If you're a grand enough homme in France, you get buried here...
I am a terrible tourist. I am the opposite of the usual kind: instead of an idiot in a fanny pack with a big camera around his neck, screaming in English, I'm the overly-timid guy trying to dress like a local, one who surreptitiously sneaks his camera only when he's sure no one's watching and tries, badly, to speak the language. What I mean is that I'm terrible at being a tourist; I feel so stupid standing there in the throng, thumbing through postcards in an obnoxious gift shop, that I end up running away and not buying any postcards (and believe me, I have to do that soon.) Let me be clear: nobody cares, and I know that nobody cares, but I still act this way.
Anyway, things are pooping along. I'm staying fed and clothed and clean. I've lost some of my first-week momentum in terms of charging off to a new famous place every day; I led an excursion of students to the Latin Quarter yesterday but did a lousy job taking pictures. I'm heading back tomorrow and will try to redeem myself. I've had some luck finding André Gorz's books, one of the most important things I'm doing while I'm here, but they ain't cheap. I'm still waiting for living here to feel a little more natural.
I understood more of the French radio news I listen to today; I think I'm learning about .25 words a day. I should be conversationally fluent by the time I'm about 112.
Anyway, things are pooping along. I'm staying fed and clothed and clean. I've lost some of my first-week momentum in terms of charging off to a new famous place every day; I led an excursion of students to the Latin Quarter yesterday but did a lousy job taking pictures. I'm heading back tomorrow and will try to redeem myself. I've had some luck finding André Gorz's books, one of the most important things I'm doing while I'm here, but they ain't cheap. I'm still waiting for living here to feel a little more natural.
I understood more of the French radio news I listen to today; I think I'm learning about .25 words a day. I should be conversationally fluent by the time I'm about 112.
4 comments:
For some GD reason language learning is not a steady upward curve, it sort of goes in spurts...you feel stupid for about a month, then your ears and mouth suddenly start to work really well for about a week, and then just as you begin to feel confident, you start feeling stupid again for another month.
Totally agree on this one... couldn't have said it better myself. Courage!
Tourist: yeah I can't do it either. I hate taking pictures of the stuff I'm supposed to take pictures of, if I even get the camera out to begin with. I like the off the beaten path stuff and I have a passion for visiting grocery stores in foreign countries to see what the locals actually eat at home. I totally understand: you'd rather 'live' and explore little corners on your own, as some sort of 'fake' local, than 'visit' a place as a 'tourist'.
Oh yeah there's a good thing to trying to be a local even when you don't know the language: you'll get a more enriched experience and actually know something about the country than if you just did the backpacking thing again... which is like some sort of fake surreal world in itself!
Isn't immersion great!?
I'm with the Rambler on language learning. I've always thought of it as ginormous stair steps. You seem to coast along wonderfully and then *bam* - hit the wall (and this was painful in my experience - I think I told you about the harassment I got for mangling "beaucoup" into "beau cul"). Then you struggle up the wall and reach a new plateau, coast, and crash again.
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