Learn French with a podcast clip from Balades ep 1. This clip has 34 words in 14 seconds, take our transcription quiz and improve your listening in French!
Learn French with a podcast snippet! This clip is from Balades Episode 1. Listen and fill in what you hear below. Read more and find a translation below. Find the full podcast here.
The above audio sample and transcription is from Balades ep. 1. We do not own the content. Listen to the entire episode here.
Not with your hands
I like this clip because you get a little dialogue, as if kids are speaking and as if a grandmother is speaking. Isabelle’s accent does seem to change slightly when she gives her guidance on how to handle the fish. And this does impact the clarity of the phrase.
The next step with this project will be to find many different accents and build our abilities to understand a wide range of accents. Isabelle lives in Switzerland, so I wonder how much her accent is affected by that.
Then again, her family is Parisian and she did spend many months in her youth in and around Paris. I’m an English speaker who speaks with an American accent. English doesn’t seem to have the same stipulations about accents as other languages tend to have. At least, not from my perspective as a native speaker.
Learning French seems to have a preference for Parisian French. Learning Chinese for a “Beijing accent” or standard Mandarin accent in the Mainland. And in Spanish, the ever present debate of Castilian (Spain) Spanish vs Mexican or another country’s Spanish. The accent chosen is important. It determines how words are pronounced, how sounds change in the mouth, and how many people can understand you. Such important things as a learner.
All in all, it comes back to our ears (not our hands) and definitely not our mouth for learning. Active listening is golden.
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There’s absolutely no way that I could get through an entire podcast in French without melting my brain, that’s why I broke it up into snippets like this. Join me for the next snippet.
The snippet in English
Find a translation of this snippet here, how much of this did you hear?
« Viens, Stéphanie, aide-moi à remplir d’eau cette cuvette. »
« Mais non, les enfants, pas avec les mains… ! Prenez une épuisette pour attraper les poissons. Et mettez-les doucement dans la cuvette. »
“Come on, Stephanie, help me fill this bowl with water. “
“No, children, not with your hands…! Use a net to catch the fish. And put them gently into the bowl.”
The above text courtesy of Google Translate. Source
What does “pas avec les mains” mean?
“Pas avec les mains” is a French phrase that can be translated to “Not with the hands” or “Not manually” in English.
It is used to indicate that something should not be done with the hands, usually implies that there is a better or more appropriate way to perform the task. It is often used as a warning or a reminder of the proper way to do something.
For example:
- “Ne mangez pas avec les mains, utilisez une fourchette et un couteau” which means “Don’t eat with your hands, use a fork and a knife.”
- “Il ne faut pas ouvrir cette boite avec les mains, utilisez un tournevis” which means “You should not open that box with your hands, use a screwdriver.”
It is used to indicate that something should not be done with the hands, usually implies that there is a better or more appropriate way to perform the task.
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remplir
cuvette
épuisette
attraper
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