|
01/06/03- Welcome...
Chicoutimi really looks like this...
(The Saguenay fjord)
  
01/06/03(230am)- been a couple of days, but ive been tellement busy. still franglaising even though im back in mtl maintanent. lets see... not a whole heck of a lot has differed in the last week versus les autres. lundi soir, did some work for my offre d'emploi for a lawyer. tuesday, gave my presentation, looked for the story of the golem in french, couldnt find it til late. was tough. wed was improv night, but i missed it due to my presentation. thursday i gave my presentation and it came out well. took me 8 hours wed to do it though. wed night we went to bistrot. same ol same ol at bistrot. so the presentation thursday, my prof didnt think i translated it- he thought i was reading from a book or something. guess i did well. and yes, i translated 5 pages of my own english writing into french. thursday i was tired from all the work so i laid low, fell asleep on the futon watching the hockey game. friday day was sad- my last day at the school. so classes were somber for me, but i got a special lunch with all the other 3 week-ers and we got letters of attestation and whatnot. bravo! went shopping for costumes with eric. pants, trench coat, tie, and vest=12$ not bad. so i made a good spy and we all had a ball at the "spy party" at the centre social. after the party, we headed to bistrot, but it was too packed so me and daniel went to mcdo's and ended up running into julie and patricia, two of the animatrices, so we talked to them a while and they gave us rides home. this am, i woke up to do d'arbre en arbre at 10am. talk about awesome... i cant think of a better way to end my last day in chicoutimi. truly truly fun and spectacular.
26/05/03(400pm)- wow, has it really been that long since i updated? anyways, its activities time right now, but im doing schoolwork cause ive got 3 presentations cette semaine car c`est ma dernière semaine ici. not a whole heck of a lot to update on. good improv. tough to improv in your own language, let alone une autre. but we did well and tied group 2. après ça, we went to le bistro to celebrate, blah blah. came home late. thursday was a long day of classes, came home and didnt do much i think. friday, had classes in the morning and then left for québec around 1. got there around 330, restaient à l`université laval. not bad. went around the downtown, watched the game at the pub. can`t believe the devils won. good thing anaheim will win the cup. walked around the city more, looking for qqchose à faire. pas beaucoup. c`est une belle ville mais pas beaucoup de choses à faire. everyone else was out partying til late late but i ended up going to bed by 1am-ish.
the next day, got up, walked around some more, went to la musée des beaux arts du québec. nice exhibit of riopelle`s works and also some of marquet`s. more walking, more looking, more not doing much, we all went to some mexican place near campus for dinner and then headed back on the bus for chicoutimi. got back to chicoutimi around 1030 but everyone was too tired to go out so i slept in yesterday. also took a long nap yesterday. and helped preparer le souper. après le souper, j`ai pris un marche pendant une heure et après ça, j`ai dormi. today was more class, more activities, but that was about it. like i said, now im doing some work for mes présentations cette semaine (un conte, un offre d`emplois, et le grand présentation jeudi)...also theres the examen oral finale vendredi. and saturday before i leave, theres gonna be an arbre à l`arbre. anywho, im gonna work for now, go home and get my guitar, and come back to finish the rest of the day. salut!
22/05/03(1215pm)- i just found this site: www.net2ftp.com that lets you ftp upload/edit straight from the net. its pretty awesome cause i cant get the stuff off my laptop so i can update here in the lab.
anyways, the lunch line is too long so i decided to take some time to do a quick update in the meantime and also change the picture of henri bourassa to something else. yesterday was an extremely busy day. premièrement, on est allé à la pulperie. its a paper mill thats a museum basically of the chicoutimi with this cool house inside of it. the house is basically this guy`s canvas. anyways, après ça, we played some badminton depuis 2 heures and were really hot. after that- la league d`improvisation. it was group 1 vs. group 2 and there were 10 of us representing our group. lemme say, its hard to be funny in english, let alone french... anyways, it was a lot of fun. much like whose line is it anyways, but its a quebec adaptation and its played a little differently. go figure, its more like hockey...
speaking of hockey, the sens won last night to tie up the series. go sens! and im doing a presentation next thurs on hockey comme une alibi pour des rélations entres les anglophones et les francophones ici au québec. should be good. yesterday i also gave a presentation/discussion on SRAS (SARS for you americans) that went pretty well. and another debate today on the genocide in the congo. today is a long day of classes- we`re here til 430 for classes but then weve got a free evening. probably, im going to relax or whatever, maybe go out i dunno. last night we went out to le bistrot after the improv and it was tellement fun. mais alors, maintenant, im sure that the line est plus court. so i`m going to go eat. homework tonight, seeing the family finally, and my real family might come visit this weekend. if elise gets her homework together :-p mais ça serait le fun. anyways, yeah, i eat.
20/05/03(730pm)- "La belle montagnaise"
Par moi-même
C`est facile de voir
La beauté des rêves
et des rivières
des lacs
et des roches.
La lumière du soleil et la noirceur des ombres.
Mais ensemble tous est plus clairs.
Nous pouvons voir tous les details
Les ondes, les petits bêtes sauvagés,
Les sons des oiseaux
Y a des forêts
À la montagne
Les roches plus grandes.
Nous montons ensemble
En tranquilité, seuls.
Le son d`eau nous mène
J`t`vois en solitude
Y a pas d`escaliers
Dans la vie
Seulement la piste
Nous entendons qu`un aigle qui vole avec la précision.
La beauté de son chasse.
Alors qu`nous faisons la vie plus facile,
Les details sont perdus.
La coulour de tes cheveaux est perdu
La joli son de ta voix est perdu
Et y a pas de rêves ce soir.
Mais demain, nous descendrons la montagne
Nous rêverons, nous verrons
Pas par moi-même mais ensemble
Y aura la beautè de la clarité.
19/05/03(730pm)- il fait chaud. 27 degrès. wow! heir, on est allé au parc saguenay. c'était tellement beau. oh la la. lets go back to saturday night though. basically i was wiped but ended up talking to jacques for a few hours about des politiques canadiens, americains, religions, etc... c'était très bon practique. après ça, i went to watch snl for a while and fell asleep on the futon before going to bed bed. woke up barely on time to make it to the school, forgot to bring a lunch and then got there. the hike was really tiring, no one seemed to be in shape for it, but we finally made it to the statue. the view: amazing. incroyable. we rested and ate on the mountain and then headed back. basically, the saguenay river is like a bunch of fjords and the scenery and view is spectaculaire. wow! we came home, i took a shower, etc...jacques' father, ronald, came over for dinner. quel blaguer! but it was cool to speak with an older quebecker. seemingly, the sentiment was more anti-globalisation/pro-socialism than most of the other stuff ive heard from the mondiales à montréal. very interesting. then when it was around 830, me, daniel, rob, and their "sister" catherine (?) went out to café international for a couple beers, watch some blues guitarist. went to fourchette for poutine but it was closed. even though it was 24 heures, 7 jours. alors, on est allé au subway parce qu'j'ai trop faim. ça fait jusqu'á une heure au matin et ensuite j'm'suis couché.
aujourd'hui, rien à dire. between la marche et the french, j'étais epuisé. so basically i got up at 11, went back to nap around 2? and woke up again around 4. demain, j'dois faire un présentation on être and avoir. not too hard. been listening to a lot of interesting music in this house. jacques and pierre-yves are big music people also and into some interesting kinds of bands. also, ive been having some interesting dreams, which is weird because i havent been a dreamer in some time. weird weird weird. some of them having to do with people at home, some having to do with people here. and the only word i can describe it is interesting. anyways, going to work on my presentation, maybe make a few phone calls home, and thats that. more later...
17/05/03(530pm)- ok, c'est le septième jour à chicoutimi. mon français commence de s'améliorer. je pense en français. je parle en français. pas de rêves en français encore. alors... mes courses sont bien. we've gone to le bistrot a bunch of times and i cant even remember everything thats happened, but ive made a lot of friends and spoken a lot of french. i cant say enough about this experience, nor how much its helping me learn french and cultur québécois. we've been doing a lot of activities- learning quebecois music and dance, playing badminton, etc etc. thursday night, i went to see la matrice rechargée avec laurie at mon ami israel. c'était incroyable. the battle scenes were amazing and even though it was all in french, i was able to understand it for the most part. a little too much emphasis on the battle scenes though and less about the ideas than the first.
later thursday night after la matrice, we went to watch the total lunar eclipse chez israel with daniel also. sti qu'sé l'fun (une expression québécois qu'j'ai appris :-) ) israel's "parents" were pretty nice and so we watched until the moon was completely cachée and then we left and called it a night. yesterday was more classes, we learned some danse québécois and then went home. was playing around with everyone here (this family is great- the "kids" are hilarious. put the 3 of them together and its like a zoo. hahahaha...) alors, around 730, we went to see this québécois musician, daniel jean. he covered some traditional songs from greats like felix leclerc or charlebois and then some traditional violin gigs. by the end of the gigs everyone was on the stage dancing away. afterwards, il y avait un partie at the centre social. lots of fun, met a lot of people, danced, etc etc... then we all went to le bistrot afterwards and got out really late.
got up this morning and havent done much all day other than listen to music, play music, and do this update. everyone was pretty much out of the house alors pierre-yves faisait une petite paravent. so i was watching him do that and was talking to him the whole time. helped me a lot with mon français même si j'avais les blancs mémoires. was good practice for me. its not only learning the french, making friends, etc etc, but a sociological "study" of another family other than my own. its interesting to see how everyone in this house interacts as a "typical québécois family." and because of that, the experience is very neat. because the people here in this city are very provencale. its like if someone visited a family of people that really never left south windsor, didnt really travel, etc. not that the worldview isnt there, but the knowledge and perceptions of "life on the outside" is totally different. and its interesting to see how other people thing about things. even moreso here than in montreal, which is an international city. definitely, im glad im here.
13/05/03(640pm)- salut! ok, the more im here, the more french im getting. this has to be one of the most extraordinary experience que je fait. sunday night, i pretty much hung out with the family and was online a little bit at the end of the evening, but went to bed around 1am since we had placement tests in the matin.
tuesday morning, i woke up, got my shit together and went to school. let me say one thing first. i'm typing this on my laptop for upload in 3 weeks, but i went on the french keyboard and it took 20 min to figure out where the question mark was because the button with the question mark doesnt do the same thing on the french clavier. au debut du matin, i went to the centre social with all the other etudiants and we signed in, then took an hour written test. j'ai fini en 25 minutes. so we got to go early and hung around waiting for our times for our oral interviews to happen. mine was at 11. so basically i talked in french to the prof for 10 minutes et c'était ça. i must say, this is an extremely nice family and i really lucked out that i got such an animated family that engages me in dialogue all the time. even if theres nothing doing but they're watching tv, ill go up and watch with them, rather than stay in my room by myself. and they're nice and ask me if i understand whats going on. anyways, after the placement tests, we went to the cafe to get our cartes de repas et ensuite, on a mangé ensemble. after lunch, we went to the big auditorium for a presentation by the director of the program on what exactly l'école de langue français et du culture québécois à l'université de québec à chicoutimi was. then, we watched this quebecois film, nuit de noces (wedding night). really comical film.
basically after that it was going home time. so i stuck around here, we had chicken fajitas for dinner. i must say, my host mom is a pretty good cook. and im eating things i wouldnt normally eat to get the quebecois experience (ie, champignons, porc, etc). alors, ensuite, we watched arrête-moi si tu peux, the french version of catch me if you can with leonardo dicaprio and tom hanks. i sorta knew the story from bank training, and so i was able to pick it up fairly well. and like i said, my "mom" kept asking all the time if i understood what was going on. it was a pretty good movie- maybe i am ready to see the matrix reloaded in french this friday :-O but néamoins, my head was spinning from the french and i was tired and the people in the house were getting ready to go to sleep (they seemingly go to sleep early in this house). but everyone was going to le bistrot for a last night of english, so i went out, had a couple beers, came back at 2am. i must say, its like frosh all over again. only this time, im meeting a lot of people. 250 people in the program. and ive seen 3 americans, 3 mcgillers. thats it. but the canadian population is more diverse in this program than it seems at mcgill. ive met more newfies, more albertans, and more outside-vancouverites than at mcgill. which is pretty cool. so i got back at 2am. oh, and yesterday also, pierre-yves came home from uqam so it was cool and now ive got a francophone friend in montreal that maybe he could introduce me to his friends there and i can make a whole batch of francophone friends? anyways.
aujourd'hui, je me suis reveillé à 8h10 and got ready, bladed to school. found out my class placement- 1C. theres 6 niveaux and 3 rangs for each niveau. so basically im 2 levels from the most advanced one. and it seems like its a good level for me. class was long and we went until diner. so i ate with a couple of people in my classes and it was really cool. starting to recognise a lot of faces. classes were good, lunch was good, and then we went to find out the schedule for the rest of the 3 semaines. after that, we signed up for activities (conscription based fitness.... wonderful...). and then it was time to go home. i stopped at archambault to pick up the nouveau album de third eye blind and also marc déry. then went to loblaws to get some things i didnt have and didnt pack (my own shampoo, q-tips, etc). and then came home. basically for dinner we had ham, veggies, potatoes, and some kind of soup. im still looking for the best poutine in the world.
as for this evening, je n'sais pas ce qu'je fais. im gonna watch 24 as my english tv hour tonight and thats it. oh, i forgot to mention, we signed the contrat this morning that if we speak english, we get 3 warnings and we're out. but thats mainly at school because its otherwise tempting to speak english when we know other students speak it. but in the family, speaking english wont matter because they wont understand what i'm saying. even when i say the word in english, sometimes they dont know what im saying. so maybe ill talk to my parents tonight, i dunno. i dont get cell service here, so i cant call them as much as i thought i might mais c'est la vie. anyways, c'est ça pour moi. bonne fin du journée!
11/05/03(730pm)- alright, well im up in chicoutimi right now. definitely interesting. heres how things have gone thus far since i went back to montreal. yesterday i didnt do all too much, just ran some errands. and as im writing this right now, im already lapsing into francais. dont be surpris si i write in french for the next three weeks. seriously, im already feeling it. anyways. last night, went to see nero with nick and then jessica at le swimming. not bad. the guys remembered me from when i interviewed them back in november. went to bed around 3 and woke up around 930. i met up with david's roommate's boyfriend, who happened to be going to chicoutimi aussi and so he was going to get a bus ticket. i offered him a ride and we left montreal around 11 this matin. long, 5 hour ride up. they were right, on rt 175, there are no exits, no gas stations. up and down, up and down the mountains. but atleast i had some company this time around. anyways...
as you can see, ive also changed the weather above to reflect my new location in chicoutimi. im rambly, the french has really gotten to my head. side note: we're here watching tv and the father is just sipping his beer from a glass. what can i say, its more euro than i think people think. anyways. got into chicoutimi around 430 and then i was waiting around the university for about a half hour while the people were coordinating and then called my host family. some people got grouped with other people with their families, but its just me here. i'm living with jacques girard et louise tremblay (here in québéc, the wife doesnt take the husband's last name). they've also got an 18 year old daughter, elyse, a 13 year old daughter, laurie, and then a 20 year old son, pierre-yves, who is back in montreal studying at UQAM. they seem like a real nice family and i guess theyve been hosts for this programme for a while, so yeah. they're really nice, talking to me a lot, they know zero english, so its really giving me a chance to speak french although frustrating when i cant think of the word en francais. they're really relaxed, ive got a guest room downstairs, computer access if i want it. small, but really nice house. this is realy going to be one of those life-altering experiences.
anyways. tomorrow morning i take placement tests and the likes and then start some of the day's activities. already ive had some good quebecoise cuisine including this excellent sugar pie. i gotta get me some recipes. i have a feeling its gonna be a fun couple of weeks although my cell phone ne fonctionne pas ici, so im only able to call my parents collect every now and then. talk about total immersion. i feel bad cause im only doing the 3 week program and theres a lot of 5 weekers, but c'est la vie. anyways, yeah you might find me writing a lot of french. since ive gotten here, this is the most english ive thought about. and since the tv is in french and we're watching it now and probably going to watch "arrete-moi si tu peux" (catch me if you can) a little later, and also listening to everyone talking, my head is really going to be swimming swimming. but its worth it. it seems like im going to take a lot out of it and living with a host family. anyways. i dunno how often ill be able to post to my site web over the next 3 weeks, but ill keep writing the updates when ive got the time. salut!
10/05/03(950am)- i know, its been a while, but like i said, i didnt think id update while i was home because of the ftp problems. anyways, im back in montreal, just got in last night around 930. things look okay here, ive only seen nick here. and dave also called last night. tonight im gonna go see nero at le swimming. today ive got some errands to do. and tomorrow, im leaving for the second leg of my journey up to chicoutimi. should be interesting. still looking forward do it, but somewhat intimidated.
not much went on last week. went to see jen at uconn a couple times before i left. the sens won, the devils won, the mighty ducks won, and the canucks won. me and the monkey went 2-2 in the second round. anyways, my conference finals predictions are anaheim and ottawa. while the wild have done a good job as the cinderella team, anaheim has been a bigger one. stronger goaltending from giguere, stronger offense from kariya, sykora, ozolinsh... ottawa will win because they have a better scoring unit. itll be tough against broedur, but i think that with arvedson and alfredsson combining, they'll do well. um, not much else doing at home. went back to work to make a couple bucks for my field day tickets. the bank's doing well. couple of new faces again. and id like to give a shout out to cheryl fournier, kris' daughter who started visiting the site. welcome to my crazy life :-p. lol. um again, not much else doing right now though. ill probably update again in chicoutimi, but who knows if ill do it in french :-p.
01/05/03(100am)- well, now that im done with exams (quebec history was a tough one but im finally done), today i slept late, got woken up by a phone call from lauren, mosied around, got some shish taouk for lunch, went to oap and met up with everyone, came back and bummed around all day. finally packed, but mainly for the week. the plan is to go home tomorrow (got a 945am bus to hartford, getting in around 650pm). then, im home until next friday evening or saturday morning when i come back to montreal. yeah. got a headache, but i woke up with it, so its got nothing to do with the couple of beers i had at oap. dont know what to say right now. dont have a big ramble tonight. really havent been up to much but lounging, sitting at coffee shops and reading, stuff like that... yeah, tomorrow at this time, ill hopefully be sleeping over jens. oh and im not bringing my laptop home for the week, so i might not be able to update until i get back. cheers.
|
