📞 "Help! I Don’t Understand a Word on the Phone!"

If you’ve been following me for a while, you already know that I was an au pair in the U.S. a few years ago. 🇺🇸 Back then, I had a solid level of English—I even had a Bachelor’s degree in English. 📚 But there was one thing I still couldn’t handle at all...

👉 After 10 years of studying English, I was still unable to understand people on the phone. 😱📞

You might be thinking: "It’s not like you needed to call anyone. We have messaging and video chats now!" 🤷‍♀️ True! But trust me, you can’t always avoid phone calls...

It was my first week as an au pair. The family had left me home alone for the first time, and I got to sleep in. I woke up, walked upstairs... and suddenly:

🚨 BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! 🚨

A deafening noise came out of nowhere. The house alarm went off! I panicked—I had no idea what to do. Then the phone rang. 📞

I picked up, and I heard something about a number—but I couldn’t understand a thing. 🤯 I tried to explain that I was the au pair, but then...

Someone knocked on the door. 🚔

It was the police. YES, you read that right—the police showed up. 🚨😵 I explained, again, that I was new and an au pair. Thankfully, I was able to reach my host mom, and she rushed home to sort things out.

From that day on, whenever the phone rang, my strategy was simple:
✔️ Hand it to my host mom.
✔️ Or just let them leave a message. 😅

But, unfortunately, that didn’t last forever...

A few weeks later, I got really sick 🤒, and we had no idea what was wrong. I needed a medical procedure at the hospital. Before going, I called my health insurance (AuPairCare), and they assured me the procedure was fully covered.

🚀 Fast forward: I had the procedure, everything was fine... until I received a surprise:

💰 A $5000 hospital bill. 😨

Nobody was home, I was stressed, mad, and panicked. I had no choice—I had to call the hospital myself.

That phone call? 🫠 30 painfully long minutes. I must have asked them a hundred times to repeat slower. I kept saying: "Sorry, I don’t understand, I’m French." 🇫🇷

But guess what? After all that stress, I finally understood: they made a mistake! 🎉 I owed nothing.

👉 Sometimes, you have to handle things alone—no friends, no family, no host parents to help you. You have to understand and communicate by yourself.

I know many of you struggle with the same problem in French. 📞🤯 So, how can you improve?

In my classes, I help you boost your listening skills using:

🎬 Movies & TV series (with & without subtitles).
🎶 Music (because songs make learning fun!).
🎙️ Voice recordings & YouTube videos (real-life conversations!).

💡 Tip: Ask a French friend to leave you a voice message 🎤 and try to repeat what they said as an exercise!

Whether you need conversation classes 🗣️ or a beginner course 📖, you’ll find what you need on my website.

💻 Check it out now! 🌍🇫🇷