Friday, March 29, 2013

My French French Class

    Sorry for the delay. I'm working on a longer post, but I've been a bit busy. This is just a quick post to say that I had my last French class today! The program I'm working through only allowed me to take the class for a month, which was fine by me, since it was enough time to increase my knowledge without taking over my entire stay here.
    I knew the month was going to pass by quickly, but wow. It still feels like I just got here. By the second week I'd really fallen into a schedule, and I think that helped to speed me through the days.
My basic schedule was this: I'd wake up at 7:20, and my host mom would drive me to the tram station at around 8:10. I'd take the tram into the city center, and get to class at around 9:00. The class was taught in two sections, an hour and fifteen minutes each, split between two teachers. I had the same two teachers for all four weeks, and I liked them a lot. They were both quite young, and were very friendly and engaging. The students in the class shifted a bit from week to week, as some people left and others arrived. But there was a core group that stuck around the whole time.




My class! Here we have representation from (left to right) the US (duh), Spain, South Korea, Japan, France and France (those are my teachers), UK, Switzerland, Brazil, Georgia, and Mexico. That's four continents! I'm still geeking out about it.

The class itself was a nice mix of grammar, reading, writing, discussions, and games. A lot of the grammar was stuff I'd already learned (unsurprising, as I've been taking French classes for nine years, and so have probably been over everything at least once) but that I'd forgotten. We also had a lot of debates- many of them spontaneous- on such dangerous topics as sexism, abortion, and LGBTQA... P... D... uh... etc etc etc rights. I've never yelled at more people in worse French before in my life, and I'm pretty sure I gained a reputation as the crazy American with the Opinions. But it felt good, and it got me talking, which is what I'm here for. Though there is nothing more frustrating than trying to make an important point in a language in which you aren't fluent.
Anyway. From what I could tell, my class was at an intermediate-type level, and it felt like a good fit. I definitely wasn't the best in the class. In fact, I might have been the worst. But it wasn't over my head, and I understood everything we did. And it was interesting to hear French spoken in so many different accents.

I didn't really make friends, though everyone was very nice. I have a hard enough time talking to people in English. Engaging in friendship-building conversations in French wasn't going to happen. But I did end up going out to lunch with a bunch of my classmates last Friday, and I talked more than I thought I would. I think we all bonded a bit, if only briefly. It was fun.





We went to a funny American-style diner for lunch.















Everything was pink, and there were old rock 'n roll posters on the walls, and little TVs were playing episodes of "Happy Days". It was great.

As diners go, it got points off for not having breakfast food, but won the points back for having pineapple juice.







'Murica!

My omelette sandwich, with a side order of salad and freedom.











































I may be meeting up with the class next week for lunch, so I probably haven't seen the last of these guys yet. All-in-all, I was very pleased with the course, and am glad I took it, though it's hard to tell at this point just how much I learned. I'm sad it's over.
However, I'm also excited about not having to get up early anymore.
Speaking of which, I'm exhausted. Bon nuit!







Sunday, March 17, 2013

Second Week Stuff

   I can't believe I've already been here for two weeks. This week in particular went by really fast. I've fallen firmly into a daily rhythm of going to class in the morning, and getting on the tram and coming home in the afternoon, and eating meals with my family, and going to bed. I've been sleeping with the heater on in my room, because it's been unseasonably cold here. The forecast for this weekend predicts snow. It's also very windy, which only makes things colder. My host mom told me that people refer to the Montpellier wind as "le vent des fous"- which roughly translates as "crazy wind"- so apparently it's a common thing here.
   Last Saturday, I took a little ride out into the countryside with my host mom and her boyfriend. They were visiting a house they're considering buying, and invited me to come along. The weather was cold but sunny, and the drive out was stunning.




















We drove southwest, into a hilly region filled with vineyards. A lot of the towns in this area date back to the Roman occupation of Gaul, and some even further back than that. At one point, my host mom's boyfriend pointed to one of the many hills, and told me that it was a dormant volcano. I'm ninety percent sure he wasn't kidding.






Our destination was a little medieval town up in the hills, just beyond the city of Narbonne. Apparently it's fairly well-known as the site of a siege during the 12th century. It's also very popular with tourists, and my host mom and her boyfriend are interested in buying a house there and turning it into a little bed-and-breakfast. They were making this particular trip in order to talk with the owner and negotiate a price.







































The town only has about fifty year-round inhabitants, and the place seemed empty. The streets were really narrow and winding, and all of the buildings were made of stone. You know. Like a medieval town.


















They're a little hard to see, but check out my host mom's awesome pants.
















We had lunch in a small, but surprisingly fancy restaurant. It was one of those places where they give you tiny amounts of food and charge you too much for it. It tasted really good, though, and included things like cauliflower soup. I felt awkward about taking pictures of my food, but I couldn't resist when my dessert showed up.



That's ice cream (vanilla, I think?), topped with whipped cream, topped with a meringue. It was really good.












Then we went and visited the house. It was three stories tall, and very nice, but it seemed to me like it would get really cold in the winter. It was right at the edge of the town, with a garden enclosed on one side by the outer ramparts, and with a view down to the river.


















My host mom and her boyfriend talked with the owner for a bit, then we walked around the town a little more, and then we left. I slept most of the way back, only to be awoken by a surprise trip to Ikea. I'd never been to an Ikea before. It was... kind of magical.
When we got back to the house, one of my host mom's adult daughters was there with her young son. They were both very friendly, and she spoke a little English and took the opportunity to practice it with me. Her son also spoke to me a bit, in French, but I had a really hard understanding him. It's the same with most of the other young French kids I've encountered. They tend to mumble and mush their words together enough to make comprehension really difficult. Anyway, we had a really tiny, really good pizza for dinner.
I slept in the next day, which was nice, but also a little awkward, since no one else did. Everyone here seems to go to bed really early.
On Monday, I started another week of class. I felt more confident than I had the week before, and I started speaking up a little more. We also got a new student, from England, which was cool. This was apparently also the end of school vacation, because starting on Monday, my tram stop was swarming with high schoolers. Before then, I'd pretty much had the stop to myself, so this was an annoying development.
Speaking of my tram...





















It's so cheerful.















I've gotten very comfortable with the tram system at this point, and have allowed myself more time to walk around the city after class. I've found a nice patisserie where I occasionally buy myself a snack, and I've found a few bookstores. And finally, after some intense searching, I found something I thought I wouldn't have access to until I got back to the US- a comic book store!
I had a mild freak-out, then went in and spent about an hour drooling over comics.
It's a nice store, on an out-of-the-way street a few blocks from where I'm taking French classes. The selection isn't great- they don't have much from any of the current ongoing series- but I can't complain. And since comics are small and thin and wouldn't add much weight to my suitcase, there was absolutely no reason for me not to buy one. Or two.




Mine! All mine! I got a Hawkeye ("Oeil de Faucon") solo issue from the 90s- in French! And I got a JLA: Classified issue I'd been looking for, in English. It was a good day.











It's been sunnier, so I've managed to get some reasonably decent pictures of my neighborhood.
















It's a bit like the neighborhood where my Danish family lived, in that it's very enclosed and quiet and safe, and everyone seems to know each other.










I've also been really getting to know my family's pets and, astonishingly, it turns out I'm not allergic to any of them. The cats have taken to chilling on my bed in the evenings, which I love. I've always been a cat person, and I've never really had the opportunity to hang out with any for an extended period of time.




































And finally, a slightly blurry video tour of the pets! Note the asthmatic cat and the creepily staring dog.


Saturday, March 9, 2013

First Week Stuff

      When I was first learning French in middle school, we spent a lot of time memorizing the names of various types of French foods. I tended to get hungry during school, and this really didn't help, particularly since most of the food we were memorizing sounded really good. One of the main culprits was les steak-frites. I don't actually like steak all that much, but I have been subconsciously craving les steak-frites since sixth grade.
     And guess what my host sister just made for dinner.
     So that's that. I've gotten all I could have ever hoped for out of France. I've finally gotten my steak-frites.
      I've been here now for a week, which feels a little weird, because it simultaneously seems like I just arrived, and that I've been here for weeks. I'm been speaking French almost exclusively with my family, and doing much better than I'd thought I would. In general, things have been pretty great. I'll see if I can briefly summarize the past week.

      I passed out in bed Saturday night, after arriving at the house, and ended up getting about eleven hours of sleep. I was physically and emotionally exhausted. I also didn't want to get out of bed the next morning.
       I eventually got up the nerve to leave my room, and it ended up being completely worth it.
       Southern France is known for its warm climate, so I wasn't too surprised that the weather was extremely pleasant. My host mom and her boyfriend took me out to a nature preserve not far from the city, to take a walk and enjoy the sun. Apparently, everyone else in France had had the same idea, because the parking lot was packed.
       It turned out to be just what I needed to unwind from the stress of travel and of being somewhere new. My host mom had roller blades and her boyfriend had a bike, and they went off down the trail, allowing me to walk on my own. It was great.

My host mom's boyfriend explained that a railroad used to run through the park, and that the tracks had been removed and converted into the walking path that's there now. It travels along the edge of a saltwater estuary that connects to the sea.

The park is protected by the state, and is home to lots of interesting wildlife.













Including this dude! There were semi-wild horses in the park, and they came over to the fence whenever anyone stopped to look at them, so I'm assuming people feed them.































Those are wild flamingoes.
















Plants and stuff























Then we went to the beach. It was a little chilly, but nice. You know. Like a beach.



















The Mediterranean Sea.











I also met my host sister, who had been away with friends the night I had arrived. Right from the start she was very friendly and enthusiastic and welcoming. She actually reminds me a lot of my real sister. More about her later.

On Monday I had my first French class, and that meant going into the city of Montpellier itself. Fortunately, Montpellier has a very clean, efficient public transportation system, consisting of buses and four tram lines. My host sister accompanied me to and from the city on Monday, and since then I've been doing it on my own. I find that I actually enjoy the trip. Montpellier is a small city, so the public transportation isn't as hectic and crowded as it might be elsewhere.
    There are four tram lines that allow for travel in and around the city, and they're each designed to represent a different element. I take the Earth tram to and from class.


















      It rained a lot this week, so I haven't had much of a chance to explore the city yet, but what I've seen so far reminds me a lot of Copenhagen- a lot of walking streets and little shops, and a generally relaxed atmosphere. I found a bookstore, which instantly made me feel better about things. I feel safe in bookstores, and when you're someplace new, it's great to have somewhere you can go to feel safe. I also found a very promising patisserie, to which I know I'll be giving a lot of money during the next two months.
      I'll say a little bit about my class itself. It's not taught at a school- instead, it's run by an organization that offers French classes to anyone who signs up. On Monday, those of us who had just arrived were divided into groups, based on our level of French proficiency. I ended up in one of the intermediate groups.
      I've taken a lot of French classes, and in terms of the teaching style and material we're covering, this one is nothing special. The factor that makes it really unique are the other students. This week I was in a class with eight other students, and I was the only American. Obviously, it wasn't the first time I'd ever been somewhere where I was the only American, but it was the first time that this fact had been made so blatant. My fellow students were from Switzerland, Brazil, Germany, Spain, Mexico, Korea, Japan, and even the Republic of Georgia (she was really excited to hear that I had not only heard of Georgia, but had also been there). And it struck me on the second or third day that the only language we shared was French, and that if I were to start speaking English, most of them might not understand me. This seems obvious, but it was still an odd, somewhat mind-blowing thought.

      I've also been getting into a routine with my family, and our interactions haven't been nearly as awkward as I'd anticipated, considering the fact that I'm usually pretty uncomfortable around strangers. My host sister is very talkative and enthusiastic, and we've already watched three movies and shared a bag of candy together. Bonding has happened, and it's only been a week, which I think is pretty amazing.
     My host mom has also been very welcoming and supportive, and drives me to the tram stop every morning. She has plans to open a bed-and-breakfast, and wants to improve her English so that she'll be able to communicate with any potential tourists from England or the US. I'm not entirely sure what her job is now, but it seems to have something to do with watching other people's kids, because I've come home several times to find the house full of toddlers. At one point I ended up helping out by reading a French picture book to one of them. When I had finished, the toddler turned to me and said "...Do you speak French?"
  Ouch.
  Clearly, my accent isn't as good as I thought it was.
        In any case, my routine has been to come home right after class (Earth tram and then a bus) and eat lunch with my host mom and, if she's around, my host sister. In French culture, lunch is the most important meal of the day, so we all sit down at the table together and eat and talk, which is really nice. On the other hand, dinners tend to be fairly small, so I'm prone to getting hungry in the evenings. This is a cultural problem that I had not anticipated.
  That's a basic summary of the week. It's mostly involved adjusting and adapting, which has been engaging for me, but isn't particularly interesting to read about. So here, have a picture of my bed.




















   






And a pineapple. Sneaky buggers are everywhere.

Tuesday, March 5, 2013

Je Suis Arrivée (and stuff)!

        I've arrived! I had meant to post earlier than this, but I've barely had any free time for the past few days. It's also awkward to sit around on the computer, being anti-social, when you're a guest in someone else's house. (See, Mommy? I'm getting the hang of this social norms thing!). In any case, I'll try to summarize what's been going on.
        Our flights (the first to Washington D.C., and then to London) were ridiculously early Friday morning- so early that it wasn't worth it to go to sleep. I'd gotten into a habit of staying up really late, so I handled this pretty well, but there's a difference between staying up really late and not going to bed at all. I slept a bit on the flight to London, but not as much as I wanted to, because the laws of the universe state that, no matter how exhausted you are, it's impossible to get any real sleep on an airplane.
         Our flight was during the day, which was odd- all of the other flights I'd taken to Europe had been overnight. I'd initially thought that this might mean I'd get an interesting view out the window, but for most of the flight we were above the clouds, and by the time we reached London, it was dark.
         I've wanted to visit the UK for years, so actually being there was very surreal. I spent most of the bus ride to our hostel enjoying the fact that we were driving on the left side of the road, and trying to take pictures of double-decker buses.




Well, I tried.














     
 I slept surprisingly well at our hostel, despite the fact that it was crowded and noisy and I was quietly freaking out about the next morning.

     



We woke up early the next morning and walked to St. Pancras Station, which looked just like a British train station ought to.


































    This next bit was a big deal for me. I'd have to take the train by myself into France, then transfer to another train- still by myself- and take that to Montpellier where (hopefully) my host family would be meeting me. I instantly found myself alternating between two different defense mechanisms: acting tough, and acting as pathetic as physically possibly. And in spite of everything, I ended up on the train.
    Since this was Europe, and therefore about ten times cooler than the US, I was taking a high-speed train. I'm not sure whether it was because of the speed, or because the air pressure in the train was weird, or because we kept going up and down hills, but my ears felt like they were continually popping. It was uncomfortable, but in a cool way.
       It was a grey, cloudy day, and I watched the scenery pass by very fast for a while. The Chunnel wasn't as exciting as it should have been. I'm not sure what I was expecting, really.
     After an hour-or-so I arrived in Lille, France, which was cold and grey and had giant flowers.









You thought I was joking.















       I'm sure I cut several years off my life stressing about figuring out where to go, and which car was which, and lugging my suitcase up and down stairs, but I managed to get myself on the train to Montpellier. It was a really nice train, and I had a great seat near the window, but it ruined its initial good impression by not announcing the names of the stops. I traveled through France for five hours, watching the countryside and hoping I would figure out when to get off. Most of the stops had fairly legible signs that I could see from the window. Most of them. The few that didn't really ruined the trip for me.
       It was nighttime when I finally arrived at the stop that I was pretty sure was the right one. There is nothing less inviting than a dark train station, and I didn't feel too great about getting off, but I found some courage somewhere. I immediately made a tourist of myself and took a picture of the sign.



















      My host mom met me just inside the station. I had been really, really nervous about this, because I don't do well with meeting strangers, even without a language barrier. Fortunately, she was very friendly, and she spoke REALLY SLOWLY. I understood everything she said. I was stunned. We got in her car and made small talk all the way to the house.

      Montpellier is a small city in southern France, right near the Mediterranean Sea coast. My host family lives just outside the city, in one of the suburbs. And it is ridiculously picturesque. Eventually I'll show you a picture of my street, and you'll see what I mean. All of the houses are sand-colored and small, with fences and nice green yards, and there are palm trees everywhere. It's nuts.
      My host family consists of a mother, her eighteen-year-old daughter, three cats, and a paranoid dog. Occasionally my host mom's boyfriend comes over to hang out. He speaks English fairly well, but my host mom and my sister really don't, so we've been doing most of our communicating in French. I think I've pretty much mastered the I-Think-I-Sort-Of-Know-What-You're-Saying-But-Not-Really smile and nod. It's worked out so far.
     This post is getting long, so I'll stop for now. I'll just leave you with a picture of the paranoid dog creepin' on me from across the room.