Learn Hardcore French: Dans un pays étranger, elle se sent parfois un peu seule. - In a foreign country, she sometimes feels a bit alone.

What is the difference between dans un pays étranger and à l’étranger? Could I say À l’étranger, elle se sent parfois un peu seule instead?

Both are possible, but they’re not exactly the same:

Dans un pays étranger = in a foreign country
You are inside some (unspecified) foreign country. It feels a bit more concrete or physical: in a foreign country as a place.
À l’étranger = abroad
This is more general and abstract: being outside your home country, somewhere overseas/abroad, without specifying any particular country.

So yes, you can say:

À l’étranger, elle se sent parfois un peu seule.
= Abroad, she sometimes feels a little lonely.

The original dans un pays étranger keeps the idea of a foreign country, almost like “in some foreign country” (even if we don’t know which one).

Why is it dans un pays étranger and not en un pays étranger?

With pays (country) in this kind of general, indefinite expression, French uses dans rather than en:

dans un pays étranger = in a foreign country
dans un pays chaud = in a hot country
dans un pays lointain = in a distant country

You will see en mainly with specific country names, especially feminine or starting with a vowel:

en France, en Italie, en Espagne, en Angleterre
en Iran, en Irak, en Afghanistan (even though they’re masculine)

But for un pays + adjective, the natural preposition is dans.

Is étranger here an adjective or a noun? What’s the difference?

In un pays étranger, étranger is an adjective meaning foreign.

un pays étranger = a foreign country

As a noun, un étranger means a foreigner / a stranger (a person):

un étranger = a foreigner (male)
une étrangère = a foreigner (female)

So:

un pays étranger (adjective) = a country that is foreign
un étranger (noun) = a person who is foreign

Why does étranger come after pays? I thought French adjectives usually come before the noun.

Many common adjectives come before the noun (like grand, petit, beau, bon, mauvais, jeune, vieux, etc.), but the default position for adjectives in French is after the noun.

Étranger is one of those adjectives that usually come after:

un pays étranger
une langue étrangère

Putting it before the noun (un étrange pays) doesn’t mean “foreign country”; it would mean “a strange/weird country” (with étrange, not étranger). So:

un pays étranger = a foreign country
un étrange pays = a strange/weird country (different adjective, different meaning)

What exactly is se sent in elle se sent? Why do we need se?

Elle se sent comes from the reflexive verb se sentir (to feel, in the sense of feel a certain way).

Infinitive: se sentir
3rd person singular: elle se sent = she feels

French often uses se sentir + adjective/adverb for physical or emotional states:

Je me sens bien. = I feel well.
Il se sent mal. = He feels bad.
Elle se sent seule. = She feels lonely.

Without se, the verb sentir shifts towards “to smell / sense / perceive”:

Elle sent la fumée. = She smells the smoke.
Je sens quelque chose. = I sense/feel something (physically or intuitively).

So you need se here to mean “to feel (oneself) [in some state]”.

How is se sentir conjugated in the present tense?

Here’s the present tense of se sentir:

je me sens = I feel
tu te sens = you feel (singular, informal)
il / elle / on se sent = he / she / one feels
nous nous sentons = we feel
vous vous sentez = you feel (plural or formal)
ils / elles se sentent = they feel

In your sentence:

elle se sent = she feels

What does parfois mean exactly, and where can it go in the sentence? Could I use quelquefois or de temps en temps instead?

Parfois means sometimes.

In your sentence:

elle se sent parfois un peu seule = she sometimes feels a little lonely

It’s quite flexible in position:

Parfois, elle se sent un peu seule.
Elle se sent parfois un peu seule.
Elle se sent un peu seule parfois.

All of these are natural.

You can use some synonyms:

quelquefois = sometimes (a bit more formal / bookish in modern usage)
de temps en temps = from time to time / every now and then

Examples:

Elle se sent quelquefois un peu seule.
Elle se sent de temps en temps un peu seule.

Parfois is the most common and neutral of the three.

What is un peu doing here? Why don’t we say un peu de seule?

Un peu is an adverbial expression meaning a little / a bit / somewhat.

When it modifies an adjective or another adverb, it is used without “de”:

un peu seule = a little lonely
un peu fatigué = a bit tired
un peu nerveuse = a little nervous
un peu mieux = a bit better

You use un peu de only before nouns:

un peu de pain = a little bread
un peu de temps = a bit of time
un peu de sucre = a little (bit of) sugar

So:

un peu seule (correct: adverb + adjective)
un peu de seule (incorrect)

Why is it seule and not seul? What is it agreeing with?

Seule is the feminine singular form of the adjective seul.

Adjectives in French agree in gender and number with the noun or pronoun they describe. Here, seule describes elle, which is feminine singular.

So:

Elle se sent seule. = She feels lonely.
Il se sent seul. = He feels lonely.
Ils se sentent seuls. = They feel lonely (masculine or mixed group).
Elles se sentent seules. = They feel lonely (all female).

In your sentence, since the subject is elle, the correct form is seule.

Does seule mean “alone” or “lonely”? What’s the nuance compared with English?

Seul / seule can mean alone or lonely, depending on context:

Elle est seule chez elle.
Literally: She is alone at home.
(It could be neutral: nobody else is there.)
Elle se sent seule.
Literally: She feels alone.
In practice, this usually means: she feels lonely (there’s an emotional nuance).

So:

être seul(e) can mean just to be alone (fact), or sometimes to be lonely if the context implies sadness.
se sentir seul(e) almost always implies the emotional side: to feel lonely.

In your sentence:

elle se sent parfois un peu seule is best understood as
she sometimes feels a bit lonely.

Could the word order be different, like Elle se sent un peu seule parfois or Elle se sent parfois un peu seule dans un pays étranger?

Yes, French word order is fairly flexible here. All of these are grammatical, with slightly different emphases:

Dans un pays étranger, elle se sent parfois un peu seule.
– Fronts the setting: In a foreign country, she sometimes feels a bit lonely.
Elle se sent parfois un peu seule dans un pays étranger.
– Starts with her feelings; the “in a foreign country” comes at the end as additional information.
Elle se sent un peu seule parfois dans un pays étranger.
– More spoken-feeling; parfois is less prominent.
Parfois, dans un pays étranger, elle se sent un peu seule.
– Emphasizes “sometimes” first and keeps the “in a foreign country” right after it.

All versions are acceptable; the choice is mostly about style and which information you want to highlight first.

Is the comma after Dans un pays étranger required?

In French, a comma after a fronted adverbial phrase like Dans un pays étranger is:

Common and recommended, because it makes the sentence clearer.
Not absolutely “mandatory” in a strict grammatical sense, but omitting it often looks less natural in writing.

So:

Dans un pays étranger, elle se sent parfois un peu seule. ✅ (best in writing)
Dans un pays étranger elle se sent parfois un peu seule. ⚠️ understandable but less standard in written French.

In practice, you should include the comma.