Jo Dawson – Case Study, France (1992)

Looking back, I can probably say that the 3 month scholarship from the John Speak Trust was one of the key defining points of my life – something for which I am extremely grateful.

One of the many memories that I have of my John Speak Scholarship time in France was talking to the lorry driver I was travelling with one day who was trying to explain to me that the workings of the braking system on his truck was based around magnets.  You can imagine the difficulty trying to work out what he was trying to tell me whilst driving around the country roads in the area around Rheims.  However we got there in the end and, 23 years later, I can still picture the moment that I worked out the key word ‘Aimant’ meant ‘Magnet’.  Such is the power of learning a language from the native speakers of a country and without any possibility of help from Google Translate or Phoning a Friend.

My scholarship lead me to France in the summer of 1992.  I was still at UMIST University in Manchester, studying International Management  and French when I applied to the John Speak Trust having secured a place at the Ecole de Commerce de Grenoble where I was to study from September that year.  Having accepted the place,

I was worried that the level of my French would not allow me to fully understand and participate in the lectures that would be held in the local language throughout that year.

Through my father’s business I managed to secure a 3 month work placement with one of their French wool suppliers, Ets Vromant SA, run and owned by the very kind Jacques Vromant.  The scholarship from the John Speak Trust allowed me to cover my living costs which were meagre as I lived in a ‘Foyer de jeunes travailleurs’ – an eye-opening place to live which housed an eclectic group of young French people. My placement started in Lille where I worked in the Vromant foam factory, glueing foam together.  A strange start which improved my vocabulary of words such as ‘Baby changing mattresses’, ‘Double foam sofa’ and ‘glue guns’.  Words that I don’t use every day now (other than baby changing mattresses when my children were born – more of that later), but were exceptionally useful and intriguing during those first few weeks.

Having mastered the French words for ‘foam bathmat shaped as a foot’, I moved onto the next location of my placement – Rheims, where I travelled around the French countryside helping the team collect wool from the local farmers.  I learned that this was the area where Champagne was grown in amongst a surprising number of sheep as well as the word ‘Pavot’ which describes a beautiful white poppy-like flower that lives in the French hedgerows.  To this day I don’t know the English translation for this flower, but to me it is a ‘Pavot’.  This was a short part of my learning journey as I moved the following week to spend the remainder of my time in Limoges from where I joined the wool collecting team, making forays into the Massif Central to buy wool from farmers.

In amongst the farm visits where we would be welcomed at 10am at a farmers kitchen table with a glass of ‘Berger Blanc’ or similar (an aniseed-based 45% alcohol designed to descale the kettle) I learned the word ‘Andouillette’.  This is an offal-filled sausage, the smell of which to-this-day reminds me of that fateful lunch when the ‘Plat du Jour’ comprised what I thought of as an innocent looking sausage.  Oh how I was mistaken, yet some of my French friends today see it as a delicacy.  Much like the way my wife still struggles even now to understand the concept behind Pork crackling…

When we were not out in the truck collecting wool, I spent time sorting that very wool with some really interesting characters – one of whom I remember was called Pascal.  He taught me the essential words such as ‘bale press’, ‘fleece’, ‘dags’ (the dung that we were removing from the back end of the fleece) and other very choice but essential words that I can’t repeat here.  However, once he got bored with this, he tried to teach me the local Patois, though with limited success.  Though they did laugh when I tried to speak in their local accent – great memories.  It was during my stay in Limoges that I remember starting to dream in French – a clear sign that all was starting to click into place.

Armed with this wide-ranging and essential vocabulary and a far greater ability to understand many of the people I met, I drove diagonally across France towards Grenoble to start my new academic year.  During this journey, after a frustrating time following caravans crawling their way through the windy mountainous terrain of the Massif Central, I was stopped by the French police for speeding down the hill the other side.  Having established the fact that I had no money in order to pay the fine, the Gendarme took me into the police van whilst he decided what to do with me.  I explained where I was going and why I had been frustrated going so slowly behind the caravans and awaited the verdict.  Having pondered this for a while he let me go with the words ‘seeing as you speak such good French and have no money to pay the fine I will let you off this time.  But don’t think that if you get caught later in the journey they will be so kind to you!’.  John Speak saved me from a fine that day.

My scholarship story ends as my new year in Grenoble started.  I was able to speak French fluently – something I am sure helped me to complete a fulfilling year at Grenoble and not least meet my wife and start a new era of my life.  My wife and I now live in England where French is our home language (including ‘baby-changing mattresses’) and our bi-lingual children choose whichever word fits best into the sentence.

 I use my French language regularly in my business where I export wool around the world.

 

I am convinced that the deep understanding of the French language and culture that I gained by being dropped into an intense learning situation at that time has lead me to better understand and appreciate the many different cultures that I deal with in my day to day business.  This cultural appreciation was one of the key aims of the visionary John Speak when he left the funds for our use so many years ago.

Looking back, I can probably say that the 3 month scholarship from the John Speak Trust was one of the key defining points of my life – something for which I am extremely grateful.

Jo Dawson