Having just returned from a trip to Paris, I’ve been thinking a lot about the French capital city. One of the first things I realized when reflecting on Paris is how many memories I have of the city, particularly from my very first trip there. So to take this in a more narrative direction, I’m going to write in this post about my very first encounter with Paris and my memories that touch all five senses. My first trip to Paris was in January 2001 for about 10 days with a small group of students from my high school and our two high school French teachers. At the time I only had 1 semester of French under my belt, and although I could string together sentences, I still hadn’t yet learned past tense, and didn’t know the word for chicken. I remember feelings, like waking up exhausted in the morning from jetlag to get our early morning hotel breakfast (croissants, bread and hot chocolate). The sun comes up later in France, and so it was still dark in the morning until about 8
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I’ve just returned from a quick trip to the US where I attended a family wedding. It’s difficult to explain, but I always find these trips unsettling. I really enjoy returning to the US and seeing family and friends. But often the comfort, the ease of communicating in English with people who know me reminds me of how hard I have to work to establish these things in France. And at the end of the day, French culture is not my culture, although I love learning about it and trying to integrate the best I can. My 'outsider' status in French culture has also made me aware of my 'insider' status in relation to American culture. To give a concrete example: during my trip to the US I was on a road trip and a classic rock station was playing on the radio. About halfway through the trip, I realized that I had recognized every single song that had played, and could probably name most of them. Before moving to France, I never would have stopped to question my rec
Regarding the title of this entry, you may be asking yourself one of many questions. Is this a post about hip hop? Or possibly you picked up on the grammar error in the title. The hip hop what- style? genre? singers? Although it sounds like something one of my students would have written, the title of this post is actually taken from some graffiti I saw on the street right here in France (see picture below). Yes, this graffiti was written in English and it’s not an isolated case. I picked this particular one because of the article error (use of the word ‘the’), but also because it’s a good introduction to a topic which is very current in France: the presence, and predominance of English. Whoever wrote this graffiti was probably influenced by pop culture imported from the US. Foreigners who come to France are often shocked by the amount of English heard and seen in popular culture. French radio and cinema have actually put into place quotas for French films, so the market