Before reading: I realize that this entry is has a negative attitude, just what I've been trying to avoid, but I was having a bad day when I wrote it so, as you should with everything I write, take this with a grain of salt. Also know that I am posting it with good intent: to be honest with myself and others about the fluctuations of emotion in the study abroad experience. Our program coordinators call it culture shock. Also, I know I make it sound like my life at home is less than optimal which is untrue. However, I felt like I was lyon to everyone when I wasn't including the bad days as well as the good.
There are 117 days left until I leave France. Of those days, 41 are vacation (aka I won't be in Rennes, not even counting a few 3-day weekends).
That's not the point of this entry. Today I'm having one of my homesick days and I want to make sure whoever reads this has an accurate depiction of the study abroad (and host family) experience, at least for me.
I just wanted to say that it's not all fun and games. Sometimes it can be very frustrating, confusing and, in a word, heavy.
Usually when things are frustrating, they're little things that could easily be handled on a normal day but if I'm tired or hungry, forget about it. Examples: the overly crowded university restaurant, people literally pushing me out of the way in stores, silly French ways of doing things that are different from American, and using a fork and knife properly.
Things that are confusing usually stem from cultural misunderstandings. For me, that happens a lot in my home. I like my host family and I enjoy the time I spend with them, but according to my friends some of the rules I have to follow are weird and not typical.
Examples:
Only showering between 5:30pm and 9pm (honestly I hate that rule and I won't ever understand it)
Not being allowed to close the bathroom door in the morning when I brush my teeth
Not being allowed to eat breakfast after 10am because that's when food for lunch is prepared (even though I've never seen that happening...)
The regimented-ness of the chore lists
Doing certain things on certain days (like every Thursday trash from the bedrooms is taken out. once I told my older host sister that I didn't have much in it so it was fine. I heard her talking to my younger sister about it and she was very unusually bent out of shape about it. It was bizarre, but I feel like maybe I'm missing something...?)
The style of "talking" that my host mom and sister sometimes have: they yell at each other, like at the dinner table...and then a millisecond everything is fine. I know that isn't that weird, but I just don't like yelling I guess.
My host parents are anti-gay marriage. They said that they don't want gay people to be able to marry because then they could adopt a baby, and babies raised by gay parents will be "psychologically traumatized."
Every Sunday my host dad jokes about how I'm not wearing a dress and that's what girls are supposed to wear on Sundays...and my host sisters and host mom actually do it. He's joking, I know, but there is a small element of seriousness to it. He's kind of not joking...but I'm not going to follow a rule like that, it's sexist. It's not a matter of dressing up, it's a matter of wearing a dress.
My host mom says my youngest host-sister, who turns 13 tomorrow, is too young to do the dishes. At 13, I think I was helping with just about every chore in the house.
When I talk to my friends about these things they all agree that it's just a very traditional French family, despite the nontraditional family structure.
Since I'm making a point of being honest, I'll throw it out there and say that sometimes I just don't want to be here. The rules, the schedules, the routines, they make me feel so stressed and uncomfortable. Don't get me wrong: I have no problems with doing chores, following loose schedules, and following rules.
And I'll be honest, again: I don't spend as much time as I'd like to with my host mom in the evenings. I just don't know what to talk to her about; I don't like what she watches on TV, I don't like being preached to about what's right and wrong in this world. I enjoy dinner time because I can just sit and listen to conversations and pipe in sometimes if I need to, but a good 25% of the time I am zoned out, in my own head thinking in English. If I lived in a dorm, I might actually have something to talk to the other residents about.
I'm slowly making French friends though, it's just taking some time.
Sometimes I think I've gotten over the culture shock, then I have a day like today where it all bubbles up and I think "what I wouldn't give to be at home on the couch watching tv with my family right now." It's funny though, because literally just this morning I was walking around thinking, "wow, I'm in France. This is so awesome, I can't believe it."
But again, in all honesty, I'm not immersing myself in the language as much as I should be. However, I'm not sure if my brain could handle all of this emotion without being able to process it and de-stress in English. Speaking is a difficulty for me in English, so when I try to do it in French sometimes it's just a train wreck. If I'm with people who I know aren't going to judge me, I'm fine. If I'm with professors or my host parents, not so much. Sometimes it's also hard for me to understand people, like store workers or whatever, when they're talking to me. A way to help that would be to watch French movies at night but my brain just can't handle it. I know my limits and what I'm capable of, I just need to take this at my own pace. Another part of it is that when I don't have something to say, I just don't say anything (in English or in French).
And that contradiction right there, that's what's so confusing and heavy. Luckily I don't feel this way that often though.
Living in a host family is hard, and to anyone considering doing it I would greatly advise you to think long and hard about who you are as a person and if you could actually handle living in a new house with new rules and new people.
Living here really is helping me get to know myself as a person though, so I'm glad I did it and I'm trying not to let the little things bug me too much. It's not worth it anyway, cause I'M IN FRANCE!
I'm not trying to give the impression that my host family isn't nice, they're all very nice agreeable people. Monique has done and continues to do great things for other people, including me by allowing me to stay in her home and learn from her family, but she's just not the type of person with whom I get along on a deep level. I'm sure some of it is cultural, some of it is generational, and some of it is just human nature.
What's important is that I'm learning what I like and don't like in other people and their lifestyles, which will (and is) helping me figure out and define who I am based on what I'm not.
I just wanted to put it out there, that I'm not trying to give anyone the illusion that my life here is all sugar-coated chocolate-filled French pastry, sometimes it's the crappy kind that you get out of a vending machine.
Hey Holly!
ReplyDeleteIt's Rachel from Pitt! Thank you so much for this...one of my major worries is the amount of stress/strangeness that comes with living with a whole new family who doesn't speak your mother tongue. When I was in Germany for two weeks that was frustrating enough...I can't imagine five months! However, I think you made the right choice living with a family..think of it this way: if you lived with Americans, you'd use even less French! Stay strong, you're fabulous. =)