Wednesday, April 27, 2011

'Art de Vivre'

The French lifestyle in true sense can be called a balanced lifestyle. What I mean by a ‘balanced lifestyle’ is a routine where work and vacation, fun and hard work, family and career are completely balanced. French call it “Art de vivre”. It is, in true sense, a very beautiful art of living. The French have a 35 hour work week when they work, they have a long lunch break when they enjoy their meal in a relaxed fashion, they have vacation at the end of a certain period when they travel with family and friends to neighbouring country or city. Everything seems to be aimed towards enjoying life more and reducing stress.

French do not compromise when it comes to enjoying life and that same value is reflected on individual’s family life. In France, every family seems to live very artistically. While the French culture can be described as being influenced by beauty and elegance rather than efficacy, it can also be defined by the expected fulfillment of duties and responsibilities towards ones family. French family life is a perfect balance between a happy, relaxing upbringing and a duty-seeking environment. Furthermore, it is a matter about paying back what you had once received. As young infants and youth parents fulfill their responsibilities as parents and when the child grows up certain obligations are anticipated of him or her towards the family.

A student at Amiens School Of Management who is a third year graduate level student remarks, ‘family values in France does not necessarily support the idea of separating after one is capable of supporting oneself, there are certain duties that are expected to be fulfilled’. The student’s remark is very apparent in practice in Amiens at least where students age 25-26 are still living with their family while still having a well paid job or an internship. Helping and supporting their family by living with in the family highlights the importance togetherness in French culture.

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Introduction


Hi everyone,
My name is Rochana Kaushik and I am currently on an exchange program in Amiens, France. Amiens is a very beautiful city that is located just an hour away from the beautiful Paris. I have been in Amiens for eight months now and during my stay here, I got the opportunity to experience and recognize a lot of new things about the French culture. So far, it has been nothing but a pleasant experience. Following the good experience I had in this period of time, I wanted to talk about some the aspects of the French culture in order to provide a closer insight on how the French society is built. Hence I decided to build a blog to introduce the French family life and values. I believe that family values influence the formation of societies. I also believe that different cultures have different family values and lifestyle. Therefore, I will be posting regularly about things I learnt and noticed about family life, family orientation, family values, etc. in Amiens (in particular) and France (in general) up until now

Below are some pictures that reflect the life in Amiens.