Don't Come To Québec.

I started this post on Friday when I was frustrated and discouraged about French. It wasn't pretty. I went to add to it on Sunday when I was frustrated about having woken up late and then having been late for church set-up. I tried to save the post but ended up unintentionally deleting half of it.

So I gave up on it. I ended up writing a more humorous and encouraging post instead, aka my last post. One of my faults is that I hide my negative emotions (frustration, sadness, anger, pain, hurt, etc.) behind the mask of humour.

I thought the post I put out would be better, funnier, more appealing if I made light of the fact that I woke up two hours late. Put an amusing spin on my frustrating, embarrassing, internship nightmare of a morning.

But over lunch yesterday, I was talking with Joey and Norton about my frustrations, the suffering that I've experienced here while trying to integrate into the French culture here. They told me to write about it. They told me it should be raw, it should be real, it should be titled "Don't Come to Quebec". So I didn't make this title up on my own. It's kind of clickbait-y tbh.

But here I go. This is how it really is. This is the mess, the frustration, the hurt of transitioning to a new province, a new culture.

The view from Camp Livingstone, where we had the leaders retreat.

It's hard. Being a new person is harder than I thought it would be. I remember it from going to a new school in grade five, from starting high school, from moving into dorm at Bible college for the first time. It's even harder when you come to a new province where 95% of the people speak a language that you only understand 50% of (I Googled this stat, OKAY?). I'm used to being able to understand everything that everyone is saying to me at any given time. 

That's why I was frustrated with French on Friday. The majority of the sessions at the retreat were translated - which was super cool!!!!! - because the leaders retreat was a combined retreat between the French and English sides of the church. But on Friday (for a couple hours in the morning + a couple in the afternoon), the French side was separate from the English, and everything was in French.

It was isolating. I was the only person in the room who couldn't understand everything that everyone was saying at any given time. And man, did I feel it.

The worst moment was when everything was explained to all of the French leaders of Église 21, and then we broke into our small discussion groups and Joey asked me, "Did you understand that?"

"No..."

"Did you understand ANY of it?!"

"No."

I felt defeated. I felt like I should be better than I am. And that's a yucky gross not fun yucky yucky feeling.

Another thing that's been really tough with this transition has been allowing myself to make genuine connections with people. I've met many people, and I want to genuinely connect. I thrive on connecting, on deep relationships, on feeling like I belong.

It's hard though because I know that I'll be leaving before the end of 2018, and I get attached to friendships so easily that it's painful for me to think about connecting with people so deeply only to leave them before the year is out.

The other hard part of the connections thing comes back to being the new person. My brain is a constant stream of, 

'Is this person just being nice to me because I'm new?'

'These people already have such deep connections with each other; I can't just force myself into their group'

'I don't fit in'.

It's a constant battle with my brain, forcing myself to get out there, making connections, be open and vulnerable even when it's hard and I won't be here too long.

I also struggle a lot with knowing why I'm here. It's hard because I prayed so much before making the decision to come to Montréal; I'm not just here on some decision I made on a post-undergraduate spontaneous whim. I felt God calling me here. I know He wants me to be here. But it's another mind struggle.

'This is hard. Why did I come here?'

'Will I be here long enough to make an impact? Do I need to make an impact?'

'Why is transitioning so tough?'

'What is the purpose of this? What in the world am I doing?!?!'

If you expect coming to Québec to be easy, it's not. So don't do it. Don't come to Québec if you're thinking it'll be an easy time.

"And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you." (1 Peter 5:10 - ESV)