Bon... C'est La Vie!

I'm taking an everyday french course at Kish institute, Nahid, Jordan. I just finished the first term (FE4) and my second term will start this afternoon. The classes have been quite good, but not so conversational. I'm doing a lot of self-study on the side. Here are some of the ways I'm trying to improve my french.

First of all, let me tell you about the amazing audio lessons of Michel Thomas. He has a translation-based method, that is to say he bases French upon English and takes advantage of all the similarities that exist between the two languages. I have finished the introductory course which was too simple, but still very useful and now I'm looking for a torrent to download any other available courses.

The other thing I'm doing is getting articles from canadian and french newspapers right in my mailbox through Google News. I print articles out every now and then and try to make sense of them using a dictionary or Google Translate. Of course it becomes easier and easier and I'm hoping it'll soon get to a point where most of the words will be repetitive, so I will understand the articles without the need to look up so many words.

I have also downloaded some french songs and am trying to enjoy listening to them; trying! One last thing I do, if the government's satellite noises let me do so, is watch TV5 programs. The movies have subtitles which can of course be very helpful. I have also recorded a few programs on video tape, so that I can replay every sentence again and again until I'v finally understood them!

I heard from friends that the process of immigration has slowed down. This could be frustrating, but at least, I'll be able to learn more french before we've left.

Syrie

Back from Syria! Best trip ever! Got the CSQ and had a nice vacation too! Let me start with the interview. The immigration bureau of Quebec is a very small place, 100 square meters the most with a reception and two rooms. It's right next to Iranian embassy and the ground floor of a 4 storey building; the three floors above all belong to Iranian consular section. When we entered, the lady at the reception ticked our names and gave us a form to fill out. 8 o'clock sharp, our interviewer, Madam Marchand came in, bonjoured us and led us to room number 2. The room was divided by a glass, so when Madam Marchand sat down and asked for documents, we passed them to her through a tray at the bottom. She asked us about our jobs mostly and also about our french and where we learnt it. She then asked her 'special' question "Pourquoi Québec?" which Sara gave a long answer to explaining the job market at Quebec, the low expenses and her love for french culture. My reply was short and simple: "Un vie meilleur pour ma dame, moi-même et maintenant notre bébé." which I now understand has some serious grammar mistakes in it! We were so lucky the interview was with Madam Marchand; she smiled all the time and was so positive and encouraging. She didn't give us a hard time at all and after about one hour of interview, gave us her 'felicitations' and bienvenued us to Quebec! It was a great feeling and when she left the room to bring our documents, we jumped up our seats and hugged! She then gave us our CSQ papers, a book titled "Apprendre le Québec" and a brochure for a free online french course. The next day, we took the CSQ papers along with some documents and an application fee to Canadian embassy and got our file number. I can now officially say: "Go Montreal Go!"

Now, a few words about Syria. It was really not bad at all. In fact, I enjoyed every second of it. Perhaps the worst things are the very bad airport (terminal 2), the old and ugly buildings and the fact cars honk all the time. But the rest is all good, at least to me. We stayed at Hotel Tedmor (Palmyra) on 29 Ayar street. This is near the Salehieh Bazaar and one of the relatively good places of Damascus. There was nothing more enjoyable than walking on the streets near the hotel in the afternoon. Here you can see some of the pictures and videos I took in Damascus.

Let's start with this picture of Rosha sitting on the hotel bed!


This is in Bab Touma Bazaar! It was very windy!

Salehieh Bazaar

Hafiz Assad Square

More pictures from the same area:

Here's a video of Damascus at night:

The tour we were with included a visit to Abil's grave (son of Adam and Eve) located to the south of Damascus and near both Lebanon and Israel borders. Here are some pictures of the place:




On Friday morning, we left the hotel and took a random bus to explore the city. The bus took us to this fascinating Armenian neighborhood with its beautiful old buildings and churches. You can see their covered bazaar in the final video and picture.

On the last day of our visit, we visited the Sayyidah Zaynab Mosque; I managed to take some good pictures there.

Busy Weekend!

It was a nice weekend with many good things happening. I got my cell-phone back from the police. They have removed the memory to get rid of its contents, which is pretty stupid as they could have simply formatted it. But anyways, everything else is fine with it and I'm happy I got it back and won't have to go there or call them anymore.

On Thursday, I booked a tour for Syria. It's a typical religious tour, with a one week stay at a three star Tedmor hotel; I say "three-star", but the truth is Syrians give as many stars as they "wish" to their hotels! We'll leave Saturday October 3rd and have the interview on Monday. I've heard the interview is mostly in French which is not a good news, and I've also heard that the interviewers can be pretty mean. Our biggest concern is not the interview, but where we're gonna leave Rosha when attending the interview. I plan to call the embassy on Monday (when they're open) and see what they recommend. I've called them several times before, they speak Arabic and very poor English, pfff!

Thursday was so busy, I also took our identifications and my military card to a translation office to get them translated once again, this time for the 'federal' file that we will open right after the interview; that is, if we pass the interview! We also took Rosha to a clinic for a vaccination; she has a slight fever now and Sara puts ice on her leg and washes her hands and legs with cold water. Our thermometers don't work properly, so I'll have to buy one on my way home. It's so strange we have three thermometers and neither of them shows anything! It's as if there is no mercury in the tubes!

Thursday afternoon, we went to Hyperstar. It was my fourth time as I've been taking our family members there one by one to show them the place! It was awfully crowded this time and we decided never to go there again except on a weekday morning.

Yesterday was the Quds day; the day protesters had long been waiting for to get out on the streets again. I'm not gonna write much about it here, suffice to say Iran became first headline on CNN, BBC, Aljazeera and France 24!

Here's something else about this weekend: The weather turned so nice! We had a heavy rain on Wednesday and the weather's been cool and autumny eversince. Last night, we thought we'd go out with Rosha for some fresh air. We chose to go to Velenjak and the small parks to the north of Shahid Beheshti University which were quiet and very nice. Tehran looked so beautiful from up there, but did it make us reconsider our immigration? Hell no!

Trip to Damascus Ahead!

Our interview at Canadian embassy in Syria is October 5th. We'll book an Iran Air flight this week and get a hotel room there for three nights. We wanna have all the "federal" documents ready, so that we submit them after the interview. I've heard we can also pay all remaining application fees (federal charges, medical charges, landing fees, etc) at the embassy. This will be a big relief as after we've paid these charges (which is not little either and something over $ 2,000), we have almost completed our immigration requirements and will then have to wait for the medical papers, get our medical check-up and then, hopefully receive our visas. From information on the internet and Iranian bloggers' experience, I can assume we'll have our visas in 10 to 17 months from now. My future posts will probably be more focused on our immigration process.

BTW, I've been watching some french programs on TV5 and France 24. I noticed some of the comedies on TV5 were Quebec productions and with Canadian accent; these comedies have french subtitles too! At first, I couldn't understand why they would put french subtitles to a french program. Can you guess the reason? Correct! Canadian french is haaaard! It's more correctly, a "dialect" of french with differences in all areas of grammar, vocabulary and of course accent! Hell that's a big challenge!