Well for those of you who didn't know, I’m in France! Here is some basic information to get you caught up on my year abroad. I apologize in advance for any grammatical mistakes (my French brain is already taking over!).
· I’m living in Saint-Uze, France which is in the Rhône-Alpes region and in the Drôme department.
· I’m going to high school (lycée) in Saint-Vallier in a school named Lycée Polyvalent Henri Laurens.
· My host family has 3 little kids named Charlotte, Pauline and Louis, two parents named Damien and Beatrice and a German Shepard named Syrah.
· I’m here for ten and a half months. Yes, ten and a half.
· The program that I’m with is AFS (American Field Service)
I think that’s all of the basics so now you get to hear all of the details that got me from Minnesota to France.
How this all started…
I had the idea in my head to become an exchange student ever since my brother went abroad in 2006 to Austria, before that I had no idea you could do such a thing. After my sister went abroad to Germany in 2008 and we hosted Silvia from Austria, I saw firsthand the benefits of a year abroad and what an incredible once in a lifetime opportunity it is. I knew I had to do it, but that is much easier said than done. Warning to future exchange students prepare for your trip well in advance (1 or 2 years) otherwise it is very hard to have enough credits for school. I had to take classes on the internet and almost no electives in order to graduate when I should and not have an extra year of high school.
The fall of 2010 I began the AFS application process. It took a few weeks to get everything together and sent. I had to get teacher recommendations, doctor’s approval, my blood type checked, write lots of essays, and my parents’ approval (which wasn't too hard considering they already let their other two kids go). After it was sent in I waited. And waited. Finally, I got an acceptance. I knew that that distant idea would eventually become a reality, but it still seemed far off in the future. In April I got my host family, it made my year abroad seem even more real. I spent the first few weeks after receiving my host family information looking at the town on Google maps and reading any little bit of information on the region on Wikipedia. Up until my arrival I had been corresponding with my host family by email. It was a good exercise for me to write in French every two or so weeks because now I have to write in French every day.
Summer, which for me consisted of a Pre-Calculus and Business class, went very quickly. Almost all of my free time went into school and but I was still able to squeeze in some time with friends. Then came French camp. Lac du Bois has always seemed like it was a part of my life, a given that every summer I would spend some time improving my French, it was a kind of a second home. But LdB wasn't always like that, my first time I went when I was 9 was a little terrifying, everyone was speaking to me in French, they had their own customs and traditions, and it was an unfamiliar environment. Looking back it was a very good preparation for my year in France. I know that at the beginning things will not be very easy, but after a while I’ll be able to express myself more, understand the culture more and feel comfortable and at home in this different environment. After LdB I had 10 days to buy things for France, finish my business class and say goodbye to my friends and family.
"Saying goodbye isn’t the hard part, it’s what we leave behind that’s tough." - Unknown
The goodbyes were hard but as this quote says it’s who or what we leave behind that makes it tough. I had two goodbye parties with my friends but when I said goodbye it didn’t feel like I wouldn’t see them for 10 and a half months. It’s hard when everyone around you is going about their routine for the start of school when you are about to start something incredibly different. Before I left I had a list of restaurants that I wanted to eat at before I left, the majority of them being ethnic restaurants because spicy food is a bit of a rarity in France, and food I wanted to eat at home before I went. Two days before I left I began packing, it wasn’t terribly hard, and it only took two tries to get the 44 pound limit for the airport. Here’s a challenge try packing for 4 seasons for 1 year in one suitcase, oh and you’re only allowed 44 pounds.
Then the day of my flight I got up early in the morning and drove to the airport with my parents, they were able to come to the gate because I was traveling alone. The time came for me to say goodbye and after lots of hugs and kisses I got in line, gave them my ticket and boarded the plane. I thought that that would be the last time I saw my parents for 10 and half months, but I was wrong. Something was wrong with the plane so we got off and changed planes so I was given another hour and a half with my parents. Even though goodbyes are hard I’m glad I got to spend another few minutes with my parents. After I boarded my second plane I was on my way to New York for the Pre-Departure orientation.
At the airport with my Mom.
When my flight landed in New York I had to manage my backpack, carry on and 44 pound suitcase all by myself, up two flights of stairs and on a few trams to get me to another baggage claim to find the AFS meeting area, thankfully the signs were very clear and the hardest part was maneuvering my luggage through the crowds. When we had enough AFSers to fill a bus we drove from the airport to the doubletree airport hotel in New York. We all got T-shirts, name tags, and a booklet of info and then we had a ton of time to mingle with kids going to France, Egypt, Spain, Denmark, and Austria. It was great to finally be able to talk with the kids that I’ve kind of gotten to know through Facebook and share what we are excited for and worried about. After we were lectured to for a day and a half we got our luggage again and were on our way to France, or should I say Switzerland?
All of the American AFS kids going to France. (can you find me?)
I’m not sure what the record is for longest amount of time without sleep but a lot of the AFSers and I got very close. If you add up the time from when we had to get up, our flight to Zurich, Switzerland, our layover of 5 ish hours, our flight to Paris, and when we finally were able to go to bed it added up to more than a full day without sleep. Needless to say, we were all tired.
View from the plane going to Zurich. (that's Paris)
Close up view of Paris from the window.
Our orientation in Paris was all of the AFS kids going to France, I think in total it was about 300 kids, but I might be wrong. In Paris we had more country specific orientations and time to mingle with kids from all over. My first food in France was not what it should have been; we were staying in a hostel so the food was like school food, but not like the school food here! (more on that later) After all of our orientations it was time to meet our families. To get to the Rhône-Alpes meeting point for the families we took a 6 hour bus ride through the beautiful French countryside. Me and the rest of the kids on the bus were incredibly tired because we had to get up at 5:30 and the girls and I in my room had stayed up until 2 talking so most of us didn’t get to enjoy the gorgeous views of the French countryside outside our windows.
Our room in the hostel. (I'm on the bunk bed)
Yup, we got to see the Eiffel Tower.
In front of the Eiffel Tower.
When our bus arrived we all had to walk a mile up a huge hill because the bus couldn’t fit up the narrow French street.
The AFS Collines du Rhone group before we met our families. (I'm in the blue shirt)
Walking up the giant hill.
Then when we were called by name and greeted by our family. When you greet someone in France you “faire la bise”, which is a series of kisses, the amount and what side you start on depends on the region, where I live you start on the right and give three kisses. I had a little trouble with it at first but now it feels more natural, or at least as natural as it can be for an American. After my quick hello with my host family we walked over to get our first family photo and then some cake and a drink. I then found my suitcases and headed off to their car. One of the things most foreigners notice about America is the size of our cars, and it’s true my host family had a hard time fitting my suitcase in their car and they had a van. I think it’s necessary to have a small car here because the streets are incredibly narrow. One of the things I noticed right away when I arrived was how fast people drive here, speed limits are more of a guideline.
Our first family photo.
I was then given a tour of the house, at home my family and I had tried to find their house with Google earth, because the zoom isn’t clear enough to read house numbers we thought we had found the right house two times, in the end I told my parents to wait until I got here so that I could tell them what house it actually was. It turns out the reason we couldn’t find the house was because it’s off the street. In my room I have a large wardrobe, a sofa, a desk, a bed, a sloped ceiling and two skylights. Here, instead of air conditioning, we open the windows. After I’d unpacked a little we had dinner. Dinner my first night consisted of quiche, salad, baguette, and chocolates that I’d brought.
Immediately the next day I started school. I’m glad the first day started at 2:00 otherwise I would have been incredibly tired. School here is somewhat the same and somewhat different. Here, the teacher lectures for the whole period and the students take copious notes. There is rarely ever class discussion. The notes that the kids take here are works of art. I’m trying to figure out their system because they all seem to take notes the same way. In every French student’s pencil case there is a ruler, white out, at least 5 colors of pens, a fountain pen, scissors, glue, highlighters, and these magic erasers for fountain pens, with these tools they underline, box, and change colors to make everything more clear, hopefully later I’ll be able to upload a photo of what their notes look like because it will take me a while to replicate. In French classrooms there are no posters, I like it when I’m facing a window so I have something with color to look at. French students don’t use pencils, it’s just not done. There are no lockers here; thankfully I’m in a warmer region, so I won’t be hauling around a huge winter coat for long.
So now you know that I’m all settled and beginning my amazing, one-in-a-lifetime year abroad.
I think this is all I’m going to write for now, talk to you later!
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