Learn how to describe the possessions you own and how to ask about someone else's
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| INTRODUCTION | |
| Virginie:Bonjour a tous. | |
| Eric: Hello, everyone, Eric here! Absolute Beginner Season 1, Lesson 10 - Is Everything You Own in That French Purse?! | |
| Virginie: Hello everyone! I'm Virginie and welcome to FrenchPOD101. I'm here with Eric. | |
| Eric: And with us, you'll learn to speak French with fun and effective lessons. | |
| Virginie: Yes, because we're very funny. We also provide you with cultural insights and tips you won't find in a textbook. | |
| Eric: In this lesson Rob needs to make a phone call, but he doesn't have a phone. | |
| Virginie: Rob is not very equipped, so he has to ask Giulia is she has a phone. | |
| Eric: Let's listen to the conversation. | |
Lesson conversation |
|
|---|---|
| Rob: Giulia, tu as un téléphone portable? | |
| Giulia: Oui. | |
| Giulia: Non…non… | |
| Rob: (rires) Qu’est-ce que tu as dans ton sac? | |
| Giulia: J’ai…un portefeuille, un stylo, un paquet de Kleenex… | |
| Rob: (rires) Et un téléphone portable? | |
| Giulia: Ah! Voilà! | |
| Eric: One more time with the translation. | |
| Rob: Giulia, tu as un téléphone portable? | |
| Eric: Giulia, do you have a cell phone? | |
| Giulia: Oui. | |
| Virginie: Yes. | |
| Giulia: Non…non… | |
| Virginie: No…no… | |
| Rob: (rires) Qu’est-ce que tu as dans ton sac? | |
| Eric: (laughs) What do you have in your bag? | |
| Giulia: J’ai…un portefeuille, un stylo, un paquet de Kleenex… | |
| Virginie: I have…a wallet, a pen, a pack of Kleenex… | |
| Rob: (rires) Et un téléphone portable? | |
| Eric: (laughs) What about a cell phone? | |
| Giulia: Ah! Voilà! | |
| Virginie: Ah! There it is! | |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER | |
| Eric: Wow. She had a lot of things in that purse. | |
| Virginie: Yes that's the purpose of a purse. Being full. | |
| Eric: Full of kinds of things. | |
| Virginie: Oui, exactly. Women have a busy life. They need a place to store all kinds of things. | |
| Eric: So, do women in France work a lot? | |
| Virginie: Oh yes. Most women have jobs. | |
| Eric: Okay. | |
| Virginie: But the pay actually is lower than men's. | |
| Eric: Ah. | |
| Virginie: Yes, that's pretty bad. And you know what, they only got the right to vote in 1944. | |
| Eric: Wow. | |
| Virginie: I know. France needs to improve, but it's getting there. | |
| Eric: But, there is something pretty good in France when you're a woman? | |
| Virginie: What is it? | |
| Eric: Don't you get a three-month leave after giving birth. | |
| Virginie: Oh yes. But that's just normal. | |
| Eric: And get time off too? | |
| Virginie: Men, yes. They get a two-week leave, which is not enough, but still, it's nice. | |
| VOCAB LIST | |
| Eric: Okay interesting. So, let's take a look at our vocabulary. What do we have first? | |
| Virginie: Avoir [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: To have. | |
| Virginie: Avoir [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Avoir [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Next. | |
| Virginie: Un portable [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Cell phone. | |
| Virginie: Un portable [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Un portable [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Okay. | |
| Virginie: Qu'est-ce que / qu'est-ce qu' [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: What. | |
| Virginie: Qu'est-ce que / qu'est-ce qu' [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Qu'est-ce que / qu'est-ce qu' [natural native speed]. Ton [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Your (informal). | |
| Virginie: Ton [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Ton [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Next. | |
| Virginie: Sac [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Bag. | |
| Virginie: Sac [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Sac [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Next one. | |
| Virginie: Un portefeuille [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: A wallet. | |
| Virginie: Un portefeuille [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Un portefeuille [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: And next | |
| Virginie: Un stylo [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: A pen. | |
| Virginie: Un stylo [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Un stylo [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Okay. | |
| Virginie: Un paquet de Kleenex [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: A pack of Kleenex. | |
| Virginie: Un paquet de Kleenex [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Un paquet de Kleenex [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: And finally. | |
| Virginie: Voilà [natural native speed] | |
| Eric: Here you are or here it is. | |
| Virginie: Voilà [slowly - broken down by syllable]. Voilà [natural native speed]] | |
| KEY VOCABULARY AND PHRASES | |
| Eric: Okay, the first word we're going to look at? | |
| Virginie: Let's start with ""un portable."" | |
| Eric: A cell phone. | |
| Virginie: Yes literally that's ""a holdable,"" a portable. | |
| Eric: Right, something you have with you all the time, you can bring around. | |
| Virginie: Yes, exactly un portable. It comes from the verb porter, which mean to hold, to carry. | |
| Eric: And that's also the same word for a laptop. | |
| Virginie: Exactly, oui, un ordinateur portable. | |
| Eric: The word ordinateur is computer, | |
| Virginie: And portable is still, literally holdable, portable, carryable. | |
| Eric: So, un portable is a cell phone, and un ordinateur portable is a laptop. | |
| Virginie: Yes. Now I would like to explain the word ""ton."" | |
| Eric: Right. Rob at some point in our dialog says ""ton sac."" | |
| Virginie: Yes and that means ""your purse."" | |
| Eric: So, ""ton"" is your in English. | |
| Virginie: And that's informal, TON | |
| Eric: So this is just one of the possessive adjective that we're going to look at another time. | |
| Virginie: For now, just remember that ton is your. | |
| Eric: So, by the way, Virginie, is sac really a purse? | |
| Virginie: Yes, it's short for sac a mains. | |
| Eric: Oh I see. So, sac is purse, but it also can mean a bag, correct? | |
| Virginie: Yes, Eric, oui, sac is both purse and bag. | |
| Eric: Easy. | |
| Virginie: What else do we have here? | |
| Eric: The best word voila! | |
| Virginie: Oh yes. I know you like this word. Voila. It's an easy one. It means there you go, there you are, here it is. | |
| Eric: This is sort of the typically phrase we think of French people saying, ""Viola."" | |
| Virginie: Tout a fait. Absolutely. Viola! | |
| Eric: You can also have voila followed by a name. | |
| Virginie: Yes. Like in, Voila Eric! | |
| Eric: and Here is Eric! | |
| Virginie: Or Voila la grammaire. | |
| Eric: Here is the grammar. | |
| Virginie: Exactly. Absolutely there goes grammar! | |
Lesson focus |
|
| Eric: Well, we're going to be focusing on saying I have. | |
| Virginie: And how to say ""do you have?"" | |
| Eric: In our dialogue, Rob asked Giulia ""tu as un telephone portable?"" | |
| Virginie: ""Do you have a cell phone?"" | |
| Eric: So it's pretty easy. | |
| Virginie: Yes, it's really easy. | |
| Eric: First we have tu, which is you informal. | |
| Virginie: Then you have the verb to have, avoir, conjugated with tu, obviously. | |
| Eric: And that is ""as"" AS, as (spell). | |
| Virginie: Tu as, you have. | |
| Eric: Then all you need to do is add what you're inquiring about. | |
| Virginie: Here, it's a cell phone, right, so un telephone portable? | |
| Eric: And we have to remember the article which is un, un telephone portable. | |
| Virginie: Exactly. Un is a and we saw that in a previous lesson. And portable is again a cell phone. | |
| Eric: So what is the entire sentence? | |
| Virginie: Tu as un telephone portable? Literally ""you have a cell phone?"" | |
| Eric: So what if we want to ask about something else though? | |
| Virginie: Okay what about un stylo? | |
| Eric: A pen. | |
| Virginie: Tu as un stylo? | |
| Eric: Do you have a pen? | |
| Virginie: C'est facile, it's easy. Non? What do you think, Eric. | |
| Eric: Oui Virginie c'est facile. It's very easy. | |
| Virginie: Now let's look at what Giulia answers. | |
| Eric: Well, Giulia says ""J'ai...un portefeuille, un stylo, etc. | |
| Virginie: Which is I have a wallet, a pen, etc. | |
| Eric: To say I have is pretty simple. | |
| Virginie: It is ""j'ai."" | |
| Eric: Once more time? | |
| Virginie: Bien sur, of course, ""j'ai"". | |
| Eric: So that's j'ai. | |
| Virginie: Do you remember what happens if the verb after je starts with a vowel? | |
| Eric: Well, I think the ""e"" gets dropped, the vowel get dropped and we just replaced it with an apostrophe. | |
| Virginie: Okay, and that's the case here. | |
| Eric: A little recap it's j'ai, j'ai. | |
| Virginie: And it's I have | |
| Eric: And tu as. | |
| Virginie: Is you have | |
| Eric: One more thing, what if I want to ask ""do you have the pen?"" | |
| Virginie: Oh, you mean the one pen I gave you earlier? Well it will be ""tu as le stylo?"" | |
| Eric: Right. So that's a little more specific. We're using the definite article le. | |
| Virginie: Yes, because we know which exact pen we're talking about, so definite article. | |
Outro |
|
| Eric: Le, great. I think that does it for today. Okay so some of our listeners already know about one of the most powerful tools on FrenchPOD101.com… | |
| Virginie: Yes, it is the line-by-line audio. | |
| Eric: This is a perfect tool for rapidly improving listening comprehension. | |
| Virginie: Yes, by listening to lines of the conversation you just heard again and again and again. | |
| Eric: So every time you hear it, it will become a little more clear. | |
| Virginie: Basically, what we do is we breakdown the dialog into comprehensible, bite-size sentences. | |
| Eric: So you can try the line-by-line audio in the Premium Learning Center at FrenchPOD101.com. Thank you so much. | |
| Virginie: Au revoir! | |
| Eric: Bye. |
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34 Comments
HideHow did you like this lesson?
Hi Don,
Thank you for posting!
In case of any questions, please feel free to contact us.
Sincerely,
Cristiane
Team FrenchPod101.com
Merci Beaucoup!
Sac a mains is a handbag in most of the english-speaking world and a purse is a smaller portable item ladies put their money in. I take it the use of 'purse' here is an americanism?
Hi Beatrice,
Thank you for posting.
Could you check if you have a free lifetime account? Those who have the free lifetime account can access only up to lesson 3 for free. If you have a basic or premium membership, please let us know which error message you see on the screen. It’d be great if you could send us an email at contactus@FrenchPod101.com so that we can take a look at the issue closely.
Thank you,
Cristiane
Team FrenchPod101.com
I can't assess the lesson
Bonjour Forrest,
Thanks for posting.
Please find below some series on pronunciation that can help you having a parameter for any words you need to speak:
https://www.frenchpod101.com/index.php?cat=28
https://www.frenchpod101.com/index.php?cat=60
Also, you can you the dictionary feature to check the pronunciation (and meaning) of a vast collection of words:
https://www.frenchpod101.com/french-dictionary/
(for example, if you type "suis", it will show the pronunciation of entries such as "I am")
Please let us know if you have further doubts :wink:
Cristiane
Team FrenchPod101.com
What if i cannot pronounce the other conjugations of a verb correctly ？
Thanks for your help on this, Marie. Really appreciated. :) :)
Peter
Bonjour Peter !
Thank you for your answer !
"I love it' => "Je l'adore"
"I love this lesson" => "J'ai adoré cette leçon"
"Est" come from the verb "Etre" ( to be) conjugated at present time
je suis = I am
tu es = You are
il est = He / she is
nous sommes = We are
vous êtes = You are
ils sont = They are
A bientôt !
Marie Alice
Team FrenchPod101.com
Bonjour Marie :)
Thanks very much for replying. I was attempting to respond to: "How did you like this lesson?" by saying "I love it", but I don't want to use Google Translate if I can help it because that's cheating. Unfortunately, somehow, I got confused between ça and est for "it", -- I don't know where I got "est" from, to be honest. I think "est" might even be Latin?!
So anyway, "How did you like this lesson?"
My answer: "J'adore ça !" I love it!
Ideally I'd like to say "I loved it", but I don't know how to form the past tense yet in French. Needless to say, French and I have a long road ahead.
Thanks again, Marie :) :)