Mon Séjour en France: 2007

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

La Fin de L'année

Okay,

After a lot of ups and downs over the past week, I know what I'm doing now. Almost. I've figured out how I'm going to take exams in most of my classes, and I'm working it out with professors in the other ones. I was really stressed out this week because I thought there was a chance I could make it to Mike's wedding, and then just come home after that. But classes started up again (sort of) so now I have something to stay for. And I still need to take those tests, anyway. Three days ago, there was a possibility I'd be leaving this Thursday, but now I'm back to waiting until the 24th.

Not a whole lot has gone on since I last wrote. I had the opportunity to see the Brattains and the Bryants in Paris. It was so good to see people from home! The first night I went with Richard to the Eiffel Tower and got some beautiful pictures at night, even though it was a little cloudy. Afterwards, we walked around and saw a few things, including the Champs d'Elysées in all its Christmas splendor. The next day I went to the Louvre with Richard and Ada. That museum is incredible. I wasn't too excited about going since I've seen so many museums in the past few months, but none of them compare to the Louvre. First of all, it's humongous. There's also the history, the architecture, and, of course, many many of interesting paintings, sculptures, artifacts, etc., from all over the world. I also checked out Notre Dame and the Latin quarter that day. At night, I went to the Musée D'Orsay with the Brattains, and again I was impressed. There are a lot of Impressionist classics there. And Mrs. Brattain evidently studied a lot of art history in college, so she knew a ton about what we were seeing. Paris was a good experience. I need to get back there in the next couple weeks, if I can.

Now I have to get to working on things for school, for a change. I have a test tomorrow--my first one--and an oral presentation (which I know nothing about except my topic) due on Monday. Yeah, this is a big change.

I'll be home for Christmas,
Stephen

Tuesday, December 4, 2007

Strikes

Hello all,

I haven't written in a while because it seems like there hasn't been much going on. I've lost track of how long this student strike has been going on. At least I have my exchange student classes to go to, but those aren't exactly a joy at sessions that last at least two hours (I've decided I like the American way of doing classes much better.). So there hasn't been a lot going on the past couple (?) weeks, but people around here are getting bored and going out a little more often, maybe.

Last weekend I went to Normandy with three carloads of people. First we went to a small town with some beautiful cliffs overlooking the Channel. Unfortunately, all of my pictures from that day were mysteriously erased. Anyway, we went to another small town which probably was a lot prettier a few weeks ago before all of their flowers died, and drove for another hour or so to get to our hotel in Avranches, right outside of Mont St. Michel. The next morning we went to St. Michel, which is famous for being a tidal island; until recently the causeway leading to it would be completely submerged at high tide. It's actually is a small town, but it's known for the castle monastery/prison at the top. It was fun to look around and learn some of the history. I remember learning a little about it with Mr. Johnson during World History in 9th grade, so it was one of the things I really wanted to see while I'm here.

On the way home, we stopped at a little town where a large part (most?) of Winston Churchill's floating harbor had washed up on the beach. During World War II, Churchill had the idea to create an enormous harbor in between England and France to use as a disembarking point for the D-Day invasion, I believe. I would probably have liked to see one of the landing beaches a little more, but it was still cool.

After I send this, I'm heading to Paris for (basically) the first time! I'm going to meet the Bryants (sans Adam, of course) and the Brattains and hang out with them for a day or so. I'm excited about seeing people from home (especially these ones)! I'm taking my laptop to backup the my pictures, and I'll try to make sure I don't lose three quarters of them this time.

See you all soon!
Stephen

Monday, November 19, 2007

Return to France

This post is a little late; I sent the e-mail a week or two ago
***

Hey everybody,

I'm back. Last week was so much fun; I saw everything I wanted to see and more, I met new people, and I was able to speak English. It was a true vacation. Between the language and the British culture, it felt a hundred times more like home.

After I sent my last e-mail (Monday afternoon), I went to the London Museum, which was not all I had hoped it would be. It was just London history and nothing more. I did learn some stuff, and they had a really interesting exhibit about the Great Fire. That night, I had real English fish and chips. It came with mayonnaise, so I tried fries with mayo for the first time. It was good, until I saw that there was ketchup on the table.

Tuesday was interesting. I wanted to go on a walking tour, but I didn't see anyone at the place where it was supposed to begin, so I walked over to Buckingham Palace because I knew they would go by there, and the changing of the guard was taking place in a few minutes. I thought I had a great spot, because I was as close to the front gates as you could get, but they don't actually do anything right in front of the palace. It all takes place on the other side of the Victoria Memorial, so I saw almost nothing. I stayed there for a long time, hoping that they would walk around, but they didn't until the very end, over an hour later. I also stayed because I heard that the queen was coming out that day. Sure enough, she came out in her Rolls and waved to the crowd. I did have a good spot for that, so I guess that made it worth it. Well, I could see something tall far away from where I was (I think it was Big Ben, but I'm not sure), so I decided to walk over there. To get there, I had to walk out and around the road in front of Buckingham, and when I was out by that street, I saw the queen coming back, in a carriage, followed by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. That was the first of three times I saw Abdullah. I think he was following me.

Well, after I finally got to the end of this road in front of the Palace, I saw signs for Trafalgar Square, and that was on my to-see list, so I walked over there. And what should I see at Trafalgar Square, but the British National Gallery? That is a great museum. It was almost entirely painting, but there was a wide range, and a lot of classics are there. I spent hours looking around. When I came out, the sun was starting to set, and I set off again to find my tall tower, and I walked down Whitehall Road on the way. And from there, I went out to the Thames for the first time. I got some good pictures of the Eye, the Houses of Parliament, and Big Ben at night. All in all, it was a pretty good day for having no plan at all. Oh, for lunch, I had Subway, for the first time in two months. I also ate Pizza Hut while I was in London. They do have Pizza Hut in France, but I had never gotten around to eating there.

The next day, I got to go on that tour. It turns out that they just don't meet where the website says they do, but pretty close. The guide was really good, and I learned some interesting history. The tour went from Hyde Park Corner to Green Park, the Palace, the beautiful St. James's Park, by Winston Churchill's famous War Rooms, Parliament, Big Ben, Leicester Square, Trafalgar Square, 10 Downing Street, the Horse Guard Parade (where I got to see a horse guard, one of the guys who doesn't move, no matter how much tourists yell at him, poke him, and otherwise annoy him), and Diagon Alley, from the Harry Potter movies. While we were at Admiralty Arch, in front of Buckingham Palace, we saw the king of Saudi Arabia leaving. The tour group was right in the middle of the road, so we got a good look. I met several Americans and an Australian on the tour, and I went with my new Australian friend to the National History Museum, which, although free, was not that exciting at that point in the day.

Thursday, I ate lunch in Hyde Park, spent some time at Tate Modern, and went to Westminster Abbey for the All Saints' Day service. Because it was a service, I didn't get to see all of the cathedral, but I really enjoyed it. Hearing the voices of the choir echoing off the walls and ceilings was something I'll always remember. At night, I met a couple of Tony's (and Mike's friends) at dinner.

Friday I spent the day at the Tower of London, a 900 year-old castle where the monarchy used to live. The queen still has a house there, but I'm not sure how often she visits. I saw the Crown Jewels, the National Armament, and lots of history. I also had tea and scones at the restaurant there...

I had no problems getting back on Saturday. It was much smoother than the trip out there. Back in Amiens, well...that's a story for another day.

A bientôt,

Stephen

Monday, October 29, 2007

My Facebook albums

Vacances

Well, it's time for another update! So much has happened in the past week! I'm writing this in London, where I have a much better Internet connection, so I can use Skype now. More on that later...

If you've been watching the news, you probably saw that France had some pretty bad strikes going on in the transportation industry. I wanted to go to Paris a week ago Thursday, and I couldn't because everything in the country was shut down. That was the 'official' date of the strike, but on Saturday when I tried to go to Abbeville (the second largest city in Picardie), we were told that there were no trains coming back to Amiens because of the strike. But that day still was fun. We went to a little plant garden and a market in town and ended up at a café (my first time at one). I also stopped inside a pastry shop and saw some incredible French food (and bought some, too). It was a good day to see a little more of the city. That night, I went with some British and German friends to watch the World Cup final. It was not very exciting. Our football is much more exciting than soccer and rugby. Most of the time.

I had a growing experience in class last week. In my English to French translation class (which is much much harder than the other way around), all we do every week is translate. The prof calls on a student who gets to go up in front of the class, read the paragraph in English, propose a translation in French, and then work through it until we end up with a good final draft. Tuesday, that student was me. There were a couple other people that did different paragraphs, but mine was the longest, and I was in front of this class of 40 or 50 students for at least 20 minutes. It was really difficult, but I was able to talk to the professor and correct my mistakes without getting too embarrassed. There was only one time when she said "Ca ne veut dire rien en français"--"That doesn't mean anything in French." I was pretty close most of the time.

I decided that I was going to the All Saints' holiday in London. Getting here was a horrible experience. After I bought the train tickets in Amiens, I realized that I didn't have my passport. So I had to run back to my room and get it, and I missed my train. Getting from Amiens to Lille wasn't a problem. My ticket was good for all day. But from Lille I was taking the Eurostar. All of those tickets are non-exchangeable, non-refundable. I decided that I was going to go ahead and try to go, although I was expecting to have to buy another ticket. I really didn't have another choice since I'd already shelled out a lot, buying round-trip tickets. So I went to Lille. (On a side note, I ran into three of the American girls in the station. They also were taking a train to Lille on the way to Brussels.) When I was ten minutes away from the Lille station I looked at the notes I had written and saw that the last train was leaving in ten minutes. I was pretty mad, because the helpful guy at the counter at the Amiens station had told me that I'd have enough time to make the next London train. And at Lille, there are two stations. The international one is 400 meters away from the one I was arriving at. So I ran over, looked at the terminal, and (praise the Lord) I saw that there were more Eurostar trains that day. I went to the ticket office, and told an agent there my predicament, and he said, no, there's no way to exchange these tickets. He looked at other trains, and there was only one train left that day that wasn't sold out, which cost 50 Euros more than the ticket I had already bought. I just asked, "isn't there anything I can do?" and he said, "well, tell me your story..." So I told him what had happened that morning and he went and made a phone call. He came back, saying, "we never ever do this, but..." and he stamped my missed train ticket, and didn't charge me a thing to go on the other train. Let me tell you, I've never experienced relief like that before.

I got to London, and took a cab over to Tony's place. I'm staying with a friend of my uncle Mike's. Tony has been incredibly helpful so far. He showed me how the Underground works and gave me advice and probably the coolest thing about him is that he's a football fan! He's originally from Detroit, and he is still very much attached to the NFL after seven years in London. Finally, someone I can talk to about football! Oh yeah, he also got me a ticket to the game in London yesterday!! For those of you who don't watch ESPN, the first ever NFL game played outside of North America just took place at the brand new Wembley Stadium, in front of a sellout crowd. Probably half of the crowd was Americans, but there were plenty of European fans, and still more people who didn't have any idea what was going on. I helped explain the game to some of Tony's British friends. It was an experience.

London is great. I've heard a lot of languages, but it has been a huge relief to hear so much English, and to not feel guilty when I speak in English! I guess I needed this vacation. The weather here was terrible the first couple days, but today is sunny and in the 60's (Fahrenheit, of course).

I've already done some walking around and seen some great things, including St. Paul's Cathedral, the Wellington Arch, and Buckingham Palace, and I finally have some things planned out to do. When I finish writing this, I'm going to take a trip to the London Museum. And it looks like I've finished writing this now.

A bientot!

Stephen

Sunday, October 21, 2007

Octobre Part 2

Hey again,

My last update took us to Friday, leaving you to wonder what happened to me over the weekend. Well, here's the rest of the story...

Friday, before I went to my first French-as-a-foreign-language language class (as opposed to FAAFL culture) I saw an ominous notice taped to the wall in the hallway on my floor. I found out that Skype doesn't work here because they're intentionally blocking it; it's a "security threat." It's incredibly frustrating because I had this great way to communicate for free, I bought a mic and a camera, and it only lasted a week or two. Skype is the only thing that has worked reliably here, besides my cell phone, which costs people calling me 20 cents a minute. The pay phones just don't work.

I talked to Emily that afternoon and found out a few more things. The kitchens in this building are now closed after 4:30; you have to go to another building and borrow the key if you want to cook dinner. This is because people came from the other wing, which isn't completely finished, and used our kitchen, and they left two small bags of trash plus two wine bottles. It's a punishment, I think. So now the 150-plus residents here have to take an extra 10 or 15 minutes every time we want to eat dinner. Also, the kitchens are the only common areas in the building. Last week, a security guard was walking the halls and yelling at people who were outside of their rooms after 11:00. The rooms are just too small to accommodate more than four or five people, so there really was nothing we could do. I think that guard was transferred to a different building, though; there were a few complaints after he threatened, manhandled, and sexually harassed students while he was drunk on the job.

Things got better, though. Friday night, some of the exchange students were commiserating over the state of things, and once again it helps to have people going through the same thing. There really is no one here helping the exchange students. Questions go unanswered, problems remain unsolved, things go from bad to worse without any sort of administration working on our behalf. It's just so different from what I'm used to. In the U.S., it's so easy to get help when you need it, almost no matter where you are or what you're doing. Emily offered a really helpful perspective that night. She said in a book she's reading (the best book written about French culture) it was described like this: If we went to South America or Africa or China and everything was radically different, we could accept it. We would adapt. But because this is France, we expect things. We expect that, because it's a developed country, it's going to be like ours, but it's not. There are some things we just don't understand. The Polish students and the Germans and the Portuguese all feel the same way. And that bothers us. It helped to hear it from that viewpoint. I'm coming to grips with it.

Saturday was the bike ride to Naours. I went with seven other students. The way there wasn't that much fun, because the weather was bad and we weren't exactly going at a leisurely pace, so we got pretty spread out. It took a little over 2 hours to get there. When we arrived at the park/village thing, we ate lunch and waited for their lunch break to end (people work 5 hours a day in France. Literally.). We then took a tour of the underground city of Naours. I didn't really understand what was going on, but I gathered that it was a refuge during World War II and up to 2600 people lived there at one time. There wasn't a lot to see besides an occasional giant sculpture, but it was a pretty impressive setup they had. There was a lot. After the underground part, the tour progressed into a history of various Picardy occupations. After that, we visited the windmills. I'm not really sure how the three things were connected (there also was miniature golf on the property), but it was a nice little park. Actually, going up in one of the windmills was about my favorite part. The sky had totally cleared up by that point, and I could see miles of rolling French countryside. It was beautiful; I had a "I can't believe I'm in France" moment. On the way back, I had a similar moment while we were resting. I just looked out across fields, eating a baguette and taking it all in. When we got back, we ate a snack at the park in Amiens. As we were leaving, a kid checked out the bike I had rented (I think he had one from the same place) and challenged me to a race around the lake. We were leaving, I was tired from riding for almost 5 hours, and--oh yeah-- the kid was about 12, so I turned him down.

One more thing. Last night, right before I wrote my e-mail, I had an interesting experience. The day before (Monday), a French student came here yesterday with something he needed to translate into English. I told him I could help, but if he wanted it done completely, he'd need to find someone else. He said he understood and went his way. Then Tuesday night, he came back to my room with a French girl (who he had just met) who knows a little English. We looked at the essay he wanted translated, and we had barely done anything after half an hour because the grammar in the first paragraph was so convoluted. So we gave up, and he started singing songs he knew in English and the French students (he had another friend with him) talked to each other a mile a minute as I tried to keep up. It was really strange. I guess it's never a dull moment in Amiens.

A bientôt,
Stephen

Octobre Part 1

Hey all,

A lot lot lot has happened since the last time I posted, so I broke this up into two e-mails. If you only have time to read one, read the second! It has some pretty good stories..

Okay. Let's go back to le 2 octobre. That's when I took the French-as-a-foreign-language class placement test. It was harder than I thought it would be. There's class 1, preparatoire, intermedière A and B, and then there's level 3, advanced or something. I'm in 2B. I think it's really perfect for me, and it should stretch me just enough without making me go crazy. I've been to two culture classes, and they'd be hard to pay attention to in English, but in French it's nearly impossible. It's 2 hours on Monday, with no break, and so far we've talked about 1) the color of dirt, 2) the shapes of roofs, and 3) weather. It's called civilisation and it's supposed to be cultural, but it's just been geography so far. It's good to know, but it's really difficult to hang on every word when you're learning dirt vocabulary. My other French-as-a-foreign-language class is more focused on the language and vocabulary, although the professor doesn't really have a plan yet. That was a lot better. In both classes, I've gotten to meet people from other countries, which is always exciting. I'm going to work with a Turkish dude (the first one I've met!) for a project at the end of the semester for the first class.

Last Wednesday, I had another great night at the Lipstick, the first club I went to here. Every other week, I think it's college night or something and students can buy discounted tickets ahead of time. Again, I only knew one person who was going to be there, so I was forced to meet new people. I went both times with Loren, the Brazilian-American girl, and she mostly goes to UPJV's sister school, so she knows people from there, and I meet her friends. This time we went to a Madagascaran (?) girl's apartment beforehand and talked with her, her Moroccan friend, and her probably French boyfriend for a while before we left, all in French. It's really nice to meet people and talk to them in French the first time we meet. I'm breaking the bad habit of speaking English! These 12-page e-mails aren't helping me with that... Anyway, lots of fun. On the way back, we were going to walk halfway back and only take a taxi for the second half because we weren't tired yet (bad idea; they charge from the train station instead of where they pick you up. Yeah, it's France.) Well the time came and I called the taxi, and I had trouble talking with the driver. I said "we're on this street" and "it's right next to this other street" (one ran into the other) and I described it every way I knew how. I thought it made sense... Well, the guy was mumbling and getting frustrated and I was afraid that he was going to hang up on me and we were going to be left there when Loren said to me, "Ask this guy." And there was someone walking down the street, and while I was talking on the phone, Loren asked him to explain where we were. Now, it's important to understand that there is no one on the streets of Amiens after about 1:00, let alone 3:30. But here this guy was, and he talked to the driver, hung up, and said "he's coming" (in French). Then he turned to me and said "weren't you in a C.A.P.E.S class?" It turns out that he was in the class that I got kicked out of. I don't think I ever explained that story...I tried to go to a new class, mostly by accident, and the teacher wouldn't let me just sit there and listen. I didn't think it would be a problem because I was in another C.A.P.E.S. course, and the teacher didn't mind at all. That was the class that wasn't for a grade. So this professor asked me to leave in the first couple minutes of class. It was embarrassing, but kind of a relief since I didn't really want to be there. And this guy, the only one on the street in the middle of the night in Amiens, had been in that class, and he recognized me. So we talked about that incident a little bit and I think he sympathized with me, although upon reflection I realize he could have just been explaining further. Probably not, but it is possible.

The next day I went to the cathedral for the first time. It was big. I didn't see exactly how old it was, but I think they started the first construction in the 1200s. Wikipedia tells me it the last tower was completed in 1406, almost 100 years before Colombus set foot in America. Yeah, it's been around. It's the tallest and largest cathedral in France, and it's built in the Gothic style, like Notre Dame de Paris. I took my time and walked through, and I thoroughly enjoyed the good experience, but I don't get as excited about things like that as a a lot of people do. After I left, I bought my first macarons, the Amienois specialty. They're good. I don't know exactly what they're made of, but it includes butter and coconut.

Well, that's it for Part 1.

Stephen

Saturday, September 29, 2007

New classes, nightlife

Bonjour!

I may have my classes figured out now. There were some interesting developments on the way. For example, I was confused in my first year French>English translation course because all of the other students already had the documents that we were going over. I was pretty frustrated after the second class, because we weren't moving on to new material and I still didn't have what we were working on, and I almost just left and didn't come back. But instead, I approached the professor and asked him what was going on. He explained it all to me (in English), and I learned that the class is actually for students who are preparing to take a test to become professors. So there are no grades and there is no final exam or anything. But I can understand when the prof when he talks and the material is appropriately challenging, so I'll stick with that one. There's a first year English>French course that I went to on Tuesday, which of course was harder, but I liked that. It might be the same thing, though; no grades, no credit. I don't actually know.

Probably the funniest experience I had was another class on Tuesday. This was supposed to be a literature and film course. Evidently, a large part of the class was only there because a general lit. course had been too full, and they had heard that the lit. and film class might become an extra general lit class. The professor talked back and forth with the students for a while, and he really wasn't sure of what was going on. After a few minutes, he had us vote on what the class should be! The vote was pretty much split, so he didn't make a decision then and there. I'm not sure he could have if he wanted to. Well, actually, I don't know if there's any sort of administrative office at all. Anyway, he just talked about a poem for an hour. It was interesting, though, and that's definitely a class I'm going back to!

Wednesday I had a second year French>English course. Before, I had to prepare a translation of a newspaper article that we had talked about the class before--my first French homework. There's another course I want to go to on Wednesdays, but it was canceled last week. So it's five classes, plus my exchange student French classes.

I went to a discothèque. It was Wednesday night, and I'd had a pretty boring week so far, so I agreed to go out. Ah, I would have gone anyway. We met up with Loren's (the Brazilian-American) friend beforehand and headed off to the club at about midnight. I ended up going with Loren and about eight people I'd never met before. I had a blast. I was there until 4:00. The next night, I went out to a different club. This time, more than 20 of the exchange students went. Not all together, but we ended up at the same place. I was there for a long time, and I danced, but it wasn't as much fun, mostly because it was almost entirely pop music. There was a little bit of rock (I got excited when the DJ played a RATM song), but for the most part, it was French and American pop. At the first place, it was mostly techno, with some American 70's and 80's music thrown in, and I can deal with that a lot better. Also, I was a more tired the second night. Anyway, both nights were great experiences, and I'm glad I finally got to do it.

I tried to go to church this morning, but the place I went to didn't have a service because they're downtown right in the middle of where the citywide market was today. I waited outside for a while, for someone to come to the door (because it's in an apartment), alongside someone who goes there regularly, and he guessed what had happened for me. Waiting for the bus to get back, a girl asked me if the bus was coming that day and if I'd already taken the bus today and we talked for a minute or two, and I understood it all. She was going to campus too, so we talked a little bit more when we got off and I found out that she's actually Moroccan and that she knows a little English but her French is better. That makes just the second exchange student I've met who speaks French better than English--and the first one actually is French; she's just lived in Portugal for the past twelve years. Anyway, the coolest part was I didn't speak a word of English for the first time when I met someone new.

I can't believe I've been here for a month. Only three more to go. I still don't know if I'll be leaving in December or January. Right now, I can't stop smiling because the Colts just scored three touchdowns in 10 minutes. Life is good.

Stephen

Sunday, September 23, 2007

Starting classes

Bonjour,

Well, classes started. I've had a real tough time figuring out what I could do or even what I could do, but I went to five or six different classes. The only way you can figure out where classes are offered here is on bulletin boards in each separate building. (In the college of humanities, there are no course descriptions posted anywhere. And most professors don't give students syllabuses.) I realized that almost all classes are offered as one session a week, which makes it simpler. Next week I'll go to three or four of those again, plus some new ones. At the end of next week, I'll decide what I'm going to take. In high school, French students spend about as much time at school as we do in America, but college is totally different. It's really hard to get concrete answers from people around here, but I believe people typically take 5-10 hours a semester. My French as a foreign language class already will be eight hours, I believe, so I'm actually planning on taking on a heavy load here. Well, a lot of classes anyway; I don't want to do harder classes that require a lot of outside work, but I really think it'd be good for me to spend a lot of time in the classroom.

In a couple classes, I was really lost, but I was able to understand most of the professors. In the three translation classes I went to, I was of course the only anglophone so I got a little more attention than I would have liked, but it's better than being ignored and getting lost! I'm taking a French-to-English class with a lady who's already been very helpful to me, and I think I'll be able to learn a lot there. There are two classes that I really wanted to go to on Wednesday, but the entire department was shut down--they cancel classes all the time over here.

Both last Saturday and today I went downtown. Last week it was with some Portuguese and German girls to go on the canal tour. Amiens is the "Petit Venice" of France, supposedly. It was a 45 minute boat ride through absolutely beautiful gardens, a lot of which were private property--our tour guide kept talking to people who were sitting in front of the river in their back yards. The guide was funny, and he knew a ton of stuff about those canals. I just wish I could have understood half of what he said! When I come back to Amiens after I can really speak French, I'll have to take that tour again. It was nice just to look at flowers for a while, though. Also, I barely spoke in English at all that day, which was nice for a change.

Today, I went au centre ville with the Americans, and Lami, one of my British friends. I bought a SIM card for my cell phone finally (the country code is 33, then you dial 6.80.70.88.91) and got my own mic for Skype. Skype has been down for a few days now, and it's pretty frustrating. I spent two or three hours the first night changing proxy settings and looking up information before I gave up. But everyone else is having the same problems, and the Université is working on it. So maybe in a week or two... Anyway, after I bought my electronics I needed a snack so I stopped at a patisserie, and picked up a nice little pastry. It was actually bigger than I thought it was, but once I opened it, I had to eat it all because I couldn't keep carrying it around. So, I sat on a bench in a tiny park (there are probably a dozen of them downtown) and ate three servings worth of dessert. It was pretty good. Afterwards, I went to the theater and watched Shoot 'Em Up. a new American movie for those of you who haven't heard of it. It was dubbed, which bothered me a little bit, but I wanted to listen to French, so I wasn't too upset about it. There were three or four really good action scenes, but it's not a movie I'd recommend to most people. Ask me if you want details...

I still don't have a church here. I haven't seen a single one in Amiens. I've e-mailed people all over the world, asking for leads on a church near here, but I haven't gotten anything besides more references. I'd appreciate your prayers as I keep looking.

It's been a good week. The scariest part was going to that first class, which fortunately was a lecture class, so I didn't have to do anything (I'm not going back to that one.). I feel a lot more comfortable now, and I'm excited about seeing what other classes will be like.

Good night,
Stephen

Thursday, September 20, 2007

Deuxième semaine

Bonjour,

A lot has happened in the first weekend and second week! I finally have my webcam for skype (stephen.carnagua), and I'll probably buy a microphone tomorrow. I thought I was getting a mic with the camera, but I didn't. So after I get that, the last major step I'll have to take to finish getting settled is to be able to access the money I put in the bank a week ago! You see, French banks are quite different from American banks, I'm learning. And after you open an account, you have to wait a week to get your debit card, which is the only way to withdraw money. And after you get your debit card, you have to wait to get your PIN number, not to be confused with the "secret code" they give you that is only good for getting your information online and will cause the ATM machine to eat your card if you enter that instead of the right PIN three times. So, nine days after getting here, I have 10 (borrowed) Euro left and my Mastercard. I still can't get the money from my stipend I got a week ago. My advice to anyone staying in France is to bring a good credit card and take cash overseas. If you want to eat the first week you're there, don't put money in the bank.

I've been talking to too many Americans. Hopefully I'll do something fun (and cheap!) this weekend with a mix of people. Now that all the Germans know each other pretty well, they're speaking in German a lot. And then they talk in English. Occasionally, they'll speak in French, but I really need to make some more French friends and hang out with the people who are willing to commit. If I'm only speaking French 1/3 or 1/4 of the time I'm talking, I'm wasting my time. Don't get me wrong; I'm not worried yet. There's still plenty of time. I'm just a little concerned because people are speaking more English instead of less now that we've been here for a week.

Last weekend was Amiens' medieval festival. There was a big market (which I had no money for :( ), and a big fireworks show Saturday night set to techno music. That might be the best show I've ever seen, although I don't remember the fireworks I saw in Disney World six or seven years ago too well. It was a lot for a town this size. I keep thinking in terms of "what if Fort Wayne was like this?" because that's about what it's relative size is (there are about 100,000 people in Amiens). Also Saturday night was the lighting of the cathedral. It was amazing! I've never seen anything like it. I'll describe the cathedral later, when I spend a day there, but for now it's enough to know that there is incredible detail on the outside. Hundreds of human figures and other shapes are carved into the three arches at the front, and everything was lit up in individual colors from a projector about 40 yards away. Imagine a sculpture in color--it looked like every single shape on this cathedral had been painted in vibrant colors.

What else have I done? I bought French groceries. It was really fun to choose new things to try. I registered for insurance and had a lot of confusion about mutuelle until I realized that they were trying to get me to buy extra insurance so there was no co-pay, and it wasn't something I needed to do. I think I know how to register for classes now. I'm going to go to every single class I might be interested in next week, when courses start, and then I register. That's just what the exchange students are doing here. Oh, I'm getting money that Ball State owes me, instead of paying them $2700. That was an exciting discovery. I learned in class today that about 3/4 of students in Europe starts learning English when they're six or seven or eight years old (and often another language soon after). We Americans are at such a disadvantage! Oh well. I'm trying.

A bientot,
Stephen

P.S. Send me something!

M. Stephen Carnagua
Res. Du Bailly Ouest
Ch. 454, Bat. D
Av. Paul Claudel
Amiens, 80025
France

The beginning

I'm going to post the first couple e-mails I sent out to family and friends here. I'm actually starting this blog a couple weeks into my trip, but it will be current from this point forward!

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Bonjour tout le monde!

Well. A lot has happened. I finally have the Internet in my room so I can talk to people. That is a relief.

My flight from Chicago was pretty easy. I sat next to a CPA who works for the U.S. Treasury and he has a daughter who's studying in Italy and he was going to go see her. He was nice. When I got to Paris, I had some trouble buying my TGV (Big Speed Train) ticket, but I made it. At my next stop, the train/bus station, I met a girl from Illinois who's also studying here. After we got off the bus (in Amiens), we met a girl from Mississippi. Now we all have rooms right next to each other. They've been a HUGE help in this transition. It's really nice to be lost with people instead of lost alone. Anyway, we somehow got a couple taxis to the campus and told the drivers the name of the school and nothing else. Well, I talked to my driver a bit (which was my first real interaction with un français) but I didn't know the address. So we had to take hundreds of pounds of luggage halfway across campus. It was not fun.

The foreign programs director here is so helpful. She speaks good English, and she saved us right when we got to campus. It just so happened that she was walking out of her building when we arrived. Seeing our rooms was awesome. The rooms are small here, but they're set up well. I'm in a room to myself, and I have my own shower! And there's a fridge, too. These are the newest dorms at Picardie Jules Verne. I'm taking a language class now, but not for credit (real classes start in a week and a half). The class is all exchange students, and there's quite a mix. Almost half are German, but there's a girl from Brazil, two Polish guys, a Mexican, two Portugese, two Brits, a Spaniard, a Finnish girl, and six Americans. I got to talk with a lot of people after class yesterday and met most of the rest today. All the Germans were relieved to speak English, because they know that much better than French.

Amiens is beautiful. I feel so bad that we don't have cities like this back home. I went to the center of town today, and there's a lot to see. There's always something new to see or do. Talking with the other students has been a blast. I've never done anything that compares with this experience. Everyone is so nice, and we're all trying so hard to learn the language. It's surreal to be in the middle of this country where it seems like everything is different. And I really prefer this sink-or-swim environment, because it's so hard to learn a language in the classroom.

I'm actually having trouble writing in English already. When I talk to my American and German friends I switch back in forth between sentences, or even in the middle of sentences. I've been forced to think through almost everything en français. It's very stressful, but I can tell I'm going to make a ton of progress over here.

And now, I sleep. (it's about 4:30)

Bon nuit,
Stephen

Mon Séjour en France