First REAL Post

Ok, as promised, here begins to good stuff.

- This is pretty obvious, but it needs to be mentioned anyway: the language barrier. (Screams into pillow). French is seriously the hardest language I have ever tried to learn. And I'm not just trying to pick it up as I go along. I've tried using audio CD's. No good. I've tried taking a class. Still nothing. I have a French Dictionary and a French Phrasebook and I can still barely speak a word of this language. If ever I need to think of a sentence to say, I pretty much need an online translator, and those are still wrong a good portion of the time. And here's the thing. Most people around here know English. Some of the nicer people will actually speak it to you if they catch on that your French isn't very good. Usually though, they just scoff at my ignorance. Now, I've tried to be reasonable about this. When I look at it from their point of view, I realize that they shouldn't automatically be expected to speak a foreign language in their own country. If someone came up to me in the U.S. and tried speaking anything but English, I wouldn't be able to help them, and I wouldn't really feel bad about it because I know the national language and I can't be expected to know just any language that someone may try to speak to me with. BUT, the official language at CERN is ENGLISH! All the scientists speak ENGLISH to each other (unless it's a private conversation, in which case they can speak whatever they want). All business is posted in ENGLISH! Meetings are conducted in ENGLISH! However, when I go to the cafeteria, those people don't speak a word of English. I don't know whether or not they CAN speak English, but if they can they certainly choose not to. And I'm pretty sure it's out of spite. I don't have any actual proof of this, but believe me. I can tell. Whenever I have to point to a food because I don't know how to say it, they give me a smaller portion than the people in front of me. When the people at the register have to point to the price because I don't instantly translate what they say to me, they give me the look of death. I'm getting a little off topic here, but I promise I will have more to say about the cafeteria in the near future.

Well, I was hoping to include a bit more in this post, but jet lag is kicking in and I'm already starting to forget some of the things I was going to say tonight. Once I get some shut-eye and get my head straightened out, I'll get back to y'all soon.