That's a cool story. I can totally see the embassy going to great length to make sure that kid could get a decent education. There are many, many khmers who arrive at LFRD without speaking a word of French (or English, for that matter), and in fact many of the bar kids I was talking about were simply pushed into the classroom without understanding a word of what was going on. After a year, they start getting the hang of it, and after 3 or more years, their French is impeccable. I admire them a lot for that, it can't be an easy situation. It's amazing to hear their Parisian accent, even though they've never actually been to Paris.Hemingway wrote:Great post. And I agree that it is better than most front pages articles.One of the interesting things about the LFRD (and any other French school abroad for that matter) is that by law they have to take any student whose nationality is French, regardless of whether the parents can afford the fees or not (if they can't the French embassy will pay some or all the school fees). It creates a microcosm that you can't find in other schools.
There was this kid whose mother was some country bumpkin who married an elderly French dude and by all accounts they all lived happily together at the further outskirts of PP. When the dude died, the embassy got wind of the kid and offered to take her free of charge. Good intentions and all, but the problem was that the family was utterly penniless. So they may not have had to pay the school fees, but they still couldn't afford the school lunches. Fine, said the school, school lunches will be free. Which is great but the mother couldn't afford the tuk tuk rides everyday back and forth. So she would come in the morning to bring the kid and then proceed to sit on the benches opposite the school for the whole school day (from 8 till 4pm) and then go home. Fine, said the school, and they actually bought her a cheap motorcycle (or it was donated by one of the teachers). So that was solved, but the kid was lost. She didn't speak French but was in second grade and was expected to read, write and know how to navigate the insanely convoluted rules of French grammar. Fine, said the school, we will get a tutor free of charge.
In the same classroom that the kid attended was the grandson (or great grandson, it's easy to lose track) of King Sihanouk. Ironically, that kid didn't know how to speak Khmer despite being Khmer royalty. But children always find a way to go past language barriers and so the two kids played, worked and laughed together, regardless of backgrounds. You don't get that at iCan, ISPP or NIS.
So here's to Lycée Descartes and its decaying buildings, which still holds the most diverse student crowd of all PP.
Just one thing I have to say: LFRD buildings are not decaying. They are spending enormous amounts of money on renovations and expansion. When I was there, I overheard the director saying that she expected LFRD to become one of the largest international schools in the region within 10 years.