Adventures in Brittany

Because my sojourn in France was extended a week thanks to my friends at the Chinese consulate, I decided to take a trip to Brittany to see the northern coast of France. After painstaking research (read: glancing at Wikipedia pages and blindly trusting passing comments of friends), I decided to spend two nights in Saint-Malo and take a day trip to Mont Saint-Michel. The main things to see at Saint-Malo are the intra-muros, the walled-in historical old town, and the numerous defense forts on surrounding islands. Mont Saint-Michel is a city constructed on a small tidal island, whose main attraction is the monastic abbey crowning the mount.

Pros:

- Mont St-Michel is possibly the coolest place I have ever been. I was seriously awestruck.

- Gorgeous views of the coast from the walls of Saint-Malo.

- Walking along the beach at sunset.

- Amazing seafood. Brittany oysters are delicious.

- Met an awesome Korean girl studying in Paris in my hostel. Both traveling alone, we decided to spend my last day exploring the city together. Long conversations about religion, racism, food. We spoke French the whole time, our only common language. We woke each other up in the middle of the night because we both talk in our sleep; me in English, her in Korean.

- Solitude.

Cons:

- The SHITTY SHITTY WEATHER. It rained almost the entire time and was freezing cold. And when I say rain, I mean pouring, pants drenched, shoes squeaking.

- Saint-Malo was cool, but it's very small and two nights ended up being a little long. Then again, I could easily have spent three days lying on the beach if it weren't raining the whole time...

- Solitude.

Also because I am lazy, here is an excerpt from my journal dated 6/9/09:

It's almost 8:30 and I'm waiting for the sun to set, armed with Kundera and my favorite Cal sweatshirt and my Nikon. The skies aren't quite clear - Mont Saint-Michel was beautiful today, but Saint-Malo continues to be grey and overcast. Still, in the distance, sunlight is pouring into the ocean through an oculous in the clouds. The diagonals of light are so beautiful that I think they must be the product of some sorcery. The beaches have cleared; just an hour ago the stone pathway above the sand was filled with joggers, families, skipping dogs. It must be dinnertime.

Mont Saint-Michel was stunning. I'd seen plenty of photos and postcards, but on the bus approaching the island, I gasped when I caught sight of it. The abbey spires tower over rows and rows of stone walls, like an Atlantis before its sinking. What a mystery that something like this exists in nature, and what a miracle that man constructed a city on top of it.

I was worried I wouldn't have enough time to properly explore it, having only four hours between buses. It turned out to be plenty of time - the island is small and the uphill paths are well-guided - but I still wish I had been able to stay long enough to see the city lit up at night.

Much of Mont Saint-Michel was extremely touristy. The main avenue was lined with souvenir shops, almost all of them toting signs in Japanese (not for naught - throngs of Asian tourists with cameras around their necks crowded the streets). Still, I was able to find a few peaceful moments away from the crowds, some with astonishing views.

(The beach is quite deserted now, the tide almost swallowing the cliff of rocks I was sitting on just an hour before. I keep putting away and taking out my camera because the scene before me is changing every minute to something more beautiful than the one before).

The view from the top of the abbey at MSM was so breathtaking partly because there were so many different landscapes to look at - the muddy bay with streams of sea water fingering their way through the dense, grey sand, the green pastures littered with rows of leafy trees, low white clouds hanging in a straight line just barely above, and then the ocean, wide and expansive, Normandy cliffs barely visible in the distance.

The abbey itself was formidable. I'm not generally a fan of Romanesque architecture, it all feels so heavy and oppressive, but I couldn't help being impressed by the massive stone columns in the crypts holding up wide, vaulted ceilings. The cloisters were beautiful too, turning their way around a garden planted with roses.

(The clouds are receding towards the ocean now, and patches of clear blue sky are finally visible under the clouds. This sunset will be beautiful).

Perhaps the most interesting part of the day was walking through the bay. Despite the warning signs about quicksand and death, groups of children running around it reassured me that there wouldn't be a problem. For the most part my trek was fine save for a few spots of mud splattering on my feet. Towards the end, though, I hit a patch of wet sand and there was no way around but through. So I stepped in...ankle deep. And then another step. And another. My feet and shoes were covered in mud by the time I made my way out, and I had no water to rinse them off with. Let's just say...awkward bus ride home with a lot of weird stares.

Still, there were magical moments on the bay. The sun kept playing hide and seek behind the clouds, and at one point was making its reappearance after a particularly long absence. Across the flatness of the bay and the fields beyond it, shadows of the fleeing clouds scampered swiftly away, chased by the wind. I felt like I was watching an episode of Planet Earth on high speed. The flatness of the land meant that I could trace the shadows of the clouds that were once above my head all the way to the horizon.

I think I almost prefer this semi-dreary, quasi-tumultuous, often-grey type of beach town in Brittany to the sunny Californian variety, all filled with palm trees and girls in skittle-colored bikinis. Other than the rainstorms, which I could do without, I love everything about it - the sad cries of seagulls overhead, the scent of seaweed and crustaceans in the air, the waves crashing without pause onto an empty beach, the steadfast fortresses and silent stone walls coldly standing guard against the ocean.

(The sky is almost completely blue now. By the time the sun dips below the horizon there will be nothing between us).

Farewell Bordeaux; Bitch-slapped by Paris

This is the weirdest place I have ever blogged.

I am on rue Washington in Paris, off of the Champs-Elysées, minutes from the Arc de Triomphe, in a line outside the Chinese consulate. It’s 8:40 in the morning and I’ve already been here an hour, and I’ve got another 50 minutes to go before the consulate opens at 9:30. I came here obscenely early because yesterday, the consulate ran out of numbers to issue at 9:50…a mere 20 minutes after they opened their doors. Thus I am braving sore feet and a chilly Parisian morning in a miniskirt, which is my genius wardrobe choice for the day and the only thing keeping me from plopping my exhausted self on the dirty ground. My laptop is propped up on a windowsill. People are staring.

My last day in Bordeaux was wonderful and heartbreaking. Alexa and I climbed 281 spiraled steps up la tour Pey Berland for the first time, a tower next to the central cathedral which offers amazing views of the city’s red tiled-roofs sprawling homogeneously beneath. We walked through the Miroir d’Eau in front of Place de la Bourse, dipping our feet in the water with children in swimsuits. My host mom made pommes de terre farsi for my last meal, potatoes topped with minced meat, one of my favorite dishes. As a parting gift, I gave her a potted plant of gerber daisies, four red blooms, and she told me that they were like her four daughters – her three real daughters, and me. She cried. I cried. “This house is yours, any time.” I had planned to say goodbye to some friends and get back at midnight to finish packing, but my host sister decided to throw a last minute goodbye party at the house. Her Facebook status announced that I was leaving at 5 in the morning and wouldn’t need to sleep that night. This was news to me…but I didn’t mind. Corona and Frenchies beat packing any day. After emotional goodbyes to Alexa and others in the wee hours of the morning, I headed to the train station. It was a strange feeling – even though my room was empty and white, as if I had never lived there at all, I still felt like I was going on vacation and would be back in a week. But watching the sun rise over the hilly countryside en route to Paris, I knew it was the last time I would be making that trip.

And then everything started to go wrong.

First of all, my train to Paris was overbooked. I had counted on one of the extra seats next to the doors, but by the time I made my way over they had already been filled. After awkwardly trying to sit on my uneven suitcase, my unsupported ass had had enough, and I tried to sit on the floor underneath a suitcase rack. Because God hates me, the rack was just short enough so that my head wouldn’t fit underneath. At this point I was exhausted, cranky, and depressed, so I decided to throw away what little dignity I had and lie down. On the floor. Of the TGV. Right next to the toilets (read: lots of people staring at me while waiting in line to take a piss). The best part was that there was another guy who decided to sleep on top of the rack right above me. The strap of his bag kept dropping through the cracks and whipping me in the face.

When we finally stop in Paris, the strap of my suitcase breaks in half the second it touches the platform.

[Tangent: someone is listening to “Everybody is Kung Fu Fighting” on their cell phone outside of the Chinese consulate…what the fuck.]

Next, the sole ATM in the train station was out of order, so I lug my 100 pounds of luggage into a mall to get money. Then I walk over a mile to find a taxi, only to happen upon the bitchiest driver of all time, who didn’t know any streets and whose only form of expression was yelling at me. I finally rush to the consulate to get my Chinese visa only to learn that they are no longer issuing expedited visas, which I had been counting on in order to make my flight to Beijing on Friday. I have no choice but to change my flight, which cost me a fortune.

I can safely say that that was the worst morning I have ever had in my life. So this is where things stand now: I am staying in Paris an extra week, up until next Friday, which I suppose is a blessing in disguise of a curse in disguise of a blessing. Let me explain. While I am grateful for this extra time in France, and especially in Paris, which is undeniably one of the most beautiful places I have been, I feel like I’m stuck in some sort of strange limbo. Maybe it’s my lack of spontaneity talking, but I would like to either be in Bordeaux, with my friends, or Beijing, with my family. I think I would be thrilled to be here alone under any other circumstances, but it gets a little difficult when you can’t stop looking back nostalgically on the last five months.

That being said, there has been no shortage of breathtaking moments in Paris. I’ll write about them next. Enough of the emo.

Two families, two homes

My dad has a business meeting in Amsterdam this week, so my mom tagged along his trip and both of them are spending the weekend in Bordeaux. My dad came with 2 cameras, 4 lenses, and a tripod. My mom brought her Nikon D90. I walked through the streets of Bordeaux today with them, D80 SLR in hand. We looked like a band of runaway photographer circus freaks. And I loved it.

As I write, my parents are napping in my bed next to me, passed out after a long French lunch at my homestay and jetlag from hours of travel. It has been so nice showing them around the city, and I love that they can have a small glimpse into what my life is like here, which is so different from any place they've ever lived. My host mom made a delicious meal of beef bourguignon, a very traditional French dish, with potatoes and bacon-wrapped green beans. We finished with French vanilla ice cream and fresh strawberries. The meal was delicious, but the best part was watching my parents share stories and champagne with my host mom and my host sisters, while we all clustered around the same table I eat dinner at every night. My dad made corny jokes that my host mom laughed at - it was all perfect.

It's funny trying to see Bordeaux through a tourist's eyes again. When I first arrived, the architecture and buildings here were awe-inspiring, and I remember having conversations with French people about how beautiful this city is and being scandalized that as residents, they couldn't see it anymore. I could never have imagined looking around Bordeaux and finding everything "regular," or getting used to sweeping monuments and towering church spires. After five months here though, I can see where they're coming from. But now, I no longer see it as a lack of appreciation. Aesthetically I still find everything beautiful, but there's a comfort in the fact that I no longer get whiplash from craning my head to look around me. I don't do that anymore because this has all become part of my life. Bordeaux is my home.

Sun, sand, waves, and...oysters?

(edit: fixed a minor glitch and now you can click to enlarge all photos)

Yesterday, I went to the beach.

My fab host mom.

Necessary.

This is not a random creeper photo! I swear I actually know this guy.

Specifically, I went to Cap Ferret with my host mom, Cedric, Ricardo, and Bin, three high school boys who are staying with my host family for 2 weeks during their vacation from boarding school. It's a peninsula that separates the Atlantic Ocean and the Arcachon Bay, and from the beach you get a nice view of the Dune du Pyla, the largest sand dune in Europe. 

View Larger Map

I'm not gonna lie, it is a bitch trying to walk on a beach with crutches. You have to deal with them sinking halfway into the sand while simultaneously balancing one leg precariously so that your cast doesn't fill with sand. All the same, it was a beautiful, sunny day, and it felt so liberating to leave the house in a t-shirt. The beaches here are gorgeous; all fine sand and clear waves. I also got to take some photos for the first time in a long time, which was great even though I could only do it sitting down (which is why all my pictures are from the exact same angle). There were a ton of people out and I took a shitload of stalker photos of little kids.

After the beach my host mom drove us to L'Herbe, a little fishing village nearby. The houses were incredibly precious, each one painted a different bubblegum color. My host mom bought a bagful of huîtres, oysters, which are a specialty of the southwest of France.

A few photos from L'Herbe:

An oyster selling stand

Crates of fresh oysters

...I do not know.

We had the oysters for lunch today and I was honestly scared to try one. I once googled "What do oysters taste like?" and the predominant response was "snot." But I'd also heard from a Bordelais friend that they taste the way the ocean does when you're facing it and drops of seaspray hit your face from the crashing waves. Romantic, those French. Anyway, you're supposed to eat them raw out of the shell with an optional squeeze of lemon juice. I sucked it up and tried one and surprisingly loved it. The first thing that hits you is the saltiness of the liquid, which I suspect is mostly seawater, and you taste little else. But go for a few soft chews and you really get the flavor of the oyster, which is strong and briny but inexplicably delicious. Definitely not the last time I'll be eating them. 

(Chuck, this is the best I can do for now as far as food porn goes. I'll bust out the camera when I'm on my feet again, promise).

Reasons I love my host mom: Part 843

Click here to see a photo of my incision. I'm warning you, it's pretty graphic so if you are squeamish DON'T CLICK IT. I happen to think it's kind of fascinating but I'm gross that way.

Tomatoes and pets

Tonight my host mom made this wonderfully light vegetable stew. I was so excited to eat something not loaded with carbs or cream, but I had barely gotten the tiny squares of green and red into my bowl (first sign of color in my diet in weeks!!) before I heard, "Wait! You can't eat it like that - here, put some butter in your soup."

It's official - even soup gets buttered in France. 

But this time I wasn't going to stand for it. "NON MERCI." I made an excuse about  my cholesterol being high (unfortunately not fictional) and got away with it.

Yesterday I bought cherry tomatoes at the supermarket near my homestay. Not wanting to offend my host mom, who prides herself on her cooking (which is very good by the way - just a little heavy on the beige), I hid them behind my books, praying they'd still be good the next morning without refrigeration. They were. Like a thief, I rinsed them off in the bathroom sink, dreaming of antioxidants and vitamins, then wrapped them in a piece of purloined foil and took them to school. You know you've hit a dietary low point when you've got a secret stash of vegetables lying around your room.

Seriously, how do French women stay so skinny? Eating disorders must be an epidemic here becuase you could not eat a normal amount and not expand/die from a heart attack at 30. Meals are interesting in France though - you'll never see someone eating a sandwich on the tram or while walking. Mealtimes are sacred and slow affairs, meant to be savored. Dining is an event, not a necessity for survival. In fact, almost the entire campus has no class from 12:30 to 1:30 - apparently the French can't imagine life without a lunch break. Unfortunately, this means monstrous lines at the cafeteria during lunch. I guess you can't have it all.

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One of the funniest things about my homestay is that I speak French to the animals - Bill (or Billou), the dog, Mausy the evil cat, and Mauschen the good cat have all been cooed over or chastised by me - en francais. I have yet to speak French to the poules (chickens), but I did get some shots of them today. Here are the non-human members of my family:

Billouuuuuu. He is the sweetest dog ever, though recently with the rain he's developed a, erm, odor. A strong one. He likes to sit right next to you during dinner, staring up and whining for the duration of the meal, occasionally pawing at your leg for attention. If you open a door he goes batshit insane wanting to go out. Close the door while he's outside and he goes batshit insane trying to get back in. In conclusion he is crazy, but I love him. He's an old dog with the soul of a puppy. I speak French to him a lot, but mostly to yell "Arrête!" (Stop that!)

Mauschen, the good cat. My host mom told me that Mauschen means little mouse, which doesn't make much sense but is still cute. He's not in the house as much, but when he is he never objects to petting. Likes to stake out the floor by the living room heater.

Mausy, the evil cat. Her name also means little mouse in German. She's not so much evil as bipolar - catch her at a bad moment and she'll launch at you with her teeth when you try to pet her. On a good day she'll plant herself on your lap and purr for hours. Both she and Bill sleep on my host mom's bed at night, it's precious. One time she came into my room and lay behind me on the bed without my noticing. I reached behind me to grab something from my coat without looking and ended up whacking her across the back. It freaked me the fuck out. I probably actually screamed. Since then we have kept a respectful distance from each other.

Chicken! I don't think they have names. Not yet, anyway. They're scared of me. And apparently eat out of frying pans.

Cobblestones and wine

Click for full-size images.

Yesterday I literally spent the whole fucking day on Facebook, because everyone and their mom, myself included, decided to put up photos from Bordeaux, and I needed to be supervigilant as bar-dancing pictures were uploaded and I had to protect my pristine reputation. 

The reason all the pictures went up yesterday is because we spent a beautiful Saturday at Saint-Emilion, a small town near Bordeaux famous for its wine. 

The town was lovely. I'm really glad we got to go during the off season because the streets were nearly empty, and my host mom told me later that during the summer there are people everywhere. The town was the definition of a quaint European village, with towering church spires and cobblestone roads laid during the 12th century. Extremely steep and potentially death-inducing cobblestone roads. We took a tour through the church's catacombs - it's the deepest underground church in Europe (or something equally impressive) and carved out of the side of a mountain. It was also cold as hell inside the buildings. I'm far from a fan of Romanesque architecture (too heavy and depressing), but it's hard not be be impressed by the sheer size of the buildings and the intricate paths underground. The day had been a bit gloomy, which was making for shitty photographs, but then the sun finally came out and it was glorious glorious glorious. 

After a historical tour of the city, we hopped back on the bus and drove to a winery not far away. I was a little surprised because it was extremely modern and indistrial, and not at all what you'd picture a traditional winery to be - no barefoot men stomping grapes (thank god) or dark stone caverns. Everything was steel and shiny. There were, however, barrels and barrels of wine at the end of the tour. 

You could smell it all around you, which no one was complaining about. At the end, we had an informal tasting of two wines. I would have felt pretentious but for all of us scarfing the stuff down like alcoholic and uncultured American college students. Oh wait, that's exactly what we are. At the end of the tour almost everyone bought some wine for themselves and their host families. I had no idea what I was doing, but I liked the second wine we tried so I picked up a bottle of that for my host mom. She promised to break it out for the next big meal.

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A cafe in front of the church bell tower in St. Em. I love this photo for some reason. It just screams Europe to me. Sometimes after a day spent speaking English with fellow Californians, I forget that I'm here, but suddenly I'll be surrounded by waves of French on the tram or I'll see something like this, and then I feel so lucky to be in this place where everything is beautiful.

Not a real post

I have so many things to post about but not enough time/conviction. So here's a gem from today, straight out of Kelly's Bordeaux Quote Book:

"Why is the chocolate cock so expensive?"

- Tiffany Huang, January 15 2009, 12:29 pm

No, you don't get context.

No class tomorrow, which means another night of walking home after the tram stops running, or waiting for the first tram at 4 AM. If all goes well, that is.

Seriously I will blog about real things soon.

Too much French class

My brain is obliterated after 6 hours of French grammar lessons (the last of which consisted of 8 ruthless pages of fill in the blank done at lightning speed), 2 hours of French writing methodology, 2 episodes of Mad Men, and 1 fatty duck leg. Seriously, J'AI BESOIN DE VEGETABLES. I'm used to a 50% green diet and all I've been eating thus far is beige beige beige beige. I can't take credit for that comedic genius - Kelly was the first one to point out France's monochromatic diet. The food here is great, but I'm starting to think there's only so much bread, cheese, potatoes, and meat I can take. The only color in my diet so far has been wine, which is probably not a good sign.

[Note: I'm not sure I've made it through a single entry without mentioning alcohol. Also probably not a good sign.]

Since I have a grammar quiz tomorrow I haven't started studying for, I'll take this time to explain a little about the class I'm in. That's right, I'm not just here on a five-month alcohol tour of Europe, though that will probably happen at some point.

These first weeks have consisted of ILP - Intensive Language Prgram. That translates into a very French woman beating the life out of us with inane grammar exercises at ungodly hours of the morning. Actually, Isabelle, our instructor, is hilarious and the only thing that makes class remotely bearable aside from French hangman with Tiff. Isabelle is a woman whose her entire wardrobe consists of black, leather, and fur. Lots of fur. Fur with little feet hanging off it. Isabelle is a woman who loved Britney Spears's last CD and makes sarcastic remarks about our exercises - "What enormous suspense! Let's read out loud in dramatic voices, or everyone will fall asleep." Isabelle is a woman who terrified me on day one. When calling roll, a few kids, myself included - answered with "ici," the literal translation of "here." After going through the list, she looked up and said, "When I call roll, say 'présent.' 'Ici' is for dogs."

Our generation gives me hope, though. When retelling this story to Piga, the host of the French party, I got this response - 

Piga: pfffffff
elle est trop bète (she's really stupid)
ca a l'air d'etr une vieille naze (she seems like an old naze[?])
Lisa: HAHA
naze, c'est quoi? (what's "naze?")
Piga: suck

French youth may need to work on their English, but at least they get to the point.

Next entry: my woes with the French University system, in which NOTHING is online. That or my awesome host family, depending on what kind of day I'm having.