French/Lessons/Introductory/Review

G: The French alphabet
In addition, French uses several accents which are worth understanding. These are: à, è, ù, (grave accents) and é (acute accent). A circumflex applies to all vowels: â, ê, î, ô, û. A tréma (French for dieresis) is also applied: ä, ë, ï, ö, ü, ÿ. Two combined letters are used: æ and œ, and a cedilla is used on the c to make it sound like an English s: ç.

Things of note about numbers

 * For 70-79, it builds upon "soixante" but past that it builds upon a combination of terms for 80-99
 * Only the first (21,31,41,51,61 and 71, but not 81 nor 91) have "et un" without a hyphen; but past this it is simply both words consecutively (vingt-six, trente-trois, etc.) with a hyphen in between.
 * For 100-199, it looks much like this list already save that "cent" is added before the rest of the number; this continues up to 1000 and onward.

V: Time
In French, “il est” is used to express the time; though it would literally translate as “he is”, it is actually, in this case, equivalent to “it is” (unpersonal "il"). Unlike in English, it is always important to use “heures” (“hours”) when referring to the time. In English, it is OK to say, “It’s nine,” but this wouldn’t make sense in French. The French time system traditionally uses a 24-hour scale. Shorthand for writing times in French follows the format "17h30", which would represent 5:30PM in English.

V: The days of the week.

 * The days of the week are not capitalized in French.
 * For phrases relating to the day of the week, see the phrasebook.

Notes:
 * What day is it today? is equivalent to Quel jour sommes-nous ?.
 * Quel jour sommes-nous ? can be answered with Nous sommes..., C'est... or On est... (last two are less formal).
 * Nous sommes... is not used with hier, aujourd’hui, or demain. C'était (past) or C'est (present/future) must be used accordingly.

Bien... is an adverb meaning well. Its adjective equivalent is bon(ne), which means good. Since je vais, meaning I go, uses an action verb, the adverb bien is used. In English, I'm good, which uses the linking verb am, is followed by an adjective rather than an adverb.

Est-ce que... doesn't mean anything (like the Spanish upside down question mark) and is used to start a question. This can be used in a similar manner to do in English. Instead of You want it?, one can say Do you want it?

chez... is a preposition meaning at the house of.... Chez moi is used to say at my place. Chez [name] is used to say at [name's] place.

on... can mean we or one.

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