Lost in Translation

My family's conversation in the car today reminded me of two of the funnier language mishaps we had while on our vacation in France:

1). While in the Loire Valley, we toured a vineyard named 'Moncontour', just outside of the quaint little village of Vouvray. After a trip through the wine museum, which was surprisingly complex and long, we got to do some wine tasting. The girl who was pouring the wine seemed nice, and after the people before us had left, I struck up a conversation, as I don't seem to have as much trouble speaking in French to people I know I'll never see again anyway. She mostly understood me, and we went through basic stuff, like whether she liked working there, if she was from the area, etc.
We finished our first taste of wine, a white, and my dad asked me if they had any red. I didn't think they did, the Loire valley is known for its whites, but I asked anyway -- but when I did so, the girl shot me a horrified and offended look and said, "Of course not, this is France!". I was a little puzzled at first - there are many good french reds! - then repeated what I had asked, very distinctly...and it turned out she had thought I'd asked if they had any Russian wine, confusing 'rouge' for 'russe'! After I hurried to explain, she was mollified and we ended our visit on a good note -- but eek, never ask a french person at a vineyard about wine from anywhere else!!

2). Fast foward to the very end of the trip, our last night in Paris. We had had a rather exhausting afternoon hauling all of our luggage through the city to find the hostel, and had selected one of the bistros nearest to our lodgings. Unfortunately, our haste to sit down had kept us from really perusing the menu first, and we had a bit of trouble finding something that the more picky members of the family could eat. Finally, my sister settled on a a random addition to the menu, a hamburger with with the very french addition of a raw egg on top. She, of course, did not want the egg, so as I ordered, I asked for "l'hamburger (that was actually the word on the french menu!) sans oeuf" - without egg, which I thought might be slightly bizarre there but certainly possible. The waiter, however, gave me a strange stare and repeated in wonder, "l'hamburger sans boeuf?" -- he thought I had asked for the hamburger without the beef! No, even though we are American, we are not THAT weird, and we soon straightened him out, and everyone, including the waiter, had a good belly laugh.

:)

Shocking Experience

just a warning: i wrote my blog entry, then went and read katy's recent ones and I feel a little ashamed...the quality and topic of my writing just does not measure up...but its done now, and its late so here goes...sorry in advance

I have returned to the States, and I thought I'd expedite my reverse culture-immersion by heading out to Girl Scout camp right after coming back. I did get over the jetlag first, it always seems to be better coming from east to west, but was still not used to America's wide open spaces, bigger notebook paper, bigger cars (bigger everything!), or people not speaking french.
I was going to camp to help with a rock climbing trip the High Adventure group was taking to the Red River Gorge. I got there in the morning, and after a bit of warm-up climbing at Swiss rock just off camp property, we headed back to camp to pack for the trip (the girls anyway). Unfortunately, as we headed for camp, so did a massive summer thunderstorm...it hit just as we were getting ready to go, lashing the camp with wind and buckets of rain. Trailz (a fellow counselor) got a call on the radio for us to head for solid shelter, so we ran for the nearest real building, the concrete block bathhouse constructed several years ago. With 2 units of girls plus counselors, it is rather cramped and hot, so everyone was perched just about everywhere, with Trailz and I claiming one of the middle cleaning-closet doors to lean against.
As the storm outside raged, we consciously tried to avert electrical dangers; we turned off and unplugged the radio, and after several warnings, managed to get a rather annoying camper from opening and closing the main bathhouse doors (complete with metal handle!) We were sitting around, talking...when suddenly, there was a HUGE CRACK!!, that sounded practically on top of us, a blue flash of light, a absolutely ginormous thunder clap...and a stream of electricity, running through our backs and out our shoes into the floor. !!!
Turns out the interior doors are also metal, although painted, and Trailz and I as well as two campers had felt some sort of shock from the lightning. It was just under the threshold of pain, not quite but definitely something, and it definitely moved from my back to my feet. Our backs tingled for 2 hours!!
Needless to say, we moved away from the door...when the storm ended, we ventured forth to find a tree about 50 yards away had been struck, was completely shattered on one side and fallen limbs were everywhere. Not to mention free wood chips. If it did that to a tree 50 yards away and we felt it, I don't want to know what would have happened if it had been closer!! Welcome back to camp, Gemini!


...and while I've heard of reverse culture 'shock', I don't think this is what they meant!!

I'm going to copy Katy...(sorry Katy!)

So Katy's list has made me think...I've been realizing lately how much I will miss Grenoble. It has been my first experience abroad, so I don't have other leave-takings to compare with, but I also have something definite ahead of me, in contrast to Katy. For me, a lot of what I miss about a place comes down to the people; while there are some little things I miss about Nashville, for the most part I miss the friends and acquaintances and professors of which I was fond. That will remain true about Grenoble, the people I have met through lab that I work and hang out with will be the major nostalgia I have. And yet...the people I really know and love will stay with me, because we won't let our friendship get away. This I have learned from moving away from university, at least, so perhaps I will not have to miss them as much as I think.
But there are definitely some things that I will miss about Grenoble as well. At a risk of looking like a copy-cat, perhaps you will excuse me for making a list as well, it seems easiest at the moment.

Things I will NOT miss:
dog sh*t on every sidewalk
people peeing on walls in the street
immensely long bureaucratic processes
longer bureaucratic processes
French road signs - IMPOSSIBLE

Things I WILL miss about Grenoble/France:
trams
all other forms of public transportation
feeling marginally safe biking in the city, thanks to bike paths
rose gardens
big public green spaces
jours feries
RTT days -- random days off every month
coffee after lunch
hour-long lunch breaks!
the breathtaking mountain view around every street corner here
being so close to awesome skiing and hiking
my Girl Scouts
train travel
easy access to other countries!
people who speak other languages everywhere
speaking french (wasn't sure I would be able to say that at the end, but its true!)
hello and goodbye in every store
my fruit/vegetable store

As you can see, the 'miss' list seems to be much longer than the 'good riddance' list... so please join me, us, in hoping that the next 2 weeks go rather slowly!

Wallet Wonderful-ness

So. I had an adventure just before leaving leaving Grenoble for family vacation...mostly accentuated by my stupidity -- but there you go ;). Here 'tis:

I found out at the beginning of the week that I 'might' have beamtime on the neutron instrument, D22, on Thursday, at 5 or 6 pm. This wasn't so hot, because Thursday was going to be my last day at work before leaving on the 8 am train on Friday with my brother to Paris, but eh, beggars can't be choosers when it comes to beamtime, so I said ok.
Thursday rolled around, I did in fact have beamtime, but we started about 6:30, and I knew we would be at work late, so I left all my stuff in the office. work...work...MARVELOUS DATA :)...work...work...10 pm rolls around, we get some pizza and are sitting near the office having it, when this random guy from our lab comes down (still at work!) and says he is leaving, do we need the spare office key or can he take it. The people I was having beamtime with say, oh no worries, we can let you (me) into the office for your stuff, so take it (instead of putting it back where its supposed to go...).

All right -- but this meant I was in a hurry when getting my stuff -- people were waiting on me, etc, -- so I managed to get my bag and leave something rather important in the desk drawer...that's right, my wallet. RATHER IMPORTANT FOR GOING ON A 2-WEEK VACATION AROUND FRANCE!! Doh!
However, I only realized this at 3:30 or so in the morning, when Trevor, my boss, dropped me off at home, with my bike, after the beamtime finished. I was finishing up some packing, realized I didn't have my wallet, and after cursing just about everyone and everything even remotely involved in the whole situation, resignedly got on my bike to go BACK to work, at 4 am, to get my wallet.

Unsurprisingly, there is no traffic at this ungodly hour, so I got there fairly quickly, managed to get through security onto the site, and got just about up onto my floor when I finally remembered this whole exchange earlier about the keys...and realized that there was no way I could get into the office! OH NO! I panicked -- and couldn't think of what to do. Finally, after waking one friend from lab up at this insane hour (sorry Estelle!!!) I realized that the guardians of the site have master keys. So, onto the bike again, out to the front gate, and...my brain ceased to function. I think my request/question was the most garbled mix of french and english I have ever heard in my life! When I said 'CIBB' (the building), it came out like Cay-Eye-Bee-Bay, and I totally blanked on the word for wallet (rather important for this situation, I would say) and had to describe it as the thing that you put bank cards in...ugh, completely ridiculous!
Thankfully, they did manage to understand me, I got my wallet, got home with no incident, and even got to take a shower before getting to the train station for my train! Note to self: only forget wallet when NOT going on a long trip early the next day. Oh, and I learned something new: it starts getting light in the mornings at 4:45 in Grenoble...I was still up and outside!!!

Girl Guides the Last

Yesterday was my last french Girl Scout meeting, as far as I know. Its funny, I always worry and fret about Guides, about what we're going to do, about the planning, I've panicked at random times, and its generally been stressful. But actually AT the meetings, it never is, its lovely. They flow, we generally had enough to do, I know a million games if we don't, and while the understanding (their french, my american-accented) sometimes gets a little hairy, no one gets upset or annoyed about it.

And yet, somehow, I am always surprised when the meetings go so well, since I am always worried beforehand. Yesterday was no exception to the rule; I approached Saturday afternoon with vague dread, but once my girls started arriving, we had so much fun. We went bowling to celebrate our last time together, but none of them had socks, so we stopped by my place to snag some from the drawers. Then on to Echirolles, where I cleverly got us off on one tram stop too early and I was yelling "Depechez-vous" (hurry!) as we crossed exits to a major highway...several times. Yikes!

No one got hit by a car however, and after we got past the one girl who had never bowled before and was afraid of throwing the ball, we all had fun. She ended up coming in second, so not so bad at all for a newbie! Afterwards, we went outside and found a nice patch of grass near the pool to have our snack, a 'Quatre Quarts' and Nutella - their favorite - with Orangina as a treat. We tossed the frisbee around, took random pictures, and generally had a relaxed, nice time. I didn't want it to end!!

On the way back on the tram, the kids started asking me why I couldn't stay for another year -- they all hugged me before they left, were sad at the end. This was really the first real signs of affection I had seen, so blatantly anyway, so it was very touching. They probably won't remember me very well, but hopefully I will have given them another year or positive experiences through scouting - and met their first real American on the way!

Stolen Bicycle Musings

People. Just a complex, interesting mix of everything. Having my bike stolen in Grenoble last week has been making me think of the striking difference between the hostility, or at least utter unconcern, of the person(s) who took my only means of self-transportation, the caring shown by people around me upon hearing the news, and the act of complete generosity shown by the girl who lent me her bike for the next 3 months, even though she only knows me through a friend. So much of what makes us tick is community, a sense of group. The person who stole my bike didn't know me, and hence wasn't bothered by taking something important to me. I'm sure they would never have taken a bike belonging to someone they know, hang out with, etc., because they are people to them rather than a random, faraway person more immediately represented by the money invested in my bicycle. On the other hand, the person who lent me a bike didn't know me either, but due to our shared community, we're both scientists at the same workplace, we have a mutual friend, I was worthy of a lovely, kind act. Perhaps part of the answer to the violence and hostility in the world is expanding our communities??

Post weekend high

I just want to say that life is a wonderful thing. I'm not sure that France is the place for me ultimately, but right now I am content and happy. I had a dinner party last night, with lots of people from lab and it was lovely. Then today, despite a ridiculously low number of sleeping hours, I went skiing with Max. It was also a lovely day, nice snow, good company, AND it was still light out when we got home at 7! 'Springing forward' kinda sucks for sleeping, but it is still nice...it made things feel so much warmer and alive...despite being very tired when I got home I couldn't stay inside and went for a walk in the park instead. The mountains are STILL breathtaking and combined with a sunset are amazing. I just wanted to walk and look at them and feel nice. I think this feeling is what people are looking for (amazing what the endorphins from exercise and sunlight can do...) but I think if everyone would just stop and look at the sky occasionally, or smell a flower, or smile at a little kid running and yelling, we all might be happier. :)

The Package Drama

Goal: to send 2 packages, 1 to my sister for her birthday and one to Aubree in China as a random cadeau

Level of Difficulty: WAY behind proportion to the goal.

Post office hours here are ridiculously awkward for anyone who has a real job, so I've always used the 'bureau de poste' that is in the lab complex. Apparently, they have recently had a rules change without notifying anyone, because when I took my packages Wednesday morning, the man informed me that they no longer send personal mail. When I told him that I was expecting to pay, not the lab, he didn't care. So then I had to carry my packages with me that evening, when I was planning on hiking up the Bastille. Oh joy. Strike 1!

That evening, I had the bright idea to stop by a real, exterior to lab, post office on the way to the mountain. They were still open (!) but it seems this was surprising to most locals as well because the line was nearly out the door. We hadn't allocated much time for the spur-of-the-moment post office run, so we decided to leave because if we had waited, it would have gotten dark when we were halfway up the hill. Which would have been bad. Uphill in the cold dark, ugh. So I carried the packages uphill and then back home with me. They weren't terribly heavy, but still.

That night, the girl who I climbed the Bastille with, Franziska, offered to take them to the post office the next day with her, when she went for something else. So I took them to work again, and gave them to Franziska after lunch. Today, she comes to the office...handing me back the package to China. She was happy that she had mailed my sister's bday present, because it needs to be there by April 3 (small chance, I know!) but she couldn't mail the other one because she didn't know the contents for the customs declaration. I think if I was AT the post office with a package, I would either make up the contents, or open it and then reseal it...but I dunno. Maybe there were lots of grumbling french people behind her in line,...Strike 2!

So there I was again, at work today, friday, with a package that was supposed to be mailed on Tuesday. I left relatively early today, 5, went to the library to pay a fine, and then raced to make it to the post office. Whew, 5:33, made in the shade!...or so I thought. I got into the post office only to find out that the computers were down and they could not send any packages AT ALL. Mon dieu! Strike 3! (but baseball aside, I was determined at this point to send this blinking package!)

Ok, can I make it to another post office in 20 minutes? This is assuming they don't close the doors early, because they have enough of a line to keep them busy to closing time...entirely possible to occur... I get there at 10 til...and proceed to come THIS close to getting hit by a biker crossing the street. Not a car...no, it obeyed the law and stopped for the pedestrian...but it was a close miss. However, that must have been the last of the bad luck because the post office counter closed just AFTER me instead of before me, at 4:53, and my package is safely INSIDE the post office.
No guarantees it will get to China before August, but hey, its on its way, after the biggest comedy of postal frustration ever. I like France, but the postal service could use some work!

french researching

Just a short note to say that I was actually quite staggered today. Kenn (a visiting researcher from Delaware on my project) asked when I was leaving, I answered the end of May, and Trevor was like, "oh my, so soon!" Kenn then proceeded to be like, you should get her to stay..." And Trevor was like, "yeah, but I can't." He looked straight at me -- and I said, "You've never tried," kind of just to see what he would say. It is true, he actually has never asked me to stay, even though he is continually harassing Andrew about taking the PhD position. I think its because whereas Andrew doesn't really know what he's doing next year, I have concrete plans that I can't change, Trevor knows I'm going to med school and so has never bothered to try and change that. It was funny though, he was like, "I haven't?"
And then later, he brought it up again and was like, "of course, if you wanted it, the PhD position would be yours in a heartbeat." And I was shocked at how tempting that sounded! Lately I have been really busy and involved with my research, the question has become much more intriguing, and I could actually see myself getting a PhD. Don't worry, I'm not going to perjure myself, or whatever the term is, by going back on my word to Vandy Med, and I have wanted med school since I was 6, I'm not changing my mind in a heartbeat, but there is a certain allure to the research option as well, more than I thought it would be.
I think it partly felt good just to get that offer, that I could stay if I wanted, but huh. Interesting.

les enfants amusants :)

So I JUST got back from Morocco, and you will hear all about it later, but before I forget, here were two amusing incidents that happened on the voyages to and from:
ON the plane (important to note here), but still on the ground in Paris. The cutest little girl ever and her dad sit next to me,
"Salut! My name is Maria! I'm half french and half arab!"
Me, slightly amused: "Hello!"
"We're going to Morocco! Where are you going? Are you going to Morocco too?!" Hehe...

And on the way back, on the train I sat about 2 seats behind a dad, 2 little boys, and the grandfather I think. The dad was very patient with them and seemed to enjoy playing with/amusing them, hence they actually were very well behaved. An announcement came on,
"Next stop, Lyon Part-Dieu" (the name of the train station in Lyon, our destination)
Little boy, in a slightly shocked/horrified voice: "Lyon est perdu?"
Total hilarity among family members and all the people in the surrounding seats ensued. ('Perdu' means 'lost' :)

These are one of the many reasons I love kids. :)))

Normandie

Soooo...I went to Normandie last week. And Bretagne, or Brittany, the region directly west of Normandy. I had a mini-adventure right off the bat, missing my train in Paris due to snow, catching a different one to a slightly different city, and then frantically calling people back in Grenoble to ask them to search on the internet for a hotel for me in Caen. Other than the one moment of desperation/tears in Paris Gare St. Lazare, it was all right, and makes for a good story. I ended up staying in a Holiday Inn in France, which sounds slightly absurd to me, but there you go, now I've done it. There are apparently no hostels in the city of Caen which answer the phone in January...weird. Anyway, since I was in Caen, I decided I was going to see some of it, so I walked around in the morning and saw some churches, the Hotel de Ville, and William the Conqueror's Castle, the dude who won the Battle of Hastings in 1066 and made (at least part of) Britain part of France for a time.
After becoming slightly lost in Caen and actually running through the streets to make it to the hotel in time to check out (note: running in thermal underwear equals bad idea, it makes you smell rather delightful), I caught a train to Bayeux. It is a delightful little town, with typical Norman architecture, small buildings, different materials than in the south of France. I saw the Bayeux Tapestry, which depicts the Battle of Hastings, and is amazing and amazingly well preserved for being nearly a thousand years old! I also got to walk around in a British WWII cemetery for a time, which was sobering but good at the same time.
Then it was off to Mont St. Michel. I stayed in a very nice hostel, run by an old British couple (yaay for PG Tips!), and they even picked me up at the train station. I biked it to the abbey the next morning, the Normandy farmland is very pretty, if a bit cold in January. The abbey was amazing, walking around in the dark, heavy stone corridors I could almost imagine I was a monk 800 years ago, truly nothing has changed in there since then I don't think. I attended mass in french just for the experience, which I will remember forever as the coldest church service I have ever attended -- you could see the priest's breath!
At this point, my solitary journeying was at an end, I popped into Rennes that evening and joined the other Fulbright scholars for the midyear meeting. Although I was rather dreading it leading up to the experience, it actually was very enjoyable. It was good to hear about what other people are doing, the American accent was nice to hear for once, and the people were much less stuck-up than I remembered. I think everyone must have just been stressed during that first orientation; understandably so, everyone was newly into the country and still trying to adjust at that point. So, three days in Rennes, many galettes and nights out later, I headed back to Grenoble to find a synchrotron run staring me in the face on Thursday. But now I have been to an absolutely beautiful part of France, and I'm actually starting to be able to hear differences in the french accent from different parts of the country, which makes me happy. :)

America the Stupid?

I have a new roommate. That is, there is a french boy/man named Xavier who lives in Iga's room right next to mine in the flat, who no longer speaks to her Polish mum and dad, who no longer comes home at 10 o'clock from the lab and who no longer gives me polish vodka from the freezer. I have lived amicably enough with Xavier for the past several weeks, saying bonjour et bon nuit, ca va when we come home and how was your day...but that was about it so far. Tonight was something of a breakthrough as far as Xavier-old roommates relations go; we had about 5 hours of hilarity, probably instigated by the Belgian beer followed by french Bordeaux, but nonetheless we all had a good time flailing around the appartement, learning new verbs in french, english, and russian, making fun of each others' pronunciation, and railing at Sylvie. It turns out despite the French Connection, Xavier is indeed on our team as far as proprietaire-coloc relations go; he seems to think Sylvie is as bizarre as she is, which is refreshing somehow.

And somehow in all the talk tonight, we got onto jokes that Americans tell on the French, on the English, and vice versa in all the combinations, even Xavier laughed about the trees on the Champs-Elysees (I warned him several times about being offended before telling him...). And apparently, quite unwittingly, I have only recently come to serve as the foil for Lara against all American stereotypes she has lived with/become accustomed to/internalized in the past several years, since she semi-subconsciously decided to boycott the US and all things American... my intelligence surprised her?!? I think I knew that all English people don't agree with the US and its actions in the world recently, but I didn't realize to quite what extent of contempt the US people in general are held. Lara I guess is one of the few true-blue Brits I know; Andrew has lived in Atlanta and Estelle is originally from Gabon, Trevor from South Africa... and apparently she thought I would be a right-wing warmonger insensitive to others and redneckish in the extreme... It is very natural to lump all people belonging to a group together, but I guess I have a slight shocked feeling - I didn't have such a set expectation of British people. It will wear off...and I guess I better keep it up, being un-'American'...

Return to Provence

A tiny apartment with a red tile floor and a palm tree outside the white-shuttered window still appears in my dreams from time to time even tough I last lived there three years ago. Mont Sainte-Victoire invades my thoughts with her weirdly jagged from, and I can still walk the narrow streets of the centre ville simply by closing my eyes. I recognized then the beauty of the place without realizing just how deeply I had fallen under its spell. After a less-than-enchanted semester in Madrid, it became clear that the feeling was not a simple love of traveling or the thrill of becoming foreign, but I persisted in attributing it to something internal, some greater theme or turn of mind. Finally, after three years with neither an adequate description nor explanation for that magical spring, I made plans to return to Aix, fearing all the while that I would find it somehow different and thereby ruin my fondest memories.

I arrived in the rain, which was unusual but did nothing to spoil the view of Mont Sainte-Victoire greeting me at the train station. Climbing on the shuttle into town, I discovered the driver singing along to Louis Armstrong and a gospel choir on "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," and couldn't hide my amusement. I took refuge from the drizzle at Book-in-Bar, a British bookshop and café before finding a small hotel with sufficient vacancy to welcome me and proceeded to spend the evening wandering near-empty streets still wondering what had brought me back.

The next morning, I buzzed the door to 15, rue Cardinale and strolled into the Vanderbilt-in-France office unannounced. At that moment, I knew that I would always belong in Aix: bisous from Maité and Manu preceded a long chat about Morocco, foreign affairs, the current students and life in general. The Vanderbilt center had been my home once before, and I found them willing to welcome me still with arms wide open. I stepped back onto the street with the familiarity of an Aixoise rather than the trepidation of a foreigner and set about rediscovering my heart's true home.

It is all still there. The majesty of St. Jean de Malte, the curious patchwork of the Cathedral and the imposing oak doors to the Institut des Études Politiques remain landmarks on my internal map. A slice of of mozzarella from Pizza Capri tasted as deliciously gooey as ever, and the sheer pleasure of staking out a bench on the Cours Mirabeau to people-watch is still an unequalled pastime (especially when done with a lemon-sugar crêpe in hand). I wandered the markets, saw a movie, window-shopped the winter sales and slipped naturally back into my French self, even in my quietest thoughts. The only break in the spell came each night as I unlocked a hotel room instead of my cozy palm-treed apartment.

I plotted to stay. I envisioned running a restaurant, a hotel, a bookstore; asking Book-in-Bar to hire me as a clerk; begging Maité to find something for me to do at the school. Visions of a life in Aix taunted me with the promise of golden sunshine and the freshest fruits, a small French dog and the familiar winding streets of the medieval neighborhood. What I fool I would be for leaving! Who needed Morocco, or for that matter, graduate school?

Eventually, the time came to leave and I made my departure quietly, on the same shuttle with the same gravelly-voiced gospel. I spent the train ride to Grenoble reminding myself of Plan A, and by the time I stepped into Sarah's apartment I felt comfortable thinking about other places again. It's been over a week now and I'm no longer on the same continent, but I still feel myself wanting to throw everything else aside and run away to Provence...I can't explain the magic, but its hold on me is forever strong.

Tale of the alien cabbage

One evening, Sarah and I walked to the produce shop to pick up a few necessary additions to the stir fry I had planned for our dinner. Once there, I assigned Sarah to choose a fruit salad mix and wandered into the vegetable aisle myself. Near the broccoli, I stopped in my tracks and yelled for Sarah, who came skidding around the corner to see what was wrong.

Together, we stared at a geometric broccoflower-thing in a shade of radioactive green. The store had only labeled it as "Romanesco," and our bewildered staring weren't revealing any new details, so we went home to google it, hoping to learn which kooky geneticist had engineered this mad franken-vegetable.



Much to my surprise, I learned that Romanesco is a completely natural plant first described in texts from 16th century Italy. It belongs somewhere in the broccoli-cauliflower family, though nobody agrees which of the two is its closest relative. And yes, it is as near to a perfect fractal as can be found in nature. I had to try it.

So yesterday I returned to the produce stand and bought a head of alien-lime-green Romanesco broccoli and steamed it for dinner. It tastes more like cauliflower but looks bizarrely foreign even on the plate (especially next to the purple hue of our red-wine-braised chicken!) A normal, healthy vegetable that looks like a nuclear experiment gone wrong? I'm serving it at my next dinner party just as a conversation piece.



(Actually, is this stuff even available in the States?)

Overheard in Provence

American girl #1: It's not a country, is it?
American girl #2: Yeah
#1: Singapore is a country?
#2: Yeah
#1: For real?

--on the terrace of the Uncle Sam café

Scouting

Girl Scouts...the term brings up the image of cookies and camping trips, and doesn't seem to be something that would vary terribly across cultures. I didn't think so either, and there are definitely things which remain constant between Girl Scouting here and in the US, but today I discovered two of the major differences!
First off, today was the 'messe territoriale', or mass (as in, the church service) for the entire region. Scouting is very catholic here, and every year they have a church service for the entire region...where everyone turns out decked out in uniform shirts and scarves and sings really off-key songs and takes communion. As my first french mass, I was a little lost, but I thought it very cute when one of my girls turned to me during the breaking of bread and asked me if I understood what was going on. I'm not that clueless!
Secondly, scouting at home would never consider having a meeting officially as a 'scout meeting' without a leader present -- too many issues with insurance and liability, not to mention that the kids would run completely amuck. Here, it is apparently not a problem, as I have a required meeting for the Fulbright next weekend, but the head scout guy was just like, oh, they can meet for themselves. They should figure out what they're doing in advance...just ask them... So I did, and next week there will be five 12-year old girls painting a wall mural inside the meeting room without any adult supervision!! I am already envisioning coming home and finding that they have permanently painted their hair blue, or created original jack-the-dripper artwork on all the wrong walls. Whatever happens, it should be interesting, since I don't know what mural they're planning ( they kept getting confused when I asked them), so who knows?! Guess I'll find out when I get back!!

Hello again! I think we are in Geneva in our story now, but really we only saw the train station and the hostel, since it was dark already when we got there. We did have an adventure sneaking my mattress into the room with the others, since technically all they had were 3-person rooms...but i wasn't sleeping by myself! No one caught us, so it was cool! The next day we had to get up early and leave for respective big cities, David to Paris to fly back to the US and the rest of us to Barcelona. It was sad...and early...2 strikes against the day already. Basically we slept for about 4 hours once we got to Barcelona, ventured out for food, saw a parade for Kings' Day (known as Epiphany in the states) and slept again. Very adventurous, I know. The parade was very cool though, apparently kings' day is their time for presents and such.

The next day, we managed a little more adventuring. We went to the Sagrada Familia in the morning, the scope of Gaudi's imagination is breathtaking!! We (George and I) both liked Gaudi's architecture enough that after lunch and a walk down the huge market street, we went to the neighborhood-on-a-hill that he designed. It was very picturesque with very cool-looking houses and railings and such. We also got to see the sun set, which was neat! That night we had tapas at two different restaurants (the first wasn't so hot, so we moved!), and the second was incredible. Potatoes bravas I think are akin to heaven.

The day after, we got up and caught a train to a little town outside Barcelona, home of the Salvador Dali museum. It was...expectedly...bizarre. Back in town, George and I walked around on the Olympic Hill for a while, back down the market street, and then we had Mexican (of all things in Spain!) for dinner. Oh yeah.

We had to get up insanely early the next day to get to Geneva again...as in 4 in the morning...ugh. So early the metro station wasn't open yet! Note to self...do not repeat.
But overall, Barcelona was very fun and interesting...I was glad to get back to a country where I could at least pretend to understand the language happening around me though!

Noble Grenoble

GRENOBLE!!! Most 'noble' of French cities...hehe..at least by spelling anyway. We got back the evening of the 2nd, after having all (I'm not sure, I might have been working on my hat) fallen asleep on the train. The next day, we took a bus out to Sassenage, a petit village just outside the city, where there is a pretty park with several trails, caves, and a stream going up the mountain. We hiked around for a while, ended up about halfway up the slope with a good view of the valley and the mountains across it. We saw French horses that hee-hawed at us in an incomprehensible country dialect.
We came back into town and took the walking tour of centre ville, stood on a bridge going over the river Isere, and stopped in a 'patisserie' and got some 'foret noire', a kind of fluffy cake with raspberries and chocolate that somehow is one of the best things I have ever tasted. That night we went out to dinner at the Epicurien, with my friend Sarah from lab, to give everyone a taste of real, high-class french cuisine.
The morning of the 4th, we went to lab! Everyone got a tour of the synchrotron, and the neutron guide halls, of course studded with red radiation warning signs, making everyone a little nervous. ;) Some very intelligent questions were asked; whether they were actually interested or were just asking questions to make me FEEL like they were interested is another question! We went to lunch with people from lab, so my old friends met my new friends (one is silver and the other gold...) which was cool. After lunch, David and I took the 'eggs', a funicular up the hill right next to the city to get a bird's eye view of things, while Katy and George took a nap. It IS rather breathtaking from up there...basically the view of the mountains never ceases to be amazing.
Then we caught the train to Geneva!

Window to Paris

Account of the first days of our shared vacation in Europe: Paris!! While we were there...we did a whirlwind tour of the Louvre the first day, with just Katy and David and me, and then crashed.

The next day, Dec. 31, was the Catacombs, this place under Paris with all these extremely old bones. It was a little creepy...and then George proceeded to walk around Paris with 'dead guy dust' on his pants for the next week...ick! Then we walked around in Montmartre, the section of Paris where the artists used to live and where Amelie (the movie) was filmed. We managed to miss the red-light district mostly (the boys have dirty-enough minds WITHOUT it) and had an enjoyable evening. Then, despite icky rain, we took a boat tour on the Seine, then went to hang out under the Eiffel Tower at about 11 o'clock. It was really cool with lots of people there...and at midnight, the tour lit up and there were champagne corks everywhere! It was fun...despite the extremely packed metro home.


We crashed, maybe a little too hard, and didn't wake up until around 12 or so the next day...slow start for the new year I guess. Pretty much everything touristy was closed for the holiday, so we walked around, saw the Hotel de Ville, the Sorbonne, Notre Dame and generally bummed around. Had dinner at this little cafe near the palais de luxembourg...it was interesting.

On Jan 2, we decided to be extremely touristy and go to

Versailles. Trouble is, it was blue clear sky when we left and horrific rain when we got there...and there was a 1.5 hour line to get tickets! So we huddled under 2 umbrellas for the 4 of us...and mine decided to give up the ghost. 4 brackets are now broken, and George, having chosen the wrong umbrella-holding girl, managed to get pretty wet...we took tu rns holding up the droopy side, but our arms got tired! When we finally got in, it was cool, but I have a slightly soggy memory of the castle, needless to say. Then we got a train to Grenoble, which I will tell about later.

ahem...

...I'd just like to add to Katy's lovely story of the tree rescue...that she was hardly such a captive aid. Perhaps she just hides it well, but she was not reticient at all at the prospect of saving Albert's life. She didn't 'trudge', and she volunteered to carry the shovel! I have to admit , however, that I too found the little old french lady's complaint extremely hilarious as to the placement of the tree...but regardless, Albert has been saved, and I think that Katy is secretly proud. Long live Albert!