Arrival in France

Somehow or another, I made it to Tours, all in one piece. The French equivalent of the English phrase "safe and sound" is "sain et sauf," which means "healthy and safe." Perhaps this indicates that to the French, arriving "sound," i.e., without serious jostling, is an unrealistic (or undesirable) goal? Although the journey from Ithaca to France was about as easy a one as I could have hoped for, I got a year and a half's worth of French jostling just getting my Visa from the French Consulate in New York City!

My first flight, from Ithaca to Philadelphia, does not deserve mention, save to say that I was nauseated for most of the flight.

I had a more-than-three-hour wait in the Philadelphia airport, which wasn't bad at all. Luckily, I had packed a selection of Euripides's plays, and the copy of Sinclair Lewis's It Can't Happen Here given to me by Matt Rosenspire. (Since my departure, I've had enough time to read "Hecuba," "Andromache," and about 110 pages of Lewis's 1935 novel.) I watched a French family eating french fries. The transatlantic flight was easy: happy Frenchmen and Frenchwomen and Frenchchildren chattered away in French, not a word of which I understood, which probably doesn't bode well for my chances at effective communication in the coming five months. I lost six hours on the flight, arriving in Charles de Gaulle airport, Paris, at 7:30 AM local time, after having slept only about an hour and a half. Strangely, even though it's now 2:50 PM local time, I don't feel tired at all. Excitement? That's the word for what I feel in my veins.

After retrieving my suitcase from the baggage claim, I took the shuttle to the train station sector of Charles de Gaulle. A ticket machine gave me trouble, and despite the kind help from a French bystander (from whom I learned that"what the frick?" is the accepted way for French to swear in English), I needed to stand in a long, long line in order to purchase a train ticket. Even though I had begun with a two-and-a-half-hour window before my 10:01 AM train departed, I obtained my ticket with under 20 minutes to spare. The French Word of the Day has been "voie," which means "railroad platform" (among other definitions), a term that I have needed to use several times today, already. A couple of train rides later, after having helped a foreign student who spoke neither French nor English to find her host family, I arrived in Tours.

I found Mme. Avertin waiting for me, holding a small placard with my name on it. After we had "fait les baises" (that's that French cheek-kissing technique, in which each party receives three pecks apiece), she introduced me to her daughter, Stephanie, and her husband. They drove me to their apartment building, and showed me to my room, as well as to "les toilettes," a facility by then badly needed: it had been a long and hot ride, and I had become fairly dehydrated in the course of the travel. The apartment as a whole is beautiful, and tastefully decorated with a mixture of European and East Asian styles. It is a clean, well-lighted place, where electric lights are hardly needed at all, in the full heat and sunlight of the continental summer. While M. Avertin ran an errand, that seemed to have involved somebody's lost iPhone (I'm not quite clear on the course of events), I unpacked.

There is a list of residency rules in the room, instated by the Institut, available in both French and English. That is, it is available in French, with a half-hearted attempt to use an online translator. Here is a sample of the opening passage concerning telephone use:
"the phone family isn't use a student. Your family phone you."
The room is larger than my room at home, has a television (complete with VCR), a window, a closet, two bedside tables, and a bookshelf. Best of all, there is a large black desk, on which I have placed my computer in order to write this post, and which I will probably continue to use. The bookshelf contains books and movies left by the Avertins' son when he graduated high school: he seems to have been a fan of Parcel Pagnol, the great writer of Provence. There are also a pair of books about Native Americans, a few choose-your-own-adventure books ("Un Livre Dont Vous Etes Le Heros"), and a copy of Camus's L'Homme Revolte. Movies include several classic Disney films, in addition to "Le Professeur Foldingue" ("The Nutty Professor"), "Robin Des Bois" ("Robin Hood"), "Dragonball" (yes, that's what it's called in France), etc. I gave Mme. Avertin the gift I had brought the family, a photograph of an Ithacan waterfall, which, I think, she appreciated.

After M. Avertin returned, we had lunch, and I did my absolute best to engage in conversation. The Avertins are very convivial, and I began to describe, as best as I could, where I lived, what I do with my life, etc. They served me some of the best Camembert and Chevre I've ever tasted. The Camembert, as is legally required in the EU, came from Camembert, and the Chevre came from a real goat (I hope). M. Avertin is retired, and Mme. is in semi-retirement. Photos forthcoming.

After we had cleared the table, M. Avertin showed me the password to the Wi-Fi Network, and gave me a kind lesson in the use of the French verb "communiquer." After shooting off a quick e-mail to my parents, I typed up this blog post as quickly as possible.

~JD

"There in the house of Nereus, arm in arm, Goddess with god, we'll live the future out. And moving dry-shod over the foaming ocean, you'll see your son and mine, dearest Achilles, lording it in his island home." ~Thetis (from Euripides's Andromache)

Last Night in the States

Ready to leave tomorrow for France, I decided to succinctly describe itinerary of my trip, and explain the creation of this blog. I have enrolled in two dovetailing educational programs, both in France, that will together last until wintertime, around five months from now.

The first is at the Institut de Touraine, in Tours, France. There, I will study the French language, live with a French family (les Avertin), and, I hope, explore castles on the weekends. The program will begin on Monday morning, and will end at the end of August.

The second is at the Univeristy of Paris VII (maybe also I and IV), in Paris, where I will arrive on the fourth of September. I hope to study French history and francophone literature. I will neither know where I am living nor what classes I will take, before my arrival. I will not even know when I will returning, although I will probably fly back between mid-December and early January.

If I am lucky, I will arrive back in time to turn to go on the Birthright Israel program with Sam Moss. I can only hope that the program will accept both of us, and that I will have enough turnaround time between the two trips.

In this blog, I will communicate my French experience to my friends and family in a way less exhausting than individual e-mails, and less intrusive than mass-emails. I will probably update the blog no more than once a day, and no less than once a week. I might also end up discussing politics, books, etc.

I have a bookish personality, and, as I do in my personal journal, will addend to each entry a line from a book that I have read since I last posted an entry. I do not necessarily agree with the opinions expressed in these quotations: I may record because I happen to find them pithy, interesting, true, false, or just amusing.

I hope to keep you all amused with my misadventures!

~JD

"To bring up children is perilous; success is full of trouble and care, failure is unsurpassed by any other pain." ~Democritus