Exciting Frenchy things

To be honest, this list is as much a reminder for me when I can't stop thinking about all the scary things as much as it is for your entertainment, but I thought it would be good for me to write down a few of the things I'm excited about before I go so I can look back on them halfway through or at the end of the year and see how many of them are still the same, and how many I managed to achieve!!

• the food. Crêpes, French bread and cheese, hot chocolate out of bowls, pastries, boulangeries, patisserie...and best of all, REAL BRIOCHE. Enough said.
• kisses on the cheek. I know this seems like a really weird thing to be looking forward to, but the lovely thing about the French greeting is that it completely avoids our awkward English I-don't-know-you-but-now-I've-been-in-this-group-too-long-to-introduce-myself pauses: if you don't know someone in a group, you introduce yourself there and then, and so no one ever feels like an awkward outsider. Plus you always know how to greet people, and there is something about the physical contact that makes you feel immediately closer to people. And it looks so European and sophisticated!
• how adventurous it will make me look. I am generally terrified of change and new things, so the idea of having exciting Facebook photos and interesting stories from my travels, and being able to compare these with other brave travel-ly people is very exciting! And even when I come home...being able to just drop these stories in to conversation by saying 'well when I was living in France', because I was actually brave enough to do it! And I am SO excited to be able to explore Brittany and Paris and then visit my other YA friends and see new places. I just love the idea of seeming like one of those fearless people who travels loads and has amazing anecdotes. So not true, but that's what it will look like!
• knowing France in the kind of way you only can if you've lived there. Being able to show my friends and family round, knowing the best cafés and shops, being able to order things fluently in French and explain the culture and etiquette to them, and then being able to talk about my YA when people talk about France and explain what it's really like
• finding my routine. People keep telling me 'it will be amazing, don't worry', and I keep thinking 'but how do you know that??'. The truth is, they don't, but one thing I know for sure is that even if it never becomes amazing, it will become normal. I will find a weekly and daily routine, find my friends, have my room as a little safe space with all my homely things in it, get involved with church, and get used to speaking French all the time, and then once I've settled into a bit of normality I will know that the hard bit's over and I've done it!!
• being bilingual!! I know this is a somewhat obvious one seeing as I'm a linguist and this is the whole point of my YA, but I honestly can't wait to be able to use all those little native-sounding idioms and chatter away easily in French without sounding really foreign
• feeling really British. Coming home and watching British TV programmes or seeing British news stories or products or something whilst I'm abroad and being able to explain them to my French friends, or explaining an English phrase or custom and feeling really English and patriotic

These are the things that encourage and excite me when I feel a bit overwhelmed, and remind me how amazing the year abroad can be! I can't wait to get a few weeks in and begin to see these things start to happen!