Welcome José! Today we are going to talk about Paris as the cultural centre for the application of multiple languages in daily life, highlighting an average day in yours. Before we start, could you introduce yourself to our readers?

Sure. So, my name is José Vincente Gualy Blanco, and I am 28 years old. Originally, I am from Bogotá, Colombia, but I am currently living in Paris. I am doing a master’s degree in Culture Mediation at the Sorbonne Nouvelle University here in Paris, France. My previous education was a bachelor’s in Literature Studies which I completed back in Bogotá at the National University of Colombia.

I speak Spanish, English, and French, but also Portuguese and Norwegian. For the latter two languages I have obtained certificates on the B1 level of the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). I’m a native Spanish speaker, but when I was a child I learnt English at the same time, because I attended a bilingual school back home in Bogotá. During my teenage years, I decided to learn Portuguese and French, also at the same time. And, with the Norwegian language, I started during my exchange year in Oslo, Norway back in 2015.

Referring to Bogotá, Colombia, I presume that you probably speak a different kind of Spanish than the people in Europe are used to. 

Correct! We pertain to this ‘geographical’ accent. One could say that we tend to speak very slowly and that we vocalise every single thing. I believe that this is very distinctive and characteristic of our Colombian accent, especially coming from Bogotá. We pronounce every single letter of every single word which makes it different from other Spanish-speaking countries. 

Interesting. So, back to Paris. I am curious to know what the driving factors were to move to Paris to pursue your academic career in France. 

Well, let’s say that it was all… coming to Paris... the execution of a very delayed plan. I wanted to move to Paris when I was about seventeen or eighteen. Hence the fact that I was already learning French during my teenage years.  Despite my ambitions, I completed my bachelor’s back home and did not manage to apply for an exchange programme, because the universities in France and Colombia had different calendars throughout the academic year. So, one of the universities with an aligning academic calendar was a university in Oslo, Norway. After finishing my bachelor's degree, I worked for a while in Colombia. At some point, I decided that it was time to do a master’s degree. I tried all my luck to apply for a program in Paris and I got in. I am finally here and therefore fulfilled a part of my dream. The master’s program ‘Culture Mediation’ focuses on making culture more accessible to different types of the public. Basically, I learn how to create projects or manage cultural institutions in order to propose different ways of making culture thus more accessible. This results in an interdisciplinary approach in which bits of sociology, management and culture studies are blended. On top of that, Paris is one of the best cities in the world to fully engulf into this cultural environment. You have loads of museums, cinemas, theatres, and not forgetting to mention festivals. It is one of the biggest cultural capitals of Europe, if not the world. 

Yeah, I was actually thinking about the cultural significance of Paris. Are there any prime examples throughout your studies that really signify the relation to Paris? 

All the time, all the time! One example goes hand in hand with the difficult question of what type of actions are needed to take in order to attract a certain type of public. I remember that our university frequently attends a particular festival which focuses on new media and technologies applied in a cultural context, organised by Forum des Images. This institution's focus is safeguarding Paris’ history by creating a visual archive. This extends from movies that have been shot in Paris or works of visual art that have Paris as the main topic. Conclusively, I am really happy that I decided to do my studies in Paris, because it is such a rich place in cultural terms. You can explore things that you have not ever done before.

And then, Paris is also a very cosmopolitan city, achieving many confluences of languages. Given the fact you speak a handful of languages yourself, I would be interested to see how you deal with switching between these languages. 

Before the COVID-19 pandemic erupted, I used to live on my own in a small studio. I would describe it as an apartment in which I would only sleep because the rest of my life was spent outside. Of course, I have many Latin-American and Colombian friends. This led to me having conversations in Spanish almost every day, for example during my lunch breaks or around dinner time. My university courses were in French though. During these months I was using Spanish and French every day, equally divided 50/50 timewise. Then, the COVID-19 pandemic happened. During the first lockdown, I spent my time in a city named Nîmes, in the south of France, with the family of my best friend, a Franco-Argentinian student. There, I somewhat ended up in the same situation in which I spoke Spanish and French, intertwined, on a daily basis. 

When I got back to Paris, I moved to the Cité Internationale Universitaire de Paris which is a huge campus where students from all over the world reside. Due to the variety in the students' backgrounds, the common languages are English and French. This is quite funny, because when I wake up, I look at my phone and read all the messages from my friends and family back home in Colombia (due to the time difference). Thus, my first thoughts are in Spanish. During breakfast I usually communicate in English, because I will most likely bump into one of my roommates. Then, during the afternoon, I most often switch to French, because most of my classes are taught in French. In the evening I call my boyfriend who’s Brazilian, so then I try to communicate in Brazilian Portuguese. Conclusively, I speak the language depending on the situation, time, and place.

To me that sounds very exhausting! How do you deal with the switcheroo of all these languages? 

So, I must admit that it is exhausting indeed. However, you do get used to it. I mean, I have experienced it several times before I got to France. Firstly, because I had a bilingual education in English and Spanish. It definitely contributes to the fact that it is not tiresome at all to switch between those languages. In France, however, I could really sense I got super tired during the first two months. Switching between French and Spanish was something I was not familiar with on such a daily basis. In the beginning, when I got back home after a long day, I was obviously very tired. In those moments, my brain turned off and I didn’t bother to think or speak in French anymore. 

In the end, I just got used to it. I got used to changing between all of these languages very often which eventually led to my mind making a ‘click’. At some point, your mind assumes that you possess all the tools to use these languages interchangeably. I guess that your linguistic mind becomes more flexible after all.  

I bet your consistent routine also contributed to this. It seems you have somewhat of a daily structure in which the different languages become part of your routine as well. Of course, there will be days where you will focus more on a particular language. Then, it is key to keep working on the consistent use of all these languages. 

Yes. The daily routine definitely helps. Your mind is like another muscle. Like you said, you have to train it and so on. Something that helped me a lot was to understand that if I was not finding the right word in the respective target language, it wasn’t the end of the world. And you know, in the end it is just about trying not to feel too overwhelmed and simply trying to adapt, as I think most language learners might feel stressed or tired because of not knowing how to express themselves. I think it is just a matter of letting yourself loose and go wherever the wind blows.