And ... the bombshell

I’ve been thinking for some time now how exactly to write this entry in my blog. Some of you reading this are people I know very well; some of you are old acquaintances; some of you are even people I’ve met since I left the U.S. and traveled to France. All of you, though, have been so positive and supportive about reading my adventures that I couldn’t just abruptly stop writing and give no reasons, and so – here we are.

I am moving back to the United States. I have already, in fact, left the village of La Canourgue, where I have been living since June of this year. You notice that I say “I”, and not “we” … my husband is staying in France. We are separating and will soon be divorced. All I can say in reference to this revelation is that my husband and I, on many levels, cannot and do not understand each other. As I’m sure you can infer, this does not make for a solid marriage. I cannot say that I am not heartbroken, because I am; I can say, however, that under the circumstances, I am making the best choice I can for myself. From this point forward, I need to be focused on putting the pieces of my life in the States back together, and I am certain that, given time, I will do just that. 

Since last Sunday, I have been staying with two marvelous people I met through a mutual friend in Orlando. I will call them “M & M” to simplify (and protect their privacy, hee hee). M & M live just south of Paris, and they came to pick up me and the cats and my luggage in La Canourgue, and then they took me back to their home and installed me there as if I were a long-lost daughter. This weekend, we went to Brittany, where they have a charming summer home in a tiny place called Uzel. I stood on the shore of the English Channel on Saturday afternoon and felt the wind in my face and smelled the sea and longed for home. Yesterday we headed back to Paris, and my flight back to the States is on Wednesday. The Thanksgiving holiday will certainly be full of gratitude this year, and all of my immediate family will be there, along with many assorted others. I cannot wait.

M & M have pampered me and made my last days in France a better experience than I could have hoped for. They were strangers to me a month ago; today the two of them are the best friends I have here in France. Just when you think the world is cold and that you are completely alone, you find that you aren’t, and that there are people who do kind things simply because it is the right thing to do. I don’t know what I would’ve done without them. 

Luckily for me as well, my angel of a boss at my old job contacted me recently to let me know that my position there was open again! This means that, upon returning to Orlando, I have a job ready and waiting. It will be a tremendous relief to be back and be doing something I am good at once again. Ironically, I don’t think I ever truly understood the word “serendipitous” before my marriage collapsed – isn’t that just a kick in the pants?

I have no idea if I will keep blogging. The idea behind this particular blog – to record my experiences in a foreign land – is now, sadly, a thing of the past. I am not sure that my regular, day-to-day life in Orlando, Florida is sufficiently interesting for blog fodder! If I continue, I hope to keep most of you as readers; if I don’t, I want to thank you all for every comment and positive word you’ve offered to me. It has meant more than I can say. Writing these entries and telling my stories helped me through the worst of my homesickness, and also helped as my personal situation deteriorated. It was good to know someone was out there listening and reading. Here’s to future inspiration, I suppose, and also here’s to family, friends, and familiarity. 

Even with the end result being what it is - I had to try this thing out. I learned things about myself that I would never have discovered living in the U.S.! Now that this particular adventure is over, I can’t say I’m unhappy to be returning to the land of my birth ... but I have a parting message for this country that has seen me through the summer and autumn of my discontent:  France, even though you’ve put some roadblocks in my way, I’m still in love with you for everything you’ve shown me these past six months and for everything that you are. We’ll meet again; don’t you worry about that. As the Terminator once said, "I'll be back."

Erin Goes Back To School

Maybe you've heard: my French language skills suck. The four years of French in high school, as well as the two years in college and the early instruction I got way back in kindergarten and first grade seem to have left almost no impression on me, and so it has been deemed by the French government, that, for my own good and the good of the realm, I must take language lessons. Thank God. It was getting awfully tiring to be sitting in a cafe, listening to conversation and trying desperately to follow what was going on, but eventually giving up and having to be satisfied with recognizing one word in every four or five. When you listen for five minutes and only catch "bird", "bike", "good" and "recycling", well ... it's a good thing I've never been of a suicidal temperment, because there are a lot of upper-story windows big enough for me to fit through around these parts.

I started classes at the beginning of September, and I think my word comprehension has increased to maybe one word in every three or so! I am starting to actually be able to piece together the meaning of conversations, and, at least in class, can even respond with only a minimal delay (in which my brain frantically pages through its French-to-English dictionary to search for the appropriate words). It's delightful. I think I may even be able to make friends soon, now that I am beginning to retain the correct vocabulary for more than just the weather, ordering in a bar, and standard greetings. I'll be able to strike up actual conversations! If you've never been in another country and not comfortable with the language, you can't even imagine the absolute relief in starting to solve the puzzle that lets you comprehend the world around you more fully. 

I go to the nearby town of Marvejols three times a week, from 8:30 in the morning until 4:30 in the afternoon to learn the intricacies of the French language and prepare for an exam called the DILF (Diplome initial de langue francaise) that I must take in December. My teacher is a lady of great patience and energy, and I love her. I won't give her name here, to protect her identity, but, trust me, the woman is a saint. We have never had a conversation in English, although if I get really stuck and say a word in English, she will give it back to me in French with nary a delay. I don't know what I will do when the class ends - maybe ask her to move in with me? Or adopt me? Maybe her kids won't mind a new, older, American sister.  

There are twelve of us in the class currently, and everyone is at different levels, but somehow it works and it's comfortable. We do a lot of spoken exercises together, which often includes what is called "presenting" yourself to the others: your name, your nationality, when you arrived in France, your marital status, if you have kids, your hobbies ... that sort of thing. And so I know that, out of the three Moroccan ladies who are in the class, two of them consider "cleaning" to be a hobby. Also, one gentleman from Portugal apparently has no hobbies at all except for weight training. (Since he is roughly the size and weight of a bantam rooster, I find this hard to believe.)  One lady, also from Portugal, insists she has no hobbies, and seems to get more and more offended each time we do this exercise. Considering that she has five children, I guess maybe she needs words for things other than "faire du ski" or "jouer au tennis". Makes sense. There are also two guys from Turkey, and we haven't been able to get any hobbies out of them yet, but I think that's because they don't understand what the hell we're asking - they only arrived in August. Luckily, one of them speaks a little English, so if all else fails, the teacher asks if I can explain in English. Some of the time, it even works! 

All kidding aside, it does help an awful lot to be a classroom and go through the rote exercises over and over - it cements them in your head. I almost swooned with pleasure when I went to the market today and had an actual conversation with a stranger that I could understand and make the appropriate responses to! Of course, it was about the weather and what I was buying, so it's not like we were discussing philosophy or quantum theory, but he said things, I understood them, and I answered him. I felt like bursting into song. (That probably would've seemed a little weird, though, so I refrained. I did hum on the way home.)

I still feel dumb almost every day. But, I've started to feel slightly less dumb, which to my mind is a huge improvement. And I have to say that most every person I've encountered here is willing to help. If you attempt their language, they're willing to cut you some slack. They'll repeat themselves, speak slower, whatever will help you gain understanding of a few more syllables. If they giggle at my accent or dismal grammar later, well, at least they had the good breeding to keep it to themselves until I was out of earshot. I'm gonna get there, folks. God bless the French government and my teacher and my classmates. One day, I'll actually be able to tell them all what their help and support meant to me, and I'll be able to do it in French. Yay!

This is just a test!

I am in the process of trying to find a few ways to get paid for my writing, and this post is as the title suggests: just a test. In order to get myself listed with a particular service that may assign me some blog topics to write about, I need to post the words a dollar sign is the cheesiest within a post. And so, my mission is complete. 'Bye for now.

Presents

A few people have asked me what to send, should they feel generous and send me a "care package" here in France. and so, with the holiday season just around the corner, I decided I would post a small list of things I can't get here but that I really, really miss and would love to see at any time arriving in my mailbox:

-peanut butter (Jif makes these little single-serve thingies that are a lot lighter in weight to send than a big ol' jar. my dad sent me some - which I have already eaten - and they got here fine in a padded envelope)
-Kraft Mac 'n Cheese (my preference is the Spirals, mmm)
-Twinkies
-Arm & Hammer baking soda (seriously, can't bake anything good without it, and can't get it here)
-Colgate Sensitive toothpaste - the paste kind (no sensitive teeth toohpaste except Sensodyne here, yeck)
-celery salt
-marshmallows - little or big
-Jolly Ranchers
-Necco wafers
-Twizzlers licorice - the Nibs are my favorite, or the cherry twists
-Mrs. Grass chicken soup - it comes in a blue box, usually two together. Lipton Chicken Noodle soup envelopes are good, too
-Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing seasoning packets
-Orbit chewing gum, sweet Mint or any of the weird flavors, like Mojito or berry or pina colada
-small ponytail holders (remember, I have about five hairs, so the ones that are about the circumference of a silver dollar are more than adequate)
-Triscuits
-Nerds
-tubes of Blistex or Chapstick - plain or anything minty/mentholated is best
-legal pads. Yellow, white, colored, it doesn't matter. All the notebooks, etc. here are made with graph paper, and it sucks for writing letters.
-Lubriderm fragrance-free body lotion, or Banana Boat After-Sun lotion. All the lotions I've tried here so far are perfumed and make my skin feel funky.
-disposable emery boards

That's all I can think of, and please don't think this is a cry for presents - it's not, really ... just helpful hints in case anyone was already thinking of sending something my way. I welcome all requests for packages TO the States, just tell me what you'd like to try and I'll do my best to send it! And remember, I would be just as tickled to get a letter from you in my mailbox as I would to get a box with goodies in it. Love you all!

I'm a permanent resident

Did you know I am now a permanent resident of France? Well, almost. The appropriate page with its fancy stamp has been put into my passport, and when I go to renew my visa in March, I will get my actual carte de sejour, which is, I guess, the French equivalent of a green card. I actually got this taken care of a couple of weeks ago, and neglected to write about it, but when I told one of my sisters the story on the phone recently, she decreed that it should be described on the blog as soon as possible. And so, here we go.

You may have read about my first forays into the world of French immigration in much earlier blogs, back when I was getting the visa I needed to travel here. I have, since I arrived, and with the help of my husband, been to visit the French unemployment office (Pole d'Emploi) and the French equivalent of Social Security, to get myself registered and on their books. Both these things were done in the early days here, and neither was very traumatic. Registering with unemployment, also, made it possible for me to get hooked up with French language classes, which I finally started this week. More on that later.

I was told to expect, soon after I arrived, a summons to meet with someone or other in the French government for a "welcome meeting" - whatever that might entail, and a medical exam. I duly sent the necessary form to the appropriate office upon arriving (well, Patrick did, thank God for Patrick) and waited for word on this meeting. And waited, and waited some more. It seems that a whole hell of a lot of people have been immigrating/emigrating (and what exactly is the difference there? I've never known) just lately, and the welcome visits were a bit on the backed-up side. Finally, last month, a summons arrived. I was scheduled to appear in Montpellier (about two hours' drive) in early September, and a list was kindly included of the paperwork I needed to bring with me, and the fee that would be required.

Though many things in France are blessedly free of charge (like my French language classes, for example), some things - like a green card - do indeed carry a cost. A weighty one! Three hundred and thirty euros, to be exact. And you can't just write a check or present your debit card, either - oh, no, you must purchase these things that are sort of like postage stamps, instead. And it's not like you can get 3 hundred-euro ones, a 20, a 10, and 3 ones ... no, you're instructed instead to purchase a weird mix of 55 and 12 and 8-euro stamps, or something similar. It's a darned good thing they send you instructions, or you'd be liable to show up with the wrong mixture, and then I'm pretty sure you would go back on a waiting list for your meeting, and possibly be deported in the meantime. Anyway, it's no worse than some of the shenanigans I've lived through at an American DMV or the Social Security administration - bureaucracy is bureaucracy, no matter what country it is in. And besides, Patrick again came to my rescue and went to procure the weird stamps at city hall. He's my hero.

So, we arrived at the OFII (Office Francais de l'Immigration et de l'Integration) for The Visit. First, we went into a waiting room with chairs around the perimeter, which slowly filled with other people anxious to immigrate or integrate. There were folks from all over, but not much English, until a couple of Thai ladies entered with their French husbands - English was apparently the language they shared. Neither one of the Thai  women appeared to understand a whole lot of French. We were also joined by what appeared to be a teenage mother with her vocally precocious (and by this, I mean he yelled a lot) son in a stroller and her dad. But wait - it wasn't her father, but actually her husband. (Seriously, the girl looked about 16 or 17.) Ew. Anyway, the room filled up, and then in came Really Skinny French Lady, to make a bored-sounding speech about a video we were all required to watch. Since I think everyone but me and the Thai ladies spoke French, her instructions were heeded, and we watched a lovely ten-minute film outlining the basic structure of French society and government. It had lots of lovely shots of Paris and of happy French people. I understood maybe half of it. Patrick whispered translations of salient points in my ear.

After that, the meetings began. This was a five-part process. You had to see one of the officials, so they could go over all your info and find out if you had a job, etc. You also had to have a visit with a nurse, a visit with a doctor, AND a visit to the x-ray room so that a chest x-ray could be taken, and then back to the original official to complete the final paperwork. Okay, then.

First, we met with Really Skinny French Lady. Patrick came with me for this one, and translated. We went over basic info, talked about the job I worked over the summer, the fact that I was already registered with the unemployment people, and what kind of jobs I might be looking for, based upon my job experience in the States. Then she told us I needed language classes (which we already pretty much knew) and attempted to give us the number of someone in Mende, where I would need to drive for classes. Patrick, having already talked to a lady in Marvejols (oodles closer than Mende) about classes there, told Skinny Lady we had already made arrangements. I was, in fact, scheduled to meet with Marvejols Lady the very next day. Skinny Lady pursed up her mouth and asserted that, very possibly, classes with Marvejols Lady would not fulfill my immigration and integration requirements. Patrick very coolly observed that since her name had been provided to us by the unemployment office, also a government office, she should be just fine. A number of terse telephone calls were made, and at the end of things, it was determined that the name of Marvejols Lady was actually the same (as was the phone number) as the woman that was on Skinny Lady's list for Mende. I promised to be sure to ask about this discrepancy when I saw Marvejols Lady tomorrow. Skinny Lady looked like she wanted to be more sure, but hey, there was a waiting room full of folks to see. We were dismissed.

Patrick escaped for some fresh air and a smoke, and I waited for Meeting Two. It was the nurse. I followed her into a small consult room and, through the use of my much-mangled French and her very few words of English, the first day of my last period was established, along with the facts that I had no major illnesses or diseases, was not pregnant, had not been hospitalized for anything in the past several years, and that I thought my vaccinations were up-to-date. When I said I didn't have my vaccination records with me, she was completely nonchalant, shrugged, and said I could see a doctor in my village if I was concerned about it. Okay, then. Stage Two, complete.

Back to the waiting room, which was starting to thin out as people were off to their various meetings. A few minutes later, I was called back for the chest x-ray. The tech took me to a changing room and explained (in English, actually - boy, was I glad of that) that in France, they don't use lead vests, and that you must be unclothed from the waist up for a chest x-ray. Oh-kay. As I was wearing a dress, I asked her should I shuck the whole thing? She replied that yep, that was what was called for, but I could, of course, leave my underwear on. Delightful. She closed the door and I undressed and then sat reading a book in my panties until she knocked for me to come out. In this interval, I heard her try to retrieve one of the Thai women from the cubicle next to mine - she had come to get her, and Thai Lady was still fully dressed. When the tech explained again that upper-body nekkid was needful, Thai Lady asked if there was a paper gown or something. The tech she sounded like she was trying not to laugh when she said that no, there was nothing. Poor Thai Lady. The knock came on my own door, and I sashayed out into the room - thankfully, I had put on good undies that morning. I was ushered into the x-ray machine, which looked like a photo booth, and had to press my front side to what looked like one of those targets at a shooting range. A big breath and a few seconds later, and I retired to my cube to dress. A few minutes after that and bam! I had my very own chest x-ray in hand.

Back in the waiting room once more, we waited for the next-to-last summons: the doctor. Patrick rode along on this one, now that he was back from his "break", and I expected a regular examining room and some poking and prodding, perhaps. I wanted Patrick there in case I needed words I didn't have in French. Nope, wrong again. The woman simply greeted us, grabbed the chest x-ray, slapped it on a light box, peered at it for a few seconds, said okay, and then asked me the same questions as the nurse. She did, as a doctor must, plead with me to quit smoking, but in a very nice way. She signed and stamped a piece of paper, gave it to me, and then we were "au revoir"ed out the door. Phew!

Lastly, it was back to Skinny Lady to give her the doc's signed okay that I wasn't a some sort of Typhoid Mary, and to give her the funny money-stamp-thingies. She carefully pasted them to a page with my info on it, clipped it to a lot of other paperwork we had sent to OFII previously, and then proceeded to print up a nifty little page that got plastered right into my passport, along with a very official-looking stamp (the rubber kind) and a shiny, holograph-y clear sticker that went right on top to seal it in. It looks very fancy and indicates that I am now firmly on the road to being Immigrated and Integrated.

I still have to go to a one-day French civics class in November (I am actually looking forward to it - I don't have to bring Patrick, as they will have English speakers there to help if I don't understand), and my carte de sejour is contingent upon my passing an oral and written test called the DILF in December, but I am not worried. I blithely walked while almost completely nekkid in front of a strange x-ray tech, and I didn't even blush. If I can ever figure out those stamp thingies on my own, I will be well on my way to really being at home here.

Oui!

The Lure of Ricard

Hello, my lovelies. It's been a while, hasn't it? I'm afraid I've been caught up in my day-to-day living, and have shamefully neglected you. Ah, well, let's try to remedy the neglect, shall we?

For all of you out there who have never visited France, there is something you should know. The French love anything anise-flavored. Candy, mints, and most especially ... Ricard. Every bar and cafe hereabouts has a bottle or ten of this aperitif ready to pour at all times, and I am going to do my best to explain it. In my own opinion, it is possibly the foulest-tasting stuff on the planet, but the French enjoy it mightily, and perhaps, as the years go by, my taste buds will become accustomed. Who knows.

Ricard (and other local variants of the liqueur, called pastis) is simply an anise-flavored liqueur, somewhat like  Galliano, or Jagermeister, or ouzo. What really differs is the serving of it. You don't drink Ricard neat; instead,  a couple of ounces are poured into a snifter (usually with the Ricard logo printed on it - the Ricard folks are no slouches when it comes to promotional materials, especially glassware), either with or without an ice cube, according to taste ... and then, you top it off by pouring in a measure of cold water before drinking. This still sounds pretty typical for any sort of liquor, but the water actually changes the color of it, so that the clear, kind of light amber of the liqueur itself now is a milky yellowish-white, looking disturbingly like skim milk. And then you drink it. And it tastes like black jellybeans. As an old friend of mine would always say, oy vey.

I've noticed that, on the whole, it seems to be much more a man's drink than a ladies' drink, but that doesn't mean I haven't seen plenty of women quaffing this beverage from time to time. One would think that the French national drink would have to be wine - and wine is important here, no doubt - but Ricard seems to give the vineyards a run for their money in terms of customer loyalty. People sit and chat with each other for hours, with a bottle of Ricard on the bar and a flagon of water between them, refilling and topping off their glasses countless times as the evening goes by. I've tasted it myself, and almost ran screaming down the street as my taste buds were saturated with the oily and slightly medicinal taste of licorice, but I am definitely in the minority here, as far as the wonders of Ricard are concerned. Again, maybe this is how I will know that I have assimilated into French society - when offered a Ricard, I will happily accept and even drink it without wanting to tear out my own tongue. But then, I was never a fan of Jagermeister or anything similar, either. Ew.

Instead, I stick to beer when I can (mostly light lagers, which are most popular here), the occasional glass of house red or white, and, more and more increasingly, whiskey and water. I haven't had a gin and tonic in quite some time - gin seems to be missing from the drinks menu in most establishments hereabouts - not too popular, I gather. Although to me, the leap from anise flavoring to juniper is not all that far, and you can always get a tonic water, wherever you go ... but I can buy gin in the liquor store or at the grocery, so my love of a good G&T can at least be indulged at home!

One last note: here, it is perfectly acceptable to order a beer sweetened with flavored sirop. I am not kidding. Grenadine, mint, or peach syrup are the most common, though I guess you could tell them to put in whatever they had on hand - strawberry, blackcurrant, lemon, orange ... There is a disturbing concoction called a Monaco that is beer, grenadine syrup, and limonade, which is like 7-UP. Basically, a Shirley Temple with beer in it. I made several of these for people while I was working at the campground, and the expression on people's faces as they sipped them always seemed to be, Ah - how refreshing. I myself am not convinced of this, and have steered clear. Between licorice-flavored stuff and sweet beers, there is enough evidence, in my opinion, to stick with the old tried-and-true staples of beer, wine, and whiskey. No surprises there. If you like licorice, though, then France is the place for you. There is a bar stool, pitcher of water, snifter glass, and bottle of Ricard right here waiting for you.

Pronunciation guide:

Ricard: ree-CAHR
pastis: pass-TEE
sirop: sear-OH
Monaco: mohn-ah-COH
limonade: lee-moh-NOD

Things French People Love

I've been watching and learning, here in La Canourgue, for three months now, and I've noticed a few things that the folks around here seem to adore. These are generalizations, of course, and I'm sure that with time, I'll discover that it's not true of everyone, but for the time being - a few Things That French People Love.

Cantaloupe: For some reason, the French adore cantaloupe melons. It's called "melon", as if cantaloupe are the only melons cultivated to be consumed by the masses. I rarely see watermelons in the store or at the market, and honeydews seem to be non-existent. There are occasionally some weird-looking African yellow-y things in the supermarket, but by and large, cantaloupe is the melon of choice. In the summer, it seems, no picnic or barbeque or quiet lunch at home is complete without this orange fruit sliced and served to each person. They eat it as a first course, and everyone exclaims with pleasure how sweet (but not too sweet) and delicious it is ... I have eaten so much cantaloupe this summer that I would be perfectly happy to never encounter it ever again. There is a huge one reposing on my kitchen table as I write this, a gift from the melon vendor whose table sits beside my front door every market day. I know my husband will happily suggest cutting into this piece of fruit when he gets home from work for his midday break, and I will smile, and say, of course, and eat it, and try very hard to enjoy it. Maybe a love for it will eventually sink in? I am living in hope.

Peanuts:  Do you like peanuts? I've always considered them to be sort of the poor cousins of the nut family. You eat them when all the other nuts in the mixed nuts can are gone. Or you crush them up and use them to garnish pad thai. Or, best of all, you can pulverize them and mix in a little oil and sugar to create peanut butter, one of the best substances known to man. Not so in France. Here, you go to someone's house for dinner, and bam! The bag of peanuts comes out. Everyone happily digs in and eats them by the handful as an appetizer. There are crackers, potato chips, and things that look like Cheetos, but are peanut-flavored. (Yuck, by the way.) If you bring a bag of mixed nuts (this is if you can find one in the store) to the party, the peanuts are winkled out and eaten first! It boggles the mind. And, as I may have mentioned before - no peanut butter. It is, quite literally, an unknown quantity here. The "exotic foods" section of the grocery store might have a jar or two available, but it will inevitably be the extra-super-chunky variety that consists of mostly chopped-up peanuts and hardly any "butter" to be going on with. I have no idea where the love of plain peanuts came from, but it is bewildering. A country noted for its love of food and cooking, and most of its denizens think peanuts are an appropriate snack. I just don't know. Also, the French word for peanut is "cacahuete", and, you know, being American, I don't like to eat things that have "caca" in the name.

Peach iced tea: I was excited to find bottled and canned iced tea available in France. I thought I would be making my own sun tea, if I wanted this particular beverage, and was pleased to see that wouldn't always be necessary. But ... if you don't like peach flavoring, you're up shit creek on this one. Fortunately, I do! Just about every grocery chain has a house brand for bottled beverages - soda, juice, etc. And apparently, for the French, "iced tea" and "peach" are inseparable. (I have seen a few bottles of mango iced tea here and there, but never in any quantity, and always with the word "nouveau" -  new - prominently featured on the label.) There is even an iced tea syrup available (I have a bottle in my own kitchen, in fact) that you just add water to and, voila!, a delicious iced tea beverage is waiting for your consumption. However, it is always peach iced tea syrup. Never lemon, never raspberry, never plain. Perhaps I should contact some beverage manufacturers here and suggest the lemon, raspberry, or mint options? If Lipton doesn't get in ahead of me, I might be able to open up whole new vistas in the French ready-made beverage market.

Outdoor activities: I come from a very suburban/urban area of the U.S. When people there have leisure time, they generally go to the movies, or shopping, or to an amusement park. Maybe they head to a public park with some friends for a summertime cookout. In this part of the world (the least-populated area of France, actually),though, when people have down time, they head outdoors. Hiking, biking, camping, swimming, canoeing ... I imagine there are places in the U.S. where this is the case, as well - I just never lived in any of them. My husband and I spend countless hours in our yard, gardening, mucking out the stream that flows through it, and inviting people over to barbeque and eat al fresco. And I've learned to be careful when someone invites me on "une petite balade" ("a little walk") ... because, depending upon the person, that could mean a hike of twenty kilometers through the mountainous terrain that surrounds us, or it could mean a short stroll to the outskirts of town and back. You just never know, and it appears that you should be prepared for either outcome when you accept their offer. I am hoping that, with time, my mind reading abilities become better and I will know when I should bring water, sunscreen, and Power Bars along for "a little walk". I'm sure I'll get there some day - and I'll probably be walking, when I do.

Meat: First, there's saucisson. It's a kind of dried sausage, kind of like pepperoni. You slice off little pieces and eat it with bread or by itself. The people around here eat it all the time, and there are an infinite number of varieties. I have no real idea exactly what goes into the making of these things, but they taste fantastic (despite the sort of vague feet-like aroma before you cut into them). Then, of course, there are pates and terrines and mousses. All made out of some sort of meat (usually organ meat, like livers) and sometimes veggies, like mushrooms or onions, and molded into a sort of loaf that you then slice hunks off of and spread on bread. Again, delicious. Think of it sort of as meat jelly or jam - makes a great sandwich. So, these are the before-the-meal meat products, and then you move on to the entree portion of your lunch or dinner, which is always ... surprise! More meat. Sausages - pork or lamb, usually - or perhaps pork chops, or thin beef steaks. Maybe a roasted chicken - boneless, skinless chicken breasts are not very popular here. Sometimes people will have turkey steaks or perhaps a piece of fish (usually salmon, unfortunately). But always, always, the main course around these parts is meat. Here is the crazy part: I've never, since I've been here, seen anyone marinate a piece of meat. There is this little packet of dry herbs that comes with any steak or chop you buy in the market that most folks will rub on the meat before they cook it, but that's it! (And it always consists of mostly rosemary. Mom, watch out.) I made an herb butter with some fresh chives and parsley last week to put on some steaks I was broiling for dinner for myself and my husband, and he looked horrified as I applied it to the meat prior to putting it in the oven. Thank God I had rejected the balsamic vinaigrette and shallot marinade that was my other idea - he might have left the house, and me, upon seeing that perpetrated on a steak he intended to eat. I have been afraid to broach the subject of marinating with my new French friends - it seems so universally neglected that I feel sure there is some big, glaring reason for NOT doing it that I haven't yet discovered. I will continue, of course, to marinate in the privacy of my own home, but in front of others ... rosemary, anyone?

I discover new things every day, and will continue to parade those things past all of you. Thanks for reading and sharing in my adventures!

Pronunciation Guide:

melon: meh-LOW(n)
cacahuete: ka-ka-WEHT
nouveau: noo-VOH
voila: vwah-LAH
une petite balade: ewn puh-TEET bah-LAHD
saucisson: so-see-SOHN
pate: pah-TAY
terrine: teh-REEN

Bread and Bonjour

I've been pondering two things that, to me, seem quintessentially French - and that you really need to understand, absorb, and participate in to become comfortable living in France or with the French. As my title suggests, these things are bread and greetings such as "bonjour". Let me break it down for you:

Bread: The staff (or stuff) of life, right? In France, you simply MUST eat bread. There is no conversation about it, like, "Hey. Should we go buy some bread for [insert meal here]?" You go to the bakery every single day and you purchase whatever bread supplies you need to lay in for that day. End of story. People here eat bread with any and every meal they consume. Bread with their coffee or hot chocolate in the morning. Bread for their sandwiches at lunch. Bread (of course) with dinner and most especially with cheese, which you eat at dessert time. And I'm not talking Wonder Bread here. Mention sliced sandwich bread like that, and most French-born citizens will give you an incredulous look, as if you just announced you like to eat dog poo for dinner. No, French bread is the long, crusty on the outside, chewy on the inside baguette, first and foremost. There are many other kinds - I am most partial to the bigger cousin of the baguette, the flute, because it is a little less dense than the baguette and has a fluffier interior. (My husband rolls his eyes at me when I state this preference.) There are breakfast breads (pain au lait, pain au mie, brioche) that don't have a hard crust and are excellent for dipping in beverages, there are sweet pastries (pain au raisin and pain au chocolat) that are related to the illustrious, flaky and delicious croissant, and there are literally thousands of regional specialties in both sweet and non-sweet, hard and soft varieties. For example, in my village they make a big ring of country bread called a couronne, and this is apparently impossible to get in Paris. It's very good, but I am a little stumped as to why you just don't eat something else while you're in Paris that they don't make here? (Like Chinese take-out or kebabs from the 24-hour kebab stand.)

But this is the thing about bread: it is not just a staple in your diet. It is part and parcel of the French man or woman's identity. Bread is not just sustenance; it is religion. I am pretty sure that there have been wars here (or at least really big arguments) over where you could get the tastiest bread. Everyone has their particular preferences, not just for the type of breads they prefer to eat on a given day, but also for the actual bakery where these are procured. People don't just buy bread from anywhere, all willy-nilly. No. Absolutely not. You go to the bakery you have ALWAYS gone to, and there is no deviation. I think when you move someplace new, you get a window of time to sample the local bakeries, but once you've gone there multiple times in a week, you're committed. And if your bakery runs out of something you want? You go without. No running across town and picking up a loaf from the other bakery, oh no. Perhaps, if you wear a wig, dark glasses, and a cape, you could drive to the next village over and buy bread there, maybe. If you had house guests, for instance, and needed bread to feed them. But you are loyal to your baker, and he or she will be loyal to you. Our bakery is literally about fifteen steps from our front door, and Patrick is now such a good and regular customer he can even take home bread if he forgets his money - he just brings payment to them later on, or even on the next day. Can you believe it??? I am working hard on ingratiating myself with the people who work there, as well, and it will be a happy day when I can say more to them than "hello", "good bye", and "one flute, please".

Bonjour: Literally, it means "good day". French people use it as an all purpose "Hello," or "Hey there!" What's different about this greeting is that you use it, um, all the time, and with everyone, whether you know them or not. First, you must greet (and say good-bye to, by the way) whoever is at the cash register in any shop or store you enter. Ditto for bars, pharmacies, the library, the post office, hotels, government offices ... anywhere, really. Even if you're just entering that building to browse around and have no intention whatsoever of buying anything or asking for any further assistance, you MUST greet them with "bonjour". (Or "bon soir", if it is after 6pm or so.) When you exit said establishment, it must be accompanied by a "au revoir", or "merci, au revoir", if they have assisted you in any way. This is gospel. It is the only civilized way to behave here, and if you don't, those employees of wherever you have just exited will gossip about you and comment on your rudeness. I am not kidding - I've now done it myself, at the campground. Wow.

And greeting people is not limited to interior spaces. We have a really deep windowsill on our ground floor window, which I sit on quite a bit, enjoying a book and/or a cigarette. Since we live in the village center, people are walking by all the time. Whether they are people I happen to know or tourists gawking at the architecture, they all will toss out a "bonjour" or "bonsoir" as they drift past me - even kids! In fact, it is now easy to tell the tourists who are from countries other than France, because they are the people who don't greet me as they walk in front of my house. (Well, there are also several long-time residents of La Canourgue who studiously ignore me and refuse to let out a bonjour in my direction. I generally pretend to be completely absorbed in my book when I see one of them coming, so I don't have to meet their eyes and recognize the slight. Or, if I'm feeling froggy, I say bonjour first, and watch the sound speed up their steps. I am hoping that, eventually - like in five years, maybe - they will get accustomed to the sight of me and grace me with a greeting.) If you're taking a walk, you say "bonjour" to anyone who makes eye contact with you, in general. Can you imagine it? Try - imagine you are walking down a street in your own town or city. Now imagine saying hello to complete strangers as you go. Strange, right? It seemed that way to me until I started doing it, and now I just can't stop. It's an addiction. But it's also 100% really and truly French. Of course, in Paris, people don't greet every person they see - the city's too enormous for that. But in the suburbs of Paris? Yep, bonjours abound. The really fun part? If you actually know the people, more often than not you also get to do the cheek-kissing thing. And that's a whole 'nother ball of wax ... I'll save cheek kissing for next time, sportsfans.

Take care of yourselves and each other, and make sure to give a nice greeting to the person behind the counter the next time you go to a bakery. Or your mechanic's. Or Target. If people look at you funny, just tell them you are experimenting with other cultural norms. If they still are giving you the hairy eyeball, just say, "merci, au revoir" and walk away. You can't win 'em all.

Pronunciation and definition guide:
baguette: bah-GETT (crusty loaf of bread, about a foot long)
flute: FLOO-tuh (crusty loaf of bread, about twice the size of the baguette)
pain au lait: pahn-oh-LAY (soft breakfast bread, made with milk)
pain au mie: pahn-oh-MEE (soft breakfast bread, as above, sweeter. Both are similar to Hawaiian rolls.)
brioche: BREE-ohsh (soft rolls with an egg wash on top to make them shiny. Sometimes have giant sugar crystals decorating them.)
pain au raisin: pahn-oh-ray-SAHN (croissant-like pastry with raisins baked in)
pain au chocolat: pahn-oh-shock-oh-LAH (croissant-like pastry with a seam or two of dark chocolate baked inside)
couronne: koo-RUN (a hearty whole-grain country bread, baked in a ring like a crown)
croissant: KWAH-sahn (you know what these are)
bonjour: BOHN-jewr (hello! or good day!)
bon soir: BOHN-swahr (good evening)
merci: MEHR-see (thank you)
au revoir: oh-vwa (good bye)

The Ice Cream Incident, Part Deux

Before Mrs. Boss could continue, I tried to interject. "Uh, I am very, very sorry about this. I can understand why you are so upset. It was a bad mistake, but I did think that I plugged it in, and I'll understand if you need to take the money you've lost from my wages ..." That's as far as I got. She cut me off.

"No, no, no," she said, impatiently. "I want you to go through this freezer. Take the ones like this (she held up the squooshy fruit pop I mentioned before) and put them in this trash bag. Count them. I want you to think about the damage you've caused. Throw them out when you're done counting them. The others can go back into the fridge outside, and you will take them there when you've finished with the bad ones. Put them underneath the ice creams already in there so they will have time to freeze again. I hope you understand the damage you've caused." And with that last, memorable sally, she swept out the door with Mr. Boss in front of her, and actually (and I swear to gosh this happened, I wouldn't make it up) slammed the door behind her. I stood there for a few seconds, a little breathless at what had just happened. Then I picked up the trash bag and began to count.

All told, we lost 42 ice cream bars because of my supposed screw-up. Nevermind that I very definitely plugged it in, and therefore was not really the culprit - Mrs. Boss is not inclined to hear excuses or explanations, once she has made up her mind as to what the story is. For the next few days, I let whomever I was working with plug in the damned thing every day, and I watched the outlet inside like a hawk. I walked outside to put my hand on the glass front of the fridge every half an hour or so, to make sure it was still cool. I only left off with my new obssession when I observed something very interesting. There are two outlets in the wall, you see, side by side. Mostly, people use the right-hand one to plug things in, but they both work. One day, one of my co-workers plugged in the extension cord for the ice cream freezer on the left-hand side. About twenty minutes later, Mrs. Boss came along, saw it, and unplugged it from the left, switching the extension cord to the right-hand socket. A few minutes later, I investigated. The plug wiggled in the right-hand socket ... it wasn't connected all the way. I pushed it the rest of the way in and checked the fridge - it was now humming along. I asked another co-worker if there was anything wrong with the left-hand socket. "No," she said, and we tested it with another appliance, to make sure. Interesting. Mostly because, on the day of The Incident, I saw that the plug was in the socket furthest away from me - i.e., the left-hand one. I wonder, I thought ... and then I put that thought away. Days had elapsed, The Incident was fading from Mrs. Boss' mind, and I hadn't done much of anything too dumb in the last couple of shifts.

So I let it go. Well, kinda. I'm still writing about it here, aren't I? and truthfully, though nothing else of that magnitude has happened since, there are plenty of little things that happen every day that incur Mrs. Boss' displeasure. Not just things that I do - there have been other Incidents, with other employees, where I saw them being told off right in front of everyone else ... so I guess I should be happy she at least allowed my delicate American sensibility a bit of privacy for my own dressing-down. I am not alone, that is for sure.

The few startled tears her words provoked on the day of The Incident have long since dried, and now I do my best to ignore her when she snaps about something silly. I smile a lot and concentrate on being nice to our customers. I remind myself fifty times a day that this charade ends on August 29, and that the money is needed and welcome. And mostly, I thank whatever powers there be that I am me, and not Mrs. Boss. I think I will survive.

The Disastrous Incident of the Ice Cream in the Daytime

Have you ever had a boss that you really, really disliked? Someone who made all your workdays into a sort of nightmarish odyssey that you weren't certain would ever end? I thought that I had had some pretty awful superiors, in times and jobs gone by, but I found out that I was mistaken. All my bad bosses from the past could be rolled up into one, and they wouldn't even begin to approach the unpleasantness of my current boss. I won't tell you her name; I won't even give the name of the place where I work - it's best to be somewhat circumspect about these sorts of things, don't you think? But I do need to tell you all a little about the lady who currently signs my paycheck. It's time.

I've always considered myself to be a fairly competent individual. No matter what the job was, I have, in the past, managed to learn quickly and discharge my work duties with intelligence and, yes, competence. Even though some jobs had a bit of a steep learning curve, I always was able to get into a groove with any new employer fairly easily. Until now.

At first, I thought it was a language thing. My boss speaks English to me, but I thought maybe things were getting lost in translation, because I certainly couldn't be as stupid and slow as she seemed to think (these thoughts of hers are communicated mostly via angry sighs, sullen facial expressions, and once, a stamp of her foot on the floor, accompanied by a loud, "Non!" Seriously.) Once I stopped to look around me, though, I saw that it wasn't just me getting the "you're a moron" treatment. She does it to her French employees, too.

Let me give an example of the behavior of this woman who is currently in charge of my immediate destiny. I call it "The Ice Cream Incident" in my head, and it was maybe the most unpleasant experience I've ever had at a job. If it had happened in the U.S., I would have left that day and never gone back - here, though, there are actual employment contracts for these short-time summer jobs, and I can't go anywhere, unless I get fired. In retrospect, I'm glad I stayed - things are getting slightly better - but for now, listen to this nonsense:

I work at a campground, in the reception building. There's a bar, a small grocery store with food and sundry items, and a terrace outside where folks can sit at tables and enjoy a beverage and the sunshine. We also have (as many places do, in the summertime) a big deep-freeze on wheels, filled with different types of ice cream treats. We call it "the fridge", and it stays inside the reception buidling all night, and in the morning, those of us who open up the place (that's me!) unplug it, wheel it outdoors, and plug it back in through a window, as the outlet is indoors. About a week after I started, when my co-worker and I wheeled the fridge outdoors, we saw that someone had, the day before, bored a small hole through the window frame above the area where the fridge sits outside and threaded the business end of an extension cord though it.

"That's new, " I remarked to my co-worker. (She speaks some English, too, and we converse in mostly English, with some French mixed in for good measure.)

"Oh, yes," she replied. "Go ahead and plug it in there," and so I did. She then headed indoors, to finish up, and I remained outside, straightening chairs and tables, putting up the table umbrellas, etc. When I went back in, I glanced at the wall socket and saw a plug already jacked in. Great, right? Wrong.

I finished my shift, went home, and returned the next day. My boss appeared from nowhere and made a beeline for me.

"Erin?" She met my eyes. My stomach immediately knotted up - so far, she hadn't talked to me at work, except to point out when I had done something wrong, or when I hadn't done something that apparently I was supposed to do. Completely unnerving.

"Yes?" I said, and tried out a small smile. It wasn't returned.

"Erin, when you bring the fridge outside every morning, what is the first thing you check, the first thing you must do?" She seemed oddly intense, even for her. She had been complaining the day before about the umbrella near the ice cream fridge, saying it wasn't shading it properly, so I tried that first.

"Um, make sure that the umbrella is shading the fridge?" I tried.

"No. Before that," she said.

I hoped my second try would be correct. "Well, you have to plug it in, of course," I began, and she pounced.

"Yes." Her voice was hard and steely. "Yesterday, someone (read here: YOU) forgot to plug in the fridge, and we did not notice until two o'clock. Many ice creams were melted and ruined. Please do not forget this again. You must check every morning." Her eyes were burning holes in my face. I started to stammer an explanation, an apology - actually, I don't know what I was going to say, as I felt like my bowels might explode at any moment, just from her furious stance and glare - but she cut me off. "Just remember next time." And she abruptly wheeled around and marched back to her office.

I blindly went through my morning opening routine (making double and triple sure that the fridge was frigging plugged in, you can imagine), and the day started. It was busy, people coming in all morning to buy bread, drink coffee, and ask various questions. I stayed out of my boss' way as much as possible, but was sure I could feel her contempuous gaze on me from time to time. Around eleven, things slowed down, and I settled into some cleaning duties. I had barely begun to sweep up the crumbs made by about 60 croissants and 100 baguettes, when the boss' voice came from the storage room in the back of the building.

"Erin, please come here." My stomach sank. It wasn't over.

I hied myself to the storage room to find Mrs. Boss, and her husband, Mr. Boss (they run the place together) standing there. He had a very sad, disappointed look on his face, she still looked like the wrath of God. Oh, Jesus, I thought. What now? I soon found out.

"Erin," Mrs. Boss began, still in her I'm so-angry-I-can-barely-keep-myself-from-strangling-you voice, "because you didn't plug in the fridge yesterday, we lost most of our ice creams. She yanked open the storage freezer we have back there and fished out some sort of frozen fruit bar. "Look at this!" She was dangerously close to shrieking now. She squeezed the wrapper and it was evident it was still mushy from melting the day before. "We put these into this freezer to try to save them, but most are still like this. Look at it - look at what you did!" She threw it back into the freezer. Mr. Boss looked chagrined, as well.

"It is a very bad mistake, Erin," he said, sadly and with great gravity. "A very bad mistake."

Part 2 ... next post

Riding The Line

I drive a lot these days. When I lived in Orlando, my daily commute to work was about 11 miles or so, and all of those miles were through residential/suburban/urban areas. It took me about 25 minutes or so, once I stopped at all the inevitable red lights and waited in the lines of traffic caused by said lights. Pretty run-of-the-mill, and something most Americans are familiar with on some level.

Now, my commute to and from work is a little less than 30 kilometers. Don't ask me what this translates to in miles, because the conversion ratio has never stuck in my brain, no matter how many times it is told to me, and, frankly (my dear), I don't give a damn. They use kilometers here; therefore I think in kilometers. 30 of them is not really very far away, I realize, but it is the nature of the drive that makes my daily back-and-forth seem so long and arduous.

The way to work is, first of all, on roads that are way out in the country. My village is in the least-populated section of France, and the surface roads reflect that. If the highway got me to my destination more directly, I would take that, but, unfortunately, the major tourist attraction for the area (the Gorges du Tarn, known to English-speaking peoples as 'the French Grand Canyon') is not accessible via highway. You gotta take these little itty-bitty, twisty, curvy mountain roads. The views are fantastic - I will say that. the trouble is that, if you are the driver, and you take your eyes off the road for one moment to enjoy the sweeping vistas opening in front of you, it is very possible you may find yourself suddenly approaching a hairpin turn, overcorrect, and go plummeting to the bottom of the canyon, cursing "the scenic route" all the long, long way down.

Not only do I putt-putt through kilometers of scenic beauty that makes me feel as if I live in a postcard, I also pass through some lovely farmland and pastures before I reach the mountainous region. Fields of wheat and hay and just plain old grass, picturesque with poppies blowing in the breeze, are around every bend in the road. There are horses and goats and sheep and cows all over the damn place. the smell of manure wafts in my windows on the morning breeze. (I imagine that it is sort of like this in Idaho, or maybe Montana. Has anyone ever been there?) Two mornings ago, and I kid you not, I came around a curve and had to stop for about five minutes, because an entire herd of shorn sheep were crossing the road in front of me. The herd was complete with its own barking sheepdog and craggy-faced farmer (shepherd?), who was helpfully wearing a fluorescent yellow vest (the farmer, not the dog - the dog was not wearing any sort of vest at all) to catch the eyes of any early-morning passers-by on this road in the middle of nowhere. He seemed surprised to see me, and the sight of the sheep tickled me so much I spent the entire five minutes grinning maniacally and laughing. As the last of the sheep crossed and the farmer gave me the high sign, indicating I could go, I could see that my jack-o'lantern grin was puzzling him. I just waved merrily and rode on - but it lifted my whole day, let me tell you.

So, the most important thing about my 30-kilometer trek is that, when these roads were built, it seems that their engineers never thought about the fact that perhaps more than one car might like to travel on them at the same time. They do have a dividing line (dotted and white in most places, indicating that passing is fine) in the middle of the road all the way there and back, but the issue is that in some places, it is just short of being too narrow for two cars to pass each other if they are going in opposite directions.If you are willing to let your right tires sort of drag on the shoulder, and there is not a tall guardrail, stone wall, or rock face on that side, you can just squeak by with no damage to yourself, your car, or the passing vehicle. From these delightful thoroughfares (on which there is a surprising amount of traffic) I have come up with a theory of French driving in rural areas that I like to call "riding the line".

Riding the line means that, as long as you are on your particular stretch of road by yourself, you drive, more or less, with your two left tires riding on top of that dotted white line. Think of the line not as a division between your lane and oncoming traffic's lane ... think of that dotted line as more of a, well, guideline. A suggestion, if you will, of where you might like to steer your car. You ride on this line, and usually cross right over it into the oncoming lane's side when you're rounding a sharp turn, but you always keep an eye ahead for oncoming vehicles. When you see one, you wait until the last possible second, and then you swing your own vehicle to just a few inches to the right of that line. You hold your breath and pray that the oncoming vehicle will not take your driver's side mirror along with them when you pass each other. Then ... whoosh! A gust of air, you can let your breath out now, and you're past them and once again free to use as much of the road as seems necessary. You might now say a Hail Mary or Our Father as you pass one of the numerous roadside stone crosses, because once again, you have escaped with your life intact. Simple.

Simple, maybe, if you were born in this part of the country and have never driven anywhere else. (Or maybe if you learned to drive in Paris, Beirut, or New York City. I think any one of the three would qualify you to be at ease driving anywhere else.) For an outlander, every day is a lesson in how much fear I can sustain and how much adrenalin I can produce in one forty-minute drive. Did I mention that the suggested speed limit, almost all the way there and back, is between 70 and 90 kilometers and hour? Again, I have no idea what that is in mph, but it seems awfully damned fast when there is an RV rumbling towards you around a curve, and you realize that to your right is a shoulder about three feet wide, and then a yawning chasm that seems to be magnetically pulling you toward it. (And also, the fact that the road ahead, where you estimate you will pass by this road behemoth, appears to have been engineered for the contestants of a soapbox derby.) In some of the narrower areas, if another car is approaching, I actually just stop and let the other car come through first, and then proceed. I know it marks me as a tourist, but hey - better than spazzing out and throwing up sparks as I scrape the entire right side of my tiny hatchback against a stone guardrail.

Do not fear for my safety, though, scary as the above revelations may be. I am getting better and better at negotiating these spine-tingling encounters, and by this time next year, I doubt I will even think of it at all. I've even managed to get my speed up enough on most sections of the road to get into fourth (and even fifth!) gear. What was originally a 45-minute, harrowing trek through the mountainous wilderness has become a 35-minute, only slightly and/or occasionally terrifying trip through some lovely countryside. I am learning. I even passed someone (an actual car, not just a crazy person on a bicycle) the other day on my way home because I thought they were going too slow. Hah! I was very proud of myself, and what did I do for the remainder of my drive home? well, I'll tell you - I rode the line.

Stranger In A Strange Land

Today is a rather momentous day for me. I have just completed my first full week of working in a foreign country. In that week, I have learned, each day, many things concerning the customs and habits of the local inhabitants, and how much my own upbringing and culture are different. It has been eye-opening, and I am looking forward to continuing to learn and become accustomed to the new place in which I find myself living.

That being said, I have some observations, culled from the interactions of the past week, which some of you might find ... enlightening? Amusing? Slightly interesting? You'll have to tell me. I am going to do my best to keep from poking fun or bitching - it has been a monster of a week, for sure. I definitely have been close to tears a few times! But I just keep soldiering on, and I know I will figure this place out if it kills me (though I'm resonably sure it won't - I hardly think people meet their doom as a direct result of culture shock). And so, on to the main event:

• I work at a campground. This means I sell drinks and breakfast pastries from behind a bar, I clean things, I wait on people sitting on our terrace, I make coffee, I answer the phone, I enter registration info into a computer. Not tough, right? Even with the language barrier, I can generally manage to figure out what someone wants and, in turn, make myself understood. Coming from a community where there are many, many people who speak English as a second language, I never really considered how tough it is to be the person who doesn't understand the local language all that well. Now, finding myself on that side of the river, so to speak, I am humbled and ashamed of my prior attitude towards those folks. Being spoken to like you are a five-year-old (and a mentally deficient one, at that) when you are, in fact, over thirty years of age, can only be defined as a "if it doesn't kill you, it makes you stronger" sort of experience. Throwing a temper tantrum to protest this sort of treatment would probably not help bolster my image, and so I have so far refrained. (Just barely.) Though if I hear another "Tu comprends?" (You understand?) after someone re-explains yet again how something like the dishwasher works (there are three buttons, come on), I may revise my strategy.
• Clothing. Most precisely, women's clothing. I've mentioned before, I think, that I have never considered myself to be any sort of a fashion plate. I wear what I like, and what is comfortable, usually, and consider myself good to go. And, working at a campground in summertime, I was reasonably certain that my wardrobe, such as it is, would be just fine. Instead, I stick out like the proverbial sore thumb amongst my female co-workers. No one told me I needed to have garments made only of linen or very thin jersey. Or that, apparently, French women consider bright colors to be de trop (too much),  and seem to only wear muted shades of brown, blue, grey, and, of course, the ever-serviceable black and white. One of the girls I work with had on a sweater the other day with some stripes of the palest imaginable coral hue the other day, and I caught myself staring, thinking, wow, that really stands out. My purples and grass greens and reds and swimming pool blues make me look like I just strolled out of a bordello, compared to the ladies around me. Ah, well, American I am, I guess - but all the same, I think I'll save my brighter dresses for leisure time. Yikes. At least everyone there seems to have flip-flops of one stripe or another - and in that department, I am well-prepared (yay, Florida!). 
• Co-worker conversation is a bit of a minefield. I am really lucky that most of my co-workers speak at least some English. (Thank God.) However, even though I can converse with them in a somewhat tortured Frenglish, there isn't too much of that, other than pleasantires about the weather and comments on the job itself. In the States, if someone new starts at your job, and you work on a small staff, by the end of week one, you generally know all there is to know about them. You can ask questions about where they live, where they've worked before, their families, their hobbies, and where they were born, if you like. Here, not so much. As my husband patiently explained to me, for the French, it is considered tremendously ill-mannered to ask where someone is from, and you never ask any personal information, you simply wait until it is volunteered. I guess the theory is that none of this background information is relevant to your work relationship, and, if the person wishes you to know about them, they will offer up these tidbits in the course of one conversation or another. As an American, of course, I find this wildly strange and very limiting. (and, of course, I am nosy.) And so I take my cues from my counterparts, and don't ask about anything they don't offer willingly, but it really limits conversational topics. You can only talk about the weather and how busy/not busy it is for so long before lapsing into a rather uncomfortable silence. I, of course, continue to offer up my own personal comments concerning my life, as they seem appropriate, but so far the reaction seems to be, "Oh dear, how embarassing. The American is telling me information I don't need to know. How on earth can she think this is in any way relevant to me?" This is accompanied by a polite and remote smile, accompanied by a minute shrug of the shoulders. And me, being the irrepressible American, keep on trying. 
• I  think also that, in many cases, American bosses try to keep reprimands a little more, shall we say, private than their French counterparts. In the U.S., if you screw something up, your boss is apt to take you aside, away from other ears, and lay it out for you. (And then you spend weeks trying to get out from under the cloud of incompetence which has settled upon you.) In my experience so far here in France, that is not the case. If you make a mistake, your boss is much more likely to put it all out there, chapter and verse, in front of the other employees, customers, or even the postmistress, should she happen to be there delivering the day's mail. I will say, however, that after they've set you straight, it's done. No residual hard feelings or undercurrent of dissatisfaction. It's done, they've told you about it, and it's over. C'est tout. ("That's all", or "That's it".) And the conclusion I've drawn? You're now so embarassed over it that you strive mightily to never do something so goshdarn stupid ever again.
• Customer service is a mighty different thing here. At my job, it's a little closer to what you'd see in the U.S., but still there are some strange differences. We're face to face with people all the time, so we tend to be somewhat more conciliatory than if you, say, called up your internet provider or phone company. (And that's a whole 'nother ball of wax, by the way - French customer service via phone. Holy shit.) At my job, we're expected to greet everyone who comes in the door - and when I say "we", that means everyone working at that time, which results in a flurry or "bonjour"s to every person who wanders in our direction. I take a lot of joy in doing this, and try to vary my inflection so that it sounds as though I truly wish each person a good day. (I have to amuse myself somehow. And I do hope they're having a good day.) And, of course, as a person leaves our reception area, they go on their way with an assortment of "Au revoir"s, "Merci, monsieur/madame"s, and "Bonne journee"s as they go. It's nice. But, I notice that the French are not as inclined to smile as we are in the U.S., and so at times I feel like a circus clown because I can't seem to stop from grinning at customers, while my co-workers adopt a more formal, Mona-Lisa-type half-smile that could be misinterpreted as a smirk, if you didn't know any better. Also, the habit of the French saying, "Ce n'est pas possible, " meaning, "It's not possible," in response to customers' inquiries, always knocks me for a loop. Someone will ask a question, and then, in response, you hear, "Non. Ce n'est pas possible," in a very definite and firm tone, and then a long pause. If the customer is stalwart enough and hangs around looking at you for further elucidation, the speaker will then indeed explain the reasons why it is not possible. (Usually, this is very logical and sensible.) But oftentimes, especially if the customer is also French, they'll just say, "D'accord - merci", which is basically, "Okay, thanks" and meander off. I am so accustomed to saying something like, "I'm so sorry, but we can't offer that option at present. Perhaps instead you'd like to ...", and then bending over backwards to try to find some small thing to make the customer happy - the French response just takes my breath away. I gotta say, though, I kinda like the sheer chutzpah of it - like it or lump it, this is the answer, and me offering you ridiculous options won't change the fact that the real answer is 'no'. It's very upfront and forthright, and I have to admire a culture that doesn't waste its time (or yours) trying to make positives out of negatives all the time. Sometimes, the answer is 'no'.

I'm sure I'll have other observations as time goes by, but these were the big things I've been thinking about this week as I embarked upon a summer of assisting people in getting closer to nature. (Boy, oh boy, do Europeans like to go camping. It's an overwhelmingly popular pastime.) No major catastrophes (well, this morning I did break 4 beer glasses in a seriously clumsy move that could have been in a Mr. Bean movie - thank God the glasses were freebies we get from the beer distributor, or I'd probably be ending my first week with a pink slip), though I am still getting sweaty palms every time I answer the phone, and end up having to hand it off to a co-worker half the time, because I can't understand a damned word the person on the line is saying. But, I think overall, I'm winning more than I'm losing, and the balance is shifting into that "win" column every day. My boss even smiled at me - unsolicited - today, after hearing me answer a question for an English-speaking couple who were checking in. I am proud of myself. And very thankful that there are so many German and Dutch tourists in the area who prefer speaking English over speaking French.

So, a summertime campground job today, but tomorrow? Who knows? (I hear that not everyone likes the president - what do you think are the odds ... nevermind.) Until next time ...

French Towns Can Be Funny

So. I've been busy! This past weekend, Patrick and his girls and I made the LONG drive up to Paris and back for his brother's wedding. It was a lovely occasion, the weather was beautiful, and I had the opportunity to meet pretty much all of Patrick's family, as well as a great many friends. We did not take the main interstates up north, as the tolls are fairly momentous on these well-maintained and well-traveled roads; instead, we took the scenic route, using the smaller (but still lovely) national roads that were the only things there used to be, before the advent of the larger "superhighways". It was a long (about eight hours) trip, but a nice one. And, along the way, I started noticing the names of towns and villages that we were passing - they triggered some very interesting conversations, let me tell you. Here's a quick list of the more interesting ones:

• Attainville - is it the fulfillment of a higher purpose to live here??
• Riossy en Brie - a town covered in delicious cheese?
• Combs la Ville - do you get your own official hair-grooming implement upon settling here?
• St. Fargeau - we drove Patrick crazy with our English pronunciaton on this one. Visions of Frances McDormand in a hat with earflaps, transplanted to the French countryside flew through my mind.
• Fleury-en-Biere - you gotta love a town named after the world's greatest beverage
• Malesherbes - bad plants? masculine herbs? who knows?
• Nevers - this one was a favorite, and many bad jokes were made (we would "never" get there, etc.), despite the fact that in French, the name sounds more like "neh-vair', with the aspirated "r" at the end
• Vierzon - I wondered if the Verizon people are aware of this town - maybe whoever named it has a relative from there, thought it was a nice name, and accidentally switched the placement of the I and the E when spelling it?
• Macon - there's actually a little accent mark over the A (a circonflex? it looks like a carat mark), but of course, we immediately thought of that place we all know and love in Georgia ... who knew? Apparently, there is also a "Bacon" somewhere in France. Love it.
• Aigueperse - this one sounds a little like "egg purse" in French, and the girls and I giggled over that nonsense notion for miles. A satchel to carry eggs? A carry-all made of eggshells?
• Cellule - this conjured past biology classes, although I can't say I am absolutely positive there is indeed such a thing as a "cellule' in English - it sounded like something you'd read in a bio textbook, though.
• Pontmort - I think this translates as something like "dead bridge", and that just made me laugh. I mean, really? Where're you from? Oh, I hail from Dead Bridge, it's really nice there this time of year.
• Mozac - A new and improved incarnation of Prozac? Makes you even "mo" calm?
• Coudes - we liked this a lot, because "coude" is french for "elbow" ... any town named after a body part is simply funny for its own sake
• La Ribeyre - Looked to me like a fancy name in a menu for a steak
• St. Flour - I never knew there was a patron saint of bakers. (Nevermind if in French, it sounds like "san floo" ... it's much funnier in English.) I'm picturing a plump-faced fella with a tall white hat who has flour dust in a cloud around his head like a halo. Priceless.

Better even than some of the town names are the store and shop signs ... I love seeing any English at all here, it gives me a charge and helps me feel at home. Sometimes, though, I feel like a little has been lost in the translation. A few examples:

• Babymoov - appeared to be some sort of indoor kids' playground ... pronounced, of course, "bah-bee-moov". Move that kid - NOW!
• Crapa'hutte - I have no idea what this actually is, or if the inspiration came from English, but it certainly made me laugh out loud at the time. It was painted on the covered back of a truck that appeared to be some sort of mobile eating establishment. Hate to tell you, but I ain't never eatin' at a place with "crap" in the name.
• Too Much - name on a trendy-looking clothing store. Do they mean to say that everything costs a lot? Or that this is what folks will say about you, should you purchase and wear their clothing? Either way, I'm thinking - not so much.
• 911 Taxis - Um, so of course the emergency number here in France is NOT 911. But I laughed out loud, thinking of some poor, stranded, injured American dialing 911 hoping for immediate assistance, and instead getting a surly French taxi dispatcher. Oh, Lord.
• Merlot TP - I am guessing that this is some sort of wine designation of which I am not aware, but seeing this painted on the side of an old gas station almost made me pee my pants. In which case, I would have been in dire need of good old Merlot TP. Wipe your ass and experience one of France's greatest products, all at once.

I wish I could've stopped to take pictures of every one of these, but with an eight-hour trip underway, I could only jot them down in my notebook and hope to come this way again someday to snap pics for my scrapbook. Anyway, I definitely enjoyed the trip northward (and then south again) to lovely Paree, and wonder if a day will come when these little French-English bombs will cease to amuse me. God, I hope not.

Stinky Spain

Sorry this pic is so tiny - I can't get the cropped version to save on my computer - another example of technology getting the better of me. It says "Benvinguts A Barcelona", which is apparently Catalan for "Welcome to Barcelona." All the signs here are in Catalan first, then Spanish, and then usually also in French.

We drove to Spain this past Tuesday, to pick up Patrick's daughters at the airport in Barcelona - they're here to spend the summer with us. (I am, by the way, still just knocked out that I can write things like, "we drove to Spain this past Tuesday", just like I would've written, "we drove to Miami this past Tuesday" when I lived in Florida. Countries are so close together in Europe. It's crazy.) It took us about five hours, mostly because we stopped several times to let the dog out to go pee (yep, Sadie came with us) and for Patrick to get another tiny cup of coffee in an attempt to stay awake. Did I mention we left the house at 5:30am? I had no coffee, and a sore throat to boot, so I will admit to falling asleep a few times, once with the directions in one hand and a can of soda in the other. (Only for about five seconds, mind you.) I missed about ten minutes' worth of downtown Barcelona and woke up as we arrived at the airport parking structure.

Hmmm. What about Spain? you ask. What's it like? Well, I'll tell you - Spain is stinky. I am not speaking figuratively or making any sort of judgement on the peoples of Spain, their attitudes, etc. I am simply saying that, from the moment we crossed the border and began bumping along the highway in this country, we were suddenly aware of some new and not very welcome odors. At first, we thought that it was the dog farting. (She hadn't poo'd at any of the rest stops, something which was vaguely worrying us.) As the miles rolled by, it became apparent that the smells that would disappear for a few minutes and then reassert themselves even more strongly were not, in fact, emanating from Sadie's hind end. They were coming from outside.

The most frustrating thing here is that, during the rides to and from Barcelona, we simply could identify the source of these unpleasant stinks. It was sort of a cowpie/sulphur/skunk aroma that waxed and waned ... never really strong enough to make you gag, or anything, but there in enough force so that every few breaths you'd become aware of it again, and wonder what in the seven hells could be making that damned stink. We never figured it out. It is a mystery. If anyone has any theories, I'd be glad to hear them. I must say, though, that the smell somewhat colored my opinion of what I am sure must be an overall lovely country. What I have seen (and smelled) so far was really nothing to write home about.

As for the actual sights in the coutryside and city ... yawn. Barcelona was not as impressive as I thought it would be. Of course, we only drove through a portion on our way to the airport, and didn't stop at any tourist attractions or anything. Mostly what I saw was just what you see in any large urban area - lots of highrise buildings, lots of concrete, lots of cars ... and the undersides of the bridges were warrens filled with homeless folks' makeshift camps, acres of them. Nothing so very different from a lot of large American cities. I would like, I think, to be able to stay a little longer when we take the girls back for their trip home in August, and see some of the historic buildings in town, etc. I'd like to have more of a memory of Barcelona than a bad smell, homeless camps, and the airport.

I did get to see my first view of the Mediterranean Sea on our way home - you can, of course, see it from the Port of Barcelona, but we thought to perhaps find a little more congenial spot for gawking once we were back in France. We stopped for a late lunch in a seaside tourist town called Collioure, and it is right on the sea. The town itself is famous for its anchovies, of all things, and all the restaurants and cafes have menu items involving these tiny fishies. Patrick ate an anchovy sandwich for lunch. (The girls and I did not.) We all walked around this charming little seaside town after lunch, though, and I really enjoyed it. I'd like to go back sometime when we could spend the day and when we didn't have to wear sweatshirts and jeans (it's been partly cloudy and in the low 60's during the day for this whole past week). The beach there was all stones, but still, the Med looked pretty good to me. The place could have been somewhere in the Caribbean islands, had there been any palm trees - it's very evident, seeing all these small villages here, where the European flair in the Caribbean came from. I've spent so much time in tropical places - it's funny and weird to see echoes of that here, in such a different climate, and then to realize that - duh! - this is where the whole shebang originated.

So ... Spain = stinky disappointment, and French anchovy capital of Collioure = surprisingly charming. Who knew anchovies were such a draw for tourists?!

Looking down on Collioure while driving in

Part of the small marina of boats docked in the harbor

The beach at Collioure and the old fort

Another beach view and the clock tower (still operational)

This one's purely for my Mom - saw this place next to the beach and thought, yep, my Mom is gonna love visiting here!!!

A Land Without Salsa

I have discovered something rather unfortunate. Not, not unfortunate - tragic. I am not able to make my delicious salsa in France, not with the ingredients available here. I am just about on the verge of tears ... how will I live my life, without the comfort of salsa? Let me tell you how I've made this discovery, but brace yourselves. You may want to cry, too, before this is over.

It started with an armoire. Our house is very old, and has almost nothing in the way of storage, especially in terms of closets. Patrick and I needed to get an armoire - something as large as a closet, with space for lots of clothing. We looked at a few used furniture stores and found nothing that really fit the bill, or our budget. We resigned ourselves to waiting until we could make the trip to Ikea and pick something out there. Then, while telling his boss, Jacques, about our predicament, he thrilled us by saying, "Oh! But I have an armoire we don't use - you'd be doing me a favor if you'd take it off of my hands." And just like, that, we had an armoire. We picked it up, put it back together, and voila! We had a place to put away our clothes. Lovely.

The day after receiving this largesse, Patrick said to me, "I'd like to get Jacques a gift to thank him. What do you think would be good." We tossed around a few ideas - and then Patrick said that perhaps we should make him something - a cake, or something (Vote for Pedro!). And then he sealed my fate with, "Hey! Why don't you make him your dip?" Meaning, in Patrick-speak, why didn't I whip up a batch of my incomparable fresh salsa and we could present that as a thank-you, along with, perhaps, a bag of tortilla chips and a bottle of beer. I said (unaware of the pitfalls lurking ahead), "Sure! I'd be happy to do that." Hmmm.

So, the next day, I set out for our local grocery store, called Intermarche (en-tair-mar-shay). I had some other things to pick up, and eventually made my way to the produce section. Strike one - they didn't carry red onions, cilantro, or any sort of hot peppers. And after viewing the canned tomatoes on offer in the canned foods aisle, I knew I would have to investigate a larger market in order to get my salsa concocted. Disappointing, but not altogether unexpected. Intermarche, is, after all, just a small market in a small town. Of course they wouldn't have any "exotic" ingredients available - makes sense, I thought.

Yesterday, we had to go to Mende (mahnd) to take care of some bureaucratic-type stuff. Luckily for me, Mende is home to Hyper-U (ee-pair-ew), one of what is called an hypermarche (ee-pair-mar-shay) by the French. Think Super Target or one of those Walmarts with the grocery store included, and you get the idea. They sell everything from clothing and lawn furniture to fresh seafood, produce, and meats. A BIG place. Surely, I thought, I will find my salsa ingredients here. We set out in good spirits.

My spirits rapidly fell. They did indeed have red onions, which was a relief, but these red onions are about a third of the size of the typical Bermuda onion I am accustomed to dealing with. I bought four, just to be on the safe side. There were no jalapenos, Scotch bonnet peppers, serranos, or anything else that might be termed a "hot" pepper - oh, wait - I finally uncovered a few greenish smaller peppers, looking a bit like a cubanelle pepper, and the sign says they were from Morocco, and are spicy. Hmmm. Well, beggars can't be choosers - into the cart it goes. On to cilantro ... but nary a trace of anything even remotely cilantro-ey can I find. There's parsley everywhere, but nothing that will finish off a salsa. Well, I've made salsa without cilantro before - it's preferred,but not essential. I'll survive, I thought.

Tomatoes. Here's a big secret - I almost never used fresh tomatoes for my salsa. The perfect base, in my opinion, are cans of diced tomatoes and mild green chiles that you find in the Hispanic food sections. I made my way to the "World Foods" section, and, gasp! no canned tomatoes with green chiles. No canned green chiles, for that matter. Nothin'. In the regular canned foods section, I chose plain chopped tomatoes in water. Maybe with some fresh tomatoes, these would work out. (I find that fresh tomatoes can be a little overpowering, and also impart a bit of a mealy texture - thus I started using the canned ones.) Thankfully, I remembered, I had my trusty container of Adobo seasoning at the house - shipped with my things over the Atlantic - and that is the real linchpin of my salsa, so I crossed my fingers and hoped it would be all right.

I compounded the salsa last night. I had a cucumber and fresh garlic in the house already, so I was good there. I bravely chopped up and combined the other ingredients found at Hyper-U. I stirred and smelled and added and prayed. I decanted the stuff into small containers and put it in the fridge overnight to let the flavors meld.

I just tasted it. Oh, it's serviceable enough to come out of a jar labeled "El Paso" or "Pace", but it's most certainly not my salsa. The tomatoes are overpowering, and have developed a sweet, almost ketchup-y flavor. The garlic and red onion are not even on speaking terms, and the cucumber seems to have disappeared altogether, instead of bringing that deliciously cool note to the acidity of the salsa. The "hot" pepper has not lived up to its name. I cannot give this to anyone as a gift - it tastes like it rolled off of a conveyor belt in Indiana. Worse than that, I am despondent - I was not kidding when I asked above, how will I live without salsa? Those of you who know me know how much I love the stuff. When I would make this back in the States, I would pretty much eat it, to the exclusion of all other things, until it ran out. Now, without any cilantro or decent canned tomatoes/green chiles, I think I am quietly doomed to only be able to make it when I go back to Florida for visits.

Don't get me wrong, the French know how to eat. At the Hyper-U, their cheese counter makes your head spin. They have more varieties of sausage and pate and terrines than I can count, all of them delicious (except the blood sausage, of course. Gross.). Their prepared foods are completely unlike those in American grocery stores - these are fine foods, prepared simply and ready for you to take home and heat up and truly enjoy. The produce section is a thing of beauty, everything looking fresh, and ripe, and wonderful. And I can't express my joy in French soft drinks - the sodas and the sirops (seer-oh) that you add to a glass of water for a delightfully tasty beverage, just as sweet or unsweet as you like ... but I am mourning the absence of a decent Hispanic foods section, with multiple flour tortillas to choose from, guava paste, canned chiles and tomatillos, ranchero sauce for enchiladas, and so much more. What will I do????

Maybe I can find a mail-order service that can send me things like this through the mail. Cilantro paste in a tube, jars of chiles and jalapenos, vaccuum-sealed flour tortillas. And white corn chips (only yellow available here.) Perhaps when we head up to Paris at the end of June for Patrick's brother's wedding, we can locate some place in the city that would sell such things. Until I figure it out, salsa is not on the menu, that's for certain. And now I've gotta think of something else to give Jacques - any suggestions??

Petanque and pantacourts

I have witnessed something 100% French, folks. My village hosted a petanque (peh-tahnk) tournament this past week. Actually, we have a permanent petanque court across from the town square, but so far I've only seen a few old men lurching around it unpredictably. I had no idea it was actually for a game of some sort.

What is petanque, you might well ask. As far as I can gather, it is sort of a French national game, and people of all ages play it, generally just when the weather is warm. (Look it up on Wikipedia, if you'd like a better explanation - my grasp of sprting events is usually somewhat skewed.) It's a summertime game, like croquet or bocce or lawn darts, and has elements of all those in it! It's played with teams of either two or three players each, and each player (depending upon how many there are, total) gets either two or three small, heavy steel balls to throw. (They are about the size of medium apples or oranges.)In a tournament, there are six balls total for each side, so if there are two teams of two, each player gets three balls each. If there are two teams of three, each player gets only two balls. There is also a small, hard wooden ball, about the size of a big gumball, called the cochonnet (koh-shone-ay) that is thrown out before play starts, and this marker is the place to aim - where you want your balls to go. (And, as you can imagine - and as I heard many times that afternoon - jokes about "your balls" abound when you're around any number of people playing this game.)

Each player takes turns tossing these hard, steel projectiles at the cochonnet, trying to get closest to it. You use a strange, underhand throw, along the lines of a softball pitch, but much slower and more controlled. The ball you're aiming at is between 18 and 30 or so feet from where you're throwing, so they've developed all these different sorts of throws, to do different things. One of the more popular defensive moves is to throw your ball so that it lands right next to an opponent's ball, knocking it away from the cochonnet and further out of play. (Sort of like croquet, non?) The tournament players take the game really seriously, and apparently you have to be licensed to even play in one of these things. Yep. At the end, after all players on both teams have thrown, the winning team is the one whose ball or balls is closest to the cochonnet. It's that simple.

And that complicated! These tourneys actually have a dude assigned to be there with a regulation measuring tape, and it's his job to measure distances between the players' balls and the cochonnet, to see whose is closest, if there is any dispute and it's not clear who is really closest. Seriously, he has this dippy little case on a strap with his measuring tools in it and everything. And the competitors are very, very serious about the game. There is some smiling and back-patting when a throw goes well, but mostly it's just a bunch of guys (at tournaments, I'm told, it's almost exclusively a male game, in lots of places. No one seems to know why. Lots of women play with their families, but I guess not so much in competitions) pacing around on a semi-smooth patch of gravel and hard-packed dirt, eyeing the court and looking like they're trying to do calculus and geometry proofs in their heads, simultaneously. (Perhaps they are.) I saw very little in the way of poor sportsmanship - when a bad shot occurred, the man involved would generally just grimace slightly and look at the ground for a while, and there seemed to be little in the way of cat-calling or general ribbing, like you'd see in practically any American sport. Very civilized, indeed.

I didn't see the very end of the tournament, so I've no idea whose team finally triumphed, but there were some shiny trophies and (I think) a cash award for the winners of the day. The tournament started at 3; Patrick and I watched a little more around 10 that evening, when things were down to the last eight teams. The locals we talked to seemed to think things would be wrapped up by 11:30 or so. Almost nine hours of play! On a Thursday. I love it. Patrick has a "non-regulation" set of petanque balls; he's going to teach me to play. I'm looking forward to trying it out myself, although the balls seem to weigh about 2-3 pounds apiece, so passersby had better be wary when I'm throwin'. Yikes.

Watching petanque in the afternoon sun and heat (well, we'll call it "heat", as it was warmer than it has been - maybe 72 or 75 degrees. Nothing for a Floridian!), I became aware of something else very European that I've seen more and more as the temperatures warm up in this region. French men, apparently, do not approve of shorts as we know them. You almost never see a French man wearing anything that leaves all of his knees bare. Bermuda-length shorts are seen here and there, but by and large they wear something called pantacourts (pahn-tah-coor), which translates roughly to "short pants". You Americans may know them as "capri pants", or, as my sisters and I have often said, "man-prees". About three out of every five men were wearing some sort of capri-length pant - the rest were in regular long pants. Maybe five or ten men out of the whole crowd there that day had on what we'd call "shorts", and maybe ONE of them in anything shorter than knee-length.

                                                                           

I asked Patrick about the man-prees. He confirmed that French men, in general, find regular, American-style shorts "too confining" and prefer the pantacourts much more for summer wear. "Confining"? Really? This is a country where, at most public pools, men are required to wear Speedos, for heaven's sake! And shorts are too confining? I am frankly mystified. And a little tickled, truthfully. Seeing lots of what seem to be very manly men wearing a type of clothing I have heretofore classified as women's wear is pretty entertaining. (Especially when they pair it with a fanny pack - no, I am not kidding.) I worried, before I came to France, that my fashion sense would be completely outrun, even out here in the country. I imagined an effortless stylishness that I'd never be able to live up to or replicate. After seeing the dress code at the petanque tournament, I am greatly relieved. I have nothing to fear - not as long as my pantacorts hold out.