Thursday 27 March 2008

Merci-er

Parisians can't just say a phrase. They put an "er" on the end of everything which initially makes it sound as if they're starting on a new sentence when they're in fact just finishing the old one. Everything is transformed, "bonjour" becomes "bonjour-er", "comment t'allez vous-er" and so on ad infinitum. In part I think it comes from the way in which Parisians speak. The accent and banter is so fluid and flowing that one cannot finish so simply at the end of a word or phrase.

But it is the quickest way to tell Parisians from other French people, and it's my way of trying to sound more local-er.

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