Originally posted by Canada_Rockies We disagree often, but never get violent about it. We do have the occasional misunderstanding. I learned French in Military College from the age of 17-20. She learned English after becoming an RN, in French, in a crash course when she joined the army to become bilingual. Her English was very difficult when we became engaged (in French, of course - family joke: I asked for a one night stand and got it wrong). She hit a whole bunch of culture shock. 2½ months after the wedding she joined me in West Germany where I was posted on a NATO stint, and tended to use a lot of sign language in the small town where we found lodgings (hence the delay in rejoining me: newly weds don't rate high on the married housing lists). Her English improved extremely rapidly. There were fewer French speakers in my unit than English.
We're both English speakers, but M is very good in both French and Russian. For me, everything since "Dah-dah. Goo-goo" seems like a complex foreign language. I had Spanish, then French, then German pounded into me, with nothing to show for it save exasperated instructors (took remedial spelling in grammar school as well, but I defeated them). My French is such that when I try it on a native speaker, they don't know whether to cry or fall into paroxysms of laughter.
Last edited by WPRESTO; 02-25-2016 at 06:44 AM.