Study-Abroad #3: Two Month Update in Cameroon- French Language Immersion

Hello, everyone and welcome back to my blog ! Today is a very special day, as it marks exactly two months since my group landed in Cameroon. Just as I did after our one-month mark, I thought that it would make sense to do the same one month later, except this time around, I have written more about what I have experienced in the past few weeks in French. After writing my thoughts out in French, I decided to also translate them into English, so that all of my friends, family, and loyal subscribers can get a better sense as to what my Cameroonian life is like in one of my native languages, as well as in the main language that is used in my everyday life.

Français : Je voulais écrire tout ce à quoi je pense. Malheureusement je ne peux pas dire beaucoup de choses pour des raisons personnelles, toutefois, ça m’arrive souvent de devoir m’excuser pour toutes les fois que j’ai raté avec mes amis et avec ma famille d’accueil. Ce que j’essaie de préciser c’est que j’oublie des choses facilement, mais ce n’est pas ma faute. C’est juste ma personnalité. J’en ai beaucoup d’amis qui ont besoin de se concentrer et de préciser des choses plusieurs fois avant de les bien faire. C’est exactement la même chose avec mon sens de l’orientation. À ma consternation, ça fait la vie un peu plus compliquer, mais ce n’est pas grave. Même quand je suis chez moi avec mes parents, il faut les demander comment faire quelque chose plusieurs fois et quand je me rappelle de comment le faire, je ne le rate plus.

Comme la plupart d’entre vous le savent déjà, c’est ma troisième fois d’étudier à l’étranger : j’ai étudié en Provence en France pour 6 semaines l’été dernier ou j’ai réalisé mon rêve de rêver en français, en Italie le semestre dernier et maintenant au Cameroun. Ça veut dire que c’est déjà ma troisième fois d’habiter avec des familles d’accueil, donc ce n’est pas ma première fois d’avoir choisi ce parcours au lieu d’habiter dans un appartement. De plus, j’ai dû complètement changé mon style de vie avec chaque nouvelle famille, en particulier ici.

Presque tout que je dois faire chez nous est nouveau. Par exemple, je n’ai jamais dû m’habituer à n’avoir pas de l’eau très souvent, de faire les lessives à main (car on a des machines) et de prendre beaucoup de temps pour préparer des repas. En tout cas, ça ne veut pas dire que je n’ai pas hâte de mieux comprendre la société camerounaise et comment les choses se passent ici. Par contre, je suis venue ici parce que je savais que je devrais changer toutes mes habitudes. J’aime bien relever des défis et de comparer comment j’ai grandi, ce que je fais chez moi et ce qu’on fait dans d’autres sociétés. Depuis que je suis petite, j’ai été toujours obéissante, patiente et gentille avec tout le monde, en particulier avec mes parents que j’aime bien. Je suis calme et je passe beaucoup de mon temps libre à entendre des gens. Cela me rend très heureuse.

Ici au Cameroun, tout le monde est toujours prêt à t’aider et à t’expliquer quoi faire si on ne comprend pas comment faire quelque chose. Un de mes objectifs d’ici est de vivre en paix et de respecter les uns aux autres mutuellement. J’ai décidé d’habiter avec une famille francophone pour que je puisse continuer à utiliser la langue française dans ma vie quotidienne pour apprendre du langage lexical camerounais et des mots qui sont moins utilisés par les jeunes. Moi, je préfère d’aider les uns aux autres et de causer avec tous les membres de ma famille chaque fois que je suis libre. En fait, ça c’est ma partie préférée de la journée.

Malgré toutes ces choses positives, je dois admettre que mon pays d’origine et ma famille me manquent beaucoup. Quand on parle avec des gens de ses expériences et de ses études à l’étranger, on parle souvent du fait que généralement qu’on a plusieurs semaines où on est tellement content d’être dans un nouvel endroit, mais on finira par être triste, confus ou même préoccupé sur ce que l’avenir nous réserve. Concernant qui tu es et avec qui tu vis, il y a aucun doute qu’il y aura des moments où tes proches te manqueront pendant ton séjour à l’étranger.

English : I wanted to write about everything that I am thinking. Unfortunately, I cannot say many things for personal reasons ; however, I often have to apologize for all of the times that I have made a mistake with my friends and with my host family. What I hope to make clear is that I easily forget things, but that is not my fault. It is simply my personality. I have many friends who have to focus and to clarify what they have to do several times before they do them well. That is exactly what also happens with my sense of direction. To my dismay, that makes life a little complicated, but it is not the end of the world. Even when I am at home with my parents, I have to ask them how to do something several times and when I remember how to do it, I no longer make the same mistake.

As most of you already know, it is already my third time studying abroad : last summer I studied in Provence in France for 6 weeks where my dream of dreaming in French became a reality, last semester in Italy, and now in Cameroon. That means that it is already my third time living with host families, so it is not the first time that I decided  to take this path instead of living at an apartment. Moreover, I have had to completely change my lifestyle with every family, especially here.

Almost everything that I have to do at my host family’s place is new. For example, I have never had to get used to not often having water, to having to wash my clothes by hand (since we have machines) and to having to take a long time to prepare meals. In any case, that does not mean that I do not want to better understand Cameroonian society and how everything happens here. On the contrary, I came here because I wanted to have to change all of my habits. I love facing challenges and comparing how I grew up, what I do at home, and what people do in other societies. Ever since I was little, I have always been obedient, patient, and kind with everyone, especially with my parents who I love very much. I am calm and I spend a lot of time listening to people. That makes me very happy.

Here in Cameroon, everyone is always ready to help you and to explain what you should do if you do not understand how to do something. One of my goals during my stay here is to live in peace and to mutually respect everyone. I decided to live with a francophone host family, so that I can continue to use French in my everyday life to learn local Cameroonian language and some of the most common words used by young people. I prefer helping everyone and talking with my family members whenever I am free. In fact, that is my favorite part of the day.

Despite these highlights, I have to admit that I really miss the United States and my family. When you talk to people about their experiences and their studies abroad, you often talk about how you generally have several weeks where you are really happy about being in a different place, but you are eventually sad, confused or even worried about what the future holds. Depending on who you are and with whom you grow, there is no doubt that you will miss at least one loved one at some point during your time abroad.

By writing this post, my hope is not to make people worry about me, or to make them think that I am not doing well, but rather to be as honest and transparent as I can possibly be. It is inevitable that you will experience many cultural misunderstandings and language barriers if you choose to study in a society that varies so much from your own, but as many people say, that can only make you stronger. What I have most learned throughout my stay here so far is that you should make a sincere effort to understand what is being said to you, meanwhile, you also have to set boundaries and explain why your behavior is the way it is (i.e. factors influenced by your upbringing and your cultural background(s) ) in order to avoid verbal conflict as much as possible. Asking questions is seen as culturally appropriate here, but you are also expected to be quick and diligent in most of what you do, so for people like me who are forgetful, it can be very hard to come to terms with that.

Not everything in life will go as planned, nor will everything be simple to do and follow, but it is possible to share your feelings with others through writing. That is when you know that you are not alone! Today marks exactly 2 months since being in this country and 3 months before going back home, so I am almost at the halfway point to seeing my sister, my grandmother, and my parents after being away for 5-8 months, which is one step closer to reuniting with them. I hope that you all have a wonderful day !

(Standing outside of my host brother's brother's balcony at night).

(My heart almost melted when I got to see a baby chimpanzee at the zoo!)

(A shawarma wrap that my host brother, Jude, and I ate at "Chips and Chicken".)

(Looking at out into the city: Yaoundé).

(The best raspberry and dark chocolate ice cream I have had so far in Cameroon at "Le Barron" found in a neighborhood called Bastos.)

Setting Meaningful Language-Learning Goals for 2017

I wanted to start off by wishing all of you a Happy New Year and thanking you for being so supportive of my blog for almost an entire year. In order to start off the year on a good note, I cannot stress how important it is to set ourselves identifiable, realistic language-learning goals that we hope to achieve before the end of the year. I will highlight a few of Steve Kauffman’s points in this post in hopes to reiterate what I find most noteworthy.

As Steve clearly points out, “the way we set goals depends on our level in the language.” In the video attached above, he mentions that he is working on improving his Portuguese, which, in his eyes, there is no need to set very specific short-term-task-type goals, as he is far into the language. On the other hand, he is also learning Korean, which he is not as far into, so he has to take a “much more deliberate approach” for that language. He also briefly explains how many people look at language-learning: “through the common European-framework of reference [that] divides the levels of proficiency into 6 levels: A1-2, B1-2, and C1-2.”

To give all of you some perspective, I will tell you what my language-learning goals are for 2017:

1. Spanish (Native)- Despite being fluent in Spanish, I hope to become more informed of what is happening around the world by reading current events. My hope is to read the news every day and to read at least 3 novels in Spanish by the end of the year.

2. French (Advanced)- Since I am closest to reaching fluency in French, I will continue to read and watch the news every week to inform myself about what is going on in the Francophone-world. I will be putting in all of the new words that I learn through that exposure, as well as any words that I learn when reading children’s books on the application Anki to increase my vocabulary. (I highly encourage you to read my post “Foreign Language Vocabulary Builder Using Anki (Application)” from 6/25/16 to learn about how you can drastically improve your vocabulary).

3. German (B2 Level)- As many of you read in my post “Why You Should Study at a Language Institute” from 8/2/16, I received a B2 certificate for German from d.i.d. Institute in Frankfurt this past summer. That means that my goal is to achieve a C1 level by the end of the year. I will try to do so by finishing up the second part of the B2 book that we were given at the institute that I have not had a chance to complete, will continue to learn words through songs, and will read as much as possible. To make sure that I retain all of these words, I will use Anki.

4. Italian (Advanced)- I have been taking Italian for three semesters in college now, have edited many Italian essays as my job at our writing center, and have attended virtually every event offered by my school’s Italian department, so I am conversationally fluent. On the other hand, since I have not had nearly as much exposure to vocabulary as I have with French and German, I will continue to listen to music and read as much as I can. If everything works out as planned, I will also be studying abroad in Italy this upcoming fall where I will be taking 4 courses in Italian and living with a host family, so my ultimate goal is to become fluent in the language.

     5. Russian (Intermediate)- By the end of this school-year, I will have taken 4 semesters of college-level Russian, so I would say that I am much more comfortable understanding native speakers and authentic material than I was a year ago, but am still very far from achieving mastery in it. I hope to become an advanced learner by the end of the summer, as I am planning on studying abroad in Russia, or in another Russian-speaking country for 2 months and living with a host family. I will continue to learn words through songs and will try to expose myself to as much authentic material as possible before I embark on that journey.

     6. Portuguese (Beginner)- My goal is to become an intermediate learner of Portuguese by the end of the year. I hope to complete every lesson of Davelanguages that is currently available (I have already finished the beginner series) and to watch as many videos and movies as I can to become more accustomed to the flow of the language.

To get to the halfway point, which can be considered to be the first 3 levels, you have to get to point in which the learning becomes “a more natural, enjoyable, flowed-type experience.” As with any journey that you take, after surpassing the beginner’s stage, which Steve refers to as the “struggle stage”, you can improve your language through an exposure to interesting content (ex: audiobooks, talking with friends, podcasts, watching YouTube videos or videos).

I agree that the first steps require some heavy-lifting, but it is possible to successfully move forward by setting specific measurable tasks and targets for yourself (ex: learn x amount of words per day). By forcing yourself to be active, he says that you will achieve more results. As you can see above, I have very concrete goals that I want to set for myself and for which I will hold myself accountable the last day of this year. I encourage all of you to do the same and to not let what others tell you, or what you tell yourself get in the way of your aspirations. Good luck, buena suerte, bonne chance, Viel Glück, in bocca al lupo, удачи, boa sorte!

As a bonus, here is an article that inspired me to write this post written by another polyglot: http://www.lindsaydoeslanguages.com/language-learning-goals-clear-the-list-january-2017/. Make sure to check it out if you are looking for more motivation to set language-learning goals.