Switzerland has four official languages: French, German, Italian, and Romansch. Our future city of residence, Geneva, is primarily French speaking. In attempt to integrate myself in the culture as much as possible, I have begun my quest to learn French. Unlike Jignesh who has an uncanny knack for languages and picks them up way too easily, I struggle a bit more. So, this should be interesting.
Monday night, Jiggy came home from work bearing a fantastic gift. Rosetta Stone French is a complete language learning program that teaches you to learn a language similar to how children learn their first languauge. It is suppose to be one of the best systems out there (the price proves it!) and even has a voice recognition system that will not let you continue until you say the word correctly. I quickly downloaded the program onto Rocket, my trusty laptop, and was able to say simple things like "the girl swims" in minutes! Ok, don't get me wrong...I have a very long way to go. I feel like a tongue-tied giraffe when trying to pronounce these words that sound nothing like the way they are spelled! I know that I am in for a complete shock when we actually land our feet in Geneva and I know that I will have no idea what people are saying. But, I have to start somewhere and I have admit that it is nice to use my brain (even if it does hurt). Rosetta Stone is just a supplement to my language quest. I plan to take classes once we arrive in Geneva but for now I hope to at least pick up some bits and pieces. Since we are speaking of languages, I guess this is as good a time as any to change the blog's official entry sendoff. So.....
Au Revoir!
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