les gens

There's a look you get when you tell people you majored in French. It says, "Well, isn't that romantic. I can think of nothing less useful." And you try to excuse yourself, "I really loved it... Employers are actually recruiting humanities majors...I learned how to learn..."

But Monday and Tuesday, I was at a training in a tiny little town in French mountains. Monday night, all 250 of the teaching assistants in the Grenoble region had dinner together, and I thought, "This, this is  all the reason I would have ever needed to major in French." People from everywhere- the US, Spain, Argentina, Italy, Germany, Scotland, England, Australia, Ireland, Russia, Israel, Portugal, and more- were all crowded around too few tables, conversing animatedly. In French. And it's such a beautiful, spiritual thing that no matter who we are, we have language in common, and we can communicate. It's comfortable to speak with everyone, because it's not anyone's native language; we are all learning, so we're all forgiving of each other's mistakes. And it is so fun to hear French spoken in all different accents, although I admittedly have a darned hard time understanding Italians speaking French. 

And of course, some people have learned French much better than others (ahem, than me). Seriously- I am surrounded by geniuses. No really, one of my new friends goes to Oxford. I'm one of the few bilinguals (and it's a stretch to even call me that). Most people here speak at least three languages, although I'd say four is more the average. And they speak them well. Sheesh, I can barely handle English! But because I majored in French, I get to admire these people up close for a few months, and find out that even though they're practically all MENSA president material, they're also very nice and some of them even want to be my friend. 

To be able to communicate is an incredible gift, and it's so beautiful to see how just one language has connected hundreds of people who otherwise have very little in common.  This is why foreign language instruction is so essential, and the more I speak with the other assistants here, the more disheartened I am by the educational system in the states. I've been here a week, and it's basically become my new life mission to go home and start a private school that starts teaching kids a foreign language by at least age 7, and which will eventually become the national model and will cater to gifted and talented students (who receive less than 1 percent of the government's education spending but who have the potential to make incredible contributions to society, if only they were allowed to develop their skills instead of being held back by the rest of the class) and will group students by ability, not age, and will teach them how to communicate complicated ideas, and will recognize the many different learning styles and will incorporate the arts (and teaches them how to avoid terrible sentences like that one. I'll do some tweaking before putting it in the mission statement).

It was long since time for bed, but I had to share the incredible brainpower I'm in contact with over here. Here's hoping some of it rubs off on me!