Photos

Saturday was a Young Adults activity with the branch. Guy-Noël, Tarolin, Maïté, Jennifer, and I got to and from Benois’ house on the bus. On the way back though, the bus drove right past the five of us waiting at the bus stop, so we had to walk to another stop to catch a different bus. It was dark and so quiet—hardly any cars went past. Tarolin was so mad that the bus hadn’t stopped, and he walked fast ahead of the rest of us. The moon was full, and huge. It was beautiful.



I don’t like saying goodbye to people. It’s almost easier just not to become friends in the first place. Almost.

I had my last Family Home Evening with the Warenghein family last night. They found me at church my first Sunday here, and have had me over every Monday night since then. They made me feel a lot less island-like while I’ve been here, and after I said goodbye last night, I suddenly felt homeless.



This is where I have been spending my last two weeks, sculpting in Jumièges. Yesterday at the sculpture workshop, Tiffann called me her favorite American. I will miss the people there, too.

Madagascar

Today was just a good day. I sculpted this morning. I am enjoying the sculpting and I am enjoying being with the other people who are participating in the workshop. But also part of it is that I finally know what is expected of me—that was the big mystery with the internship: What do they want me to do? But with the sculpting workshop…I just sculpt.

Also, though, I’m not a guest there. I’m just part of the group. It’s funny, but being a guest so often lately is one thing that I have had a hard time with. And finally I can help do the dishes and not worry if it’s polite or impolite.

The mother of my host family is from Madagascar. She has a relative getting married, so the house has been full of cousins and aunts and uncles. Tonight dinner was much more noisy, more busy. The uncles play the guitar and sing, loud and in harmony. One of the French cousins was curious about the US and posed lots of questions. We talked about the school system, about the death penalty—comparing the countries, and also comparing to Madagascar talking to another cousin who lives there.

The Madagascar cousin and I went up to my room to practice English. She recently got back from China—she was there to export “contrefaçon” clothes and toys to Madagascar. She has her bachelor’s in law and is looking to get a master’s in France. We talked more about the school system: in Madagascar, the schools are in French, and business operates in French, but friends and family speak in Malagasy. Madagascar was a colony of France until 1960, and the country bases its civil code on that of France. Then the French cousin found us, and we talked about relationships.

Sculpting...

The sculpture workshop continues. I am working on a bas-relief in Caen stone. Today at lunch someone asked me where I was from, and someone else knew Mormons were connected with Utah, so we spent some time talking about that. We established that Mormons dress like normal people and don't have to live in Utah. This evening, we had a barbecue. I expalined the strength of the different swear words they recited to me in English. We told jokes; mine weren't always that funny after translating them into French or explaining "la chute"--the punchline--for the ones in English. Tiffann told me about smoking weed and Mathieu talked about why he is vegetarian. And Adeline, who is teaching the workshop, talked about sculpting.

Waffles in Belgium, Cheese Course in France

Last weekend I went to Belgium. It didn’t really hit me that I was visiting a whole nother country until I was leaving Belgium. While Jennifer and I were there, it felt like the most natural thing in the world to be in Belgium—that is, not extraordinary at all. As we left, it felt extraordinary to be in Belgium. To have been in Belgium.

They sell beer in the vending machines in Belgium. Besides the vending machines, took a boat ride along the canals of Brugge, tasted curry, ginger, and spice cake chocolates, watched a woman making bobbin lace, wandered the Comic Book museum, and visited the bizarre and oversized Palais de la Justice where we could see the Atomium from a distance. Belgian waffles—from-Belgium Belgian waffles—are pretty much one of the best things I have ever tasted. Saturday was the national holiday, and that morning, in Brugge, we followed the small-town parade of a brass band and the veterans color guard. As they walked past I could hear the metals on their uniforms clink and I wanted to be home celebrating my own country.

It felt good to be back in France. Monday morning, I started a two week sculpture workshop that the MJC is running in Jumièges, near Duclair (the small town where the MJC is located). It feels so odd that this is what I have ended up doing, but I have enjoyed myself yesterday and today. So far I have sculpted a snail shell and a dog, in addition to helping make home made French fries and setting up a tent. Today I got a sunburn on one arm as we sat around picnic tables for two hours eating lunch—melon, bread and jambon cru and butter, salads, then the homemade fries and bloody steaks, a round of camembert, dessert, then coffee and tea.

Harry Potter Et L'Ordre Du Phénix

This is a photo of the Fnac (like Barnes and Noble) in Paris. The sign announces, rather nonchalantly, that Emma Watson and Rupert Grint will visit to chat at 6:30 on 4 July. It surprised me, I guess. I don't ever see things like that in Salt Lake.

I saw the fifth Harry Potter movie tonight. I liked it--except, towards the end the dramatic epic-battle-between-good-and-evil made me feel like my life was really rather uneventful.

I understood the movie, which was amazing. I had also seen the latest editions of "Pirates of the Caribbean" and "Shrek" while I've been here, and most of the story--delivered in French--just went over my head in those cases. A month or so down the road, though, and I understood practically all the dialogue in this movie--except for Snape, who mumbles. Or something.

Malidies; 14 July; Day Off

Maladies:

I fell down the stairs last Monday. This made me feel like an old person. I hit my elbow hard, and it still hurts.

After the discussion about food handling, I got some sort of stomach bug for a couple of days—probably from unpasteurized cheese.

14 Juillet:

I told Patrick, the father of my host family, that I would be going to Paris for Bastille Day. And I said it like that: “Je vais à Paris pour Bastille Day.” I wasn’t thinking apparently, and it turns out “Bastille Day” is not in fact what the French call it. But anyway, I was there. I was a block away from the parade (so I heard it go past). I saw the parade of military planes and fighter jets go overhead, which was really impressive—all different kinds flying low in formation. I also finally saw the Musée d’Orsay, as well as the sewer museum. The sewer museum stank. But I think it is an excellent example of how Paris has capitalized on tourism—they can even get people to pay money to see their gray water.

That night, Jennifer and I watched fireworks over the Seine in Rouen.

Photo: "Eve after the sin"

Day off!

I don’t go to the MJC this week, except Wednesday. This afternoon, I went to lunch at Dr. Rolland’s house in the country—the woman who helped organize the internship. After lunch, she said, okay, now what do you want to do? We ended up doing some oil painting for the afternoon. What a strange thing—in France, in some woman’s thatched-roof house, painting.

A Few Thoughts

This is a picture of the church in Duclair. And the clouds of Normandy. The clouds here are beautiful.

Today is my last full day at the MJC in Duclair, I think. I have three more weeks in France. A lot of the internship has been...well, not what I expected. "Expected" namely being that I expected to have a defined role--ie something to do. Even so, there is a lot to look back on and it has been a good experience.

The plan the MJC people came up with to occupy me for the next three weeks is the next week off (except Wednesday evening, which is an apero and a barbeque), then for two weeks I am going to participate in a sculpture workshop. I don't really want to participate in a sculpture workshop. I don't know why I have such a bad attitude about it. It really will be interesting, I imagine. And how could I participate and not learn things?

Last night, the mother of Jennifer's host family, Caroline, showed us how to make crepes. While we were making them, Caroline talked about how she thinks it's important to travel. She spent two and a half months in Boston when she was twenty-two. Her son is that age now, and is looking at starting a job. She thinks it's too soon for him to settle down like that.

The family is doing some work on their garage, and they found a German rifle from WWII hidden in the wall. A few weeks ago, a woman who used to live in the house visited them. There were Germans in the house and in surrounding houses during the war, and the woman thinks it was her father that hid the when they left.

Wednseday night, Christine Rolland, the internship coordinator, had Jennifer and I to dinner. There, much of the conversation was on the horror of the newer laws that prevent restaurants preparing their own sauces (must be prepackaged) and that the milk in cheese had to be pasturied. Christine and her husband insisted that it was to boister industry at the detriment of small business and flavor. Personally, I've had a few I'm-going-to-die-of-food-poisioning moments. Well, I exagerate. But things like how leftovers are often left on the stove rather than in the fridge. Food service people take money and prepare food without gloves or soap in between, and food items are often stored at room temperature here, too. There was a barbeque a few weeks ago at the MJC, and the raw sausages came strait out of a plastic grocery sack. So I think restaurants not being able to prepare their own mayo (doesn't mayo have raw egg?) has more of a reason behind it that to insult the taste buds.

Independence Day

It was wet this morning. I took the bus to Duclair, like I usually do, and rounding a corner, I heard the bus driver react to something and say, "he lost control." And then there was a smack that made me feel sick, and the windshield smashed. I haven't ever been in a car accident, and as it was happening, I thought okay, this is it. I expected the bus to slide off the road, I expected to fall out of my seat. But that didn't happen.

It was a head-on collision with a car that had somehow gotten over into the other lane. It was wet. It was around a corner. No one in the bus was hurt. I don't know what happened to the person in the car. I didn't want to know.

Kiss Your Co-Workers

There were a few things I simply didn't believe before I actually got here. It's like how up until I was about fifteen, I didn't believe in taste buds. Taste buds simply didn't seem logical, so I decided that they just didn't exist. Being in a different country is like the Taste Bud Awakening.

I had read about France before getting here, but I had the same strategy for processing the things I read about the culture. I don't like people making generalizations about any group of people, so when I read about "how the French think" or "how the French eat," I simply ignored it.

It turns out, though, that cultural differences--like taste buds--actually do exist. Like saying "bonjour" so often--entering a store, getting on the bus, coming in to an office. And kissing people.

I am starting to see how it is nice to greet and say goodbye to people, always. The daily handshake with everyone is cool, but the two kisses on the cheek is still a little close-quartered. You can tell if the person smokes. If the person brushes his or her teeth. It still simply isn't something I'm entirely comfortable with. Especially with older men. That's just a little too much.