"Les Cupcakes? C'est un muffin?"

My First Two Days and a "Top 10" Experiences/Lessons so far"

I'm in France! It's "incroyable"! So many new experiences.
I had seen the house I'm staying in on Google Streetmap, a miraculous phenomenon that lets you see satellite images of basically anything up close, but I thought it was a different house because there are HUGE hedges in front of mine. The house is absolutely GORGEOUS (I'll post pictures later!), very chic and modern. My host family ("familly d'accueil") is amazing. Chantal and Alain are probably late 50s or early 60s and have four grown children, the youngest of whom I met. They even asked us to use the "tu" form of you rather than the more proper "vous" form, and to call them by their first names, which isn't very common. I have a house-mate, Hilary, who is a really good friend of mine from Notre Dame (she was one of the first people I met after transferring to Notre Dame). We each have our own beautiful rooms and a shared bathroom, and we have the entire upstairs to ourselves. It's really a nice arrangement. It's getting a bit late here so I'll post my top 10 experiences/discoveries of France so far:

1) The French have no clue what cupcakes are. They don't exist in France. Hilary and I attempted to describe them (like cakes, but smaller, no, they aren't "moofans" but close etc. etc.). We finally showed them a photo on google image (le google eemaj") and convinced their son Adrien to visit a cupcake shop when he goes to NYC next month.

2) Snuggies have arrived in France. Except they are not called snuggies. They are called, mysteriously, "TV fleece-plaid." And no, they are NOT plaid. They are also available for 8 euro, instead of like 25 dollars in the US. I have no clue why a) snuggie doesn't translate, it seems so universal and b) why the French are confused about what plaid is.

3) FOOD. La nourriture en France is amazing, although it's VERY hard to be lactose intolerant and vegetarian. I have to take lactose pills twice a day to be safe. But our mother Chantal is an excellent cook. There are several courses served at EVERY lunch and dinner (soup, then a cheese tarte, then salad, then amazinggggg cheese (at least two varieties, I like camembert and I didn't even mind le bleu, although I've detested it all the other times I tried it) and bread, then some time of dessert, like rum ice cream or fruit. Wine is served at every meal, and we discovered that only the man of the house is allowed to pour the wine. It's all delicious, but it's not served in very large portions a les Americaines. You get a nice sampling of everything. Pleasantly full, but not stuffed.

4) Everything is ancient. 14th century? Don't bat an eyelash. Apparently they were renovating a parking garage downtown and found some bones from the 2nd century. No big deal.

5) It's hard to find anything without a map because square blocks and well-organized cities don't exist. there are triangle-shaped blocks, circle-shaped blocks, frequent dead-ends, etc, etc. So I guess I just have to look like a tourist for now.

6) French cashiers at grocery stores don't weigh your produce for you at the register. and get mad if you are a silly American who doesn't understand this simple fact.

7) I'm overcoming my stereotypes about French people. The vast majority of people have been incredibly kind and helpful (we had one old man do a U-turn on his bike and ask if we needed directions

8) It rains. a lot.

9) Wine takes up two HUGE aisles at the grocery store, and chocolate is about 3/4 of an aisle. Priorities, people.

10) It's incredible how little French people waste. Things are more expensive, so lights are NEVER left on, and rooms are dim. It's a little cold in the house. At meals, Chantal makes PERFECT portions. There's almost never leftovers. Even looking at French garbage bags lining the sidewalk before trash day, there's very little, maybe a small garbage bag per week for an entire household. Environmentally conscious AND it makes economic sense!

and a bonus:
11) IT'S VERY EXPENSIVE. I bought a bag of almonds, some prunes, a tiny bag of oatmeal, and a few crackers at the French equivalent of a Walmart and it cost be nearly 20 euro (like 35 dollars). A beer at the bar tonight was 3 euro, which wouldn't be that bad except a) the small portion sizes and b) the exchange rate is killing me.

a bientot mes amis!
claire

sidenote: I'm going to try to update this every couple of days, but I want it to be something that I want to do rather than an obligation, so no promises :)