MY STORY: How Culture Shock Inspired Me To Create Comme une Française
Summary
TLDRGeraldine, a French-Mexican engineer, shares her journey of adapting to British culture and language after moving to Leeds for work. She empathizes with foreigners struggling with French, inspired by her mother's experience as a Mexican in France. Geraldine's passion for helping others led her to teach French at the Red Cross and later create online lessons to assist people worldwide in understanding French language and culture, amassing over 8 million views on her YouTube channel.
Takeaways
- 🌐 Geraldine Repair, the speaker, shares her personal journey of struggling with understanding and speaking English in Britain, despite being proficient in the language.
- 🎓 After completing her engineering degree in France, Geraldine moved to Leeds, England for a job, where she experienced cultural and linguistic challenges.
- 🏡 Geraldine's mother, originally from Mexico, faced similar struggles with language and culture when she moved to France, which inspired Geraldine to help others.
- 👩🏫 Geraldine began teaching French at the Red Cross to asylum seekers, which was her initial step towards helping others integrate into French society.
- 🌟 She found fulfillment in teaching French, which led her to start creating online content to help a broader audience understand and speak French.
- 📈 Geraldine's online French lessons have been a success, with over 8 million views and nearly 500 videos, showcasing the demand for her content.
- 👥 Her lessons aim to help learners not only with the French language but also with understanding French culture and customs.
- 🌟 The video script highlights the importance of community and support in language learning, as Geraldine's friends encouraged her to create online content.
- 📚 Geraldine's story emphasizes the value of sharing one's culture and language with others, as she did through her YouTube channel.
- 💌 She invites viewers to share their own stories and motivations for learning French, fostering a sense of community and engagement.
Q & A
What was Geraldine's initial struggle when she moved to Britain?
-Geraldine struggled with understanding and speaking everyday spoken English, as well as comprehending the culture, jokes, and local customs.
Why did Geraldine decide to move back to France after living in Britain?
-Geraldine decided to move back to France because she realized that working as an engineer in a big company was not her true passion.
How is Geraldine connected to Mexico?
-Geraldine is fully Mexican as her mother was born in Mexico and moved to France. Geraldine herself was born in France to a Mexican mother and a French father.
What did Geraldine's mother experience when she first moved to France?
-Geraldine's mother experienced difficulty in speaking and writing French, and also faced casual racism, but she managed to understand the culture and customs and made France her home.
What inspired Geraldine to start teaching French?
-Geraldine was inspired to start teaching French after experiencing her own struggles with language and culture in Britain and seeing her mother's experiences as a foreigner in France.
Where did Geraldine initially start giving French lessons?
-Geraldine started giving French lessons at the Red Cross, teaching asylum seekers who had a good level of French.
What was the response from Geraldine's friends when she proposed the idea of helping people online to understand French?
-Geraldine's friends responded enthusiastically to her idea, expressing that they needed such help and encouraging her to start doing it.
How long has Geraldine been creating content to help people learn French?
-As of April 2022, Geraldine has been creating content to help people learn French for over seven years.
What kind of content has Geraldine produced to help people learn French?
-Geraldine has produced over 400 videos on YouTube, which have garnered over 8 million views, to help people learn French and understand the culture.
What is Geraldine's goal with her French lessons?
-Geraldine's goal is to help people speak French, understand the culture, customs, and all the little things that are often missed when learning a language, so they can feel at home in France.
How does Geraldine feel about teaching French and sharing her culture?
-Geraldine loves teaching French and sharing her language and culture, as it allows her to help others in a way she would have liked to be helped.
Outlines
🌐 Embracing French Culture and Overcoming Language Barriers
Geraldine Repair shares her personal journey of falling in love with British culture and the English language, which led her to move to Leeds, England, after obtaining her engineering degree in Ghana. Despite her proficiency in English, she faced challenges in understanding colloquialisms, humor, and cultural references, such as the popularity of Doctor Who. After two years, she returned to France, inspired by her mother's experience as a Mexican immigrant in France, and decided to help others integrate into French society by teaching French at the Red Cross. This experience was transformative, leading her to create online French lessons to assist a broader audience, including asylum seekers, in mastering the language and understanding French culture.
🗣️ Sharing Stories and Encouraging Language Learning
In the second paragraph, Geraldine extends an invitation to her audience to share their personal stories and motivations for learning French. She expresses curiosity about what led them to the language and what they hope to achieve. She encourages open dialogue in the comments section and looks forward to future lessons that will continue to enhance her students' understanding and proficiency in French. Geraldine's passion for teaching is evident as she reflects on the joy of helping others learn and appreciate the nuances of the French language and culture.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡French culture
💡language barrier
💡integration
💡asylum seekers
💡French lessons
💡modern French
💡casual racism
💡language and culture
💡personal experience
💡YouTube lessons
Highlights
Geraldine shares her personal journey of struggling with understanding and speaking English in the UK, despite being proficient in it.
She moved to Britain after completing her engineering degree in France to work as an engineer.
Geraldine's experience of cultural immersion in the UK included not understanding local jokes and the popularity of Doctor Who.
After two years in the UK, she decided to return to France to pursue a different career path.
Geraldine's mother's experience as a Mexican immigrant in France inspired her to help others integrate into French society.
She began teaching French at the Red Cross to asylum seekers to help them perfect their language skills and understand French culture.
Geraldine's realization that she could help people in a way she wished she had been helped led to her passion for teaching.
She started creating online French lessons after receiving enthusiastic support from her international friends.
Geraldine's YouTube channel, 'French with Géraldine', has over 8 million views and nearly 500 videos, helping students worldwide.
Her lessons aim to fill the gaps in understanding everyday modern French, including culture and customs.
Geraldine invites her audience to share their stories and reasons for learning French.
She expresses her love for teaching French and sharing her language and culture with others.
The transcript highlights the importance of understanding cultural nuances and everyday language for effective communication.
Geraldine's story emphasizes the value of personal experiences in overcoming language barriers.
Her initiative to help others integrate through language learning showcases the power of empathy and shared experiences.
The success of her YouTube channel demonstrates the demand for accessible language learning resources.
Geraldine's approach to teaching French is a testament to the effectiveness of combining language instruction with cultural education.
Transcripts
[Music]
if you're in love is everything French
you love French culture customs food the
country today of the history the
architecture but you struggle with
understanding everyday spoken French and
speaking it this is exactly where I was
ten years ago well I was not in the
exactly in the same situation because
for me that was English but I completely
understand what you're going through my
name is Geraldine repair and ten years
ago I was in love with everything
British with English itself and after my
engineering degree here in Ghana in the
Alps in France I moved to Britain in
Leeds actually in the north of England
in Yorkshire to get a job as an engineer
in Winfred that was fantastic
I loved English I my English was good
enough in order to get a job but every
day I was struggling with culture with
understanding the language itself the
jokes I didn't understand why everybody
was watching Doctor Who even if it was a
children program I was missing out on
lots of things and I didn't have anyone
to give you any answer not that I could
not ask questions but you can ask you
cannot ask people questions all the time
but to think that you don't understand
and there were lots of thing that I did
not know I didn't know so it was really
a struggle and after two years that were
wonderful I had a fantastic time there I
decided to move back to France to do
something else with my life because
being an engineer in a really big
company was not something that was
really my thing so I moved back to
France and I was really experiencing
what my mom experienced 38 years ago
because my my mom is Mexican so I'm
fully Mexican as well I have a Mexican
Passport
so she was born in Mexico and she moved
to France 30 years ago just for a visit
of the year she had a job here and she
did not speak any word of French she did
not know
think about the culture and then she met
my dad and decided it was a good country
she could stay and she had me so since I
was born I always experienced casual
racism and I saw the how much she was
struggling with speaking French which
was difficult which is still difficult
writing French which is still a
nightmare for her and but she understood
the culture and the customs and made
made it so but I always knew what it was
to be the foreigner because I could see
that in my mom so when I moved back to
France I did decided to help other
people integrate in my country like I
would have done for my mom if I could
and I started giving French lessons at
the Red Cross which was a fantastic time
I taught there for I think three years
and I was teaching to asylum seekers who
had a pretty good level of French and
this way I could help them perfect their
French fixed our little mistakes and
send the customs the news all these
little thing that I was missing when I
was in England and this was a revelation
for me because I could help people in a
way of would have liked to be helped and
I loved it so much that I decided to
start coming from sighs and I see I
talked to my American friends and also
if you British and Australian friends
here in Kanab and I asked them what do
you think about the idea of helping
people online to understand French speak
French and understand the culture better
and all said yes please do this I needed
for yesterday and it was such an
enthusiastic response that I got from my
friends that I started doing it and they
sent me so many questions that it was
very good so I could start making
lessons and also making paying programs
to help more people than just my group
of friends that Lisa Gherardini welcome
she come in France STV
live in France feel at home we have a
joke in France how do you spot a
foreigner in a cafe it's the one
drinking wine it's been eight years now
eight years in April 2022 I can believe
it
and I've been making one less than a
week for more than seven years which is
over five hundred four hundred videos
and that's crazy so all these lessons on
YouTube have helped so many people
[Music]
I've had over 8 million views so far so
I'm so happy because it's been helping
students all around the world for so
much time that I'm delighted to help you
speak French and understanding the
culture the customs and all this little
thing that have been missing from you
for so much time I told you why I love
teaching French so much and sharing my
language and culture but I would love to
hear from you what brought you to French
you can tell me what brought you to come
and processor as well I'm always curious
but what brought you to French why do
you love learning it and what do you
want to achieve tell me I would love to
hear from you I shared my story and I
would love for you to share yours let me
know the comments below and I hope to
see you next time in another lesson
about French culture or French language
to help you get better at understanding
and speaking everyday modern French
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