Hi everyone! This is Julia here, the aforementioned "third blogger." After that very kind introduction yesterday, I don't really know what to add except that I would describe myself as a student, a globetrotter, an occasional mountaineer, a bookworm, a runner, and a 22-year-old wannabe adult (I'm trying really hard to master this whole "adult" thing, with variable success). As a French major, I'm also an unabashed francophile, which leads me to the topic of this post.
Over the past four years or so, I've had the opportunity to live in France twice; the first time in Paris, for a grand total of five weeks, and the second time in Dijon, that time for a much more respectable eight months. Now that I'm finishing up my undergraduate degree, I have the opportunity to go back to France for a third time, at least if I get accepted to the teaching assistant program that I applied for! While living in France has given me the chance to learn a lot about the French culture and way of life, especially since I got to live with two different host families and go to a French university and speak French everyday, I've never felt truly "French"; I've always felt like more of an outsider looking in. I'm actually ok with that a lot of the time, considering how bizarre some French customs are! But if I were a Frenchwoman born and raised, my life would probably be quite different ...
1. First of all, I would definitely smoke. Here in Canada, we tend to see smoking as the first step towards lung cancer and a premature death, but in France, smoking is a social activity - no, it's a way of life! It is pretty much impossible to go anywhere or do anything without getting exposed to whiffs of cigarette smoke: walking down the street, sitting in a café, or even going to class (I distinctly remembering sitting inside my classroom in Dijon, trying not to cough due to the teachers' cigarette smoke wafting through the windows and the door. What's more, classes were stopped every hour so that all of the professors could congregate outside and enjoy a cigarette). As much as smoking is kind of gross, though, it was kind of cool to see the professors role their own cigarettes every day - cigarettes are really expensive, so everyone just buys pure tobacco and paper and rolls their own cigarettes to save money! I also noticed that hand-rolled French cigarettes smell a lot better than the cigarettes people smoke here, possibly because they don't contain nearly as many chemicals. In short, although I am a bit too health conscious to smoke, if I were French I would definitely indulge in a cigarette (or two, or three) from time to time!
2. I would complain all the time, about everything, without shame. In Canada, we value a positive attitude, and nobody wants to be around someone who does nothing but complain. In France, however, complaining is practically a national sport! Everything is fair game, from the government to foreigners to immigrants to anglophones to the administration (notice a theme here?). I would therefore feel free to complain about anything I wanted ... or, according to the French, I would feel free to "be realistic."
3. I would enjoy five weeks of paid vacation every year! Yes, you heard that right. FIVE WEEKS OF PAID VACATION. I would most likely use that time to sunbathe on the Mediterranean coast, or maybe head to Normandy or Brittany instead if I felt like saving money.
4. I would be impossibly stylish all the time, and look fabulous in absolutely any clothing item. Ok, so not every French person dresses like a Parisian aristocrat - the fashion in Dijon was a bit sketchy, and I distinctly remember that people seemed to have a weird obsession with skulls - but I can dream, right?
5. I would own a small dog and I would let it poop all over the sidewalks. I would then walk away and make no attempt to clean up the mess, leaving the fresh poo for some unsuspecting pedestrian to step in (probably a tourist, since French people know well enough to watch out for that sort of thing). Actually, I would hope that I would still be a nice enough person to not do this; this is more of a rant against French dog owners. Seriously, CLEAN UP AFTER YOUR DOGS, FRENCH PEOPLE!
6. I would eat copious amounts of pâtisseries and baguette and not get fat. Probably because of the cigarettes I would be smoking. I guess there are some benefits to smoking after all! Or there must be, because how else do French women stay slim when carbohydrates are such a big part of the French diet?
7. I would attempt to speak other languages such as English and fail miserably, merely succeeding in making people laugh at my comical French accent. Ok, to be honest, most people that I encountered spoke at least a little bit of English, and generally it wasn't terrible, but it's a national stereotype that French people are incapable of speaking any language besides French.
I think those are pretty much the main things I would do. As you can see, some aspects of French life seem absolutely fantastic to me (FIVE WEEKS OF PAID VACATION), while others are perplexing or downright frustrating. I'd still do almost anything to give living in France one more shot - the way of life, the history, and the language are just so interesting to me, despite the weird cultural differences. Only another month or so until I know for sure if the French government wants me back!
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