Written on 14 September 2009 Montpellier Time
I received my class schedule today and begin school tomorrow. It's exciting to get back into something I enjoy. I have loved the relative freedom I have had my first couple of weeks in Montpellier. However, I was starting to get restless. I had the same feeling before I left to come to Montpellier. Summer, although wonderful, seems to take a little bit too long sometimes. I wanted, and will get tomorrow, an avenue to channel my energies. Something productive, challenging, and educational that will force me to use my mind in a result oriented setting. My challenges will be four seperate french language courses, a french economic and social class, and a history class. Altogether, it will be sixteen hours per week of classes spoken entirely in french. My schedule is heavy Tuesday through Thursday with only one class on Monday evening and nothing on Friday. I will work Monday and Friday afternoons for three hours at the Office of International Relations. All in all, I love the schedule. It will keep me busy throughout the week yet allow me enough time to study on Monday and Friday. Most importantly, it is nice to finally have a plan. Taking away the uncertainties of what you will do next will undoubtedly help me get more comfortable here. Although, somethings are still not fine-tuned, I like to back in the thick of things. After a while, I felt as if I was fomenting on the fringes of life, sitting and watching at my café as others pass through their everyday routines while I stood by contemplating thoughts that had no concrette way of being express in a contemporary outlet. I will try not to take away from summer too much, I love it. It is a chance to engage yourself in what you are truly passionate about. However, school and other enterprises allow you to express the improvements or diminutions you have either gained or slacked off in obtaining over you break. For this reason, it is nice to plunge my efforts back into something that does not permeate from me, dictated by others and the course I wish to take with my life.
Friday, September 25, 2009
Written on 13 September 2009 at 8:57 Montpellier Time
Today was another good day. This afternoon, Suzanna and I went to the Musée Fabre, a Montpellier art museum in the center of town. It was very nice. I still do not have the eyes for modern, abstract art. No matter how hard I try, I can't see anything more than a couple of splotches of paint here, dabs there, and random swipes all over. I know they are made to convey a message or have a certain vibe to them, I just can't put it together. I always come away thinking they have come up with with their designs on accident. They picked up a cardboard slab from the floor of the garage, saw some streaks of paint had seeped over from the neighboring paint cans from last month's kitchen project or a shriveled piece of tin, and there it is, your income and the beginning of countless interpretations made by art gallery visitors such as myself. I know that is not the case, I know, or at least I assume, it is a labor intensive, detailed way of work. A way of crafting a piece of art or sending a message through once erratic and chaotic elements. It's just not for me. I preferred the older art. The impressionists and romanticists of the past. The scene is there for you. I relate to these better. I can see these situations in my own life. the skyline, the landscape, the people, the buildings, can all be transcribed to a feeling or experience I once had that mirrored it. For me, it links the past with the present, the unknown with the known. The painting of the farmer laying in his fields one morning surrounded by his dog and cattle, although in a different context, reflects a similar feeling I would have one lazy Sunday morning after breakfast, at the farm. I found most, if not all, of the paintings as worthwhile to have seen and I was pleased with the visit. After the museum and a stop at a café, I walked the streets of Montpellier and returned home in time for the chinese dinner, part two. I found out a little more information on the meal, it is called a chinese fondu. The sauce is still a mystery, but I learned how it is used. They create the sauce in a large pan, not unlike the large bowl of cheese used in the fondus I am used to, and cook each course item separately in the sauce. First, was the meats, second, the potatoes and noodles, and last, the vegetables. While you are dining, the upcoming course is stewing in the fondu and the course following that is sitting on the table in front of you, rare and in water. Once again, the food was great and filling. One thing that struck me as odd though, the music we listened to at dinner, the conversations we would have about common interests in various subjects, and many of the clothes we were wearing were American. Televsion stars, songs, televsion shows, actors, and actresses, brands of t-shirts, were almost all made in or come from the United States. The conversation would converge on these topics even without me in the lead. Often, what my german and chinese friends found common ground on were American and often subjects I had not seen or heard or comment on knowledgeably. Each one of us has a uniaue culture deriveed from our situations back home. I thought the conversation would be more polarized, involving far differrent examples revolving around a central genre. We would share our country's shade of classical music or drama television. However, it was not like this. Many of the things they mentioned come from the U.S. Two things really struck me. First, the ability of our communications and broadcasting systems to reach distances across the globe and several time zones away. I guess, I really never thought of the tv show Heroes having an international, at least not chinese audience. Second, with such an influence over so many parts of the world, I caught a glimpse of the responsibility of U.S. citizens, government, private sector, entertainment, media, and communications outlets (others as well). What we do is seen by more than those that inhabit our country. We are here to make an example for all of the world. What an awesome responsibility and one that cannot be mishandled. We have the oppurtunity to set the stage in world affairs, under a common cause and by certain, over-arching principles. I hope we can live up to the awesome task or industry and hard work, in the past and present, has created for us.
Today was another good day. This afternoon, Suzanna and I went to the Musée Fabre, a Montpellier art museum in the center of town. It was very nice. I still do not have the eyes for modern, abstract art. No matter how hard I try, I can't see anything more than a couple of splotches of paint here, dabs there, and random swipes all over. I know they are made to convey a message or have a certain vibe to them, I just can't put it together. I always come away thinking they have come up with with their designs on accident. They picked up a cardboard slab from the floor of the garage, saw some streaks of paint had seeped over from the neighboring paint cans from last month's kitchen project or a shriveled piece of tin, and there it is, your income and the beginning of countless interpretations made by art gallery visitors such as myself. I know that is not the case, I know, or at least I assume, it is a labor intensive, detailed way of work. A way of crafting a piece of art or sending a message through once erratic and chaotic elements. It's just not for me. I preferred the older art. The impressionists and romanticists of the past. The scene is there for you. I relate to these better. I can see these situations in my own life. the skyline, the landscape, the people, the buildings, can all be transcribed to a feeling or experience I once had that mirrored it. For me, it links the past with the present, the unknown with the known. The painting of the farmer laying in his fields one morning surrounded by his dog and cattle, although in a different context, reflects a similar feeling I would have one lazy Sunday morning after breakfast, at the farm. I found most, if not all, of the paintings as worthwhile to have seen and I was pleased with the visit. After the museum and a stop at a café, I walked the streets of Montpellier and returned home in time for the chinese dinner, part two. I found out a little more information on the meal, it is called a chinese fondu. The sauce is still a mystery, but I learned how it is used. They create the sauce in a large pan, not unlike the large bowl of cheese used in the fondus I am used to, and cook each course item separately in the sauce. First, was the meats, second, the potatoes and noodles, and last, the vegetables. While you are dining, the upcoming course is stewing in the fondu and the course following that is sitting on the table in front of you, rare and in water. Once again, the food was great and filling. One thing that struck me as odd though, the music we listened to at dinner, the conversations we would have about common interests in various subjects, and many of the clothes we were wearing were American. Televsion stars, songs, televsion shows, actors, and actresses, brands of t-shirts, were almost all made in or come from the United States. The conversation would converge on these topics even without me in the lead. Often, what my german and chinese friends found common ground on were American and often subjects I had not seen or heard or comment on knowledgeably. Each one of us has a uniaue culture deriveed from our situations back home. I thought the conversation would be more polarized, involving far differrent examples revolving around a central genre. We would share our country's shade of classical music or drama television. However, it was not like this. Many of the things they mentioned come from the U.S. Two things really struck me. First, the ability of our communications and broadcasting systems to reach distances across the globe and several time zones away. I guess, I really never thought of the tv show Heroes having an international, at least not chinese audience. Second, with such an influence over so many parts of the world, I caught a glimpse of the responsibility of U.S. citizens, government, private sector, entertainment, media, and communications outlets (others as well). What we do is seen by more than those that inhabit our country. We are here to make an example for all of the world. What an awesome responsibility and one that cannot be mishandled. We have the oppurtunity to set the stage in world affairs, under a common cause and by certain, over-arching principles. I hope we can live up to the awesome task or industry and hard work, in the past and present, has created for us.
Friday, September 18, 2009
12 September 2009 at 9:06 Montpellier Time
Today was an excellent day. A large portion of my morning was spent in my café and, on my way home, a trip to the grocery store. The afternoon was spent at the beach. Once again, the weather was perfect and the atmosphere was very relaxing. I got home around six this evening for the day's main event. Qibin and Tianghia had planned an authentic chinese dinner for us. It was magnificent. A five course meal of beef tips, chicken , sausage, tofu, noodles, rice, lotus flower, cucumbers, sausage tomato soup, some other things I fail to remember, and, for dessert, an orange and rice pudding. The food was excellently cooked in a wonderful chinese sauce. The sauce was a delicious mystery. When asked, Qibin could not translate into french or english the numerous ingredients it took to create such a masterpiece, a combination of spicy and sweet that brought each food item to life. It was enough spice to make you sweat and I had a few tears, but you never felt like you could breathe fire. I can truthfully say my pants felt tighter after the meal. I didn't think my skin was elastic enough to hold such an expansion. All in all, it was wonderful. We have so many differences in our household. Linguistically, culturally, religiously, yet, good food is a universal language. Over dinner, communication was easier. Words were replaced with smiles, sounds of joyous dining (mmmmm!), and hand and arm gestures (the thumbs up and rub of the stomach). In the moment, we could all relate and come together with ease and on common ground. We were happy consumers, sharing in the connectivity of food. After dinner, as hard as it was, we thought a walk in the park would help to digest the load we had just eaten. It was nice, relaxing. We shared stories of home and identified ways in which our cultures intersect with one another (ex: Yao Ming). It was a lovely evening and it should be a great night's sleep, I was almost too full to type.
Today was an excellent day. A large portion of my morning was spent in my café and, on my way home, a trip to the grocery store. The afternoon was spent at the beach. Once again, the weather was perfect and the atmosphere was very relaxing. I got home around six this evening for the day's main event. Qibin and Tianghia had planned an authentic chinese dinner for us. It was magnificent. A five course meal of beef tips, chicken , sausage, tofu, noodles, rice, lotus flower, cucumbers, sausage tomato soup, some other things I fail to remember, and, for dessert, an orange and rice pudding. The food was excellently cooked in a wonderful chinese sauce. The sauce was a delicious mystery. When asked, Qibin could not translate into french or english the numerous ingredients it took to create such a masterpiece, a combination of spicy and sweet that brought each food item to life. It was enough spice to make you sweat and I had a few tears, but you never felt like you could breathe fire. I can truthfully say my pants felt tighter after the meal. I didn't think my skin was elastic enough to hold such an expansion. All in all, it was wonderful. We have so many differences in our household. Linguistically, culturally, religiously, yet, good food is a universal language. Over dinner, communication was easier. Words were replaced with smiles, sounds of joyous dining (mmmmm!), and hand and arm gestures (the thumbs up and rub of the stomach). In the moment, we could all relate and come together with ease and on common ground. We were happy consumers, sharing in the connectivity of food. After dinner, as hard as it was, we thought a walk in the park would help to digest the load we had just eaten. It was nice, relaxing. We shared stories of home and identified ways in which our cultures intersect with one another (ex: Yao Ming). It was a lovely evening and it should be a great night's sleep, I was almost too full to type.
11 September 2009 at 9:00 Montpellier time
Well it's nine o'clock and I feel as if I stopped typing, I would fall asleep and awake at the same time tomorrow. Today, I has no official duties and I spent the day doing mostly what I wanted to do. I spent the early morning and late afternoon in my café, sipping some coffee, reading, talking with a friend, and enjoying the sights of Montpellier. I love it. No matter how small the cup of coffee is, it is always worth the 2.30 euros I have to spend on it. You are paying for an experience, a hot liquid massage somehow reaching each nook and cranny of your body, relaxing and gently guiding you through a chunk of time in your day. The sights, smells, sounds are all the same. Several times I have sat right across the street on a bench in the small park facing the café and the beautiful buildings lurking behind it. The seats are relatively as comfortable and you are only about twenty feet away from the café. Basically, nothing distinguishes the two positions other than that one looks into the park and one is actually in the park facing the café. Yet, the experiences are not representative of the distance or comfort of either situation. I could stay for hours in the café. After a short time in the park, I am ready to go. I cant't explain it. The café takes a hold of me, rendering me motionless for at at least an hour. I read, think, and do whatever else one could do planted in a seat. Everyone is curious about the french diet. How do they eat such high fat, high calorie food and stay a very healthy nation. I think I have cracked that one, they walk, a lot. However, I find the café more perplexing. What are they putting in their coffee? Some secret tranquilizer that immobilizes its' victims. That makes no sense. A person like me who sits in the café far longer than his cup of coffee takes the seat away from the next paying customer. I keep them from making more money off a potential buyer. Yet, they never stare you down for lingering or try to hurry you out the door. Often, you are the one who has to ask for the check, it is not waiting for you. Maybe, I like to go to the café here in France becuase I think it is an aspect of french culture. By going to a café, I am integrating, getting to know, and becoming part of the french system of life. I enjoy it because it makes me feel more in touch with the society I have felt alienated from since I arrived. Whatever it is, the kind waitresses, the tranquilizer coffee, or me posing as a frenchman, I can't deny its potency. It's wonderful, an everyday routine adding pleasure and relaxation to my unfamiliar world.
Other than the café stops, I spent my day catching up on e-mails and blogs. I had a wonderful oppurtunity to talk to my mother, it was so nice to hear her voice. It truly made my day. I took Suzanna to a couple of the places she hadn't seen yet. The aqueducts, the Promenade du Peyrou, the Jardin des Plantes, all looking just as beautifully as the time I first saw them. That's all I got, Bon Soir!
Well it's nine o'clock and I feel as if I stopped typing, I would fall asleep and awake at the same time tomorrow. Today, I has no official duties and I spent the day doing mostly what I wanted to do. I spent the early morning and late afternoon in my café, sipping some coffee, reading, talking with a friend, and enjoying the sights of Montpellier. I love it. No matter how small the cup of coffee is, it is always worth the 2.30 euros I have to spend on it. You are paying for an experience, a hot liquid massage somehow reaching each nook and cranny of your body, relaxing and gently guiding you through a chunk of time in your day. The sights, smells, sounds are all the same. Several times I have sat right across the street on a bench in the small park facing the café and the beautiful buildings lurking behind it. The seats are relatively as comfortable and you are only about twenty feet away from the café. Basically, nothing distinguishes the two positions other than that one looks into the park and one is actually in the park facing the café. Yet, the experiences are not representative of the distance or comfort of either situation. I could stay for hours in the café. After a short time in the park, I am ready to go. I cant't explain it. The café takes a hold of me, rendering me motionless for at at least an hour. I read, think, and do whatever else one could do planted in a seat. Everyone is curious about the french diet. How do they eat such high fat, high calorie food and stay a very healthy nation. I think I have cracked that one, they walk, a lot. However, I find the café more perplexing. What are they putting in their coffee? Some secret tranquilizer that immobilizes its' victims. That makes no sense. A person like me who sits in the café far longer than his cup of coffee takes the seat away from the next paying customer. I keep them from making more money off a potential buyer. Yet, they never stare you down for lingering or try to hurry you out the door. Often, you are the one who has to ask for the check, it is not waiting for you. Maybe, I like to go to the café here in France becuase I think it is an aspect of french culture. By going to a café, I am integrating, getting to know, and becoming part of the french system of life. I enjoy it because it makes me feel more in touch with the society I have felt alienated from since I arrived. Whatever it is, the kind waitresses, the tranquilizer coffee, or me posing as a frenchman, I can't deny its potency. It's wonderful, an everyday routine adding pleasure and relaxation to my unfamiliar world.
Other than the café stops, I spent my day catching up on e-mails and blogs. I had a wonderful oppurtunity to talk to my mother, it was so nice to hear her voice. It truly made my day. I took Suzanna to a couple of the places she hadn't seen yet. The aqueducts, the Promenade du Peyrou, the Jardin des Plantes, all looking just as beautifully as the time I first saw them. That's all I got, Bon Soir!
Friday, September 11, 2009
Written 09-10 September 2009 at 8:36 Montpellier
The past two mornings have been the mornings from hell. Hours spent at those locations in France everyone knows to avoid. Even I, after only a week into my stay, have come to dread any and all official obligations leading me to one of the many government-run offices in Montpellier. The task was simple when contemplated. Go, submit a dossier I had already assembled and be granted a carte du sejour. Like many other passes of entry and residence, I wasn't too sure of its necessity other than it was demanded by the French government. I should have known it was going to be a trying experience. Whenever the process is mentioned, it is never stated as something to go get, rather, as something to go ask for. If that didn't give me a clue, the preliminary events, obtainting a certain, special stamp obligatory to the process, should have warned me that misery was on its way. When I say special, I mean special. We went to more than ten different locations looking for this rare item. Finally, after nearly three hours of search and destroyed missioned, we arrived at the Préfecture and received the stamp in less than two minutes. Then, it was off to the University of of Montpellier to ask for the carte du sejour. By this time we had been at it for a few hours, legs wobbly, stomachs growling in disappointment that mid-day lunch had not been served. We arrived, waited for almost an hour, and were finally taken back for our turn to ask permission to have a carte du sejour. If the wait and searching was not painful enough, the real agony came when the civil servicewoman told us it was not necessary for us to have a carte du sejour, our passport would do the trick. Well, that was enough for me. I have grown accustomed to this in France. Ninety percent of the battle is getting to the point where you are actually able to acquire what you are looking for. Once you are there, it's quick and painless. Give your dossier and files, get what you are looking for. The difficult part is assembling the things you need to get whatever you are trying to get. Whether photos, school papers, or official signatures, something always seems to go awry and take up far too much time. For me, When told we didn't need the card that was enough. She spoke english to me so I understood what she was saying and the justification for the change of plans seemed sufficient. However, my roommate, Qibin, who havs been so helpful in getting me to and from and acquiring the things I need, came in to help his seemingly lost roommate and seriously complicated things. I knew what was going on, she could speak english. Qibin didn't take her for her word. Here came the problem. Qibin spoke to her in french and came out unsure of the information he had heard. He didn't believe her. Mind you, he speaks good french, but I understand and speak english much better than he does either in french and she spoke to me in english. I knew what was going. However, confusion set in it when Qibin insisted that we report the situation to our director. Here it is, Qibin was confused, he didn't really know the reason why we didn't have to get the card. However, my french is not good enough to explain the entire situation to Qibin and his english is not good enough for me to have assure him in english. Welcome to the miseries of communication problems. It's a maze, no, rather a bermuda triangle where when something goes through it doesn't come out the same, it it comes out at all. We went back to the office and notified our director. This precipitated into into a twenty-minute conversation of the event, our director sighting precedents of past cases where the card was needed, Qibin dismayed over the entire ordeal, and me, standing silently, unable to enlighten the group and solve our issues. It's a scene when something doesn't go the way a french woman had expected it to go. Speech and bodily gestures rage rapidly. It seemed as though someone had a fast forward button capable of speeding up a human being. The speech is fast, colorful, and ranged in volume from low and slow to high and extremely fast. The arms flailed, the legs stomped, and hair was grabbed. The solution was that we would return the next morning to the bureau with Christelle, our director, and she would sort out the confusion. We arrived this morning for session number two. It was shorter and an even bigger waste of time. A servicemen successfully satisfied Christelle and Qibin with the original assessment I had had, yet, was incapable of relaying. We left, Christelle shouting "Vivre la France" as we exited the building. This is about the worst it gets here. It might not seem like much, but, in the moment, the world seems to stop functioning, everything beautiful and worthwhile in the world seems to die. It seems like a dream, more like a nightmare, something you wake up from with a cold sweat, running and screaming. It's not though, it's part of France and, I think it is fair to say, it's completely miserable. I recovered and had a good time later this afternoon with our new roommate, Suzanna, at a café in the Place de la Comédie. She is very very helpful and fun to talk to. I successfully closed, actually Suzanna did the work, my internet contract that proved incapable or supplying the thing it was supposed to. The past two days, despite the hellish mornings, have overall been good and I seem to be creating something of a routine in Montpellier.
The past two mornings have been the mornings from hell. Hours spent at those locations in France everyone knows to avoid. Even I, after only a week into my stay, have come to dread any and all official obligations leading me to one of the many government-run offices in Montpellier. The task was simple when contemplated. Go, submit a dossier I had already assembled and be granted a carte du sejour. Like many other passes of entry and residence, I wasn't too sure of its necessity other than it was demanded by the French government. I should have known it was going to be a trying experience. Whenever the process is mentioned, it is never stated as something to go get, rather, as something to go ask for. If that didn't give me a clue, the preliminary events, obtainting a certain, special stamp obligatory to the process, should have warned me that misery was on its way. When I say special, I mean special. We went to more than ten different locations looking for this rare item. Finally, after nearly three hours of search and destroyed missioned, we arrived at the Préfecture and received the stamp in less than two minutes. Then, it was off to the University of of Montpellier to ask for the carte du sejour. By this time we had been at it for a few hours, legs wobbly, stomachs growling in disappointment that mid-day lunch had not been served. We arrived, waited for almost an hour, and were finally taken back for our turn to ask permission to have a carte du sejour. If the wait and searching was not painful enough, the real agony came when the civil servicewoman told us it was not necessary for us to have a carte du sejour, our passport would do the trick. Well, that was enough for me. I have grown accustomed to this in France. Ninety percent of the battle is getting to the point where you are actually able to acquire what you are looking for. Once you are there, it's quick and painless. Give your dossier and files, get what you are looking for. The difficult part is assembling the things you need to get whatever you are trying to get. Whether photos, school papers, or official signatures, something always seems to go awry and take up far too much time. For me, When told we didn't need the card that was enough. She spoke english to me so I understood what she was saying and the justification for the change of plans seemed sufficient. However, my roommate, Qibin, who havs been so helpful in getting me to and from and acquiring the things I need, came in to help his seemingly lost roommate and seriously complicated things. I knew what was going on, she could speak english. Qibin didn't take her for her word. Here came the problem. Qibin spoke to her in french and came out unsure of the information he had heard. He didn't believe her. Mind you, he speaks good french, but I understand and speak english much better than he does either in french and she spoke to me in english. I knew what was going. However, confusion set in it when Qibin insisted that we report the situation to our director. Here it is, Qibin was confused, he didn't really know the reason why we didn't have to get the card. However, my french is not good enough to explain the entire situation to Qibin and his english is not good enough for me to have assure him in english. Welcome to the miseries of communication problems. It's a maze, no, rather a bermuda triangle where when something goes through it doesn't come out the same, it it comes out at all. We went back to the office and notified our director. This precipitated into into a twenty-minute conversation of the event, our director sighting precedents of past cases where the card was needed, Qibin dismayed over the entire ordeal, and me, standing silently, unable to enlighten the group and solve our issues. It's a scene when something doesn't go the way a french woman had expected it to go. Speech and bodily gestures rage rapidly. It seemed as though someone had a fast forward button capable of speeding up a human being. The speech is fast, colorful, and ranged in volume from low and slow to high and extremely fast. The arms flailed, the legs stomped, and hair was grabbed. The solution was that we would return the next morning to the bureau with Christelle, our director, and she would sort out the confusion. We arrived this morning for session number two. It was shorter and an even bigger waste of time. A servicemen successfully satisfied Christelle and Qibin with the original assessment I had had, yet, was incapable of relaying. We left, Christelle shouting "Vivre la France" as we exited the building. This is about the worst it gets here. It might not seem like much, but, in the moment, the world seems to stop functioning, everything beautiful and worthwhile in the world seems to die. It seems like a dream, more like a nightmare, something you wake up from with a cold sweat, running and screaming. It's not though, it's part of France and, I think it is fair to say, it's completely miserable. I recovered and had a good time later this afternoon with our new roommate, Suzanna, at a café in the Place de la Comédie. She is very very helpful and fun to talk to. I successfully closed, actually Suzanna did the work, my internet contract that proved incapable or supplying the thing it was supposed to. The past two days, despite the hellish mornings, have overall been good and I seem to be creating something of a routine in Montpellier.
Written 08 September 2009 at 8:15 Montpellier Time
I awoke this morning to the normal routine. A morning of mind-numbing, seemingly inconsequential errands of establishing a life in very bureaucratic France. It was a trip to the bank to get checks in which we were told we could get checks, but we would have to come back eight days later to apply for them. Some of the things we must do defty reason, seem extremely ineffecient for both the buyer and seller, the civil servant and the citizen. After the bank we went to the center of town to pick up our dossiers for our carte de sejour application, the card that alolows us to reside and work legally in France, followed by a trip to establish a bank account for our new roommate, Suzanna, and to terminate my existing internet contract?. It was nice, I had a friend to do my errands with. It seems to go much smoother with Suwanna, a german fluent in french and pretty good at italian, latin, and english. We accomplished nothing of what we set out to do, she was not having the long line at the bank and the person who sold me the internet contract was not at the store so we could not terminate the internet access I had purchased (that makes no sense to me). We returned to the aprtment for lunch and coffee, a power nap for my friends and a trip to the park for me. We returned to the city this afternoon. We parted ways. I stayed at the international house to catch up on e-mails and the other left for a day of shopping. Suzanna and I met up later on to take a second stab at the internet contract. The lady was not there, our attempt was frustrated again. We spent some time shopping for a few things my new roommate needed. We parted way, her in the direction of the local grocery while I took another walk around town. I was with people all day. I noticed I could speak a little more french, my vocabulary swelling to encompass new topics and deeper conversation. It was nothing ground-breaking but it was a definite improvement. Perhaps, I find it easier to comprehend french with a german accent attached to it than a chinese accent. Whatever it was, I could more clearly communicate my thoughts and comprehend more verbally that I have since I first landed. It can get exhausting, you never get to relax in a conversation. Your ears are always cocked, trying to transform vibrations in your ears into coherent meaning and thought. At some moments, I wish I could somehow push a button and make every person in Montpellier speak english. Nonetheless, I can see and feel an improvement in my language skills and a firmer grasp on the life I now live.
I awoke this morning to the normal routine. A morning of mind-numbing, seemingly inconsequential errands of establishing a life in very bureaucratic France. It was a trip to the bank to get checks in which we were told we could get checks, but we would have to come back eight days later to apply for them. Some of the things we must do defty reason, seem extremely ineffecient for both the buyer and seller, the civil servant and the citizen. After the bank we went to the center of town to pick up our dossiers for our carte de sejour application, the card that alolows us to reside and work legally in France, followed by a trip to establish a bank account for our new roommate, Suzanna, and to terminate my existing internet contract?. It was nice, I had a friend to do my errands with. It seems to go much smoother with Suwanna, a german fluent in french and pretty good at italian, latin, and english. We accomplished nothing of what we set out to do, she was not having the long line at the bank and the person who sold me the internet contract was not at the store so we could not terminate the internet access I had purchased (that makes no sense to me). We returned to the aprtment for lunch and coffee, a power nap for my friends and a trip to the park for me. We returned to the city this afternoon. We parted ways. I stayed at the international house to catch up on e-mails and the other left for a day of shopping. Suzanna and I met up later on to take a second stab at the internet contract. The lady was not there, our attempt was frustrated again. We spent some time shopping for a few things my new roommate needed. We parted way, her in the direction of the local grocery while I took another walk around town. I was with people all day. I noticed I could speak a little more french, my vocabulary swelling to encompass new topics and deeper conversation. It was nothing ground-breaking but it was a definite improvement. Perhaps, I find it easier to comprehend french with a german accent attached to it than a chinese accent. Whatever it was, I could more clearly communicate my thoughts and comprehend more verbally that I have since I first landed. It can get exhausting, you never get to relax in a conversation. Your ears are always cocked, trying to transform vibrations in your ears into coherent meaning and thought. At some moments, I wish I could somehow push a button and make every person in Montpellier speak english. Nonetheless, I can see and feel an improvement in my language skills and a firmer grasp on the life I now live.
Written on 07 September 2009 at 8:15 Montpellier Time
After a few errands this morning, I thought i would head to to the beach. As should be expected in France, people were free to roam nude? Yes, the infamous, nudist beaches of Europe. That place, when mentioned before I left, that inevitably led to a "Sweet Dude" response from my male, not to mention college, friends. There I was, amidst the place that intrigued me so deeply as a child watching the slide show of my parents' trip to Europe. But what I found was more National Geographic that Playboy, more reading than observing. I had to give it to these women, if males can walk bare chested around a beach, so should women. In the settting, the objects lost the sexual power they hold over us men. It was natural, consistent with the demands of the environment. There was something very egalitarian about it. Without hiding the objects of many a man's lure and other's obsession, it exemplified taking a woman for more than her sexual appeal, which, I believe is done far too often by kids my age. Perhaps that is a little too dramatic, maybe it would just be better to add it to the list of things described as french. Add it to wine, cafés, cuisine, arrogance, fashion, architecture, the arts, and protest. I guess it was odd seeing it at first, but, after a few minutes, it became a nonentity.
My final roommate arrived this evening, she is an exchange student from Germany. She seems nice and should be a pleasure to live with.
After a few errands this morning, I thought i would head to to the beach. As should be expected in France, people were free to roam nude? Yes, the infamous, nudist beaches of Europe. That place, when mentioned before I left, that inevitably led to a "Sweet Dude" response from my male, not to mention college, friends. There I was, amidst the place that intrigued me so deeply as a child watching the slide show of my parents' trip to Europe. But what I found was more National Geographic that Playboy, more reading than observing. I had to give it to these women, if males can walk bare chested around a beach, so should women. In the settting, the objects lost the sexual power they hold over us men. It was natural, consistent with the demands of the environment. There was something very egalitarian about it. Without hiding the objects of many a man's lure and other's obsession, it exemplified taking a woman for more than her sexual appeal, which, I believe is done far too often by kids my age. Perhaps that is a little too dramatic, maybe it would just be better to add it to the list of things described as french. Add it to wine, cafés, cuisine, arrogance, fashion, architecture, the arts, and protest. I guess it was odd seeing it at first, but, after a few minutes, it became a nonentity.
My final roommate arrived this evening, she is an exchange student from Germany. She seems nice and should be a pleasure to live with.
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