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Back in Chicago I worked full-time during the day and went to school full-time at night. I never had a slow moment and always had somewhere to go or something I had to do. Now that I'm in Melbourne and deciding which job path to take and what to fill my spare time with, I'm struggling a bit.
I know that I just got here and everyone I meet says, 'Whats the rush in finding a set routine? You just arrived! Take a break and enjoy your holiday!' Well I don't know how to do that. And when it comes down to it - I'm not on a holiday, I am trying to make a life here. I feel like I need to have somewhere to go or something to do that is worthwhile to me in the long run. I can only go into the city so many times, eat at the different cafe's and do the all the touristy things that Melbourne has to offer, before I need something more.
I've been researching online and have decided that I am going to enroll in French classes down at the Alliance Francaise de Melbourne. I loved taking French in high school and was able to test out of it in college so I could get through the other courses I needed to graduate. To this day I regret that decision to some extent. I know at that time in my life I was much too busy with work to be fully committed to continuing French at a college level, but to some degree I think that was a very lazy excuse not to go through with it.
I've been here in Australia for just under 2 weeks and I would say that 8 out of every 10 people that I meet think that American's are uneducated and pretty stupid. For example, I was in a cafe the other morning and was minding my own business, enjoying my latte and reading the paper, when I overheard the baristas chatting to another Australian customer. She said that she read a survey that asked more than 5000 Americans to look at a map of the world and see if they could identify what country was incorrectly placed on the map. (The map showed Australia upside down) Apparently the results showed that 70% could not correctly answer the question.
Of course I had to chime in with my American accent and challenge her findings just to keep her on her toes, but in the back of my head I'm thinking could that be true? Could the average American really not be able to discover that on a map? SO in the hopes of proving the 'stupid American' stereo-type wrong I am going to use my free time learning another language.
I know that I won't stay in Australia forever, like some people back home are convinced that I will, and I want to be sure that I'm not limiting myself to possible opportunities because I only speak one language. I have no idea how this will all work out, but I submitted my application this morning and hopefully every Saturday for the next two months, from 9am to 1pm, I will be chattering away trying to learn something new.
Au revoir!
8 comments:
Good for you! I studied French in college for awhile and have forgotten most of it. Such a beautiful language. I know how you feel about wanting to be involved in a group or organization. In high school and college I was pretty active in different groups and then all of a sudden I graduated and now all I do is work. So I am trying to figure out what I should do next!
i think it's a good idea for you to get out there and do things like this. maybe you'll make some new friends in the process and you'll definitely be learning, too!
pretty cool! Re-learning french has been one of my New Year's resolutions this year. Canadian's learn french through to gr 9, but I stopped it after that and have also regretted it since! But I have yet to find the time and money simultaneously to start taking classes again.
Hope it goes well.
I found you through Lindsay's blog and have been lurking, just wanted to say hi and make myself known!
What's funny is one of my Aussie friends recently told me about that "poll" taken, except the version she told me was slightly different. She said they had switched South Korea and New Zealand and asked Americans what was wrong with the map. I can't find anything on the net supporting either of these claims. So either there's an entire organization devoted to making Americans look stupid or it's something that keeps morphing into different versions of Americans can't find "x" on a map. Who knows?
And here's something awesomely random yet cool about taking French classes in Australia!
Good luck on the French classes!
Doesn't it get soooo annoying that the rest of the world always has some rant about America and how awful and stupid we are? I guess when you're on top those below you always want to pull you down.
When I went on vacation to Greece (which by the way the Greeks were very friendly towards Americans), I felt like I had to be extra nice and extra polite to foreigners to prove that Americans are great people. The funniest thing that happened was when I asked a man if he wanted me to take a picture of him and his wife (he was trying to take it with one arm extended), he was British and said, "Yes, that would be lovely. Are you a Yankee?". he he he...um, Yankee? How uneducated did that make him sound, but the accent was awesome and made him sound smart.
That's wonderful. I took french for a couple years myself. It's pretty easy to catch on. Good luck!
Congrats for taking a leap of faith and following your dreams! What a great way to meet people as well. Good luck with everything and I look forward to following your blog as well!
I used to go to AF ! It's very helpful ;-) I can also understand the stereotypes. Unfortunately there is that stereotype but then again there is a big population in the US = larger proportion of x and y people. X being smart, Y being not so.
Tell us how it goes !
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