Many people claim that it is hard to learn a new language, get in touch with a new culture and its ways when you are an adult. Luckily our online school has a lot of amazing students that prove this theory wrong every day!
Madeleine is from France and has a PhD in musicology. She now lives in the US and is a cellist. She composes music and covers known songs with her cello. The well-known Greek song “O dikos mou o dromos” is one of the songs she has recently covered and sent us. Her rendition of this song and the melody of her cello amazed us which is why we wanted to tell her story. What amazed us even more after talking with her, is that she told us everything in Greek!
“I’ve been learning Greek because my boyfriend comes from the Greek minority of Constantinople. They speak Greek with his family and his mother doesn’t speak English or French. Luckily, now I can have simple conversations with her.”
We really want to know why she likes to do cello covers of popular Greek songs and her answer is something we had never thought of before…
“I really like Greek songs because they have a beautiful and somehow melancholic melody. This suits an instrument like the cello quite well. My experience with Greek music dates way back. Some years ago I had a cello teacher who was Greek. We started playing Greek songs with him and then we even traveled to Crete in the summer. We did a concert with Greek musicians there and played music in the street every night.”
Madeleine likes to share these amazing stories, which seem to have properly initiated her in the Greek lifestyle, with her Greek LOL teacher, Stella, too.
“I love having Greek classes at Greek LOL and my teacher, Stella, has actually become my good friend.”
Stella also loves having classes with Madeleine. She tells us that Madeleine writes very nice texts in Greek that she has a great imagination and that she surprises Stella because she always adds 2-3 new words that she finds on her own. Stella believes that what really helps Madeleine with her amazing progress in Greek is that she always tries to speak Greek whenever she is around Greek people and that she really enjoys the process of learning something new.
What is certain is that when you learn to love something, whether this is the beautiful melody of a unique instrument like the cello or learning a new language like Greek, good results and progress are a one-way street!
Thank you Madeleine for sharing your story and for being part of the Greek LOL online family!
