Le Blog

Another Friday afternoon, and for the first time in two weeks I have time to do something unproductive - which in this case is updating my blog. Or le Blog, as I will now call it. It could be la Blog though, I'm not sure.

I've been trying to learn French for a month now, and progress is slow. The French still harbour a bit of a hope that their language can be seen as a world language, harking back to their glory days as the world's cultural leaders. I understand that desire, but I have to say that it might help if they made their language just a little bit less impenetrable to the outsider.

The basic problem with learning French is that somewhere along the line the French people seem to have lost that essential connection between the alphabet and the language, because there appears to be no true relationship between the letters on a page and the word that is spoken. The common theme is that the last syllable of a word just drops away, but not in any systematic way - just about two thirds of the time, and for no reason related to what those letters might be.

Then you get to French numbers. Up to 60, its ok, but after that it gets a little strange - to say seventy you say sixty ten. 75 is sixty fifteen. At 80 it gets better - four twenties. And if you want to get to 99, try four twenties nineteen. I suspect the reason the French are having so much trouble containing their budget deficits may be that, with such a number system, they just don't count all that well.

Trouble with the language has also led to me developing a somewhat inaccurate reputation in French class, to the great amusement of my teacher and class mates. In one of the first lessons we were asked whether we knew any french verbs. At that point the only french I knew was 'voulez vous couche avec moi', which I knew was not appropriate for a French class. However, I assumed I could use a literal translation, and 'coucher' would simply mean 'to sleep' - a perfectly innocent verb to contribute to the conversation in the right context. Not so - the verb does not mean to sleep (dormir) and does not have an innocent meaning. So in my first French class, the only thing I was able to contribute to class was a verb that basically translates as 'to shag'.

Since that point its been assumed that I regularly use this verb, and every time verbs come up, coucher is repeated as 'max's verb'. This week we learned about meals, and the French teacher specifically pointed out that I might like to use the phrase 'would you like to have breakfast with me', which I am told can only be taken one way in France.

Language aside, its been an intense couple of weeks here. Think about how much work you would have had to do at uni if you actually had to read every assigned reading for every class. Then imagine you were doing a degree compressed into half its usual length (MBAs in most of the world take two years). It makes for very busy days. My days at law school were basically spent not learning a thing for 13 weeks of semester and then studying like a mad man for two weeks before exams. Here that is not an option, as the exams start as soon as classes finish, so you have to stay on top of things as you go.

Then there is the group work. All assignments here are done in a group - the international bunch that I mentioned in the last post. Groups, I have to admit, pose a new challenge. Most of you will know that admitting I am wrong, or even entertaining the notion, is not something that comes naturally to me. Yet my group seems strangely unconvinced that I am always right. Maybe they just need to spend more time with me ;-)

Finally some favourite quotes from some of my lecturers. I should mention that one thing about this place that shows is that it takes teaching very seriously. I remember well the many research focused professors at Sydney Uni that had very little interest in teaching, and did a very poor job of it. While research is a big thing here too, the lecturers are all very good, which makes a great change. But they are all European, and while they all speak near perfect English, they still manage to drop some great quotes to liven up their classes once in a while:

Economics lecturer, as his phone started ringing mid lecture: "Oh, its my mum" - hangs up the call. He laughs - "Doesn't matter, she is half dead anyway" Realising that the class is in shocked, awkward silence: "oh, I mean deaf, not dead"

Finance lecturer (with a thick German accent): "vot iz a cashflow?" - "vell, cash flow is ven it makes ring ring, ja?" (referring to an old till)

Same finance lecturer: "But vot iz the differenz betveen Bernie Madoff and Sarkozy? Madoff goes to jail for his ponzy scheme, ja, but ze french government continues, ja?"

On a totally unrelated note, and in a move of blatant cross promotion, INSEAD have asked us to help them publicize the official blog, where I am one of quite a few contributors. It's aimed at potential MBAs, so probably of more interest to some than to others, but here is the link:

http://the-insead-mba-experience.insead.edu/

Scroll down a few entries to find the last one by yours truly.