Lost in translation: how to juggle between 3 languages

And end up speaking none 🙃. Here we shall talk about the advantages, difficulties, and fun bloopers of speaking 3 different languages daily.

First, as usual, a pretty sunset. Which will serve here as an introduction. Last weekend, I joined friends in Sologne, France, for a hen do. Idyllic farm with a swimming pool, pets galore, bike ride, and good wines, the weekend was a dream.

Are you dreaming yet?

It also took place entirely in French, which was a new (and old) situation for me. Over the last few years, I have mostly socialised in English and German. When I did speak French, when my friends visited me in my various cities, the day still entailed parts in German or English.

This weekend, except for the one phone call with my boyfriend, took place in French. And, despite French being my working language as a copywriter, and my native one, I realised that, in the 10 or so years I lived abroad, a lot of new expressions appeared. And found myself not able to understand some stuff.

“C’est quoi les bails ?”: that one left me a little stupid and clueless. After hearing it a few times and pretending I understood, nodding along, I did ask, discreetly, for a “translation”. A translation of my own native language. In English, it would be the equivalent of “what’s up/ happening”, a perfect translation though would be Hiberno English, with the “what’s the craic?” expression.

This “incident” brought back to my mind the few times when I did not understand English fully, which led to a funny quid pro quo. If I say “Cut the crab’,” which expression is it that I misunderstood?

Yes, correct, “cut the crap”. I did use cut the crab for a few years before someone kindly explained to me the correct expression. I still giggle picturing the expression in my mind.

🦀🦀🦀🦀🦀

Another misunderstanding that comes to mind: in the U2 underground towards my then workplace in Munich. 2 = Zwei in German. Yet, well into the tube drive, the driver said something like “Ou Zwo”. Guess who panicked and thought was in the wrong tube? Turns out Zwo is used in transports because Zwei is too close to Drei (3).

Aside from these little misunderstandings, juggling 3 languages feels like you’re a master of none, even your native one, while being highly qualified at language-related things.

I write and work mostly in French, but my style will sometimes be a tad closer to English, short, sharp, and more direct. When I edit my work, I need to adapt to a French style of speaking and writing. It is actually the hardest part for me, harder than grammar and punctuation.

I did work in English in the past. I even studied and wrote my BA and MPhil dissertations in academic English. What’s the most common feedback I got? “Sounds lovely, but a bit too French”.

On that note, little rant here, but as a non-native speaker, you’ll always be a lot more corrected than a native English speaker. I’ve noticed that native English speakers tend to overcorrect texts written by non-native ones, although our texts are understood by the majority of English speakers in the world. A lot of native English speakers will insert hard-to-understand words or idioms that only people born and raised in a specific context will understand. Anyway, rant over, that’s for another time.😘

Now, the tricky one is German. I’ve started working in German this year, and oh my, the struggle. The German you learn at school is nothing like the dialect of the region you’ll end up working in. I understand the news on TV quite easily, but when it comes to a specialised conversation in Bavaria, my brain is fighting. Let’s not even talk about phone calls and administrative situations.

And I do feel, that because I spend so much energy trying to speak and understand German on a daily basis, I end up losing my abilities in English, and sometimes even in French. This struggle often translates into being not able to speak any language correctly at the end of the day.

A mishmash between the three of them, and an acute need for silence, a good sleep, and a pause. Sometimes a deep rejection of the language I had to speak that day.

Now, there are some cool advantages to juggling between those three languages every day. And as a writer, my style is enriched by images, metaphors, and specificities of all three. I can also easily put myself into the shoes of someone whose English or French is not perfect, and adapt easily, which to me is key to communicating to the most. Hello marketers and journalists, please read the last sentence again.

The best advantage? I can gossip easily in any of those, which is great when my French friends come to visit me in Germany. Gossiping is bad btw, stop it.

If you speak with an accent, you never know what you’ll get: some people will warm up to you, some will straightaway stop taking you seriously. Many accents are rejected by society. Though I’ve been not discriminated for my accent personally, mocked at worst, the same cannot be said for multilingual people who are a lot more admirable in their knowledge, learning an entirely new alphabet, grammar, and ways of speaking, and are still completely rejected by idiotic societies who cannot even consider them as equal. Just because they have one accent, and not another.

Back to the advantages of speaking three languages: it means the possibility of exchanging with even more people and getting access to their stories and cultures more easily. It is also super helpful for understanding society in general. But let’s not dive into that either, I’d just recommend reading this post I wrote about how German and French attitudes can clash and how you see it in the language. It’s all love, promised.

Now I’m interested in your experience. Have you found yourself lost in translation? Do you speak multiple languages? Any fun anecdotes you’d like to share? Let me know. Again quite the abrupt ending but I doubt anyone is reading all the way hehe.