Voyage en Pologne

Après une nuit insomniaque dans l’aéroport de Francfort, où une très longue escale m’a permis de bien connaître le terminal, je suis arrivé en Pologne.  La ville de Wroclaw dans le sud-ouest du pays ne fait pas aussi métropole que Paris.  Déjà je me sentais dépaysé, mais il y avait encore beaucoup plus de dépaysement à venir.  J’ai trouvé la station d’autobus où l’anglais et le français ne servaient à rien mais où une langue remplie de consonnes fortes résonnait.  C’est avec cette langue sonore que le conducteur de car m’a accueilli quand j’ai essayé d’acheter un billet.  Il faisait de son mieux pour communiquer, et moi de même, mais le message n’a jamais fait mouche.  Néanmoins le billet était acheté et je me suis installé.  Le car allait à Jelenia Gora qui est une encore plus petite ville, c’était là où mes vraies aventures commenceraient.  Le car a démarré.

En regardant par la fenêtre, le paysage passant sous un ciel grisâtre, je réfléchissais à ce que j’étais en train de faire.  Voilà deux mois que je m’étais inscris à l’organisation WWOOFing (World-Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms) et un mois que j’avais décidé de passer mes vacances de printemps dans une ferme polonaise. Pour ceux et celles qui ne la connaissent pas, WWOOFing est une organisation (un peu comme le troc mais davantage bio) qui vous permet de d’avoir accès à une façon de vivre que vous ne connaitriez jamais autrement.

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Meanwhile, in Nice

It’s hard to believe my semester here is more than half over. In many ways I feel like I just stepped off the plane yesterday. The novelty of being on the Côte d’Azur has definitely not worn off, and to be honest I hope it never does. But in many more, subtler ways, it’s clear to me that I’ve started to adapt to life here. I can now find exact change among the euro coins in my wallet in a matter of seconds, something I definitely could not have done 10 weeks ago. I have mastered the art of crossing against the light, and believe me, this is a skill you must acquire if you want to get anywhere here in a timely fashion. And perhaps the most obvious thing, so obvious in fact that I rarely think of it, is that I’m used to hearing French wherever I go; it just doesn’t seem jarring anymore. It’s people talking in English that I now find odd, although this happens more and more now that tourist season is approaching.

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Weekend in Provence (17-18 mars 2012)

Last weekend, 20 of the Sweet Briar students went to Provence on a trip organized by the program. We had a great group of students and an equally great dynamic duo leading us: Moïra (one of the Sweet Briar secretaries) and Gilles (the guide for the trip).

We met up at Gare de Lyon at 6:30 am. The TGV (high-speed train) left the station at 7:07 am, and almost 3 hours later we got to Avignon. A private bus was already waiting for us and we went straight to Uzes. We walked around the town’s market and enjoyed the nice weather.

Our next destination: Pont du Gard. I didn’t have many expectations about the bridge. When we got there, I was amazed by the magnitude of the monument and stunned by its architecture. The river and the mountains made a beautiful landscape. Pont du Gard is, without a doubt, one of my favorite places in France so far. Gilles told us about the history of the bridge (the construction may have taken place between 40 and 60 AD) and we all took many pictures. What a fascinating place!

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Pardon ?

 As I got ready to come to Paris with Sweet Briar for the spring semester, I was warned time and again about the language barrier.  “Get ready to feel really stupid for a couple months,” my friends and family advised cheerfully, and “don’t worry, they’ll love your smile even if they can’t understand what you’re saying.”  And yes, I knew I wasn’t anywhere near fluent; this is the case for many Sweet Briar students.  But hey, I thought, it can’t be that bad; I get good grades in French class, I understand everything my teacher says, I’ll be fluent in a week.

I’ve been here for over a month now, and the magical insta-fluency that I imagined hasn’t kicked in yet.  Language continues to be a daily struggle in several ways.  At home, my wonderful, kind host parents suffer through my horrible grammar and repeat everything they tell me two or three times at an average dinner.  At Paris VII, I’m enrolled in a Sociology course and a Literature course, in other words a French comprehension course and a French comprehension course.  Each class is challenging, but I consider the day a success if I manage to follow the surrounding students’ whispered conversations about last weekend.  If I’m stopped on the street, it generally takes several moments of polite listening for me to discern whether I’m being asked for directions or propositioned.

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Hemingway and Me

Ernest Hemingway famously wrote, “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.”

Each day as I ride the metro all over Paris- with increasing agility although I always, always fumble over the manual door handles- I have been reading Hemingway’s novel about Paris, A Moveable Feast. The book, which recounts the day to day activities of Hemingway’s life as a 25 year old writer scraping to get by in the City of Light, has been thrilling and enlightening to read.

Hem, as his friends seem to have called him, dedicates each short chapter to something small and simple about Paris. The first, for example, is called “A Good Café on the Place St-Michel” and describes the conditions in which he liked to write, the lighting in the café, the beautiful passersby, and the empty, almost-sad feeling he would get after he finished writing a good story. His stories about mundane aspects of life and his strikingly simple prose (something, I have learned through the book, which he worked tremendously hard to achieve, often eliminating every unnecessary word in his works, phrase by phrase, attempting to make the “truest sentence” he could) is somehow enthralling and I find myself eagerly turning the page to discover whether he’d get coffee with or without cream or if he would go to the horse races or straight home after lunch.

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Walkin’s Welcome

Paris: The city of Lights, the city of Art, the city of Chic. Can anyone ever conquer Paris? Can anyone ever say they know Paris well? Personally, I have read amazing amounts of magazines, blogs and guides that attempt to teach you the real Paris, the authentic places to go and where the good prices are. So, let me tell you something: if it has been published in a book or it’s mentioned in a tumblr page, it is no longer a secret. It may still be amazing, but it cannot be “THE best kept secret in Paris”. If two people know it, it simply is not a secret.

What I suggest that we young, fun, nifty students do is simply “do it our way”. Close all the books, stop googling “Paris best yummy cheap restaurant” and start owning it. Wear comfortable shoes and, well, just walk. No metro, no buses, no maps. Just walk around, and discover your own Paris. Visit the little jardins that pop-up every now and then, lose yourself in a small cobblestoned street where all you can buy is fish, cheese and vegetables and find a small chocolaterie whose prices are reasonable and chocolat chaud you can enjoy at their one table next to the register. Continue walking and discover statues you never knew existed, graffiti with colorful awkward political comments and smells that make you think you are in Istanbul or Beirut. Walk around the backstreets of Champs-Élysées and find that one small Italian place that uses virgin olive oil, fresh tomatoes and mozzarella on their pizza. Discover the cutest little pink Salon de Thé and invite your friends for a warm cup of verveine. Find that really good passion fruit macaron place with the outstanding recipe of soft and crunchy macaron that melts in your mouth.

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Cultural shock

I was prewarned before coming to Europe that I would receive a culture shock. But culture shock, what’s that? What could possibly be so difficult to grasp–to enjoy–when you’re in the magnificient city of Paris?

All my friends envied me when I told them of my plans to study abroad for the whole year. ”Paris? I’m so jealous! You’re going to have such a great time!” My dad, who had also spent his junior year abroad but with Hamilton College, told me it would be the best year of my life. I had so much to look forward to–so many sites that I already wanted to see even before stepping onto the plane. ”The world is your oyster,” I was told. And, “you only live once.”

Yet, after arriving in Paris, despite my fascination with the beautiful and historical attractions and my happiness to be abroad, it was difficult to acclimate. I went from being a student who always raises her hand in class to one who was afraid to speak even though I have a good grasp of the language. My dad’s French family friends were amazed at my knowledge of French–at my ability to understand what they said and respond to their questions, but that didn’t convince me.
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The Key to Paris

 

The key to Paris, a city that is bursting at the seams with artistic and cultural events, museums and unforgettable monuments, is to mix checking off things from the “to-see list” with quiet moments at cafés or parks observing the hustle and bustle of the city or journaling.  It is very easy to be overwhelmed by the pace of the city and the plethora of things to do.  Perfect days are easy to come by in Paris – especially when the weather is as delightful as it has been.  For me, any day that includes time spent in the Luxembourg gardens is a great day.

One exceptionally perfect day that I had started with a walk down the Champs-Élysées towards l’Arc de Triomphe.  Waiting in line for the Arc was a small price to pay for being able to see miles down each Parisian boulevard that Haussman designed.  I love the view from the top of the Arc de Triomphe because of its centrality and tranquility.   For people just arriving in Paris, it provides a great opportunity to see the entirety of what Paris has to offer.  In addition, l’Arc de Triomphe gives one a taste of the architectural richness in Paris and the history revealed through its monuments.

After checking off one site on the “to-see list”, I traveled over to the Luxembourg gardens to sit in the sun on a reclining chair – one of my favorite past times.   It’s a great change of pace to be surrounded by flowers, bathe in the sunlight, and enjoy utter relaxation – completely free to people watch or journal about the day’s activities.  This garden makes me feel truly content.

After dinner with my host family at home, I took the metro to the Eiffel Tower to sit on the Champ de Mars with friends.   We were ready for the bubbles of the champagne and the sparkles of the Eiffel Tower.  The Eiffel Tower sparkles every hour, on the hour – each time is as good as the last!  At the end of this day, I went to bed feeling truly Parisian!

 

Katy Zingale

October 20th, 2011

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Becoming une française

When a 65 year old French lady leaned over on the tram and told me how classy I looked, you can imagine that I was very excited. More than that, I felt that I was finally a part of the noise and colors of Nice.  Even though she had to repeat herself a few times before I understood her words, I couldn’t believe she had assumed that I was French. After I explained that I was an American study abroad student, she slowed down and we had a fascinating discussion about the education system.  She explained that she completely supported the compulsory English lessons in French schools, since most of her generation had never had the chance to learn English.

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Pondering the New and the Old

The first thing I saw was the majestic spire piercing the clear sky, bathed in icy sunlight.  My gaze immediately fixed on the gray, imposing stones and numerous, evocative carvings, and it was difficult to tear my eyes away.  Stepping off of the bus, I barely noticed the other buildings or the merciless wind that would eventually numb my feet.  All I could think was, “Wow, this cathedral is old.”

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