Qu’est-ce que tu fais dans la vie ? 👨🏻🌾
What do you do for a living?
Coucou ☕️🇫🇷🥐 I'm Amélie Laurent and this is my French newsletter. I supercharge your progress from A2 to B2 through colloquial dialogues.
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Bonjour mes chers abonnés 🙌🏼 It's great to have you here for another Thursday lesson!
Houseplant Love-in 💕🪴
J'ai également appris la semaine dernière que la majorité de mes lecteurs possèdent des plantes d'intérieur ! Juste quand je pensais que je ne pouvais plus vous aimer... vous me faites ça.
Today we’re going old school, back to basics. Roughly Chapter 4 of a traditional grammar book. Let’s talk jobs. 👨🏻🌾🧑🏿🏭👷🏽♀️
Bravo pour vos efforts, vous êtes des superstars!
We all secretly know the only way to truly learn a language are real-life conversations and experiences. Lessons and grammar can only take us so far.
While real-life experiences are difficult to recreate, my colloquial conversational dialogues help you learn authentic French in context. They’re how real French people actually speak.
If you have any questions or concerns - comment below or simply reply to this email.
Gros Bisous! A x
✨New Feature: Dialogue Audio 🎧
Dialogue du Jour
Théo : Qu’est-ce que tu fais dans la vie ✪?
Charlotte : Moi, je suis infirmière. Je m'occupe des personnes âgées. Et toi, Théo, tu bosses dans quoi ?
Théo : Je suis serveur dans un café. C'est du métro, boulot, dodo ✪, mais je m'y suis habitué ✪.
Charlotte : Oh, ça doit être difficile parfois. Mais c'est aussi un métier gratifiant, non ?
Théo : Parfois, ça peut être un peu intense, mais j'aime bien. C'est intéressant de rencontrer tant de gens différents chaque jour.
Charlotte : Oui, je peux imaginer. Mon taf ✪ est aussi intense, mais ça vaut le coup quand on voit le sourire sur le visage des gens.
Théo : Absolument. C’est une belle façon de voir les choses. En fait, je suis récemment rentré de congé ✪ et ça m'a fait réaliser à quel point ✪ j'aime ce que je fais.
Charlotte : C'est génial d'entendre ça. Il y a tellement de gens qui n'aiment pas leur travail ou qui sont au chômage ✪.
Théo : Oui, je me sens chanceux ✪. En fait, j’ai déjà été viré ✪ d’un job et c’était pas drôle. Mais bon, on vit et on apprend, n'est-ce pas ?
Charlotte : Tout à fait, Théo. On fait de notre mieux et on continue d’avancer.
♡ 𝕃𝕚𝕜𝕖 𝕓𝕖𝕝𝕠𝕨 👇
✪ Notes
Qu’est-ce que tu fais dans la vie? = Tu fais quoi dans la vie ? = Tu bosses dans quoi ?
métro, boulot, dodo ✨ = one of my all-time favourite French expressions - I just love it. It’s the Parisian way of speaking of (and critique in doing so!) the ‘daily grind’ or ‘the rat race’ - when life starts to blur into one continuous routine of ‘commute, work, sleep’ (the literal translation loses all of the charm and force). ‘Same old same old’.
je m'y suis habitué 🧩= I’m used (to it). être habitué à = to be used to
taf ✨= travail, emploi = job (colq.) ‘On s'en prend plein la gueule dans ce taf’ (This job is a real pain in the ass.). The other colloquial term is un boulot, which you met in the above sayings. un métier = job/occupation. That’s 5 words in total (for job)(if you were counting)🥸
(de/en) congé ✨= time off / holidays “Pierre est en congé pendant deux semaines” (Peter is on leave for two weeks)
à quel point = combien = how much (to what extent).
(être) au chômage = ne plus avoir d'emploi. le chômage = unemployment, chômeur/chômeuse = unemployed person
je me sens chanceux = I feel lucky. See my last dialogue for all things *luck*➹
virer = to get fired/sacked (colq.). “Je devrais vous virer pour ça” (I ought to fire you for that)
*✨ = especially ‘Frenchie’ words/phrases you should try and use more.
*🧩= ‘canned’ expressions or phrases that are best learned as a whole, like puzzle-pieces
Writing Prompt ✍️
Like most millennials I’ve been struggling to find my groove since moving to The World of Work. I was a French teacher for a while (obviously) and it’s what I have a passion for, but it didn’t pay the bills so well! So I’ve been middling in the corporate world for longer than I want to admit. My dream would be to teach French again though… something you all are helping with! 🥰
Alors, qu’est-ce que tu fais dans la vie ?
All answers are welcome. One word.. or one sentence.
Write me your answer in the comments. I can’t wait to read them! 👇🏼
Translation
T: What do you do for a living?
C: I'm a nurse. I look after the elderly. And what do you do, T?
T: I'm a waiter in a café. It's all subway, work, sleep, but I'm used to it.
C: Oh, it must be hard sometimes. But it's a rewarding job too, isn't it?
T: Sometimes it can be a bit intense, but I like it. It's interesting to meet so many different people every day.
C: Yes, I can imagine. My job's just as intense, but it's worth it when you see the smiles on people's faces.
T: Absolutely. That's a nice way of looking at it. In fact, I recently came back from leave and it made me realise how much I love what I do.
C: That's great to hear. So many people don't like their jobs or are unemployed.
T: Yes, I feel lucky. In fact, I've already been fired from a job and it wasn't much fun. But you live and learn, don't you?
C: Absolutely, T. We do our best and keep moving forward.
Exercise - Fill in the blank 💪
Quickly test your comprehension, accelerate your learning. 🚀
À cause de la situation économique actuelle, de nombreuses personnes se retrouvent malheureusement __ .
Due to the current economic situation, unfortunately, many people are finding themselves unemployed.Après des années de travail acharné, je suis enfin en __ pour une semaine.
After years of hard work, I'm finally on leave for a week.Je suis __ à mon emploi, malgré les longues heures.
I'm accustomed to my job, despite the long hours.C'est un rythme de __ pour moi ces jours-ci.
It's a routine of metro, work, sleep for me these days.Mon __ est assez intense, mais j'aime ça.
My job is pretty intense, but I like it.
If you’re struggling the ✪ Notes section is always a good place to look. 😉 The answers are all in the dialogue or notes section.
[NO PEAKING] Answer Key: 1. au chômage 2. congé 3. habitué 4. métro, boulot, dodo 5. taf
Une Façon d'utiliser ce Dialogue
These dialogues are a very simple tool. Yet this allows them to be versatile and endlessly flexible to you and your learning style.
Here’s one way you could use the dialogue this week:
🥪 Listening sandwich - Listen to the recording (2-3 times), then read the dialogue and fill in your understanding, then listen again.
This is a great way for beginners to boost their oral comprehension in small helpful doses. Listening first exercises your brain, and listening again after studying allows you solidifying the connections. It’s also encouraging as you can see what you’ve learned !
Check out my quick guide🔗 for different ways you can learn with these dialogues. Perfect if you’re finding them too easy or too hard. 🙌🏻
Private French Lessons
If you’re a serious intermediate student, and would like a private lesson, you can book one here →. Please note there are limited spots available, it is '“first-come first-served” as you say in English.
𝔻𝕠𝕟'𝕥 𝕗𝕠𝕣𝕘𝕖𝕥 𝕥𝕠 ♡ 𝕝𝕚𝕜𝕖 𝕠𝕟 𝕊𝕦𝕓𝕤𝕥𝕒𝕔𝕜👇
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Keep practicing, on se voit la semaine prochaine !
Amélie x
j'enseigne le piano. J'adore la musique et j'aime bien partager cet amour avec les autres.
Je fais des études du Marketing. Récemment, j‘ai fait un stage dans le départment marketing d‘une entreprise de la bière ce qui était très intéressant.