Dialogue

Vocabulary

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Lesson Transcript

INTRODUCTION
Greg: Hello everyone, I’m Greg. A Promising Future in France.
Mailys: Bonjour tout le monde. This is Mailys. In this lesson, we will learn about the ‘passé composé’, a form of past tense in French.
Greg: Jacques just got a new job and he’s going to Mireille’s place to tell her about it.
Mailys: They are using informal French as always.
Greg: Let’s listen to the conversation.
DIALOGUE
Jacques: Génial ! Je suis gérant de magasin ! J'ai hâte de raconter cette histoire à Mireille ! Elle va être contente et ses parents aussi, j'imagine. Gérant, c'est mieux que concierge, ça... Je vais nous acheter un gros gâteau pour fêter ça !
Mireille: Qui est là ?
Jacques: C'est moi, Jacques, laisse-moi entrer, vite ! Bzzzzzzz
Jacques: Salut, mon amour !
Mireille: Salut, mon lapin ! Dis donc, tu as l'air heureux, toi ! Qu'est-ce que tu apportes dans cette grosse boîte ?
Jacques: J'ai acheté un gâteau parce que nous allons fêter !
Mireille: ... et qu'est-ce que nous allons fêter exactement ?
Jacques: J'ai trouvé un nouvel emploi ! Je suis maintenant gérant d'un grand magasin au centreville !
Mireille: Tu es gérant !!? Félicitations !!! J'appelle maman !
Greg: Let’s hear the conversation one time slowly.
Jacques: Génial ! Je suis gérant de magasin ! J'ai hâte de raconter cette histoire à Mireille ! Elle va être contente et ses parents aussi, j'imagine. Gérant, c'est mieux que concierge, ça... Je vais nous acheter un gros gâteau pour fêter ça !
Mireille: Qui est là ?
Jacques: C'est moi, Jacques, laisse-moi entrer, vite ! Bzzzzzzz
Jacques: Salut, mon amour !
Mireille: Salut, mon lapin ! Dis donc, tu as l'air heureux, toi ! Qu'est-ce que tu apportes dans cette grosse boîte ?
Jacques: J'ai acheté un gâteau parce que nous allons fêter !
Mireille: ... et qu'est-ce que nous allons fêter exactement ?
Jacques: J'ai trouvé un nouvel emploi ! Je suis maintenant gérant d'un grand magasin au centreville !
Mireille: Tu es gérant !!? Félicitations !!! J'appelle maman !
Greg: Now let’s hear it with the English translation.
Jacques: Génial ! Je suis gérant de magasin ! J'ai hâte de raconter cette histoire à Mireille ! Elle va être contente et ses parents aussi, j'imagine. Gérant, c'est mieux que concierge, ça... Je vais nous acheter un gros gâteau pour fêter ça !
Jacques: Great! I'm a store manager! I'm looking forward to telling Mireille about this story! She will be happy, and so will her parents, I imagine. Manager's better than janitor... I will buy us a big cake to celebrate that!
Mireille: Qui est là ?
Mireille: Who's there?
Jacques: C'est moi, Jacques, laisse-moi entrer, vite ! Bzzzzzzz
Jacques: It's me, Jacques, let me in, quick! Bzzzzzzz
Jacques: Salut, mon amour !
Jacques: Hello, my love!
Mireille: Salut, mon lapin ! Dis donc, tu as l'air heureux, toi ! Qu'est-ce que tu apportes dans cette grosse boîte ?
Mireille: Hello, my bunny! Say, you look happy! What are you bringing in this big box?
Jacques: J'ai acheté un gâteau parce que nous allons fêter !
Jacques: I bought a cake because we are going to celebrate!
Mireille: ... et qu'est-ce que nous allons fêter exactement ?
Mireille: ...And what exactly are we going to celebrate?
Jacques: J'ai trouvé un nouvel emploi ! Je suis maintenant gérant d'un grand magasin au centreville !
Jacques: I found a new job! I'm now the manager of a big store downtown!
Mireille: Tu es gérant !!? Félicitations !!! J'appelle maman !
Mireille: You're a manager? Congratulations! I'm calling mom!
POST CONVERSATION BANTER
Greg: Mailys, in this dialogue, Jacques bought a cake to celebrate his new job.
Mailys: Well, you know, France is famous for its delicious desserts, especially its pastries, which is ‘ses pâtisseries’ in French.
Greg: What are some of the most well-known pastries and desserts, Mailys?
Mailys: Well, crêpes are the equivalent of pancakes, but they are thin and light. They are used both for desserts and as a meal. Croissants are a crescent-shaped pastry -- the name actually means “crescent”. And éclairs are long pastries filled with whipped cream and topped with a layer of chocolate. The name means “lightning”.
Greg: Oh and there's mille-feuilles, these rectangular shaped pastries made up of several layers of thin pastry, cream and chocolate and topped with a distinctive wavy pattern.
Mailys: Yum, that's right. And did you know the Christmas log also came from France?
Greg: Really? I didn't know that! It seems that no matter where you live, you can probably find French desserts nearby, so enjoy! Now let’s move on to the vocab.
VOCAB LIST
Greg: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson.
The first word we shall see is:
Mailys: génial [natural native speed]
Greg: awesome, great, brilliant
Mailys: génial [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: génial [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: avoir hâte de [natural native speed]
Greg: to look forward to
Mailys: avoir hâte de [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: avoir hâte de [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: acheter [natural native speed]
Greg: to buy
Mailys: acheter [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: acheter [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: gros [natural native speed]
Greg: big, large
Mailys: gros [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: gros [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: content [natural native speed]
Greg: glad
Mailys: content [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: content [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: fêter [natural native speed]
Greg: to celebrate
Mailys: fêter [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: fêter [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: lapin [natural native speed]
Greg: rabbit
Mailys: lapin [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: lapin [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: gérant [natural native speed]
Greg: manager
Mailys: gérant [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: gérant [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: félicitations [natural native speed]
Greg: congratulations
Mailys: félicitations [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: félicitations [natural native speed]
Next:
Mailys: appeler [natural native speed]
Greg: to call
Mailys: appeler [slowly - broken down by syllable]
Mailys: appeler [natural native speed]
VOCAB AND PHRASE USAGE
Greg: Let’s take a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. First is ‘Avoir hâte’ which means “to look forward” or “to be eager”.
Mailys: It's made up of the verb ‘avoir’ meaning “to have”, and is followed by the noun ‘hâte’, “haste”.
Greg: The preposition ‘de’ is used to introduce a verb. For example-
Mailys: Le nouveau gérant a hâte de commencer!
Greg: The new manager is eager to start!
Mailys: Mireille a hâte d'annoncer la bonne nouvelle à sa mère.
Greg: Mireille is eager to announce the good news to her mother.
Greg: ‘Appeler’ meaning “to call”, and ‘acheter’, “to buy”, present some small spelling irregularities. For ‘appeler’, the ‘l’ doubles when it is the last sound of the word.
Mailys: So, ‘appelle’ has a double ‘l’, but ‘appelez’ has a single ‘l’.
Greg: For ‘acheter’, when the ‘t’ is the last sound, the preceding ‘e’ becomes ‘è’.
Mailys: So ‘achète’ ends in ‘-è-t-e’, but not ‘achetons’ or ‘achetez’.
Greg: Despite these small changes, they are still considered to be regular verbs.
Mailys: Look at the lesson notes to see the correct spelling, and listen to the conjugation to get the right pronunciation.
acheter
j'achète
tu achètes
il achète
nous achetons
vous achetez
ils achètent
Greg: And now let’s look at the verb appeler
j'appelle
tu appelles
il appelle
nous appelons
vous appelons
ils appellent
Greg: ‘Gros’ means “big” or “large”.
Mailys: Ils ont une grosse maison avec une grosse piscine.
Greg: They have a big house with a big pool.
Mailys: Depuis qu'il est avec Mireille, Jacques est plus gros.
Greg: “Since he's been with Mireille, Jacques is bigger.” Ok, now on to the grammar.

Lesson focus

Mailys: The focus of this lesson is the ‘passé composé’, a past tense form of French.
Greg: To express the past tense, French uses two main verb tenses.
Mailys: The first one, called ‘passé composé’, expresses one-time events, or events marking change.
Greg: This would be the equivalent of “I bought-”, “I did-” or “I found something.”
Mailys: The second one, called ‘imparfait’, is used for ongoing or unfinished events.
Greg: This would means something like “I was doing-” or “I was looking for something”. In this lesson, we will introduce the first form of past tense, called ‘passé composé’.
Mailys: We have two examples of ‘passé composé’ in the dialogue - ‘j'ai acheté’ and ‘j'ai trouvé’.
Greg: The ‘passé composé’ is formed by using an auxiliary verb, which is usually ‘avoir’, meaning “to have”, and a past participle.
Mailys: The auxiliary verb is usually ‘avoir’, but a few verbs require ‘être’.
Greg: As for the past participle, it is formed by removing ‘-er’ from the end of the verb, and adding ‘-é’.
Mailys: It actually sounds the same as the infinitive and the ‘vous’ forms, so even native speakers have trouble spelling the past participle correctly.
Greg: Let's look at the ‘passé composé’ conjugation for the verb ‘aimer’, to like, or to love.
(Mailys: reads French, Greg: reads English)
j'ai aimé, I liked
tu as aimé, you liked (singular)
il a aimé, he/she/it liked
nous avons aimé, we liked
vous avez aimé, you liked (plural)
ils ont aimé, they liked
Greg: Now let’s hear some example sentences that use the passé composé.
Mailys: Elle a cherché un livre mais elle ne l'a pas trouvé.
Greg: She looked for a book but didn't find it.
Mailys: As-tu regardé cette série télé?
Greg: Did you watch this TV series?
Mailys: Ils ont fermé la porte à 21 heures.
Greg: They closed the door at 9 pm.
Greg: A small number of verbs require the auxiliary ‘être’, “to be”, instead of ‘avoir’.
Mailys: Out of the verbs we introduced in these 25 lessons, ‘devenir’, ‘venir’, ‘revenir’, ‘arriver’ and ‘aller’ need ‘être’.
Mailys: Il est arrivé à l'heure, comme toujours.
Greg: He arrived on time, as always.
Mailys: Es-tu allé au marché comme j'ai demandé?
Greg: Did you go to the store as I asked?
Greg: Reflexive verbs also need ‘être’, even when the verb otherwise needs ‘avoir’.
Mailys: J'ai lavé la table.
Greg: I washed the table.
Mailys: Je me suis lavé les mains.
Greg: I washed my hands.

Outro

Greg: Well, that brings us to the end of this lesson, and this series. We hope you enjoyed it and found it useful, and that you’ll join us for the next series.
Mailys: Yes, thank you all for listening!
Greg: Until next time everyone!
Mailys: Bye.

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