French School Students Tour Sydney

3 June 2009

While the ship’s company of HMAS Sydney mastered the French language during their recent Northern Trident 2009 (NT09) deployment visit to the port of Toulon, 17 school students and their teachers were practicing their English during a recent tour on board the ship.

The year 9 and 10 students from various schools in the region, were selected to attend the tour as a reward for their hard work and commitment to their studies.

Tour guides, LEUT Jeff Topping and LEUT Victor Yee, were asked to conduct the tour in English only, which for them, proved pretty easy as their French was particularly limited!

“We took them on a tour of most the ship, including the bridge. They really liked sitting in the Captain’s chair and looking through the ‘Big Eyes’ binoculars,” said LEUT Topping.

“The Seahawk Helicopter was very popular with the boys and the smiles on their faces and enthusiasm was great to see. Their English was very good and they asked me lots of questions including plenty about Kangaroos!” he said.

The tour concluded with a quick stop at the ice cream machine in the Junior Sailors Café before the students and their teachers received Navy hats and pens to remind them of their visit.