The late chef and author Anthony Bourdain once said, “If I’m an advocate for anything, it’s to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the ocean, or simply across the river. The extent to which you can walk in someone else’s shoes or at least eat their food, it’s a plus for everybody. Open your mind, get up off the couch, move.”
Over the past few months, myself and four other SFU students have had the privilege to upend our normal lives, get on a plane, and study at the Université Catholique de Lille, which is located in northern France near the Belgian border.
As the semester winds down, I speak for all five members of our group when I say that we’ve learned and grown tremendously during our time here.
Traveling has been our favorite part of the experience. We have visited 20 countries and two continents over the course of the semester, including trips to the cities of Paris, Dublin, Vienna, Athens, Tirana (Albania), Marrakech (Morocco) and Cluj-Napoca (Romania).
We’ve enjoyed experiencing new cultures, new foods and new lands. For me personally, solo traveling forced me to navigate unfamiliar places and transportation systems while trying to stay level-headed when things went south.
We all agree that Lille—and even Paris—do not feel like big cities, but rather large towns. French life also has a more relaxed pace than American life. People often go out to “prendre un verre” with friends after work, and it is very common to see friends and families out strolling the streets and parks after the working day has concluded.
The French also take their work-life balance incredibly seriously—don’t expect any sort of response to a work-related question outside of working hours.
Lille was not perfect. For much of the period between mid-January and late March, the weather was consistently gloomy and overcast, with frequent rain showers. Furthermore, our group found the French university system to be different and sometimes incredibly confusing.
Unlike the United States, students are not provided a syllabus that outlines the course, how many days one can miss, etc. It is also the norm to only have two graded assignments the entire semester. Lastly, but certainly not least, the language barrier added a very challenging element.
The French will not slow down their normal speaking pace for non-native speakers, which can make social interactions difficult and painfully awkward. Conversely, many would switch to English upon detecting any accent. As someone who wanted to learn French, this was frustrating.
Despite these challenges, we all agree that we would study abroad again—although perhaps not in Lille. The experiences gained here have been immensely valuable on many different levels.
If you are on the fence about studying abroad: GO.
It won’t always be easy or what you expected, but it will definitely be worth it.
