Everyday life made challenging
Year in France offers student insights
In class last week, the lecturer
asked what would soon be tak
ing place in the French coun
tryside. I, sitting in the back
row and seeing no hand raised
in front of me. blurted out
"grape harvest" almost
automatically. For this time last
year, I was in the French coun
tryside. And I was harvesting
grapes.
Reporter’s notebook by
Catherine Merten
Studying with the Univer
sity's program in Foiters,
France, was, to put it tritely, a
wonderful experience. The ac
tivites during those nine mon
ths — moments that seemed
monumental at the time — are
now lumped together under the
vague category of "my year
abroad.”
Traveling, learning, discover
ing different places, different
people and different parts of
myself, I was so caught up in
being in France, in absorbing
the French culture, that it all
seems somehow unreal in
retrospect. What was for almost
a year an intensely all
encompassing new way of life
has lost the powerful grip that it
had then, now only affecting
my life by the mental pictures of
memories. Distanced
geographically, I am also
distanced emotionally.
Hack in the U S for my senior
year of college, I am repeatedly
asked, as are surely all students
who studied abroad, "Didn't
you go somewhere? How was
your year away?" Most people
ask these questions casually
while passing me on campus.
My "year away” was such a
complex and marking ex
perience that it could never bo
appropriately expressed,
especially in passing So I
usually respond with a smile:
"It was great." which is of
course true. But it’s also the big
gest understatement of my life.
Every day last year, all of us
"foreign students" were
challenged. Shopping for food,
doing banking business, getting
Correction
In an article previewing the
ASUQ's Wellness Sym
posium in Monday's Oregon
IJaily Emerald, Father Carlos
was misidentified as a
represenative of the Sanctuary
Movement. Father Carlos is
with the Newman Center,
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a haircut — all are undoubtedly
a part of a student's quotidian
life Yet in a different culture,
with a foreign language, these
routine tasks became
challenges.
Eventually we learned to buy
fresh vegetables at the open-air
market We learned how to use
our automatic teller cards. We
learned how to describe the
desired haircut (sometimes not
until after having once suffered
with the hair stylist's own ides
of what they thought you
wanted). Being able to function
in such a society inevitably in
creased our independence and
self-confidence.
Further, encountering people
from historical and religious
backgrounds often conflicting
our own put into question the
very elements of our own
socialization and heritage.
In Poitiers, we met students
from all over the world These
people, along with those 1 met
me this fall
Though last year seems far
away. French ways still mingle
in my American days On Sun
day. I expect all stores to be
closed and no trucks to run on
highways. I'm continually sur
prised at the relative lack of
cigarette smoke in public
places I frequently find myself
confused in writing, stuck bet
ween the French and English
languages And. unfortunately.
I still drive as if them were no
speed limit.
The first week of classes here.
I went to the French department
and saw the professor who I had
had for French as a freshman
Speaking French last year
became natural for me. I was
eventually fluent. Hut when I
saw my professor, I could not
speak to her. I choked on the
words; my lounge twisted with
the accent; my mind raced to
translate my thoughts
It took me a number of days
Though at times I felt lost and uncertain
last year, I came out of it feeling stronger
and more comfortable with who I am.
while traveling throughout
Europe or while picking grapes
in Beaujolais. all possessed
some! idea, opinion or
stereotype of America and
Americans. Exchanging ideas
with them made me ref]pct on
my own culture, my own
identy.
Though at times I felt lust and
uncertain last year. I came out
of it feeling stronger and more
comfortable with who I am
However, it feels like I was
away for much longer than nine
months. The campus is
renovated. Store hours have
changed My favorite coffee
place is gone. More friends have
cars And since I turned 21 in
France, we now meet fora drink
— legally.
My off-campus house offers a
much different living arrange
ment than the women's dorm I
lived in last year in France Ten
of us Oregon women lived with
roommates downtown in a
predominately French dorm
(the building in which loan of
Arc was interrogated in H29).
Maids cleaned regularly (I'll
never forget someone coming in
at 8:30 a.in. to vacuum under
our beds.) The front gate locked
at 7:30 p m Phone calls no later
then 10 p m Yes. my two
bedroom apartment welcomed
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before I could reconcile my
" Frenchness" with this en
vironment that had always been
strictly American Now,
though. I've settled into
equilibrium.
I.ast Friday I shared bread,
wine and cheese with other
French speakers at the French
House. I made crepes for my
housemate, using the ap
propriate French technique that
friends had taught me As a
French teaching assistant. I lead
six hours of conversation each
week
France is still, and will
always lie. a part of my lib*
When I recently ran into a guy
I lived near two years ago. he
didn't recognize me. "Have you
changed somehow?" he asked.
A lot, I thought to myself To
him. I simply attributed the dif
ference to my haircut
(Catharine Morten is currently a
student at Brown University.
Providence. K I
OOE
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