Entry #5 : Cultural encounters

December 7th was my third day at GEOS and I have to admit it was a really hard day. Not that the work I had to do was difficult (not at all), but I felt really sick on that day and I missed my bus ...  As a result, I almost arrived late and with the biggest headache EVER ! Fortunately, I had some time to prepare my stuff and relax in the lounge before starting the classes. Just like last week, I overheard some conversations between the students and I realized that I was surrounded by so many different cultures. Last Friday, I was just thinking of the languages I was hearing (I was amazed since there were so many at the same time), but this week, I understood that they weren't separated only by their language but by their cultural traits as well. The best example is food. Almost all of the students brought something traditional of their culture for lunch. For example, next to me was a Korean guy who was eating rice enveloped with a sheet of alga. On the other side, there a Spanish girl eating traditional cheese bread from Brazil and her friend was eating tortillas. After seeing all of their food, I felt a little hungry! Also, on December 14th, it was the Christmas party at GEOS and everybody brought real traditional food. Some of them let me taste what they brought and it was so good ! All the dish had a particular taste. It was interesting to compare them.

Another thing that made me realize the difference between our culture and the other ones was when I heard some people talking during the party. They said that the reason they were here at the party was because they loved the staff and the school in general, not because it had a particular religious meaning. 

Also, because culture is something really important in GEOS, there are flags from many countries displayed in the school. It might be for students to feel welcomed since most of them are from somewhere else in the world. Pretty much every students are immigrants or foreigners who are in Quebec for a certain time. 

Unfortunately, I haven't learn any new words or expressions during the last two weeks. Since the class I'm attending are in French, it's hard to learn about English. However, I get to talk with the students between and after the classes, but our conversations are more often about familiar topics. So, I understand everything they say.

I hope I'll get more opportunities to practice next week !

Entry #4: The world is my classroom

This week was my third day at my internship. I arrived there a little earlier than usual and I could see that there were much more people than usual in the lounge. I found a little spot to sit and do the same as always : listen to students. The ones that grabbed my attention were a group of Spanish people who were  reading a French newspaper on the table in front of me. It's not the fact that they were reading it that surprised me but they were making a sum up of each articles they read to make sure that they understood. I found it really inspiring. They were so motivated to learn French that they were doing extra-work like this (it wasn't even an assignment). I thought it was a great way of practicing while doing something else at the same time. Also, by reading the French newspaper, without even realizing it, they were also learning about the French culture in general. There was articles about festivals, musician, Francophone culture's problems, etc. 

This is a really good example of how the world can be our classroom. Immersing yourself in an other culture allow you to discover so many new things. You can learn from doing simple things like reading the newspaper of another culture or talking to different people. I had the chance to experience that through my internship. I learned a lot from people whom I talked to and from the tasks I was asked to do when I was working. 

Internship and immersion are more based on the practice than traditional classes in school. Sure, it's a totally different way of learning but, to me, it isn't a bad way. Actually, I can assure that I learned a lot more from my internship than from English classes this year. It is a personal fact, it might be different for other people. I guess it depends on which learning strategies works the best for you!

Entry #3 : Diving in !

My second day at GEOS Languages Plus went just as well as my first day. My schedule was exactly the same as the previous week so from 13:00 to 14:30, I was in room #6 for grammar class and from 14:45 to 16:15, I was in room #5 for conversation class. I thought it would be great to stay in the lounge for the first 30 minutes since I got to hear great conversations the week before. I sat with a boy I had met in my grammar class. We talked in English since his french wasn't very strong. I tried once to talk to him in Spanish (he's from Brazil, so Spanish is his first language) but he barely understood anything. It was pretty funny !

After that, he left and I listened at the conversations around me. Right behind me, there was few students from different nationalities who were having a discussion about how they perceived French people. They said we were too serious and cold compared to Latin-American people who were very friendly. I thought it was pretty interesting to hear their point of view. I never thought French people were cold but maybe it can be different for people who lived in other cultures. It might be because of their habits or their manner of seeing the word ''cold''. I also realized that the students whom native tongue was French have a better accent than the others. Those whom native tongue is Spanish are also quite good with the accent but they seem to have a hard time pronouncing the ''th'' sound. Actually, from my point of view, people who have Spanish or French as their first language definitely have a better accent for English than Japanese, Korean or Chinese. That might be explained by the fact that Latin languages have more in common with Germanic languages than the languages from East-Asia. 

Noticing those kind of things gives me a little more confidence into my learning skills because I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have ever thought of those things before starting the program. I think it proves that I'm making progress and that I'm equating the theory. 

There's one thing I realized about Anglophone culture after listening to so many different conversations : English people seem to compliment each other a lot. In the office, everyone is always really polite but still familiar. I heard a lot of people taking to their colleagues with nicknames and shooting compliments all the time. That's something you don't see too much in a French working environment. 

Also, I did learn some English words during the time I was doing some administration. For example, the word ''jork'' means ''tiroir'' in French, ''file'' means ''dossier'' and ''photocopier'' means ''photocopieur''. The last one seams obvious because the translation is practically the same but if you don't know it ... Well, I could you know it ?

Make sure to come on my website again really soon to have feedback of my next visits at GEOS !

Bye