In the Real World, People Speak ‘French’ French

I know this may be perhaps rather cliché to say, but ‘real’ French can’t be taught in the classroom. Rather, it must be learned by talking and interacting with people; certainly, picking up mannerisms of a particular culture will soon self-translate themselves into understanding the language and sociolinguistic cues of the community one is trying to be a part of. Alright, enough of such talk.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that I still have a lot to learn, particularly in terms of language and cultural nuances. Ever since I left for my entretien yesterday, I have been constantly being witness to ‘that which is French.’ My ride to Fontenay-sous-Bois was quite easy from Etoile, only taking half an hour. Julie, our internship placement advisor, was nice enough to come along with me to the internship site, as this is the first time that my internship site has worked with BU. After a quick stop at a vrai café (Julie told me that, in France, we’re not supposed to show up too early; one should arrive just on time, and a little after works just as well), we walked to the internship site, which is probably only about a two minute max walk from the RER station. We approached what looked like a house and were soon greeted by staff members of AFS Vivre sans Frontières.

Julie left me to (as I would soon find out) speak with the director of the programme, while I had my interview with Elsa and Simon. They were really nice and personable, and talked to me about the different responsibilities, the application process, and so forth. By application process, I mean that I’d potentially be on the administrative side of a study abroad programme, helping to match students with host countries and families, etc., as well as to orient students leaving France for one of AFS’s 50 destinations. In essence, I get to put my study abroad experience to good use! I’d say that’s quite up my alley, yebo?

After what I thought was my actual interview, Elsa showed me around the Vivre sans Frontières building and introduced me to the staff members; there are currently 14 people working with 400 incoming and 400 outgoing students. Hyuu! Following the tour, she showed me into the same room I had spoken to her in earlier and left to continue some work. After about five minutes, Julie came down with another staff member who told me I would now be going for my interview. I didn’t quite understand, as I thought I had just spent about 30-45 minutes talking to two people. In any case, Julie said she would wait for me, and so I followed this staff member upstairs and went into a small office in the corner of the top floor. It was about 17h00 by this time, and only one lamp atop the Director’s desk. I sat down and within about a four-minute interview session in French, the Director welcomed me (in English) to the group. So long story short, I’m 99 per cent sure I have the internship. I’m just not entirely sure, as I haven’t yet signed the formal contract. But, oh well, we’ll see what happens soon enough. In any event, the experience was rather interesting, and definitely opened my eyes to the fact that in the real French world (as opposed to the one in the BU building where people are more than happy to correct our French, slow down for us, etc.), people speak ‘French,’ not American French, or collegiate French, but actual French.

I suppose to continue the French experience, I unexpectedly cooked a five-course dinner for Trevor and I. Round 1 was a simple toasted baguette with Leerdammer and Gouda, as well as ham, followed by tomato sauce to which I added Gouda on slices of pain de campagne with baked pasta crusted with Emmental. For round 3, we visited South Africa for a bit and had carrot salad (2:1:1 ratio of carrots, apples and orange juice) paired with the white wine produced from Stellenbosch. After working on some homework in order to take a breather from the food we had just eaten (plus-que-parfait anyone?), we then had our cheese plate of chèvre, emmental and comté. We finished off our meal with a two-part dessert of mousse au chocolat noir and my favourite, chocolat chaud.