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Uphill grade...
Jun. 10th, 2011 10:32 pmThe alarm duly woke me up at 7:15 this morning, whereupon I shut the blessed thing off and went back to sleep—until 10 am!
It finally occurred to me that going to sleep at 11 pm local time is like taking a nap at 3 pm at home, so that waking at 2 am is like waking at 6 pm at home (after a too-long nap). The subsequent rack time between 4 am and 10 am is like falling back asleep at 8 pm and waking at 2 am. In short, jet lag is having its merry way with me.
When I finally did get up, it was off to the corner store for bread. I must say, however, I was tempted by the other goodies on sale.
In more mundane news, I managed to finish about 6,000 words by 3 pm and send it off, leaving the rest of the day free. As things turned out, no sooner had I hit "send" on my email than it started to rain in earnest. Galina and I set out, however, equipped with umbrellas, and we followed Galina's basic instinct, which was to sit down on a bus—any bus—and see where it would take us.
As it turned out, the bus stop was equipped with a very clear map of the bus route, so from the Rue la Boëtie, we sat down on the #84 bus and let it take us all the way around, up to the Porte de Champerret, and then back down toward the Seine, past Place de la Concorde, to the 7ème arrondissement, where we got off—to a light drizzle—at the stop just before the vehicle turned off of the Rue du Four onto Rue Madame.
From the bus stop, we hoofed it to the Èglise St. Germain de Prés, where, at #5 Rue de l'Abbaye (just behind the church), can be found the Cercle International de l'ARC, where one can practice speaking one's French.
The setup, briefly, is this. For a €10 annual fee, you can show up between 2 pm and 7 pm on weekdays and practice speaking French. People sit around a table with a native-French-speaking facilitator and talk about just about anything. I forked over the signup fee and spent a fascinating hour at a table with a young woman from South Korea, a young man from Vietnam, a young woman from Spain, a young man from Lebabon, and a gentleman from Poland. If my work load allows, I plan to visit the place a few more times before leaving Paris. I felt my French improving just sitting there at the table.
In the back of my mind, I've been processing a question the facilitator asked about what it was about French that we felt was an obstacle to our acquisition of the language.
In my case, the answer has two components. First, and easiest to address, are the simple nuts and bolts of dealing with the customs of the country. Here, I'm not referring to customs from any academic perspective, but to things as simple as "What is the procedure for buying a bus ticket?" (Answer: You can buy a ticket from the driver, who prefers exact or close-to-exact change, after which you must "validate" your ticket by inserting it in a device mounted just behind the driver's cubicle.)
What does all this have to do with language acquisition? Well, the short answer has to do with how people deal with you based on how you present yourself; a longer answer is probably worth a post of its own.
The second factor, for me, is learning to comprehend French at the speed it is usually spoken. (A variation on this answer is: To learn to comprehend French as it is spoken in the south of France.) This was particularly apparent to me during my visit to the bank yesterday. Once the source of the problem became known, the young man who was helping me launched into an explanation that I had some trouble following. The solution, in this case, was simple: I asked him to repeat what he had said, but to do so more slowly, which he did (and consequently, I understood everything he said).
It occurs to me that both factors are two facets of the same jewel, but again, a more detailed discussion will have to be put off until I've had time to better clarify what I want to say.
Galina and I walked back along the Blvd St. Germain until we got to the Seine, where we decided to reboard the bus. While we were waiting, my camera was burning a hole in my pocket, so—
We picked up another €25 of food on the way home. Every time we do this, we end up with a surplus of food, so I expect our daily expenditures for food will start to trail off, if not stop, somewhere in the near future.
Cheers...
It finally occurred to me that going to sleep at 11 pm local time is like taking a nap at 3 pm at home, so that waking at 2 am is like waking at 6 pm at home (after a too-long nap). The subsequent rack time between 4 am and 10 am is like falling back asleep at 8 pm and waking at 2 am. In short, jet lag is having its merry way with me.
When I finally did get up, it was off to the corner store for bread. I must say, however, I was tempted by the other goodies on sale.
In more mundane news, I managed to finish about 6,000 words by 3 pm and send it off, leaving the rest of the day free. As things turned out, no sooner had I hit "send" on my email than it started to rain in earnest. Galina and I set out, however, equipped with umbrellas, and we followed Galina's basic instinct, which was to sit down on a bus—any bus—and see where it would take us.
As it turned out, the bus stop was equipped with a very clear map of the bus route, so from the Rue la Boëtie, we sat down on the #84 bus and let it take us all the way around, up to the Porte de Champerret, and then back down toward the Seine, past Place de la Concorde, to the 7ème arrondissement, where we got off—to a light drizzle—at the stop just before the vehicle turned off of the Rue du Four onto Rue Madame.
From the bus stop, we hoofed it to the Èglise St. Germain de Prés, where, at #5 Rue de l'Abbaye (just behind the church), can be found the Cercle International de l'ARC, where one can practice speaking one's French.
The setup, briefly, is this. For a €10 annual fee, you can show up between 2 pm and 7 pm on weekdays and practice speaking French. People sit around a table with a native-French-speaking facilitator and talk about just about anything. I forked over the signup fee and spent a fascinating hour at a table with a young woman from South Korea, a young man from Vietnam, a young woman from Spain, a young man from Lebabon, and a gentleman from Poland. If my work load allows, I plan to visit the place a few more times before leaving Paris. I felt my French improving just sitting there at the table.
In the back of my mind, I've been processing a question the facilitator asked about what it was about French that we felt was an obstacle to our acquisition of the language.
In my case, the answer has two components. First, and easiest to address, are the simple nuts and bolts of dealing with the customs of the country. Here, I'm not referring to customs from any academic perspective, but to things as simple as "What is the procedure for buying a bus ticket?" (Answer: You can buy a ticket from the driver, who prefers exact or close-to-exact change, after which you must "validate" your ticket by inserting it in a device mounted just behind the driver's cubicle.)
What does all this have to do with language acquisition? Well, the short answer has to do with how people deal with you based on how you present yourself; a longer answer is probably worth a post of its own.
The second factor, for me, is learning to comprehend French at the speed it is usually spoken. (A variation on this answer is: To learn to comprehend French as it is spoken in the south of France.) This was particularly apparent to me during my visit to the bank yesterday. Once the source of the problem became known, the young man who was helping me launched into an explanation that I had some trouble following. The solution, in this case, was simple: I asked him to repeat what he had said, but to do so more slowly, which he did (and consequently, I understood everything he said).
It occurs to me that both factors are two facets of the same jewel, but again, a more detailed discussion will have to be put off until I've had time to better clarify what I want to say.
Galina and I walked back along the Blvd St. Germain until we got to the Seine, where we decided to reboard the bus. While we were waiting, my camera was burning a hole in my pocket, so—
We picked up another €25 of food on the way home. Every time we do this, we end up with a surplus of food, so I expect our daily expenditures for food will start to trail off, if not stop, somewhere in the near future.
Cheers...
