French opened the world up to Yusef Bushara.

He spent two years studying in the south of France and is now completing a degree in Hong Kong.

The 21-year-old thinks he might have taken a more traditional educational route were it not for “the great opportunity” L’Alliance Francaise des Bermudes gave him while in his early teens.

“The things that happened to me since are just like an expanding sort of world view that I got by going to France and studying there for a month,” he said.

“Even though that isn’t much time, I just realised that other things were possible – that I could study abroad and have these unique opportunities that I wouldn't have had. So it was kind of like my first sort of step outside of Bermuda to see that it's important to be able to seek opportunities out that you don't hear spoken of so often when you're home.”

L’Alliance Francaise is a non-profit organisation and has offered French immersion courses to Bermuda students since 2001 through fundraisers and financial assistance from the Christian Humann Foundation.

About 120 children between the ages of 14 and 16 have enjoyed trips – first to French-speaking Canada and to France itself since 2008.

Students are selected based on their writing and conversational ability.

Yusef, who began French lessons with Elaine Smith and continued with Anne-Laure Bazin while a student at Somersfield Academy, learnt about the programme through his sister, Hana, who had participated two years earlier.

“I wanted to take opportunities to become fluent more seriously and then this programme popped up and so I just gave it a shot when I was 14.

“I went to Cannes for the month and spent my time doing an immersion programme. And then I guess that's when the seed was placed.”

As he prepared to apply for university it hit him that “maybe the US, Canada and the UK aren't the only options”.

“And so that's how I found out about Science Po and ended up at university in France.”

The Middle Eastern Studies programme offered by the school was also appealing to Yusef.

“My dad is from Sudan and growing up I was just really keen on learning about our cultural heritage. I ended up majoring in political science with a Middle Eastern concentration. I just wanted to know myself better and have an academic understanding of the things that shaped my heritage on my dad's side.”

Although he signed up for the English-speaking programme offered by Science Po, about 40 per cent of Yusef’s classes were in French.

“It's trial by fire,” he said. “I took a while to sort of get comfortable again, but I wasn't new to French at this point. I'd been taking French since I was very, very small but it was relatively new in a fluent context.”

Yusef spent two years in Menton before moving to the University of Hong Kong, where he is pursuing a degree in English studies. He is now fluent in French but it is not part of his course work. However, as “the largest expatriate community in Hong Kong is actually a French one”, the language is not going to waste.

Ultimately, he hopes to study “Caribbean literature and Caribbean thought at the graduate level”.

“This could look like a creative writing or post-colonial studies programme. The key thing for me is to find an institution that lets me write creatively and build a reconditioned framework for understanding the Caribbean on a perceptual level.

“I’d like to find language, embedded in French and English créoles, that match the experiences of people in the region so that we can loosen our imagination and envision futures that feel entirely like our own.”

At home, working at the Bermuda National Gallery for the summer, Yusef’s advice to students interested in language is to take advantage of every opportunity given.

“Learning a language makes you want to understand the world and as many languages as you can. So once you start it's hard to stop,” he said.

“It doesn't have to be French. Alliance Francaise is a great opportunity if you're interested in French but there are so many language programmes and study-abroad programmes if you have interest in a language, so seek them out. My life is remarkably different than it would have been if I hadn't gone on that trip.”

For more information about L’Alliance Francaise des Bermudes visit www.alliancefrancaisebda.org/