POUTIIIINE!!!

Goodness.  What on earth can be said about the past week-and-a-half that I have been in what is quite possibly the most beautiful place ever?  A whole lot, that’s for sure.  Let’s break it down!

Lauren and her parents picked me up from my grandparents’ in Michigan on the morning of the third of July.  We drove for a while before stopping in Port Huron in northern Michigan at this really cool restaurant.  We sat in the atrium of the restaurant in movie theatre-style chairs with silent films playing off to the side.  ‘Twas quite neat.  The wait at the border was a bit long, but we finally got through and entered Canada around what was probably about one or two o’clock.  We drove through Ontario, often noting the vast number of Petro-Canada stations and Tim Hortons coffee joints.  In London, Ontario we exchanged some American money for Canadian and had some fun figuring out which coins were loonies and which were toonies and admiring the twenty-dollar bills.  We finally stopped for the night in Kingston, Ontario.

The next morning, we headed out and finally crossed the border into Québec at around noon.  It was extremely exciting.  The excitement was slightly marred, however, by my attempt to order a smoothie at the Tim Hortons right on the other side of the border.  The woman from whom Lauren and David was very polite and accommodating when it came to their unsure French, but when I ordered from someone else and messed up one word, she immediately switched to English.  I persevered, however, and spoke only in French.  It was rather disappointing, but I survived.  And later I came to realize that it wouldn’t be the only time it happened.

Going on the highway around Montréal, traffic was absolutely nuts.  It was even worse when we got into Québec City and tried to navigate through Vieux-Québec in an effort to find our hotel.  We finally made it and thanked God for the valet service so we didn’t have to try to park.  After getting settled into the hotel, a Marriott Courtyard right next to the Place d’Youville stage for le Festival d’Été, we decided to go to a snazzy restaurant right across from the stage called Chez L’Autre.  I had the most delicious roasted chicken au jus ever.  (Okay, it’s the only chicken au jus I’d ever had.)  Lauren and I spoke French to the waitress, and all was well.  After dinner, Lauren and I walked around the interior of the walls of Vieux-Québec and went nuts in Archambault.  And by “went nuts,” I just mean we were excited.  We didn’t go broke or anything.  I did, however, have to buy a CD of Bruno Pelletier’s since the only hardcopies of his CDs that I have are Concert de Noël, Bruno Pelletier et le GrosZorchestre, Microphonium, and Rendus-là.   And I need them all.  Eventually.  The only ones that Archambault seems to stock right now are Un monde à l’envers, Rendus-là, D’autres rives, and Sur scène.  So I bought D’autres rives since it has my favorite song in the entire world, Loin de chez moi.

The next day was the real day of tourism.  We visited the Château Frontenac, la basilique Notre-Dame, went down to the Basse-Ville, took a roundtrip ferry to Lévis just for the hell of it, and did all of that fun touristic stuff.  Lauren and I also got to see some street performers doing stuff like rolling around in a hoop and juggling fire.  Then we came back to our hotel and went to Chez L’Autre again for dinner.  I got the roasted chicken au jus again, at which point I realized that I’m allergic to something in it.  Joy.  A little after dinner we all walked a good way away from the wall to see a free performance of Cirque du Soleil’s Les chemins invisibles.  IT WAS AMAZING!!!   

The next day we drove in some direction that escapes me to see la basilique Ste-Anne and the Montmorency waterfall.  Once the afternoon hit, we headed west to Trois-Rivières to see the Torontonian jazz singer Emilie-Claire Barlow in Le Festivoix.  I’m not a fan of jazz, but it was a great show.  She’s hilarious, and her use of franglais was awesome.  It was particularly funny when she would say something funny in English and the four of us would crack up, but no one else would get it.

On Sunday, we headed to Université Laval to move in to our dorm and start the whole study abroad thing.  When we went into the residence services building, the woman assumed we were with a group called Explore.  Neither of us contradicted her because we didn’t realize there was more than one French immersion group and we just assumed that our program was called that and we didn’t know it.  Oops.  We were placed into our dorms, which are directly across the hall from one another, and said goodbye to Lauren’s parents.  After that, Lauren and I had a few hours until a “tour” that was being given, so we walked down the street to check out the huge Archambault store in the mall and to eat at Casey’s a bar/grill right next to it.  The “tour” was nothing more than walking around our dorm building, which wasn’t very helpful.

The next morning was the first day of classes.  Lauren and I arrived at the language building at 8h30 to receive our schedules and the levels of French into which we had been placed.  It was at this point that we learned that we weren’t in Explore, that that was a program for Canadians and was practically free.  Oops.  We went one more floor up to find our correct group, which we did, and got in line for our schedules and placement.  It was then that I realized that I had forgotten my passport in my dorm, which needed to be photocopied before I could receive my schedule.  So I walked the ten minutes back to the dorm and the ten minutes back to get it photocopied, which took a while.  Finally, I learned that I was in the highest placement, “supérieur” or “superior.”  Sweet!

After lunch, Lauren and I just hung out for a bit and I talked to my mom and sister on Skype.  We went to the University Pub (yes, there is one) to hang out with a bunch of people in our group and the “animateurs” who are very similar to Truman’s student advisors.  It was lots and lots of fun.  There were games and limbo and music, and it was a blast.

One thing that’s interesting about this program is that they really mean it when they say they want you to speak French all the time.  Like seriously.  I am currently wearing a yellow wristband that tells people I’m an advanced French speaker, so they can come up to me and say whatever they want and I should be able to understand.  Beginning students were blue wristbands, which means that you need to keep sentences simple and you’re able to use franglais.  Red wristbands are for intermediate students.  I’m scared of my yellow bracelet.  Also, they give out different colored cards at random.  They give out green ones if they hear you speaking French and red ones if they hear you speaking some other language.  If you’re seen not wearing your bracelet, you get a yellow card, at which point you have to go find an animateur and explain why you weren’t wearing it.  Or something like that.  If you don’t do this, it becomes a red card.  Apparently there are consequences for too many red cards and rewards for lots of green cards.

Today was the first “real” day of classes for the advanced and superior levels.  We received our schedules, which include our optional course.  I chose Le Québec et sa culture, which should be EXCITING.  At some point we’re going to learn about swearwords in Québec.  My other two cours are advanced grammar and oral expression.  So I’ll get a total of six credits.  I don’t know if they’ll transfer to replace a requirement at Truman, but I’m just happy for the electives and the experience.

For TL;DR: Québec is awesome.  I love it.  I find French already coming more easily to me when I speak it, and Lauren and I speak it almost all the time to each other.  It’s quite awesome.