Field Excursion: mes amis de DEA

October 1991: I had just finished my French language course (from CAVILAM, Vichy)and joined other French students of DEA (diplôme d'études approfondies, or "diploma of advanced studies") at the Universite d'Orsay, Paris sud, in order to carry out our two weeks' field excursion in northern France along the coastal region of baie de Sommes and Calais etc. We were strangers to each other and I was the only one who had just left a language school to join university students. It was a bit difficult for me in the beginning as they all used a lot of slang language while I was still behind in catching up with the slang part of the language because at the language school we were taught plain language and the students we interacted with were all non-French. Those two weeks provided the needed opportunity to familiarize myself with slang as well as to learn more about each others cultural values. Those were two brilliant weeks of my French life - ma vie a la francaise! We visited many places of historical importance during those two weeks' of geological excursions. I got on very well with everyone and later on during the year and in the coming years we became good friends.