Noël

I feel incredibly blessed and lucky pretty much every day I'm here, but Christmas was overload on the blessings and luckiness. My friend Rach and I had planned to be alone in Paris on Christmas when our friends Luigi and Clement invited us to spend the holiday with their family in Paris. We were looking forward a good meal and some familial vibes. What we got was a full-out Christmas, complete with a walk down to the major department stores to see the holiday lights, presents--THEY GOT US PRESENTS!!, and a massive delicious home-cooked meal. And, as if things couldn't get any better, there was an adorable giant dog (and you know how I love giant dogs), we played French Taboo (and you know how I love Taboo at any time in any language), AND they gave us each a scratch-off instant-win lotto thing and I WON 100 EUROS! To top it all off we had an encore meal the following night complete with oysters (les huitres) and lamb (gigot d'agneau). It still sucks that I couldn't be home, but this was seriously the best possible surrogate Christmas imaginable.

Antoine Says...

He only studied French authors in high school. "Why would we study foreign authors in translation if there are so many good French ones?" A fair question, though I'd rather have a broad knowledge of world literature than a pinhole knowledge of American lit. I can shoot the shit on Twain, Dante AND Flaubert, he doesn't even know who Twain or Dante is...

Authorized Voyeurism

You may have wondered why I've stopped adorning my posts with lovely pictures of my exploits around Paris. Honestly I haven't taken that many post-worthy pictures believe it or not. Paris has already been photographed so thoroughly and artfully that for the most part I feel it a waste to take one more picture of Notre Dâme or Place de la Concorde. Sure one could argue that my own pictures carry significance beyond their mere aesthetic merit, that fact that I can find a superior picture of Notre Dâme on Google is besides the point. Fair enough. Admittedly at times I find that carrying my camera around compels me to pause and truly observe the picteuresque or dramatic qualities of my surroundings. At other times I find my camera to be a burden because I am constantly stopping to freeze-frame fragments of my life that will never add up to the sum of their parts. In college a friend of mine complained that people spend too much time recording their life and not enough time living it. After college people always complain that they didn't take enough pictures. This seems to be yet another case of finding a happy medium.

In any case, I had begun to fear that I was erring towards too much living and not enough recording, so I forced myself to document an average day in simple snapshots. After several hours spent warring with Facebook I managed to put them up there for those of you with Facebook access. The battle wounds are still fresh; I may not endeavor to put photos up there again for some time to come... I also played around with this map site called Community Walk, which is pretty similar to Google Earth. Basically I linked my pictures to a map of Paris, so you can follow me around Paris on normal, satellite, or hybrid view. Enjoy: http://www.communitywalk.com/map/40567

Just Desserts

Tonight Antoine tried cooking fondants au chocolat with creme anglaise. The creme came out great; the fondant was tasty (it's hard to make something out of melted chocolate and sugar not-tasty), but the texture wasn't quite right. This may have partially had to do with the fact that he hadn't bought the proper baking tins, so we made ersatz tins out of an empty beer can. In any case, I'd be lying if I didn't admit I got mild sadistic pleasure out of watching a Frenchman fail to cook perfect French pastries.

French lesson: Same but Different

American English (AE): I left my tooth for the tooth fairy.
French (F): I left my tooth for the tooth mouse.

AE: I feel like such a third wheel.
F: I feel like the fifth wheel of the carriage.

AE: I've really got a green thumb.
F: I've really got a green hand.

AE: The teacher uses a lot of pie charts.
F: The teacher uses a lot of camemberts.

French Kids Say the Darndest Things

Me: “Do you know what Spring Break is?”
(long pause; kids in deep thought)

Kid: “Is that like Prison Break?”

Antoine says...

French people don’t use credit cards. The idea of spending money you don’t have is perilously frightening to them. I tell him that many many Americans have accrued thousands of dollars of credit card debt, and that furthermore, credit cards, loans, and credit ratings are at the core of a good chunk of American’s personal finances (I qualify this assertion by noting that I am just beginning to understand my own personal finances). He says there is pretty much one kind of loan in France, and there are no credit ratings. If you have a good secure job you get a loan. However, many French bank accounts allow you to maintain a modest negative balance without interest or penalty.

Antoine says...

French people don’t invest in stock because they find it far too risky. “Who invests in the French stock market then?” I ask. Americans and Brits largely. “What do French people invest in?” Real estate.

44 rue du Docteur Roux

I have moved. Why? What was wrong with Emma and her perfect flat on Rue la Bruyère? Well, nothing was wrong with it per se. When I first showed up in Paris the idea was that I would crash with Emma for the first few weeks and then we’d discuss and see how things were going. That conversation was significantly delayed because of life getting in the way, but finally we did sit down and chat. Emma made the valid point that my American fresh-out-of-college lifestyle was on a somewhat different wavelength than what she is used to and perhaps I would have more fun having a place of my own. She also said, “It’s not your fault you’re loud, it’s just that you’re American.”

My reactions to this turn of events were many and varied. I didn’t disagree with her; I did often spend my days lazing around the flat and my nights out until the wee hours, and I can be loud (though I found it unnecessary to attribute this quality to my nationality).

I was however somewhat shocked to be flung into the impossible Parisian housing market without even a chance to redeem my ways. Life at Emma’s had generally been just that—life AT EMMA’S, so I was almost excited about the prospect of HAVING a place of my own. But I was not at all excited about the prospect of FINDING a place of my own. I had friends who had been looking for 6 weeks and still hadn’t found anything; Emma was giving me until the end of November; time to get a move on…

The details of searching for a flat are painful and uninteresting. If you’re familiar with the New York housing market, envision that but as a foreigner from a generally despised country. However, I can’t really complain, because in contrast to my many friends who were and are still searching nearly two months into our contracts, I found a place within 10 days.

I’m now living on the other side of town in the 15th arrondissement in a really cute flat with a French kid named Antoine. Antoine is 23, from Lille (a town near the Beligan border), and a business student. He’s spent summers working in California and London so his English is great, and he hopes to return to the US for more business school. So far he’s taught me a lot about French politics, economics and slang, I’ve tried to return the favor.

I would thus like to commence a regular feature of my blogging called “Antoine says…” Naturally Antoine is as fallible as any other mere mortal, and he’s always up for a good debate, so if you’ve heard conflicting opinions do let me know.

Turkey Day and Tequila

In almost all things food-related France beats American hands down. Thanksgiving is a notable exception. Not only is Thanksgiving a magnificent display of the few dishes Americans know how to cook well, it is also a significant milestone in the lead-up to Christmas. Many stores around Paris have had Christmas decorations up for two weeks now; it just doesn’t seem right. However, manually tearing down premature tinsel seems a bit dramatic, so I opt for a more civil protest—throwing my own Thanksgiving feast and making Europeans eat it.

The invitation is my first attempt at French poetry:

"Thanksgiving sera," un poème de E. Silverstein et S. Shimanoff

Thanksgiving sera
Ce jeudi, ooh la la la
Dinde dinde sur le plat

Samedi chez moi
Festoyez, n’oubliez pas
Tarte à la citrouille.

Translation:

Thanksgiving will be
This Thursday, ooh la la la
Turkey on the plate

Saturday, my place
Celebrate, do not forget
To eat pumpkin pie.

As anyone who has hosted a Thanksgiving knows, it requires considerable advanced preparation. Step one is acquiring my mother’s pumpkin pie recipe and my grandmother’s turkey and stuffing technique. Step two is finding a turkey. I am told that the best way to secure a good turkey is to order one in advance, so I go down to the market near my school on Wednesday to discuss turkey matters with the butcher. They butcher me a beautiful 4.3 kilo turkey, which I pick up Friday afternoon. Step three is waking up at 9am Saturday morning to begin the long haul to dinner. Early on I give up converting English measuring units into metric and am pretty much eyeballing everything. Therefore, the recipes from my mom and grandmother serve mostly as inspiration rather than true recipes. My grandmother had been extremely precise on the turkey-cooking process: 325 degrees for 15 minutes per pound. Much math ensues: 4.3 kilos = 9.5 lbs. x 15 minutes = 2.4 hours at 325 Farenheit = 163 Celsius. After seasoning and stuffing the turkey I turn to my oven to put my calculations into action. I am confronted with a temperature dial numbered 1 through 9. 1 through 9?? Grandma didn’t say anything about a 1 through 9. I am screwed… In my head I envision where 325 might be on an oven dial back home, turn the knob, stick the bird in, and pray. Saul and I then decide to head out for some last minute shopping, leaving the turkey alone to slowly cook on mystery temperature 6.

We head to one of the two American specialty stores in Paris, The Real McCoy, in search of fresh Ocean Spray cranberries. This store creeps me out big time. It has the feel of a 50s bomb shelter, lined with boxed and canned products that will never go bad, ever; mostly things I am glad to not be eating on a regular basis anymore: Doritos, Fluff, Jello, Shake and Bake, Goya Adobo. The prices are astronomical. 10 euro for a bag of Reese’s peanut butter cups, 7 euro for a box of Pop-tarts. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy me some Reese’s and Poptarts back home, but it seems absurd to spend so much money on products so obviously inferior to their French equivalents—chocolate and breakfast pastries that is. We buy the cranberries and flee.

As we head home I’m beginning to think it was a mistake leaving the turkey unsupervised on mystery setting 6. For all I know my flat is burning down. Turns out a Thanksgiving miracle has occurred. Not only is the flat not burning down, the turkey has beautiful golden crispy skin and moist white meat beneath. I might actually pull this Thanksgiving thing off…

Friends show up slowly but surely, in fashionably late French style. My French friend Catherine informs me that the oven settings are clearly meant to be multiplied by 30 degrees Celsius. Thus, setting 6 is equivalent to 180 degrees Celsius, or 356 Farenheit, close enough to Grandma’s recommended 325. ‘Twas a good guess.

I’d like to take a moment to parade my cosmopolitan guest-list before you:

Team US:
-East Coast: me (NY), my friend Henson (NJ, in Paris for the weekend)
-West Coast: Saul (OR), Keith (CA)
-South: Rachel (TX)
-North: Wayne (AK) and Dave (MN?)

Team Europe:
-La France: Fabien, Catherine (co-worker), Claire (Rachel’s roommate)
-Deutschland: Yvonne (my German counterpart at work)
-The United Kingdom: Raj (Fabien’s girlfriend), Emma and Anna

The 14 of us (delightfully split 50/50 US/Europe, no?) devour dinner and move on to devouring the tequila Henson graciously brought duty-free from the States. Europeans tend to savor their liquor; we Americans show them how to quickly down it with salt and lime. Incidentally, Henson had bought nice enough tequila that it was sort of a shame to contaminate it with such collegiate rituals, but old traditions die hard.

Voila, two American traditions imported to Europe in one night: Turkey Day and tequila.