The Start of my Depart

Written By: Julia Peisker

Location: Switzerland

Major: French

Bonjour! The location of my semester-long study abroad program is Besançon, which is a city tucked away on the east side of France neighboring Switzerland. As a French major, the timing of this trip worked out quite well as it satisfies most of the class requirements for my major!

Before leaving, I would clearly have some apprehensions about staying overseas; five months is a long commitment for living in a foreign location. I had many concerns – How would I take public transportation? How would I overcome being homesick? What if I went to a store and someone asked me a question that I was unable to comprehend due to the language barrier? What if my bank accounts or phone got suspended because I was abroad? What if I got lost? These are just few amongst many others of my fears before leaving. However, I have faced all these anxiety-inducing subjects since my arrival and made it past them all successfully.

My first big fear was figuring out how to utilize the public transportation system, since buses and trains are typically confusing and complicated for me in the U.S. Also, I knew that due to the distance between my host mother’s house and the school, I would be forced to utilize this system. However, I quickly learned that public transportation here is much easier to use than for example in Kalamazoo and it is designed that way as the majority of people here take it daily. The public transportation was one of my biggest fears but I swiftly figured out that it should have been the least of them!

I was additionally very worried about feeling and overcoming homesickness. When I first went off to college, I missed home a lot and it took me a while to get settled, but I think that was good practice for my arrival in France. The moment I got here, I immediately thought, What did I get myself into? But I knew that like going to college, I would just have to stick out this feeling until I settled in and got more comfortable. To conquer this feeling, I also called my parents and friends very often, and it just felt like I was calling them from Kalamazoo like usual, and I felt much better. I also brought pictures of my family and dog to put on my desk which has been very comforting as well!

As for talking to French people in public, I was very nervous to do so at first; I did not want to talk to anyone as I was just frankly terrified. The first day, I just settled for being hungry as I did not want to initiate the communication to order food. However, I was eventually forced to do so and it has just become daily life for me. When you are anxious about being able to understand people, it makes it even harder to know what they are saying, so I ultimately just had to get over my fears and it has therefore become a lot easier. If I cannot understand what someone has said to me, I simply politely ask for them to repeat themselves or to speak slower, and so far mostly everyone has been very understanding and respectful of that.

In the back of my mind, I was also worrying about the status of my accounts for my bank and phone, such as if they got suspended because they suspected fraud or whatnot. However, as a preventative measure, I called my banks and phone company beforehand to tell them I would be abroad. My bank accounts have luckily not been suspended but I did have a scare with my phone. For my international phone plan, I am able to make calls over Wi-Fi for free, although calls not utilizing Wi-Fi cost a certain amount per minute. I originally thought I had been making my hour-long calls to my parents over Wi-Fi, but that turned out to not be the case. I received a cautionary message from my phone company declaring that there had been too much international activity and additional charges in regard to that, so my account was in danger of being suspended and to call them to avoid this from happening. However, I called my phone company right away and quickly learned my lesson about making calls over Wi-Fi!

Lastly, I had a huge fear about becoming lost in the city- which was pretty much inevitable as I had clearly never been in Besançon before, let alone overseas. Google Maps has been very helpful with this though, and I always check where I am going on a map before leaving so that I at least know the general direction in which I will be going and what stores or other landmarks are next to my destination.

All in all, I was fairly worried about numerous activities for going abroad, but many of my biggest fears turned out to be for nothing! A lot of it was figuring out how everything works here upon arrival, as many things could not have been thought through in advance. However, I am very glad I took the leap of faith of coming here as I am learning so much about not only French culture, but other cultures from around the world as well and gaining many valuable experiences.

Categories: French, Adventures, Switzerland