First week

So…just over one week has passed and a LOT has happened! But I’ll be selective in what I tell you, so you (hopefully!) don’t get bored.

Arrival
Mum, Dad and I set off early on Sunday morning, went through the Eurotunnel and arrived in Lille in good time. The journey seemed to take an age - even though I slept through part of it - I think it was the anticipation of what was to come. When we arrived at the flat, we received a warm welcome from the couple who own it. It is well-equipped and the couple had tried to think of everything I would need. They got together information about Lille and trains to my schools, as well as baking us a cake and providing some flowers from their garden! I am really pleased with the flat; I don’t think I could’ve done much better.

Japanese
On Monday night I went out for a Japanese meal with Marie, her boyfriend and her boyfriend’s brother. It was really strange to hear French spoken with a Japanese accent and gave me confidence when ordering, because they aren’t as likely (as French people) to know I’m not French!

‘Tagged’!
There’s a massive Carrefour supermarket here and I decided to go in to get a few bits and bobs wearing my backpack (nothing strange about that). So I strolled in to the entrance and got called back by two security guards and I realised that it was something to do with my bag. The only times I’ve known security people to be interested in bags is when they want to check what’s inside, so I started opening it for them to check the contents (I wasn’t sure why they’d want to when I was just going into a supermarket, but hey, I’d go with what they wanted!) and they chuckled at me saying ‘It’s not security!’ (I thought ‘what on earth is it, if it’s not security?!’), so I closed my bag back up and the man proceeded to put a black plastic tag through the zips so I couldn’t open it. Very strange and very annoying! It must be some kind of mechanism to help prevent shop lifting. I groaned when I thought of my reusable carrier bags trapped inside but I presumed they’d be able to do something at the checkout. A little while later, I reached the checkout, gestured at the black tag and said to the cashier ‘I’ve got bags inside’. To which she responded ‘Can you go and ask my colleague over there, I haven’t got anything to undo it with.’ So, panicking inside, but with no option, I approached the cashier she’d gestured towards and interrupted her transaction mumbling ‘excusez-moi madame, mais…’ and holding my bag up to her. Thankfully it didn’t take long and it seemed as though she’d already had to do it 100 times that day!

GBU
I went to Lille University’s GBU on Tuesday night (the equivalent to the Christian Union) and it was really nice and friendly. There were 13 of us packed in to the living room of a flat. I had been told how small Christian groups were in France, but it really struck me that this group was for the whole university, whereas in Southampton on the same night, a group of that size was meeting just from a small hall of residence. I don’t think the GBU is as well known as the CU, but even so…

Schools
I have started at my two schools and for the most part I like what I see. The teachers are friendly, with many of them making an effort to say ‘welcome’ or ‘hello’ or ‘nice to meet you’ in English. It was really nice to find out that most of the pupils enjoy having classes with the English language assistant and a lot of them have been happy to meet me. So that’s a good position to start from. I’m in a period of observation for two weeks, so that I can see how the classes here work and start to gage the level of the kids’ language, etc. It’s really quite different to being in an English classroom.
So far I’ve done some observing from the back of the classroom, but mostly I’ve been standing in front of classes next to the teacher in order that the pupils interrogate me! It’s often been questions and answers in English but some classes (particularly younger ones) have been allowed to speak in French. It’s a bit daunting and the teachers are learning about who I am at the same time as the pupils. You can’t help thinking ‘what are they thinking about me?’…sometimes their reactions are clear (like in one class, when asked ‘Do you like marmite?’ I said ‘yes’, they were all disgusted!) and sometimes they’re not. I was even clapped once for saying that I’d watched a certain French film (a film about the North of France)!
At one point I was sitting in on a double lesson which was not a language lesson, and I was due to leave after the first hour. When the first hour was up the teacher (the librarian!) said the kids could have a 5 minute break and lo and behold, all the girls came crowding round my table, with one girl in particular very eager to ask me questions in English! I just about got to my next lesson on time.
There is a lovely Christian teacher in the English dept at one of my schools, Laurence, who lives about 5 minutes away from me which is great and she has said if I need any help I can go to her :)

Signing off
I went to a French-speaking church and an English-speaking church on Sunday, but this post is long already so I’ll leave talking about churches to another time.
So all in all I’ve had a very good start to my time here. Much better than I thought it would be in fact. And I know that it’s in no small way related to God answering the prayers of many of you, so thank you. I’ve had to face up to a lot of things that are very new or that require me to step outside my comfort zone this week. I praise God for sustaining me and giving me courage to do things I wouldn’t normally do.

A bientot,
Fiona xx