May 12

Saturday, May 12, 2007

I woke up with the intention of going running this morning, but when I looked out the hotel window at quarter to six it was still dark, so I decided against that and went back to bed for another 45 minutes. It was a Holiday Inn Express and the beds were the most amazing thing ever!! And the duvets were do die for…so I really didn’t mind going back to bed.
Breakfast was great, as normal here too! Although my “family” for the past week was so healthy that I haven’t even had one petit pain au chocolat!! I had some cereal and yougart this morning – pretty normal, I guess!! And then we were off to a different village outside of Grenoble to set up for the reunion (I can’t make the accent stay because of that Word tool that thinks it knows everything about spelling…).
There are a lot of people involved in OSEF…I never realized quite the size of the organization before. Mme Lenfant started it 14 years ago when her son Fabrice went on a type of exchange that she organized for him and a few friends to the US or Canada (I’m not quite sure). And now, all these years later, OSEF is pretty much her entire life…never mind the life of her family and friends. Fabrice and another friend, also named Fabrice both work for Europ Assistance, which provides the health insurance for both the Canadians and the French. Then, the Hotel where I stayed the first night…they are the friends of Mme Lenfant and it is this hotel where both sides stay when coming and going out of Paris. And the connections keep going. Everyone who goes to these meetings to prep the kids that are leaving on the exchange are involved on various levels. There are some friends, other teachers, and relatives from all over the place. It is rather amazing, actually. I am beginning to realize the extent of it and the fact that Mme Lenfant still gets to know all 500 students (Times two for each country) and spends the time matching them with an appropriate dossier on the other side is pretty impressive. It is her entire life.
So for Grenoble, one of the largest regions, there are over 100 students participating in one of 4 or 5 different programs that OSEF now offers! There are “les écoles de langue” where the French student goes to Vancouver (normally) but it is not reciprocal. Then, there are 3 different lengths of exchanges – one-month during the summer and then a two-month and a three-month exchange during the school year.
We had 5 rooms where we divided the kids up into 4 groups and the parents into another. Before the students get there, we organize all the desks in a U-shape and put up an impressive amount of Canadian paraphernalia! I have never quite seen so many Canadian flags at once…
In the morning I sat up with Mme Lenfant and the regional coordinator as we went through the exchange process (everything from spending money, to laundry, to the actual flight, to Canadian food) with the Parents. The student groups were going through basically the same thing with one of the 12 regional directors, friends, family, etc.! It is a little strange to be talking about home like I did…but it is pretty fun too…once I talk slow enough that everyone can understand me!! I answered a few questions about Canada and things like bringing visas and kids buying cigarettes and lots of stuff about school. Mostly Mme Lenfant talks…but I get in here and there (I always try and make the parents laugh…that is pretty much my objective. And if I manage to do that, then I know they understand me…another objective J)
After lunch I went around to all the other student groups and talked about school and answered any questions that they had about anything. After comparing school so much, it really makes me realize how much I loved school and how much fun education is in Canada (especially compared to here!!)
We wrapped up at about 3pm and made it out of there pretty quickly. They have a van (it seats 9 people plus baggage!!) which is a good thing because of the number of people that are involved and the amount of paperwork, drinks, food, etc that goes everywhere! We drove for about 4 hours to get to Dijon and then had dinner and then, sleep…and the entire thing is a repeat event tomorrow!!


Night

-Allison