When I went to France after taking French in high school I tried speaking French to various people and they usually responded to me in English. That's certainly one way to say "your French is shit."

Dur mais réel.

French people are so bad at speaking english that those who can manage want to show it off at every opportunity.
But in Montréal, it's more a matter of an inferiority complex from french speakers. And the habit to be forced to speak english with those who don't want to learn french.

When I went to France I remembered enough high school French to ask for directions, but didn't remember enough to understand the reply. Luckily everyone spoke English anyway.

I tried to buy cigarettes. "Winston, s'il vous plait," while pointing at them. Lady started screaming for her colleague, "anglais!" Then I had to ask for them in English.

No need to bother with French.

Bro I made so much effort to learn this foreign language, of course I am going to use it whenever I have the occasion!
I do this also with other language I know.

People that have lived in France for years and speak perfect French told me that when they try to order something in French the waiters just look at at them with contempt and respond in English. It's not you, it's them.

I worked for a year in the entertainment department on Queen Mary 2. On one voyage there was one French family who were very pleasant. So I attempted to be a Good Employee greeted them at the door of the theatre one evening with a cheery "Bon soir!", as per my GCSE French.

The following seconds were exceptionally awkward, as I had no idea what they replied with.

I learned a lesson that day.

Isn't French in Quebec very different from everywhere else that speaks French?

Try leading with "Hello-Bongjoor", they'll understand.

Some words have a different meaning, they use a lot of English words, and have a unique accent. We Frenchmen can understand québécois with minimal difficulty.

Thank you. I have heard differently before, but never from a first hand source.

Some pronunciations are very different for sure. For example, France French says montagne (mountain) sort of like mohn-tahn-yeh, and in Montreal it's mohn-taine.

i’ve worked as a cashier in quebec, and i promise you if you don’t speak french, don’t pretend, you’ll only make things more awkward for everyone lol. personally, if someone speaks to me in french, even with a big accent, i reply in french, tho i know that not everyone does

ask if we speak english, more often than not (especially in montreal) the answer will be yes, and if not we’ll get someone who does. (at least that’s how it was where i worked, maybe other places who are less used to have english-speaking customers would react differently)

Yeah. You can tell the people who don't travel internationally that much always insist on trying to speak the local language as much as possible without understanding the high time cost of language switching in the middle of the interaction instead of establishing the language at the beginning.

I'm not familiar with the "jig is up" saying. Someone mind explaining it?

It means something to the effect of "I've been caught in a lie and can't keep up the act anymore"

perfect French

Its like there's a nation actively trying to kill its own language.

Lingua Franca indeed.

Interestingly, Québécois French is less likely to use loanwords like "le weekend", preferring instead to use terms like "fin de semaine" (literally "end of the week"). In terms of vocab used, a French person is still likely to understand a Québécois French speaker (and vice versa). I can't speak for how much impact accent has on intelligibility though

Source: English person who did 8 years of French in high school, who also has a French Canadian friend

Cat's out of the bag

The easiest way to compare is Irish/Scottish relative to global English. Or better yet, a thick American southern accent compared to a British accent.

The idioms, the accent etc all have their particularity. Typically quebecers can understand French from France but the opposite is a little more difficult.

All that being said, just like all languages there's localised variations around quebec. And a trained hear can usually tell the difference between someone from Gatineau, Montréal, quebec, Gaspésie or Lac St-Jean.

Same thing happened to me when I went to southern Mexico. I tried using the 3.5 years of Spanish I took and they barely even tried to humor me. At least the housekeepers were pretty chill and would indulge my not amazing Spanish lol

I lived with a French Canadian while living in France. They like to get so high and mighty about speaking "purer" French with "less loanwords", but I would say they use just as many if not more.

One example was a day we started taking about cars. I hear him use words like "wheel" and "bumper" (literally just the English words with a French accent) and I'm like "bro do they really not use the French words for those in Canada?"

I went to Paris once, and despite everything I had heard my whole life, if you start off with a Bonjour and end with a Merci, in between, the locals are almost all perfectly happy to speak English with you.

I’m sure I say these things with a thick American accent so they all know not to continue too much further in French.

I had a similar problem when I lived in Japan, but it manifested in sort of the opposite manner. My Japanese was shit, but my work (as an English teacher) required that I answer the phone using a long Japanese greeting.

Eventually, I could do that greeting in my sleep with very little accent. And I have a name that could be mistaken for a Japanese name.

Inevitably, I'd finish the greeting and they'd respond with a torrent of full speed Japanese that I couldn't understand at all.

I considered doing the greeting poorly, but instead, I just said "Hello" in English after finishing the greeting and people usually got the idea.

written french is a lot easier to understand than spoken french, we need IRL real time subtitles for these people...

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/the jig is up

when you go in with the plan of saying "one coffee please" and you know how to say it and you think you know how to pay for it, and then you get a question you don't understand after "hello", that is something i can relate to
i guess it's probably different in canada, where english is a majority language, so you can basically assume everyone speaks it, but when i was driving through germany, i first tried using my rusty german, and if/when i reached my limits, i asked if they spoke english
and also it's a challenge for oneself, i wouldn't want to take that away from people, although i can see how it can be frustrating when a long queue halts for some time due to communication issues

8 years of French in high school, huh?

ahn kwassan!

"I'd much rather stumble around in English than witness whatever the fuck you're about to do to my mother tongue" - the French

But yes, a simple "Parlez vous anglais?" puts most conversations firmly in friendly territory. It's entitlement that puts most people off.

I suppose it wasn't all in high school. It was between the ages of 10 and 18, which would mean that it was from Year 5 to Year 13. In my country, secondary school is from year 7 to year 13; I said "in high school" because that's when the majority of it took place

That’s how it was in NL too.

We’d say hello / good morning in Dutch and they’d clock my accent and switch to better English than I could muster.

That's a Paris thing

Go even a meter outside the city and people will pretty much ignore you when you don't talk french

Source: the bunch of French people I know

Say something to prove you've never been to france without saying you've never been to france.

Definitely been there multiple times.

Plus I know people who live there their whole life

All I need is to get that first beer in me and two years of high school French comes flooding back until they ask me to stop.

My gf studied Dutch for years, came over to NL, spoke to my parents in Dutch, all good.

Then we ordered things in a café. She kept speaking Dutch, the waitress understood, but kept replying in English with a heavy accent. Then switched to Dutch when speaking to me.

I've always heard those stories and couldn't imagine anyone being so rude but yeah.

The meaning behind the idiom is that "jig" is an old term for a trick, so you're no longer fooling the person.

They do like the words un hamburger/hotdog. They have their own slang, want to test your mingled(mangled) language skills? Try talking to an Acadian, a mixture of french and english in the same sentence, so much fun. Accent has a HUGE effect, rural folk(not living in the cities like MTL, Quebec city, and a few others) can have such a thick accent I can't understand 2/3 of their words

Oh they weren’t being rude to me.

I had it explained as “15 million Dutch people speak mostly Dutch, but we all speak French / English / German cuz they can’t stop fighting wars here”

Really, alors vous pouvez sur et certain me dire que la majorité des français hors de Paris sont ceux qui traitent les étrangers qui ne parlent pas le français comme les Parisiens étaient bien connu partout en france pour traiter les étrangers pour des décennies?
Cool good to know you know someone therefor confidently incorrect, I can tell you this by having lived there and having family there both in Paris and its suburbs and other places within the country. But please tell me more about france from your perspective.

Une baguette SVP

I only know enough French to start bar fights in Montreal, which gets awkward because the folks involved are generally better at bar fights than I am.

Regardless, I'm convinced there is nothing in this world more satisfying than a hearty "TabarNAK" at just the right moment. Fuck's a great word, but there's just something about those extra two syllables and the emphasis at the end that fills me with joy.

I went to the many places in small villages, think about 200 people there, and was welcomed with open arms.
My French was bad but with trying to talk with hands and feet in English and French did a lot. They learned English and I learned French.

...

Viva la France

I wasn't sure if you were trying to make a joke about the quality of your ability to communicate in French lol

I mean, I'm sure they have an accent, but in America you'd be considered racist for disparaging someone over that.

Maybe that's the cultural disconnect.

I still can't quite accept that the French for "what" is literally "what is it that"

What is quoi. For "what is that?" we say "C'est quoi?", which translates to "This is what?".