french immunity

I took the kids to McDonalds (groan) a while back. While there I met an American with his French wife and their son. You know the old cliche about the best way to learn a language is to get a girlfriend/boyfriend who speaks it? Well consider this guy. He's been married for fifteen years to this woman, a native of this area, and he can't make a sentence. I'm not kidding. He joked about it, said the only word he knew was doll, "poupée, right honey, it's poupée isn't it?" He seemed perversely proud of his achievement.
Obviously the wife is bilingual but still...sheesh!
K

P.S. - if you saw this post earlier you may have noticed that I misspelled McDonald's (MacDonald's) ...draw your own conculusions.