Hi everyone!
J’espère que vous tous allez bien, hope your year is going well.
I’m writing from the plane home…. didn’t intend to have such a gap between posts but things got suprisingly busy!
Thought I’d show some of the highlights of things that have happened since my last blog post, then I will post something with some tips and advice.
So…. back to the story. I think I’d just come back from Italy (as you do) and it was still the uni break when I last wrote. I could hardly believe it was already halfway through the semester already in early March. The semester was only 10 weeks long with one week break in the middle. I definitely started noticing an improvement in my comprehension of lectures, which was good because we started getting end of sem assignments!
The classes and corresponding exams for DEUF I had are as follows:
Introduction to French Culture 3 ECTS — two multi choice quizzes
French Language classes 5 ECTS — we had a speech, a written account, and about 3 tests (hardest but also most helpful class lol)
= this formed an elective course ‘French unspecified level’
Grammar and linguistics 2 ECTS — multi choice quiz
Stylistics 3 ECTS — assignment
= this formed the same thing, ‘French unspecified level’ for an elective space I had
Social geography 4 ECTS — oral exam with the prof — S4/a 2nd year paper
Political philosophy 4 ECTS — written exam (the same one as for local students, only just managed to pass this one lol) this was ‘S2’/a 1st yr paper
= this formed a Global 200Lvl 15 point UoA course equivalent
Global History 3 ECTS — assignment
Modern History 5 ECTS — oral exam
= both 1st year courses that together formed Global 100Lvl on my transcript
(for context, I’m doing a Bachelor of Global Studies doing the Global Politics major and NZ as my area study so had to use elective space for French classes)
So… I had a bit going on to study for! On the whole though, didn’t find it too difficult, everything in the Lettres faculty (so excluding philosophy) was adapted for international students. I’d say the exam prep and writing two 5 page assignments in French was a tricky but worthwhile challenge. I now know how to talk about slavery in the Red Sea in the 19th century in surprising detail 😂Classes were finished by about early April, however some had finished completely by the end of March, and my last assignment was due on the 28th of April.
On another note, in mid April I made the trip up to Paris. My high school was doing a trip to France and my old French teacher had reached out to old students to ask if anyone would like to catch up, which was a pretty cool (albeit bizarre haha) to meet my French teacher and see the current French cohort in the real, actual, it-really-exists Paris!!!
The same French teacher had arranged a pen pal scheme with students our age in Northern France, and I’ve kept in contact with my penpal Lison who is now studying in Paris. Lison came down to visit me for a few days in January in Lyon, back when I struggled to really express myself in French in a friendship like that (her English is really good xoxo). But she very kindly offered to have me stay with her in her flat for the few nights I was there (even though she was really busy 🙏🥺). She speaks to me in English and I speak to her in French which is surprisingly fun and lets us both practice — especially because speaking is often the most difficult side of a language to master, and I think especially difficult in a friendship context when you’re trying to express yourself as honestly and openly as possible. To be honest, learning how to do this has been one of the best parts of the whole exchange, but more on this later.
It was pretty unreal to be in a city I sort of knew I’d visit since I started learning French at 11, but all at once felt very very grateful that I had actually made it with the best company, and so soon after finishing high school. Never knew such beautiful things could come so soon, especially because starting uni I didn’t imagine travelling until I’d graduated and worked for years… it seemed really far off, and then to be there one year after starting uni…. it was just amazing. Felt so, so lucky.
Compulsory Eiffel Tower photo.
Managed to have a pretty good conversation with my French teacher, and catch up with some younger students I’d seen around school when I was there. I met up with a school friend who is working as an au pair in London, so we got to go to some museums and walk around. I did find Paris pretty overwhelming with things to do, and feeling as though this city was bigger than I could ever even try to comprehend, full of people, and sort of colliding and overlapping histories and cultures. But as my kiwi friend Sophia pointed out when we went to Rome together, travelling and getting to experience cities like this with someone else is so special. Adds a new dimension to travel. Made me think a bit about travelling again, whenever that may be, and how I would try to structure it to be able to connect with people to make the travel as transformative as I found it during this period.
Moving on, or I’ll never finish this blog post haha, in April we went on an organised bike day in Spring, and I got to perform in a dance show!!!! No big deal though, I did a contemporary dance class that was offered at uni and we put on a show.
Bike day with the CROUS.
Wow, looking back it’s been a really, really busy, even before things went into overdrive and I began going on the run a bit from the start of May… I’m really looking forward to getting home haha.
Talk soon in the next post,
Chloe 🥐✈️