Letters from Abroad: Finals Week at the Sorbonne

Averi Melcher
Delta Delta Delta

Well, here we are, school is back in full swing and we are all starting to fall into our daily routines once again.  However, while you are all excited to have made it through one more semester at UNL, I’m still trudging through my last week of classes at the Sorbonne.  That’s right – I’m just beginning finals week – 3 weeks after Christmas break.  So, although I had some wonderful times and travels this holiday season, I always had that feeling of gloom hanging over my head, reminding me that I still had five finals and two papers to write.  Oh yes, and they would have to be en français, of course. 

Even a bottle of champagne with my friends on New Year's Eve couldn’t completely mask the fact that, although I was ringing in a new year, I was dragging the worst part of 2011 (that would be those pesky finals) into my new, and promising 2012.  Fear not, I still managed to have a great time.  After all, we had situated ourselves on top of the largest hill around, where we had arguably the best view of Paris and the Eiffel Tower as it sparkled for the last time in 2011. 

Plus, we got to uncork our champagne at the same time as about two hundred other strangers and all scream and yell “Bonne Annee” while clinking our glasses like old friends.  My friends and I knew without a doubt that 2012 was destined for greatness when an outburst of rogue fireworks happened shortly after all of this – it was pure magic.           

And now, as I sit at my desk and try to avoid procrastinating, even the smile that New Year's Eve and all of my other adventures brought to my face is beginning to fade into a stack of review sheets and books.  It felt like I only had one small fleeting moment of a vacation before the French scholastic system decided it’s students were having too much fun and starting pulling wine bottles out of hands and replacing them with bubble sheets.

These are not any simple, bluff-your-way-through-because-you-don’t-really know-the-answer tests, either.  There is no room for vague sentences or any sort of doubt on the answer sheets in France.  Instead, we lose points for writing sentences that are too vague – even on the vocabulary sections – and when we do answer with a very straightforward response, it seems that it is still possible to lose points because “you could have done better.”

I’m not going to lie; I feel pretty intimidated right now.  I know this should make me study more, but the intimidation has completely swept over me, making me afraid to even glance at my grammar book.

At least I can take solace in the fact that, while I’m sitting in the testing room next Saturday morning for three hours, kicking myself for waiting until the last moment to read over my notes, I had a good reason for not studying.  Four good reasons, actually: Amsterdam, Pisa, Prague and Luxembourg. 

And, if I make it through that final test, I will have another two-week vacation before my classes start again in mid-February.  Although, I’m not completely sure if this vacation will be spent celebrating my successes on an exotic island or trying to hide my failures at a café in Place Dauphine (it’s a very quiet park in Paris – no one will see you crying into your coffee there).  Either way, I am going to soak up those two weeks much as possible and prepare myself for another crazy semester in Paris.

I already have a bunch of plans and can’t wait to soak up the opportunities before me – be it celebrating St. Patrick’s Day in Dublin, spending Spring Break on the beaches of Barcelona, or finding what exactly is in Russia. 

So stay tuned, and have a great semester!

Averi is a junior studying journalism and mass communications with a minor in French. You may contact her at averi_melcher@hotmail.com.