The College by the Harbour - St Aloysius

Languages
French Tour
Eighteen St Aloysius francophones were met by their
French families at the Gare T.G.V d’Avignon late morning
after a 2 1 /2 hour comfortable journey from the Gare de
Lyon, Paris.
On arrival our French ‘mothers’ smothered us with kisses, 3 in
fact, in the Provençal way. After the French students visited us two
months earlier, all the students were pleased to see each other again
and we quickly made our way to the Renaults, Citroëns and Peugeots
waiting to take us to our respective homes.
My home was located 10 minutes by car from the old city walls
of Avignon. My "mother" drove us daily to the walls where we
walked through the narrow back streets and alleyways to le Lycée
St Joseph.
The French Tour Group at La Maison Carrée, Nîmes
(a Roman ruin in the centre of the town of Nîmes)
Le Lycée St Joseph was founded in 1565 by the Jesuits. Today
it is a co-educational, secondary, day and boarding school with 940
students. Although it is a Catholic school, no religious instruction
is given, prayers are not said and there are no Jesuits at the school.
Like most French students, those at le Lycée St Joseph do not wear
a school uniform. Discipline is strict, teachers are respected and
there are no Detentions! However if homework is not completed
the school will fail you in that subject and according to the French
Education system you will have to repeat the year in another
school. The school also has a surveillant (supervisor of discipline)
who has the power to expel or suspend.
Attending classes proved interesting. They were of one-hour
duration, with students concentrating and mechanically writing
down all that was said. The environment is sterile with blackboards
and old-fashioned desks in use. Students do not interact with each
other or even much with their teacher. Subjects such as: Molière,
Classicisme and the ‘Latin subjunctive tense’ were the main topic
amongst the French students. Being a co-educational school, well,
let’s just say, our minds were not necessarily focused on the
curriculum.
We were also quite enthusiastic when the opportunity came
around to share a PE lesson with 60 Year 10 girls!
Of course every Frenchman’s mind quickly turns to food. Le
foyer, (the canteen) and our official base in le lycée St Joseph
comprised of a lady selling pain au chocolat (Chocolate croissant)
and pissaladière (the local style of pizza) and a Hot Chocolate
vending machine that was regularly running out of cocoa, at least
while we were there!
While at the lycée, despite Mrs Downes advice ‘that we are here
to learn French language and culture…, not here to change the
French!’ we at least managed to teach the French students how to
play cricket. ‘Roos - 1 Froggies - 0. Then for a game of authentic
French soccer. Froggies - 2, ‘Roos - 0
Our accents sometimes raised eyebrows. Although some said it
was because the ‘Posh’ accented Parisian French, close to that
taught in Australian schools stood out amongst the broader,
Provençal accents of the region, it might have been our somewhat
Australianised French. The latter of which was taken to a little
more kindly.
We met aunties, uncles, cousins, grandparents and girl and boy
friends and strangers who viewed us with curiosity and
affectionately called us les kangourous.
On the weekends our families entertained us with shopping,
visiting the Christmas market, ice-skating, Harry Potter (Version
française, of course) excursions to surrounding areas, even as far as
Monte Carlo and attending a soccer match in Marseille. In
Avignon itself, the shops are small and specialist but if you travel
to the outskirts of town you can shop at Europe’s biggest shopping
mall ‘Auchaun’.
The weather proved a challenge, temperatures ranged from
minus 5°C to 11°C and we had the pleasure of experiencing the
first snowfall in Avignon in 9 years. Our families main concern was
safely navigating the roads and indeed some students could not
attend school that day. Of course we took full advantage of the
situation by pelting Rev Fr Radvan SJ with snowballs.
After a wonderful 2 week homestay, it was time to bid Au
revoir to our host families and head back to Paris knowing that our
French had improved, we would be home soon and that we have
loving second families on the other side of the world.
On behalf of the students who took part in the Tour I would
like to thank Mrs Karen Downes, Head of Languages, and Rev Fr
Iain Radvan SJ for looking after us so well on the Tour. We would
also like to thank our parents and the sponsors of the Tour for
making the Tour such a great success.
James Dixon
Year 10
St Aloysius’ College French Trip 2001
On November 30 2001 our adventure began. We were a
group of eighteen students and two teachers. We packed
our bags and said farewell to our families for three weeks
and embarked upon the tour of a lifetime.
Despite the last minute problems, Reverend Father Radvan SJ
losing track of time in the cafeteria at the airport, while the rest of
the group started to go through immigration clearance, we finally
squeezed ourselves into our seats aboard our Lauda Airlines flight
and into the night we flew. We were all fascinated with the screens,
which showed us taking off and landing. We always seemed to land
at an angle on the runways and never head on.
We arrived in Paris at some dreadful hour in the morning, very
tired and stiff, and were met by our contact, Elizabeth. Arriving at
the hotel we left our luggage as we went off to hunt for food. The
local crépérie did a roaring trade. We walked several blocks and
then caught our first Métro to Île de la Cité. We wandered around
Notre Dame, took the obligatory group photo and walked up to
Place de la Concorde via le Jardin des Tuileries where we had a very
expensive afternoon tea. By this time eyelids were starting to droop
and complaints about sore feet and feeling tired began to come from
our weary boys. Onto the Metro we got, and home we went.
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