Transcript

When we learn French from school courses or textbooks, we don't always learn the French we actually speak on a daily basis in France, the colloquial French.

However, if you watch movies, series or talk with French people or come to France, you will be quickly confronted with these vocabulary words that you may not know.

Welcome to our new French video. There are some colloquial, slang words in French that are really very common in everyday life, used by everyone in France.

In this video, I propose you to see ten essential words to know, ten familiar words, essential to know in French to speak with French people or to understand movies, series, music in French.

Before you start, remember to like the video and if you are new, subscribe and activate the bell so you don't miss any of my videos.

The first word is a book. A bouquin is simply a book. You might say I took a book to read at the beach.

Clothes or clothes. I bought some new clothes for this summer. Clothes are simply clothes.

A car or a crate. A caisse normally means a cardboard box, but a caisse and a bagnole also simply mean a car. These are colloquial words that are regularly used to refer to a car, an automobile or a car.

I don't know where I put my car keys. I parked my car on the next street.

Work. You've probably heard this word before, really, everyone uses it on a daily basis every day. Job is simply work. I changed jobs this year. I like my new job better. By the way, we often use the term métro, boulot, dodo to refer to our daily routine. It means I get up, I take the metro or some other form of transport, I go to work and then I go to sleep.

So, the next word, really, in my circle, I don't think I know anyone who actually uses the official word. Everyone really uses the colloquial word for refrigerator.

Everyone, but really everyone, uses the word fridge. Really, using the word refrigerator is very rare. Really, everyone prefers to say a fridge. I put the groceries in the fridge. The fridge is where you put fresh produce like cheese, yoghurt, vegetables and meat.

A cop. Flic is a word often used in everyday language to refer to a policeman. In fact, if you watch any French-language detective series, you're bound to have heard the word flic.

To remain in the same lexical field, in colloquial language to speak about the prison, one often says the clink. He is in the clink. The criminal is in the clink.

Une clope. If you've ever been to France and gone to a party, maybe someone has asked you for a clope. A clope is a cigarette. Smokers smoke clopes.

A buddy, my buddies, your buddies, his buddies...

Buddies are simply friends in more colloquial language. My mates and I love to party. I party a lot with my friends.

And let's move on to the last word, which is really very often used, but like all the words in this video, it's bouffe. Chow is a word we use instead of food.

There's also the verb bouffer. What are we eating tonight? I feel like eating a pizza. This word, bouffer, is a little more familiar than the others. For example, you can ask someone for a cigarette in the evening, but in a restaurant, don't talk to the waiter about food. It's a little more familiar anyway. You say that more with your friends, with your buddies.

That's it for today, I hope you enjoyed this video.

Don't hesitate to let me know in the comments if you'd like me to make more videos about colloquial words, colloquial French or slang. If you liked this video, please don't forget to put a like. And if you're new, please subscribe. See you soon.