Cultivate your French : Slow French, at the right pace.

On Wednesday 24 July, we loaded up the car and left Paris with a twinge of regret. 

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Micaela and I are at Gare Saint-Lazare for a summer stroll.

Since the last renovation, the station has become a real shopping centre. There are numerous stores selling clothes, shoes and beauty products, as well as fast-food outlets and fine restaurants such as chef Eric Frechon's Lazare. I'm dying to try his Paris-Deauville dessert.

But our program was more geared towards sweets.

There's plenty to choose from at Saint-Lazare! We bought macarons at Ladurée, we also bought some at Dalloyau and finally, we stopped off at Les Merveilleux de Fred. Do you know this meringue and cream dessert? They're a big hit in Paris. 

So if you'd like to improve your French, discover this part of Paris and benefit from all the positive effects of the exact text, as well as the cultural notes, you could subscribe to the Cultivate Your French transcript at www.cultivateyoufrench.com.

The subscription costs 4 euros a month and each new subscriber receives the 10 latest episodes.

Micaela and I are at Gare Saint-Lazare for a summer stroll.

Gare Saint-Lazare is the oldest station in Paris, having been renovated for the 1889 Universal Exhibition, the same year the Eiffel Tower was built. After going up rue de Rome to the Pont de l'Europe, the site of two famous paintings: Edouard Manet's Le chemin de fer and Gustave Caillebotte's Pont de l'Europe, we'll head back down to the station via rue d'Amsterdam. Can you follow us? 

So if you'd like to improve your French comprehension, discover this part of Paris and benefit from all the positive effects of the exact text, as well as the cultural notes, you could subscribe to the Cultivate Your French transcript at www.cultivateyoufrench.com.

The subscription costs 4 euros a month and each new subscriber receives the 10 latest episodes.

We're at Gare Saint-Lazare, in the Europe district, whose streets bear the names of capital cities. This summer, I'd like to invite you on a four-part historical, cultural and gourmet summer stroll! 

Where were we?  Ah yes, Micaela and I were walking up Rue de Rome, the street that runs alongside the train station from the Cour de Rome up towards the Batignolles district. We're going to talk about painting today. 

So if you'd like to improve your French comprehension, discover this part of Paris and benefit from all the positive effects of the exact text, as well as the cultural notes, you could subscribe to the Cultivate Your French transcript at www.cultivateyoufrench.com.

The subscription costs 4 euros a month and each new subscriber receives the 10 latest episodes.

Gare Saint-Lazare is a star! What is it? A station that doesn't even have a TGV? A star? But why? 

First of all, in terms of passenger traffic, it's the second busiest station in France (after the Gare du Nord). The station serves the western suburbs of Paris, as well as Normandy.

It's also the oldest station in Paris. It opened in 1837. It has been painted by some very famous artists. Would you like some names? Gustave Caillebotte, Édouard Manet, Claude Monet, Camille Pissaro, among others. 

Micaela swiped her Navigo, I swiped my ticket, and you could hear the automatic gate open. We're at Gare Saint-Lazare, in the Europe district, whose streets bear the names of capitals. I'd like to invite you on a four-part summer stroll through history, culture and food! 

So if you'd like to improve your French, discover this part of Paris and benefit from all the positive effects of the exact text, as well as the cultural notes, you could subscribe to the Cultivate Your French transcript at www.cultivateyoufrench.com.

The subscription costs 4 euros a month and each new subscriber receives the 10 latest episodes.

This episode is a re-run of an episode from 2020, at the end of the lockdown when we started to be able to move around. But it's also a very summery episode! 

So if you want tobenefit from all the positive effects of having the exact text of the episode, you could subscribe to the Cultivate Your French transcript at www.cultivateyoufrench.com.

The subscription costs 4 euros a month and each new subscriber receives the 10 latest episodes.

We have some major political news in France with the legislative elections since the President, Emmanuel Macron, dissolved the National Assembly. We therefore have to elect new deputies. There is a rise in the far right in France, certainly because people feel misunderstood more than out of racism. Still, it makes everyone a bit nervous. This rise is mainly affecting rural areas. The second round of legislative elections takes place on Sunday 7 July. 

My daughter Micaela is eighteen, so she voted in this year's European elections, the results of which prompted the head of state to dissolve the assembly. 

In the notes accompanying the transcript, we'll take a look at a few expressions. You’ll also find the election vocabulary and some sample sentences. This is very useful for following what's happening in France on TV, radio or in the press. 

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For the Olympic Games, which start in Paris in a few weeks' time, we have a beautiful poster. It was designed by the artist Ugo Gattoni, who studied art after a spell in the sports and swimming studies section. The poster took two thousand hours of work, and was produced on a graphics tablet, but entirely by hand. Anne-Laure and I got together to talk to you about this poster.

In the notes that come with the transcript, I invite you to try your hand at collecting adjectives based on the last blog post on the podcast. You can share your harvest with me, either orally or in writing. 

So if you want to cultivate your French and harvest a good crop and benefit from all the positive effects of having the exact text of the transcript, you could subscribe to the Cultivate Your French transcript at www.cultivateyoufrench.com.

The subscription costs 4 euros a month and each new subscriber receives the 10 latest episodes.

Last week, on Thursday to be precise, our friends Isabelle and Thierry, Pietro and I, got on our bikes for a trip to Paris. Our destination? The Centre Pompidou, also known as Beaubourg. Until 1 July, the museum is showing an exceptional retrospective of the sculptor Brancusi. It's an extraordinary museum, with one of the best views of Paris. On the way back, we took the rue de Rivoli, which is now reserved for bicycles (but still has a lane for buses and taxis) and runs alongside the Louvre and the Tuileries gardens. We turned off towards the Madeleine, then the Gare Saint-Lazare, the 17th arrondissement, Neuilly, the Levallois bridge and we were back home. We left at 1.30pm. So it was a nice ride, which of course also included a gourmet break, as you'll discover in this episode recorded on the spot! 

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There was a change in the weather at the start of the week, with the sun that had finally returned giving way once again to rain. It's in keeping with the gloomy mood I've been in since the elections. I don't feel like listening to the news or the radio any more, so to take my mind off things I listened again to the concert by Lea Dessandre, Thomas Dunford and the Jupiter Ensemble, who played pieces by John Dowland and Henry Purcell last Tuesday at the Maison de la Radio. Felicia and I attended the concert, the theme of which was melancholy in love. I'd had the tickets for a long time, hoping that she would be able to come. Everything becomes uncertain as the end of the year approaches. 

In the notes that come with the transcript, we'll look at three very natural expressions in French that I want to tell you about. I'll also share with you some practical phrases relating to culture: going to the theatre, a concert, etc. 

So to cultivate your French without melancholy and benefit from all the positive effects of having the exact text of the transcript, you could subscribe to the Cultivate Your French transcript at www.cultivateyoufrench.com.

The subscription costs 4 euros a month and each new subscriber receives the 10 latest episodes.