Various notes

[alt_draco]

It's been a full week back, that's to be said. Along with all the talk about the Triwizard announcement, a lot of people have been asking me if I can teach them to speak French. All I can say to that is that if I had that kind of free time, I'd be some kind of professor or something. But for those of you that already have SOME kind of conversational knowledge of the language, I was thinking of forming a weekend afternoon group where we can just practise talking to each other while drinking tea or something. I'm a bit rusty myself, but when she was here I spoke to my Aunt Amanda almost entirely in French, so I've already gotten some good practise in in the last few weeks.

Along those lines, me and the lads on the Slytherin quidditch team have agreed that it'll be important to keep up with our flying, even with quidditch cancelled for the year. If any of the other house teams want to arrange some impromptu pick-up matches, talk to me or Harry or anyone else on the Slytherin team.

Has anyone else noticed how much nicer the food is at school, compared to last year? The elves must have stepped up their efforts, now that we'll be hosting guests. Or maybe they're getting better food and ingredients - anyway, something's definitely different.

Comments

[alt_draco]

I thought that brassicrose was supposed to be weirdly tasty and addictive, once you'd had enough of it. Though maybe that's only if you grew up eating pretty poorly by comparison.

I don't see many people all that concerned about learning Bulgarian - but then, where would they learn it? I can't think of a single person I've met who speaks it. I reckon they'd have to buy a book.

[alt_padma]

Well, Bulgarian just doesn't seem to be all that glamourous, either.

Anyway, I heard that the students from Durmstrang aren't all Bulgarian, so you'd have to learn German, Hungarian, Russian and even maybe Polish to really be sure you could talk to them all. I think it's much more sensible to wait to make someone's acquaintance and then learn a little of whatever they speak at home.

But French is French!

[alt_draco]

What language do they all speak when they're together at school, you reckon? That must be hard to manage.

French is nice. Mother certainly loves it. Father too, really. I think France itself has a lot to do with it.

Tout y parlerait
À l'âme en secret
Sa douce langue natale.

[alt_zacharias]

Doesn't matter - they'll be speaking English here, won't they?

[alt_draco]

Maybe. But even so, they have an entirely different attitude towards people who can speak French.

[alt_padma]

The French? Or the Bulgarians?

[alt_draco]

The French. I couldn't tell you much about Bulgarians beyond quidditch.

[alt_padma]

It's the shopping, Mum says. Nothing like Paris for fashion. Or food, I guess.

Do you think if someone came to your French tea parties but doesn't already know any, we'd learn?

[alt_draco]

I think so, if they were clever enough to start with.

[alt_padma]

And yes, Brassicrose is supposed to make things taste sort of sweet and more people are saying now that it's addictive too (which is why they're not supposed to use it) but it's not anything like real decent food.

I dunno. Derwent could have been wrong, too.

[alt_draco]

Whatever the reason, the food's a whole lot nicer, so either way it's good, yeah? So long as no one eats to much of it.