Done eating until 2008

The day after I posted my last blog I wished I had waited another day so I could write about something a little bit more interesting. Sunday I went and hung out with my friend Benjamin for the day. In the morning we went riding so I could buy my host sister a Christmas present (a little late). Then I checked out a weekly market in Benjamin's town. There you can find clothes, crafts, fossils, cheese, sausage, and rotisserie chicken that smells amazing when you're walking past it, hungry. Afterwards I ate lunch at Benjamin's house and watched an old classic movie, "La Tatoué," with the French actor Louis de Funès.

Then after lunch I did something that I think is necessary for my French experience - I toured a winery. It's owned by Benjamin's grandparents, and although I didn't learn much as Benjamin was my guide and he doesn't know that much about how it is made, it was still cool to see everything. If you ever get the chance to yell inside of an empty wine-fermenting tank, do it! It sounds awesome. Benjamin's grandparents also gave me six bottles of wine, which was incredibly nice of them. Therefore it is my job to promote their wine and their "cause." The name of their winery is "Domaine de Tavernel," although they don't export their wine to the U.S. However, I can help them out in promoting biologically produced wine, which is what they make.

Now, moving on to Christmas... Christmas Eve (the "Reveillant," "waking up" in French) we started eating at around 7:30. Small appetizers with an aperitif wine, then the dinner started. Raw oysters, shrimp, salmon, and mussels with butter, parsley, and garlic with white wine. After that everyone had of course eaten pretty well, so we took a break and opened presents. Then more dinner of roasted salmon with Camargian rice (a mixture of white and brown rice from the local Camargue marshes). And finally, for dessert there was a ice cream "log" of vanilla and chocolate ice cream with a layer of chocolate. That, along with champagne, lychees, almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts, chocolate truffles, and fruit as you please.

Christmas day was a little different, as we had already opened the presents. Also, one of the presents the night before was a foosball table for the family, so we built it and played until at least 2:30 AM. Then next morning I woke up at 11 and didn't eat anything, as the next big meal was coming after noon. Again small appetizers, then the meal of red wine, foie gras (fattened duck liver, which is highly acclaimed but I didn't find that special), escargots with the same persillade sauce that the mussels had, which I actually liked a lot and ate about a dozen of. I really don't know how this
turns into something yummy, but it does! After the escargots, there was quail with parsnips and garlic, another ice cream log and all the other dessert items.

So my long story about the food and all is done. I'm leaving for Barcelona the 31st to meet my parents, which I'm really excited about. I'm not sure if I'll post a blog before I leave or if I'll wait until I get back here January 5th with pictures. Happy New Years!

Noel is approaching!

Well Christmas (Noel en francais) is approaching and it's definitely going to be a different one for me this year. Thursday we had the Christmas meal at school, which wasn't really anything special except that they gave us bags of chocolate including a chocolate Santa, snowman (bonhomme de neige), and a couple small chocolate Christmas ornaments. Basically I got stuffed and then had a couple extra hours without class that I could do nothing with. Other than that not much is going on. My "host grandfather" came last night and he is staying a little bit past Christmas. I don't have much more to say on the subject of Christmas, but I'll be sure to post a little more about my experience here after it happens.

In other news, I realized that I've come a long way in speaking French. Yesterday I had to go and ask a secretary in my school if a teacher was there so I could go and talk to him about a class that he marked me absent for, and I think I talked really well. Plus the fact that I spoke well with my host grandfather last night, responding to his questions quickly and without confusion. I've actually realized for a while now that I understand people when they speak much more quickly, however I'm still not near what I consider fluent while speaking. I've found that speaking a new language is much more difficult to do compared to understanding one.

Now I don't have much going on. Today is the first day of vacation, and as the weather isn't very nice I spent it playing some board games with my host father, brother, and sister. I dominated Risk but my 11 year-old host sister won Clue. Tomorrow I'm going to my friend Benjamin's house for lunch, a little hanging out and possibly bike riding.

Anyways, I hope everyone who is now at my house for the Hanukkah party has an awesome time, I wish I could be there with you all. And I also hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas! Until the next post...

Il neige!

Last night my friend Benajmin's dad said it was going to snow while he was driving us back from bowling. I said "Here, no!!!" (in French of course) but sure enough it snowed today. See picture above of my back yard. That was at about 11 o'clock. Now it's 4 and the snow is completely gone because of sun, rain, and temperates of about four degrees Celsius, above freezing.

Bowling also went pretty well, after I "warmed up." Which means that I sucked at the beginning but ended the first game alright and won the second! So it turns out I can do something other than "evasion sports"...cycling and running.

I can't think of a title...

I figured I should post now, as it's been almost a week since my last post. Unfortunately not much has happened, as I've been sick most of the week. I went to school Monday, and stayed home Tuesday, yesterday, and today. However, tomorrow I'm going to school for a couple few reasons:

1. I'm feeling more or less better.
2. There's a rule here that if I miss more than three days of school I need a note from a doctor.
3. To escape my younger host sister, Caroline. She's sick too, and she's been driving me absolutely crazy because I'm around her all day and she loves to get on my nerves.

There's actually a fourth reason, but I'm going to write about that separately. December 22nd is my host sister Marine's birthday, but as that is the start of the Winter vacation, she's going to celebrate it tomorrow. After school five of her girl friends are coming home with her, hanging out, and eating dinner here. Then them, me, and some guys in our class are going bowling in Nimes. Hopefully I don't embarrass myself too bad with the bowling.

I also thought I would write a little more about French school, even if I haven't gone most of the week. When I came here I immediately noticed that the teachers weren't quite as discrete as American teachers when talking about students' grades. For example, my math teacher hands everyone their tests after saying out loud their grade, and, from time to time, what kind of stupid mistakes they made. Now she's a little bit of an extreme, but still I think that aspect of the French school system is quite different, and may be a reason for French students seeming more serious about the studies - in general - than American students. But that also might be because they decide on their career paths much earlier. In Premiere (junior year) they choose a category: "Economics," "Science," or "Literature." Then, in Terminale (senior year) they choose a specification. For example, students in Science choose between Physics/Chemistry, Math, or SVT, which is a mix of biology and geology.

Okay, that's it. I need to go shave, as I haven't needed to look presentable the past few days so I'm a bit scruffy, but I do need to look presentable tomorrow. Take care everyone!

How do you spell Hanukkah.... in French?

"Hanouka," apparently. I'm not celebrating quite like I usually do. No menorah, no Hanukkah parties with the neighbors or family, and actually very few Jewish people around me. However, I did manage to make latkes tonight, which my French family liked. Thanks for the recipe Mom, and I can see why making latkes for 30 people is such a pain...

Other than that my week has passed pretty normally. Tuesday I had my class "conseil," which is when the class delegates, two students elected to represent the class, meet with all the teachers and get every student's average. My average was a 13.5, which was really good. The averages fall into categories, indicating more or less on what level you are working. I was on the "compliments" level, which is quite good , although my teachers have been easier on me than the French kids in most subjects.

Tomorrow my host father's parents are coming for lunch. After, I'm going to watch the basketball game of my younger host sister and walking around the village she's playing in, which is named Aigues-Mortes (Aigues pronounced "Egg"). It's an old town, the old section of which is enclosed by tall ramparts. It was where an old French King left with ships for one of the Crusades, although I don't know many details. I think it was somewhere around the 10th century. Anyways, I should have some interesting photos to put up this weekend, so be sure to check up.

Happy Hanukkah everyone! Here's some music I found out about, if you want to get in the mood: The LeeVees.

Incroyable!

So it's been an interesting week since I posted my last blog. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday consisted of more student manifestations. That means that I went to two hours of class on Tuesday, didn't go at all on Wednesday (which is a half day anyways), and went to all my classes on Thursday even though they were quite small. At the left is a picture of a ton of students from other lycees in Nimes blocking the front entrance to my school on Friday. The block was still going on at Camargue, another school in Nimes, so they came to recruit students from our school to help. I didn't go, but it was interesting to see anyways.

Today I woke up early and got out the door on my bike before eight o'clock. I rode to my friends Benjamin's house, and we left there at about 8:15 for the Pont du Gard. The Pont du Gard is a famous aqueduct built by the Romans probably in the middle of the first century A.D. It was originally quite long (about 50 km) and brought water from a spring in Uzes to Nimes. Now only a small portion stands, but it really is a magnificent thing to see. I can't even imagine how hard it was to create such a monstrous thing without modern materials or machines, especially for the length of time it has stood and will stand. To give you an idea of the amount of water here when it rains and the strength of the Pont du Gard, take a look at one of the pictures of the aqueduct. When it rains quite a lot here the water level if much above the first level or arches, and the aqueduct stands quite strong still.

The system of the aqueduct actually wasn't completely quite as extravagant as this. At the slightly higher elevations it was simply a canal that ran along the ground. There is a drop in elevation from Uzes to Nimes, which helped the water move along. On top of the Pont du Gard is a small canal. You can take a look at the pictures and see that there's a roof over most of the upper level, which was put there to prevent the water from being polluted by bird crap or leaves or whatever might get in there.

Besides the Pont du Gard, it was quite a good day. We rode almost 5 hours with getting there and returning home. Eating lunch sitting on the rocks in the sun next to the aqueduct was pretty awesome. If you ever get to the south of France make sure you check this out. And now, after a weekend of good riding, I'm tired and I'm going to go to sleep. I hope everyone's well and thanks for keeping up with the blog. Bonne nuit!

A week of bloquée and soirée.

I'm sure that title looks like gibberish to most of you, but I'll explain it. Thursday was quite an interesting day because there was a student "manifestation" at my school. They've been happening all over France in lycées (high schools) and universities in response to what is being called the "loi Pecresse," or the Pecresse law. The law will do a few things, including:

• privatizing universities, which will increase price for French students. Universities are either free or nearly free here, which means you just need to pay for somewhere to live, food to eat, and books.
• increasing class size to a minimum of 35 students in lycées, and
• taking away "demi-classe" hours, which are hours during the week that the class is split into two. This allows the teachers to get to know the students a little better, which is of course better for education if the students take advantage of it.

As a result of this law, these manifestations or strikes have been happening a bit. They've taken the form mostly of "bloquées," where the students block the entries to academic campuses or buildings. That's what happened at my school on Thursday morning, which meant I missed a couple hours of class. The manifestations will probably resume Tuesday, although that is not certain as I do not know the result of the vote that was taken Friday on whether or not to carry on with it. Also, most of the students that are leading the manifestation, not just the ones who were participating to get out of class, are members of the Young Communist Party.

As for the soirée (party) part of the title, I celebrated Thanksgiving here yesterday. So last week I wrote that I was cooking for 10 people, which was true then. However, the night after I wrote my blog my host mother told me that it had exploded up to 20 people. When I heard that the first time we just started laughing because if I had been nervous before, I didn't know what I was going to be when the amount of people doubled.

But it actually turned out pretty well. I woke up pretty early and got started on two apple pies and two pumpkin pies, all before lunch (thanks for the recipes Grampy). That was especially interesting because I used a real pumpkin to make the pumpkin pies, as they do not have canned pumpkin here. After lunch I made the sweet potatoes, roasted the seeds from the pumpkin, and got to relax a little bit. My host mother and I collaborated on the turkey, while she made the stuffing and the green beans and I made the gravy. It was a little different than the Thanksgiving that I'm used to, as we didn't start dinner until after 10 and finished dessert at about one o'clock. Everyone had an excellent time and gave good feedback on the food, which might have been helped by the amount of Beaujolais wine and Armagnac that was consumed. So I survived and had a pretty good time too. I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving as well!

Chestnuts really roasting over an open fire

So yesterday I went to St. Ambroix, which is a town in the very north of Le Gard, almost in the region of Cevennes. We went to some friends' house for lunch, and then after took a small tour of the surrounding area. Their house was absolutely beautiful, mainly because it was just such a change for me. Build in the early 17th century, it was actually originally two small houses with a few other tiny apartments. Now all of that is connected, so it has a very tall gap in the middle that used to provide light to a small alley/courtyard in the middle. Anyways, now all of that is closed in and is their house. Since those Centre-Ville French houses are so tall, it has three floors with small verandas looking out on the Plaza of St. Ambroix. Plus the fact that the man used to work for some kind of French foreign services and the European Union, so he has all kinds of interesting pictures, masks, weaves, etc.

After eating lunch we drove north into Cevennes. Besides the beautiful mountainous scenery, we checked out something that I definitely wouldn't have know about if I were just a tourist here: la Clede, which is a small place a guy makes chestnut flour and shows the history of how it is/was made. Here's a link to check out some information about the chataignes, or chestnuts, if you would like.

Tomorrow I'm not going to school again, as there is another strike. Tomorrow is a one-day strike for teachers who choose to do so. The strike for train drivers is still going on, as well. Instead of going to school I'm going to do my Thanksgiving grocery shopping, among other things. I'm getting all geared up, but still nervous to cook a huge meal for 10 people. Hope everyone has an awesome holiday!

Il fait froid!

I haven't been able to translate "I'm freezing my ass off!" into French yet. I think if I said that in French it wouldn't come out right at all. But anyways, I was freezing my ass off today. Five degrees Celsius isn't that bad, but when the wind starts going it can be kind of cold.

I'm trying to think of other things to write, but right now I'm really distracted. I just discovered the massive amount of good music on the NPR World Cafe website, so right now I'm streaming a whole concert of Nickel Creek (which a lot of you might not think is good music, but I like listening to bluegrass in France). So what's going on, anyways?

This has been a pretty tiring week. Having 8 hours of class Tuesdays and every 7 Thursday (8 every other Thursday) can be really tiring. Plus I leave for school in the dark and get home in the dark. But fortunately tomorrow won't be too bad - two hours of a math test from 9 to 11 and then one hour of history from 1 to 2. The other thing I've noticed about school is the number of people who's hands I shake or who I do the French "bisous" with every day. It's not so much the amount of people as the amount of people who's names I don't know or don't remember. This is because of two things: 1) I'm horrible remembering names when I'm meeting a lot of people and I'm not around them a lot, and 2) people remember me a lot easier because I'm American, I'm easy to tell apart by my bad accent and my different style. Oh well, maybe I'll get the hang of it eventually.

In other news, I am about to start riding with my neighbor and the cycling club he rides with. I can't wait to do that, because it means more, and faster people to ride with. Plus they go out for days of 200 kilometers, so I should be in real good shape when I get back to the States next year, and the French bread won't affect me quite so much. I can't wait to ride some real mountains! The little "collines" around here and nice and all, but riding the Massif Centrale in the spring should be pretty sick.

Other than school and the daily stuff, I'm planning for when my parents come here December 31st. I of course can not wait to see them, and I wish I could see everyone. I've been here for just about two and a half months now, and I definitely miss everyone. But it's going to be the long haul after they leave in January! Anyways, love you all, talk to some of you on Thanksgiving and for anyone I don't talk to enjoy your feast. I'm going to struggle to cook my first Thanksgiving for ten people on Saturday the 24th, because I have class until 5 on the 22nd...

Bisous!

Ah, dommage!

I never wanted it to come, but the end of vacation was yesterday morning. And I could barely stand these two days of school after nearly two weeks off, but here the weekend is! And I also realized that it's been a week since I posted, so it was about time.

Sunday I actually went to La Gavotte, which is right next to Marseille. I again ate a lot of awesome food, which this time was a warm Spanish gaspacho. I enjoyed watching it be made as much as eating it. Basically the man who cooked it took this huge pan and set it over a grill. He cooked these small steaks and pieces of chicken in a little oil and then took them off. After he poured on a ton of onion, peppers, and tomato pulp, added the meat back in and seasoned it with salt and pepper. Then threw in a bunch of small pieces of soft bread. Entertaining and delicious, a real French meal.

The other entertainment was listening to my host father's large family debate soccer. As he said, there are 900,000 people living in Marseille, and 900,000 coaches. It cracked me up listening to my siblings' great aunt saying "Cisse est nul, Cisse est la merde!"

The rest of the week was spent avoiding homework and riding my bike. Wednesday morning I got up at 6:30 so I could start riding when the sun came up. I rode a good route to Uzes, but had to take a detour on the way back because some rocks had fallen from a cliff, and I think might have actually killed some people. Needless to say, the road was blocked and my ride, with the detour and my first puncture ever on my road bike (I've been lucky) the ride took a little longer than I wanted. 115 kilometers, I finally got back home at 12:45 and scarfed down some ravioli.

In other news, Thanksgiving is approaching and I think I'm actually going to cook for it. Except we'll celebrate Thanksgiving during the weekend, because I have class until 5 on Thursday. I'm definitely going to cook the turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, green beans, and a couple pies; possibly more if more people are coming over. If anyone has any cooking suggestions or serious dishes I'm leaving out please send them my way. That's all I think. Take it easy.

Buenos Días!

Yeah, that picture basically summed up the last few days. Everyone here kept saying that I was going to gain 4 kilos in 4 days, and although it wasn't quite that much it might not have been far off.

Tuesday afternoon we left here, Nîmes, and went to Philippe's parents' house in Sainte Marie la Mer, a town close to Perpignan. It is right next to the Mediterranean, and in the summer it explodes to a relatively quiet town of 4,000 to an enormous 50,000! There's sort of two halves of the town - the side that is inhabited year-round and is really the heart of the village, and the other half, which is actually much bigger than half, which is much more resort-style.

Wednesday morning we went to a town on the Spanish border called Le Perthus, where, once you get to a certain point, one side of the main street is France and the other half is Spanish. I got a haircut on the Spanish side for 8 Euros, which was nice with the climbing exchange rate. After looking around the town there for a little while we went to another town, which I don't remember the name of but is close to Figueres. That's where we ate the monsters you see above, brochettes. I got a bruqeta mixta, which is the long skewer with grilled meat and peppers and onions hanging above a plate of fries and two small plates of salads. That along with calamari, bread, sangria, and espresso filled me up rather well for the day! That afternoon we went and looked around Cadaques, a town on the Spanish Costa Brava that hosts a museum to Salvador Dali.

Thursday morning I got some reading done and looked around the town of Sainte Marie a little bit. After lunch four of us went to the French town of Colloiure (difficult name is Catalan, not French). It was incredibly busy, and I can't imagine it in the tourist season. There's also a small training center there for the French version of Navy Seals, so I got to see a couple interesting exercises they were doing. There a took some really good pictures, too, so make sure you check those out on the pictures link. Many artists have painted or sculpted the church tower in Colloiure, it's really beautiful with the colors and the very blue Mediterranean.

This morning I went and checked out the garden that Philippe's parents keep in Sainte Marie. I thought it was quite awesome, as I'm now enjoying their produce. Their garden is amazing, they grow just about everything there, including apples, peaches, lemons, tomatoes, potatoes, sweet potatoes, watermelon, honeydew, eggplant, zucchini, pumpkins, strawberries, peppers, almonds, and some fruit that I don't remember the name of but is delicious, sweet, and looks like a tomato except it grows on a tree. Plus they have trees at their house for oranges and kumquats, figs, and possibly a couple other things. Anyways, I thought that was wicked...

That's it for now. It's not almost 2 AM here and I've had a long day, so it's time for me to go to sleep. I'm going to Marseille on Sunday for the day, so I might come back with some more stories or pictures. A bientot

Perpignan and a Spanish haircut

Hello all! I'm writing a little sooner than I have been because I'm leaving this afternoon for Perpignan, where my host father's parents live. Perpignan is a Catalan city close to the border with Spain. Apparently Salvador Dali once said that the train station in Perpignan was the center of the universe, because he got his best ideas there. He even painted a picture of the Iberian Peninsula rotating around Perpignan, which is now there on the left. I'm not quite sure how that shows what I just wrote, but apparently that's what it means. However, I'm not quite the art guru.

Anyways, my point of writing all that is that I'm going to be away from the computer for a few days, but hopefully I'll come back with some good pictures for you all to look at. I'm also going to get a haircut in Spain while I'm staying in Perpignan, because apparently haircuts are cheaper there.

I went to a market yesterday morning. It wasn't a market for produce, mainly clothes and some other products. It was on one side of the stadium for the soccer team Nimes Olympique, which is in the Ligue Nationale, two leagues below Olympique Marseille or Olympique Lyonnais, two teams that you might see on TV playing in Ligue 1 or the Champions League. On the other side of the stadium was a huge market for flowers. I bought a sweatshirt at the market, and now I'm going to stop myself from buying much more than a t-shirt, because if I don't I won't be able to close my suitcase in June. There are weekly markets for produce in the surrounding towns, although I don't have much of a need to go to those because I'm not buying my own fruits and vegetables.

I'm much more settled in here now. Last night when my local coordinator and his British wife came to check up on my I caught myself talking French accidentally every once in a while in the middle of a conversation in English. I also have to keep catching myself from saying "Oui" or "Quoi?" when I'm talking to people on Skype. I've been really enjoying riding here. On Saturday I rode 100 kilometers by myself. It would have been nice to ride with someone else, but at the same time I was happy I was alone cause I had some really awesome moments where I was happy it was quiet. Just me winding up that valley, then rolling along in the sun and smelling really good bread baking, an old French guy clapping for me right after climbing the "colline" at St. Comes, etc. It was awesome...

Bisous

The title is the hardest part...

So it's been about a week and now I have a few things to write. I have more time to be on the internet tonight because I'm waking up late tomorrow. Being on the internet means writing this blog and watching interviews with presidential candidates on the Daily Show website, my new method of narrowing down the Democratic candidates. It's weird having to actually make a decision for voting now that I can. But anyways, I'm waking up later tomorrow because I only have one hour of class! I'm actually not sure if I'm going to go, because the class is from 1 to 2 and going all the way to Nimes for that is kind of worthless. So I think I will start my vacation early.

HUZZAH!!! Vacation! The way French school works is there are about 7 to 8 weeks of school followed by a vacation. So I have one that starts tomorrow afternoon, I have the winter vacation, another "ski" vacation in February, and the spring vacation in April before school ends in the middle of June. During vacation I plan on getting to some more of the local sights and taking some pictures for everyone to see, riding my bike a ton, hopefully cooking some, reading, and of course learning French.

And speaking of school, there were two interesting things that happened this morning. For one, all the students bags were looked in when they entered the school and they were told nobody was allowed to leave the campus before noon, which is usually not the case. This was because yesterday someone lit a firework, threw it in a room, closed the door and ran away. The other thing at school this morning was a field trip close to the town of Rochefort du Gard, which is in between Nimes and Avignon. It was a geology lesson, and while I froze my ass off and tried to understand the other students took lots of notes on the age of the rocks and the chemical compositions on the rocks around. I understood a little better when we were allowed to go search for fossils...

I saw my first match of European handball last weekend. My host brother Axel plays on a team in a nearby town, and I got to see them play a team from Nimes. They won, which was good, and it was interesting to see it cause it's kind of a mix of basketball and lacrosse and hockey to me. I also cooked jerk chicken and New-Orleans style fried potatoes last weekend. The jerk chicken didn't come out as well as I wanted, and it was way too spicy for the kids here. Not sure what I'll get around to cooking this weekend/vacation, but we'll see. I'm also riding a lot more now. I'm trying to do at least 100 miles a week for now. Unfortunately I don't have many people to ride with and the wind here can be strong at times, but it's better than nothing. Plus other people get impatient if I want to stop and take a few pictures, which I will try to do on my next ride so you can see more of my route.

A prochain!

Ouais, j'ai le WiFi!

I now have a pretty reliable wireless connection! That means you can send me emails to either address: jonah.meyers@verizon.net or wayfarer4900@yahoo.com. The first address is a little quicker for me to get to because I don't have to go through a browser now, but do whatever your hearts desire. Wireless also means that I can talk on Skype much easier, and the sound and picture quality is better. So if you have a Skype name we can talk!

Also in the French news is a "greve," or strike. Basically, years ago when certain jobs, such as driving trains and buses, were very difficult the people who practiced those occupations were given certain benefits, including earlier retirement. Right now the government is trying to take those perks away, so bus drivers and train drivers all over the country are striking. There are some marches happening in Paris, but the most that has happened around me is a one-day strike by the bus drivers, which meant that I did not go to school yesterday! I really could have, but I only have two hours of Physics because my other three teachers decided not to go to school as well. So instead I....

Woke up at 8 instead of 6, ate breakfast, and rode my bike alone for over two hours! And what a magnificent ride it was. I did the same gorgeous route as Sunday, winding up through this valley with limestone and pine trees around me, and with an excellent view. Also passed through plenty of small villages with the beautiful French "plain trees," and I even rode through one village which is called "Campagne," the French word for country. I think it has about 200 people living in it, so the name is definitely just!

Today was a pretty good day as well. Only five hours of class, which actually is pretty easy now. I got a math test back and I had the third highest grade in the class, believe it or not! Then for lunch a friend and I bought "steak-frites" sandwiches, which the guy in the cafe calls "American"s and went and ate in the Jardin de la Fontaine. Plenty of wind here, so it isn't always the warmest, but it's still beautiful.

But now I must go take a shower and watch a rugby match. It's between France and Argentina (Moi contre Katherine) for third place in the rugby world cup. Unfortunately last weekend France lost to England in the Semi-Final. England will play South Africa tomorrow night. I'm also going to put up a few pictures of my new bedroom, so you can check those out if you'd like.

Bonjour Tout le Monde!

Sorry I've been a little slow in getting to this post, but there's a reason for that. I am now very settled in here. The language is still hard, but I have a schedule I'm used to and people I'm used to seeing, etc. I still refer to Maryland as "chez moi," or my home, but living here isn't so strange to me now, after a little more than 6 weeks. So anyways, that's why I haven't posted in a little while, because I don't think my daily schedule is that interesting. But finally I have a few things to write, so here goes.

When I decided to come to France I thought that this would be a good opportunity to figure myself out and to figure out what I want in the future. It's still early in this whole experience, but I've already thought about it and basically found an answer for myself: I don't need to think about my future. It's comforting that I know where I'm going to school next year and what dorm I'm going to live in and all that, but that's all I know and that's all I need to know. It's nice to be able to not really worry about where I'll be in five years and just decide "Hey, why don't I go to France for 10 months?" (Thanks Mom and Dad!) Plus, if I did decide what I wanted half a decade down the road I would probably change my mind half a dozen times.

Speaking of college next year - University of Maryland, College Park - my dorm room is going to be a huge change. This past weekend I moved into the new bedroom here, which is pretty big and doesn't have that much in it. So next year it's going to be a little different with a room about half the size, two times the people, and four times the stuff.

What else has been going on here? Hmm... I had a pretty good weekend. Sunday morning I rode about 40 miles on beautiful roads with not many cars, so that was excellent. Saturday and Sunday I spent some time fixing the family's bikes, so I can keep my skills from getting too rusty. And Sunday I also ate what the French called Pain Perdue, or "Lost Bread." They mentioned to we were going to eat it later, but I couldn't really understand what it was they way they were describing it. So later, when I took a break fixing bikes to go eat some, I realized that it was French toast, which is a name they laughed at. There are a few differences to the real French version though. It is eaten in the afternoon, between lunch and dinner, instead of for breakfast. Also, it is always made with the stale baguettes, which is why it's called Lost Bread, because you don't want to eat the bread anymore without soaking it in eggs and frying it. And it's eaten with a little sugar on top instead of maple syrup. When I mentioned that it was eaten with maple syrup in the U.S. they joked that that's why Americans were fat. But, I said, then again I'm American, I weigh 140 pounds (63 kilograms), and I can eat what I want when I ride hard for 40 miles in the morning!

Hope everyone is doing well, and I've heard a lot of people are reading, so thank you and keep it up. I miss you all! Chao

Allez Les Bleus!

Last night France defeated the New Zealand All-Blacks 20-18 in a quarterfinal rugby match! A world cup victory is in sight! Allez Les Bleusssssssssssssssssssssssssss!

Oui, je suis americain...

I've had to say that a lot... And it's not bad, I don't mind that people can tell I'm not French because I don't speak it that well or I just plain look different. But my math and geology teachers don't really like Americans, which I think is ridiculous, because not all of us are the same. They might not like Americans because they think we go parading around taking over everything and refusing to speak anything but English, but that isn't me, now is it? I didn't put Bush into office...just saying...

And although I'm definetely not the most patriotic person in the world, I do have no point out how much America affects the world. The French (and much of the rest of the world) listen to American music, watch American movies, and wear clothes by American companies. The clothes are in English and I've been surprised by the number of kids who wears clothes when they don't understand what's written on them. Now I want to look at my math teacher's favorite movies...

Speaking of classes, I got two tests back yesterday. One was in geology, which the teacher wrote "Non!" on in big red letters. I don't understand that class at all, obviously. But the other one was Physics/Chemistry, which I managed to get a 9 out of 20 on. That sounds bad, but it's awesome for me and it's actually the average of the class, because the tests are real difficult here and they teachers also grade hard. The last question on the Chemistry section of the test was a chemical equation where you had to find the amount of ethanol and CO2 produced in the fermentation of the grape juice, and determine the alcohol content of the wine! Now THAT'S French!

Other than that, I haven't been up to much. I've been pretty tired because it's exhausting learning all the time. And right now I'm trying to figure out the specific gravity of different foods so I can convert milliliters to grams, after converting from cups of tablespoons or teaspoons. Although I tend to think the metric system makes more sense in general, with cooking that's not the case at all. Sorry this post hasn't been very interesting, but that's all I've got going right now. A bientot!

A Little History...

Okay, so this blog is going to be a little bit about the history of Nimes and Boissiéres. I say a little because I don't really know that much about either at the moment, but here's what I do know.

The city of Nimes was originally called Nemausus after a spring that was discovered when the Romans first started a colony here. Nimes and the surrounding area was inhabited mainly by Roman soldiers, who were given plots of land after serving in Julius Caesar's army for 15 years in his campaigns of the Nile. And I believe that's also the reason that the city's major symbol is a crocodile chained to a palm tree, because there are crocs in the Nile and the climate here seems to support palm trees pretty well. If you walk around the city you can see lots of evidence of Nimes being a Roman city.

The Arènes, a giant amphitheatre, is probably the second-most well preserved after the amphitheatre in Rome. Two Feriàs (festivals with bullfights) are held in the Arènes every year, as well as some other smaller events. Another Roman monument is the Maison Carrée, or in English "Square House," which is actually a rectangle. It's still in amazing condition, and in the past it was used for government purposes more than anything, although the Romans originally built it as a temple. The other monuments I've already mentioned a little bit about. The Jardin de la Fontaine was built by the Romans, part of it was either destroyed or just dissapeard eventually, and it was added onto by the French in the late 18th century. I went to the Jardin today and took a ton of pictures, so be sure to check them out on the picture link. The Jardin also houses La Temple de Diane, another Roman temple that isn't in such good condition but still nice to look at. And at the top of the hill is the Tour Magne, which is the oldest monument of all. Also, although not in Nimes (and I haven't seen it yet), the city is famous for the gigantic aqueduct that used to carry water to the colony.

A couple other facts about Nimes. The city has had quite a controversial past. Nimes has always been a very Protestant city. At some point all Jews were kicked out of the city, and another point in history there was a small massacre of Catholics, including 5 bishops that were murdered in front of a church. But on a nicer note, Nimes is also the birthplace of the material serge that is used to make jeans! That's right, in the 19th century an immigrant to the United States with the last name Levy (which I guess later was changed to Levi), decided that serge would be the perfect material to make pants for cowboys! Possibly because the cowboys of the Camargue marshes wore similar pants? Anyways, "denim" is a mispronunciation of "de Nimes," or the material "from Nimes."

Okay, this is getting really long so I'll finish quickly. Boissiéres is a town of 560 people, and it was a town of about 230 people in the mid-17th century. That's not much growth in over three centuries if you ask me... Also, the town has a castle that I don't really know anything about other than nobody lives there now. I'll try to find out more about that.

Okay, I'm done. On a side note, I ate kangaroo in my school cafeteria on Tuesday. Not bad. Thanks for caring if you've gotten this far, and good night!

"But calzones are Italian and chili is Mexican!"

That's what my host-mother told me last weekend after I cooked them dinner. I made calzones and they liked them and now they want me to make dinner once a week, so I don't know what I got myself into there! But anyways, I said I would try to make dinner for them once a week and I would try to make some"American" food, or at least dishes that I thought maybe they had never eaten. I agreed with her that calzones definetely were Italian and not American, but dammit, Chili is Tex-Mex and Texas is part of America! (Of course I was dissapointed in myself for making an argument that George Bush would have made, but then again, Lance Armstrong would have agreed too, and as long as he's not a doper, that makes it a little bit better.)
So yeah, this weekend I'm making Chili and in the future I don't know exactly what. Because I did realize that America doesn't have a recognized cuisine like a lot of other countries do. Or at least America doesn't have recognized cuisine that you would want to eat every night, because Philly cheese steaks and Chicago deep-dish pizzas can get pretty unhealthy. So post some comments with suggestion if any pop into your head please.

But I've already made one post about food, so what else is going on? I posted some pictures a couple days ago that I took when I went out riding Wednesday. They're just of a local "climb" and the view you see while a the top, which I think is awesome.

Yesterday I walked around le Jardin de la Fontaine with a friend of mine but I forgot to put my camera in my backpack, so I'll have to go back and get some pictures. It's not really a magnificent garden in the way of various flowers and other plants, but it is an amazing Roman ruin. It's quite large and includes canals that are sourced from an underground river! Plus if you walk all the way up trough the garden and up through the hill you can see all of Nimes and another monument, the Tour Magne. However, this tower costs 2.70 euros (or about $3.78 at the moment) to climb to the top, so of course I didn't do that. I'll definetely take some pictures n the next week and get those up.

That's it for now, I hope everyone's well and have a good weekend!

Jonah

This is HARD!

Yeah, this is the hardest thing I've ever done. Everyone is probably reading this going "Oh, Jonah sounds like he's settling in well and having a great experience." And I am. But man is it difficult when everyone around you is speaking a language that you don't speak very well and sometimes you want to scream AHHHHHHHH but then you would just have to explain yourself in another language, which is very diffiult. Or they'd just think you're that crazy American. And it's not jst the language barrier, but also being thousands of miles away from people I know really well and the fact that all my classes (with the exception of English) are in French. At least I've seen most of this stuff before so that helps me towards understanding, but man is it difficult! At least my French teacher is letting me off the hook and not making me read the 500-page novel L'Education Sentimentale.

But besides that rant on me struggling, I'm pretty good. I'm learning quickly and I've noticed I'm conversing much more easily now. I had plenty of time to practice today because I didn't have class for five hours! That's right, in France when teachers can't make it there's no substitute, you just don't have class. Both my French teacher and Sciences de la Vie and Terre (Geology and Biology) teacher were absent, so from 11-4 I ate lunch, played foosball, talked, and sat in a beautiful park in Nimes called Jardin de la Fontaine. (Come visit me and I'll show it to you).

A couple things I forgot to mention in the last blog. Both are about the creation of the drink that France loves so much: wine. There are wine "breweries" spread throughout France called Cave Cooperatives. The word cooperative is used because the grapes from the surrounding vineyards are taken to the cave (which is a building, not a cave) and made into wine. Hence, it is a cooperative effort between the cave itself and the various vineyard owners. The caves also smell very bad, so you should be happy you don't live near one. I have to hold my breath every time I ride by one. Also, the grapes are driven to the caves immediately after they are picked by these gigantic tractor-like machines that I don't know the name of. As they are driven there some of the juice from them falls onto the road and the sugar of the grapes creates something the French call coal. It's very sticky, and as I learned last bike ride, slows you down quite a bit if you try to ride through it.

Okay, c'est tout! Bonne nuit!

France est trés jolie!

So this weekend I had more French biking experience. Yesterday I rode to Espace Bikes, a shop in the nearby town of Caveirac via the Voie Verte (bike path, which translates into "green route") with my friend Benjamin. Much much much smaller than what I'm used to, but the guy who owns it is real nice. Then on the busy road into Nimes and through the city to another shop, which I forgot the name to. It was full of beauticul Colnago and De Rosa frames and even a Pinarello Prince, which, for anyone who doesn't know, costs about $10,800. At the second shop I bought a powder drink mix and some gels, and now my host father is accusing me of doping. This morning I rode with Pascale, the father of one of Axel's friends, for about 53 kilometers, or 32 miles. Went a sligtly different direction and evetually caught a group of five riders, who we hammered with for a little bit. I talked a little broken French with a woman in the group who was wearing an old USPS Berry Floor jersey. Anyways, I can't wait to get back out riding again, I really wish I didn't have to go to school. I'm planning rides into Provence to see the lavender fields and south to the Camargue marshes and the Mediterranean.

I'm settling in a little better now. I still miss everyone a ton but I'm making friends and now I feel a little less like the outsider, because I'm understanding people when they talk much quicker and I can respond without having to pause and think as much about what I'm going to say.

Friday when I didn't have class for two hours me and a guy in my class walked to a bike shop in Nimes, which was closed because shops have the strangest hours in France. But we walked around Nimes a little more anyways, an I saw all the preparations for this weekend's Féria. Unfortunately I didn't go to the Feria, which is a weekend of corridas (bullfights) and live music and food and drunk people in the streets. Maybe I'll make it to the even bigger Féria that happens in April, I believe, during the Pentecote weekend.

That's it for tonight. Sorry I didn't take any pictures this weekend, but I'll try to get some when I go out riding Wednesday and/or Saturday. Bisous, et bonne nuit!

Jonah

Manger

So today at lunch I had an interesting experience that I would never have in the U.S. From 12-3 I didn't have class, so I went with a couple guys in my class to a local café to play bébé foot (French for foosball). Some of the French kids were pretty good, and they had a few interesting rules I didn't quite understand. For instance, if you lose then you have to crawl under the table to the other side. Anyways, it was a lot of fun and making friends is definetely helping me learn French. Plus, I think I represented America well in the area of bébé foot.

Oh, and the food in France is BANGIN'! When I'm not at school my French family eats lunch and dinner together. The food is tasty and usually there is a lot. For example, on Sunday we had a big casserole of potatoes, onions, and cheese for lunch. MMMMMMMMM. Then a few hours later some friends of the family came over bearing fruit, lemon, and chocolate tartes. Everyone sat around eating those and drinking strong coffee or tea. Dinner was the rest of the casserole, a tomato salad, and a leftover dish of yellow rice with auid, mussels and shrimp from the previous night. And I wouldn't usually want to eat all that seafood, but I've decided this is the year to culture myself and eat more things. I haven't had any snails yet, but maybe some time...

Following every meal is either salad, fruit, bread with chesse or butter, nuts, and/or dessert. In the case of my family, amazing chocolate ice cream! But okay, I'm done being fat. Tune in again soon for another update from the beautiful south of France!

Speaking of Biking

I went on an amazing ride Sunday morning with the father of one of Axel's friends. We rode about 55 kilometers (yes, I'm learning the metric system). The first 10 were pretty flat but somewhere in between kilometer 10 and 15 we climbed this nice hill. Long, gradual, and surprisingly easy, and at the top you could see everything. Beautiful! Sorry, I didn't bring my camera with me but next time I go out riding I definetely will. We rode through the town of Sommiéres, which is the second biggest town in my immediate area besides Nimes. Then a bit after Sommiéres, back on the Voie Verte (the awesome bike path) to finish the ride.
And for you mountain bikers, I actually saw a bunch of people on nice dually bikes coming down when I was starting up the climb. I think there are actually some pretty good trails around me. I'm probably going to go mountain biking with a few guys from school soon, so we'll see!

Off the topic of biking, I also wanted to write about a few things I'm still getting used to:

• Camembert in the school cafeteria
• Having to continually hold the water source while showering
• Eating salad after the main dish
• Being at school from 8 til 5
• Commas instead of decimal points
• Eating acorns
• The toilet being in a seperate room from the shower and sink.

French School

So after a couple days of moving around between classes (in France you have all your classes with the same group of people unless you're taking a different language), I am finally in the correct class with my host sister Marine. French school is very different from American school. They count down instead of up, like we do in the U.S. So your juior year, which is the grade I am in, is called Première (1st), while your senior year is called Terminale and your sophomore year is Seconde. And French lycée, which is high school, starts with Seconde, so I guess there really is no official Freshman year.

So anyways, a French school day is completely different from an American one. This morning I woke up at 6 and left the house at 6:40 to get on the bus. Chemistry class started at 8, then math at 9. We got books for all or classes from about 9:30-9:45 and then had a break while some people changed classes before our second half of math. We had math until 11, lunch from 11-12, history from 12-1. Then from 1-3 we sat around and talked (I attempted to at least), and another hour of history until classes were over for the day at 4. Yeah, I know, it's weird! And actually, I have a few classs that double as two subjects. For example, physics and chemistry are the same class, history and geograpy are the same class. French lycée has a week A and a week B, so chemistry is taught during week A, and physics is taught during week B, for example. Not all the students are finished classes at the same time, either. Some days I finish at 4 while others I finish at 5 and wednesdays I finish at noon.

Last year students were allowed to smoke on school grounds but this year they have to go right outside. Oh, and students can leave campus whenever they want if they don't have class, with no pestering about having a pass. So sometime during one of my two hour breaks, maybe I'll go grab something to eat at one of the magnificent local bakeries. We have cards that, when scanned, allow us to open the gate to the school after it opens, and keeps track of meals.

School is of course very hard for me right now because I don't speak French that well. But I'm getting better quickly! The lesson on the industrial revolution in history wasn't hard to follow today, and I even managed to catch on to a joke about soccer when the teacher told us about the Manchester-Liverpool railroad line. But this morning I was really confused as to why the math teacher was talking about croissants when she was talking about croissance (a graph increasing)!

That's it for now. Make sure to check out the pictures I'll put up later tonight. They're only of my town, another small town, and the bike path, but I'l take more as soon as I can.

L'école est demain!

Hello all! Some of you want to know more about how my trip is going, so I figured I would post some information about my town, my family, and Nimes. Boissiéres is a town of about 500 people. It is trés jolie (very pretty), with very arrow streets and an old chateau that nobody lives in at the top of the hill that the village stands on. Don't worry, I'll post pictures of the village and the chateau as soon as possible! Boissiéres is bordered by the villages of Nages, where the running of the bulls took place, and Bizac, which I rode my bike through today and is even smaller than Boissiéres.

I walked around Nimes this morning with Laurence and Marine after dropping Caroline and Axel off at school. They start a day before Marine and I. (Yes, unfortunately I have to go to school tomorrow...) I saw the amphitheatre Arènes, where corridas (bullfights) will take place next weekend, and the Maison Carrée, another famous Roman remain.

School is tomorrow and I have absolutely no idea what to expect. I will be in the same class as Marine and Benedict a friend of Marine's who attended the running of the bulls with us. And, oh, by the way - the running of the bulls isn't simply a bunch of idiots running as fast as they can so they don't get gorged. What happens is the French cowboys ride with their horses very close togethr so that the bulls running behind them canot pass. Meanwhile, the young men try to catch up to the head of the ulss and grab its horns until a number of them stop it from moving. People are allover the streets and constantly awaiting the next bull or bulls so that they can get out of the way.

I think that's it for now. I hope everyone is doing well, and I'll post again soon. Bisous!

Jonah

Salut!

I am inBoisseres, France at the moment typing on my French family's computer. The keyboard is different so it takes me a very long time to type. If you want to reach me, use my address wayfarer4900@yahoo.com please, not jonah.meyers@verizon.net. I will put pictures up as soon as I can, but not until I can find a way of getting internet on my own computer.

My stay in France so far has been quite an experience. I have been slightly overwhelmed because everyone around me is speaking a language that i do not speak very well. But I am learning fast. Boissieres is a beautiful, small village with narrow streets and red-tile-roofed houses. My family is very nice and I've even been to the local running of th bulls! Sorry I have to stop now because I really need a shower and typing is so slow. I will find out where I can get wireless internet and then write about everything. Missing everyone already!

P.S.

If you would like to see the city of Nîmes relative to France, you can look at it on Google Earth:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=N%C3%AEmes,+France&sa=X&oi=map&ct=title

Zoom out and look at the green arrow to see it relative to France or Europe. Or you can zoom in a little and find Boissieres slightly down to the left of Nîmes. If you zoom in enough you can even spot the street I'm living on, Chemin de Cougoul.

Une Semaine

Salut!

Okay, less than a week until I leave, so here's the run-down of my year in France. I will be living in a small town in the south of France called Boissieres. My town has about 500 people living in it, but the nearby city, Nîmes, where I will be going to school, has 150,000 people living in it. I will be living with Philippe and Laurence Mialet and their children Marine (16,f), Axel (14,m), and Caroline (11,f). They have a six-bedroom house and a swimming pool!
I'll be attending school at the Lycée Albert Camus, where I will take math, physics (grrr), French, English, Spanish, geography, science, and gym. School starts at 8 AM every day and doesn't end until 6 PM! However, I get a two-hour break for lunch and I don't have school on Wednesday afternoons.
The city of Nîmes is famous for its amazing aqueduct and amphitheater, its history of religious violence, and the seasonal bullfights!
I'm so excited to start my year in France also still very nervous! Thanks for reading all the way through if you've made it this far, and I'll be sure to post with another update soon.

Hello anyone that might see this!
As you probably know if you're reading this, I will be living in France from September 2007 to late June 2008. I leave Maryland on August 30th for Boston and then to France on August 31st. I will be living with a French family and studying in a French high school for a 13th year of high school before going to College Park.
I figured I would start a blog so I could share my (hopefully amazing) year with you all. This will be easier than emailing a million people. Although I would love to email all of you, I will probably not have enough time to do that. Sorry! So if you would like to keep updated on my life, and I won't be offended if you don't want to, then read up! Also, I will post pictures of beautiful Provence, Lanquedoc, etc. periodically.
Hope to see everyone before I leave!