Stephanie Siu: Bienvenue en France!

After about a 13 hour flight from Vancouver –> Toronto –> Montreal, I finally arrived in Paris! The city was beautiful and still sleeping at 6:30am. My stay in Paris only lasted about 3 days, but I just wanted to get a feel of France before moving into my stay in Caen. During my 3 day stay I felt the hustle and bustle of Parisians and the fast past environment they live in. Snaking through their labyrinth of a metro (aka. subway) system was an adventure itself, as all their metro lines are underground. The Parisian attitude towards English speaking tourists weren’t as bad as I was told. I did, however, tried my best to speak the little knowledge of French I knew. Using my hands to explain what I wanted helped a lot as well.

As my 3 day journey in Paris came to an end, it was time for me to head to Caen, via train. Taking the train from Paris was the only means of getting to that city. I was lucky enough that I had my sister with me to help me find my way there. We bought our train tickets ahead of time in Vancouver and paid Canadian prices. We took the metro all the way to Gare St.Lazare, which is not to be confused with Hausseman St.Lazare because Gare St.Lazare is the train station, and not a metro station. After I understood that a metro station and a “Gare” station were different, I came to a colossal realization that you can’t plan everything to try to get ahead to know which direction to take or the type of decision to make. Sometimes the answer comes to you as you experience things in real-time.

I arrived on a Saturday afternoon. As the train pulled into the station in Caen, I immediately felt the feel of a small French town. The town itself was small and much more relaxed. After catching a cab to my residence, Les Estudines, it was finally time to start settling in. My apartment was perfect and cozy for one person. It came with all the essential necessities and it was my responsibility to get the extra essentials that I felt I needed to feel at home. For the first day that I was there, I wanted to explore and get to know my environment, before I can call it my home for the next 4 months. However, unpacking my things and getting acquainted with my apartment took a good few hours. Therefore, by the time I went down to the city center, the stores were ending for the day.

One thing that was striking to me was that EVERYTHING closes on a Sunday. It seems that French people take Sundays off to enjoy time with their family. The only businesses that are open are a few cafés and high end restaurants.  During this day, it was a good opportunity for me because that way I would be able to see the cobble stone streets and not get carried away by the shopping crowds. I got to see all the buildings around and two that were 16^th centuries old! It was amazing! Each building felt like its own character that made up Caen. The city center was full of winding roads and alley ways that take you to another church. The most infamous abbeys here are Abbey aux Hommes (where the great William the Conqueror was buried) and Abbey aux Dames (where Queen Matilda was buried).

I heavily relied on my compactable map for the next few days, but I felt that getting lost sometimes is the best way to know where things are. Usually the best discoveries are found in that manner. The town is built around William the Conqueror’s castle, which is right in the center. The castle is known to be the oldest and grandest fortress in all of Europe. I found that if you can find or see the castle, home is not too far away.

The city’s way of transportation is via trams and city busses. Thus far into my stay in Caen, the most challenging situation was when I had to buy my Twisto pass for the tram/bus (Twisto is equivalent to Translink). The agent that was helping me did not speak a word of English. Therefore, I had to rely on the little French I knew to help me get what I needed. After about 6 minutes of using my hands and speaking broken French, the agent finally knew what I needed. She spoke very slowly to me in French, so that I may pick up on some words to understand her. The process took about 10mins and I was good for the semester. I felt so proud that I was able to get through a situation like that, even though it was a minor one.

About 2 weeks of school has already passed by and I’ve met many European and Asian students that are also in my program. It turns out that I’m the only Canadian student and 1 out of 2 students from North America. The other North American student is from South Florida, USA. I guess it’s very Canadian of me to branch out and become friends with people from different nationalities, while the other students tend to clump together with their own nationalities. I was definitely not in my comfort zone, which was great! Every day I feel as if I’m gaining insight of my ability to adapt to all sorts of situations and environments. I hang out with a small diverse group of nationalities and they’re all just as scared and excited about being in Caen as I am. 

As this is just the start of the Fall semester, I hope to connect to more students here and swap cultural stories with them. Every day here is different and I intend to take advantage of it in every way that’s possible!