OffQc | Québécois French Guide

Rabii Rammal writes about the overuse of text messages in a relationship, even when the subject matter is important. He says:

Même les affaires importantes. Genre quand on se chicane, on s’envoie des romans.

Even important stuff. Like when we fight, we send each other novels.

They don’t really send each other novels of course, just really long text messages.

As you listen to spoken French, have you heard genre used like that? It means “like” when giving an example of something. We can say it’s a colloquial way of saying par exemple.

In another example using genre, Rabii talks about going overboard with saying thanks in certain situations:

Genre je peux remercier le facteur qui me remet une lettre, mais je ne peux pas remercier un facteur que je croise dans la rue pour l’ensemble de son œuvre.

For example, I can thank the mailman who delivers a letter to me, but I can’t thank a mailman who I bump into in the street for the entirety of his career.

Harriet mentioned in a comment that she learned the difference between the words facture and facteur. Une facture is a bill. Cashiers also often use this word in the sense of receipt. (Voulez-vous la facture? Do you want the receipt?) Un facteur delivers the mail.