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I grew up going to a French school. For a significant portion of my early education, I had every single class -- except English class -- in French. But to be honest, I never really loved it. I had started midway through elementary school and so I always felt like my French was never quite good enough.
I was behind relative to my classmates. I needed special tutoring to get caught up (while my classmates were off learning a third language). And so I used to constantly beg my mom to take me out of French school and put me in a, you know, regular English school. I know this was tough for my mom, but her response was always steadfast: "You'll thank me when you're older."
At the time, I couldn't possibly imagine her ever being correct with this statement. But it turns out, she was. Today, I'm grateful to be able to travel to a place like Paris and kind of speak the language. (I say kind of because, hey, it's been a long time since high school!)
And I'm grateful that when I go into Mabel's Bakery across from Junction House that I can order a coffee and a croissant in French. (Most of the people there are from France. Try it for yourself. They're lovely humans.)
In fact, I enjoy it so much that I recently decided to enroll in a French class at Alliance Française here in Toronto. (Fresh $80 textbook pictured above.) Obviously the 9-year-old version of myself would be completely shocked with this absurd decision. But I guess this is just what happens when you've been indoctrinated from a young age.
Or maybe I just really want to build something in France one day.
When I was around 8 or 9 years old my mother put me into a French school in Toronto. Her logic was simple: “This is Canada. You should know how to speak both official languages. It will create opportunities for you in the future.”
But I hated it. I couldn’t speak a word of French at the time and so I would come home from school complaining that I couldn’t understand anything the teacher was saying. How was I supposed to learn anything?
I begged her to put me back into an English school.
To her credit, my mother remained absolutely steadfast. She would say to me: “Trust me. You’re going to thank me for this later.”
Not surprisingly, I learned French. I was put into a special “intro” stream and so when my classmates were off learning a third language (German), I was given introductory classes designed to bring me up to their French level.
I still remember the sense of accomplishment I felt when I could finally carry on an actual conversation in French.
Sadly, at this point in my life, my French is fairly rusty. I really should work on that. But it’s decent enough that people in Montréal – which is where I am right now – will say to me: “You’re from Toronto. How is it that you speak French?”
In fact, somebody said to me last night that in Montréal they typically encounter more French speakers from the U.S. than they do from Ontario. That surprised me. As a country, about 10 million Canadians report being able to speak French (2011 number).
Every time I visit Montréal, I marvel at the display of bilingualism that seems omnipresent in this city. And, if you grew up in an immigrant household, you may also speak a third language – the one your parents spoke to you in. I think that’s wonderful.
So with that: thanks mom.
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