The Transition Artist

It is morning and I’m alone. In France. In Paris to be exact.

This is the point at which you can cue the squealing girl sounds in your head, because these facts alone have me so excited I could hardly sleep this morning. My family left at 5am to catch their flight back to the U.S. Everybody got up at 4am (including me, unfortunately, because they were about as quiet as a herd of elephants as they got ready to leave), and after an hour of packing and prepping, they were out the door and I was left with the room to myself.

I’ve been waiting on this day for what feels like ages. I’ve talked about my program and explained (to the best of my ability) to all of my family members what I expect the sequence of events to be when I arrive at my program headquarters to start my year abroad. I’ve described an orientation, moving into my new apartment (which, strangely enough, happens to be exactly 270 meters from my aunt’s apartment), taking a French placement exam, and meeting the other program participants. I’ve felt like I knew what to expect as I head into this new adventure, but the truth is I don’t. I have absolutely no idea what this year will hold, and, to be honest, I don’t want to.

I tend to fly into most things with a spirit of, “it’ll be great!” So that when and if it isn’t, I can just make adjustments as necessary. People have asked me if I’m nervous or scared, and I’ve answered, truthfully, that I’m not. Because I don’t know what I should be afraid of! The unknown can be scary, or it can be really, really, brilliantly exciting, and I like to believe that, especially in the case of to this new adventure, the latter is a truer statement.

I think the primary thing, though, is that this year abroad has already given me many more things to be excited and in great anticipation of than to fear. To start with, I can’t even fully explain how I got here. If you had asked me exactly a year ago if I would consider studying abroad in France for a year I probably would’ve said no. This time last year I was looking up universities in New Zealand and South Africa to study at, certain that I would prefer to spend time abroad in one of those two countries as opposed to anywhere else.

However, something changed in me when spring semester rolled around and I had the great privilege of befriending French exchange students. I met 7 wonderful individuals who made me love and miss France so much more than usual, making me feel the pull back to the country I considered a home away from home so much stronger. I had visited France 10 times before (starting when I was 18 months old – this trip will be my 11th), but never stayed longer than 3-4 weeks. My grandma was born and raised in France, and my dad spent the first 5 years of his life, and all the summers of his childhood after his family moved to the states, in France.

That being said, I hadn’t learned to love French the way he did. Although I grew up around the language and culture of France, I wasn’t taught French as a child, and as a result have spent the last 11 years in French classes trying to get a handle on the language. I won’t lie and say it was easy. Sure, the words were easier to pronounce because I had heard them growing up, but grammar made no sense, vocabulary was hard, and speaking conversationally, even with family members, made me so nervous.

French at the university level was even harder. I took two advanced classes to fill my language requirement and was ready to be done after that. Until, of course, I wanted to speak French with the exchange students. I’ve always loved the language, hard as it may have been to learn, and it sounded beautiful to hear them speak it, so I wanted to join. The problem was, I understood, but I wasn’t fluent enough to feel confident jumping into conversation.

After making a few abashed attempts at French conversation with my friends, I started toying with the idea of studying abroad just after spring break this past March. I had intended to study public relations (my major) in French at a French university, but found it was exceptionally difficult to find a university willing to accommodate, as well as get the credits approved by my home university. I heard about a program in Paris (the last place I thought I would study, since I have family there and could visit any time I pleased) that offered classes in both English and French, with a focus on French immersion classes at the Sorbonne university.

To make a long story shorter, I basically decided one day that this program sounded like a good idea, applied, promptly decided that fluency would take me a year, and decided to accommodate the credits by adding a French major to my degree. Within a week I was enrolled. You could definitely call it rash decision making.. Now that I’m here, there are a lot of things that have made me even more glad that I so rashly decided to throw myself into this adventure.

For one, my French grandmother, who passed away right before my 11th birthday, had always wanted me to learn French. She was the reason I took French for so many years. When she was my age she learned English by traveling overseas and studying in the U.S. In a coincidental turn of events, I am doing the exact reverse and will be living in an apartment two blocks from the apartment she grew up in. I’ll walk the same streets she walked, go on some of the same adventures, and spend time with the same family members nearby. If she were here she would be so thrilled she would probably want to come join me.

I’ve never been known to be a short story teller, but to keep from writing a novel on one blog post, I’ll go ahead and sum it all up at this point. I am beyond excited for what this year will hold. I’m intent on becoming fluent (so intent I’ve been avidly reading French books, and sometimes even the dictionary). And I’m wildly unprepared, and content with it.