S’amuser: to have fun/to enjoy

Nous nous sommes amusés beaucoup quand nous sommes allés au Mont-Saint-Michel, Saint-Malo, et Chenonceaux.

And it’s true—we had an incredible amount of fun when we went on an excursion planned by the Institut to Mont-St-Michel, St. Malo, and Chenonceaux.  Each locations was incredible to visit, and at all we had some fun (and very amusing) adventures.  I was tempted to put the French vocab word of the day as “drôle” or “amusant(e)” to convey how funny the weekend was, as it certainly was entertaining.

Waking up very early to get ready to go on this excursion was not exactly fun, although it did give me the chance to marvel (again) at how early the sun rises in Tours as well as the fact that apparently some people party strong at 6:40 in the morning, judging by music and singing that emanated from an open window on my walk over to our meeting place.  The 3-hour bus ride to Mont-St.-Michel was actually pretty entertaining, thanks to traveling buddies Lauren and Mark, and we also got a chance to experience the French equivalent of a rest/truck stop, which was actually very nice.  I also became introduced/enamored with pre-packaged gaufres, or small chocolate dipped waffles.  Even the junk food in France is delicious.  Driving through Bretagne was quite lovely—there were so many fields and pastures and meadows with Queen Anne’s lace and goldenrod and splashes of bright red that were the poppies characteristic of the region.  (New item added to the “Things to Do in France” checklist: frolic in a field of poppies.)  And approaching Mont-St.-Michel was also amazing; all of a sudden the giant, craggy edifice of the abbey springs up out of nowhere from the rolling countryside, slowly becoming visible through the fog.  The sandy beaches and marshland and oceans also seem to appear out of nowhere.

Mont-St-Michel, seen rising out of the mist from the bus.

Before this little trip I had always just assumed that Mont-St-Michel was simply a fantastic castle of some sorts, situated by itself on an island in the middle of nowhere.  In reality it’s not quite so lonely as that.  I didn’t realize it before, but Mont-St-Michel is actually a pretty touristy place, composed of not only the abbey but also a vast assortment of restaurants, museums, and the typical tourist shops (filled with t-shirts, postcards, jewelry, knickknacks, and various assorted objects) that lined the winding walk up to the entrance to the abbey, which was at the top of the mount.  It was very crowded, which I also didn’t expect—throngs of people with their dogs and small children coursed up and down the far-too-narrow path—and it reminded me of being back in Paris.  A group of us had lunch at a nice, not-too-expensive restaurant that served moules frites (mussels with French fries), and were there for over an hour, and ended up being late to the actual abbey.  Travel tip: If you’re ever on a tight schedule in France, never go to a sit-down restaurant.  It will take forever.  Ordinarily this is a very nice thing, not feeling rushed at a restaurant, but if you have places to be, c’est pas très bien.  It’s better off to get food à emporter (to go) from a boulangerie or similar establishment.  Luckily, though, even though we missed our group by a good twenty or so minutes, the people working at Mont-St-Michel were very nice and understanding, and once we explained that we were part of a group of students that had already entered, they let us in.

Some of the USC Tours Group-Tyler, Alysia, Mark, Lauren, Molly, Me

Hurray for awesome suits of armor!

An interesting find at a boulangerie in the touristy part of Mont-St-Michel...Do Europeans really think we're that unhealthy?  And that typical Americans eat sandwiches filled with French fries and ketchup?

Mont-St-Michel is quite an interesting place.  The views from the top are magnificent (you can see the water!), and it possesses a very intriguing history.  First an abbey, then a prison, then a UNESCO world heritage site (I think) and a pilgrimage spot for tourists.  Like many of the older religious buildings in France, you can tell by the architecture that it was designed for inspiring lofty thoughts—all of the columns, arches, stained glass, and soaring ceilings impart an airy, heavenly quality to everything.  It was fun trying to imagine what it must have been like hundreds of years ago when it was inhabited pretty much only by monks and nuns, though this was a little hard because time (and a lack of distinguishing  furniture) has made most of the rooms look the same.  At one point we caught up with our group, being led by perhaps the most animated teacher at the Institut, and for the most part followed him.  The tour was very interesting, although it was a little difficult to hear what our guide was saying, since he spoke entirely in French and it was very crowded.  It was a shame, since he was a very good speaker who obviously knew a lot about the building.

A bad picture...but inspiring lofty thoughts?

One of the back walls of the abbey.

After Mont-St-Michel, we drove another hour or so to St. Malo, a place I hadn’t really heard of before and didn’t even know we were going to until an embarrassingly late time.  St. Malo is probably one of the most interesting places I have ever been to: an old walled city in Brittany, on the northern coast.  It was absolutely gorgeous, especially since the weather was fabulous.  People always talk about the south of France and laud its beauty and various other attributes, but after this weekend I’m convinced that the north is just as beautiful, if not more; it certainly has a bit of a rugged charm to it.  The town itself is really neat, with a wall that you can walk around (although we didn’t get a chance to do it), a small cathedral (which we did visit), and more than a healthy number of cafés, pâtisseries, and boulangeries.  We became acquainted with the wonderful creation of beignets (they almost give the ones in New Orleans a run for their money, albeit they’re so different it’s a little difficult to judge) and the various ways their awesomeness can be augmented, e.g. by the addition of nutella, jam, or ice cream.  Whoever invented ice cream-filled beignets needs to be either canonized or sent to prison, I can’t decide; punished for creating something so bad for you but so incredibly delicious, or praised for the same reason.  They’re quite possibly some of the most delicious things I have ever tasted, ever.  After walking around the city for a little while and enduring various trials and tribulations (see the following paragraph concerning our adventures with street performers and public bathrooms), we went to the beach, pretty much walking up and down the length of it, collecting seashells, exploring tidal pools, marveling at the strange sand piles left by unknown ocean critters.  It was so lovely!  And the sea was incredibly blue.  So gorgeous.  And all too soon we had to leave for another incredibly long (but likewise super entertaining) bus ride back.  Oh the games you can play on long car trips…

Cathedral at St. Malo

Walking along the beach...Maggie and Millie and Molly and May?  Well, we have a Molly at least.

Rocks!  With little tidal pools and seaweed and tons of mussles.  Us biology majors definitely had a moment where we explored the tidal pools for critters.

One of our escapades in St. Malo, which I shall refer to as the Adventure of the Torture Tub and the Great Bathroom Debacle, deserves its own paragraph, it was so amusing.  After indulging in the sweets that have probably trimmed a good year or so off of our lives, they were so deliciously unhealthy, we wandered around for a little while and then decided to seek a bathroom, since they appeared to be plentiful in St. Malo.  We had the very good fortune to pick a public toilet right next to what was probably the creepiest street performer in France, and who was probably the creepiest street performer I will ever see in my life.  He was most likely a very nice gentleman deep down on the inside but definitely looked like a serial killer, with his strange mask, odd clothes, and purposefully bandaged hands.  That and his wooden cart full of strange things, which was soon nicknamed “the torture tub”.  His cart/torture tub contained (among other things) a mini mummified thing, a knife which he had much fun brandishing about, and a slate, on which he wrote things that were apparently funny but that none of us really understood.  Some of his acts consisted of sending children around the crowd to wipe the faces of other people with a handkerchief, which was apparently very entertaining for the massive crowd gathered around him, who smiled and laughed almost continuously at his antics.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen people more entranced by a performer in my life.  It was an almost hypnotic show, and difficult to look away from, as we waited in line for the bathroom.

So creepy he gives clowns a run for their money.  And probably only surpassed in scary-ness by the child-eating pale man from Pan's Labyrinth.  That or actual real-life serial killers.

One thing you should know about public bathrooms in St. Malo: they are self-cleaning.  When one person leaves and shuts the door, it locks momentarily while the cleaning happens, then becomes available for the next person to put in their toll of 30 centimes and enter.  This would ordinarily sound like a very good thing—who wouldn’t want to visit a self-cleaning bathroom?  However, the self-cleaning, contrary to its name, doesn’t exactly effectively clean the bathroom (or replace certain necessary items like soap and toilet paper), and it’s pretty terrifying if you actually get stuck whilst the bathroom in the process of cleaning itself.  After two of our group, Chloe and Molly, left the bathroom, they held the door open for us to enter so we wouldn’t have to pay the obligatory 0,30 euro.  Jennifer and I went in together, and when the door shut, the self-cleaning process began.  First the toilet flushed by itself, which was pretty nifty.  Then little spigots suddenly came out of the floor and started spraying water in all directions, which was not so nifty.  Jennifer and I tried to seek shelter from the water—shelter was nonexistent—and as embarrassing at it is to admit, we started screaming as well.  (What else is one to do when you're trapped in a bathroom and suddenly water starts spraying everywhere?)  And then the lights went out, which prompted more screaming.  The doors were also locked (we found out later that there was a red button that you could push from the inside to unlock the door, but alas, it is rather difficult to identify red buttons or read signs in pitch blackness) and wouldn’t open despite the effort we put in.  We had to beg our fellow classmates from the outside, who found the entire situation incredibly hilarious, to put in money so the doors would open again and we could escape.  Apparently we were making so much noise with the screaming and the laughing that the incredibly creepy street performer stopped his show, sat on his cart, and watched our group for a little while with the rest of the mesmerized crowd.  Some of the audience members were apparently angry at this interruption, while others realized what had happened to the poor silly American tourists and were similarly laughing their heads off.  Ah, there’s nothing like the stare of a street performer and wet shoes to accompany a hasty retreat/walk of shame out of a public bathroom.  I think it must have taken my shoes at least an hour to fully dry after that.

So that was our encounter with the French Public Bathroom.  We learned several valuable lessons from this experience:

1. Don’t be cheap when it comes to public bathrooms…pay your 30 centimes.  Unless, of course, you want to get trapped in a bathroom—after all, it makes for a very good story.

2. There actually are a few occasions when it’s better to use a bus bathroom than one on land.

3. Always look for signs, and read them immediately—you never know when the lights are going to randomly go out on you.

4. Sometimes Europeans can have very strange senses of humor…and it is relatively easy to attract the wrath of creepy street performers.

All being said, that was definitely one of the most hilarious things that has happened in France thus far.  I don’t think I’ve laughed that hard in a very hard time.  In retrospect, of course.

Sunday wasn’t quite as an adventurous of a day, and although it was devoid of such bathroom disasters, it was really very much enjoyable.  Since my famille d’acceuil had gone on vacation and said that I could have friends over, and since Mark’s family had nicely asked him to spend the night somewhere else for a day because they had their extended family over, and since it’s a little disquieting to stay by yourself for multiple days in another person’s apartment, we had a slumber party.  Yay!  Said slumber party consisted mostly of making a spaghetti dish with ham and onions at midnight and attempting to watch a movie but falling asleep.  In other words, it was awesome.  The next morning we succeeded in making breakfast (another surprising culinary feat) and went to mass at St. Martin’s basilica, which was pretty fabulous.  I actually enjoyed it more than mass at Notre Dame—though that service was certainly beautiful, the throngs of tourists sort of diminished the meaning of it.  Here it seemed much more sincere, and filled with an understated beauty.  It was very interesting to try to translate the service in my head, and we were both surprised by what all we knew.  I was even more surprised that I didn’t look like a complete fool during the service, hahaha—I have been to a grand total of three Catholic masses in my life, all of them in French, so I’m not exactly sure what goes on, or when you stand, or when you sit, or when you cross yourself.  The rest of the day consisted mostly of lunch (Libyan food), a trip to the best boulangerie in the world, and watching movies.  We watched “La Vie est Belle” (Life is Beautiful) in the original Italian with French subtitles and actually understood what was going on.  However, since we understood what was going on, there were some resultant tears, and we had to remedy it with about 3 hours of Sense and Sensibility.  It may sound a little lame, in retrospect, but it was definitely an awesome day.  Even if we got next to nothing accomplished.

And these past three days school has resumed, with phonetics labs, writing, and oral communication skills.  The oral comprehension is perhaps the most difficult so far, as we’ve listened to tracks where people speak incredibly fast.  But hopefully we will improve soon enough!  We’ve also started on individual projects in our class, which actually seem quite fun—I’m going to do a comparison between different generations and ages of the inhabitants of Tours, and the interviews that this will require will hopefully improve my speaking skills and reduce my timidity.  Other students are writing travel journals, making mini newspapers, exploring the lives of political activists in France, discovering what it means to be “from Tours”, comparing the religious establishments in France, and doing a host of other things, so it will be awesome to see all the final products. 

Today we also got to go on another excursion after classes to the Caves of St. Roch and the castle of Chenonceaux, both of which were super interesting.  The caves around the Loire Valley are mostly manmade (resulting from all the mining of the stone to build the various chateaux along the river), and after the time of kings and queens were used for a great variety of purposes, including raising silkworms, growing mushrooms, and, of course, storing/making wine.  We had a pretty interesting tour guide who explained the wine-making process (as well as several odds and ends about how the stone was removed, the history of St. Roch, etc) as she led us through the caves, and we got to have a free wine tasting after our visit.  I don't even like wine that much but it was actually a fairly enjoyable experience.  Local wine=better than lots of stuff I've tasted.  (Now, if only the rubbing alcohol/hand sanitizer taste would go away...)  After this little trip, we boarded the bus again and went to Chenonceaux, a very lovely castle on the Loire River.  We definitely could have spent more than the two hours we were allotted to visit there, it was so interesting and pretty.  The grounds of Chenonceaux not only contained the beautiful castle (with an intriguing history--I think it was built for a mistriss of the king?), but also various gardens, a labryinth, a playground (in which we had much fun), a replica of a 16th century farm, and tons and tons of trees.  Definitely fantastic.  I wonder if the groups of school children we saw on field trips there realize how luck they are to live within driving distance of actual castles?  And of course, the bus ride back to the Institut was certainly amusing in itself.  Back row bus riders unite!  Hahaha.

Strange machines to turn the wine bottles during their second fermentation (I think).

Preparing for the wine tasting at the caves.

Some of our group members at the entrance to Chenonceaux.

Fairy tale castle!

Beautiful River! 

(Or, in the words of Tyler: "It looks just like it's out of The Lord of the Rings...except for the truck")

Life in Europe, much like life in America, is filled with little daily adventures and misadventures.  On Monday I must have talked about birds with the father of my host family for a good half hour, which may sound boring to some but for a biology major such as myself it was quite fascinating, and I learned a lot of vocabulary.  Les hirondelles.  Les merles.  Les pies.  It was also a good lesson in circumlocution, since trying to explain what a robin or hummingbird is when you don’t know the words in French can be rather challenging.  Yesterday Shakhlan, Mark, and I had a mini interview with a nun from the Basilica (Sister Marie Aimee, I think…perhaps one of the most awesome people ever), which was likewise interesting.  We also learned that the postal services workers are going on strike from today until Friday, but we're not exactly sure why; hopefully it won't last for too long.  Today I also went to a choral concert that was actually an exam for conservatory students in the directing class, which was quite fascinating--the teenage boy in my host family conducted a few pieces, which was pretty neat.  It both reminded me of church choir back home and made me want to look up Scandinavian music.  It's always nice to see the "real life" side of France, and not just the touristy stuff.  Like SMS language, which we did in one of our classes today--we can now write text messages using abbreviations like 2puis and tt and lgtps and kon and g and 2m1 and koi.  Very beastly, haha.

And oh, the misadventures!  Forgetting to check the weather before getting dressed.  Getting lost.  General acts of clumsiness.  My host family probably thinks I’m perpetually tipsy, based on the number of times I’ve run into doors and dropped things, coupled with the fact that the vast majority of French grammar and vocabulary leaves my head whenever I talk with them.  And yesterday the bathroom door handle came off in my hand.  Zut alors!  Oh well.  Life is a series of adventures, hahaha.

Several of us have made two major resolutions for our remaining time in France: to eat less horribly and to speak more French.  We are not proceeding very well with the first aim, as you can imagine, especially since yesterday we discovered that there was such a thing as chocolate flan.  The fact that I’ve been avoiding cucumbers, tomatoes, lettuce, and raw vegetables in general like the plague because of the E. Coli scare does not help matters at all either.  But hopefully we won’t return to the US as giants, hahaha.  We also noticed that whenever groups of USC people gathered together, it seemed as if we always defaulted to English for communicating—choosing the path of least resistance, in effect.  But this won’t help us learn the language nearly as much, and il faut que nous changions nos habitudes.  So we will try.  And hopefully be successful.

The rest of the week will likewise be filled with some pretty interesting adventures, including dinner at a Moroccan restaurant with the USC Tours group, a karaoke night, and a long weekend in which to come up with other things to do.  I’m excited.  Les aventures commencent!

Ciao!  J