LAVAL - If you happen to bump into Markus Eisenschmid around town, do him a favor and… speak to him in French.

The Rocket forward is getting better and better at handling himself in the local language, but he doesn't get many opportunities to practice because people often switch to English within a few seconds of hearing him speak.

"If I go grocery shopping, my only problem is that I'm a little shy. I would really start learning it if I would just start speaking," admitted the 23-year-old Marktoberdorf, Germany native. "The problem here, though, is that it's pretty bilingual. I can blame the people here, because as soon as they hear I have a little bit of an accent, they start speaking English to make things easier for me, so I fall back into English, too. If I really didn't have a choice but to speak French, I think I could really be fluent within three months."

Eisenschmid owes his basic knowledge of the language to many years of French classes he took in school back home.

"I started my English, just a little bit, when I was in grade 3 or 4 (around eight years old). I wouldn't say I learned a lot there. When I was 10, I really started focusing on learning English, and when I was 11 years old, I started learning French at school," recalled the young forward. "My school was pretty strict with learning vocabulary. We had to come prepared for every lesson, we had vocabulary to know for the next day. The teacher would grill us about them.

"I feel I know a lot of words right now. From Grades 6-11 (ages 11- 17), I had a good six years of intensive French."

The 6-foot, 180-pounder lacks confidence when speaking and admits he needs to break out of his shell, but when he gets warmed up, his French is very good. The one thing he knows he has trouble with is adapting to the Quebec accent.

"It's tough, because the accent is so different. It's not an easy language. It's also different, because I learned Parisian French. Coming here, I had to adjust to the accent. We have French lessons with the team here now and our teacher has taught everyone the basics. She said I don't even have to go in there, because she heard me speak French before and she said I know all the numbers, I know all the greetings and those basics. I could have a simple conversation with someone. If they speak to me in French, I understand everything. I just have trouble expressing myself."

To practice and learn French expressions, Eisenschmid can count on a good number of francophone teammates in the Rocket dressing room, including Daniel Audette and Jeremy Gregoire - with whom he spent Christmas this past December.

"We were at his family's and there was traditional Quebecois music," recounted Eisenschmid.

Gregoire confirms that his on-ice coworker particularly enjoyed the holiday classic: La Bottine souriante.

That's exactly the kind of cultural exposure Eisenschmid is clamoring for.

"For myself, I just want to learn the language, because I want to immerse myself in the culture. In the summer, I like to travel," concluded Eisenschmid, who spent a weekend in Barcelona with his good friend Sven Andrighetto last summer. "Europe is a small [continent], I like to fly to different places just for a weekend, because everything is so close. Getting away in the summer is what I do."