Delayed, Cancelled (anglicisms)

English: Delayed, Cancelled

French (anglicisms)=Délayé, Cancelé

Anglicisms are common in European French and Canadian French alike, both in colloquial and formal contexts. However, the anglicisms that European francophones use tend to be different than the ones that Canadian francophones use.

Here are a couple Canadian French anglicisms that you’d likely hear as a flight attendants. You’ll often hear your francophone colleagues and passengers alike say ‘’délai (m)” instead of “retard” and “délayer/délayé” instead of “retarder/retardé”.

The word “délai” is a real word in French. It looks similar to “delay”, and though it technically does not mean “delay”, many of your colleagues and passengers will use it to mean “delay”. The word “délayer” also exists in French but is very obscure and no dictionary will define it as “to delay”.

“Cancelé’’ is another anglicism you’ll hear for “cancelled” instead of “annulé”. “Cancelé” is not a word you’ll find in any French dictionary.

Our Canadian French for Flight Attendants audio course teaches formal French expressions but will also teach informal anglicisms like “délayer” and “canceler”. Your French Canadian passengers will inevitably use non-standard terms like these with you, regardless if they’re technically right or not, simply because it’s natural for them, and it’s important that you understand them when they do.

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Modules 1 and 2: French basics and pass your flight attendant French test.

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Flight Attendant Souvenirs. Souvenirs d’un agent de bord. Nagano, Japan. February 2015. Nagano, Japon. Février 2015. These are the ski hills near Nagano (Shiga Kougen), where many ski events of the 1998 Winter Olympics took place. By “near”, I mean a two-hour bus ride. There are multiple interconnected peaks, meaning you could go up the lift, ski down the other side and then go up the lift for the next peak. There’s a bus system that shuttles back and forth from the base of the first peak to the base of the last one. I don’t ski very well, so I was quite happy to stick to the bunny slopes and snow plow my way down.

Cancellation

English: Cancellation

French: Annulation

Weather, mechanical issues, and crew issues may cause delays and they may even cause cancellations. Cancellations usually happen before passengers board the airplane, so for a flight attendant, this word isn’t nearly as common as the word for “delay”.

Occasionally though, your flight may have boarded, you may have taxied out to the runway, and you’re pretty much ready to take off, when your plane experiences a more serious mechanical issue or the weather worsens considerably, prompting the flight to return to the gate and possibly the cancellation of your flight. This is likely the kind of situation where you’d need to inform your passengers that the flight is cancelled.

Cancellation (noun)=Annulation (f)

To cancel (verb)=Annuler

Cancelled (adjective, past participle)=Annulé

The flight is cancelled.=Le vol est annulé.

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Want to learn to speak the French you need to work as a flight attendant? Learn even more with Canadian French for Flight Attendants.

Special pre-launch price or Module 1 (French basics) and Module 2 (French for flight attendant French tests).

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Flight Attendant Souvenirs. Souvenirs d’un agent de bord. Nagano, Japan, February 2016. Nagano, Japon, février 2016. This would have been my second personal trip to Japan. My first stop was Nagano, the host city for the 1998 Winter Olympic Games. This is the city’s main shrine Zenkou-ji. I stayed in Nagano for one night and that was enough to see everything there (namely, the shrine). I left for the nearby ski mountains the next day to see a friend who was working at a ski resort for the season.

Delay

English: Delay

French: Retard

Flight delays are bound to happen. There are many things that can cause delays. Often, a single delay has multiple causes, each one causing a short delay, and they add up to a longer delay. The causes are often weather. Other times, it may be because of mechanical issues. Other times, it may be because of scheduling issues: it takes many people working in unison to get a single flight to depart. For example, if a pilot or flight attendant calls in sick very last minute, the flight might take a delay as they try to find a replacement. If the original ramp agents are pulled away to work on another flight, you may be delayed as you wait for other ramp agents. If your original aircraft is stuck elsewhere for whatever reason, you may need to wait for another aircraft to come in.

Delays can happen at any time, from the moment passengers get on the plane till they get off. When it does happen, it’s the flight attendants’ responsibility to keep passengers informed of the situation.

Delay (noun)=retard (m)

To delay (verb)=retarder

Delayed (adjective, past participle)=retardé

The flight is delayed.=Le vol est retardé.

Though the origins of the words are similar, we of course do not use “retard” in English in the sense of “(flight) delay”. It is however the correct term in French.

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Want to learn to speak the French you need to work as a flight attendant? Learn even more with Canadian French for Flight Attendants.

Special pre-launch price or Module 1 (French basics) and Module 2 (French for flight attendant French tests).

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New Orleans 2015. La Nouvelle Orléans 2015. Here are a few pictures from an obligatory swamp tour I did just outside of New Orleans. I was on a small boat with a small group of people, complete with a boat captain who spoke with a southern accent so thick you could barely understand him, weaving through the bayous of the swamp. We didn’t see too many animals because it was cold (for New Orleans), but we did attract a wild boar over with some marshmallows.