Život v Cizine (was La Vie Expatriée)

Friday, June 22, 2007

La Fête de la Musique

June 21st was the Fête de la Musique. In honor of the occasion, there were musicians, mostly amateur, playing in just about every public square and most restaurants, cafes, and some bars had shows as well.

I exited from the oral part of the DFA to the sounds of a rock band in a nearby square. Coming home from the metro, I could hear music, another rock band, coming from the corner bar, while there was African music coming from the African restaurant a few doors down from my building. Over at Jules Joffrin, across from the mairie, an accordionist was playing, while the corner cafe had a group setting up their instruments.

And I had dinner at my favorite restaurant, La Table d'Eugene, which had arranged for a jazz group, the Jazz Mooners. For the dinner, the proprietor, Joël, had pushed the tables together for communal dining (as well as to leave room for the instruments), and I was seated next to a very nice French couple. The music was not, in fact, all that impressive: they basically played American standards with soft jazz arrangements. Surely there's French jazz? But they were certainly competent musicians and so it was an enjoyable evening.

By the time I left, it was just getting on to midnight, and I could still hear music from some of the local establishments. I thought about doing a little more "music hopping", unfortunately, I was tired and even a bit headachy (the DFA and the fretting over it had taken a lot out of me), so I just went home.

Labels: France, La Fete de la Musique, Table d'Eugene

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Wednesday, June 20, 2007

Next Stop: Prague

Well, I've decided that Paris is really not for me, at least not just now. So, with the end of classes and the lease on my apartment next week, I'm moving on to Prague, where I've signed up for a TEFL/TESOL Course.

After that, I'm not sure what I'll do. I'm kind of toying with the idea of China. Or maybe Russia. Or I may decide on Central or Eastern Europe. Or I may backtrack to Western Europe.

It all depends on how well I take to Prague.

See, here's the thing: moving to Paris was relatively easy (once I got over the whole "Oh my God, I'm completely and totally insane" phase with which I was boring people). France is, after all, a Western, industrialized nation and I was already familiar with the language. So on the comfort scale, France isn't all that far out there. In fact, I think that's the problem: it's not far enough out there. So I'll try a little farther out the comfort scale, i.e., the Czech Republic.

If it turns out that Prague is just way too uncomfortable, I'll backtrack, if not to France, then to Western Europe. (Spain or Portugal might work.) On the other hand, if Prague is still not uncomfortable enough, then I'll push out the comfort scale still further. Then again, if the comfort level seems just right, then I'll stay. In brief, I'm doing a Goldilocks number.

I'm also partially motivated by a concern for hanging out someplace that'll look good on my resume when I get home. And really, Western Europe has been done to death. As for France, in particular, not even the French are trying to start careers in France.

Labels: France, Prague, travel, work

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Thursday, May 31, 2007

Fontainebleau

This week's little excursion was to Fontainebleau, about 1/2 hour (by train) southeast of Paris.

The trip and Avon, where the station for Fontainebleau is located, are not particularly interesting. The suburbs of Paris through which the train passes look largely industrial; it doesn't get pretty until after Melun. As for Avon, I suppose I really shouldn't judge by what I could see from the bus, but I certainly didn't see anything that made me want to linger.

The château has been there since the 12th century, and was used and renovated by kings and emperors through the Second Empire in the 19th century. Most of what remains now was built on what François I^er put in place in the 16th century, but very little is in an "original" form. There are rooms where the ceiling panels are from the time of François I^er, but the panelling on the walls dates to Louis XIV, while the furniture is from the reign of Napoleon III. (In fact, one of the artists who worked on the restoration painted DeGaulle and one of his ministers into some of the trim in the Hall of Trophies, so you could even argue that the renovations continued right on up to the Fifth Republic.)

The main approach to the Château is now across the Court of the White Horse (named for a statue that's been gone since the 17th century); also known as the Court of Adieux, since it was from here that Napoleon made his farewells before going into his first exile.

The audio guide that's included with the price of admission to the Château is very good, and quite complete. The guided tour, on the other hand, was pretty much a waste of time. It mostly covered rooms that are also done in the audio guide, and the tour guide was uninspiring. She seemed more interested in getting the tour over with.

The gardens are lovely, through: spacious and green, with lots of fountains and ponds. I don't quite get what's going on with the topiary cones, though.

The carp pond in back of the Château has this little pavilion in the middle, where the King could entertain his mistress. One hopes that they remembered how well sound carries over water!

And a view of Fontainebleau from the far side of the carp pond.

Labels: Fontainebleau, France, sightseeing

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Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Musée Rodin

Last week's sightseeing trip was a visit to the Musée Rodin, one of my favorites. They had just opened a new exhibit, Le Rêve Japonais (The Japanese Dream), which includes both Japanese selections from Rodin's private collection as well as Japanese inspired works of Rodin.

I was not all that blown away by the exhibit, although that says more about my tastes than the exhibit. The reason I really visit the Rodin is to wander in the garden and visit my favorite sculptures. The Thinker, for example:

Or The Burghers of Calais, which is just heartbreaking:

The Three Shades I find fascinating: it's three of the same figure, just turned differently:

And of course, I could pour over The Gates of Hell indefinitely:

Labels: France, Paris, Rodin, sightseeing

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Saturday, May 26, 2007

Chartres

I took a little day trip down to Chartres on Wednesday the 16th.

It's an hour out of Paris by train, through some very green and lush country. Aside: each time I leave Paris, I return a little more dissatisfied with pavement and stone buildings.

The Cathedral is a prominent landmark: you can see it about 10 minutes before arriving in Chartres, and it's easy to hone in on once you arrive. It's also close enough to train station that I could easily remember how to get back!

When visiting the cathedral, Malcolm Miller's tour is a must (at least for Anglophones). He's 73 now, and literally wrote the book (Chartres Cathedral). He's been giving tours twice daily (noon and 2:45) during the spring and summer at the cathedral since 1956; during the winter, he tours and gives lectures. I took his tour on my first visit 20 years ago. Back then, he solicited tips at the end of his tour; now, at the prompting of the government, which wants to be able to collect taxes, he charges a 10€ fee up front. (Well, that's how he explains it, anyway.)

At the time of my first visit, the government had just barely started cleaning and restoring the stained glass windows. Now, twenty years later, they've made impressive progress, and I'd estimate that a good half of the windows (it looks as though all of lower tier windows, as well as the west and north rose windows and some other of the upper tier windows) have been done. Perhaps if I return in another 20 years, they'll all be done!

They've also started cleaning the outside: the north entrance is done, and the south entrance is about to be shut and cordoned off so that they can restore that one. The north entrance, all cleaned up:

I showed up for both tours, as did a few other visitors, so Miller very thoughtfully changed his spiel so that we wouldn't be bored. During the noon tour, for example, he walked us through the west rose window (left below), with its story of the Passion, the Nativity story, and the Jesse tree, going from left to right below the " rose"; during the 2:45 tour he walked us through the north rose window (right below), with St. Anne in the center, flanked by Old Testament patriarch below the rose. (We know it's St. Anne holding Mary, and not Mary holding Jesus, he explained, because the child's halo doesn't have the cross that marks Jesus. Not that you can pick up that detail from the picture.)

The dedication of the Cathedral at Chartres to Our Lady predates the trend of Marian devotion that started in the 12th century. As a result, when the king of France received a significant Marian relic, Chartres, as the nearest major church devoted to Mary, became the beneficiary of the Sancta Camisa, which is alternately described as having been the garment that Mary wore at the time of the Annunciation or at the time of the Birth of Jesus. When the reliquary was opened, though, it was found to be a length of silk that reportedly does indeed date back 2000 years.

The presence of the Sancta Camisa made Chartres a major pilgrimage center. Conveniently enough, it was also on one of the major routes to Compostella, another favorite destination for pilgrims. And so, in the pavement around Chartres, you can find these reminders of the past: mosaics of pilgrims and the shell of St. James, the patron of Compostella.

I didn't have much opportunity to explore the rest of Chartres. Like most French cities, though, it does have its war memorial:

Labels: Chartres, France, sightseeing

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Friday, May 25, 2007

Impressing French waiters

Things I've learned about impressing French waiters:

• Ordering an apéritif, especially a Ricard (an anisette), impresses them to no end. I haven't quite figured out why this is, but they really straighten up at that. Kir is also very popular, and is frequently a default selection when a restaurant includes an apéritif as part of its menu.
• Ordering cheese instead of something sweet for dessert also marks you as a force to be reckoned with. It's not a bad move at any rate, since I find that French desserts are pretty boring. Note: Those luscious, creamy pastries you see in the bakeries? They never make an appearance for dessert; the French don't understand why you want something rich like that after your meal. (But you do want something rich like cheese? Well, no one says this is logical.) Pastries make an appearance only at the French version of tea time, the goûter.
• Ordering a digestif, such as an Armagnac or a Calvados, also wins over waiters. Outside of Paris, ordering a regional specialty will especially endear you. I ordered Izzara (a green, herby Basque liqueur, kind of like Chartreuse, only milder) in Lourdes, and my (Basque) waiter immediately became my new best friend.

I've thought about trying to train myself to eat with my fork in my left hand, in the Continental style, but finally decided against it. Any attempt to masquerade as a native withers and dies the instant I open my mouth to speak, so why bother? Besides, as Miss Manners observes, "American table manners are, if anything, a more advanced form of civilized behavior than the European, because they are more complicated and further removed from the practical result, always a sign of refinement".

Labels: food, France, manners

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Tuesday, May 08, 2007

Movies en français

The movies I've seen most recently are both French biopics: Molière and La Môme. I was mostly able to follow along, although some of the argot in La Môme eluded me. I miss subtitles, though: it's a pity movies aren't captioned for the hearing impaired in the theaters.

Molière

This is more Molière's (early) life as if it had been a Molière play than biopic. Think "French remake of Shakespeare in Love" and you'll be on the right track. The premise is that 22 year old Molière is rescued from debtor's prison by a man with more money than sense who wants Molière's help in attracting the attention of a woman with whom he's enamored. Along the way, Molière encounters the characters and situations that would later figure in his plays.

It's an entertaining romp, although there's something of a disconnect between the script and most of the cast, who seem to be under the impression that this is a farce, and Romain Duris as Molière himself, who, though excellent, is far too intense and even tortured for the tone of the movie.

I suspect I'd have enjoyed this still more if I were more familiar with Molière's work. While I recognized some of the characters and situations vaguely, I'm sure that I missed even more than I caught.

It's slated for a (limited) US release later this summer, and it's worth checking out, especially for the French theater buff.

La Môme

La Môme is about Edith Piaf, who was known early in her career as La Môme Piaf (the Kid Sparrow). It's also due for a US release this summer, as La Vie en Rose. I can see why they didn't keep it as La Môme (in French), since that would be a little too obscure for Anglophones, and translating the title to The Kid might just get people all confused with the Chaplin (1921) or Willis (1990) movies. But, not that anyone asked me, if they had to go with the name of one of her songs, why in mercy's name didn't they choose "Je ne regrette rien"? That would have made ever so much more sense.

At any rate, Marion Cotillard is superb as Piaf. The movie itself is very episodic and jumps around in a seriously distracting fashion. Her daughter, who died in childhood, appears only briefly in flashback towards the end in a scene that you would miss if you blinked, and the Second World War apparently never occurred. The only way I could keep track of the "when" of the movie was by assessing how ravaged Cotillard looked in any given scene. I'm not sure what the director was thinking: a more straight-forward approach would surely have served his purposes as well.

Labels: France, La Mome, Moliere, movies, Piaf

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Friday, May 04, 2007

Sarko vs Ségo

I really didn't intend to follow the presidential elections all that closely: it's none of my business, after all. But all you hear in the streets, on the metro, or in the cafes is Sarko this and Ségo that.

On Wednesday, the night of the debate, the streets and cafes were empty. Everyone was home watching the debate. The bars were all crowded, though, and everyone was clustered around the TV: you might almost have thought there was a big soccer match on.

I watched most of the debate (French transcript here, or English excerpts here). It would never have flown in the States: it lasted 2 1/2 hours, without commercial interruption, and the candidates discussed actual issues in something more than 30 second sound bites!

I went in to the debates with a mild bias against Sarkozy and for Royal: he's too ready to make immigrants the scapegoat for France's woes and I rather like the idea of a woman president for France. After watching the debate, though, I don't see how Royal can win. Her ideas seem too scattered, and she proposes to pay for them by raising taxes, already the highest in Europe, still further. Although I must say that I thought her very courageous for saying so bluntly that she planned to raise taxes. That's something else you'd never hear in a US presidential debate! Sarkozy, on the other hand, seemed to have a solid grasp on France's current economic problems and concrete ideas on how to deal with them.

It may just be a function of the neighborhood in which I live (with a young and largely immigrant population), but it seems to me that people are not so much for Royal as they are against Sarkozy (and quite vehemently against at that), and I don't think that the debate will have served to inspire much positive enthusiasm for Royal.

In Oral French class, we talked about the debate a little: almost all of us had watched it. The consensus: we found Royal easier to follow than Sarkozy. She spoke more slowly and repeated herself more. We didn't get into the politics!

Labels: debate, France, presidential elections, Royal, Sarkozy

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Tuesday, May 01, 2007

Making bridges

The French don't do that American thing of transposing holidays to the nearest Monday; instead, they let their holidays fall where the calendar gods intend. But, when a holiday falls midweek, they'll typically take off the corresponding Monday (and Tuesday if necessary) or Friday (and Thursday) to faire le pont (make a bridge). When you have five weeks of paid vacation time, this kind of bridge building is a lot easier. And so it has been this weekend.

May 1st is Labor Day in France, and it appears that most Parisians who can have built their bridge and gone out of town: the crowds on the metro have diminished, and the markets were relatively empty on Sunday. The markets are packed today, though, although most of the non-food stores (and even a lot of them) are closed for the holiday.

The custom most strongly associated with May 1st in France is buying, and giving, lilies-of-the-valley. This has nothing to do with Labor Day, of course. According to the Wikipedia article that I consulted, the custom of giving lilies-of-the-valley as a good luck token dates back to Charles IX in 1561. Every florist shop has hundreds of little bouquets of these lilies. And, if a little cluster isn't enough for you, or if you need a hostess gift for May 1, you can buy potted lilies, or elaborate arrangements in which the lilies are grouped with roses or orchids. You also have the option of buying your lilies from street merchants. The Wikipedia article also observes that, on May 1 only, it is permitted for non-florists to sell lilies-of-the-valley. (The implication there of course is that on all other days and with respect to all other flowers, French florists are protected from such amateur competition. Although I remember seeing street merchants selling daffodils for a few weekends at the start of spring, so there are apparently other seasonal exceptions.) I dutifully bought my own handful of lilies, wrapped in a sheet of cellophane that sports the legend "Je porte bonheur" (I bring happiness), to establish my bona fides. In my good deed for the day, I even bought a sheaf of lilies for my neighbor across the hall.

There are two more bridge-building opportunities for the French this month: next Tuesday, May 8, is Victory Day (the date WWII ended in Europe), and Thursday, May 17, is Ascension Thursday.

Labels: France, holidays

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Sunday, March 25, 2007

The "Littleness" of French food and drink

French food and drink is almost always expressed in terms of "littleness". There's the petit goûter (little snack) to accompany your afternoon cafe or tea, the petit apéro (little apéritif) to precede dinner, the petit déssert and petit cafe follow dinner (no translation needed here surely!) And even in the markets, one orders a petit poulet rôti (little roasted chicken). Without noticing, I've fallen into the same pattern, asking for a petit pavé de saumon (little filet of salmon) or a petit morceau de bleu de causses (a little piece of bleu de causses, my favorite blue cheese).

So it was very odd in the bakery this morning when a gentleman ordered a gros morceau de quiche paysan (a big piece of quiche paysan). The clerk repeated his request, in an amused voice, and soon the entire line was buzzing, "A big piece?" "Yes, a big piece." "He ordered what?" "A big piece."

(For what it's worth, I think the piece he ended up with was the standard size.)

Labels: food, France

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