French language Q&A Forum

In your lesson you say that demeurer, when used in the perfect tense with avoir or être, behaves in the opposite way to other two meaning verbs. Is that right?  Does it not behave in the same way, ie. it takes être when intransitive and avoir when transitive?

Sorry, perhaps this is not right. For example, il a demeuré à Paris is an example of intransitive avoir use. 

So, is the rule that we use être when the usage is intransitive and expresses a state of being?

The narrator of this exercise Le jour des rois was very muffled, like in an echo chamber. 

For those of us trying to translate it is difficult enough to understand the words, but the poor sound quality compounded the difficulty.

Hopefully this can be addressed for future dictees.

Thank you, Norma Zippin

Le chalet : It is one of those words - does the ‘a’ have a roof over it or not ?  According to my Oxford English-French dictionary no, which is why i’m going with that spelling, but the American English - French dictionary could well say otherwise. Google translate is without too

Is there a rule as to whether à or de follows a verb?

Wasn't sure which forum to ask this question as it relates to a different topic but this is the attached forum so I'll ask it here:

The statement and translation :

J’ai un cheveu blanc. – Non, tu as plusieurs cheveux blancs !

I have one white hair. – No, you have a few white hairs!

In this example the word ‘plusieurs’ was used to mean ‘a few’ but in the lesson “Quelques, plusieurs, de nombreux = A few, several, many (quantities), ‘plusieurs’ means several and quelques means ‘a few’. Is there a nuance in usage here?

It would be helpful to highlight where each audio begins. This makes it easier to coordinate hand eye, particularly the third one due screen and text location on web page.

Allez-vous commander la salade?

For this question if I have to give negative answer

Non je ne vais pas la commander or je ne la vais pas commader. 

Which is correct? Ps elaborate

Why is it de l’argent which I thought meant some money. The lesson wrote: either money or a gift. So why was soit d’argent wrong? Thanks. 

Bonjour Madame Cécile !

While attempting this challenge, I faced a few difficulties which I would like to ask here-

1.C’est un endroit magique au milieu des montagnes, mais ça manque de transports en commun ! 

In this phrase, why has “ça” been used ? We need to talk about the ‘châlet’ so can “il” not be used ?

2. D'abord, je prendrai l'avion jusqu'à la grande ville la plus proche, qui est ‘quand même à’ quarante kilomètres du châlet ! 

Madame, what is the usage of the expression-‘quand même à’ ? 

This expression was used in this exercise to mean -still but what are its other uses ?

3. Mais je ne pourrai pas conduire jusqu'au châlet lui-même. 

Why is lui-même used here, shouldn’t it be ‘moi-même’ ? As, in the sense of “ I wouldn’t be able to drive myself till the chalet’ ?

Merci beaucoup pour votre aide et réponse.

Joyeux Nöel à vous !