“Sydney I’m really sorry to bother you…” Véronique’s words drifted into my ears as I came to after a fitful nap on the couch. Was I still dreaming? Why is she speaking English? Were my first thoughts as a pushed my flu-ridden body to a seated position.
“Uh…désolé, pardon?” I managed out.
She continued in English, probably to be absolutely certain I understood, which only verified the seriousness of what she was about to say, “The Gendarmerie, they want to speak with you, today.”
Oh shit was my next thought. The Gendarmerie, aka the COPS wanted to interview me??
Before proceeding with the story I should probably back up a bit to provide context. And you know, verify I have never been a criminal or “person of interest” in any crime, in any country.
There had been an incident the day before, a few days into my stay with the family of which Véronique (or Véro) was the mother.
The neighbor girl (whose name I cannot recall) and I were taking the family ponies back to their yard. Upon descending down the hill to the vineyard where the ponies lived we noticed someone across the path.
At first we both assumed it was Léo, Véro’s husband (my host parents during my stint in Bordeaux wine country) working on the vines. However, as we approached we noticed all the fencing around the ponies’ paddock was torn down.
“Qui est là? (who is there?)” I asked the neighbor whose name escapes me.
“Ce n’est pas Léo (that’s not Léo)” she responded, confirming my suspicion. She then rambled on frantically and from what I could gather she thought we should take the ponies back up to the house.
We placed the ponies in a makeshift corral in the giant woodshed slash car port and entered the house to tell Véro about the strange man and the torn down fencing.
Upon recounting the story to Véro she became very agitated and started asking more questions to the neighbor girl. I started to gather this was indeed a strange occurrence, but there was more to the story.
However, in the middle of all the craziness (Véro was on the phone, Léo had taken off in the truck and the children had come out to see what all the excitement was about) my dad called. Being an amazing daughter I answered, despite the potential crisis unfolding in front of me.
“Hi Dad”.
“Hey how’s it going? The family nice?”
“Yeah super nice, but there’s a bit of a situation.”
“Oh yeah? What’s up?”
I recounted what had just happened, “So basically from what I can gather there’s an intruder on the vineyard somewhere.”
After a bit shorter conversation than I’m sure my dad had expected I rejoined the madness unfolding in the kitchen. Véro quickly caught me up on the vineyard drama.
Based on the description we gave, Véro and the kids concluded it had to be the neighboring vineyard sabotaging the fencing. Why, you may ask?
Well as Véro put it “nous sommes en guerre avec les voisins.”
Translation: “we are at war with our neighbors.”
A bit dramatic, like Montague and Capulet level stuff. Okay maybe not that intense, but still a guerre??
What exactly was the reasoning behind the “war” (dispute really)?
Well, apparently Véro and Léo had slowly built the yard for the ponies over a period of months. And before beginning the process they’d consulted Véro’s parents (who started the vineyard) about property lines.
Her Father insisted that where they were planning to build the pony yard was his land. However, the neighboring vineyard disagreed (but only said so AFTER the yard had been finished) and over a period of months had pulled little stunts (like destroying la maison de ponies!) to illustrate their frustration.
This incident seemed to be the tipping point in the dispute and after about an hour Véro and Léo decided to call the police instead of going into full-on vigilante mode.
Fast forward to my flu-induced nap on the couch and Véro’s wake up call. The police wanted to talk to me ASAP because 1) I was technically a witness and 2) I wasn’t a resident of the area and they didn’t want me to leave without giving my version of the events.
So approximately an hour after Véro’s had woken me up, Léo and I were on the way to the local Gendarmerie. On the drive there I had two main thoughts 1) Oh god, am I going to be able to speak in English? I don’t know if my French is good enough to speak to police and 2) Oh god, I really don’t feel well enough to do this. To be fair my stomach was NOT happy and I had a very sore throat.
When we arrived at the station a police officer took both of us into a room that resembled any generic office space. There were two desks with computers, a window and a door, as well as an officer behind each desk.
We were told to each sit down with one officer. Thank god. This was much more bearable than I’d imagined. For the record I was picturing a CSI-esque (or any crime show) interrogation room, but like more French.
I handed my passport over for proof of identification, the officer briefly looked it over then proceeded with questions.
“Comment vous appelez-vous?”
Umm didn’t you just look at my passport? Right don’t be sassy to law officials. “Sydney Baker” which I then proceeded to spell out for him in French.
“Votre numéro de téléphone?” I gave him my phone number.
The questions continued in French and I responded in French, the whole time thinking: holy shit, I’m doing this, I hope he understands what I’m saying, okay made it through that one….
Then it was time to give my official statement. “Vous pouvez parler en anglais, comme vous voulez” he said.
YES. Oh btw – translation: “You can speak in English if you like.” I wasn’t going to have to stumble through a story I didn’t fully understand in a foreign language, hurray!
I began to recount the previous afternoon’s events, by the time I’d finished I realized he hadn’t written a single thing down. Not. A. Single. Thing.
I was pretty peeved, I’d dragged my sick butt down there, gone through a whole interview in a foreign language, while sick to my stomach AND a horrible sore throat. Yet he couldn’t be bothered to take notes.
After a minute of awkward silence he said, “I’m sorry, I don’t speak English very well, je ne comprend pas ce que vous avez dit”. Okay fair enough, but WHY oh WHY then would he go out of his way to assure me I could give my statement in English?? I was so so so confused AND irritated.
He then promptly got up and when to talk to two other officers in the back of the room. When he returned he informed me that unfortunately, the officers who could translate weren’t at the station that day. He then asked me to please repeat en français.
Again I was pretty peeved, he couldn’t have checked this before asking a sick girl to give a statement? Even though I’d been nervous I’d have gladly attempted a French statement initially, had I been asked. Now I was going to repeat myself, with a sore throat and upset stomach!
I struggled through, and probably mispronounced a few words, incorrectly used a tense or two and maybe forgot a few adjective agreements. But, he didn’t ask me to repeat myself, and even wrote notes this time! He asked a few follow up questions, thanked me and once Léo had finished we were on our merry way.
I have to say the entire ordeal was a bit of a turning point for me. After it had all sunk in I realized that was something most people, most Americans would probably never experience.
Oh my god. I just gave a police statement, in French, and I think they understood.
After enduring the whole thing I had a major boost of confidence in the whole speaking French department. Dinner parties were suddenly less intimidating. Explaining to the children that fighting constantly was not a nice way to spend school holidays was a breeze.
Looking back I’m actually quite glad this happened at the beginning of my stay, it allowed me to trust myself when speaking French. I believe my language ability blossomed in France afterwards because of this.
I continue to think back to this incident anytime I need a boost of confidence. Whether that be for a job interview, meeting new people or trying new things, if I can give a police statement in a foreign language, then I have the ability to do a lot of things.
How about you? Did you ever have any law enforcement encounters in a foreign language? Or a breakthrough moment when learning a new language? Comment below!
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