Bienvenu Chez Les Français (Welcome To The French)

So far, I’ve had six life-changing experiences: my first English lesson in primary school, my first accordion lesson, visiting my sisters in the hospital after they were born and watching  my grandmother slowly die of leukemia. The sixth and most recent of these happened in 2011.



Despite learning French for six years at school and studying it for two years at Salzburg University, I’ve had never set a foot on French soil. But I already had made up my mind about the country, famous for its cuisine and its ‘napeopleon-esque’ then-president. For me, French people wore strange hats (berets), ate baguettes, drank wine, adored Edith Piaf and were stuck up. And that’s how I expected it to be when I got on the train to spend a month at Nevers in central France. Getting there was exhausting. After spending the night in an old City Night Line train, I finally arrived at Paris East in the morning. That’s where the problems started. The metro ticket machines didn’t work properly, there were no elevators and I had to carry my heavy suitcase down the stairs. And of course, all announcements were in French. At Paris Bercy, the train station where I had to wait four hours for my connecting train, it was the same. Luckily enough, I found a woman who repeated everything for me really s-l-o-w-l-y. After fighting with the ticket machine again, I finally got on my train and was confronted with a giant sitting next to me who coughed the whole trip.

Arriving at Nevers two hours later was a relief. The family was a lucky choice: The mother Muriel was an English teacher; the father Benoît a lawyer; the three kids Justine, Alèonore and Gabriel were adorable; the baby Jeanne really quiet and the cat wanted to cuddle all the time. They lived in a big three-story house where I even had a room for myself. For the first three days I felt like my head was about to explode, hearing French 24/7. Have you seen the French movie ‘Welcome To The Sticks”? It’s about a post office manager who is sent to the North of France and is unable to understand a single word people say. I had the same feeling! To fight it, I even listened to STS and Hubert von Goisern in the evenings; usually I hate this kind of Austrian music! After the first few days passed, the first few differences became visible:

First, the French weather differed a lot from the Austrian weather. Two days earlier, I had walked around with boots and winter coat. But here in Nevers it was sunny  and I only had to wear a cardigan in the sixteen-degree weather! Funnily enough, the French were complaining how cold it was all the time.  Second, their music school system differs a lot from the Austrian system. In Austria, kids are usually taught how to read music by their teachers. In France, all kids have to attend an extra lesson where they learn everything about major and minor keys and so on.  Third, French behavior at crosswalks differs a lot from Austrian behavior. French people are like the Italians, they jaywalk ALL the time. Only when accompanied by their children do they wait until the traffic lights turn green. Fourth, French houses differ a lot from the Austrian houses. French houses are white, gray or brown, while Austrian houses are neon-colored. Fifth, the prices at French museums differ a lot from the Austrian prices. In France, students and kids don’t have to pay; in Austria even children have to pay to visit a museum. And sixth, the French attitude toward nuclear reactors differs a lot from the Austrian attitude. I still wonder how they can be so calm when there’s a nuclear reactor only fifty kilometers away.

After a week, I was fully integrated into the family: I looked after the baby, took the kids to school and spent lots of time in the city center. It got easier to understand what everybody said, although I had to fight huge vocabulary problems. At university, we had learned five expressions for ‘smoking a joint’ but I had no knowledge of basic words, such as playground slide (toboggan) or baby bottle (le bibron). Deciding that I couldn’t go on like that, I bought a little exercise book and scribbled every word, every idiom and phrase I liked in it. Thanks to Muriel I was able to see other nearby cities. I visited Bourges, an amazing city with a charming old town and an impressive cathedral. I visited Jaques Coeur’s palace, the cathedral, and various museums. Back in Nevers, I got to meet the parents of classmates, talked to shop assistants and friends of the family. And my whole world was turned topsy-turvy. The French were not stuck up; they kindly waited when you were struggling with the language. As soon as you told them that you were Austrian, they got curious and wanted to know everything about life in Austria. I was becoming a chatterbox, now able to engage in everyday communication without stopping somewhere in the middle of the sentence.

The last two weeks were weird. Stopping to compare everything with life in Austria, I had adapted to the French lifestyle and even started to think in French, to swear in French. French was E-V-E-R-Y-W-H-E-R-E. I even had the chance of going to Aurillac in south-central France to meet the rest of the family. Treated as one of them, I felt at home.

But all good things must come to an end. Arriving at Munich train station in March was weird: everybody spoke German and I could understand it without having to concentrate. Do I miss the French lifestyle? Sometimes. Do I want to go back? Sure. Was it a life-changing experience? Yes it was, in so many ways. I’ve still got the exercise book scribbled full of words. I’m confident now when I speak French to a native speaker and I’ve totally changed my opinion on the French people. They don’t wear strange hats at all, don’t eat baguettes but bread (pain), drink wine only in the evening, adore Edith Piaf and are extremely nice when you speak a little French.

Pictures: © All rights reserved (taken by me)