Compréhension
1. The main character is Amit.
2. He was born in the USA. "[…] people always assumed that he'd been born and raised in that country and not in Massachusetts." .
3.
a) Langford is where his boarding school is situated and where his parents sent him when he was 15 when they moved to Delhi.
b) Winchester is the town where he used to go to high school and live before going to Langford.
c) Calcutta is the city where most of his relatives live.
d) Delhi is where his parents moved to after leaving Winchester.
e) Massachusetts is the state where he was born.
4. His parents are from India. His father is a well-known scientist, he is an eye-specialist. The family is rich. They have a high social status and must belong to the upper-middle-class.
5. The family had to travel and move frequently to different countries because of the father's job, as a result Amit was sent as a boarder to Langford.
6. – Amit had to work harder to keep being a good student as Langford academic level is high. "At his high school in Winchester he'd been a star student, but suddenly he'd had to work doggedly to maintain his grades." . – The rules at Langford are different from the ones he knew when he was at Winchester High school. "He had to […] call his teachers `masters'" , "He had slipped as best as he could into this world […] calling boys by their last names" , "He had to […] attend chapel on Sundays" . – He had to dress differently as well. "He had to wear a jacket every morning to his classes" , "[…] jeans were not allowed" . – The social background of his schoolmates was not the same. "[…] he learned that his parents' wealth was laughable compared to the majority of Langford boys." . – He had a different lifestyle. "There was no escape at the end of the day […]" , "[…] he was crippled with homesickness, missing his parents […]" , "He sought traces of his parents faces and voices among the people who surrounded and cared for him […]" .
7. As Langford was totally new to him and he had to change life, he did his best to fit in and to adapt to that new lifestyle.
8. His parents didn't want to uproot him from an environment he knew even though Langford partly changed his life, that's why they sent him there not to force him to adapt to India. Morevover, they wanted the best schools and university for him, so that he could succeed and have a wide range of opportunities in his future life.
9. Although Amit had to change life and to adapt to a new one at Langford, he seems to enjoy his new life and independence but he is still resentful and blames his parents for sending him there and leaving him in America, that's why he is homesick.
Expression
1. Amit, Langford, USA Dear father and Mother, I'm writing to you as it's been quite a long time now since you left to settle in India, so I wanted to tell you about my life here at the end of that first semester at Langford. I must admit I was a bit lost and I had mixed-feelings at first as life here is totally different from the one I had when we lived in Winchester, but everything is alright. The school is of course different but life at school is also radically different as well. When I attended school in Winchester we didn't use to call our teachers "masters", here it is what we have to call them, but needless to say I got used to it immediately. Something which is also new to me is that our masters call us by our last name. Although I'm not a Christian, here I have to attend church every Sunday, but I feel happy doing that as it is a means for me to discover what it is being a Christian, however it seems strange to me. You remember, I used to wear jeans when I went to high school in Winchester, here it is not allowed so I had to change that too and wear a jacket. You can see that I have had to adapt to a very different lifestyle here, but it is fine and my schoolmates are very friendly with me. It is different from the life we used to have when we lived altogether in Winchester but somehow it teaches me to adapt to new situations, to fit in a different group of people and to become autonomous and gain independence which is something that a young man must learn so as to stand on his own two feet at one moment or another. I really appreciate that and think it has made me become more mature and I'm very happy with that. I'm looking forward to hearing from you soon and anyway I'll see you when I visit you for Christmas. Love from Amit
2. Parents always hope that their children are going to make good choices, that's why they can help offering advice to make sure no harms happen to their offsprings. If the advice is not synonymous with pressure it can be helpful and well-accepted. Still some parents go further and try to make decisions for the young, either to protect them or because they are convinced that they alone can be right. They sometimes want to influence our personal choices but we do not agree with them and sometimes argue because they want to impose their point of views which are not always in tune with the time being but rather with the time when they were younger. We can say that the generation gap quite often causes these conflicts because teenagers are nearly adults and don't want to be treated as babies any longer. Parents' and children's lifestyles differ and create tensions which may disappear when we grow up and come of age. Whatever the reason, this attitude can be an obstacle to their children's development. Besides, it may lead to rebellion and refusal of any advice whatsoever. Young people should be led to independence, that's how far interference should go.
Traduction
À Noël et à chaque fin d'année scolaire, Amit quittait Langford et rejoignait ses parents à Delhi, où il s'installait dans leur appartement rempli de domestiques à Chittaranjan Park, dans une chambre sobre réservée à ses séjours. Il n'aimait pas ses visites à Delhi et son Bengali mal maîtrisé inutile dans cette ville. Ces séjours le rendaient nostalgique de Calcutta où il avait l'habitude d'aller et où vivait toute sa famille.
