FRANCE

Behold, I haven’t blogged once in the nearly three weeks I’ve been in France. My apologies. So, onward to the information!

My host family (or host person, as the case may be) couldn’t be better. Madame Filleux is probably about seventy; she’s friendly and talkative and laid-back and … encouraging? As in, she makes me feel good about my French, even when I’m tired and start saying things that translate to “I carried us there rather tomorrow.” Any evening that I spend out, she’s fine with, and any evening that I spend at the apartment, she fixes dinner and we talk and watch television together, so I’m liking this dynamic so far. She shares control of the apartment with her Yorkshire terrier Melody, who is considerably less welcoming by comparison, but I’m sure she and I will warm up to each other.

Having a rocking host family: check.

As far as making friends while in France, Sarah and I had discussed being sure to branch out and befriend people we wouldn’t be able to otherwise, making the most of this unique opportunity to study in such a different setting. That’s one goal I can already consider achieved, in that Sarah and I have both befriended—get this—a sophomore! She’s here as part of the Notre Dame program too, and Sarah and I were a little hesitant at first: would we have enough in common with a sophomore to be able to maintain a friendship with her? Would she be as intimidated by us as we were by her? Would our nascent friendship be able to withstand the inevitable intercultural misunderstandings? Would we risk putting too much of ourselves on the line in this friendship, losing a part of our identity as juniors in the process? Lauren (the sophomore in question) proved persistent, though, and Sarah and I both knew that, scary though it might have been at first, it was right of us to return these friendly overtures. We’ve hung out quite a bit, just the three of us or in larger groups, and we’re getting to know each other more every day. Sure, befriending a sophomore wasn’t easy, and it wasn’t completely within my “comfort zone”, but that’s exactly why I decided to study abroad in the first place: to branch out and do things I would never be able to do within the bubble of Notre Dame.

Having friends, and exotic ones at that: check.

Having a langue class that doesn’t make me hate everything: no check. Details on that will come later.

As for my initial thoughts on France—I’m well aware, by the way, that I’ve been here less than three weeks and have been only to Angers and Paris in that time—I have the following short, unsurprising, completely stereotypical “American in Europe” observations to make:

Black. Everyone wears it. A lot. I know it’s winter, but come on, people; that’s just an awful lot of black.

Quiet. In restaurants and stores and on sidewalks, the French are just remarkably quieter than I’m accustomed to. We’ve all heard that Americans have a reputation abroad for being obnoxiously loud, and I’m sure that quite a few are, but … I’m pretty sure the French actually whisper. Also I’ve heard non-Odette laughter in France three times: twice by children on bicycles, once on TV.

Bakeries. They really are everywhere, and they really are obscenely good. My favorite discovery? A bread/pastry that I will deliberately translate overly literally as a “small chocolate Viennese woman” (“petite viennoise chocolat” for those of you in the know): it’s basically a sweetened bread in the general shape of a baguette, but much softer and loaded with chocolate chips. Oh yes, choco-viennese. Oh yes.

The cost of living. It’s … high? Sarah and I calculated it, and to the best of our knowledge the cost of living in France is three thousand euro-meters per second squared (3000 €m/s^2). Luckily Sarah and I discovered an Asian market, allowing us to add ramen to our poverty diet of cereal and yogurt and Banania (which, translated into English, means “racist French chocolate milk”—look it up). Also luckily, I eat most dinners with Mme Filleux, so I’m taken care of there, limiting my welfare-esque diet primarily to lunches. It is kind of ridiculous, though, that we are paying room and board to Notre Dame, while the monthly stipend they provide is sufficient for food only on one of three conditions:
1. we eat cereal for every meal,
2. we steal, or
3. “board” is written in quotes any time Notre Dame makes mention of room and board for students abroad.

That, then, is where I find myself. I will be better about writing from now on, and I will devote my next post to actual things that have happened while I’ve been here (with accompanying photos where applicable/available/moral).