So here's the thing, France

I've been lagging in my blog posts, so this might be a long one. I just cleaned my room, which felt GREAT. You would think that with as little stuff as I brought with me, it wouldn't really be possible for all of it to create a massive clutter in my bedroom. Wrong! Apparently I am capable of that, even with one suitcase's worth of stuff.

So last weekend I went to the southern coast of Bretagne with my host parents and some of their friends. That basically consisted of three days of zero English, tons of food, and tons of wine. We were in Quiberon, which you should look up on a map because it's pretty funny. It's just barely hanging off the edge of France. It's called a presque'isle, or an almost-island.
The weekend, which was mostly spent having like five-hour meals, created many interesting conversations. One of which was me trying to explain why I'm a vegetarian. FAIL. Not only did they not get it, but they very strongly disagreed with me. Oh well. So much for that. Culture clash, I guess.

Another interesting conversation I had with them was about being a woman in France.
Let's just talk about this for a minute. It's been on my mind because I have recently had many a conversation about my other fellow American women who are here in France, and we all have had the same experience here. Honestly, it is hard to be a woman in France. For one thing, women have a defined role here...it is not unusual, in fact I would say that it is common, for women to have all cleaning/cooking/child-raising responsibilities in a household. For example, when we were at the beach house last weekend, there were two women, plus me, and three men. The women literally did EVERYTHING (cooking, cleaning, dishes, etc.) and the men did NOTHING except sit around and drink whiskey. It was completely absurd. But also, I realize, part of the culture here.
Another thing about being a woman here: French men are awful, disrespectful, abusive pigs. There, I said it. Now I will say that that is a huge generalization. But the truth is, I have been accosted by strange men many times since I've been here. And so has every other girl I've talked to. I've come to expect it, because it happens to me virtually every time I go out. Sometimes it's fairly harmless...some guy trying to talk to me or asking me if I'm lost. But other times it is outright harassment. And no one here does anything about it. Whereas, in the U.S., if a man was harassing a girl that way, you could call the police on him, no problem. If I called the cops because of a guy doing that here, they would probably just laugh at me.
Don't worry, I have learned what to do/say when they approach me to get rid of them. And I know where not to go at night, etc. But I'm really sick of it. They shouldn't be able to get away with that! Ughhhhhh!!!
In addition to all of that, in daily life, there is also the fact that women are not very present in politics, nor in the professional world. And in France, women didn't have the right to vote until 1944!
So all of you American women out there, you've got it pretty good. Just remember that women in other places in the world are not as free as you are. Take advantage of that freedom.

Very old rocks

Well, I definitely jinxed our excursion in my last entry. Of course it was cold, windy, and wet on our excursion yesterday. Oh well. I should know to expect that from Bretagne.
It was fun anyway. Sort of. I mean, it was interesting. Sort of. First we went to Carnac to see the monoliths. It's like Stonehenge except older and in France. I didn't know they were older than Stonehenge...that is just crazy. And they really don't have any idea why they are there, whereas with Stonehenge they at least know that it has something to do with marking the sun's position (like a calendar, I think). But when it comes down to it, they are really just a bunch of very old rocks. So, I'm glad I saw them, but I think 10 minutes in a field of them would have been more than enough.

After that we went to Vannes, which is actually a town instead of just countryside. It's a little coastal medieval city, very charming, full of old buildings and traditions. I was talking to Daniel during lunch (galette with goat cheese...probably one of my favorite things ever) and he told me that you really have to go outside of Rennes to get a feel for the real Bretagne, the region. It's true...Rennes is sort of a metropolis, and though there are definitely parts of it that are celtic and medieval and super Breton, not all of it is like that. Vannes, however, appears to be a truly Breton city. Nearly every building dates to like the 4th century or something. Craziness. While we were there, we saw a group of guys dressed in completely ridiculous outfits (as in, two were dressed like leprechauns and several were dressed in drag) and one of them ran up to me, Scottie, and Natalie and was like "wait, you're walking too fast, I just need one kiss, please" and kissed each of us on the cheek, and then ran off. That is the second time I've seen a group of young guys dressed like that and doing silly things in the middle of the day, and I've decided that it's the French version of a bachelor party. So silly.
Last night, a few of us went out to celebrate Brice's birthday. Scottie and I had knitted him things and made cookies, and his reaction was more or less speechlessness, which was very cute. Brice and Yoann have been really great to us (reminder: they are two of the French students who are helpers with the program), and it's been great to have French people to hang out with all the time. We went to this pizzeria for dinner, and I found out that in France, you don't take home leftovers if you aren't able to eat all of your food at a restaurant. As in, if I asked if I could take home half a pizza, they would think I was a freak. Isn't that so weird? I think that is just bizarre. At one point last night, we played telephone (remember that game?) alternating in French and English, and it left us in stitches. It was really hilarious. You should really try it sometime with people whose language you don't speak very well. Hehe.

I can feel spring a-comin'

The sun is finally starting to come out in Rennes! It is incredible how much my mood changes when the weather is nice. France is SO charming in the sunshine. I can't even believe it. Everyone is outside, sitting in front of cafés, walking their dogs, taking their kids to the carousels, playing accordions, etc. Seriously, everything is beautiful. On Tuesday, I spent the whole afternoon in a park, Thabor (if you ever go to Rennes for some reason, you really must go there), drawing and sitting in the sun and listening to the birds. It was so great. Sitting around on the grass like that reminded me a lot of springtime at Guilford, which I have been missing. When I was wandering around the park, I had the realization that I am going to hate leaving here. But I don't have to think about that yet.

The past week has been full of sunshine and hanging out with good girlfriends. I've met some really awesome girls on this program, which is nice, especially since French girls are impossible to try to be friends with. And we are all about doing silly things together. I forget sometimes that we are all doing this program because we are interested in the French language, and that results in our outings often being as French as possible. For example, if we are going to watch a movie together, we will always opt to watch it in French (we definitely watched a Disney movie in French on Saturday night...it was awesome). It's really nice to feel like you're accomplishing something and having a great time also. I definitely learn more French outside of the classroom than in. Which is one of the reasons I am pretty apathetic about classes here (I study, don't worry, professors who are reading this :-) )
I haven't actually received any grades yet, so I don't have reason to worry...yet. I had two tests in the past few days, so we will see how that went.

We have a new addition to the family at my house. With one more foster girl, I think we are now at maximum capacity. Her name is Rose-Marie, but she goes by Rose. I think she is 14 or 15. The girls who live at my house are the only teenagers I interact with, and half of them smoke. I just can't get over it. They just seem so young to me. There isn't an age for buying tobacco here...or if there is, it's very very young. So every time one of them pulls out their cigarettes, I'm like "whaaaat..? Oh, right." It makes me sad, kind of.

This weekend, I am going on an excursion with the other Americans to Carnac and Vannes. I am excited!!! It will be nice to go somewhere new. I hope the weather is as nice as it's been here. If not, I have picked up the ability to have a good time despite the weather, which has so far been awful every time I've been somewhere exciting. Croisez vos doigts! (cross your fingers!)

La Vie Enchantée

So I know my last entry was mostly about knitting, but that's what I do with my life these days, so bear with me.

Last night I went to a "soirée de tricot" or, a knitting party, at a cooperative that I found called La Vie Enchantée.

Let me back up a little. My friend Haley and I have been talking about how we feel sort of lost in France because there aren't places where you can really just sit and have a coffee and read or use your laptop or, you know, knit. We are both used to having our cavernous revolutionary coffee shops that we go to on a daily basis and sit for hours doing whatever. I have realized that when you are a college student, it is places like this that really become your living room. Except better because there is coffee and interesting people and open mic nights and so on and so forth.

Now. When she and I walked into La Vie Enchantée, we knew that we had found a home. First of all, it's a co-op. One of the things I miss greatly about my school in the states is the co-op where I volunteer. Walking in, we were surrounded by familiar things that one often finds in "revolutionary spaces"...flyers, event calenders, collaged table tops, a menu of local foods, people huddling around knitting and talking. But really the best thing about my evening at La Vie Enchantée was the people there. The thing about French people is that they are extremely unapproachable...they are certainly not the most welcoming people in the world. It is therefore nearly impossible to make friends with them. This has been one of my great frustrations since I've been living in France. However, the people who were hanging out at this place were not going to let us sit in a corner unnoticed. The woman who was organizing the event (and who also spent part of the evening reading feminist poetry...yes) was very curious about what I was knitting and the kind of needles I was using and wanted everyone in the room to see. Talking to her, I discovered that she is a storyteller, that is what she does, and she lives on a commune a little ways outside of Rennes. She told me about this festival that they're having called La Festival de la Lenteur (Festival of slowness) with workshops and things about living slowly. Also this man came up to us and told us that he is a sculptor and painter and he told me that there are life drawing sessions at les Beaux-Arts on Wednesday and Thursday evenings, and I am SO excited to go to one.

Anyway, the point is, Haley and I are meeting up after we are done with classes this afternoon so that we can make our way to our newfound home. Happiness.

Establishing my usual haunts

I should be doing my homework right now, but that's not really on the top of my list of things I want to be doing at the moment. So I blog instead.

It has been a little strange, getting back into the routine of going to class every day. Classes aren't really my favorite thing. I am learning some interesting stuff in some of them, but not most of them. I can say that I am absorbing a lot of French in all of them, but that's about it. Yesterday in my press class, we were talking about weekly publications, and I learned that the most read weekly publication in France is a satirical newspaper called Le Canard Enchaîné. It's extraordinarily difficult to read, even for the French, because it employs quite a lot of plays on words, literary references, cultural references, etc. But people from all walks of life read it. And the best part is, it's basically an anarchist newspaper. There are no ads, it is completely self-supported, fairly anti-capitalism/anti-authority, it is constantly exposing government scandals, it never buys information from anyone, and it sells the most copies of any weekly publication in France. I find that very amusing. As my professor told us, there is a little anarchy in every Frenchman/woman.

I feel like my daily routine is starting to become French. The past few days have gone something like this: I get up and go to class, eat lunch, maybe have another class, and for the rest of the afternoon I sit in cafés and talk with friends for hours. The best is when my French friends come along because I am forced to speak only French. Yesterday I spent the afternoon trying to explain southern culture to one of my friends who is going to be living in the south of the U.S. next year. That was pretty amusing. There is not a word for grits in French. Tragedy.

Today I went to the yarn store with a couple of my friends who are curious about the art of knitting (I am spreading the knitting love all over France), and the woman who was helping me asked me where I was from, and when I said the United States, she said, "well, you speak French very well." and for the rest of the time I was there she referred to me as "mademoiselle qui parle très bien le français," or, "young lady who speaks very good French." It was very cute. It's so funny that the French say things like that. In the U.S. we would never say to someone who sounded foreign "you speak very good English." Which reminds me, I forgot to say that when I was in Paris, I was told by three Indian guys with British accents that I spoke "quite good English." Thanks. It's just my native language, that's all.