September 5, 2014

I passed a good evening with my host sister, Quitterie. We visited the house of one of her friend's and I got to speak French with plenty of young people. It was an adventure indeed! Her friend, Etienne spoke to me sometimes in English and corrected me with French at times. For example, when I said, "Qu'est tu veux ça?" He said, "Non, c'est est-ce que tu veux ça?" And then said to me in English, "We are here to learn you French." He made me laugh a lot. "Non," I said. "We are here to teach you French."

Marie and Quitterie taught me French swear words and Marie wanted us to have a conversation in English for practice. After speaking in French a lot for the past couple of days, it was a little difficult to transition back to English. It didn't feel right and my accent had changed a little bit as a result of speaking in my second language so much. I think my English is suddenly getting more formal sometimes.

Everyone smoked, but me, which at first was shocking, but after meeting a lot of people in France that smoke, I am pretty used to it. Etienne told me in English, "There is not a lot of cigarettes in the U.S, but there is a lot of drugs." I couldn't stop laughing at that: "C'est vrai!"

Quitterie and friends 

I told Céline I liked the phrase for single woman in French: "femme libre." She told me, "It's a nice phrase, but don't use it at a party, or bar because people will think you want to do it with them." I asked Quitterie's friends if they found certain words in English difficult to pronounce. For Etienne, it was "woman."

Etienne, who is French and Kurdish, told me about his visit to Syria the year before the war. "It was very calm, everyone was fine." It was very interesting to talk politics in French and he in English. It was an insightful conversation for me and he offered good perspective. I told him I wrote a play about a family living in a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan. He told me it's good to be interested in these things, to ask questions.

Studying abroad is amazing for one of these reasons: I couldn't have had a conversation like this in my home country, or in a classroom. The main part of the experience is the people one meets who offer so many different experiences and perspectives on the world. The journey continues to be incredibly eye opening.