Then I began to hear that this was not always the case. Too often, students fresh out of six months of FSI language training would go to post and find that nearly everyone in the embassy spoke English. If they didn’t have to work with many people outside the embassy, their skills would actually diminish. It made sense, of course, but I was determined that this would not happen to me.

In the past week, however, I’ve discovered a second problem with maintaining my French skills – the more I speak, the worse I get. Let me explain. When I was in class at FSI, the most important thing was to speak correctly. The second most important thing was to communicate my point. That meant that if we were discussing an environmental conference or an African election, it was better not to make grammatical mistakes than to communicate a nuanced point. Now it was still important to convey the general idea I wanted to get across, but beyond that, it was all about the grammar.

Now that we’re here, the opposite is true. When I’m speaking with Flynn’s nanny about how much to feed him or how he likes his bath or what to do when he’s spitting up, I quickly stop caring at all about grammar and only care that I communicate my point. Conjugation? No time for that. Vocabulary? Hand gestures work just as well. Past tense? She’ll get the idea.

So I’m hoping that my sloppy French speaking doesn’t stick with me and I don’t return to FSI in two years only to find I’ve gotten worse. I understand there are some classes at the embassy that can help me improve and I want to take advantage of them once I start working.

In the meantime, I’m going to continue to believe that the French word for “ironing” is actually just a hand gesture, that pronouns don’t really exist and that everything that has ever happened is continuing to happen at the present time.

With five weeks left before my due date, we decided it’s probably time to begin figuring this out. Several books are en route from BN.com (which is also helping us make progress on another goal: cashing in all our gift cards). In the meantime I posed this question on one of the Foreign Service discussion boards. Here’s some of the advice I’ve gotten so far:

• Only speak to the baby in your native language. No matter how good you get at your second language, you’re still not a native; you don’t want him to pick up your mistakes.
• Be consistent about who speaks to him in what language. So, for instance, even if the nanny speaks both English and French, she should only speak to him in French.
• Make sure the people spending a lot of time around your baby speaking the local language have the level of functionality you’re after. If they speak with grammatical errors or in a local dialect, that’s what your baby will learn.
• Put him in playgroups and other activities that force him to be immersed in the second language. Even if it seems like this is doing no good, stick with it. After six months of not uttering a word in the second language, he may suddenly open his mouth one day and speak fluently (well, as fluently as a toddler can speak).
• Don’t be discouraged if it seems like your baby’s speech is developing more slowly than his English-speaking peers. If you add up the words he’s learning in both languages, his vocabulary is just as big. And he’ll eventually catch up with the English.
• Have a plan for keeping up the language skills when you’re no longer living somewhere the second language is spoken.

Anything else you would add?

About a month and a half ago I took my end-of-training exam, and then afterwards I gave myself a much needed break. It was the holidays. And focusing on French for six months is tiring. And then I started ConGen. But now… well, it’s been a month and a half. It’s time.

I was counting on getting back into the swing of things in a structured way, through free classes offered by the Global Language Network. Unfortunately free language classes must have sounded like a great idea to a lot of other people too; neither Andy nor I won a spot in the lottery.

What now?

I keep meaning to go to the French-speaking meet up groups that I used to attend fairly regularly, but so far it hasn’t happened. (There’s one tonight, for example, but there’s also a going away shin-dig hosted by one of my last remaining A-100 colleagues.) I keep promising myself that I’ll read several French articles a day, but after a frustrating first day that plan fell away. (I could understand mostly everything, but my brain translated to English much more than before, which really slowed me down.) So then I decided at the very least I could listen to the news in French every morning while I was getting ready. I’ve been doing a decent job of that, but 10 minutes of listening comprehension isn’t really enough to maintain my skills, let alone improve them.

By the time I get to Cotonou I’m going to have been done with French classes for longer than I was ever in French classes. If I feel like I’ve lost a lot now, I can’t imagine what it’s going to be like in July. So, yes, I need to try harder to find time for French. And I will. I promise. Starting… tomorrow?

What have you done to maintain your language skills after training?

I took my French exam today. The results: 2+/3.

What this means is that I scored a 2+ on the oral section and a 3 on the reading section. Since my goal was a 3/3, it seems like I passed one section, but barely missed out on the other.

But alas, it’s not so simple.

You see, in order to get bonus points on the management register, I needed a 3 in the oral section. The reading section doesn’t matter for bonus points. I could have eaten the articles instead of reading them, but as long as I scored a 3 on the oral section, I’d have gotten my bonus.

So what now? Well, since I’m an EFM and not an FSO, my French days at FSI are over until I’m actually hired. I can still take the phone test to get points on the management register in the traditional route, but right now I’m a little too burnt out on French to really think about that. What I will need to do, however, is find a way to maintain my French skills (or lack thereof – signed, The French Department) until we go to Benin. That seems like a good activity for after the holidays.

Alex wanted me to add two more things. Despite not quite achieving my goal, I’m proud of how far I’ve come in just six months. And French isn’t really just for jerks.

What makes this even more surprising is that I performed horrendously during my exam today. I totally forgot all the complicated tricks I had up my sleeve to try to seem more advanced than I really am. Worse yet, I made dumb mistakes I never make in class. I don’t know why this happened. Nerves, perhaps? It certainly didn’t help that my examiner just so happened to be the one person in the whole French Department who intimidates me, with her perfect accent and seeming disdain for every word that comes out of my mouth. (She subbed for my class a few months ago for one very, very long day.) Although, to be fair, she was perfectly nice during my test this morning, even during my exit interview while stressing several times that despite passing, I still really, really need to work on my accent.

In any case, I got my 3/3. This is good news because:

• I’m ready to say au revoir to French at FSI. It’s tiring. I need a break.
• I’m really proud of myself for passing. Even without the pregnancy, it was unlikely. With the pregnancy, I really thought it was impossible.
• I get the rest of the week off. Helllllo, Christmas shopping!
• Passing and moving on to other training will result in a longer Christmas break than if I’d remained in French. Sweet!

However, this isn’t all good, because:

• Since I can’t go to post until after giving birth, I’ll have to do something work-related in DC until May. Frankly, as much as I’m ready for a break from French, more class would have been a lot easier than what I’ll likely end up doing when my other training ends in February: a bridge assignment at Main State.
• French class has no dress code. Main State does. Have you seen maternity business suits? Yeah, me too. They’re horrible. And expensive.

In the long run, I’ll probably kick myself for getting my 3/3 on the first go — not just to avoid a potentially exhausting bridge assignment during my third trimester, but also because my French still definitely needs work. The idea of having intelligent conversions in French as a representative of the American government, well, that terrifies me. Trust me, no matter what FSI says, I’m not ready. For that reason, more training wouldn’t have been so bad.

But oh well. For now, at least, passing feels pretty good. As does all the lounging around I have planned for the rest of the week!

Alex: It seems like nobody passes the French test. I’m nervous.
Andy: I bet you’ll do fine, stop worrying.
Alex: Be quiet. You don’t have to pass the test. You don’t even have to take it.
Andy: Um, here’s our dog, play with her for a while.

Well, fast forward to five months later and the roles have reversed. While Alex still has to take the test, the pressure is mostly off of her. After all, we’re going to be here until August no matter what. What’s another month or two in French class but a chance to improve her speaking and avoid the need to buy maternity suits for a bridge assignment at Main State? Besides, almost nobody passes the test the first time around.

Me on the other hand, now I’m starting to feel the pressure. Let me explain. As an EFM, I have no real obligation to take the two-hour end of training exam. I don’t have to achieve a certain score in order to go with Alex to Benin. If I wanted to, I could just decide that today was my last day of French class and spend the rest of December sleeping until noon, hanging out with my dog and eating cereal directly from the box.

But I do have motivations to continue. First, the better I speak French, the better I will be able to conduct important business in Benin, such as getting our car tuned up or arranging for golf lessons on the country’s only golf course. And unlike Alex, my French training will likely end with my test on December 20 even if I fail. Typically EFMs aren’t able to get additional training.

Second, if I manage to pass the oral section of my end of training exam, that will give me bonus points on the management register. That means I won’t have to take the phone test that most FSO candidates take to get an extra boost. But if I don’t pass the oral section, I’ll still be able to take the phone test right away, and I’ll have a pretty good idea of my weaknesses.

So lately, the roles have been reversed. I find myself feeling a little stressed while Alex is more relaxed. I’m the one up early doing homework, grumbling when I’m interrupted, and she’s getting an extra hour of sleep.

Bon chance à moi.

It wasn’t that advice alone that made this seem like good time for us, but alas, here we are. And now I’ll let you in on a secret: being pregnant during language training isn’t necessarily all that sweet of a deal. Admittedly, I haven’t experienced pregnancy under any other circumstances, and I’m sure there are always challenges, but still, I think this must be especially rough. Let me explain.

Pro: The hours are good. You spend 4-5 hours a day in class (depending on the language) and then so some homework and lab work whenever it’s convenient for you. Not too shabby. This works especially well for doctors appointments and such.

Con: This schedule requires a great deal of initiative, which can be hard to come by if you’re not feeling well.

Admittedly, it’s probably a wonderful arrangement if you’re one of those lucky people who feels more or less normal during your pregnancy. Like my mom. She had absolutely no morning sickness whatsoever while carrying either my sister or me, so I naively assumed I’d be the same. Well, unfortunately, the maternity gods had something else in mind. Darn them.

From week 5 to 13 I felt nauseous and dizzy and tired pretty much constantly, and threw up several times many days too, even though I was able to eat basically nothing. Despite this, I managed to miss only 1/2 day of French class in body, as hard as that was to pull off. Knowing that any sick time I took now subtracted from the amount of (paid) maternity leave I could take later was good motivation.

So, I showed up. I went through the motions of what I was supposed to be doing. And I think if I had been working a normal job, while I clearly wouldn’t have done my finest work ever, I would have at least gotten by. But with language learning, showing up and going through the motions doesn’t cut it. Even though I was at FSI physically, I was definitely not there mentally. My body was in triage mode: focusing on keeping crackers in my stomach instead of hurling them on my classmates took precedence over the nuances between lequel and dont. (Dear classmates, you’re welcome.) In language training, if you’re not able to absorb the information, you’re not getting by; you’re getting nowhere.

Before I started feeling bad, I was also doing a fair amount of studying on my own too, but these last two months I’ve spent the majority of my non-class hours sleeping. (And bossing around my husband, Andy insists that I add.)

From week 13 until now, week 17, I’m definitely feeling better, but I’m still not 100%. As much as I’d love to give the same amount of effort to my French studies as I did the first few months after I started, it’s just not possible.

Come to think of it, language training during pregnancy might not be so bad if I were the sort of person who was able to alter my expectations of myself accordingly. Unfortunately I am not that person, which I guess is the real problem. (And, I’m sure very few of you fellow FSOs out there are that sort of person either.) So, I’ve been feeling horrible physically. And on top of that, I’ve been feeling guilty for not being able to study very much. And as a result of that, I’ve been feeling frustrated about not making as much progress as I’d like.

Yes, there are definitely certain advantages to being pregnant during language training (being in DC rather than some far-flung country for medical care is another of them), but it’s not a completely painless journey. I just thought you should know.

Good: Successfully arriving at our first hotel in Nice, and explaining that we were early but asking if we could leave our bags behind the front desk until check-in time.

Bad: Successfully arriving at our hotel in Marseille and having no idea what the staff was saying to us. I blame the Marseille accent.

Good: Reading and completely understanding the service disruptions posted at the tram station in Marseille.

Bad: Struggling with the Marseille public transportation website which was only in French. I’m going to blame the accent again with this one.

Good: Negotiating, in French of course, some extra conversation classes at our school in Nice.

Bad: Failing to negotiate, even in English, a discounted rate on our breakfast in Marseille.

Good: Ordering dinner in French every night and always getting what we asked for.

Bad: Somehow accidentally ordering a coffee at a bakery when we’re pretty sure we didn’t ask for one.

Good: Realizing that everything we’re being taught at FSI is real. The words and phrases we learn aren’t just theory like imaginary numbers in math. They have real uses outside of the classroom. They are part of a real language that millions of people use every day. Learning French is not just some futile exercise designed to demoralize students at FSI. Understanding this gives us a great deal of motivation to keep going despite the difficulty.

Bad: At the same time realizing just how far we still have to go to be remotely conversational in real world situations. It’s great that we know two words for “car.” Unfortunately there are probably six more that we’ve never heard. We found that we could ask questions and usually understand the answers. But when we were in situations where we had no idea what to expect, and people were speaking at a normal rate without dumbing it down, things got real tough real fast.

Our trip was a good one and we walk away feeling motivated as we head down the final stretch (maybe) of our French lessons.

The fact that we could be sitting in Turkish class two years from now trying desperately to avoid using French is not something we allow ourselves to think about.

See you in two weeks! We’re off to France for our immersion trip!

In truth, we’re not actually leaving until tomorrow after our morning French class, but I have to ban myself from the Internet for the rest of the day because I’ve done absolutely nothing thus far to prepare for our departure. Aren’t people supposed to get more responsible with age? I seriously used to pack for trips weeks in advance. Sigh. What’s become of me?

Anyway, we’ll be based in Nice, but we’ll also be spending a weekend in Marseille and a day in Monaco. And wherever else our shaky French skills lead us…

Did I mention this counts as work? Yep, life is good.