Owner of The French Nook - Private tutoring school Experienced native French teacher for conversations, writing expression, reading, for any level in Sydney

Find out more about Clara

• Did you grow up speaking this language? Or were you inspired by a trip abroad, an individual or a certain aspect of the culture?

  You can't be more French than me! I am 100% French on both sides of my family, I was born near Paris and grew up on the west coast of France.
  I can't live without pasta with butter and tons of cheese (and my personal touch is a raw egg on top).

• Can you name a living, historical or fictional character that you think is the emblematic representative of the language's culture?

  If you've seen the French movie "Untouchables", I personally think that the two main characters Driss and Philippe perfectly represent French people. France is multicultural, and the French language also evolves with time. I love how classical French and slang are mixed and matched in the movie. Putting two French characters from different generations and backgrounds really shows the diversity present in France.

• Is there a typical word, phrase, tradition or expression in the language that you particularly like?

  "En faire tout un fromage", literally translated as "make a whole cheese out of it". I think it represents French people well: we always exaggerate everything, and make a big deal out of nothing. Basically, French people really like to complain.

• Why does speaking this language matter to you?

  I live in Sydney surrounded by Australians, and as much as I love them, I miss speaking my beautiful language. I love how French effortlessly sounds poetic, even when we have something to complain about.

• What is the main difficulty in learning this language and what can help the process of learning?

  There is always an exception to the rule in French. I mean, there are always exceptions to the rule in every aspect of our life as well - which is what my mum always told me everytime I make generalities out of something.
  French can seem a bit impressive at the beginning, but I can tell you that this is not the most beautiful language for nothing: all these exceptions always make French sound and look better.

• Provide a valuable anecdote related to your language learning or your days at school.

  When I was younger, my parents decided to homeschool my two sisters and I for a whole year so that we could travel. My mum was teaching us the artistic subjects (French, English, history, etc) and my dad the scientific subjects (maths, physics, biology, etc). I have always been very bad with science but loved writing and reading so much that the lessons with my mum were always so much shorter than the lessons with my dad, compared to my sisters who were very logical and good with numbers but not as interested in French grammar.

• How has travel or a specific trip helped you to increase your skill and knowledge of the language?

  When I was younger, my family and I travelled to various countries and met a lot of French-speakers from Belgium, French Canada, etc. Everytime we met new people like that and heard them speaking French, it was always funny to hear new expressions from their own country, how they have their own French words that we didn't even understand. Sometimes, I had to have them repeat what they were saying because the accent and the vocabulary were so different that I couldn't understand anything. This really showed me how many variations of one language there can be, and I sometimes love to share in my classes the differences between all these types of French.