( or I hope she did). I digress again.
OK, so in my quest to develop my spoken French, I made new friends recently, French friends. Ismail is from Morocco and Pascaline is from France but lives on the Reunion Island. They both speak french and would love to learn English. So it was gonna be a symbiotic relationship between us… The reason for this long story ladies and gentlemen is that ever since I started chatting with them and sometimes speaking, I have surprised myself gazillion times with the pool of french vocabulary I would have unknowingly stored up. I would just think of any English word and the “Young Translate” app in my head automatically brings up the french word for them, and in split seconds too. This made me realize this truth, that you wouldn’t know how good (or bad) you are if you don’t at least try. So,come on, slap your neighbour and say JUST DO IT (But be sure you can outrun them, because not everyone knows they are supposed to turn the other cheek... hahaha)



I will post stuff about my french speaking progress once in a while and also give anyone who wants, tips with which you can learn any new language, any language at all. Please keep in touch.