And so it begins...I set foot in Paris almost two weeks ago and yes, albeit many trials I am still well and able to keep you all up to date on my Parisian escapade. My advice for anyone who is planning to embrace another language in a different country is to NEVER feel comfortable with your grasp of the language in question. My brain has been pummelled from the inside out, soaked in boiling water and finally, it has been fried, just to make sure no part of it is left fresh and unused. Speaking French day and night is mentally exhausting although I have to give myself credit for the first couple of days when vocabulary I didn’t even know existed managed to find itself churning out of my mouth. I arrived in Paris last Monday. After having met my house mates, sorted my stuff etc. We had a welcome meeting in the school I am working/ studying at. This is one of the most limit stretching, thought provoking programmes I have ever taken part in. I found out (among many things) that from January onwards, we will be visiting different churches all over France every weekend, doing performances including mimes, dramas, songs, dances etc. I also found out that PE has been reinstalled in my life...always a plus! Life here is so different to life at uni. We shop as a house, every evening one person cooks for everyone else, we all do the housework together (it’s amazing to live in a clean house, a pointer for future house mates in fourth year ;P), it’s essentially the epitome of a communal life style. Obviously, I have made quite a few errors in conveying what I mean, seeing as French is not my mother tongue. One rather highlighted event was when I was trying to explain that I had a cobra wrapped around my neck when I was in India. However, instead of saying cou, which is the French word for neck... I pronounced the “ou” sound a tad more than I should have, resulting in “cul” which basically means your behind. I essentially told a crowd of French people whom I had only met hours before, that 4 years ago in India I had a snake wrapped around my arse...not the greatest moment of my life!
Other non linguistic highlights have been when we were sent off on our “Sparteam”, which essentially was a day of military camp training. This consisted of a light warm up which included press-ups (I can only do one) sit ups, and other wonderful running trips. We then had to climb over ridiculously high walls, swing across a river by a rope, and finally....La buse! La buse is designed to get you to surpass your limits and your phobias. It’s essentially a tunnel, big enough for a person to get through, but one can only pass through it by lying prostate on the ground, and then dragging themselves by their elbows. There is not enough space for you to sit up, or even crawl. This tunnel also has muddy water running through it, and a fine selection of insects and spiders living within it. Our task was to get the whole team from one end of it, to the other. I have to say, it’s probably the most terrifying thing I have ever done in my life, seeing as I am both arachnophobic and claustrophobic, however, as soon as I was in, I shut my eyes, and started praying. You could see the light at the end of the tunnel, but I didn’t open my eyes, as the light’s proximity was an illusion. The tunnel was much longer than it seemed. However, I survived, apparently gaining a spider web with a massive spider on it along the way, (my new French buddies managed to get it off my head without telling me it was there, Praise God), and despite being shaken up, I was so glad I did it. As they say here... nous sommes ici pour connaitre dieu, et surpasser notre limites! (we’re here to get to know God, and to surpass our limits, be they physical, emotional, psychological etc.)
This week I have had a drama class, guitar lessons, and today we’re scheduled for PE. I will keep you all up to date, but I think it’s safe to say, this is and will be one of the best experiences of my life. I’m anxious to see how things pan out, whether my French will get any better (please God!), how God will work in our lives, what talents we will discover, and what other impossibilities will become possible.
A bien tôt tout le monde! A la prochaine fois !
Bisous xxx
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