Been and Gone

At the last session we talked about what we did over Christmas, and also some of our travels.  We heard all about Egypt, Lebanon, and some other exotic places.

Here’s something that came up: what’s the difference between BEEN and GONE, for example:

Where is Brian?  For once, Brian is NOT in the kitchen…

Brian has been to Egypt.

Brian has gone to Egypt.

Both BEEN and GONE are used as past participles of the verb GO, but with different meanings.

GONE means “left for” or “travelled to”.  BEEN means “travelled to and returned from”.

If I say Brian has gone to Egypt, that means he’s in Egypt now.  If I say he has been to Egypt, this means he is back in France again.

Notice the following sentences on a similar subject:

Brian came back to France. (not *at)

He came home. (here we don’t need “to”)

Brian has never been back to Egypt. (not *gone back).

Our next meeting is at 10.00am on Saturday 23/01.

Happy New Year!

May 2010 be full of good things for you, and a good year for improving your English!

It has been very quiet at the Café des langues in recent weeks for a number of reasons.  But we would like to start the new year as we mean to continue.   The first meeting for the new year will be on

Wednesday January 13th from 6.00pm till 8.00pm

at our usual place, the Café le Bon Pasteur in Nantes.

We will have a lot to catch-up on – come prepared to tell us how you celebrated Christmas and New Year, and whether you have made any new year’s resolutions.

Check the column on the right for the dates for the first trimester.

Look forward to seeing you.  Pour plus d’informations sur le Café des langues, cliquez ici.

No meeting on Saturday 31/10

It’s a shame, but we will have to put off (reporter) the fun of speaking English together until the next meeting which will be happening on  Saturday 14 November from 10.00 till 12.00 at the usual place.

Look forward to seeing you then.

We’re back!

This blog has been very sleepy over the summer months, but the Café des Langues has opened again.  We decided to try meeting on a Wednesday evening for a change, and had our first session on September 16th  with a few new people.  We will try to alternate between Wednesdays and Saturdays to make the gatherings more accessible for more people.

In our last session we talked about the interesting things we did over the summer.  Kathryn from New Zealand told us all about her travels.  She talked about some of the differences, and how she nearly got in trouble for not validating her train ticket (composter).  We told her a bit about Nantes.  We told her a little about her history, with words like…

• slave trade
• Carribean
• West Indies
• landowners
• race
• sugar
• spices
• cotton
• wealthy = rich (the noun is ‘wealth’)

A few of us had travelled abroad to other European countries over the summer.  We also talked about our leisure activities.  Françoise told us about her painting, and the following question was asked:

*For how long do you paint?

We thought we could improve the question, and came up with:

How long have you been painting (for)?

Notice that we generally put the question word (who, which, what, where, why, how etc.) at the beginning of the sentence.

Some of us worked over the summer, which brought up the following sentence:

*I’m used to work in the summer.

We improved it a little:

I’m used to working in the summer. (j’ai l’habitude de travailler l’été).

We noted that there is a similar sentence that means something quite different:

I used to work in the summer. (je travaillais en été.)

Good to be practising English again at our favourite café.  Next meeting: Wednesday 30/09 at 8.00 pm

Language from our last session: talking about birth order

We talked about so many things at our last meeting!  Here is a little summary to remind you of some of the language that we used.

1.  Talking about our plans for the weekend. “What are you planning to do this weekend?  What are your plans for the weekend?  What have you got planned for the weekend?”

I intend to + infinitive

I’m planning to + infinitive

I’m thinking of + -ing

I intend to visit a flea market (marché aux puces).

I’m planning to go to a garage sale (vide-grenier)

I’m thinking of looking for some paperbacks (livres de poche) at the second-hand bookshop. (= librairie.  Notez que “library” = bibliothèque/médiathèque)

I’m going to work around the house. (je vais faire du bricolage). I’m going to do some painting (peinture) and wallpapering (tapisserie.  Notez, “tapisserie de Bayeux” = tapestry).

I’m going cycling / going for a walk / going for a ride (dans une véhicule) / going riding (à cheval) / going hiking (faire une randonné)

2. Talking about the weather.

It’s pouring down.

It’s raining cats and dogs.

3. Talking about health.

I have a stomachache / a headache / a toothache.

I have the stitch. (J’ai des points de côté)

It hurts. (ça fait mal)

4. Talking about birth order. This was fun.  We discussed the advantages and disadvantages of being the firstborn, the middle child, the youngest, or an only child.

fraternal twins (faux jumeaux)

identical twins (jumeaux)

siblings (nom collectif pour les frères et soeurs; normalement au pluriel)

He’s older than me.

There is a gap of 8 years between me and my sister.

The firstborn has to show an example.

Parents expect a lot of the firstborn.  They are more demanding of the firstborn.

The firstborn has to look after his younger siblings.

The firstborn is the guinea pig (cobaye).

The youngest is spoilt (gâté).

The youngest has to wear hand-me-downs (des vêtements que le frère ou soeur aîné(e) à déjà porté)

Our next meeting will be on Saturday April 4th at 10.00 AM at the usual place.  All welcome!

How to get to grips with the verb “get”.

I seem to have had a lot of questions lately about the very versatile verb get. It is one of the 100 commonest words in the English language, and one of the top 20 verbs. It has very diverse meanings, and is used in a variety of ways. Specialists will say that it is not usually good form to use get in writing, but it’s so useful that it is difficult to avoid.

Here is a summary of the main ways we use get.

1. Get + noun/pronoun

When get is followed by a noun or pronoun, it usually means something like receive, fetch, obtain, or catch…

I got a postcard from Darren yesterday.

Did you get some flour when you went to the supermarket?

Wrap up warmly so you don’t get a cold.

2. Get + adjective

When get is followed by an adjective, it usually means become…

I can’t climb those stairs so quickly these days – I must be getting old.

Turn that radiator on so you can get warm .

3. Get + preposition

When get is followed by a preposition, usually some kind of change or movement is implied…

What time do you usually get up in the morning?

Why don’t you get out of the house and get some fresh air?

4. Get + past participle

A. Get is often used for expressions where other European languages use reflexive verbs. We use this to talk about something we do to ourselves:

get dressed
get lost
get engaged
get married
get divorced
get confused

B. Get can also replace be in passive structures such as…

The thief got caught when he used a stolen credit card (= was caught).

I got invited to Terry’s wedding (= was invited).

C. When there is an object before the past participle it can mean to finish doing something…

It has been so humid lately that it takes days to get the washing dried.

Get your room tidied and we’ll go to the park.

D. We can use the same structure (get + object + past participle) to talk about arranging for something to be done by somebody else.

I must get my hair cut – it’s looking terrible.

Peter has gone to the garage to ask about getting the car fixed.

5. Other uses:

get + -ing usually has the meaning to start doing something:

You should get going otherwise you’ll miss your train. ( = you should leave now)

get + to + infinitive often has the meaning to persuade:

I can’t get my husband to agree on the colour of the carpet.

This little list doesn’t cover every use of get, but it’s enough to get you started. If you get stuck you could always get yourself a dictionary. Don’t get frustrated if you find it difficult to understand all the uses of get. It gets easier as you get used to the language. So, why don’t you get on with it?

Vocabulary from our last session: sickness and professional development

Last meeting we were planning to talk about our hope and plans for 2009, but instead we started off by talking about sickness! Not the most joyful topic, but we got lot’s of good vocabulary out of it and it is something that is a common topic for the middle of winter.

• n. the flu (la grippe – noter qu’il faut toujours utiliser l’article: “I caught the flu”)
• n. headache (mal de tête: “I’ve got a headache”)
• n. disease / illness (maladie)
• n. cold (rhume: “I’ve got a cold”)
• n. mumps (les oreillons)
• n. measles (la rougeole)
• n./v. cough (toux/tousser)
• runny nose (le nez qui coule: “I’ve got a runny nose”)
• n. nurse (infirmier/infirmière)
• v. cure / heal (guérir)

  “I don’t feel well.” (Je ne me sens pas bien)

A couple of the people in the group had some plans for professional development in 2009:

• n. internship (stage)
• n. competitive exam (concours)
• n. civil servant (fonctionnaire)
• n. tax / taxes (les impôts)
• n. retirement (la retraite)
• adj. retired (retraité)
• n. primary school (école primaire)
• n. middle school (collège)
• n. secondary / high school (lycée)
• n. higher education (études supérieures)
• n. unemployment (chomage) – unemployment rate (taux de chomage)
• adj. unemployed (au chomage)
• n. grève (strike)

We also talked a lot about the Faroe Islands thanks to our Faroese friend who joins us, and we heard a little about Guadeloupe from Louis. Keeping on the theme of islands, for our next meeting on Saturday February 21 at 10h00 we are going to talk about New Zealand for a bit of anglo-saxon culture. I’ll bring some photos to start the conversation, but come along with questions about everything you ever wanted to know about New Zealand.

The Café des langues is open again

We have had a long break, partly because our favourite café was closed for renovations. But we’re starting again on Saturday 7/02. Check out the About page for information about where to find us.  You can find the dates for our future meetings in the green box on the right.  If you haven’t been before, the Café des Langues is a relaxed place where we practice our second language.  We mainly focus on English at the moment, but also have the possibility to start a German-speaking group – if you are interested you can use the Contact Us page to let us know.

The “new year” is not very new any more, but as we haven’t seen each other for a while, let’s talk about some of our hopes and plans for 2009:

• Overall, do you generally feel optimistic, pessimistic or indifferent about the year 2009. Why?
• How were the holidays – did you have a nice break? What kinds of things did you get up to?
• Do you usually go shopping in the “sales” at the beginning of the year? What did you buy this January?
• Where would you like to go on holiday this year?
• What projects will you be working on in the first quarter of this year?
• Did you make any New Year resolutions? By the end of this year, what skills, activities or studies will you have completed?
• Have you put together a list of music to buy, books to read or movies to see this month/this year?
• What are you going to do this year to improve your level of English?

See you Saturday.

What defines French culture?

The theme for the next language café is CULTURE. Here are some questions to help you with this vast subject:
* What are some things that define a culture? For example, music, language…
* What do people from other countries think about French culture?
* What do you think is unique about French culture?
* What are some things that you appreciate about other cultures that you know? What are some things that you find really strange?
* Is there anything that frustrates you about your own culture?
* How do you think French culture has changed since you were a child? Since your parents were children?
* Would you ever consider living permanently in a country other than your own? Which country? What are some of the differences that you would have to get used to?

Si vous désirez venir pour pratiquer l’espagnol au lieu d’anglais, merci de nous le signaler par mail (adresse à droit), ou par le formulaire “contact”. Gracias.

See you Saturday

Language to talk about Home

Last session we started with the English proverb:

“There’s no place like home”,

and talked about the difference between house (la maison) and home (chez soi).

Another proverb we learnt:

“Wherever I lay my hat, that’s my home.”

We talked about different kinds of dwellings:

• house boat, barge (péniche)
• ranch-style house (US: une maison plein-pied – similaire à la maison vendéenne)
• three-storey house (maison à trois étages)
• council flat (GB – un appartement HLM)
• housing estate (un cité – un groupement d’immeubles HLM)
• rental flat (un appartement en location)
• ground floor, first floor, second floor etc. (rez-de-chaussée, 1er étage, 2e étage etc.)

Some other words and expressions that helped us describe our homes:

• space (espace)
• wide (large)
• square metres (mètres carrés)
• living room (salon/séjour)
• lawn (pelouse)
• chores (les petits boulots/le ménage)

But as usual, we talked about a lot of things not just related to the theme. Had some really interesting conversation about art and artists that we enjoy. Perhaps that could be a theme for another language café?