Well, I had a great weekend. Meredith came into town on Friday evening, and we ate galettes and caught up a bit. On Saturday we walked to the market and bought some bread, goat cheese, and fruit, and ate it in the park. It was sunny out! I couldn't believe it. I told Meredith she must have brought the Italian sun with her. We walked around a bit, went to my favorite yarn store, drank hot chocolate in my usual cafe, etc. I had invited some friends to come over for dinner because my host parents weren't going to be there, and they didn't mind if I had a few people over. My friends got there before my host parents left, and my host mom must have thought we were all very cute, and she brought out champagne and sat and talked with us for a while, which was really lovely and adorable. And I cooked a meal for everyone, which was really great because I do that a lot when I'm home, and I hadn't done it since being in France. The next day was Easter, and Meredith and I got up and took a bus to a tiny medieval town about 45 minutes away where there is literally nothing but bookstores. The town, Becherel, has about 1,200 inhabitants and like 18 bookstores. It's fantastic. They were having a book festival, so there were tons of people there, and even more books than usual. When we were on the bus, we were sitting right behind the bus driver, and I overheard a conversation between him and another woman. When we got to Becherel, he asked if there was a protest happening. The woman said no, that there was a book party happening. He asked, "what does one do at a book party?" and she answered, "you party...with books." And another woman chimed in, "yeah, it's better than just reading because you're not by yourself!"
When we came back to Rennes, my host family was busy preparing for the big Easter dinner/soiree they were having. The whole family came over, plus some friends, plus Meredith, Scottie, and myself. The whole evening was pretty hilarious. By now I've gotten used to the five-hour French meal, but it's still sort of a riot, especially when you're a foreigner. Adding to the hilarity was the fact that Meredith does not speak a word of French. Basically there was a lot of translation happening, as well as drunken attempts to communicate in English with us. We ate fondue and had crème brulée for dessert (which I watched my host mom make, so maybe I'll be able to attempt it one of these days). Fondue is so fun...it's like being allowed to play with your food. Food for people who get bored easily at the dinner table. It was supposed to be a musical soiree, so Scottie and I sang some songs, but everyone else who was going to play decided that they were too shy or they "forgot" their guitar. Boo. Except Antoine, near the end, asked us if we knew the song "Wonderwall" and that resulted in an all-inclusive sing-a-long. Hilarious.
Just now I had an interesting conversation with my host mom at the dinner table. I am inspiring her, somehow. I don't really know. She has started knitting a sweater for Loann, her grandson, because she saw me knitting one day and remembered that she liked to do it. And now she wants to bake more because I'm always baking (she doesn't even know...I don't bake half as much here as I do at home). Anyway, she said that I (and my other American friends here) have given her a new idea of what Americans are like. I guess she always thought we are all sort of boring and don't care about anything and just sit in front of the television and eat cheetos all day. But my lifestyle is nothing like that, and I bake and knit and sing songs all the time. I assured her that I'm not exactly normal, but Americans can be interesting people too, you know. At which point my host dad chimed in to remind her that there are "a lot of states" in America. Hehe. But it's true, the U.S. is completely enormous compared to France. In any case, I'm glad that I've won points for America in her eyes.
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