Vive la France!

Today is the two-week anniversary of my arrival in Paris, as well as the end of my first week of Sciences Po's welcome program, which is two weeks of classes meant to help exchange students get acquainted with the style of teaching at Sciences Po as well as brush up on their French before real classes start (on the 23rd). Nothing is graded but UC students are getting credit for participating in the welcome program (shh, don't tell). Each day we have either a methodology class or French class, but usually both, for two hours each. Everyone in the welcome program is divided up into groups of about 15 students according to French level, and you take each class with this same group. I was skeptical of my group at first--we are all girls and most of us are from the U.S.--but after actually getting to know some of the girls I've gotten over that. There are three others from the UC Berkeley crew, including Melissa and Beth. There are two fellow Portuguese speakers, two Brazillian girls, one of whom I've talked to a good amount (in English, French, AND Portuguese) and who is really cool, she moved from Brazil to Georgia at a young age. I also discovered that TWO of the girls in my group (who didn't know each other) know people that I went to school with in Cairo. One of them went to elementary school with a girl I knew at CAC and another girl has known my friend Laila (who I've somewhat lost touch with but who I used to be quite good freinds with) since she was little (their families used to vacation in Maine or something). It was one of those instances where she threw out a name in the miniscule chance I actually knew the person but in this case I said, "Uh, yes, I actually do know her!" Not that I needed any more proof that it is a very, very small world, but there you go.
As for my two Sciences Po instructors, they are GREAT. We especially lucked out with our methodology teacher; we've heard some other ones are pretty dull but ours is extremely knowledgeable and passionate about what he teaches, as well as having an interesting background. His parents are Algerian, as I suspected from his name, and he specializes in matters of multiculturalism and identity and race and all that stuff that I just can't get enough of. The point of the class is to learn the format of certain assignments at Sciences Po--namely the infamous "expose"--but we learn about many other French themes in the process, including history of the 5th Republic, immigration, the economy, etc., essentially giving us a more well-rounded view of the country we are studying in. We all had to sign up for expose topics on the first day, and both Beth and I did ours on Thursday (as we did our best to get in on the "multiculturalism" day as we took the same wonderful immigration in France class last semester). My topic was "la laicite," which is the French version of secularism. The expose is a ten-minute presentation with a very specific format--don't try to get all creative like you can at an American university--so of course I was unsure if I understood it completely, but it ended up going very well. The professor even interrupted me at first to say "votre introduction et problematique sont exellentes" (!) Beth's went well too and we enjoyed a high-five after class (I don't think it's a secret that we are both huge dorks). Another thing about our methodoloy teacher is he appears genuinely interested in what we say and really tries to help us, which I can't imagine is always easy. I suspect that he is a little more lenient than other teachers, though, as apparently another methodoloy teacher said that some professors will give you an automatic zero if you read at all from your notes or if you make hand gestures that are too casual ("what does that mean, like if you flip someone off during your presentation?")
I also really like my French teacher, she is not overly friendly but we also learn and have discussions about interesting topics (the French education system, for example) and she corrects us when we speak (amazing how many teachers I've had who don't do this), but does so in a non-condescending way. Even though two hours often seems a little too long to sit in class for me, I'm mostly struck by how beautiful the french language is (especially with the classic Parisian accent), and I'm pretty sure I could sit and listen to either of my teachers for a very, very long time without getting bored. I'm quite certain if an American were lecturing me on some of the same topics in English my rate of zoning out would be much higher.
What I've seen of Sciences Po itself so far I really like. There is a table every morning with every major french newspaper sitting there for free, and a cute cafeteria with REALLY cheap sandwiches and espresso (yay) that are quite good. It's very small both physically and people-wise, which is probably better when you're studying abroad, although I've always liked the mass anonymity of Berkeley. There is one main entrance area, and us UC kids have commented that it's a little like high school again, in terms of running into people. A first-time random encounter with someone at UCB will usually end with the thought "I may never see you again," but here all you have to do is say "that guy from New Zealand" and everyone knows who you're talking about. Of course, this is probably something that will change once school starts and the majority of kids are French.
Life outside of school hasn't really calmed down either, which may be the reason I seem to be getting a bit of a cold. On Wednesday night the girls all went out to a famous gay club on the Champs-Elysees, which is quite a high-end place but Wednesday is ladies night and thus we got in for free. It was the most fun I've had in a while and as the night went on the music got progressively louder and better, from more unrecognizable Euro-techno to Daft Punk and Justice, with some Whitney and J-Lo thrown in, naturally. We left somewhat early because Beth and I had exposes to finish in the morning, but not before two men dressed up like James Bond got up on platforms and started stripping (we were unknowingly standing very close to said performers--not sure if this was a good or bad thing!)
Thursday night we did some bar-hopping in the Bastille area that was semi-set up by the Sciences Po welcome program. It was actually a great area to bring students, lots of young people and not too high of prices, with lots of places on a few cute little streets (a little like Bairro Alto of Lisbon, although nowhere near as cool, of course). It's actually turned out to be very easy to talk to French people (admittedly, it's probably easier if you're a girl). Everyone thinks it's really cool when you're from California and even cooler when you tell them they can speak in French because you understand. We were all very happy to practice conversation skills although every time we've gone out we've been very aware of "cultural differences" between France and the U.S. we've been warned about. As Shelby from UC Paris says, "Americans like to get on the Metro and look around at everyone and smile from time to time...DON'T do that here. A smile means more than you think, DOT DOT DOT" While we appreciated the advice, us girls have decided it may have been better had they not told us this, because all this has turned into is a continual effort to frown every time we unintentionally make eye contact with someone. I have this feeling like we are not pulling it off every elegantly.
To conclude with a vast generalization about the French people, they are NICE. Okay, scratch that. More like, that stereotype about French people being grumpy and brusque and hating Americans? It's exactly that, a stereotype. I tried not give it any validity when I was "warned" before I came here and it has no more validity now. Me, Melissa, and even the UC students who are in lower levels of French, have all found the majority of people here to be extremely friendly. The only dirty look I've gotten was from a woman at the check-out counter at Champion when I didn't put my groceries away quickly enough (I'm sorry I don't want to pay for a plastic bag and thus have to figure out how to stuff this gigantic bottle of olive oil into my purse, okay?), but it'd be quite ignorant on my part to attribute that to her being French. I could say the "trick" is to do your best to speak French even if your accent sucks or you make mistakes, because they do really appreciate that, but even that sounds like I'm saying that I have the key to getting along with the impossible French people when in reality it turns out that people are people wherever you go and for the most part, a little bit of kindness and effort go a long way.

Well, it's a beautiful sunny day (albeit a million degrees below zero, if you come form California), and I'm off to join Allie for some sort of walk in some sort of park. Looks like I've written another novel, but once again believe me when I say these are very few words to encompass my experience here so far.

Stay away from Hallmark today and a very happy birthday to my respective besties in New York and London.