I was updating my calendar today and realized that I will be settling into my apartment in Trois-Rivières, Québec one week from tonight. Woah.
I'm feeling a combination of excited and wistful. I've had a great summer. By this time next week, I will have accomplished everything I wanted to this summer: great times with family and friends, lots of music-making, and home decluttering (o.k., the decluttering isn't 100% accomplished, but is it ever?). My class schedule isn't set yet, more about that in a moment, but I'm really looking forward to being on campus and in classes.
The wistful part: for the first time since fall 2001, I won't be starting the school year at FHS. Last week I went to drop something off there, and for the first time I really felt that I'm not part of the staff any more. I'm still getting staff e-mails and thus got the e-mail with all the first-week-of-school instructions. I read it and realized that I won't be part of that. Of course, the first week of meetings was never the good part; that was seeing the kids. Still, seeing that e-mail really made it hit home that the FHS chapter in my book of life has reached its last page and it's time to start writing the next chapter. I still plan on going to games and performances, and if I'm around to sub I'll certainly be interested in doing so. But there will be kids and staff I don't know, and things will have changed as they inevitably do from year to year. Plus I'll miss my friends. I'm counting on e-mail, texting, and social media to fill that void.
FHS p.s.: it took them a year, but they have filled my position!
Last Thursday I went up to Trois-Rivières to report Friday morning to take the French test required of all non-Canadian students. It's essentially a French SAT without the math. I find it highly amusing that the test is published by the Educational Testing Service, the American company that brings you the SAT. And that was precisely the format; 180 multiple choice questions to answer by filling in the bubble sheet. 90 were listening questions where you only get to hear the text, not read it, and 90 were reading and grammar questions. Grammar is my strength (thanks to three decades of Latin teaching) and I know I got all the grammar questions right. Pretty sure the same is true for the reading. And there were a few listening questions where I had no idea what was said. Just a few, though, so I can live with that! Why this test is a big deal: none of the test-takers can register for classes until we get our scores. We were told that we would get them Wednesday in our e-mail. So I'll be spending Wednesday on my phone until that e-mail comes. 👀 Those who get a low score are required to register for remedial classes. I know I'm not going to get a low score. So I just need to get that e-mail, at which point the registration portal will be opened for me and the others. Shopping for fall classes, yeah!!
Calendar: Wednesday I get the e-mail and register. Friday morning I'll be back on campus for a mandatory meeting for all new international students. As I tell everyone, I hardly feel like an international student, but technically I am. Then I have to come right back as the final concert for my adult band camp (yes, that's a thing, and it's super-fun, this is my second year doing it) is Saturday. Sunday 9/1 I'll be heading up to Trois-Rivières with all my stuff, with a stopover in New Hampshire to watch a college soccer game, specifically to watch the member of the FHS Class of 2019 to whom I was the closest play in his first college game. Sunday night in Trois-Rivières I'll have to grocery shop and stock my fridge because I checked and the supermarkets will be closed there on Labor Day (or, as they spell it where I'm going, Labour Day, or I guess I should say Fête du Travail). So Monday 9/2 will be my day to settle in. Tuesday morning 9/3 I have yet another mandatory meeting for all new students in the French language and literature department. And Wednesday 9/4 it's go time!!
One part of this endeavor has evolved a little bit. I don't have a definite return date anymore. I will stay at least through the fall semester. Then if I decide I've accomplished what I went there to do, I'll come home. If there is something more for me, I'll stay for the academic year. If I want to stay beyond that point and can afford to, I will. All the back-and-forth travel I've done, or had to do, this summer has made me realize that I'm really not going to be all that far away. So I will keep my return date open and play it by ear.
A bit of housekeeping: some people have told me they have tried to comment on past blog posts and weren't able to. Try posting as "Anonymous" if you're having trouble commenting; I'd love to hear what you have to say! Thanks / merci!
Sunday, August 25, 2019
Sunday, August 11, 2019
one step closer, and what I'll be giving up
Earlier this week, I finally received my admission to the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières. Well ... conditional admission. The condition I have to meet: I have to go up and take a French test. I laughed. After the enthusiastic encouragement of the department head who had amazingly complimentary things to say about my written and spoken French ... I have to go take a French test. Fine. In my line of work, I understand that they want a test score on a piece of paper in my file. So I will go provide them with one. It will be a good excuse to go check on my apartment.
In making the trip up for the French test, I will be missing what would have been the last get-together of my women's circle before I return to Québec. This is a tough one. This group of women is so dear to me. We have shared our secrets, celebrated the wonderful events and milestones in our lives, and been there for each other during the difficult times. For four of the other six women, I had their kids in school. Our bond will always be there. But I will deeply miss being in their presence regularly.
I've also just found out that I'm required to go to the international students' orientation. I had to laugh again because I hardly think of myself as an international student there even though technically I am. And in attending that orientation, I will have to miss part of a music workshop I've already signed up and paid for and was really looking forward to.
As September gets closer, I'm feeling these and other impending losses more deeply. And there are more losses to come. I realized a few decades ago that once we are well into adulthood, no major move comes without some losses, without leaving some things behind.
My music has been taking off since I started studying guitar last December at the local folk music school and got involved with the school's groups and events. I found my performing niche with their new Cajun group for whom I'm the vocalist (in French) and one of two rhythm guitarists. The group is led by my guitar teacher who performed for a decade with BeauSoleil, probably the most famous Cajun band in the U.S. Mainers might have heard them at the American Folk Festival in Bangor where they have performed a couple of times. Earlier this week I saw my guitar teacher and we had a great conversation. He wants us to perform. And I want to perform, especially with him. We really hit it off and he is just an amazing performer. He knows I'm heading back to Québec shortly. So how will performing work? Will it work? I want it to. But I can't be in two places at once.
And then there's my ties to the school where I taught for the last 18 years of my 33-year career. There are a lot of incoming seniors and their families I'm close to. They won't be part of my day-to-day life any more. I know I'll be back some weekends and during school vacations. But the role the school has played in my life for the past 18 years is over. A few parents of seniors were nice enough to ask me if I would still stay involved with graduation planning. I said I would be happy to but that it has to be the school's decision. The responsible parties at school have said yes, that of course they would like me to stay involved. But will it be realistic? The academic year at UQTR ends April 24, 2020, well before graduation season. So it could work. But a lot of work has to be done before that point that I won't be there to help with. So is it realistic? Is it fair to the people who will be doing that work to just waltz in next April and say hey, I'm back, even though I've been clear that I will not be available until April?
After I wrote the first draft of this post, a tragic event happened in my school community that really brought home the topic of no longer being a day-to-day part of it. An incoming senior boy who was a student in my class as a freshman drowned two days ago in the Saco River. He jumped into the river off a rope swing and never resurfaced. His body was found about 7 p.m. by search divers. At 8 p.m. a parent texted me to tell me that kids were congregating at the school. My reply text: "I'm on my way." And off I headed for the 18-minute drive which I probably accomplished in less than 18 minutes this time. And when I arrived, there they were, all in a big mass in the middle of the parking lot. I estimated about 150 kids. I was a few steps from my car when a boy who had been in my class this year saw me, came running, and collapsed into my arms sobbing. I have no idea how long we stood there, him sobbing, me holding him. It was a while. Then another student came up. And another. And another. For an hour. A parent who was there on the periphery told me later that she wondered who it was that kids were waiting to hug. Then she saw. Oh. It's D-Whit. It was an honor to be there for them, and I'm humbled in the trust they had in me at that moment. And I'm very grateful that I was there in their moment of need and not in Trois-Rivières. At moments when a young person dies, it's important for their peers to see us adults role-modeling that we are grieving but not helpless with grief, that we are putting one foot in front of the other and carrying on, and that we are there for each other. (It's also important for us to take care of ourselves and process the loss away from the kids. Which I am doing. In private.)
Obviously this was an extreme event. But there will be others when I will be longing to be there and can't because of the distance or my class schedule. And it will hurt, whether it's a happy or sad event.
So these days I'm coming to terms with the fact that this choice to go to Trois-Rivières will not come without some losses. I'm dealing with it by reminding myself why I made the decision to go: because I was called to go up there and spend a school year in an area where I've spent three great summers. A calling. A Sirens' Song. And yet two nights ago when I was grateful to have been in town at the moment when we all needed to be together, I started second-guessing myself. This is my community. What am I thinking? Why leave? I have everything I need and want right here. Not everyone handles separations and good-byes well and I've felt some people pulling away already. Am I making a mistake? Am I reading more into "the calling" than is there?
For the moment, I just have to trust the call. I've said all along that the call is so loud and persistent that there must be something up there for me. I need to finish what I started and find out what that is.
In making the trip up for the French test, I will be missing what would have been the last get-together of my women's circle before I return to Québec. This is a tough one. This group of women is so dear to me. We have shared our secrets, celebrated the wonderful events and milestones in our lives, and been there for each other during the difficult times. For four of the other six women, I had their kids in school. Our bond will always be there. But I will deeply miss being in their presence regularly.
I've also just found out that I'm required to go to the international students' orientation. I had to laugh again because I hardly think of myself as an international student there even though technically I am. And in attending that orientation, I will have to miss part of a music workshop I've already signed up and paid for and was really looking forward to.
As September gets closer, I'm feeling these and other impending losses more deeply. And there are more losses to come. I realized a few decades ago that once we are well into adulthood, no major move comes without some losses, without leaving some things behind.
My music has been taking off since I started studying guitar last December at the local folk music school and got involved with the school's groups and events. I found my performing niche with their new Cajun group for whom I'm the vocalist (in French) and one of two rhythm guitarists. The group is led by my guitar teacher who performed for a decade with BeauSoleil, probably the most famous Cajun band in the U.S. Mainers might have heard them at the American Folk Festival in Bangor where they have performed a couple of times. Earlier this week I saw my guitar teacher and we had a great conversation. He wants us to perform. And I want to perform, especially with him. We really hit it off and he is just an amazing performer. He knows I'm heading back to Québec shortly. So how will performing work? Will it work? I want it to. But I can't be in two places at once.
And then there's my ties to the school where I taught for the last 18 years of my 33-year career. There are a lot of incoming seniors and their families I'm close to. They won't be part of my day-to-day life any more. I know I'll be back some weekends and during school vacations. But the role the school has played in my life for the past 18 years is over. A few parents of seniors were nice enough to ask me if I would still stay involved with graduation planning. I said I would be happy to but that it has to be the school's decision. The responsible parties at school have said yes, that of course they would like me to stay involved. But will it be realistic? The academic year at UQTR ends April 24, 2020, well before graduation season. So it could work. But a lot of work has to be done before that point that I won't be there to help with. So is it realistic? Is it fair to the people who will be doing that work to just waltz in next April and say hey, I'm back, even though I've been clear that I will not be available until April?
After I wrote the first draft of this post, a tragic event happened in my school community that really brought home the topic of no longer being a day-to-day part of it. An incoming senior boy who was a student in my class as a freshman drowned two days ago in the Saco River. He jumped into the river off a rope swing and never resurfaced. His body was found about 7 p.m. by search divers. At 8 p.m. a parent texted me to tell me that kids were congregating at the school. My reply text: "I'm on my way." And off I headed for the 18-minute drive which I probably accomplished in less than 18 minutes this time. And when I arrived, there they were, all in a big mass in the middle of the parking lot. I estimated about 150 kids. I was a few steps from my car when a boy who had been in my class this year saw me, came running, and collapsed into my arms sobbing. I have no idea how long we stood there, him sobbing, me holding him. It was a while. Then another student came up. And another. And another. For an hour. A parent who was there on the periphery told me later that she wondered who it was that kids were waiting to hug. Then she saw. Oh. It's D-Whit. It was an honor to be there for them, and I'm humbled in the trust they had in me at that moment. And I'm very grateful that I was there in their moment of need and not in Trois-Rivières. At moments when a young person dies, it's important for their peers to see us adults role-modeling that we are grieving but not helpless with grief, that we are putting one foot in front of the other and carrying on, and that we are there for each other. (It's also important for us to take care of ourselves and process the loss away from the kids. Which I am doing. In private.)
Obviously this was an extreme event. But there will be others when I will be longing to be there and can't because of the distance or my class schedule. And it will hurt, whether it's a happy or sad event.
So these days I'm coming to terms with the fact that this choice to go to Trois-Rivières will not come without some losses. I'm dealing with it by reminding myself why I made the decision to go: because I was called to go up there and spend a school year in an area where I've spent three great summers. A calling. A Sirens' Song. And yet two nights ago when I was grateful to have been in town at the moment when we all needed to be together, I started second-guessing myself. This is my community. What am I thinking? Why leave? I have everything I need and want right here. Not everyone handles separations and good-byes well and I've felt some people pulling away already. Am I making a mistake? Am I reading more into "the calling" than is there?
For the moment, I just have to trust the call. I've said all along that the call is so loud and persistent that there must be something up there for me. I need to finish what I started and find out what that is.
Thursday, August 1, 2019
a tentative Plan B for next year
August 1, the New Moon, and Mercury direct (if that reference means nothing, pick up an Old Farmer's Almanac and read up; weird stuff happens during Mercury retrograde and resolves when Mercury goes direct). August 1 is also the Pagan holiday of Lammas, which celebrates the harvest. Perfect day for an update. I'd been waiting to post until details were finalized, and they're not, but here goes anyway!
Recap: I learned on July 10 that l'École internationale de français (ÉIF, International French School) was cancelling the advanced level courses for fall due to low enrollment. My whole next year's plan had been built around that. So I needed a new plan. My four options:
1. Enroll in the regular French courses at the University, not the ÉIF. Super-intimidating.
2. Enroll in another ÉIF program which consists of one-on-one tutoring, 15 hours a week for two weeks max, with the same teacher. One of the teachers in this program is the one who has been my teacher for the past three summers and is fantastic. So that sounded good.
3. Look at other programs at other universities in Québec. There are good ones at McGill in Montréal, Laval in Québec (City), and Trois-Pistoles, in, well, Trois-Pistoles (115 miles north of Allagash, Maine). I'm actually an alumna of the one at Laval.
4. Pack it in and come home.
I considered #3 for about one minute. I already have an apartment in Trois-Rivières with a lease until April 30, 2020. Québec law does not allow the breaking of a lease. So the apartment is a sunk cost, and thus option #3, although I'm aware that it's not necessary to invest more money just because of a sunk cost, has been eliminated. On to option #4.
I considered #4 for about two minutes. But as I've noted before in this blog, I'm feeling very strongly called on an intuitive level to spend more time at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR) and in the Mauricie region (upper central Québec, named for the St-Maurice River). VERY strongly called. Something is up there for me. If that sounds crazy, so be it. I've spent my whole adult life making decisions on intuition more than facts, and it has served me well. Indeed I've learned that if I don't pay attention to my intuition, I regret it later. So option #4 to pack it in and come home has been eliminated.
Option #2, the one-on-one tutoring. I asked my teacher about this possibility. He checked and found out that I could do it, but with no guarantee that I would get him as a teacher as the ÉIF assigns teachers to students by seniority. I didn't want to take the chance on not getting him as a teacher and spending 30 hours over two weeks by someone I didn't know and may not hit it off with as much educationally and personally. So option #2 has been eliminated.
Option #1 is left.
Here's the list of reasons NOT to do it.
• More expensive.
• More isolated; the ÉIF is a community, a school within a school, and with option #1 I'd be just another commuter student.
• Tougher academic environment. It's a giant step from the ÉIF to taking regular UQTR courses with native-French-speaking classmates.
So why am I applying to do it anyway?
• The academic advisor of the ÉIF suggested it and said I would be able to do the work.
• My online/Skype tutor over the past year got her BA from this program and is getting her masters' in it now. She is one of two francophones who know my capacity in French better than anyone and she said she was "certain" that I could do the work. I asked her if I would be the only adult in the classroom. She said not at all, that she (mid-20's) was one of the youngest graduates of her program.
• I met one of the professors in the program through my summer program. She encouraged me to take her class.
• The advisor suggested I talk to the department head of the undergrad French department. So I made an appointment with him for my last morning of my summer program, which was Friday 7/19. He is very highly regarded so I was looking forward to meeting him.
It went great. He was utterly encouraging. He praised the quality of my written and spoken French and said that they had admitted non-francophone students with less proficiency than I have now. He went over the list of courses with me and gave me a copy of the letter they give to newly admitted students to the department with info about a big first-day meeting. He recommended that I apply as a matriculated student and pursue either a "certificat" (30 credits) or a "baccalauréat" (90 credits - university in Québec is 3 years of undergrad because they do two years first in a "cégep," something like a community college or junior college). I don't really need a degree, but the encouragement felt great.
So I left that appointment, and left UQTR and Trois-Rivières immediately following, on a high. It felt like I had gotten a new direction. I headed home that Friday and filled out the online application on Monday. Applying to college in Québec is a lot cheaper and easier than in the USA. It took me an hour, and most of that was spent looking in my apartment for my Ellsworth High School and University of Maine diplomas which the application requested a photo of. No test scores, no letters of recommendation, no resumé with academic honors and extracurricular activities. Just transcripts and diplomas. I knew right where my transcripts were, but not my diplomas. Thanks to this, I have everything in one place now!
So now I wait. I have an e-mail acknowledgement that my application has been received. I have the code and security questions to check the status of my application online -- which I have been doing a ridiculous number of times a day. Probably not unlike high school seniors around the country. Other than that ... I'm set. I have my apartment. I have a bank account. I know my way around. I know what my class schedule will be as soon as I'm admitted and sign up for it!
It's a little nerve-wracking to be waiting to be admitted. But I don't expect anything to go wrong this time. I'm considering the fact that the department head endorsed my applying and enrolling as a sign that things will work out this time!
And I have to be honest: I know I will work harder and learn a lot more this way than I would have in the ÉIF. I was already one of the top students in the ÉIF and it would have been very easy for me, more like a vacation than a college semester or year. The department head I met with told me I was "déjà trop bonne" ("already too good") at French for the ÉIF. Sounds like this is yet another case of things working out the way they're meant to work out!
To give me a reason to add a photo, here's how I met the professor from whom I'm planning on taking a class. Her name is Patricia Powers. Despite the English-language name, she is 100% Québécoise francophone. French people with English names are not unheard of up here. She is very high-profile up here; she is on Radio-Canada (Canada's French PBS; the English is the CBC, or Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) as a "chroniqueuse," a great word for which there is no exact English equivalent; it's like a podcaster but on the radio, not on a podcast. The masculine is "chroniqueur." She's big in the entertainment community and the UQTR community. She teaches French both in the ÉIF and the regular UQTR French department. And the icing on the cake, or as they say in Québec, "le cerise sur le gâteau (the cherry on the cake)," is that she is a very warm and lovely person. She was looking for two ÉIF students from my summer program (for adults) to interview for a short video ad to put on the ÉIF website and wanted two people who spoke French well. (I'll share the link as soon as it's posted.) She picked me and a woman from Edmonton, Alberta who actually was francophone as a child but lost a lot of her French due to going to anglophone schools, having mostly anglophone friends, and marrying into an anglophone family. So she sounds francophone when she speaks. Here is a photo taken right before the interview. Left to right are Patricia Powers, me, and my classmate Sylvia. Who says older women can't look fine? I think this is an amazing photo of all of us. Notice how she's touching my hand and leaning in; very québécois. She encouraged me to take her fall course "expression orale," which is public speaking. I can't wait! I really enjoyed taking public speaking in high school and college in English, so doing it in French will be a blast!
Recap: I learned on July 10 that l'École internationale de français (ÉIF, International French School) was cancelling the advanced level courses for fall due to low enrollment. My whole next year's plan had been built around that. So I needed a new plan. My four options:
1. Enroll in the regular French courses at the University, not the ÉIF. Super-intimidating.
2. Enroll in another ÉIF program which consists of one-on-one tutoring, 15 hours a week for two weeks max, with the same teacher. One of the teachers in this program is the one who has been my teacher for the past three summers and is fantastic. So that sounded good.
3. Look at other programs at other universities in Québec. There are good ones at McGill in Montréal, Laval in Québec (City), and Trois-Pistoles, in, well, Trois-Pistoles (115 miles north of Allagash, Maine). I'm actually an alumna of the one at Laval.
4. Pack it in and come home.
I considered #3 for about one minute. I already have an apartment in Trois-Rivières with a lease until April 30, 2020. Québec law does not allow the breaking of a lease. So the apartment is a sunk cost, and thus option #3, although I'm aware that it's not necessary to invest more money just because of a sunk cost, has been eliminated. On to option #4.
I considered #4 for about two minutes. But as I've noted before in this blog, I'm feeling very strongly called on an intuitive level to spend more time at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières (UQTR) and in the Mauricie region (upper central Québec, named for the St-Maurice River). VERY strongly called. Something is up there for me. If that sounds crazy, so be it. I've spent my whole adult life making decisions on intuition more than facts, and it has served me well. Indeed I've learned that if I don't pay attention to my intuition, I regret it later. So option #4 to pack it in and come home has been eliminated.
Option #2, the one-on-one tutoring. I asked my teacher about this possibility. He checked and found out that I could do it, but with no guarantee that I would get him as a teacher as the ÉIF assigns teachers to students by seniority. I didn't want to take the chance on not getting him as a teacher and spending 30 hours over two weeks by someone I didn't know and may not hit it off with as much educationally and personally. So option #2 has been eliminated.
Option #1 is left.
Here's the list of reasons NOT to do it.
• More expensive.
• More isolated; the ÉIF is a community, a school within a school, and with option #1 I'd be just another commuter student.
• Tougher academic environment. It's a giant step from the ÉIF to taking regular UQTR courses with native-French-speaking classmates.
So why am I applying to do it anyway?
• The academic advisor of the ÉIF suggested it and said I would be able to do the work.
• My online/Skype tutor over the past year got her BA from this program and is getting her masters' in it now. She is one of two francophones who know my capacity in French better than anyone and she said she was "certain" that I could do the work. I asked her if I would be the only adult in the classroom. She said not at all, that she (mid-20's) was one of the youngest graduates of her program.
• I met one of the professors in the program through my summer program. She encouraged me to take her class.
• The advisor suggested I talk to the department head of the undergrad French department. So I made an appointment with him for my last morning of my summer program, which was Friday 7/19. He is very highly regarded so I was looking forward to meeting him.
It went great. He was utterly encouraging. He praised the quality of my written and spoken French and said that they had admitted non-francophone students with less proficiency than I have now. He went over the list of courses with me and gave me a copy of the letter they give to newly admitted students to the department with info about a big first-day meeting. He recommended that I apply as a matriculated student and pursue either a "certificat" (30 credits) or a "baccalauréat" (90 credits - university in Québec is 3 years of undergrad because they do two years first in a "cégep," something like a community college or junior college). I don't really need a degree, but the encouragement felt great.
So I left that appointment, and left UQTR and Trois-Rivières immediately following, on a high. It felt like I had gotten a new direction. I headed home that Friday and filled out the online application on Monday. Applying to college in Québec is a lot cheaper and easier than in the USA. It took me an hour, and most of that was spent looking in my apartment for my Ellsworth High School and University of Maine diplomas which the application requested a photo of. No test scores, no letters of recommendation, no resumé with academic honors and extracurricular activities. Just transcripts and diplomas. I knew right where my transcripts were, but not my diplomas. Thanks to this, I have everything in one place now!
So now I wait. I have an e-mail acknowledgement that my application has been received. I have the code and security questions to check the status of my application online -- which I have been doing a ridiculous number of times a day. Probably not unlike high school seniors around the country. Other than that ... I'm set. I have my apartment. I have a bank account. I know my way around. I know what my class schedule will be as soon as I'm admitted and sign up for it!
It's a little nerve-wracking to be waiting to be admitted. But I don't expect anything to go wrong this time. I'm considering the fact that the department head endorsed my applying and enrolling as a sign that things will work out this time!
And I have to be honest: I know I will work harder and learn a lot more this way than I would have in the ÉIF. I was already one of the top students in the ÉIF and it would have been very easy for me, more like a vacation than a college semester or year. The department head I met with told me I was "déjà trop bonne" ("already too good") at French for the ÉIF. Sounds like this is yet another case of things working out the way they're meant to work out!
To give me a reason to add a photo, here's how I met the professor from whom I'm planning on taking a class. Her name is Patricia Powers. Despite the English-language name, she is 100% Québécoise francophone. French people with English names are not unheard of up here. She is very high-profile up here; she is on Radio-Canada (Canada's French PBS; the English is the CBC, or Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) as a "chroniqueuse," a great word for which there is no exact English equivalent; it's like a podcaster but on the radio, not on a podcast. The masculine is "chroniqueur." She's big in the entertainment community and the UQTR community. She teaches French both in the ÉIF and the regular UQTR French department. And the icing on the cake, or as they say in Québec, "le cerise sur le gâteau (the cherry on the cake)," is that she is a very warm and lovely person. She was looking for two ÉIF students from my summer program (for adults) to interview for a short video ad to put on the ÉIF website and wanted two people who spoke French well. (I'll share the link as soon as it's posted.) She picked me and a woman from Edmonton, Alberta who actually was francophone as a child but lost a lot of her French due to going to anglophone schools, having mostly anglophone friends, and marrying into an anglophone family. So she sounds francophone when she speaks. Here is a photo taken right before the interview. Left to right are Patricia Powers, me, and my classmate Sylvia. Who says older women can't look fine? I think this is an amazing photo of all of us. Notice how she's touching my hand and leaning in; very québécois. She encouraged me to take her fall course "expression orale," which is public speaking. I can't wait! I really enjoyed taking public speaking in high school and college in English, so doing it in French will be a blast!
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