My French Family

Even though I’m usually only at my homestay during the evenings, I feel like I’m beginning to connect with the family and establish a relationship. For one I’m finding myself more able to contribute to the dinner conversations. Sure I don’t always understand all of what they say, but enough to agree or disagree at the right times (I hope).

The mother was out-of-town last weekend, and so it was just the daughter and I during dinner. I learned more about her, and we talked a lot about music and movies (both French and American). I let her borrow a new French CD I just bought, and she enjoyed it a lot. She’s 16, so she’s a little to young for me to completely relate too but she’s a really sweet girl and I can tell that we have similar personalities: both very studious and intellectual, both interested in art and culture, and shopping of course! She is also very helpful and patient with my amateur French. She has studied English for 5 years so she can translate vocabulary for me and point of the different nuances of the language.

The mother is very nice and accepting as well. They are both really interested in my life, which I find very flattering, and at the same time they give me my space and don’t expect me to be around all the time. It’s a really nice balance.

We don’t start our grammar course at the Sorbonne until next Monday, so we still haven’t found out what level we placed into. There was a get-together tonight at our school for all the host parents, and I guess my host mother asked if they had seen the results and knew what level I was going to be in. Apparently they had, so they told her… I placed in Superior 1, which is the second highest. She was really excited for me. I thought it was really funny that she found out before I did, since I’m not supposed to find out until tomorrow when I pick up my results.