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Can You Say "Gare"?
Can someone please give me a phonetic pronounciation of the following please:
Gare St. Lazare Gare Lyon I don't expect to sound like I'm French, but I just don't want my Texan to show too much. Thanks. Shrink |
gar like in car - i used to mistakenly say gare like in wear and people thought i was talking about some war ("guerre')
gar san lah-czar gar lee-own Ready to be corrected by a real Francophone! |
Where is the station (located)?:
Où est le gare SNCF? (assuming it is the French National Railways station you are looking for). |
Intrepid - quick question, not important: is "gare" really masculine? Thought it is la gare and une gare, but I'm often wrong.
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Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think it's la Gare de Lyon (I know, I'm anal about some things).
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...and you might confuse someone if you pronounce "SNCF" as "ess-en-cee-eff"...
Say "ess-en-<b>say</b>-eff"... Best wishes, Rex |
...oh, and since you mentioned that you're Texan... remember to think of how it sounds to you when you hear British say "car" (the three "a" vowel sounds in "gare, and "la-zare" are pretty much all the same)...
as opposed to the more Reba-Mc-Intyre-esque... "kawr"... |
gare is feminine. That's why you have "gare routiere" for bus station. If it were masculine, those would all be "gare routier"
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Just don't do what I did several years back in Poitier. Dare I admit it? I pronounced "gare" so badly, that a police officer said to me in perfect English, "Madame. I am sorry to inform you that the war has been over for more than 50 years."
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Gare de Lyon would not exactly be "lee own", but can't think of Eng. word that has the correct pronunciation for "on" in French since it's a "nasalized 'n'" Guess it will have to do.
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Gee, if I had asked this question and received all these varying answers, I'd be tempted to chuck it all and simply say, "where the hell is the damned train station?"
The bottom line? Never ask how to pronounce something in French unless you're willing to take lots of different opinions. |
I really have to disagree about "gare" rhyming with "car" as most seem to be saying. Unless it's the very nasal pronunciation of New England, car doesn't sound like the French way to say gare. It's closer to the New England pronunciation, but still without a pronounced "ah" sound that occurs in car. The closest English word I can think of is "care" but pronounced a little more sharply. But again I think it all depends on what part of the U.S. you are from. The real fact is that French and English sounds are different, and that adapting to say them properly is difficult if you are not a native.
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But here in the UK, if you rhyme it with "care" you end up saying "guerre" and people think you're talking about the whole war thing again.
For a foreigner speaking a bit of French on travel to France, rhyming it with car will see you understood unless in Texas you say car a lot different to what we do. |
Wayne, wayne, wayne...
"gare" rhymes with bar, car, far, jar, par and tar (... that last word is what they put four of, on a car... in the South...) not bare, nor care, nor chair, nor dare, nor fare, nor fair, nor hare, nor hair, nor lair, nor mare, nor pair, nor tare, nor ware... |
Hmmm...I always thought it was a wider "a" than "car." Kind of "gaahr" with the "r" somewhat swallowed in that French r manner.
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Shrink, aren't you glad you asked?
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"Car is close enough to make your point - nitpickers only confuse the issue. You don't need to pronounce it like a Parisian but 'car' will be good enough.
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Do not forget to perfect rolling your Rs for precisely the exact length of time. In school, rolling the Rs was given as much importance as the tounge formation required for the correct uuuu.
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Gare rhymes with American English "car."
Saint (St.) rhymes with "ran." Don't pronounce the 't'. Lazare rhymes with American English "ma car." Lyon rhymes with the English name Leon. That's as close as one can get to an accurate description without delving into phonetics. Fortunately, it's more than sufficient. You don't have to say it like a native; you need only say it well enough to be understood, and the above will be good enough for that purpose. For what it's worth, gare is indeed feminine in French (la gare, not le gare). The 'r' is a uvular fricative in standard French, although pronouncing it the English way does no harm from a comprehension standpoint. The vowel is an open front unrounded vowel, very similar to the 'a' in English "father." If you know the International Phonetic Alphabet and you hanker for a precise pronunciation key, see http://www.mxsmanic.com/Gare.pdf |
That's exactly what I meant, Anthony. I don't say the a in car the same as the a in father, do you?
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