Week 2 in Tours

I'm accumulating interesting exchanges between myself and French speakers. I've learned numbers, introductions, greetings, and some other terms for describing people or objects in a room. Still lacking the ability to converse, I resort to pointing or asking to use English (less preferred but I might look less silly).

For starters, I really need to practice saying "Au revoir" "goodbye". Somewhere in my mind, I have difficulty remembering this. Instead I leave a person and tell them "Bonjour". This has happened twice just today. Bonjour means hello so I'm sure they were a bit confused as I said this walking away. Oh man.

I was at the grocery store to buy kitchen towels. I picked up a pack but didn't buy it because it left fuzzy stuff all over my black jacket. So I picked out other towels and headed to the register hoping I didn't look like I had a serious dandruff problem on the front and side middle region of my jacket. The cashier and I exchanged friendly smiles and then she started speaking to me... Huh? I have no idea. I told her "non francais" and then she started picking at the fuzz on my jacket. This is where hand motions became helpful. I demonstrated with the towels I was buying that the fuzz came from that, sort of.

Another check-out experience, I was at the end of the register ready to start bagging my groceries. The cashier rang up a loaf of bread and a stack of school paper and got ready to do the 3rd item but there seemed to be scanning error. I already had the paper in my bag, when she took back the bread and starting saying something to me. Again the phrase "non francais" and she just reached into the bag to see what I already had, I think to make sure there wasn't a 3rd item unaccounted for. Whew.

Lastly, I was at the post office. "Bonjour, mademoiselle" "Bonjour (smile)" I show the envelope, I point to the word Austria on my envelope, and I say Austria in the way I think they pronounce it in French "Autriche". Got through the "I need a stamp"-interpretation and she tells me the price. I heard "quatre...." This is 4, so I'm thinking : Is it 40 cents. Is it 4 euro? or Is it 80 cents which is like 4 times 20? Other places have a digital screen I can read to figure out what was said. Nope not here. So I hand over a 10 euro bill and wonder how much change I'm about to receive. A lot, because it was apparently only 40-something cents to mail a letter to Austria.

Goals for the week :
1) incorporate s'il vous plait (please) into my rough French exchanges.
2) start saying the full sentence Je ne parle pas francais (I don't speak French).
3) figure out how to ask May I buy/have ____? or say I would like ____ please.