The Fugitive Goes Whale-Watching

I visited Tadoussac on Sunday with a bunch of other people from language school. Tadoussac is a little town in Quebec where the Saguenay meets the St. Lawrence. It's about 800 km from the ocean, but the ocean's tide comes all the way over to Tadoussac, bringing with it salt water and whales. The picture here is of two humpback whales.

In other news, last Friday we had our "Soirée Québecoise" at the school. We were all supposed to dress up in traditional Québecois clothing and we did a bunch of traditional dances and had some competitions. I didn't put a lot of effort into my costume, so on Friday afternoon I went to find a shirt to wear. I had the addresses and hours for two second-hand clothing stores on the same road. I arrived at the first one before it was supposed to close, but there was a big "Fermé" (Closed) sign on the door. But the sign with the store's hours said it should still be open. I decided to try the door just in case someone had just forgotten to change the "Fermé" sign that day. It was unlocked, but as soon as I opened it I heard a long beeping noise. Now I know a lot of stores have a beeping thing to tell the employees when someone enters the store, but this wasn't just a short beep, and I couldn't see any signs of life in the store. I didn't go in the store; I just closed the door. Soon, I could hear faint siren-like alarm sounds through the closed door. So I left and went to the other clothing store.

My fingerprints got left on the door handle, but I don't have a criminal record, so the police won't know who I am. But I didn't take anything or even enter the store, so even if they could track me down, I should be okay.

My host claims that most people in Chicoutimi do lock their doors, and they definitely don't intentionally set an alarm while leaving the door unlocked. So I guess an employee must have forgotten to lock the door.

I've posted more photos (including photos of the Soirée Québecoise) on my photo site in the Quebec 2006 album.

Christianity in Chicoutimi (or The Strangest Grape Juice I've Ever Tasted)

Here in Quebec, on several occcasions I've heard people say, "Because the Catholic Church was so restrictive in the old days, people weren't allowed to _______________." For example, when we were learning Quebecois dances, we were told that a certain dance that we learned was banned by the Church because it involved changing partners. The church was also pretty strict about how women dressed. (I think their dresses had to go right down to their feet.) The church couldn't control the government, but they did have a lot of power over everybody's daily life in Quebec.

Eventually things changed and now Quebec is one of the most secular parts of North America. A lot of people have some nominal attachment to the Catholic Church, but there don't seem to be a whole lot of committed Christians here. I get the impression that the super-restrictive Christianity of the past eventually pushed people away.

But Christianity doesn't have to be that way. From what I've seen, filling Christianity with extra restrictions that are only very loosely based on the Bible seems to help people obey the "do not" rules in the Bible, but not the "do" rules, especially, "Love your neighbour as yourself," and, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength," which happen to be the two most important commands in the Bible.

But enough preaching. I've been to mass at the Catholic cathedral here twice. It was far from full, but there was reasonably good turnout. I couldn't understand it very well, but what few things I could understand seemed consistent with Christianity the way I see it, and they don't seem to be trying to control people's lives the way they used to.

This past Sunday I went to a Protestant church with some of the other students. There are only two or three Protestant churches in Chicoutimi. Somebody said this one seems to be a Brethren church. It was different from what I'm used to. The chairs were arranged facing the centre instead of the front. Most of the women (but not all of them) wore some sort of covering on their heads, but aside from that, people were dressed pretty normally. During the service, people would sit quietly for a short time, then someone would get up and say something, pray, or get the church singing a song. (A couple of the songs were familiar, but in French.) And eventually, somebody preached a sermon, and they served communion. This was probably the first time I've ever had communion with wine. (Seems like most Protestant churches use grape juice, just like Jesus would have if he'd been an early-21st century Protestant.) I understood the church service better than at the Catholic church, but it was still tough. I think I picked up on something about Jesus having victory over death, and the sermon had something to do with Proverbs 15:1, which says (in English), "A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger." So it seemed to be a pretty good church, and the people seemed friendly (although I unfortunately spent more time talking with my classmates than with the other people).

Meanwhile, at the university, I'm not the only Christian in this program. There are some others in my class and in other classes. A few of them are here because they want to be missionaries in French-speaking parts of Africa. I've gone to church with a few of them each week, and last week several of us got together to pray. On Sunday a bunch of us went to the church that I already told you about. They seem to be eager to make a difference in the lives of the people in this program. As for making a difference in the city in general, sometimes I wonder how much difference we can make in Chicoutimi when we don't speak French very well and we're only here for five weeks. But God's strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9), so who knows?

The other side of the coin

I've seen the movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail several times, and of course one of my favourite scenes is the one with the French soldier talking with the knights (or "k-nig-its", as he liked to call them) with his rediculous French accent. Now I've seen the other side of the coin.

Here's how it happened. Yesterday, in our weekly class on Québecois culture, we watched the movie Asterix in Britain, a French animated movie from 1986. (Asterix is apparently quite popular in Quebec even though these cartoons don't come from Quebec.) The movie was in French, and the British characters in the movie were hilarious. The movie didn't have any subtitles, so the British characters all spoke French, but with silly-sounding British accents. (Which makes me wonder how silly my accent sounds to everyone in Quebec.) The main British guy loved to start his sentences with, "Je dit..." which is French for "I say..." Maybe it's not quite as funny as Monty Python, but it's the most entertaining French movie I've seen yet. (And of course I understood the French-speaking British people with the bad accents far better than any of the French people in the movie.) Another funny thing in the movie: It showed the British Parliament and Big Ben made completely out of wood. Even though the clocks were replaced with sundials, it still had that hourly chime. Another scene in the movie showed a sundial making a ticking sound.

French music

I have an hour free right now. I could be doing homework or studying, but I decided to write today's second blog entry instead.

I got my very first French CD a while back. It's by a band called MesAïeux. It's kind of a neo-traditional band. Their song Dégénerations seems to be fairly popular here, at least with the students in this program. You can watch the video at http://mesaieux.qc.ca/intro.php?lang=anglais. When you go to that page, click on Multimedias, then click on Videos, and then click on the second video screen that you see. For some weird reason, the video is split into three parts, so you'll need to click on the ">>" button when the video stops abruptly.

In case you're wondering what the song is about, it's about some of the ways society has changed over the generations. Here's a rough translation of one verse (with some help from world.altavista.com and a dictionary):

Your great-great-grandmother, she had fourteen children
Your great-grandmother had almost as many
And worse your grandmother had three and that was enough
Worse your mother did not want any; you were an accident
And worse you, my little girl, you change partners all the time
When you make mistakes, you have an abortion
But there are mornings, you wake up crying
When you dream at night of being surrounded by children

So yeah, it has interesting lyrics. Hope you enjoy it.

(Note: It turns out I made a mistake in Translation. See the August 9, 2006 posting entitled "Bad Translation" for a correction.)

Cathedral pics

And now the moment you've all been waiting for (or at least the moment Grace has been waiting for), a picture of the cathedral:
As usual, I've posted more pictures (including some of the inside of the cathedral) at my photo site in the "Quebec 2006" album.

And so begins my third week here. A while ago my hosts told me that for most people things really start to click in the third week. They start thinking and dreaming in French, and understanding French becomes easier. As for me, my French keeps improving, but it's still really hard to understand people who don't dumb down their French, and I really have to concentrate to understand dumbed-down French consistently. I haven't had any French dreams, but then I've only had one English dream that I can remember. But I've improved a lot, and it's less than half over.

Back from the capital

I'm back from a trip to Quebec City. We were only there for one night, but it was good. Last night I saw some street performers in Old Québec and visited an Irish pub where they had some live celtic music. I heard a few familiar songs like "Irish Eyes are Smiling" and "Farewell to Nova Scotia." Most of the songs were in English, but a few were in French. And they played this one really fast instrumental song. The fiddler's hand was a blur! He was an amazing player.

Today I got to visit the Québec Citadel, the Plains of Abraham, and the Parliament, and I fell in a wading pool. One big difference between Québec and Edmonton is that when you visit a historic site in Québec, you think, "Wow, there was a big battle here!" but when you visit a historic site in Edmonton you think, "Wow, people traded fur here!"

Here's a picture of the Citadel's regimental goat and the goatkeeper:

As always, I've posted more pics in the "Québec 2006" album at my photo site (use the link on the right side of the page).

Ironic event of the week: Someone else in the same program as me told me that Chicoutimi doesn't have enough organic food stores. The funny part: I'm pretty sure I've seen her smoking.

A few pics

This is me with my housemate Joey. He's a medical resident in Montréal, where it's pretty easy to get by with just English, but he wants to speak French well too.


Here we see a couple of buildings by the Saguenay River in Chicoutimi.


And this is a grizzly bear at the Zoo Sauvage in St-Felicien.

Check out these and more photos by clicking on "My photos" on the right-hand side of the main page, and then click on the "Quebec 2006" album. All the wildlife photos (so far) were taken at the zoo.

Funny French name

Funniest place name I've heard so far in Québec: Baie des Ha! Ha! If you don't believe it exists, check out this page. Not only does it prove Baie des Ha! Ha! exists, it's an interesting story about cheese too!

My first messe

Yesterday I experienced my first Catholic mass. (I went on Saturday because most of us went on a trip to the Lac St-Jean area today.) I went to the local cathedral with a few other people from language school, including my former roommate Ryan. They had a little booklet with the liturgy printed in it, so that really helped me understand what they were saying. Even with that book, it was hard to follow, since it was in French. When the priest gave the homily (Protestant translation: sermon), I didn't understand a thing because there was no printed outline, and there was an echo. But I must say, I did appreciate the parts of the mass that I could understand. I recognized some things like the Apostles' Creed in French. A song that was part of the liturgy said something like, "Jesus is dead, Jesus is alive..." And the cathedral is beautiful. It's quite an old building with a lot of statues, carvings, and stained-glass windows. I'll probably go back sometime, maybe on a Sunday when they have a longer mass. (The Saturday mass was fairly short.)

In French, mass is spelled "messe," so it's kind of funny seeing the signs in front of Catholic churches saying when the "messes" are.

So today, Sunday, five busloads of us went for a trip about halfway around Lac St-Jean. We visited a zoo where the animals seem to live in a more natural habitat than most zoos, and we visited a historic village with a big waterfall. It was a good chance to see some nature and get to know some of the people at language school better, even though our conversations in French tend to be fairly shallow.

I still find it hard to understand people in French, especially if they speak French well, because they talk fast and use big words. Our teachers and my hosts have quite a bit of experience with non-French-speakers so they're good at dumbing it down, but even then it's difficult. But some people don't know how to dumb it down very well.

Edmonton's new nemesis

Today I met someone from Edmonton's new nemesis. Yes, she's from Raleigh, North Carolina, and she introduced herself to me after seeing me in my Oilers shirt. But she was a gracious future loser. (Remember: every time the Oilers have lost in the Stanley Cup final, they won the Cup the next year. Yes, that only happened once. Meanwhile, every time the Flames reached the final, they lost in the first round the next year. Just thought I'd throw in that little detail.)

I finally uploaded a few pictures from Chicoutimi. Check them out at http://photos.yahoo.com/ascheuer. They're in the album called...wait for it...Quebec 2006.

Bike rental from a real bike shop: $120. Buying a bike from Canadian tire: $130

Yesterday I said I was going to buy a used bike, but it turns out that the two stores that were supposed to have used bikes don`t sell used bikes. One of them would rent me a pretty good bike for $120, but that seemed expensive, especially after my housemate bought one at Canadian Tire for a similar price. So I walked to Canadian Tire and bought a $130 bike. I`m sure it`s not as good as the one from the other store, but this is just for a month. I know my brother would be rolling in his grave if he had one. (We`re having him cremated. By the way, he is still alive, in case anyone was wondering.)

By the way, if anybody knows anyone in Chicoutimi who wants to buy a month-old bike sometime around August 5, tell them about me.

Be sure to check out Ryan`s site at http://www.traveljournals.net/travelers/torchmaker/. He`s my old roomate and he`s also here in Chicoutimi.

For some of our activities here, we`ve been put into groups with our class and the other two classes that are around the same level (level 5 in my case). Today we had to vote on a name. Our team is now called "le cinq." Don`t blame me; I voted for "Liberté cinquant-cinq."

Je ne parle pas anglais

The program has begun. On Sunday I made my way to the Université de Québec à Chicoutimi. The people who worked there didn`t speak English with me, although they might have said a word or two when I couldn`t understand them. I spent the afternoon and evening at the home of the family that I`ll be living with. The only person who was there at the time didn`t speak English, so that was a good chance to practice my French. Later my roommate arrived. He`s from Vancouver, living in Montreal, and doing the same program as me. His name is Joey. Since we hadn`t signed the form saying we`ll only speak French, we spoke English­. Later, the rest of the family arrived. They seem to know a bit of English, but they don`t speak English around us.

On Monday we were back at the university where we had our placement tests. I found the oral interview much easier than the written test. I don`t think I was ever totally sure of any of the answers on the written test. We also had a tour of Chicoutimi that afternoon. It has about as many people as Fort McMurray, but in some ways it seems like a bigger city. It`s probably just more established, whereas in Fort McMurray, they have to play catch-up with the infrastructure.

Today we had our first classes. I got put in a level 5 class (6 being the lowest level and 1 being highest), which is pretty much what I was hoping for. Today we also signed our forms saying we`ll only speak French, so there`s no turning back now. (I think I can still write email, write for this blog, and make long distance phone calls in English though.) I`m speaking French better than I ever have before, but I`m still not very good. This will be a challenge. I mentioned something about Jesus today that probably sounded really clichéd, so I don`t think I`ll be having any deep or complicated conversations for a while, not that I won`t try.

Seems like a great group of people here, but communication is harder than usual. I think I`ll enjoy it, but if you pray, please remember to pray for me.

Please leave comments in this blog. It would be great to hear a little something from all of you. (If the comment feature doesn`t work, send me an email so I can fix it. If you don`t have my email address, just leave it until someone else tells me it`s not working.) Anyway, I`m off to get a used bike.

Federalist sighting

I have arrived in Chicoutimi safe and sound. At the Montreal airport I met two Americans who are doing the same program as me in Chicoutimi, so we shared a cab from the airport into the city. I mentioned that it`s Canada Day, but they seemed more interested in sleeping than going to a Canada Day event. So I went by myself. There was live music (mostly in French) and fireworks. There was a good-sized crowd out there, so I guess some people do care about Canada Day here. There were several Canadian flags up there, some `Labatt Bleue` ads, and not a single Canadian government logo in sight.

My French still really sucks, but I did manage to order a sub at Quizno`s completely in French. It helped that the menu was bilingual. Growing up eating out of bilingual food packages might have helped a bit too. Chicoutimi seems to be a beautiful city, and quite a few people here speak English much better than I speak French. The French immersion program starts tomorrow, so starting tomorrow I`m not allowed to speak English. That will be when the learning curve really gets steep.

Bon nuit. (Good night.)

Alex