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The Real World: France
When Becky and I went for our walk the other day, she told us that the neighboring town of Bourré has a large Portuguese population, so the locals call it "Little Portugal". Our town*, on the other hand, is "Little America."
I knew, even before I interviewed for this job, that this program was not something that I could completely agree with. The internships - that's fine. Whatever. But here at the abbey, one of our main focuses is on international education. So we have groups of undergraduate students coming over for semesters, for the summer or for chunks of a few weeks to soak up local... well, nothing.
It is, indeed, like The Real World: Paris except that we're in an abbey instead of a château and it takes a lot more travelling and grumbling to get into Paris than a simple RER ride. I feel like I'm surrounded by Ace and CT, who don't understand why the French don't like them and why they don't speak English like normal people.
They don't take language lessons - they just stay in the abbey, supposedly learning about French culture (you can't have culture without language) and occasionally leaving the grounds to get drunk at the café or to stand in line in front of me at the boulangerie and take forever because they have not bothered to learn any French, including the words for "price" and "bread". I wonder, if I hadn't come along and translated so that I could hurry up and get my own damned baguette, if they would have given up and starved. I wonder if they'll ever bother to learn. I hope it's just that I'm hearing the vocal few and that there are actually people who are interested in learning things during their time here. But I'm skeptical...
Usually, the interns wouldn't have to have this much exposure to the students. But, as wireless access is tenuous elsewhere on the grounds, I have adopted the computer lab as my office. I spend most of the day here, wincing as they mangle European place names and talk loudly about how drunk they are, have been, or will be.
During my orientation, they said that we weren't allowed to accept gifts from visitors to the abbey. They did not, however, mention anything about punching them in the face.
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* Name withheld to prevent Googling...
srah - Friday, 11 June 2004 - 7:21 AM
Tags: the abbey
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Comments (2)
Mommy - June 13, 2004 - 2:49 PM - ℓ
Maybe if they speak louder it will help! Sorry, as a non-French speaker, I do feel your pain. Love you and miss you.
That's the story with exchange students everywhere, of all nationalities. When I was at university, most of the French students (this is at my university in England) travelled in packs, not wanting to communicate with the strange locals (mind you, where I went to university, the locals were admittedly very strange). Only decent, sensible, fun people interacted with us Brits and made friends (people like you and me and all other fine upstanding folk).
The same was true when I did my year abroad. I avoided my fellow Brits as far as possible, though, because I wanted to meet new people and actually use my language skills. I don't understand people who spend a study (or leisure) period abroad and don't make the slightest effort.