Je suis etudiente de Institu de retardation. Je parle Français un peu.

I enjoy French classes very much. I’ve been trying/dying to get this module for the past one year; it’s a faux pas for a fashion student to mispronounce Lancome, Louis Vuitton and Haute couture, ya know?

For the last couple of weeks, we learnt how to pronounce the French alphabets and numbers, greetings, form basic sentence structures and French grammar.

In French alphabets, A is not aey, not erh (like, a thing) but is pronounced as ahh. R is not arr, not ar-rer but is pronounced as airrrrrrr (note the rrrrr). Z is not zee, not zee-zed (I know people who pronounce it that way), but is pronounced as zed. G is pronounced as J, and J is pronounced as G. Only some letters like F, L, S sounds the same.

It is not uncommon to see me frantically scribbling down the pronunciation (in Singlish-style) to every new word I come across, for I have a memory like a ping-pong ball. Some are quite humorous; some are indecipherable to others but me. When I look across the classroom or in the lecture hall, I think my book is the most scribbled among all.

Thank god. This semester, they finally included a recorded audio CD with the lecturers’ vocalizations. Every night, I’d listen to my hansem French lecturer’s voice as I slowly conk off into ZeeZeeland. Such bliss. Hahaha.

Today, I shall present to you, The French Alphabet in Little Dowager’s style.

Disclaimer: I shall not be responsible for anyone’s embarrassment cause by one’s mispronunciation hor.

A – Ahh (as in Brouhaha) B – Beh (as in KNN Beh!) C – Say (no emphasis on Y) D – Day (no emphasis on Y) E – Urh F – Eff G – Ghay (a cross between Gay and Jay) H – Arsh (like a short tongued person saying “Arsehole!”) I – Ee J – Ghee (like Ghee, the butter they use for Prata) K – Kah (Not Car as in Toyota/Honda, but like Ther Kah (pig trotter in Hokkien) L - Elle M – Mne (no emphasis on E) N – Nne (no emphasis on E) O – Ooh (Emphasis on O; say a very masculine Ooh) P – Peh (A cross between Lim Peh and Pay) Q – Quu (not Qoo) R – Airrrrrrr (like a breathless duck gasping for Air!) S - Ass T – Teh (like Teh Tarik) U – Yuu (like how Caucasians pronounce Fish in Mandarin) V – Vay W – Doo-bler-vay (like… double V not double U. The Français say the Anglais got it wrong) X – Eix Y – E-grec Z – Zed

Vous comprenez?

C’est bien.

Numbers another time. wink