So, once upon a time, a confused English graduate decided to take up French. Little did she know, that one day, this bumping into French would make her pack bags for a seven months stay in France.
It started some three years back, in 2010. On a dear friend’s suggestion, I enrolled myself at Alliance Francais de Delhi. The first few months, I liked the fact that I am learning a new language. With each passing semester, the new professor had one question to ask, “Pourqoui étudiez-vous le français” ( why do you study French). I never had an answer to this question. I was studying French because I had nothing else to do at that moment. I was studying French because I liked the fact that I was still studying and I didn’t have to worry about the silly-little-life-changing-question, “what next?”. I was studying French because I couldn’t clear the Masters in English entrance exam at one go. But these are not the kind of things that I could have explained in French ( at that level). So every time I was asked about my inclination towards French, I said, “J’étudie le français parce c’est une langue très rythmique”. (I like French because it a rhythemic language). Well, students who would say, “J’aime cette langue” ( I like this language) are always thrown another question, “Mais Pour quoi” (but why?). In my case however, there were no counter questions because I stated a fact, and that’s it. You can’t ask someone why do you like the rhythm of a language. Years later when some of my students appeared for DELF A1, I suggested them the same statement during their production orale! 😉
As time passed, I started liking the language. I especially worked hard on my accent. Saw movies, improved my ‘r’s and ‘u’s. Stuffed my phone with French audios of all kinds to get the pronunciations right et Voila, one day I spotted this poster on the AFD notice board.
I found a motivation, and I also found an Answer to the “pourquoi”. I needed a B1 level delf to be able to apply for this program. Along with that, I needed a good score in IELTS exam. Most important of it all was writing a Statement of Purpose for the program. I started preparing myself for France, oops! for the exams, I mean. You can click on Preparing for DELF B1 and Preparing for IELTS to know more about the preparation part.
So that’s when I began, dreaming. The dream came true in the year 2014, that too, in the most dramitic way possible.
