The resounding disaster that was my French Oral.

There are various things in this world which I simply do not like. Things that grate on me, things I detest.
Milk, for example. It just doesn’t taste right.
There’s also the colour orange. It makes me feel aggressive.
Could I forget people who spell the word “College” as “Collage”? Please, they don’t deserve free 3rd Level Education if they can’t even tell the difference between an institution of higher learning and a pretty dull art-form.
Or people who still haven’t mastered how to differentiate between “your” and “you’re” and “its” and “it’s”. How hard can it be?
Not necessarily finally, but most notably, the French language. In general. Seriously, how I abhor it.

What an absolute disgrace of a language/ subject- one which, as of yesterday, I shall never be speaking again. Ever.
I still have to sit the written exam, but there’s no reason why I have to speak it again. Ever. I’m never going to France or any French speaking countries in the future. Ever. On principle.
I’ve just spent the last 6 years learning it to forget it, basically.
As far as I’m concerned, France can just go burn and die, and take its hideous language with it. When I’m the leader of the world, I’ll exterminate all francophone country-dwellers. Mark my words.

So yeah then, my French Oral.
Well, it’s all been a bit of a mess and I’m afraid, to paint the full picture, I’m going to have to give a bit of background information.
I think I may have some major bad karma built up, because this week has all been one big stroke of massively unfortunate luck!
On Friday evening of last week, I started feeling pretty horribly sick and, to cut a long story short, was brought to hospital on Saturday where I spent three delightfully drug-filled days.
Now, much as I’d like to see myself in a hospital in the future, it’s not as a patient. Becoming a doctor would be quite delightful, grimacing in an uncomfortable bed just days before my French oral, well, it’s not the dream.
I had my “Shortcuts to Success- The French Oral” book clutched to my chest when I was in there, but it was pretty hard- nay, impossible- to get anything revised during my lovely little trip there.
I’m grand now like, but very tired. Very cranky. I’ve been better.

My French Oral was meant to be on Wednesday, but all things considered, I wasn’t bet into the idea of trudging into school and smiling idiotically at an examiner at that stage. I’m all for dishing out lots of ridiculous clichés and idioms through the medium of French, but not when I was feeling so damn sorry for myself. The school took this all into account, obviously.
It was a struggle to change out of pyjamas, never mind flashing the examiner my winning smile. Or just plain flashing her- anything for an A.

My oral was rescheduled until Friday, i.e., yesterday, which was a relief of sorts, but I still wasn’t exactly in the full of my health, eagerly anticipating it.
Because I missed my slot on Wednesday, I had to go follow the examiner on her tour of Waterford, so on Friday I had to go to another school to do it. Bear in mind, I’m not from Waterford- I don’t know where stuff is. At all.
The school in question, renowned for its high pregnancy rates and slight skanger-element, was difficult enough to find, let me tell you. I left my house an hour in advance, hoping to reach it at 12.15, 15 minutes before my oral, but found myself shouting at my father to accelerate at 12.25 when we weren’t even near the school.
I eventually got there, choked down a bottle of rescue remedy and found where I needed to go. I wasn’t particularly worked up, but I suppose the nerves were hitting a bit at this stage. There I was, in a scary different school, in my foreign uniform with nothing but a folder of French notes for protection.
I met the deputy principal of said school, a delightful lady, and she told me not to worry- the examiner was a fox. Actually, she said she was nice or something, but the examiner WAS a fox. A fox being a largely good thing, please note. So I met the examiner in question and realised, well, she was actually a lovely woman. She put me totally at ease, made me feel comfortable and made me forget about the pregnant, knife wielding masses of girls probably looking at me from every direction. She’d obviously been told I wasn’t well and was lovely and considerate! I had to sign about 10million different roles (Slight hyperbole possible) but soon enough we were on our way.
She was dead keen on all the basics, something which I did find a little off putting when I tried to introduce topics like “La Drogue” and the Health System, but which I had been warned about by others who had been examined by her. I slipped the subjunctive in just twice – “Il faut que j’aie presque 600 points” and “Il faut que je fasse la cuisine” when asked what I do to help around the house (A slight lie- I don’t cook!). I didn’t even get to use my delightful “IL FAUT QUE LE GOUVERNEMT PRENNE DES MESURES POUR AMELIORER LA SITUATION AVANT QU’IL SOIT TROP TARD” line which I love enough to capitalise.
We spent ages talking about Medicine, her grinning at me, me sitting there wishing I’d done more preparation. I decided, being an honourable student and all, I’d accentuate my illness like nobody’s business and tell her I was tired and weak, barely able to get out of bed. Granted I was actually quite tired and weak, but I wasn’t “tres tres TRES faible” and in quite as much pain as I decided to let on. Meh, as I said, anything for pity and hopefully, an A.
She was really interested in Irish as well, for some reason, which sucked majorly. How cruel is it to focus in on Irish in a French oral, even though I showed nothing but reluctance to speak about it? Obviously I switched “car” for “mar” once or twice there, losing my beloved French accent and making my words sound like they’d been coughed up by a cat.
I had a document prepared on Barack Obama, which I decided to NOT bring in with me for fear of the difficult questions I’d be asked. Meh times infinity.

Overall, I’m glad it’s over. But to be honest, it was a disgrace of an exam. I’m definitely going to have to work on my written section now to so much as match my grade from last year! I can’t believe it had to be so crap, but at least my little streak of poor health didn’t fall at the beginning of June!
Now it’s Easter, so I’ve two weeks to wallow around the house in self pity.
I just spent the last 4 hours playing soccer, eating ice-cream and going for a long stroll with my friend though, so looks like I’m not too bad! Meh.

I HATE being sick.

How did everyone else get on? Any great stories? Go on then, comment away.

18 thoughts on “The resounding disaster that was my French Oral.”

  1. Gah that sounds horrible, what rotten luck 🙁 I got some sort of head cold just says before my music practical and had to sing my 6 pieces with my nose totally stuffed up 🙁

  2. I think the examiners have to let little “car/mar” things slip. I definitely said “oui” in Irish and I think I said “mar” in French. They couldn’t possibly penalise us stressed-out trilinguals for that… right?

  3. Oh no! That’s terrible. Though at least, as you say, it didn’t happen in June!

    I brought in Amelie as my document, on being assured that anyone who had brought it in previously had only been asked questions like what happens, the characters, genre. So when the examiner asked me to tell me about my document, I speiled off some of this. She then proceeded to ask me about different scenes. I couldn’t even understand the questions, and the examiner wouldn’t move on, she just kept saying ‘La boite, la boite’ Yes yes, the box, the box. I understand that much, but I can’t talk about it, so move along!

    I’m also glad I never have to speak the language ever again, and if I thought I could get away without writing it ever again, I would pretend the last five years of french classes never happened. 🙂

  4. Elizabeth: That’s awful.. :(. Why the bad karma, why!?

    Liam: Actually, I heard that every single linguistic slip to that effect is looked down upon majorly, punishable by whips and chains, or something. Maybe that’s not true, just what that strange man told me last night.

    Aoife: Gah, stupid examiners, ruining our days. Could be a good sign though, maybe she thought you were better than your predecessors.
    Goooooodbye French, it shall never again be uttered after June! (I said that last year, but this time I mean it!)

  5. I knew making fun of your Scrubs addiction wasn’t the only thing I meant to do when you mentioned the murse changing your IV. Just can’t believe I prioritised teasing you over asking about a three-day trip to the hospital… I presume you’re not dead and zombified?

    Anyway, I fudged my German orals up real bad. Kept stuttering, and I think I said ‘agus’ a few times. Scheiße…

    Probably the first time I’ve ever choked in my life. Unless you count the time when I was 5 and bit off more of my hamburger than I could chew and started to choke and my mom had to do the Heimlich and scratched the inside of my throat with her long nails because she totally over-reacted and I would have been fine except I guess I do remember not being able to breathe and maybe she saved my life but it was the throat-scratching that was most vivid in my mind.

    Yeah.

  6. There are various things in this world which I simply do not like. Things that grate on me, things I detest. When people misspell/ misuse the french language.

    IL FAUT QUE LE GOUVERNEMENT PRENNE DE MESURE POUR AMELIORER LA SITUATION AVANT QU’IL NE SOIT TROP TARD

    XOXOX

  7. pity about your sickness! so happy the orals are over though!! 🙂 i had a few tough stages too in french, well not really tough more like blank moments…wups

    how are you handling a study plan? im completely unorganised and left all my revision to the last min for the mocks! realy dont want that to happen again for the big LC! can ya help please??

  8. Haha, I fully overdosed on Rescue Remedy beforehand as well. It’s such a lifesaver!! Even if it did make me a bit too giddy afterwards…And I was so proud of getting the subjunctive twice in too 😛 Glad yours went ok too 😀 Unfortunately my friend was a little nervous and managed to accidentally declare that she didn’t like meaths because her teacher was ‘fat and innapropriate’. (All she’d meant was ‘rude’…honestly.) Haha!!
    xox

  9. Emerald:
    Luckily I avoided that whole dying/ becoming a zombie thing…
    Scrubs is an epic show, but that had nothing to do with the fact that I had a murse. A murse!! Oh God, I love sexism.

    Sarah Murphy:
    Cool, I hate French. SO we make a good team. OMGZBBZKKTHX XxXxXxX

    Sarah:
    RE:”how are you handling a study plan? im completely unorganised and left all my revision to the last min for the mocks! realy dont want that to happen again for the big LC! can ya help please??”
    Well, so far, in my entire 6th year experience (this year and last) I’ve never actually EVER made a proper study plan. Aha, i wish I was joking.
    I’m going to write a big, colourful list today of all the stuff I want to get done over Easter, and then cross stuff out as I get it done. I think that’ll work for me, but then again.. I’m one of those people who studies best at around 4am.

    Kevin:
    Yesterday a pigeon made me shriek, in public. Eughhhhhh, flying ratssssss!

    Dorothy:
    Rescue Remedy ftw. Seriously, it’s too great. Although- giddy? I had a bit of a comedown afterwards! Ham, I think I over-overdosed.
    Haha, your friend’s a legend by the way!

    Liam:
    15 hours study today, aye?

  10. Have some respect for that douchebag who’s always whining about how he got nailed to a post that ONE time, resurrected, bragged about resurrecting for a few days and then bitched off to heaven because he realised how boring it was on the mortal plane and couldn’t be arsed to continue spreading the word of God when he could be cruising around the afterlife picking up angels instead. God, he’s such an asshole. No wonder I’m your favourite son…

  11. This is extremely offensive. i am french and the language is beautiful just cause your little brain cant comprehend the language doesnt mean its bad.

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