All of these posts are going to be put on the web way after they happened, but each was originally written on the date in its title. I waited far too long to actually make a blog.
I left the states on January 2nd, beginning my new experiences in this new country with the new year.
The excitement of anticipation for departure took a long time to hit me, so it was hardly on the forefront of my mind until a few days before I left. At night when you're trying to go to sleep is the time at which you tend to want mental relaxation the most, trying to leave the day behind you as your dreams carry you on to the next. On that night, however, my mind allowed me no such luck; instead, it proceeded to go over every possible plan and hypothetical scenario that it could invent on the topic of the coming semester, so I remained awake that night until the time that my father was getting up for work. Had it not been for the exhaustion of every day since then, I imagine that I would still be going through that insomnious ritual on a nightly basis now. I spent the next couple of days packing and preparing to part from my family and friends, and then the time finally arrived.
I like to think of myself as strong and independent enough to be unfazed by goodbyes that are to last less than a year, but when you wake up to see your mother in tears over your departure, it becomes a lot harder to keep your cool. Her goodbye marked the most emotional end of the spectrum that was capped at the other end by my sendoff from Kevin, with whom I exchanged a brief wish for a good next half year and a wave goodbye. Yeah, we're close. As for mom, she drove me to the airport and stayed with me up until we got to security, at which point I had not been feeling emotional, but mom promptly fixed that. Mom tears are contagious, so we had a teary hug and goodbye, and so began my travels sans parent.
Having not flown at all in some five years or so, and having never been on an international flight at all before, I wasn't sure what to expect on the plane that would be my home for the next eight hours, but I did know that the next time that I was to set foot on the ground, I would be in Europe for the first time.
Long plane rides are an interesting experience in several ways, one of which being a certain temporal displacement. Not only did I spend eight hours in one seat without much human interaction or moving, but I also traveled across seven time zones, such as to emerge from the plane at a time 15 hours later than when I had boarded. Since I was only able to get in about as many minutes of sleep as hours had passed, the day had already been very long for me before I arrived in Amsterdam for the layover.
Although I had been preparing myself to function in French culture for over seven years at that point, I was altogether unprepared for Dutch culture. My first flight was on Dutch Royal Airlines, being my first exposure to any european culture. My memory of airplane food had been a rather negative one, so unless American plane food has significantly improved over the last few years, I find Dutch plane food to be greatly superior, so that was a plus for them in my book. Their language, however, I was unsure of how to take. You typically don't hear that language in the States, so the bilingual intercom announcements on the flight came as quite a surprise to me. Certain words sounded similar to French, so I felt almost as though I should have been able to understand it, and then the other elements reminded me of German and the Swedish Chef from Sesame Street, or if the French and German languages had a baby that grew up to be an alcoholic. Eventually the pilot announced successively in gibberish and English that we had arrived in Amsterdam. I was in Europe. All that was left was the transition into France.
I watched the sun coming up as I boarded the Air France flight to Marseille, preparing myself to feel mostly illiterate as soon as I was to land. In the spirit of expediency, though, I managed to embarrass myself in French long before landing. When the flight attendant was going up and down the aisles offering food and drinks to people, I thought I would be well enough prepared to handle the short conversational exchange. Au contraire, when he offered me some sort of cookie I had no idea what he was saying, so I just asked for water and sipped on that while everyone else on the plane munched away on their snack. The best cure for my new embarrassment at this point was the view of Marseille as we approached the next airport. I wish that words could do justice to the beauty of that view, or that I had at least taken a picture or something, because it was a magical start to my time in the country. The rolling hills and mountains, the greenery, and the town itself looked beautiful in the morning sun, and it was as picturesque as anyone could hope for. I was finally there. I had finally arrived in France.
My entire first day in the country had a very surreal feel to it. It's possible that this feeling came from the final realization of this dream that had seemed so far off for so long, but the fact that I went for about 24 hours with 15 minutes of sleep more than likely played a significant role.
Another girl from the program and I split a cab ride to take us from the airport in Marseille to the hotel in Aix-en-Provence (Aix, for short), and we soon began noticing small cultural differences between the US and France. For one thing, taxis in France are a hell of a lot nicer than american ones. Our cab was a polished looking dark gray compact car that looked much too nice to actually be a cab, but it nevertheless took us where we needed to be.
Upon our arrival at the hotel where we were to stay the night, we noticed yet more differentiation from american living. The room was more like an apartment than a hotel room in our eyes, coming with a stove, full-sized fridge, and dishwasher. As we ventured into the bedroom, it took us a moment to verify that there were indeed two beds. The French must like getting cozy with each other, because these two twin beds were right up against each other, which we knew would make for an interesting night since there would be four of us in the room for the night.
Yet another surprise awaited us in the bathroom: there was no toilet in it. As I have since come to discover is also the case with my own apartment, the toilet is kept in a separate room from the sink and the shower. The primary conclusion that I have drawn from this is that french door knobs must be filthy. After having satisfactorily judged the country's culture by way of its hotels, Hanna and I emerged into the city in search of food.
The Cours Mirabeau is the primary street marking the city center of Aix, and it is lined with some of the most delicious and expensive restaurants to be found. Apparently Aix is the second most expensive city to live in out the of entire country. On that note, I would like to issue a formal apology to my bank account. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. So anyhow, Hanna and I eventually settled upon a nice little restaurant on the Cours, and we proceeded to take in our first dose of french dining culture. We each ordered a croque-madame and une verre de vin rouge, being my first taste ever of the former and my first ever legal purchase of the latter, and we commenced people watching.
Almost every french person on the streets is wearing some, if not all black, which fits pretty well with the american idea of the French. They are also all dressed impeccably well at all times, all smoke, and are generally really good-looking people. Cue disdain and jealousy. You see hardly any berets here though.
Starting with my croque-madame that day and continuing through every meal that I have had since then, all french food is delicious This applies to €20 meals on the Cours, €3 crepes from a cart, and €1,50 sandwiches from the FAC (Faculté de Lettres at Aix-Marseille Université, my school). My sandwich on that first day was a great introduction to french dining, but the only problem was that we didn't know how to pay and leave.
Apparently, neither of us had ever learned the word for check (l'addition), and we were certainly not used to the culture of simply sitting and hanging out at the café for so long, so we began to grow a bit uncomfortable. In France, people are never rushed in the slightest to leave a restaurant, even when the waiter knows that they are done eating and ordering drinks or desserts, so they never bring the check out early unless it is asked for. Since Hanna and I didn't have dictionaries with us or wifi access to some sort of translator, we eventually broke down and asked in English for the check. Once we had paid, our next obvious destination was one that I had been dreaming of for a long time: the french book store.
As a classic lit lover, I have a great appreciation for the power of words how the author intended them to be, and as a French speaker, I have the ability and preference of reading classic french literature in its original text. It is very difficult to find french language writing in american book stores, so for years I have been dreaming of being able to wander through the passages of a french book store. This store was a dream come true. This part of town was built by the Romans, so the buildings are old and beautiful, and the downstairs area of the store had cavernous passages slightly reminiscent of Carlos Ruiz Zafon's cemetery of lost books. I wandered around in the store until my francophilic heart was satisfied, and I left with a healthy stack of books. It was great.
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