Learning French for traveling purposes?

Imp

So I was talking to my girlfriend earlier about gift giving and holiday plans. As it turns out, we're both interested in traveling and awesome vacations instead of piles of gifts. She's always wanted to go to France, and I want to make that happen. Neither of us speak any French, but we want to learn. Any of you had any experience with learning a language for traveling? What worked, what didn't? I've heard Rosetta Stone is good, and I've heard it's bad from folks at work who've used it for conversational and business use. Really, I just want some info!

Thanks in advance folks!

Over

Find some Michel Thomas.

His method is completely orally based, no note taking or heavy reading, just listening and practicing. It's aimed at conversational proficiency, so if you're looking to travel, it should be fine.

MagicToaster

Learning a language, for any purpose, is something that requires a lot of dedication. The secret is to eat, sleep and breath that language untill you go insane.

I encourage you to continue learning, even after you've traveled. There is no better experience than going to another country and getting around in the local language.

Mojo_Jojo

Everything I hear about Rosetta Stone is pretty bad. The Michel Thomas tapes are great though, especially his growing hatred of the female student.

Learning a language is hard. I'm trying to pick up French at the moment, and even spending one or two weekends a month over there and doing weekly French classes for about a year has me at a very low level. So start long before you intend to get there.

Improvolone

And also understand that in major cities you'll be fine without any French, so even knowing some French will be a great help. Don't expect to travel the countryside sleeping in cottages on just English, but hey, the cabbies in Paris speak better English than those in New York.

legallytired

Basically what Improvolone said.

Unless you are incredibly dedicated, trying to learn french before the trip won't help you that much as most will answer back in english or you simply won't understand their answer. Even as a french native speaker I had to be pretty careful with the way I talked to be understood.

Learning some greetings/thanks and basic stuff never hurts however!

Improvolone

Useful phrases not spelled phonetically:
Je ne parle (pas) francais - I do not speak French - The pas is grammatically correct but you can get by without it
Tu parles Englais? - Do you speak English?
C'est tout (?) - That is all/is that all? - Most sales/food people will ask this at the end so expect to hear it all the time
Oui - Yes
Non- No
Merci (beacoup) - Thank you (very much)
Bonjour - Formal greeting
Allo- informal greeting
Ca va? - How are you? Appropriate responses are...
Bien - good
Mal - bad
ca va - kind of middle of the road. So yes, "ca va?" "ca va merci. es tu (and you)?" "ca va." is an entire conversation.

Even if you go knowing four words, use them when you can. People legitimately appreciate your effort.

Arang

Improvolone wrote: »

Tu parles Englais? - Do you speak English?

One note on this: French has two second-person personal pronouns, polite and impolite. The impolite is tu and the polite is vous. There's some grammar stuff (verb conjugation), but you'll be using the polite form when talking to strangers, asking for directions etc. You probably won't be murdered for screwing up, but you will be seen as a jerk.

I'm not 100% sure what's expected when talking to cashiers and waiters and such, but going with polite is the safe choice.

As such, the polite forms of the above phrase is Parlez-vous Anglais?

Really, though, don't worry too much about grammar. The French are always happy to hear foreigners speak or try to speak French.

Mojo_Jojo

If you're just going to learn a little bit of French then you only need to use the formal you (vous). So to a bus driver, waiter, policeman, stranger, etc. you should be using vous. Also, "Allo" is not an informal greeting, it's just how you answer the phone. "Salut" is what you're looking for, I think.

corcorigan

The Parisians will never miss a chance to hate you for being impolite. Always use vous when it's appropriate. Basic grammar is a vital bit of learning a language!

A good bit of advice I got from some French friends regarding vocab was "English is just French words with an English accent".

geckahn

michel thomas is awesome. I learned more spanish in two weeks of listening to his tapes then I did in a semester of spanish class.