After years of studying French in the classroom, it wasn’t until I spent time living in France that I started hearing people saying all sorts of things I had never heard before.
I’d ask people how they were and they’d reply talking about cockroaches and potatoes – I was baffled!
This made me realise how important idioms are if you really want to master a language.
Knowing idiomatic phrases in French really ups your ‘language game’ and makes you sound like a native. So I thought I’d share some useful and funny ones with you.
Here are 8 fun French phrases that you need to know:
(Literally means: to have the cockroach)
Of course we’re not actually talking about cockroaches! This absurd idiom means “to feel depressed” or “to feel down”.
(Literally means: to have the potato / peach)
And here we’re not talking about potatoes or peaches either! These phrases mean to be happy and to have lots of energy.
(Literally means: to take care of one’s onions)
This lovely idiom means “to mind your own business”. It might sound funny, but people use it in all seriousness!
(Literally means: to fall in the apples)
This phrase means “to faint”. People also use it to express shock or surprise.
(Literally means: Oh the cow!)
Know the English phrase “Holy cow!”? Well, this one is similar. It expresses shock or exclamation and means “Oh my gosh!”
(Literally means: Let’s go back to our sheep.)
What have sheep got to do with it?! Well, this bizarre expression actually means “Let’s get back to the subject.”
It comes from the 15th century play La Farce de maître Pathelin. In the play, maître Pathelin, a local village lawyer, presents two cases to a judge, one about stolen sheep and one about stolen cloth. While arguing the case about the sheep, he repeatedly brings up the case about the cloth to confuse the judge, who tries to get back to the first case by saying “mais revenons à nos moutons…” (“but let’s get back to our sheep…”). So that’s how sheep came to symbolise the subject at hand!
(Literally means: to have the wooden face)
This means “to have a hangover”. It comes from the idea that when you have a hangover your mouth is as dry as wood! Clever, eh?!
Je me suis réveillé avec une gueule de bois terrible ce matin. (I woke up with a terrible hangover this morning.)
(Literally means: to have a strike of lightning)
This saying means “to fall in love at first sight”. The idea is that you suddenly and unexpectedly fall for someone, just like a sudden lightning strike. You can use this phrase to talk about objects, too:
For a person: Quand j’ai vu Mélanie pour la première fois j’ai eu un coup de foudre. (When I saw Melanie for the first time, I fell in love at first sight.)
For an object: Il a eu un coup de foudre pour l’appartement. (He fell madly in love with the apartment.)
Put these hilarious French phrases into practice and you’re guaranteed to impress!
Whether you’re new to French or simply want to brush up on your language skills, start learning with our French course today.
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