French, English and Montréal
Sign promoting the use of French language in a mall in Montreal: “I like when retail employee talk to me in French. Thank you.”
It’s only when I showed up at Starbucks that I realized I had no idea how to order in French. And ordering my coffee in English in Montreal would look back, wouldn’t it. But I needed coffee: this is a working weekend for me and I haven’t had much sleep the last few days.
I apologized right away: “désolée, je commande toujours en Ontario!”. The barista eyed me, not saying a word. I gave it a try: “Je pourrais avoir un… grand? Café vanille? Latte?” He sighed and corrected me: “on dit un moyen café latte vanille sans sucre”. “Oh, thank you! So that I will know how to order tomorrow morning!”
The barista turned to the other employee and yelled in English: “eh, can I have a grande skinny vanilla latte?” “Sure, no worries.”
I looked at him quizzically. He shrugged like a French guy would have: “I’m an anglophone, ya know”.
Oh Canada. The country where you never really know which language to use.
It reminded me of ordering at McDonalds’ in Québec a while ago, when I was still new in Canada. Feng and I were traveling around Montréal and had stopped to grab a bite. I was slightly happy that for once, I could order in my mother tongue – my English wasn’t that good and Feng was usually in charge of these things in Ontario.
I’m by no mean a regular McDonalds’ customer. In France, the only time I went there was when I was in high school. If the first class of the day was cancelled for any reason (for instance, if a teacher was sick), we had nowhere to go but McDonalds’, which was the only business opened before 10 am. We used to share McMuffins and hang out there for a couple of hours, waiting for the next class.
So I really wasn’t sure what to order and how to order it in Québec. I started with the drinks:
— Can I have two Coca Light?
— What?
— Two. Coca. Light.
Blank stare. I eventually pointed to the Coke machine behind the employee. “Ah, un Coke Diète!”.
The rest was equally as tricky because unlike in France, all the English names are translated to French: “McCroquettes” for “Chicken McNuggets”, “MacPoulet” for a “McChicken” etc. In case you were wondering though, “Big Mac” is “Big Mac”, but they call it “le” Big Mac. And the Quarter Pounder with cheese” is a “Quart de livre avec fromage” – in France, it’s a “Royal with cheese” – but of course Québec does use the imperial system.
Let me tell you, by the time I finished ordering, Feng was laughing out loud behind me. I sounded like an American redneck ordering in broken French.
After the experience, I began to translate everything to French every time I needed to speak Québec French. But as I quickly learned, it’s not that easy. For example, Staples, the popular office supply store, doesn’t translate literally as “Agrafes” – it’s “Bureau en gros”. Ooops.
You never know which language to use when talking to people either. Some people reply to you in English after you speak French, some take offense if you speak English but don’t speak French anyway. I’ve had minutes-long conversations in English before I realized we were both francophones. And I had similar conversations in French before realizing the other person didn’t understand a word of it.
Walking around in Montreal yesterday, I heard a lot more European languages (such as Italian, Spain Spanish, German etc.) than in Ottawa. I heard a lot of French from France as well which reinforced my perception that most French immigrants live in Québec.
I also noticed that I must have a ‘foreign’ look because people tend to speak to me in English everywhere I go in Montréal. And yet you can tell they are francophone by the accent, plus as soon as I reply in French we switch to that language. Weird.
Language and bilingualism can be a strange issue in Canada. It’s fun, though. I’m very happy that I can use both French and English daily.
Related articles:
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- French And English (3÷10)
- Learning French Or English In Canada (6÷10)
- Broken English
- John Erick: from Venezuela to Montreal
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@Cynthia — The West-end is definitely more English but I find most people speak both languages anyway, just English first. How about you, what is your first language?
@khengsiong — Yes, that’s the reason why. It’s just funny because I didn’t know at the time… same way the “stop” sign is translated to “arrêt” in Québec but in France, it’s just “stop”.
@Bluefish —
They were also handing out bag similar to the poster. I speak French first when I’m in Québec, except for a couple of times when I forgot to…
@Agnes — I think each country’s Mcdonalds’ has its local food. I remember the Kiwi burger in New Zealand (with beet!) and the cheese sandwiches in France.
@Linguist-in-Waiting — Yes, this is why I like to live in a bilingual country!
@angela — You would definitely fit in Montreal, franglais is the most spoken language! French speak franglais too, they just don’t know it
As for your story… I can totally picture it! I remember a while ago I was at my bank in France and an American guy came in, he wanted to know if he could exchange travellers’ cheque. He obviously didn’t speak French but for a few sentences which he must have learned. I could understand him no problem but the woman at the bank was stuck on the fact he had said “tu” instead of “vous”… seriously, give him a break, I thought!
@Beth — You are right, just trying to speak French will make your life easier and it is appreciated, like in France.
@Yasmine — Oh, I know, ordering at Starbucks is painful. I don’t know why they make it so difficult…!
@Soleil — I thought “coca” was the word used everywhere, kind of like “Mcdo”
@Seraphine — You know what, that may work!
@Celine — I guess you don’t need it in your side of the world.
@Gill — Yep, it is Pulp Fiction
Do you find a lot of differences between Canadian English and British English? I can understand BE no problem, mostly because I read a lot of book by British author. The slang is a bit different but I don’t find it hard to understand.
@barbara — And I think they say “beigne” for “beignet’, which I find funny because in French slang, “une beigne” is a clout.
@London Caller — But people wouldn’t understand because in France, fries are actually “Belgium fries”
Sounds confusing and terrifically fun at the same time! Such a shame that I grew up in Minnesota and have still never made it to Canada. I was so close.
.-= Tanya´s last blog ..Paris is the Most Expensive City in the World =-.
Haha, loved your post… I just read it to my colleagues who laughed too! I was actually surprised to find in France that they haven’t translated the McDonalds menu into French, it seems wrong for the French not to. I eat McDos occasionally — we get a good student deal.
I normally order — “je prends un menu *insert English pronunciation here* Royal Bacon s’il vous plaît?“
– “do you want fries and coke? ketchup?”,
– “oui, s’il vous plaît”,
– “seven euros please”,
– “merci, bonne soirée, au revoir“
– “thank you, good evening, goodbye”
Just because I have an accent, and don’t speak French particularly well, they ALWAYS speak to me in English at McDonalds in France!
.-= Kim´s last blog ..Shocking news… =-.
p.s. — I LOVE the kiwi burger with beetroot and egg… mmmm!
p.p.s. — NZ English whilst mostly BE has a lot of American English words. Is Canada similar? We say chips for crisps, chips for fries (yes it gets confusing having the same word for 2 different things!), truck for lorry, soccer for football…
.-= Kim´s last blog ..Shocking news… =-.
Oh jeez Zhu you should go live in India for a while.
I’m ready to explore Montreal now. I can only speak English. Chad can speak French but he says he feels shy.
hehehe
.-= Priyank´s last blog ..Hare and Tortoise =-.