Watch where you step

I haven't really updated this in a while. But inquiring minds apparently want to know if I am still alive... so yes. I am. I just haven't been super inspired to write something new lately. Nothing has really seemed to stick out as "blog worthy".On some days my day is a rather normal french day with french class, English lessons for my host family,  and a little bit of  attempted conversation or a french movie in the evenings. Sometimes the most interesting part of my day is walking to school and watching the fifty or so snails who seem to feel the need to make a daily pilgrimage across a certain extremely busy sidewalk.







***Spoiler Alert***** they don't all make it :(

 


Snail watching (and unfortunately sometimes snail crunching) may seem kind of like a lame activity for what is supposed to be an exciting and life changing gap year, but, let me assure you I am absolutely content and reveling in the fact that I have found a little piece French normalcy for this leg of the journey. I love that it is starting to feel a bit more comfortable and it is exactly what I was looking for in this first couple months of my adventure.

My riveting essay on the death penalty

The last few weeks have been filled with many little successes in my attempts to parle en francais. Most of which are followed by a little internal (and sometimes external) happy dance. For example I did a major victory celebration the first time someone asked me a question at the train station and I not only understood the question but knew the answer. Go me! Of course that is still not always the case as yesterday 2 teenage girls rattled something off at me faster than the speed of light and I was reduced to the classic open mouthed gaping and "je ne parle pas francais" response. I guess you win some you loose some.  I have also moved up a level in school and we now are attempting to learn about and actually discuss real world topics and issues (key word = attempting). I had to actually write a paper and give a presentation on the death penalty - wasn't I lucky to get that nice light topic to research during my vacation? And finally when asked where my partner was at crossfit I was able to find the words to explain that "il vomis". I guess some things never change at crossfit no matter where you are.

On the door of the teacher's lounge at school - mocking our lack of ability to use the past tense correctly lol

I also feel like I am adapting well to other aspects of french culture as I can handle the inherent dangers of french sidewalks now with ease.  It is absolutely essential to watch where you are going at all times as in France the sidewalk = le troittoir, but also equals the place they can park their car however the F*@& they want. You could very easily walk into a parked car just as you could very easily step in a very large pile of doggy doo doo if you are walking and texting. It is seemingly impossible for even one dog owner here to pick up after their dog despite there being hundreds of stations with bags for dog owners.
 

I also am starting to develop a french palatte thanks to my strategy of don't ask questions just eat what ever is in front of you. This is mostly because I don't have a very expansive vocabulary of food names in french so even if I ask I then have to google anyways. Sometimes the eat it and see approach is just simpler and a bit more of an adventure. It has led to many surprises (ie eating creamed fish- ugh) and many firsts (rabbit, duck, turnips, radish soup etc). Some of which I have enjoyed and others that I have choked down out of politeness. We did have a yummy raclette party last friday and that was fantastic. Raclette is kind of like a cousin to fondue and it was followed up by possibly the best cake I have ever eaten, a rasberry and coconut cream Charlotte cake. Also stinky french cheese is apparently just another acquired taste that you can learn to appreciate it if you can keep forcing yourself to eat it regularly enough. Perhaps you remember me complaining on facebook about the brick of stinky cheese that I bought in Clermont Ferrand in September and then refused to eat and threw out,thereby stinking up my hostel room for two days. Well, we eat that type of cheese quite regularly... for dessert! lol ...and I tolerate/almost like it now.

I have gotten up to some fun stuff in the last couple weeks. For example:

Sushi!!!! - I have been craving it as I am used to eating it probably once a week. Sadly it is ridiculously expensive here. I'm talking 10 dollars or more for california rolls kind of expensive. But we found a place that wasn't too bad today. Still way more than at home but I got my avocado rolls so I am a happy camper. Also chicken and fried egg rolls with fried onion in the rice. And because its France and everything must come with nutella ... Kinder surprise and nutella dessert rolls. A bit of an adventure but they were surprisingly good.

 


More bike trips with the host family - Last Sunday it was nice and sunny and we did a 20km ride to a nearby fishing town, Mauguio, that is surrounded by canals and massive lagoons. It is a great place to go bird watching as there are plenty of flamingos to be seen.

Une Cigone Blanche (Stork)

Des Flamant Rose (Flamingos)

L'etang  (lagoon/pond)

Smart cats hanging out by the fisherman

Go Lingo - this is an awesome language exchange program modeled off speed dating. They pair you with a native french speaker who wants to practice English. You both speak English for 8 minutes and then you both speak french for 8 minutes. Then you move to the next table and repeat. Its great practice and makes for a nice night out where you get to meet some local people.



                         
The Montpellier Wine Festival - let me explain how this glorious thing works. You pay 2 euros for a wine glass with three tickets and then you take that wine glass to any of the hundred or so stalls of local vinyards and you can taste their wine. In theory you are limited to just three tastings and in theory it is just a small taste and you dump it out after..... but the vendors don't bother to take the tickets and they also are generous pourers SO in effect we have a 3 day festival of FREE WINE. Amazingness. I can't even imagine if this existed in Canada. Utter Chaos. But here with the exception of us few idiotic tourists with unrefined palates, most people actually want to taste the wine and discuss the dryness/sweetness/fruitiness etc. so it doesn't get too crazy and sadly it was only for a weekend. Although I did manage to go all three days :)

 

First Macaroon for me :)

Much Wine + Interview in French = Merde!!!

 










I also have some upcoming trips planned for my last month in Montpellier. Thanks to ridiculously cheap european airfare I will be jetting off to Morroco for 4 days soon for about a quarter of what it would cost me to fly from Vancouver to Calgary. Kind of ridiculous but I will take it.  Also going to try to get a couple day trips in to nearby places like Avignon and Nimes. So if this blog post about my fantastically normal life the last few weeks has bored you, you can stay tuned (or not) for more exciting posts to follow. But in a meantime I will be here soaking up the french normalcy and watching where I step in the mornings.