Learn how to talk about past events and make comparisons
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| INTRODUCTION |
| Brandon: How Long Have You Lived in this French City? Brandon here! |
| Yasmine: Bonjour. I'm Yasmine. |
| Brandon: In this lesson, you’ll learn to how to compare things in French. The conversation takes place in a restaurant. |
| Yasmine: It’s between Florent and Jérémy. |
| Brandon: The speakers are friends, so they’ll be using informal French. Okay, let's listen to the conversation. |
| DIALOGUE |
| Florent: Tu es de Nice ? |
| Jeremy: Oui, je suis né là-bas. |
| Florent: Quand es-tu venu à Paris ? |
| Jeremy: Quand j’avais 17 ans. |
| Florent: Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque ! |
| Jeremy: En vérité, j’ai étudié des guides de voyages pour touristes. |
| Brandon: Listen to the conversation one time slowly. |
| Florent: Tu es de Nice ? |
| Jeremy: Oui, je suis né là-bas. |
| Florent: Quand es-tu venu à Paris ? |
| Jeremy: Quand j’avais 17 ans. |
| Florent: Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque ! |
| Jeremy: En vérité, j’ai étudié des guides de voyages pour touristes. |
| Brandon: Listen to the conversation with an English translation. |
| Florent: Tu es de Nice ? |
| Florent: You're from Nice? |
| Jeremy: Oui, je suis né là-bas. |
| Jeremy: Yep, I was born there. |
| Florent: Quand es-tu venu à Paris ? |
| Florent: When did you move to Paris? |
| Jeremy: Quand j’avais 17 ans. |
| Jeremy: When I was 17 years old. |
| Florent: Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque ! |
| Florent: But you know Paris better than anyone! |
| Jeremy: En vérité, j’ai étudié des guides de voyages pour touristes. |
| Jeremy: Actually, I studied travel guides for tourists. |
| POST CONVERSATION BANTER |
| Brandon:Yasmine, how common is it for young people to move to a big city in France? |
| Yasmine: Well, there is an increasing number of young people from the countryside moving to cities. |
| Brandon: What cities do they usually move to? |
| Yasmine: I’d say Paris, Marseille and Lyon mainly. |
| Brandon: Like in other countries, it seems like the migration of young adults to urban areas is quite common, as they look for jobs and educational opportunities. |
| Yasmine: It’s so common that we have a French phrase for this trend, which is exode rural. |
| Brandon: That means "rural exodus." It makes sense, because many large companies and renowned universities are in the cities. And that provides career opportunities. |
| Yasmine: Exactly. I'm living in Lyon, which is a big city, so there is less unemployment compared to other cities. But living in a big city is not cheap. |
| Brandon: I’m sure the rent must be very expensive. Okay, now onto the vocab. |
| VOCAB LIST |
| Brandon: Let's take a look at the vocabulary for this lesson.The first word is.. |
| Yasmine: là-bas [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: over there |
| Yasmine: là-bas [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: là-bas [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: Next we have.. |
| Yasmine: venir [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: to come |
| Yasmine: venir [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: venir [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: Next we have.. |
| Yasmine: connaître [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: to know |
| Yasmine: connaître [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: connaître [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: Next we have.. |
| Yasmine: quiconque [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: anyone |
| Yasmine: quiconque [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: quiconque [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: Next we have.. |
| Yasmine: vérité [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: truth |
| Yasmine: vérité [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: vérité [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: Next we have.. |
| Yasmine: étudier [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: to study |
| Yasmine: étudier [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: étudier [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: Next we have.. |
| Yasmine: guide de voyages [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: guide book |
| Yasmine: guide de voyages [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: guide de voyages [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: and last we have.. |
| Yasmine: touriste [natural native speed] |
| Brandon: tourist |
| Yasmine: touriste [slowly - broken down by syllable] |
| Yasmine: touriste [natural native speed] |
| KEY VOCAB AND PHRASES |
| Brandon: Let's have a closer look at the usage of some of the words and phrases from this lesson. The first word is.. |
| Yasmine: être née |
| Brandon: meaning "to be born." |
| Yasmine: Etre is a verb meaning "to be." Né is an adjective meaning “born.” Née is the feminine form. |
| Brandon: If you want to explain where you were born in French, you have to use.. |
| Yasmine: être + né + preposition + the place name. |
| Brandon: Can you give us an example? |
| Yasmine: Sure. Je suis né à Paris, |
| Brandon: meaning "I was born in Paris." |
| Yasmine: or Cette fille est née en Italie, |
| Brandon : meaning "This girl was born in Italy." You can also use the verb |
| Yasmine: venir |
| Brandon: to say which city or country you’re from, even if it's not your hometown. |
| Yasmine: For example.. Je viens de Lyon. |
| Brandon: "I'm from Lyon." Okay, what’s next? |
| Yasmine: Quiconque, |
| Brandon: meaning "anyone." It’s a formal French word that you find mainly in formal registers, such as law and other administrative jargon. It can be an indefinite relative pronoun or an indefinite pronoun. |
| Yasmine: That’s right. Its meaning is something like tous les gens qui... "all persons who...". Quiconque only refers to people. |
| Brandon: But for French people, it sounds too formal, right? |
| Yasmine: Yes, and it can be hard to pronounce, so you can replace it with qui or another indefinite pronoun. |
| Brandon: Okay, now onto the grammar. |
Lesson focus |
|---|
| Brandon: In this lesson, you'll learn how to compare things in French |
| Yasmine: Let’s first look at the word meilleur.. |
| Brandon: ..which means "better." |
| Yasmine: When comparing things using the adjectives bon, |
| Brandon: "good," |
| Yasmine: and the adverb bien, |
| Brandon: "well," |
| Yasmine: ...be aware that when you’re expressing a greater degree, the conjugation is not plus bon or plus bien, but meilleur for the adjective bon, and mieux for the adjective bien. |
| Brandon: We heard this word in the dialogue, right? |
| Yasmine: That’s right. In the dialogue we had Mais tu connais Paris mieux que quiconque ! |
| Brandon: Which means "But you know Paris better than anyone!" |
| Yasmine: Note that we didn’t say something like plus bon, which is a common mistake that French learners make. |
| Brandon: Can you give us one more example? |
| Yasmine: Sure. Ce costume est mieux fait que l'autre. |
| Brandon: which means "This costume is made better than the other one." And there are some other words for making comparatives. When comparing qualities, you can also use an adjective, right? |
| Yasmine: That’s right. For example...ton costume est plus élaboré que le costume de Boris. |
| Brandon: meaning "...your costume is more elaborate than Boris's." |
| Yasmine: Or.. Tu es aussi bonne que moi, |
| Brandon: meaning "You are as good as I am." As you can see in these sentences, there are three degrees of comparison in French. |
| Yasmine: That’s right. First we have plus. |
| Brandon: This means “more” and shows a greater degree of something. You also have another word like “as,” as in “the same as”, right? |
| Yasmine: Yes. It’s aussi. You can show equality with aussi. |
| Brandon: And also, a lesser degree can be characterized with the word meaning “less,” which is.. |
| Yasmine: moins in French. To sum it up, you can say moins, aussi, or plus + adjective + que, or qu' to compare things. |
| Brandon: Listeners, make sure to check the lesson notes for more examples and explanations. |
Outro |
| Brandon: And that’s all for this lesson. Thank you for listening, everyone, and we’ll see you next time! Bye! |
| Yasmine: À bientôt! |
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