Post- le seizième

I. La semaine dernière:

This last week was a busy week of classes and studying. Significantly, I was informed by my school, UMaine Law, that assuming I receive grades of "C" or better, I will actually receive credit for each course I am taking, including my French Course. Yay!


II. Hier: Je suis allée à synagogue. Yes, an egalitarian Massorti (analogous to "conservative" synagogues in the U.S.) Synagogue in Paris in the 15th arrondissement. http://www.massorti.com/adathshalom/ I really like this neighborhood. It is near the Eiffel Tower. It was a pleasant walk in my heels from the metro stop to the synagogue. The service was interesting, particularly because there was a bat mitzvah. Clearly everything was in French and Hebrew. The melodies, etc. were almost familiar to me, but the cadence was slightly different. The bat mitzvah's d'var torah (sermon) was about anti-semitism. I understood the main ideas, but like everything, I feel I'm missing something...I understood maybe 50-60% of the words...and it was good practice for my French, but I really need to learn more.


I grow impatient with myself. I've been here long enough to speak more, right? It does not help that many people want to speak English with me. It also does not help that my French Course at school is so large and includes such a wide range of levels. Although we are all supposed to be roughly at the same level (there was a placement exam earlier in the semester) everybody brings their own educational and cultural baggage and some students are clearly more advanced in certain ways than others.


So, for example, I really enjoy the amount of writing we do, but that comes very easily to me. There are simply too many people in the course to really improve my speaking...particularly my pronunciation.... My vocabulary is also hopelessly limited...and having formally studied the language so briefly before coming, my knowledge of grammar is essentially all self-taught.... My speaking seems to improve more by trying to buy train tickets, or trying to ask directions, or things like that. I don't know. I just don't know....


III. Aujourd'hui: In a few hours I will meet with a lady and her teenaged son. The son wants additional help with his English because he has a difficult teacher in school. Since my French is quite limited I hope I will be able to actually be helpful. I was pleased, though, that I entirely understood his mother over the phone. That's just it. I understand far more than I speak, or am able to speak.... Aaaaaargh. This lady seems very nice, though. She is a friend of the mother in the family I am living with. The problem was that over the phone I understood and I was able to say a few things and solidify a time and place to meet, but all of the little polite niceties I would have casually said in English were very strained and even somewhat inaccessible for me in French. Sometimes that type of thing is easier in person? Sometimes I hope I don't come across as rude...it is merely that I have a very limited vocabulary...really.... Somebody...please help me with this.... Please....


Well, after meeting with these people this afternoon (and hopefully better assessing where he is at proficiency-wise, and what we can work on together) I will head into Paris for a dinner at La Coupole. ( http://www.flobrasseries.com/coupoleparis/carte/). This dinner is with a group of students from my school who are visiting France during this week as part of a seminar exchange program (http://mainelaw.maine.edu/students/academic-program/franco-american-seminar.jsp). It should certainly be interesting to see them! More on that later, as I really ought to continue with my never-ending homework.... Hyperbole? Or....


-A