Annick has said time and again how much she enjoys hearing the way international students express themselves in French because we are the ones who allow her to truly appreciate the language and how it can be changed to suit the person. Also, she says, it allows her a brief glimpse into how we process the language.
Normally Annick will choose one special student to serve for the day as the student to be picked on repeatedly and through multiple examples. This sounds far worse than it is. As she is French, her insults end up being nothing more than casual jests and we all enjoy it very much. Last Thursday I was lucky enough to have my chance come up.
I think the profs have talked about me in their break room and during lunches. More than once comments have been made to me about how shy I am and they sometimes treat me as if I'm fragile. I endure this. But still it didn't stop Annick from telling me that she had picked me as her guinea pig that day or, as the French say, as her tête de turc - an idiom which arose from France's long and drawn-out history with the Middle East.
So again today I seemed to fall into this role and I even tried to tell Annick as such, only when I tried to think of what to say it came out "Je suis le turban encore aujourd'hui." Turban, I learned, is definitely not the same thing as tête de turc. For a second I read confusion on her face before understanding finally came and she made the connection. She laughed for a solid minute and then told me that she loved my coloration of the language. Coloration of the language and coloration of my cheeks, no doubt, for I could feel them burning.
But at least I had chosen a word that was kind of related and I wasn't too far off the mark. Besides, I'm here to learn and I still have a lot to learn!
Normally Annick will choose one special student to serve for the day as the student to be picked on repeatedly and through multiple examples. This sounds far worse than it is. As she is French, her insults end up being nothing more than casual jests and we all enjoy it very much. Last Thursday I was lucky enough to have my chance come up.
I think the profs have talked about me in their break room and during lunches. More than once comments have been made to me about how shy I am and they sometimes treat me as if I'm fragile. I endure this. But still it didn't stop Annick from telling me that she had picked me as her guinea pig that day or, as the French say, as her tête de turc - an idiom which arose from France's long and drawn-out history with the Middle East.
So again today I seemed to fall into this role and I even tried to tell Annick as such, only when I tried to think of what to say it came out "Je suis le turban encore aujourd'hui." Turban, I learned, is definitely not the same thing as tête de turc. For a second I read confusion on her face before understanding finally came and she made the connection. She laughed for a solid minute and then told me that she loved my coloration of the language. Coloration of the language and coloration of my cheeks, no doubt, for I could feel them burning.
But at least I had chosen a word that was kind of related and I wasn't too far off the mark. Besides, I'm here to learn and I still have a lot to learn!
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