Grad School- Conference in France

After a few years of working in Professor Sunshine’s lab, I was fortunate to be invited to present a poster and give a talk at a conference in France. I should explain at this point that Prof Sunshine is not American, but is British. He also did research in several different European countries as part of his doctorate. Most European science labs speak English, but you generally need to learn the local language to speak with support staff. So I assumed that he spoke enough French to get by. Well, apparently Prof Sunshine’s idea of speaking the local language is to say English words with the accent of the local language. It was absolutely hilarious! Even better- everyone at the conference knew that the scientist and student from our lab consisted of 1 American and 1 Brit. However, I was consistently identified as British and Prof Sunshine as American! Boy did that tick him off! Perhaps Prof Sunshine should have chosen a wardrobe other than sneakers, stained shorts and ripped T-shirts. Presenting while wearing a T-shirt that said “F-You!” probably didn’t help matters any. To add insult to injury- I was wearing American dog tags (replicas of my husband’s), yet I was still consistently identified as the Brit. Silly wanker.

One thing that I did learn was that my education in French was woefully lacking in such useful items as how to order a pint of beer that was on tap. Luckily, a professor from Quebec quickly taught me this key phrase (Une pinte de bière pression s’il vous plait). However, the language barrier defeated both the prof from Quebec and myself at lunch the first day. Lunch was served as a buffet. However, no one was permitted to serve themselves- you had to indicate what you wanted to one of the servers. I noticed that the servers were getting a bit disgruntled as people pointed to the dishes they wanted. So I politely said “I would like these three dishes, please” (Je voudrais ces trois plats, s’il vous plait). I then pointed to the dishes that I wanted. If the dishes had been labeled, I would have asked for them by name. I was then given 3 servings of the first dish I indicated. I glanced at the prof from Quebec, he shrugged and then pointed to what he wanted. When we reached our table, he told me that he would have asked the same way I did! For the rest of the conference, I just followed everyone else’s lead and just pointed.

The language barrier also resulted in my being offered a post-doc at this conference. After my talk, I was invited to sit with some of the senior scientists (presumably to discuss my research). The waiter came around and took everyone’s drink orders. I ordered non-carbonated water as I was quite thirsty after talking. If you didn’t specify “normal” or “natural” water, then you got carbonated water by default. After the drinks arrived, one of the senior scientists asked me how I obtained “non-bubbly” water. When I explained I had ordered it, he asked me to order him a bottle of regular water. I caught the waiter’s attention and made the request. When the bottle of water was delivered to the table, the scientist turned to me and asked if I’d like to post-doc in his lab! So basically, by using a phrase that anyone with access to an English-to-French dictionary could come up with, I was offered a post-doc. Apparently my ability to order non-carbonated water in French was more important to this gentleman than completion of my doctorate. Made me wonder what the “qualifications” of his other post-docs were!