Un weekend provençal
We were sitting on the beach, eating sandwiches of baguettes and cheese, taking in the January sunrays and watching the Mediterranean blue wash up and down the sand, and suddenly I remembered what Stage 1 culture shock felt like.
I spent the past weekend with the Middlebury kids in Aix-en-Provence and other cities in Provence. Now, ever since 6th grade, when SuperTeacher Ms. Penner had just gotten back from a trip to Aix, I've wanted to go. And let me tell you, it was just as wonderful as I had imagined.
The sun shone everyday; the cities were cute and little and very French. We spoke in French almost all the time, despite others not completely respecting the Pledge, which was very rewarding and made me feel much more comfortable with my language skills. But what was the most exciting for me was remembering how much I really do love to travel. It's been a long 5 or 6 months so far, and it's going to be a long 4 more, but it's always refreshing to be reminded of the reason why I'm here at all. The reason why I came, and of what I always told myself I love so much. It's refreshing to remember that I actually do love it.
p.s. Provence pictures to be posted as soon as I get internet or take my laptop to a wifi spot. Sorry for such the delay!
My new "friends"
Ahh, study abroad, and it's new definition of so many words. Such as, the word 'friend'...
Tuesday, Week 1: In my first class of the morning, the teacher has us break up into small groups to analyze a text. One of the guys in my group turns to me and says, "If you aren't following something we're saying, just be sure to let us know," and then stops to explain something later on when I looked (I'm sure) utterly confused.
Friend status: "Hi. My name's Becky. Here's my cell phone number. Let's be friends." (ok, I didn't actually say that, but I was quite tempted)
Wednesday, Week 1: A girl in my Phonology class recognizes my accent and comes up to introduce herself. She's American too! We talk for a few minutes about how the teacher talks really fast and how linguistics is AMAZING.
Friend status: American
and a linguistics nut?! I think I have a new best friend!
Tuesday, Week 2: A girl in my Lexicology class remembers me from last week and greets me with a bis (kisses on the cheek). We get to talking, and I find out she takes French Sign Language. When I mention that I know some ASL, she suggests we get together some time to talk about the two languages.
Friend status: Look out boy from Tuesday class, and Karen the American, I HAVE A FRENCH FRIEND!!
Wednesday, Week 2: I find out that French friend's name is Marion. Clearly an important step in our friendship.
Monday Dinner Adventure
I have dinner with my host family every Saturday, Sunday and Monday. These evenings are usually spent with me in my room beginning at about 6:00, desperately scrounging for something to eat while I wait for the oh-so-European 8:30 dinnertime. But eventually I make it, and I rush downstairs when they call my name, or…ring my bell. Oh yes, there is a bell.
Every Monday the whole family comes over for dinner. Mme Farisy isn’t there usually, because her work is far away and so she spends the night in another town. But to make up for that, M. Farisy’s sister is almost always there, as well as Pierre and Isabelle’s two cousins, who are about my age, and sometimes there is another uncle or aunt as well. It’s a big family affair, and I find myself generally at a loss for words, as I understand very little of the conversation.
Last week was an affair in and of itself, when M. Farisy decided we should have sorbet for dessert. The way French meals work, you feel as if you’re at a restaurant. You start with soup, while the main dish may still be in the oven. You eat the entrée, and salad, bread and dessert, as each are brought out to the table, unlike in America where we just plop everything in the middle of the table or in a big pile on our plates. So the decision to make sorbet occurred right about as we were eating salad. M. Farisy got out the frozen fruit, the sugar, and whatever else you use to make sorbet, and put it all in a big electric mixer of some sort. But in turning on the mixer, it became apparent that something was wrong. Everyone finally decided that it didn’t sound right, but M. Farisy couldn’t help but try it one more time. Of course, in the discussion as to whether it sounded right or not, he had removed the top to the mixer, and therefore turning it on wasn’t the brightest idea.... As M. Farisy reached for a towel to wipe the bits of strawberry off his cheek, and the counter, and the other side of the kitchen, it was decided that we should call the neighbor.
Now, don’t ask me who the neighbor is, or why on earth we would call her for our broken appliance questions, but apparently Violette would know what to do. So M. Farisy called up Violette and declared that she’d be over in two minutes. She arrived in a flurry, carrying a large black box with her. M. Farisy had her look at the mixer, and try it out a few times (with the top on). She poured out the fruit, sugar and mush concoction and examined the blades on the bottom. Still having no idea what was wrong, she declared that it was broken (gasp!) and pulled yet another mixer out of her big black box. She set it all up and told M. Farisy that she would try it this time. However, M. Farisy then informed her that there simply was no more fruit left, and we therefore couldn’t make sorbet tonight. With a look of “Why on earth did you call me then?”, she took the broken mixer, left the new mixer on the counter, and returned home.
After finishing our lovely dessert of white cheese and jam, the boys declared they had work to do and must get home, and I went back up to my room, to do nothing but write this story down in order to laugh about it again and again.
First week of classes
This whole past week has felt very much like the first week of high school, except in all the good ways. I go to class at all too early an hour (9:00...completely unacceptable), have lunch, go to more class, and come home. Classes seem good; teachers seem nice enough. And, for the most part, I find myself understanding what they're talking about. I've sat at lunch with a group of people from one class, only knowing one of their names, and only understand about 50% of the conversation, but I sat with them nevertheless. One day, I sat with an American girl from one of my classes, understood a whole lot more of the conversation, and smiled for making friends, even American ones. As far as exciting, this week was anything but; however, it seemed like a very normal first week, and that alone made me happy.
As far as classes go, I'm really satisified with my schedule. The 9
AMs almost every day are balanced out by no class on Fridays, which is perfect for traveling. I'm taking lots and lots of linguistics classes that Middlebury would never offer in a million years (lexicology, phonology, history of the French language), one history of cinema class, translation and interpretation. My translation and interpretation classes are the ones I'm most excited for. In each of them, there are French students and anglophone students, and sometimes we translate from French to English, sometimes from English to French, and we discuss what you can and can't say in each language. It seems like great practice for my language skills, and is really interesting as well.
I looked at the school calendar today, and with adding in breaks and trips I already am planning on taking, I can practically feel the semester whooshing by my face already. But as long as time flies when you're having fun, I suppose I'm ok with that...
Pain au chocolat
America has a lot of faults, many of which I am willing to excuse, accept and even embrace. Its one fault, however, that is completely inexcusable is its significant lack of chocolate croissants. This is a serious problem that I would like to be resolved by the time I return.
A Few Days in Poitiers
I arrived in Poitiers two days ago, but it feels like at least a month already. I couldn’t be happier with the town itself. It’s a town of about 85 000, often called the biggest of the small cities, or the smallest of the big cities in France, and is certainly a refreshing change from Moscow. The town sits on the top of a hill, with the river Clain running right through it. I’m living right in the center of town, about a five minute walk away from everything. In the center of town is the large Hôtel de Ville, or Town Hall, and a square with everything on it from small, independent boulangeries to the large department store Printemps. Off of the central square begins a series of little, pedestrian streets with shopping, restaurants and cafés. As you twist and turn around these streets, you eventually come to the main market square, with a large daily indoor market and an outdoor market on the weekends. On market square stands Notre-Dame-la-Grande, a huge beautiful church with intricate carvings all over its walls. From here, you can turn off onto some of the real streets, and suddenly you know you couldn’t be anywhere except Europe. Each street seems hardly wide enough to walk along, let alone drive on, and they’re all one-way, although I can’t for the life of me figure out how the French know which one way is the right way. I wandered these streets for a while, and every time I turned a corner, I saw a new cathedral sticking out over the buildings, or right in front of my face, or down the street and in the distance.
The university campus is out on the edge of town, about a 20 minute bus ride from the center. We spent most of the day yesterday on campus, getting registered and figuring out class schedules and such. The one thing that makes me very excited is that the university feels like a real campus. It’s not squished in between two blocks in a big city;everything is laid out with green space in between, with the science buildings on one side, and the language or arts buildings on another. Although they say it is pretty dead at nights or on the weekends, because all of the French students live in town, while I was there during the day, it felt like a true college campus. Kids were hanging out and talking to each other in the hallways or cafes (eating chocolate croissants and drinking coffee, of course). The campus seemed truly alive and I could really see myself making friends and feeling comfortable while I’m there. It’ll be a nice change from Russia, I think, and I'm already looking forward to classes starting on Monday.
New Worlds
It’s been a weird few weeks. Exactly two weeks and four days ago, I was saying farewell to a town I knew – Moscow. But then in a matter of hours, I was home again. I was speaking, hearing and seeing English. Before I knew it, I was skiing with family in Colorado, and as soon as possible I was singing High School Musical at the top of my lungs with some of my favorite people in the world at Middlebury. And then tonight, just about three weeks after I had been standing on Red Square, in the shadow of the Kremlin, I found myself on the Place de la Concorde, with the Madeleine behind me, the Champs Elysees extending to my right, and the Eiffel Tower peeking over the tops of buildings in the distance.
Two weeks wasn’t long enough to be home. It wasn’t long enough to bathe in comfort and familiarity. However, as I look back over the past three weeks it makes me realize how much I really have done in the past 6 months, or year even. Eventually it'll all come together - I'll sort it all out, process it, realize what it all means - but for right now I can't help but marvel at simply how amazing it's all been, and at how far, literally and not so literally, I've come.
