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Oui, je peux (Yes, I can)

By ltchouaffe

I remember after I first arrived back in September, I went to a restaurant  by myself. It was an early Sunday morning and I was excited to get some food in my stomach. The waitress came up to me, led me to my seat and started explaining the menu. I only let her go on a couple of seconds before I stopped her along I'm English if she could speak English since  I couldn't understand French. She gave me an exasperated look and she continued in non perfect English. This story is similar to many similar events that happened afterwards where I did not have the words in French to ask or do the domestic things like understand the menu. Even though this story may seem minor, this particular event has stuck with me for a long time.
Learning a new language is hard and French itself is not an easy language. People learn languages for many different reasons including discovering or going deeper into their identity. In my first semester in Strasbourg, despite my  initial initiative to learn French, my heart was in not in it for a while  and since I was in a program where most of the classes were in English, it didn't help. However, after a friend urged me to try harder, I took this semester to put more effort in. It was not easy and while at this moment my French is not perfect in any way and I still get nervous talking to natives, I look back at that time in the restaurant because I realize how far I have come and showed me that you have to put in effort. I guess I learned that I can try and it is possible. I am capable of challenging myself. I still have more work to do but I can say things that I couldn't say a year ago and am more confident than I was a year ago. It's a start but a good one indeed.