Segment 9: Camaraderie
Friends, I am here to report how much better I am feeling. Thank you for all the support over the past couple of weeks. I know I am not out of the grief “woods”, but some blue skies in Paris have helped the sun shine into the depths of me over the past few days. This was aided by how kind and helpful people were to me on Wednesday, my mom’s birthday, when I took a train an hour outside of Paris to get my Covid Booster vaccine. They honored her in how they helped me. I was so nervous about not having all the right paperwork or not knowing the right vocabulary, but everything went smoothly. I feel equally blessed to have a small choral gig this week singing as an alto section leader for the adult choir at the American Church of Paris’ Christmas concert this weekend. We are singing Haydn’s Te Deum, which is just delightful, and everyone is just so grateful to be there and sing together. I love that. And I know my mother would join that choir, too, if she could!
Yesterday, I suffered the effects of my vaccine, but it wasn’t as bad as my first round, back in March; instead, this time, I was pretty dizzy until about 4 or 5 pm, but didn’t have a fever. My arm is almost 100% back to normal, too. Added bonus- I now feel invincible. Don’t worry, those of you who worry about such things, because I know the Covid situation in Paris isn’t great and I am very much masking, especially around the dorm, despite others' disdain for the mask policies. I was able to convince myself to stay home from class though and was delighted to find how much I can accomplish in a day when I don’t use all my mental energy in French class. I polished a resume and wrote a cover letter for an RA position in this dorm (for NYU Paris students next semester. I interview this afternoon, so we’ll see what happens!). I read half of my French novel, I did some research, sent some emails and studied what I had missed in class the day before when I left early to get my vaccine.
Today, my phonetics teacher was shocked by the news that I am American, as she was fully convinced by my accent that I was German. Apparently I make German mistakes instead of English mistakes! I admit that I feel proud of this accomplishment. We had our first test reading a whole document. I am curious how this will be graded! Of course, pronunciation is taken into consideration: clarity of vowels, all the consonants that are supposed to be pronounced and none of the others; but phrasing the sentences is also being considered: when the voice goes up and down depending on how the information serves the sentence. We have been practicing this page-long text about I.M. Pei’s Pyramid at the Louvre for at least a month and a half, so I am glad to be done with it now.
Our grammar class was cancelled and we had all planned to go to the Christmas market in the Tuileries Garden after class anyway, so we went earlier! We had a blast as our big group of happy young women traversed the garden speaking excitedly in French about all kinds of things. It was another special experience with this class of women whom I am growing to love quite a bit! One of my classmates decided it was time for me to make my Paris singing debut there and then, and since everyone else in the class seemed to take this opportunity very seriously, I humored them and sang a lick of an aria, garnering the attention and video recording of several other passerby as well- including a runner (stopped her right in her tracks!).
We walked through the touristy market, enjoying each other’s company and speaking in French with little moments of cultural exchange: I got a description of many traditional foods served at Christmas in Sweden and I got to share about an American gastronomical delicacy: the corn dog. Yes, there was a stand at the very back of the market selling real, Manhattan hotdogs and also corn dogs (of some sort…). No one in our class seemed to be chomping at the bit to try one though… My socks were also knocked off when my Swedish classmate and I were describing what “encens” (incense) was to our Norwegian classmate, and my Swedish classmate used the English word “cloying” to describe the scent. I looked at her in awe and asked how in the WORLD she had that word ready offhand, when I wouldn’t have even come up with it myself as a native speaker. She blamed it on reading so many novels in English, but watch out world: this girl is like 19 years old and uses the word cloying in a second language.
I am so thankful for this little community of women that I get to learn alongside this year. There are no divas among us and everyone is serious and supportive about learning French. We are curious about one another’s cultures, patient with each other when we struggle and we celebrate victories together. It’s a sweet little family.
Marie in Paris
