Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Escape to Nice!

So... I have a confession. I didn't like Marseille. It was alright. The old port was very pretty and the food wasn't bad (although I didn't en up trying the bouillabaisse (?) fish stew) but as soon as you were out of the tourist-y port it was very poor. Apparently it's the poorest city in France.

Either way, if I had my choice I would much rather go somewhere else in France than back to Marseille. I DID enjoy my trip out to the Chateau d'If though. I went with another guy from Canada named Nicolas, and we had a grand old time wandering all over the (surprisingly small) Chateau and pretending to be prisoners.



Back in the port there was also a stunning view of the Notre Dame de la Guerre on top of the hill. It was all lit up and gorgeous in the night sky. There is a 12ft Virgin Mary statue on the top that is plated in gold. You can really tell too, even from the port (1km away) this statue is clearly discernable and clearly made of gold. I didn't make it up there to see the crypt, but I think I will make up for it in Paris when I see the catacombs.



Other adventures in Marseille include meeting two fairly friendly American boys from California who were very impressed with themselves for having their weed cards on them. One was a chef and the other had just graduated with a degree in Operations Management. They were cooking dinner while I was updating the blog last time and invited me to have some! It did smell delicious. Sausages with fried potatoes and eggs all mixed into a little pie thing for dinner. Not bad at all! It was funny the next morning when we were all eating our French bread and jam for breakfast though, and they began to make themselves eggs and sausages again. The Europeans at the table kept looking at them and saying things like 'such a heavy breakfast!' 'meat, first thing in the morning?'. Oh, America.

Saturday, August 28, 2010

Je suis un Réfugiée Climatique

Oui, c'est vrais. At my last dinner cooked by Catherine the Kitchen Goddess, Michel and I were discussing whether or not I would come back to Montpellier and how if I ever did I was welcome to stay with them and their family. I said that if I came back I would love to come in December/January/February, and probably March to escape the cold weather. Michel laughed, his red wine in one hand and his baguette with olives in the other (yes, really) and said "Kenna! Tu es un réfugiée climatique!" Then we got around to discussing how I would claim my refugee status at the border. We figured the border guard might look at me a little strangely until I told them how cold it got during our winters, and then let me get away with my claim. AWESOME!



So this morning I boarded a train, had my last baguette and orange juice breakfast from Catherine, and left Montpellier bound for Marseilles. I promise to write about Marseilles tomorrow, but there are a few things I want to catch the rest of the world up on, ex: further conversations in a French family.

There is: The shower conversation
Catherine and I were talking about when I was going to have my showers at the house, because apparently they set it up so that people have their showers in the afternoon, morning or evening. This made sense, we do that in Canada sometimes to make sure everyone gets hot water, maybe they do that here for a similar reason? So I'm set, I get my showers in the afternoons post-school day. A few days later Catherine and I are talking about it again, I was wondering if I could take my shower the following morning instead of that afternoon.

"Ah, but Kenna you take long showers."

No, I don't. They're like 15 min. I'm a machine at showering when I want to be. However, that's evidently not how Catherine sees it. "Yes, but they aren't hot showers."

"No no, they are long. It doesn't matter if they are hot or cold, the tank only holds so much water." Oh, I get it. Hot/cold doesn't matter but volume of water does. Their tank is... tiny.

"Ah, ok. I understand. I take long showers because I am a girl!" I laughed. We say that in Canada all the time, right?

"No," she cuts in. "It is because you are English!"

Old rivalries die hard, we laughed about that one for a good long time. There was also an epic conversation with the grand-children (9 and 11) about Celine Dion. Unfortunately, I didn't realize their little wailing sounds were supposed to be Celine Dion singing, and I was pretty sure that at the time we were talking about 'les indiens', Indians. I swear if you say 'Celine Dion' and 'les indiens' fast and slur your words a little bit like a kid, they sound the same. I told them that "that sound is not what the Indians make, they sound like this;" ... and then I made an old school Native American war whoop, at the dinner table, and no one knew what on EARTH I was doing.

That one took a while to explain.

Last but not least, the French advertisements. Oh they are amazing. The first two are a McDonalds campaign and the caption reads "Come as you are."



The cartoon on the next one is a recurring character from a comic book called "Asterix and Obelix" (hope I spelled that kinda right), the guy tied up by the tree is the stereotypical villian.



There was another good one of the drive-through with Cinderella and her carriage turning into a pumpkin, mice and all, but I couldn't find it again.



This is a bowling add. It is my favourite French add yet. Really. Bowling. Every non-European at the school knew this add, because it took all of us by surprise. Epic? Yes. French epic.

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

Je suis fatiguee...

37 C

Every day that it's hot like this I stagger home at about 7 and collapse on my bed for half an hour before dinner. Or sneak some baguette and jam to try and boost my energy and stay awake. The heat just kills you lol!

I'm still having an excellent time though. Since the last post I have written another French skit with Binnert (Crown Prince of Holland, or so is the running joke) that will be posted at a later date; visited a flea market for the first time in my life and bartered for things; chased the neighborhood cats around for pictures because one of them is a beautiful Siamese; been back to the beach on the bus instead of bicycle and discovered macarons!

Yes, yes I've been busy. We'll start with the Flea Market. One of the things I based my trip and my locations in France around was flea markets. If only for the novelty. I'm really quite convinced that you get to know a country by what they throw out and what they recycle. In the case of France? Everything is recycled. Seriously, EVERYTHING. At this Flea Market, hosted in a large, empty, mostly tree-less parking lot at the edge of town I found everything from English China tea sets to cheap new computer parts. Good times, but very hot. The next one I visit is the market in Marseille, I'm plenty curious being as it's supposed to have a very different array of goods from the one here in Montpellier. More antiques, traditionally.



The cats were a minor distraction, but stay posted for the blog on French advertisements. Oh man, they have the strangest adds here. I don't want to say too much and give anything away, but McDonalds is pretty posh here and I'm enjoying their most recent slew of adds. Also... the bowling adds. Yes... not exactly what your average Canadian bowling company would use.

Also, turns out you can get to the beach by bus, in 15 minutes! This is a wonderful discovery that has meant many more trips to the beach. The last one was Monday when the new South African fellow (Wes) spent the afternoon trying to teach Binnert and I to catch a wave and body surf. Wes seems to think he can't get too far because the waves are small here and "he's fat" (lies), whereas I'm pretty sure I do a terrible job of catching them because I'm small and the waves just push me up over them. Good times.



But oh... let me tell you about Macarons! So as previously mentioned my host-mom is a professional cook. Turns out that means she is also pretty good with pastries. Tonight after dinner she was pondering what to feed me for dessert, being as I couldn't have what the rest of the family was having (some sort of very dairy-heavy tart/pudding... thing... very French). She had some little 'macarons' in the fridge, so I was served a little plate with three tiny, light, round sandwich-things on them; pink, brown and yellow. They are little clouds of sugar and egg-white and amazing! Crispy on the outside and soft, pate fillings in the center! Catherine kept laughing. "You are so English!" She said, "Have you really never had a macaron?" No, no I hadn't. I swear I will rectify that though, I intend to eat as many macarons as my future permits, and enjoy them loudly every time.

Saturday, August 21, 2010

Chirgurie Esthêtique

Best school day yet. It was Friday, a good school day under most circumstances really, made better by the assignment our instructor gave us: Write a dialogue (and then act it out) between two parents and their child, the child wants something that the parents do not want them to have. Then she gave us three scenarios to choose from.

1) The child wants... a scooter.
2) The child wants... an animal.
3) The child wants... plastic surgery.

Yeah, yeah you read the last one right. Plastic Surgery, a.k.a. chirgurie esthêtique.

I had two other girls in my group, the Irish girls Nicky and Sarah. Nicky is tall and blond with blue eyes, and she likes to party. Sarah is shorter with darker hair, and is quite cynical. Both Nicky and Sarah have very thick Irish accents. Well you can imagine what we decided would be our topic. I was the father, Sarah was the mother, and Nicky was our bonny wee-lass just come home from a night on the town.

NOTE: Whenever Nicky spoke during this skit it was in a monotone, she was very hung over that day, Sarah kept giggling (very stern mother, that one) and I was my usual self, as to say... loud with lots of hand gestures.

http://www.facebook.com/kenna.morris#!/notes/kenna-ann-morris/most-amazing-french-skit-ever/420056897886

Unfortunately, the blog couldn't seem to handle the html for this one, so it's been made as a facebook note.

In other new: It is incredibly hot in Montpellier. It is 35C, in the shade. Don't let the weather forcasters lead you astray with their technology and their significant amount of education in weather phenomena; it's just flippin' hot. You know how at home we hide inside in the winter to get away from the snow and the freezing wind? Yeah... today everyone has hidden inside, with all the lights off, all the windows closed and all the fans on. Even the WIND outside it hot.

... I have seen a strange and odd reversal of my world.

Friday, August 20, 2010

WARNING: Read at Leisure

Oh man, life is epic. Catherine is making pizza for dinner. Like from scratch. Like from SCRATCHSCRATCH! This morning I came into the kitchen to have breakfast (the only time I'm allowed in the kitchen) and I smelled burning. It was coming from two peppers, one red and one green, which were sitting out on the stovetop smoking. I asked Catherine if the peppers were supposed to be on the stove without a pan or anything underneath them and she nodded (she was busy making some sort of sweet tart for the kids' breakfast). I asked why the peppers were on the stove like that. Ah, ma fille! The answer is simple. Apparently uncooked peppers are hard on the digestive system. So you... er... char... the skin of the pepper on an element to cook them, then wrap them in a sheet of newspaper and let them sit for the day on the counter. When you get home from work, you cut the skin of the pepper away from its meat (I imagine with a very sharp knife and epic skill) and that is what you then slice into strips for putting on pizza.

That's. Just. The peppers.

This afternoon I found her kneading the dough when I got back from classes. Clearly Catherine loves to cook.



Yesterday was also an adventure! Contrary to Googlemaps, Montpellier is not actually a beach town, its about 15km inland. So I rounded up Kate and informed her that we were going to rent bikes from the TAM (Transit Assoc. of Mont.) and bike to the beach for the afternoon. It took two tries over as many days for this to work, but at last... success! What a gong show though. I've cycled in traffic in a few places, the most wild being Cuba, the most insane being Africa (never again, oh god) but nothing was quite like cycling in France.

The TAM and rent-a-velos are in the middle of the vieille-ville (old town center). From there you have to navigate your way through crowded, narrow lanes until you get far enough out that you are on roads wide enough for auto traffic. MISTAKE! There are bike lanes on the edges, but those are really only guidelines and they aren't terrible large. Without helmets on strange, very non-agile bikes with poor brakes this whole process is hilarious. Initially we thought we'd go through the pedestrian plazas to avoid all the auto-craziness, only this meant a lot of going down stairs and up escalators in pedestrian malls. Bad plan, but you get awesome looks from the locals going up an escalator with a rent-a-velo.

Resigned to the streets, we left the pedestrian plaza and I played navigator with my map... until we rode off the map. It was a small map. Fail! Fortunately I now have enough french that asking people for directions isn't so bad. I think I scared Kate a little, being as she didn't have much experience on a bike and I kept to larger, main roads to avoid getting lost, but we made it to the river unscathed. Once we were at the river the riding became significantly nicer, and our progress significantly smoother.

We did unfortunately spend so much time getting out of the city that we were riding on an un-shaded path to the beach in the heat of the day. We ended up deciding that we couldn't face another morning of walking into class and hearing Binnert (from Holland) asking us how the beach was and having to answer 'Well, we didn't make it.' again. Regardless of the actual result of this final foray we agreed; we made it to the beach, and it was brilliant.



Really though, we did make it. We got lost a few more times but it was fun. When we arrived and locked up the bikes Kate asked me how warm I thought the water was. "Brilliant." I said. "No no." She laughed, "Like what temperature, give me a number." I laughed. "A brilliant number!"

The water was actually pretty cold, I'd guess 17 C, maybe 18 C max. We swam in it anyway and it was - you guessed it - brilliant.

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

T'aime le Ketchup?


I am guilty as charged. Oui j'aime le ketchup, je suis du Amerique du Nord. Apparently when Catherine puts her love and good lamb into little balls with herbs and bread crumbs, then bakes them until they're all crispy and delicious, it's not impressive when people ask to put ketchup on them. In all fairness, I thought it was a great idea. It was also delicious, both with and without ketchup. Changing my meal plan to half-board was totally the best decision I have made thus far. Unfortunately, being as Catherine is a professional and the kitchen is small, she claims it as her domain and I have yet to step more than 1m into the kitchen before I am chased out. No cooking lessons in fine French cuisine for me :(

The afternoons and early evening are definitely the best time of day though! I attend classes before noon, spend the early afternoon with the other students (you know, wallball, pogs, trading cards, all those awesome pastimes) in the old town centre. This particular afternoon involved a mission for bicycles. It's 15km from the school to the beach. Not epically far, but far enough that you'd much rather do it on a bicycle than on foot. Well, Montpellier's transit service happens to rent bicycles very cheaply. Kate and I probably invested an hour trying to figure out where you could rent a bicycle from and what kind of ID they would accept as collateral. (For the record, it's passports and drivers licenses as standards, but they accepted my YMCA card as a student ID when I had nothing else on me.) We had a blast riding around on these incredibly difficult to steer bicycles and we're all set to pick up two to ride through the old town and the huge plaza to the beach tomorrow. I'm definitely excited to finally swim in the Mediterranean.


Post-bicycle adventures I come home, have a snack/read/do homework until 8:00pm when dinner is served. Best part of the day. It's an excuse to listen and speak with Michel, who I have to admit is totally becoming my favourite host-family member. Eat epic food and learn all sorts of random new words (gitan, feuille, pépin). For example, the family has what I thought were two gigantic palm trees in their front garden. Nono, they are just huge herbs. I thought Michel was making things up again - and it took a good amount of cajoling from the rest of the family for me to believe them - but it's true, herbs can be that big.

... I googled it...

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Couscous Behind Closed Doors



Ok maybe the couscous was not so secret as that. As in... maybe we had it in the garden, under the fig tree, next to the six Love Birds (les oixeaux inseperables) that Michel keeps. With a delicious, heaping plate of couscous with lamb and veggies followed by chocolate mousse with Grand Marnier mixed in. Got my board fixed with the school today, and oh! It is wonderful to be able to eat what I smell cooking in the kitchen all afternoon. Anyway, closed doors are another custom that I have to get used to in France.

So in Canada I've always felt (yes PSA members, felt) that a closed door is kind of a silent 'go away, leave me alone'. This is not the case in France at all. Since I arrived at the Forquin household I've been opening my door, being as it keeps mysteriously closing. It mysteriously closes because Catherin not-so-mysteriously shutting it as a sign of respect for my privacy! Ah, the things that are lost in translation. All the doors here are left shut; the bathroom, the toilet, Michel and Catherine's room, my room, Alexandre's room. Not as a way of asking people to leave you alone, but as a respectful way of recognizing that that space is yours and that the housing in Europe is tiny. It took a few minutes of confused french conversation for me to figure out what was being explained to me, but... look! Look at the Canadian! She gets it!

I am also falling in love with the tram system here. It is a tram, kind of like the C-train in Calgary, but infinitely cooler. Why you may ask? Not only because the whole tram is very roomy inside, painted pink and decorated with an abundance of flowers - there's more! Once you enter the suburbs of Montpellier (where I'm staying) there are sections of rail with grass underneath them!



No joke! Like real, soft, green, alive grass! I was exclaiming this happily to Michel who taught me all sorts of new words to describe my delight (joyeux, joli, alegre, heuruesse) when he called his little black dog Duke to heel and looked at me very seriously.

"Kendra," he said gravely. "The grass is plastic."

No.

No!

Devastated, he insisted it was so until I went over and touched it. The grass is real, and he had an excellent laugh at the whole thing hahaha! Catherine thought the whole story was excellent. One day, I will board foreign students and tell them all sorts of terrible lies when they are incredibly happy, and I will do it with a straight face, and it will be a blast.

Monday, August 16, 2010

Montpellier, the land of Germans


Yes, the land of Germans. I couldn't help but giggle a little when I walked into my introductory class this morning and met the other students for the first time. There were 6 of us there for the intro, and 4 of them were German. Then the regular classes began and once again, many, many Germans. It's funny because in Malaga the primary language spoken by the students was english, so I never really noticed who was from where because we could all easily communicate with eachother. Here in Montpellier it is very different. There are two girls from Ireland, two more from Mexico, myself, an Aussie (Kate) and then a whole bunch of Germans. Surprise? Yes.

I'm learning plenty about French customs as well, which is good because if I don't learn, I'm going to get myself in trouble. For example, when I got back from classes this morning I put my water bottle in the fridge to cool it down while I did my homework. Shame, shaaaame. I didn't realize that one of the little tables in my room is actually a little fridge. I'm to keep my food in there, the large fridge is for the family and the family only. Another mistake I made before I even got here was setting myself up with a room in a host family, but not asking to have any more than one meal with them. When it's one meal the school defaults you to breakfast, which is a shame because breakfast is France is small. Think like... a croissant and coffee, a smoke if you're really hungry. This means that I generally end up leaving the breakfast table hungry being as I neither smoke nor drink coffee. The big meal in France is dinner, and the lady of the house is a professional cook. Fail, faaaaaaaaail! As I sat at the dinner table this evening with my baguette sandwhich while the family ate chicken, pasta and freshly baked bread followed by home made fig tart I realized my folly. Not only was I drooling over food that I wasn't allowed to have, I had offended Catherine because she believed I thought she couldn't cook!

That will absolutely be fixed tomorrow. First thing on the agenda is to find and purchase a transit card for the month, which will more than pay for itself because the transit fees here are incredible. Second thing to do IN BOLD is to change my fees so that I'm a half-board, and can eat dinner here. Never again will I make that mistake. Dinner with the family is a blast too, Michel is brutally sarcastic, opening stories with lines like 'ah yes, in winter here we have a great deal of snow, 1-2m in general'. Catherine is talkative and kind but terrible at explaining the meaning of words I don't know yet, so Michel steps in and acts out things like 'soft', 'sweet', and 'ripe'. All of which were in reference to the figs used to make the tart. No big deal, the figs all grow on the tree in their front yard. o.O Best host family ever.

Sunday, August 15, 2010

Paris, again.


Well, I've made it. I'm in Paris for the second memorable time of my life and again it is... raining. I guess really you can't hold it against the city, although I've heard rumours that every once in a while the sun shines here. None the less, I'd rather it rained on me while I was in Paris than in Calgary.

Getting here was a bit of an adventure (as is travelling with me under any circumstances :P ) I had to change my flights initially due to a 24 hour stomach flu. That was a blast. The flight over was good although I'm curious as to what made Air Canada think that bananas and carrots were ever meant to be together in muffin form. Airplanes feed you the strangest food, really. Arrived in France mostly on time and found my hostel (Square Caulaincourt) without a problem. I'll post pictures soon, but I'd absolutely recommend this hostel to anyone no taller or wider than... well, me. If you're at all tall and broad you probably won't fit in the showers, or the beds, or through the doors. Ah, c'est la vie en Paris, petite.

At the moment I am waiting to catch my train to Montpellier and meet my host family for the next 2 weeks. Catherine and Michael sound awesome, and are picking me up at the station when I get there. Unfortunately my first mistake of the trip thus far was when to buy the ticket down to Montpellier. It is a major holiday in France today (I still don't know which, it might have to do with eggs) which means that showing up a half hour early and buying your ticket doesn't guarantee you a seat. In all fairness, this system has always worked for me in the past. Either way, I will be getting to Montpellier at 9:00pm or so local time instead of the much preferred 12:47pm. Fail. So until my train arrives I'm off to sit in a cafe somewhere with my trusty alien bag and wait. Hope it's sunny where you are!