Cultures Unite to become FRANCAIS

In case you haven’t noticed, I’m beginning to find blogging very therapeutic.  Hence the almost daily entries!  Thanks for listening.

Basically, the way my program works academically is that I am in a division at the Université de Grenoble solely for international students wanting to learn French.   This sector is called the CUEF.  All the classes are in French, but the linguistic/grammar courses cater to your ability level.  I am required to take 10 hours of these classes a week as well as 4 open seminar classes with students from all ability levels.  For those 4 classes, we have 9 options to choose from.  Right now, I am leaning towards History of Contemporary France, Politics of France, French and Francophone Literature, and Translation of English (which is required).  If I am at an advanced enough French level, I can take classes at the Université but I am not quite there yet. 

 Today was my first day of French grammar/ linguistic class.  These classes will be in a group with 10 other students.  There are students from Brazil, China, Japan, Kazakhstan, and the United States.  It’s neat to hear all the different accents and to have the only common language be one that we all struggle with. 

After class ended at 12:30, I went to lunch with one of my classmates who is from Kazakhstan and speaks Russian, the second most popular language.  We met up with another student who speaks Russian as well as a Japanese woman.  It was strug city to have conversations, but we ended up chatting the whole time with few awkward silences.  I found out that Russian is unlike any other language, except Ukraine.  I also found out that my classmate is at about the same level of French as I am but will be living in France for the next 6 years.  Brave man!

After lunch I had almost 3 hours to kill before my next class.  I didn’t have a laptop, had already journaled, and did not feel like reading.  Most of my friends from Swarthmore had already left for a hike for the day so I literally had nothing to do.  This is where the first case of homesickness set in.  My mind started to wander (dangerous!) and I got to thinking about how I really appreciate the luxuries of Bowdoin and the United States in general.  Back at school, if I had nothing to do I would call my parents or would text my friends to see what they were up to.   Which led me to think about how wonderful my friends are and how much I miss them.  This = sadness.

Luckily, I had made plans with Elita to meet up before class at 4 to check out the activities fair.  She is just such a wonderful person that she immediately made me feel better.  We checked out some sports clubs and decided to go to the mores specific club fair together later and potentially yoga.  Then we rushed off to our next class, only to wait outside with 50 other students for half an hour.  We later found out that class had been canceled for the week.  Here’s my first example of the infamous French University system – where class is randomly canceled and professors show up later than the students on a regular basis. 

It didn’t end up being a waste of time, however, because Elita’s friendliness helped us meet a girl from Columbia named Camilla and a girl from Italy named Margaux.  We ended up hanging out with them for the rest of the afternoon.  Once again, I couldn’t help notice that their accents were SO cool and the words they struggled with were totally different from what Elita and I struggled with as Americans. 

Elita, Me, Margaux exploring near Centre Ville

Elita is bold enough to introduce herself to people in a language she is not perfect in; this is a skill that I need to work on!  I find that here, I am ashamed of my inability to speak and am not as outgoing as I usually am.  Gotta go back to the goals at the beginning of my journey and put myself out there!  I am here to learn French!

Telepherique in Chamonix

Other news – Macy is officially visiting in October and we’re going to spend a day/ night in Paris.  Super excited!  I am pumped for Chartreuse this weekend, hiking with Molly, and exploring more of the night life in Grenoble.  I have also decided to take a trip to Chamonix next weekend with CUEF.  Chamonix is called the “mer de la glace” or ocean of ice.  It has snow year round and has a sweet télépherique, cable car, going over the mountains.  Check out this sweet pic!