apprendre le français? pourquoi?

Today was my first day of school…or at least semester courses.

I'm so happy that the semester has finally started so that the dreaded practicum is over. I only have class Tuesday-Thursday now…..but my French class starts at 8:30am every Tuesday and Thursday. I had to jump out of bed when my alarm went off at 7:30 this morning (super sadface) and rush out the door so that I could print my composition before class.

Of course, I was early even by my standards. I was the only person in our classroom at five minutes till 8:30. I packed up my things and went downstairs to check to see if I was in the wrong classroom. My entire class was downstairs printing their compositions, and our professor was nowhere in sight as per usual. I went back upstairs and class started ten minutes late.

I really like the new pace of learning during the semester. We have 7 and a half hours to learn one chapter! We're starting on chapter 9, where we left off during the practicum, that's about vacations and the francophone world. Basically geography class taught in French and focusing on all places/things French. The pace was so slow and relaxing, and it was so early in the morning, I almost forgot that I was learning.

During French class was another saga of my struggle to make friends. I sat with Kristina and Sierra (more like they sat near me), and we were working on an exercise; saying the capitals of francophone countries. We got to the question about Canada, and I blurted out that there was no capital of Canada. I don't even consider Canada a country! Sierra, of course, made one of her "I'm so much smarter than you" comments. Ugh. So embarrassing. Don't only do I have no friends, but the few people I actually kinda talk to now think that I'm dumb.

During lecture we got into an interesting discussion about being bilingual. Our professor told us that studies show that bilingual people are twice as smart as people who only speak one language. She posed the question "why learn French?" to us; why are we learning French considering that most Californians speak Spanish. Excellent question.

French class finished, and I had 15 minutes before my Histories of Paris class. I was one of two students in the room before other groups starting coming in. They all sat around me, and it turns out that everyone has friends. Ugh. Not encouraging. The good news is that there are boys in the class (there are 93 of us in the program, and there are only about 12 guys)…I'm sure none of them will be talking to me.

I like my histories class already. The professor, who wants to be called Christina, was really nervous and endearing and you can tell that she loves the subject and wants life to be easy on us. I really like the first lecture that covered some basics about Paris' geography and building situation as well as the first two patron saints.

I knew that I would have a lot of reading to do today, so I planned on going to the park to get some work down. I first stopped at the boulangerie near my apartment (the one on the corner with the good bread is closed on Tuesday) to get my baguette and then I went home. I ate my baguette, read a small section, and then walked to the raised garden near my apartment. The park was full, considering it was lunchtime, so I sat on a planter at the very end of the promenade. The sun beat down on me as I read about Henri IV's building in Paris. After I finished that reading I came back home to escape the sun.

I thought that reading a few chapters of a book wouldn't take me that long, but it ended up taking me the rest of the night. I also had to do French homework. It's 10:37, and I'm pretty exhausted. I did, however, get to Skype with my mommy! I've gotten to see her smiling face more in Europe than I would while at school in California.

I don't have class until 1:45 tomorrow, and considering that I did all of my histories reading today, I'm going to sleep in (probably until my body wakes me up before 10) and then get some work done before class. The nerd life chose me.