Champagne Showers

Cou cou! Finally a (series of) blog post(s) of adventures from my final 2 week paid vacation of the year- which involved a visit from a wonderful lifelong friend, during which we naturally made wonderful lifelong memories.  It’s a whopper, so I’ve divided it up for easier reading.

After a lovely American style Easter brunch (during which my French friend tried to eat his English muffin, apparently in England only called a “muffin” with a knife and fork) and chocolate egg hunt chez moi, I jumped on a train for a night in Paris. It’s gotten to the point where I don’t really know what to do with myself in Paris anymore… so I hit up the café in Montmartre, one of my favorite parts of Paris nonetheless, made famous by the film Amèlie, before then wandering out for a solo beer to watch a bit of the Paris Saint-Germaine futball game at a bar. The best part was that no one spoke English to me the entire day, a very small personal victory as big cities are used to tourists and generally switch to English upon hearing an accent. I have a terribly strong accent unfortunately, but at least the Parisians deemed my French competent enough to stomach my American pronunciations of their beautiful language. 

 

 Megan arrived the following morning, and we spent the day strolling around a bit of a rainy Paris, checking out the Eiffel Tower, the lovelock bridge and eating my favorite Macarons from la Durée on les Champs-Elsyées, which we paired with a lovely white wine in a small café just off the main drag. 

Nantes Castle Picnic

Back at home I got to see Nantes through the eyes of a tourist, and knock off a lot from my “to-do before I leave” list. The city did not disappoint. Really Nantes is such a neat place with pretty architecture, delicious regional specialties and odd quirky things to discover. We ate pastries every day, visited a small art gallery, bought fresh food and moldy delicious cheese from the market, rode bikes, spent some tranquil moments in the various gardens, enjoyed crepes, RODE THE ELEPHANT, and naturally spent some time walking around the castle, lounging by the moat enjoying a bottle of wine and a picnic lunch. 

We rode the elephant, and then took a million pictures with it

Three beautiful days later we found ourselves on part 2 of our adventures: the Champagne region of France, to the city of Reims (pronounced like “Prince” without the “P”, and with that throaty “R” French is famous for). It’s hard not to feel fancy when visiting Champagne caves, learning about the different types of grapes used to create each type and how the drink is made (1 vine of grapes to make 1 bottle of champagne!) and finally tasting the delicious bubbly beverage ourselves. Champagne can only be considered Champagne if produced from this region; there’s a special chalk in the soil here that makes the grapes extra fancy and magical.

 Reims is also home to the cathedral where the majority of the kings of France were crowned The cathedral is immense, equally impressive as Notre Dame de Paris, and has a stained glass window celebrating the region’s most famous beverage, and others created by one of my absolute favorite artists Marc Chagall. I had started a “Travel Wants” list around New Years with Champagne-Ardenne region as a definite doable at some point this year (unfortunately other cities like Prague and Budapest etc were not so lucky), and I was quite pleased when Megan agreed to the idea to check it out. 

Champagne Stained Glass

As difficult as it was to say au revoir to our fancypants hotel-living Champagne-drinking lifestyle, we continued via train back to Paris to find… the bus stop. The following week was taking us to Croatia and Slovenia, and the culture shock was a slap in the face the minute we stepped onto our eighteen hour bus ride… and no one spoke English, or French. It hit me then just how comfortable I have grown with France in general. It’s always good to be a bit cautious as a traveler, to recognize when you are out of your comfort zone and how it makes you feel, how you can grow from respecting whatever differences you may encounter. But the thing is, travel within France doesn’t give me that nervous anxiety “Oh boy what kind of idea was this?” kind of feeling anymore. It was an odd realization, and it made me feel good about how I’ve integrated into French life. I am truly confident in myself and my explorations within the country. But maybe my general level of comfort in France should have been apparent when I explained to le boy that I was going to Paris for a night alone, and my constantly lovingly worrying about my general well-being fiancé said “Oh I’m not worried about you in Paris (one of the world’s largest cities…) You’re great in Paris”. 

 

But oh my, we weren’t in France anymore. Thankfully, the gesture of tapping someone on the shoulder and holding out a box of cookies is universal, and perhaps one of our greatest ideas… feed these bus drivers treats so they will always make sure we are on the bus before it leaves the rest stop, since we have no idea how many minutes are announced in Croatian at every stop. Overall the bus ride wasn’t terrible, but it was an 18 hour bus ride all the same. We were happy when we finally arrived in Zagreb, Croatia the following morning. Perhaps we celebrated a bit too soon though…

La Reine est trop Sportif

I had one reader mention that she was disappointed there was no blog post to read this past Monday, so I apologize for slacking a bit…

Sorry Mom :)

We’re back to the grind here in Rezé/Bouaye/Nantes… and as much as I felt like a small child whining about school starting back up again, it was good to get back on a routine. Of course, going back was made easier when I glanced at the calendar and realized I have 5 weeks of work before my “working” weeklong trip to London and the following two week “Winter Break”.  The French  know how to keep their teachers sane… just when the kiddos really start to drive you crazy, surprise! Two week break! Oui! Unfortunately most of my European friends will be returning home again for this February break to visit their chéries, but I hope to figure out some sort of travel for that time as well.

I've had some fun lessons since being back. I'm discussing the idea of an American roadtrip, the mentality of the idea, quotes from Jack Kerouac etc. with my "seniors" here. Today we talked about the importance of music on a roadtrip and I had them choose and explain a song to add to our own class roadtrip playlist. I lent out my ipod to some kids who forgot theirs, and my collection of Justin Bieber songs was questioned... if they scrolled down to the "O"s to see the number of "Original Broadway Cast" albums I have they chose not to say anything. I am obviously an insanely cool American in their eyes.

This blog post is going to be a little bit about sportz. You all know how athletic I am, and how much I love sportz. You are probably not surprised that this past week I went out and got a little exercise, and also attended a World Cup match. 

Did I pick up running? Tennis? No. I went and played LAZERGAMES. Curious as to whether there were any differences between American Laser Tag and French LAZERGAME, I celebrated the return of my foyer friends by donning all black and attempting to shoot them with lasers. French laser tag isn’t much different than what I remember from 13 year old American birthday parties of my past doing the same thing. Really, no big differences, including the language. It was a bit strange hearing “DANGER! DANGER! The base is under attack!” in English while playing. In fact, I am almost sure I paused and was subsequently killed the first time I heard it. Another thing I found bemusing was the list of players’ names… each laser vest & gun truc kept track of the players’ stats and you had to remember your assigned name to see how you performed. I was Batman. Some other random (mostly) American names included: Terminator, Pikachu, Chuck Norris, Yoda, Legolas, Frankenstein, Shrek… odd yes? 

I’m sure you’re all at the edge of your seat waiting to know just how well I compete in laser war. Round One I ranked 14/16. Yikes. I was consoled when I realized our little group of foreigners took places 13, 14, 15, 16. I picked up my game and dominated Round Two ranking 8/16.

The weekend brought on the second sports venture… the COUPE DU MONDE BABY-FOOT. What, you may ask, is Baby-Foot? It is the French’s adorable way of saying “Foosball”. In England they call this Table Soccer, in Spain they call this Futbolín, in Germany it’s probably something with a ridiculous amount of consonants… but I think France takes the cake for best word here. I figured: “When else will I ever get to personally watch a world cup event?” “When else will I get the chance to watch a serious foosball game?” “I brought all this left over 4th of July stuff with me, when else can I wear that sparkly star crown and the mini American flag in France?” I am not one to let an opportunity like this pass me by. And thankfully, despite having about 4 hours of sleep the night before, my friends thought the same. 

I was disappointed to find that America was no longer in the running (but that didn’t stop me from chanting USA USA, waving my tiny American flag, when I walked past the team sporting their uniform USA windbreaker jackets). Sometimes I think it’s the French that don’t know how to handle my at-times-overwhelming enthusiasm, but I got some weird looks from the American Foosball team as well. Sorry for supporting you when you are in a foreign country ‘Merica, geez. 

So the game I did get to watch, the women’s finals, I cheered for La France. France vs. Germany. A professional foosball game, by the way, takes 2+ hours. That’s a lot of sport for me… but the occasional camera shot of the crowd and the desperate attempts to get on some obscure EuroSports TV Channel pulled me through. One thing I found interesting was that they played one round of the match on a French made table (wood), and the next on a German made table (plastic). The rules were surprising more extensive than I imagined… and were upheld by two, that’s right TWO referees. Deutschland took the gold which made our German friend quite happy.

All in all an oddly positive experience. It was fun to spend a Sunday afternoon cheering “Allez Bleu!” while waving around those inflatable extendable-arm noisemakers. To top it off I got this poster…a little baby-foot guy, telling you to stop messing around. You better believe this will be framed if someday Joe wants a sports-themed room in our home.

On a non-sports related note, France celebrated the Epiphany with a tradition I was quite happy to take part in, and one that I will bring with me to the United States when I return home. KING CAKE. Mmm.  It’s a puff pastry cake filled with apple compote or frangipane with a tiny porcelain figurine baked in. Whoever gets the slice with the figurine is the king or queen, gets to wear a paper crown all night, and chooses his or her king/queen. I got to be the Queen (at the school cafeteria, and yeah, I wore the crown through the cafeteria as well as into the teachers’ lounge). Being named the Queen wasn’t too big of a surprise considering I had about 5 pieces of King Cake at different points throughout the week. 

My Spanish friend calls me “The Queen” often because of a long standing joke from a time she accused all Americans of thinking they are the “Kings or Queens  of the World” because of our expectancy to find English speakers throughout the world. This Queen idea was only reinforced after Joseph proposed, adding quite a bit of sparkle to my Miss America/Queen wave. Which I do quite often.

Seriously. Look at this Pastry Saturday Find.

Are you wondering how I am doing with my Resolutions? We’ve been hanging out with some French people from the foyer lately, even meeting up with them this past weekend at the bars… so while I don’t have a language tandem (this is proving more difficult than I imagined), I feel I am still integrating a bit more already. I didn’t start reading anything in French yet, but I did go see another movie (Les Lyonnais, a French “gangster” crime film with a lot of violence and a plot I am still not sure I really understand). I also researched and found a French-American organization in Cleveland. Once I make the big move home it will be easier to pretend I still live in the land of extensive vacations, grèves, and Macarons the size of your face, but with the added bonus of my own chérie located geographically closer. 

Bises and Love from this Queen

Steph

Almost forgot, if you happen to be looking for a great read, I recommend “The Night Circus” by Erin Morgenstern. It’s a wonderfully magical book with a love story and a hint of darkness that is just perfect. 

Also, to those of you who have been lighting up my mailbox here with holiday mail and engagement congratulations... thank you. So much. 

Merci

I am a lucky lucky girl, with a lot to be thankful for. So in the spirit of Thanksgiving, which left me just a tad homesick here in lovely France, I thought I’d dedicate this post to all the things I have to be thankful for at the moment.

Of course, the first, most important and probably gushiest I’ll get right now, I am thankful for my family. I think it was my greatest stroke of luck to be born a Wiezbenski, as I have wonderful parents, interesting and smart and unique siblings (and their significant others and children), extended family who send me texts and emails and cards and even have visited me over here… it was not easy to be away from everyone this past week. But I really need to give a shout out to my mother, who is a gem among gems, who mailed me Thanksgiving plates and napkins and surprise! the new Harry Potter DVD, who instinctively knew I would need a pick me up this past week, and who put up with a lot of complaining and a dramatic story & tears about my frustrations in finding a cookie sheet to fit my mini-oven here in France. Of course she realized that some of this frustration was certainly from France’s inability to provide me with this oven “truc”, but of course stemmed from other things, mainly homesickness. Thank you.

I am thankful for many many enthusiastic Americans who wanted to gather together and share this holiday with each other and with our many foreign friends. We had a turkey! I made green bean casserole, but couldn’t find canned Cream of Mushroom Soup or a bag of Fried Onions, so I did it all from scratch. God bless you Crème fraîche. I am really enjoying exploring cooking more, and getting creative when I don't have access to what I'm used to in America.  We had at least eight nationalities at our festivities… and that’s when I am just struck by how lucky I am to be here. To be living this experience. To be learning every day, from new people, from our world. It's hard for me to capture those kinds of feelings at home, isolated in our giant country.

I mentioned at the feast… I am so thankful to have great great people to share this with in France, but I am also thankful that I have so many really wonderful people at home to miss right now. You know who you are.

I am thankful that the process of legalizing my stay here is complete. I’m an immigrant! For the year. And to get away from all these emotional sentiments, I’ll share a bit of awkward with you. The process involved a lot of paperwork, some passport sized photos, and a medical appointment. The awkward parts were when they took a topless XRAY to test for Tuberculosis (I think it’s because they don’t want to deal with people coming back to their offices to get a skin test read), and they let you keep the XRAY to take with you on your tram ride home. This was only after the doctor analyzed it (no worries on the TB thing) and informed me that I need to eat a bigger breakfast because my stomach was looking a little empty. Medical Technology you are so weird. Language barriers can be interesting at the doctor’s office, and the one that made me blush the most was when the nurse said the standard “Condoms are the only protection against STDs” line except I did not understand her rapid-fire French, looked quite confused at this statement, and asked her to please repeat, like I had never heard this information before… once I got it, I awkwardly stated “Oh yea.. they teach us that in America too”.

I am thankful for The Hunger Games, which is the series of books I have been reading recently, and which is the cause of the delay in my normal Sunday blog posting. I am first to admit I am a giant book nerd and love reading in general… but these I cannot put down.

I am thankful for the interest of other teachers at school in who I am, and what I am doing here. I have rides organized for 2 of the 4 days of the week, when teachers go out of their way to bring me to and from school. This turns my hour long multiple public transport commute into a quick 15 minute car ride.  I have also been asked into and taught 2 geography classes, mainly just answering kids’ questions on the USA and showing pictures from my Roadtrip Vegas-Ohio last summer. The students had good and interesting questions and I took up their entire hour of class speaking with them. It was nice to have an entire class in French as well, as most of my classes are obviously in English. I am quite enjoying the majority of my students and teaching in general.

Because this is getting long, like normal, I am quickly but just as importantly thankful for:

the markets here (that constantly remind me of my sister in law, oh Hilary how you would enjoy shopping for food like this, actually making a relationship with your food and the people it comes from)

With the market comes Pastry Saturdays, my futile attempt to control my consumption of delicious French treats. This week,with nothing in my apartment for breakfast, I went for an apricot croissant from a baker at the market near médiathèque. I originally tried to photograph it for you, but it was so perfectly flaky and gooey at the same time that holding a camera and enjoying my weekly indulgence was just impossible.

that I live in Nantes, a big city with many social options each week. Like this past weekend, the national Festival de Bars Bars providing free local live music in almost every bar in the city and many other cities across the country. One of my English teachers at school is in a band that played and it was fun to go out and see her.

The Christmas market. And all that comes with it. Mulled wine, chis chis, carousels, beautiful Christmas trucs, and lights lights lights. Bliss. I’ll leave you with those beautiful images.

Mulled Wine. The only reason to like colder weather

 

Bises Bises Bises

Steph

Saturday Night Saturday Night

I had some interesting interactions in Nantes this weekend…

1.       Some friends and I were on our way to the castle, when we passed some French men sitting at an outdoor table… I overheard one of them ask the other if he thought we were French. In my opinion French women always look fabulous… so WooHoo! For maybe being considered one.
 
2.       Later in the evening I was asked on the street if I had a lighter. Here is our conversation
“No I do not have a lighter, I do not smoke”
“You are clearly not French”
“Why because I don’t smoke?”
“No, because of your accent”
Goodbye all self confidence and good feeling from being possibly mistaken for a French girl earlier in the evening.
 
3.       We left to go to a bar and I was not quite finished with my wine… so I just carried it by my side and tried to be discreet when we were walking through the center of town. Someone walked past me and asked what I was doing with that bottle of wine. I wanted to say I am hiding it. In French “to hide” = se cacher. Instead of using that verb I used “Se coucher” which means to go to/to take to bed.  I told a stranger I was taking my bottle of wine to bed. Awesome.
 
4.       We got to the bar where I ran into a whole crowd of my students… I’ve just been observing a lot of classes so I did not recognize them, but they knew who I was right away. Why were my high school students in a bar? Perhaps that young drinking age is not so great for professional relationships. I am mainly confused why they were in Nantes… it takes me an hour on public transportation to get to my high school and I doubt they drove themselves as they cannot get their license until age 18. Thankfully when I saw them I was just standing in line for the bathroom and not doing anything to make a fool of myself. I told them I would see them Monday and that was that.
 

Some other interesting weekend tidbits:

There is a bar here called “La Maison” which translates to “The House”. It is organized like a house would be with its different rooms decorated as different rooms in a house… you can choose to drink in the kitchen, the bedroom, the living room, the bathroom even. Very fun.

 

I also had my very first treat from a bakery (I’ve been very good you see). I am biding my time until the perfect macaron comes into my life, but I did get directions to the supposed very best boulangerie in Nantes. I also walked past this beautiful display (a revolving tower of macarons? Yes Please!) but did not have the time to stop. I’m sure it will not disappoint. Neither did this Caramel Éclair. The caramel here is sea-salted and absolutely delicious.

 

Sunday: to recuperate from being so Frenchy, in a true act of desperately missing Joseph (and also a desire to interact with fellow human beings) I went to watch American football at the one bar in Nantes that will show a game. The Bills won. Eagles were looking sloppy. Sportz. ‘Merica. Speaking English. Oh Yeah. Apparently  that even my English  has a very strong American accent and is hilarious for people from Australia and Guadeloupe to imitate. (Emily George if you are reading this- the country of Guadeloupe reminds me of AP U.S. History and our dilemma with Guam. Yes?)

No word on my school schedule yet- so I've been working on my to-do list and spying on people with their dogs in the field outside my window instead.

Maybe by the time I see my students again they will have forgotten that they saw me in a bar on Saturday night.

Bises!   Steph

Why Love France?

Sometimes people are confused just why I love France so much, and why I always want to be there.  So here’s a little something something I put together to let you know just what I am specifically excited about for the next couple months of my life, and some things I am not so excited about.

Things I love…

• Let’s get it out there right away: The Food, the Drinks, the Desserts, the Wine…The food is brilliant. I can’t wait to discover a local boulangerie for my everyday baguette, try many patisseries for macarons and bonbons, go to the market for fresh veggies and fruit, and pair a good stinky cheese with even better glass(es) of red wine.

• Being a Pedestrian. All the time. I won’t have a car in France. No big deal. I’ll have public transportation, hopefully a bike, and my own two legs. This will suffice. .. and will hopefully counterbalance my love of French food.

• Foreign Language I make mistakes. But I love love love this language. And I can’t wait to see just where my language skills will go after such a long period of time listening/speaking/writing it.  And the funny stories I will have from language miscommunications. These situations can breed awkward, and I tend to thrive in that. Bring it on.

• Teaching I know I belong somewhere in the education field, and I feel lucky that I have had a lot of different opportunities to see just where I want to fit in. I am excited and terrified to have a classroom of my own.

• Travel There is a Mediterranean cruise planned for October with my parents and my aunt. I’ll probably be in Spain at Christmastime. I want to get to Morocco to see my college roommate at some point. And my very first friend ever is planning on coming over to backpack. Top it all off with the possibility of working camp again this spring? Family, Boyfriend, Friends… the world is ours. I can’t wait to explore more of it with you

• A Slower-Paced Lifestyle They work a shorter work week, take longer lunch breaks, and close their shops up when they need to. Americans put so much value on ambition and convenience… which can be great. But I think that some days it’s harder for us to take a step back and enjoy everyday living.  

• New People + New Perspectives One of my favorite parts about study abroad was the class of kids I studied with. We had about 17 kids in class, representing about 9-10 different countries. Living in the Midwest, this is not something I get to experience often. I’m excited to learn more about France and will have most of my interactions with French people, but there is also a German language assistant and a Spanish language assistant placed at my school. And I’m sure multiple nationalities will be living at the “foyer” that I will be calling home

• Pretending to be Belle from Beauty & the Beast It’s too easy. Life over there is so picturesque. I just want to sit on a fountain while people sing a song about me, read a book, and have a sheep take a bite out of a page.  I can skip the whole locked up in a castle for a spell of time. 

Things I can handle but wish I didn’t have to…

• (The lack of) my American life + Time Difference  I will miss you, and you, and you… I have a lot of wonderful people to miss. This will not be easy. I know that. I love you. I know that the time difference makes it hard to keep in touch, but let’s try. And if you ever are wondering what life 6 hours into the future is like, chat me up…

• Dog Poop. Everywhere. The French are not the most responsible dog owners when it comes to picking up their pups’ messes. When I studied abroad I had one particularly terrible day. And on my way to my program director’s office to discuss said day, I stepped in Dog Poop for the first time that semester. He congratulated me and said that meant I had truly lived in France for a significant period of time.

• Greves (Strikes) True Story, I was once tear-gassed in France.  Because I was outside eating my lunch at the wrong place wrong time, and the middle schoolers were striking. While I love that the French really work for what they believe and act as an important part of their government processes, this can be very inconvenient. And make you cry. And they are very common.

• Neutral Colors Goodbye bright colored clothing and prints. I used to think I was so worldly and people would mistake me for European all the time. Nope. I am so… American.  I don’t need to be drawing any excess attention to myself so I try as hard as I can to dress like the French when over there. So I’ll be donning black, brown, beige, grey etc clothes for a good spell of time.

There are good and bad things about everywhere you can live. But since I try to live my life a little more on the optimistic side, I think my list of great things about France outweighs my negatives.  My lists could be far more extensive, but you get where I’m going. I love France.  I’m excited to live there, and maybe now it’s a little clearer why. I'm only 10 days away!

Bises, 

Steph