Lazy weekend

My third lazy day in a row--due to the rain, my lack of a bike or car, no buses after 9:00 and my aching legs (thank you, two-hour-long ski prep class, for thoroughly kicking my ass), I haven't done a whole lot this weekend besides watch lots of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. I was planning on a hike today, but my cuisses de tonnère (thunder thighs) just won't let me.

I think in the future, I need to plan weekend getaways to the beach or nearby towns. Everything is closed on Sunday in Pau. Complaining about boredom when I'm in France is probably the lamest thing ever, so I won't do it. But it's days like this when I realize just how long I'm going to be here. Pau really is home for the next three months.

Getting comfortable

Another strike is happening tomorrow, so bus transport is pretty much out. Whereas before I didn't have a problem with the strikes, Charles pointed out that they're often manipulated one way or another and don't always happen for the right reasons. For now, it's part of living in France.

School hasn't been this easy in years. Art History is taught in French, but there's no homework or textbook, and my final grade will be Pass/Fail anyway. Phonetics doesn't even count for credit, and all I do is sit at a computer and listen to a recording of French phrases. I'm often asked to repeat the phrase, but that's marginally important at 9:00 a.m. when I haven't had much coffee. I'm supposed to take a placement test for the real French classes next Wednesday.

I'm taking a (not-for-credit) French cooking class, which sounds awesome, but actually isn't. With one stovetop and 14 students, there's only so much the teacher seems to be able to handle. She doesn't speak much English but doesn't seem to understand that most of us speak fluent French, so that further hinders our ability to learn anything beyond spreading goat cheese on baguette. I paid 80 Euros for 4 classes, and last night was left wondering why I basically paid 20 Euros to eat a salad and some canned duck (already prepared because it would "take too long and was too complicated to explain"). Most of the stuff I've eaten in class I could easily figure out how to make on my own. No special preparation techniques; no food pairing secrets; no wine, unless I bring the bottle. So bring the bottle I did.

I also had my first French yoga class last night. There were a ton of people in the class and the room was uncomfortably warm because of it, but I think yoga and sports will be useful for improving my French this semester. It was a very basic class, mostly focused on breathing techniques (and I prefer that kind of yoga anyway as opposed to the calorie-burning, Westernized method). I liked hearing the teacher give an instruction in French and then following along on my own.

I'm also signed up for a ski preparation class on Thursdays and hiking on Saturdays. I watched Magali's handball practice tonight, but ultimately decided that team sports might be stretching my language skills a little too far.

I feel like I've been here for months already, although it's only been two weeks. I've done so much, and time passes so slowly here without anything pressing to do besides go to class. I have so much empathy for foreigners in the United States now; here, my identity is always The American or The Non-Fluent, Heavily Accented Speaker Who Can't Follow Our Conversation But Just Sits There With A Dopey Smile On Her Face. Every day I learn new words and phrases, but it's frustrating to tell a story and realize you're ruining the comedy with your linguistic mix-ups. I'd like to meet more French people, but I don't know how when I can't even keep a conversation with Charles and Magali's friends.

Weekend in the Basque Country

Friday night I took an excursion to the Pays Basque (southwestern France/northwestern Spain) with the study abroad group. First we visited Bayonne (France), a picturesque little town famous for its chocolate. After lunch and a few hours to wander the streets in the light rain, we drank rich cups of hot chocolate and moved on to San Sebastian (Spain) for the night.

In Spain, dinner doesn't start until at least 10:30 p.m., so we got dressed up and went out to the tapas bars and discothèques (nightclubs). The counters of the tapas bars were strewn with plates of small hors d'oeuvres-type snacks--you simply fill up your own plate and pay before you sit down to eat. There's also no imitating Spanish sangria; every glass tasted more like juice than wine. The discothèques started getting crowded around midnight, but we stayed out until 4 or 5 a.m., dancing and walking home on the beach.

Everything in Spain is pretty inexpensive, but the only thing I didn't like was the way everyone smokes inside. My coat reeked by the end of the night. Lots of French people smoke, but hardly ever indoors. And unfortunately, some towns in Spain are notorious for pickpocketing, so I didn't bring my camera to take pictures.

The next day we took the charter bus back to St. Jean-de-Luz, about an hour outside Pau on the Atlantic coast. In the past, my daydreams about the south of France were filled with images exactly like the beach in St. Jean-de-Luz. To finally be there on the soft sand, with sunshine, 70-degree weather and blue sky and sea...words can't describe it. I definitely want to go back soon. There was hardly enough time to relax on the beach for a while, then grab some ice cream and a sandwich and head back to Pau.

I feel like I'm on a 4-month vacation here. No job, no homework (right now, anyway), temperate weather--it's exactly what I hoped for. Despite all the stress, anticipation and paperwork to get here, it's been worth it so far.

Laisse tomber

Subtle rain replaced the warm sunshine this morning. I walk to school under an umbrella, watching for frequent dog poop on the thin sidewalks, listening to Elliott Smith, looking for the gray cat on Rue du Midi that's probably hiding from the watery skies.

It's been two weeks since I hugged anyone.

I rattle off a French tongue-twister for Phonetics, and the teacher says très très bien and gives me another one that looks exactly the same. Un ange qui songeait à changer de visage pour donner le change se vit si changé. I copy Le Mésopotamie: Croissant Fertile, histoire écrit from the white board to my graph paper notebook, let my gaze drop to the floor and don't pick it up for a long while.

Today, for the first time in two years, my life is wholly up to me. The distance has finally been cut, no longer overstretched like a sore muscle, and life is assez simple. I am free from that which is no longer serving me.

I've been in France for two weeks, but time passes remarkably slowly. Already my body is becoming anchored in the winding streets; I'm beginning to find shortcuts and recognize places in this labyrinthine town. (Before today), the past week has been a happy one, filled with cups of coffee and French movies (patiently explained in slower French by Charles).

I hate that I'll never speak like a native, but I have hope that in a month, I'll at least understand more. My head no longer hurts from listening and speaking a second language constantly. Just as I fell in love with French in seventh grade, I am even more in love with it now.

I don't know what I'd do without Charles and Magali, who spend so much time with me. Already I can predict I'll be very, very sad to leave Pau in December.

Ce que j'aime, ce que je n'aime pas

There are things I love and things I hate.

I love that Charles is teaching me piano, though it's difficult in English and even harder in French. The ABCDEFG system is replaced with do-re-mi-fa-so-la-si (do=C).

I love going hiking in the Pyrénées, where you don't need a language to enjoy the mountains and the lakes, the little purple wildflowers and the forest.

I love the setting sun as it illuminates the kitchen, while I drink hot chocolate and learn French slang.

I love drinking wine at a bar with Charles and Magali, proud that I can hold a conversation in French about quantum mechanics and philosophy.

I hate getting stuck downtown at night with my English-speaking friend, waiting around for a bus for 45 minutes and finally deciding to drop 7 Euros on a taxi home simply because I don't want to walk alone in the dark.

I'm frustrated that my French isn't yet good enough to keep up with conversations at the dinner table. That I always have to say "repetez" or "encore une fois" or "quoi?" when I don't understand. That I forget a new word as soon as I hear it.

I'm already tired of eating so much baguette at every meal.

I hate how easy it is to get lost here. And I hate pulling out the map and looking like such a damn tourist, but it's the only way to direct myself through the maze of streets.

I hate not having a phone. Or a bike or a car. All I have is my feet, the bus, and taxis (and taxis are too expensive).

Dazed and confused

Day 2 in Pau.

Since I arrived I've been bombarded with new information, directions, schedules, phrases, people...it's too much and too many little things to write down, yet I have the feeling I'm going to unintentionally end up alone downtown with no idea how to get home at 2:00 a.m. some night, having forgotten the buses stop running at 9:00 and no cell phone to contact anyone.

So far, this trip has completely crumpled my organized personality and tossed it in the trash. I come home from school at 5:00 with a zillion different papers, maps and brochures thrown in my backpack and nothing written in my planner. No to-do lists (those of you that know me well will think this is very odd). I probably should have gotten lunch stuff at the grocery store yesterday, but I didn't think about it at the time, and now the effort to go back and get it just seems out of the question.

There are so many things to do in town, so many buses to take, so many ways to get lost.

On a happier note, my host sister/cousin Magali came home today. Her family lives in Bordeaux but she goes to school here and thus lives with my host family during the school year. I was invited to have dinner with the family again, but they all speak so fast to each other that I had trouble keeping up with the conversation and spent most of the meal just listening quietly...I hope that didn't come across as rude. I realize now that they probably speak slower and more simply to me.

I'm going out to a bar with Magali and Charles tonight. I'm trying to accept every invitation my host family makes for meals and outings. The sooner I get totally fluent in French, the better. I'm already sick of this adjustment phase, when everything is overwhelming and confusing. And I haven't even been in Pau for a week yet; how can I possibly cram this much new information into my brain every day?

Pau at last

My head hurts from hearing and speaking French. Right now it takes so much effort to concentrate on everything people say to me, process it, then create some sort of halfway comprehensible response. It's so easy to glaze over and listen to the pretty sound of the language without actually processing what it means.

I took a language placement exam at the University of Pau today (just to determine what language level I should be in), and I realized it's been about 3 years since I took a French grammar class. I can barely remember how to conjugate certain verbs, when to use what pronouns, and how to write a business letter. I hope I don't get placed in too low a level and suffer consequential boredom for the next three months.

Where my last blog left off:

We left Paris on Tuesday and took a bus ride to Versailles, but the palace was closed due to workers' strikes--quite common in France. The study abroad group wrote a complaint letter, but I chose not to sign it. Striking is how the people get their government to cooperate, and as a foreigner, I feel I have no place in that argument. I can always come back to Versailles. We were, however, able to tour the sprawling gardens. I spent an hour riding a rental bike, and it turned out to be my favorite part of the entire Paris tour. I miss being on my rusty old cruiser back in Denver.

The bus ride to Pau took two days (with a few stops in between to see the Château de Chaumont and Château Azay-le-Rideau). We stopped in Tours overnight on Tuesday and woke up to heavy rain on Wednesday, which made lugging our suitcases to the bus a lot of fun (!!!). Every day since I left the U.S. has been exhausting; the tours start at 9:00 every morning, we spend the whole day doing something, and I go to bed at 11:00 at night. And now that we're finally in Pau, things are getting a lot more interesting...

My host family is great. The parents are professers at the University of Pau, and they have two sons, one who is 27 and a lawyer in Paris, the other who lives at home and is 23. They also have a 20-year-old niece who should be coming back from vacation tomorrow. They live in a 3-story house with yellow walls and palm trees in the front yard. It's about a 15-minute walk to the University, and the kids have their own private kitchen and bathroom on the third floor, where my room is as well. I seem to be staying in a boy's outgrown room; the ABC wallpaper and petite wood furniture is very cute though. I can understand most of what they say, but my efforts to formulate intelligent responses are usually thwarted by huge brain farts that prevent what I want to say from translating into French. Ça va.

Today was the first day of school. And man, do I hate the first day of school. Really just an orientation day, but this was also my first full day in Pau. Charles (the host brother) walked me to the meeting place for my study abroad group, but at the end of the day, I got a little lost trying to walk home by myself. Not only was the map slightly incorrect, but the streets in France are much more nightmarish than in the U.S., I don't care where you live. According to my host mom, the concept of "blocks" doesn't really exist here. The streets are long and short, winding and truncated, and one street becomes another quite frequently. There is really no direct route to school; I have to take a bunch of neighborhood streets.

I'm also not sure how I'm going to handle this whole leftover-baguette-for-breakfast thing. I'm used to a plate of eggs and vegetables in the morning, not a piece of bread and butter. By lunch at 12:30, I was starving. I went to the grocery store after school to pick up some yogurt and fruit, but because all the brands are different here, it took me quite a while to figure out if the thing in my hand was really what I wanted. The homestay contract only guarantees me breakfast daily and 2 dinners per week, so I need other stuff to eat when I'm not with the family.

Let's talk about meal time in France.

I seem to get a different story from everyone, but my experience has been that the French are not at all big on breakfast. If they do eat in the morning, it's a leftover baguette from dinner the night before with butter and jam. Here at my homestay they gave me instant coffee to drink, but even in cafés the coffee is more like an espresso--tiny.

Meal times are set in stone, too. Lunch is only from 12-2 p.m., and dinner is 7:30-10:00. You no snacky-snacky long time! The combination of food at the University cafeteria was strange today: your choice of chicken cordon bleu, plain pasta, carrots, and/or eggs. No sauce (except ketchup), and sides consisted of cucumber salad or tabboule. The French seem to love tabboule--I've seen it everywhere.

Dinner is usually three courses, with an appetizer, entrée and dessert. My homestay mom is a great cook but isn't big on meat, so I think we'll be eating a lot of cheese, bread and vegetables. She's also diabetic. I mentioned my (real? how should I put that?) mom can't eat gluten, thinking that would be a shock to people whose main staple is flour, but it wasn't a surprise. I guess more and more French people are starting to discover gluten intolerance.

My host family doesn't eat slowly, contrary to the myth I had heard about marathon-length French meals, and the portion sizes aren't really smaller. I'm still usually the last one done :( But because the food appears on your plate in increments instead of all at once, I don't feel like I have to hurry up at the end of the meal when everyone else has a clean plate and I'm still munching on half my potatoes au gratin.

I watched TV with the family and had them explain to me in slower French what was going on--like a mini lesson in the politics and current events of the country. Channel-flipping seems uncommon in this house. We watched a solid 30 minutes of a show where the people have a conversational debate about something and wait for the chef in the background to prepare their meal. Then they eat the meal and debate some more.

I told my family if this were an American show, the chef would have to finish the meal by the end of the debate or face having her head chopped off. No pun intended.

Paris, days three and four

I am exhausted and ready to go to Pau. It's our last day in Paris before the 2-day bus ride down to Pau, and I have walked and ridden the Métro so much that I'm ready to pass out by 9:00 every night. Paris is beautiful and interesting, but it's also dirty and crowded like you would expect in any big city.

Yesterday we visited:

The Eiffel Tower, which was MUCH bigger than I anticipated (but the view from the top was incredible)
Les Invalides, a monument holding Napoleon Bonaparte's enormous tomb
Sacré Coeur, a church on a huge hill in northern Paris (traveler's tip: HIDE YOUR WRISTS on the walk up the hill! These Senegalese guys get in your face and try to tie string bracelets around your wrist; if they succeed, the bracelet is untie-able and they charge you 10 Euros)
The outskirts of northern Paris and the flea markets at Port de Clignancourt

The flea markets were disappointing; mostly cheap, made-in-China crap. I did find a nice watch, but when I tried to haggle with the merchant he got very offended. Oops. But it was interesting (and I think important) to see the outskirts of Paris, which have larger ethnic populations and fewer tourist activities. It felt like "real" Paris--the dirtier, less charming side of the city that lower income levels call home.

OH and I tried something disgusting. Thinking I would be daring and try a traditional French drink, I ordered un pastis with lunch--I had heard it was a "refreshing" summer drink consumed in the south of France. Yeah, it's like downing a thousand pounds of concentrated black licorice. And because I didn't want the waiter to taunt me, I drank the whole freakin' thing.

We also took a boat ride on the Seine river at night, passing the Louvre museum and Musée d'Orsay. The illuminated city was gorgeous.

Today we visited:

La Place de la Bastille, which used to be a military fort but since its destruction is now just marked with a fancy traffic circle and opera house
La Place des Vosges and Le Marais, one of the richest residential neighborhoods marked with a quiet park and Victor Hugo's apartment
The Jewish and gay districts
La Cimitière du Père Lachaise, a cemetery with the graves of Oscar Wilde, Edith Piaf and Jim Morrison
And had a group dinner to celebrate our last night in Paris.

I like Paris, but I don't think I could live here. Too big of a city for me. But I haven't had too many problems with my French so far (although I can barely understand people when they respond to my elementary-level questions such as "Where are your bathrooms?" and "Are there any nuts in this?" Requests for slower repeats are quite common). I've been able to help out the other American students on the trip who don't know how/what to ask.

Paris, days one and two

My flight to Paris arrived on time yesterday at 11:00 a.m., so I had half the day for touring. Our study abroad group took a trip on the Metro and walked to les Jardins du Luxembourg (Luxembourg Gardens). The gardens were huge, some English-style (more trees and round flower beds--supposedly more "natural") and some French-style (more square layout). Parisians spend the afternoon there reading, playing with their kids and relaxing. We even saw a wedding. A smaller group of us ate dinner at a café along a side street in the Latin Quarter close to Notre Dame. France is not as expensive as I had thought it would be--15 Euros bought me a glass of wine, appetizer, entree and dessert. And here, you don't have to pay tax or tip on top of the price listed on the menu. Which makes eating in groups much easier when it comes time to pay l'addition, and the waiters only try to sucker you into leaving tip because they know you're American.

Oh, and about being American and the rumored rudeness of the French:

NOT TRUE!!! Everyone has been incredibly nice in Paris thus far. As soon as you start talking (in English or French), they know you're American, so they start speaking to you in English. Most of the time I have replied in French anyway, and I always make the initial effort to ask my questions and say my greetings in French, but communication has not been a problem. Maybe just trying to speak French makes the difference between being served or snubbed. So far, my 8-9 years of French has gotten me by pretty well, but I have had to ask a few people to repeat themselves more slowly. Details and long speeches are hard to understand.

And a street rule: you don't smile at strangers here. If you do, you're asking for flirting and pestering. Thankfully, I don't smile unless I have a reason to, anyway. Which means no whistles or relentless French men so far.

Today our group started the tour at 9:00 a.m. and took the Metro around l'Ile de la Cité, the area around la Seine river and central Paris. Took too many pictures of buildings, some of which I probably can't even identify now, but overall, the architecture and layout of Paris is just gorgeous. So old and so elaborate. Among the things on this 8-hour walk were:

Saint-Chappelle, a cathedral with beautiful stained glass
Nôtre Dame

Pont Neuf ("New Bridge"--actually the oldest bridge in Paris)
Palais de la Justice, the prison where Marie Antoinette was held before her execution
L'Opéra, the most bling-bling opera house I have ever seen, which inspired The Phantom of the Opera
La Rive Droite (Right Bank), where you can find shops selling $10,000 watches, Coco Chanel's original apartment, and the Ritz hotel

The Champs Elysées and Arc du Triomphe, the latter which we climbed to the top via the LONG spiral staircase to see a 360 degree view of Paris

I'm going to see if I can start a Photobucket account for uploading some pictures; apparently this website sucks at that.

Preface

I'm starting this blog to keep my friends and family updated on my life in Pau, France over the next three and a half months. Provided I have the discipline and memory to continue posting, there will be pictures, detailed tidbits of news, and French phrases that y'all can incorporate into your everyday speech to confuse and frighten your neighbors. And possibly some juicy celebrity gossip and daily ratings of the fierceness of my hair.

My flight to Paris from Newark, New Jersey leaves at 9:30 p.m. tonight, with anticipated arrival at 11:05 a.m. Paris time. Weather forecast is around 74 degrees and partly cloudy the WHOLE week I'm there--score. I'll spend 4 nights in Paris and then take the bus (with the study abroad group) to Pau. I'll be leaving December 18.


After a year of applications, saving, spending, booking, packing and repacking, I'm finally ready to go. I've taken French classes since 7th grade, but as it now my minor in college and I've reached senior year without any practical application for the language, my main goal with this trip is to improve my speaking and listening abilities. At the time the idea occurred to study abroad, I was just tired of life in Colorado and wanted a temporary change, a way out for a while. I wanted something to look forward to. Now, however, I'm hoping the trip will give me some bigger ideas regarding what to do when I graduate from Metro in May.

I will truly miss everyone in the U.S. My Skype name is lizdom28 if you can catch me on that...