The other day I mentioned that I don’t have any classes with real French people. This poses a problem because the whole purpose of my being here is to improve my French skills through interaction with French people. Instead I spend most of my day stammering and trying to muddle through a conversation in French with a bunch of Russians who are about as fluent as me, which is ‘not very.’
So you can imagine how thrilled I was to stumble upon a poster on the campus bulletin board saying (in French) that this guy Victor was looking for an English tutor. So I text him and he’s definitely interested. Excellent! I am thinking to myself…Finally I’ll meet a real French person. Maybe we can set up a language exchange…half English, half French!
So we set up a meeting, which never happened. But after a miscommunication and him getting sick, we finally rescheduled and met on Monday. He was extremely nice and happens to speak perfect English, which was really weird. The whole time I was thinking why did he post an ad for an English tutor? So I try to casually drop into the conversation “I can’t help but notice your English is perfect” to which he replies “Oh, yeah. Well I spent most of my life in Canada. Vancouver, not the French part.”
At this point, I’m truly confused and slightly annoyed. So he’s NOT a real French person, and now it turns out he’s Canadian?!
Regardless, conversation was interesting and he was very nice. We finished our coffee and parted ways, making plans to hang out later in the week. I go home, still confused about what just happened. Then I put it out of my mind. I think to myself not French, but at least someone new and nice.
Wednesday I’m back on campus. I’m visiting my best friend, the hot beverage vending machine, when I see Victor’s poster again. I give it a quick glance and something catches my eye. Wait a minute….I read it more carefully, and suddenly everything makes sense.
What I thought the sign said:
[Seeking] English lessons from an Anglophone with negotiable hourly rate.
What the sign actually said:
Offering English lessons from an Anglophone- hourly rates negotiable.
Oy!
Lessons learned the hard way:
-Always take a cell phone to the bathroom in case you get locked in a stall
-Keep an eye on the ground AND the sky
-Pay Cat Man if you take his picture
-You cannot read.
These are some pictures from Le Musée d'art moderne et d'art contemporain (MAMAC) here in Nice. Some of it's interesting, but most modern art makes me feel like I'm just not smart enough to understand it.
These are some pictures from Le Musée d'art moderne et d'art contemporain (MAMAC) here in Nice. Some of it's interesting, but most modern art makes me feel like I'm just not smart enough to understand it.
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