Adjustments

I've been in Europe for 2 1/2 weeks now, but the culture shock only really started this week, once I began living here, as opposed to traveling around. It's amazing the difference between being a traveler and being a foreigner trying to reestablish yourself in a new city. Particularly a city where most people don't speak your language. Strasbourg is different from Paris that way--while most people did grow up having learned some amount of English, they're not all guaranteed to speak English, or speak it well. It really is a French city, and people expect you to speak French.

For me, aside from the whole language barrier thing, the biggest issues with culture shock here have actually some of the smallest. One problem I've been having is smiling. Apparently, in France, you don't smile at strangers. Ever. It's not like in America how it's polite to smile and then look away if you make eye contact with a stranger. If you smile at someone it means you know them, or if you don't know them, it means you think they're cute. But smiling at people is pretty instinctive for me, and not something I can just turn off. I catch myself smiling at strangers all the time, then realizing that I probably just totally confused them. A friend of mine was actually followed around by a guy she accidentally smiled at on the tram after she got off. (She was fine, don't worry.) But hey, who knew? Smiling in France is a potentially dangerous act.

And then there's the bread. I have never eaten this much bread in my life. A traditional French breakfast? Coffee and a small baguette with butter or jam. Lunch? Your standard cheap lunch from a cafe is a sandwich, but not your typical American sandwich. Picture about a foot and a half of baguette, sliced open and filled with sandwich ingredients. And then dinner is often accompanied with guess what? More bread. And if you haven't had enough bread, there's usually a pastry somewhere in there to accompany a meal.

Now, don't get me wrong. It's all really good bread and really fresh and totally delicious. But it's almost all white bread. And if you know me, you know what a natural foods nut I am. I am just dying for some excellent whole grain breads. And I've seen them in some bakery windows, and they look great! But most things come on or with white bread. I think there is actually more whole grain breads around here than most parts of France because we are so close to Germany, which is basically the land of multigrain breads. They have more types of multigrain bread than I can count there. I just need to figure out how to get more of those. At this point, I think I would have to buy a giant loaf of whole grain bread if I want to eat some.

As I said, the trials and tribulations of adapting to living in France: a lack of smiling and an overabundance of delicious white bread.

Fist world problems? Maybe.

:)

French Alliteration: Pierre and the Purple Papillon Bus

There are few things as relaxing as collapsing onto your own bed after a 10 day odyssey through 4 cities in 3 countries with an average of 6 miles walked daily, 2 to 3 lectures a day, and a total of more than 20 hours spent riding in a pastel purple charter bus. Right now all I can think about is my bed. Well, mostly the fact that it is my bed.

That’s right, at long last, I have finally arrived in Strasbourg, and am sitting in what will, for all intensive purposes, be my room for the next 4 months. And it’s not bad. I moved in with my host family just a few hours ago, and while I’ve only seen a tiny fraction of the city, I think I’m gonna like it here. But more on all that in a later post (I promise it will come in a few days, just as soon as I'm actually settled in!). 

Now let’s get back to something worthy of discussion right now: Pierre and the Purple Papillon Bus. Title of a bilingual French and English children’s book or my main mode of transport for the last 10 days?

Yup, it’s the latter (though I do seriously think it would make an excellent children’s book). We rode around in a pastel purple bus covered in butterflies (papillon means butterfly in French) driven by a 300 pound French man named Pierre who managed to maneuver the bus around tight corners and into alleys where I never dreamed busses could go.

Did I find irony and amusement in this? You betcha. Every time I got on. 

Now you may wonder: is that really so strange? Charter busses often have funny designs on them, and maybe there are a lot of oddly colored busses in Western Europe. Well, after 10 days of travel across many roads and tourist hotspots, I can safely tell you our bus stood out like a sore thumb. That did make it quite easy to find though, so that’s a plus. However, there was always that slight unavoidable cringe you felt when standing on a crowded Parisian street and the purple papillon bus drove up. We weren’t just that group of obviously American college kids, we were that group of obviously American college kids getting on the gaudiest tourist bus in Paris. It was at once both a point of pride and shame. But I did grow to have a certain fondness for that purple papillon bus. But mostly for Pierre. Which is why it seems fitting that my post to close out the traveling seminar part of my study abroad experience should be an ode to Pierre.

I have this theory that Pierre moonlights as a getaway car driver for heists across Europe. He’s far too good at his job to be just a bus driver. No one has that much dexterity behind the wheel by accident. And the way he’s always just sitting there calmly, amused by us Americans, but never saying anything--it’s not actually the language barrier between him not knowing any English and us not being particularly good at French like he wants us to assume, Pierre is actually fluent in 10 languages and 14 distinct regional dialects found across Europe. Oh, and he has a photographic memory so keeps perfect mental map of all the major cities of Europe, including back alleys and a mental record of what the maximum size vehicle is that can fit down each street. 

I swear, there’s definitely more to Pierre and the Purple Papillon Bus than meets the eye. I can’t say I will miss the hours spent riding around in that bus, but I do say goodbye to Pierre and the bus with a certain degree of affection.

Now that I've written it out, I think maybe this story would make a better action movie than children’s book. Pierre would be a pretty stellar action hero. Either way, neither story is being written tonight. At long last my journey of more miles than I have the mental capacity to attempt to calculate right now is over, and the next adventure starts in the morning.

Right now?

Bedtime.

Things I’ve Learned While Traveling Through Europe

This is the first post in a series highlighting what I've learned through experience and observation while in Europe this semester. Some things are practical, many are just plain silly, and all are based on actual events, though not all of them happened directly to me.

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Rule #1:

Street food is good, particularly crepes in France, waffles and oliebollen (dutch donuts) in Holland, and fries anywhere.

Rule #2:

Don’t stand in bike lanes in Amsterdam. Ever. And if someone shouts “bike!” you dive out of the way.

They will run you over. And you are severely outnumbered by them.

Rule #3:

Be open to trying different foods, because the wurst can often be the best. At least in Aachen, where the Hanswurst restaurant proved to be super cool and fun, thanks to an awesome waiter. 

It was a self service restaurant, and the waiter liked us so much he actually served us at the table :)

Rule #4:

Watch out for homicidal pigeons. They aim to take out bicyclists.

Rule #5:

The red light district in Amsterdam is million times less sketchy before 10pm. If you want to check it out, definitely go before then. And don’t get lost there. Bad idea.

Rule #6:

Don’t let drunk people wander by the water. The paths go right up to the water, and no one wants to dive in and rescue you from the Seine.

Rule #7:

Eat a hearty breakfast. Hotels make good breakfasts.

Rule #8:

Try the local specialties of food and beverages.

Rule #9:

Have a map of the city you’re in with your hotel circled on it with you. It will come in handy.

Rule #10:

Learn at least the minimal necessary phrases to get by in whatever country you’re in. Unless you’re in Holland--they pretty much all speak fluent English in addition to Dutch. Things like “Do you speak english?”, “I don’t speak ______”, “I would like ______”, “How much?”, "Where is the _______?", “Thank you”, “Toilet”, “Wine”, and “Beer” should get you by ok.

Rule #11:

Don’t be surprised if you see super heroes roaming Europe. Spider Man and Super Man sometimes walk around Amsterdam and “Batman Live” is playing in Cologne. 

Rule #12:

Make friends with your waiters and especially your bartenders. They tend to be cool people and tell you fun, interesting stories and good places to go.

Rule #13:

Listen to prophetic German grandfathers. If one starts following you and your friends through the street at an ambling pace, and then comes up to you in front of a more than 1,000 year old cathedral and strikes up a conversation, telling one of your friends that he will remember where she is from and she will be famous 1,000 years from now, and then walks away, you should believe him. And make sure to snap a picture before he disappears. 

It’s like walking into a movie...

Being in Paris is like walking into a movie. But, like actually. 


As I’ve walked through this city the past few days, it strikes me just how much of my knowledge of Europe, and particularly Paris, is shaped by film. It seems everywhere I go, little things about Paris evoke movie scenes in my head. It makes me feel like a silly little American, but in a way it’s kind of cool to see the real places that I’ve seen depicted in numerous films, and realize how those films inform my perception of the city.

One of the first things I remember noticing about Paris was on the drive from the airport to our hotel on my second morning in 18 hours. It was the police sirens. Parisian (and I think European in general) police sirens have a particular sound, that is quite distinct from American ones. It was something I instantly recognized though. Those sirens were a sound I’d heard many times over in movie car chases. Several different scenes from the Bourne movie series began playing through my head immediately. 

What does it say about me that the first thing I recognized in Paris were the police sirens that I’d heard in the Bourne movie series?

I know it’s a weird association to be the first that comes to mind, but I think I’ve watched those movies enough times to make Matt Damon racing through the streets of Europe in a bullet-ridden car the thing I associate most with that sound. My dad and I also just watched the second one the day before I left, so that might have had something to do with it.

There are other movies too though, ones that are a little more obvious. I’ve seen the Notre Dame several times now, and even went inside once. Without fail, every time I see it, the song “The Bells of Notre Dame” from the Disney movie of The Hunchback of Notre Dame immediately pops into my head.

Even when someone just mentions the Notre Dame I start to hear that song. And its actually just the chorus that goes through my head, so it’s just the same line (“The Belllllllllls ooooooooooof Nooooootreeeee Daaaaaaaaaaaammeeeeee!!!!!”) over and over again. In fact, it’s going through my head right now. It’s a great song, but at this point I’m quite sick of it. And we’ve still got another day in Paris.

I also saw Midnight In Paris last week, Woodey Allen’s new movie where Owen Wilson plays a writer completely enamored with Paris who magically gets transported back in time to Paris in the 1920s and meets the famous authors of that time. It’s a very cute film and I really enjoyed it. The entire movie is basically about the magic of Paris. As I was walking around the city, I kept expecting to feel like I was in that movie and be swept up in the magic of it all like Owen Wilson was, but it didn’t happen. Paris was definitely pretty, there was no doubt about that, but I didn’t really see the magic, what was so enthralling and spellbinding about the place. It just seemed like another city, only with nicer architecture.

But then, yesterday after all our group touring around was done (imagine a group of 30 + college students wandering around Paris all snapping photos at the same time. yep, we’re those tourists), three friends and I decided to wander around on our own rather than go straight back to the hotel on the group bus from where we were at the Notre Dame (“The bells of Notre Dame!”). We started walking through the nearby streets as the sun finished setting and the sky quickly darkened completely, prompting Paris to light itself up. 

Wandering through Paris at night is a completely different experience than during the day. Everything is well lit, and not just easy to see, but tastefully lit, as if to emphasize the prettiest parts of all the buildings. And the lights of the storefronts and street cafes somehow just fold seamlessly into the whole facade. All the shops and cafes I’d seen earlier that day looked somehow different at night. Things were more vibrant, and the streets seemed to transform into something less ordinary and altogether more memorable. 

There was a moment as I walked out of a corner grocery store onto an empty alley, waiting for my friends. It was just a narrow cobblestone road sloping around a corner completely devoid of people and storefronts, but with pretty buildings and lined with subtly twinkling street lamps. In that moment, I felt it. All that magic of Paris that everyone was talking about, the reason people fall in love with the city, why it’s such an enchanting place--I got it in that moment. I also felt like I had strayed into a scene from Midnight In Paris, and looked out, expecting to see if a magic car that would take me back to the 20s would appear around the corner.

Silly me, it was only 7 o’clock. Maybe tomorrow I’ll try again at midnight.

:)

So It Begins...

This is the first of my posts chronicling my semester abroad. Rather than just a stream of conscience blog of my day to day life, many of these are more of creative vignettes about my experiences. They might be a bit embellished or altered from the truth. So read them with a little pinch of salt.

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I can never get comfortable in these chairs. There’s just something about the uniform black airport chair that is distinctly un-comfortable. I think they were purposefully designed to be just barely not wide enough, so that it always feels awkward sitting in them. Or maybe it's just the countless number of butts that have worn away at them. 


This chair could be in any airport, and god knows I’ve sat in hundreds of chairs just like it. Today it’s a little different though; not the chair, but the scenario. Today I’m sitting at Terminal 3 in JFK airport, waiting for a plane to Europe.

Actually, I’m waiting for the group of people I’m supposed to fly to Europe with. None of whom I know. Or have any idea what they look like.

The marker I’m looking for to tell me it’s them are big luggage tags in the somewhat audacious and gaudy combination of navy blue and vibrant orange. Syracuse’s colors. If nothing else, I can say they certainly stand out. Those same tags are on my suitcases, like a colored alarm bell announcing my presence. Till my comrades in clashing colors appear, I wait. And people watch.

People watching at airports is one of my favorite activities. LAX and JFK are particularly excellent places for people watching. From small women with 10-inch afros in business suits to men with guitar cases wearing sunglasses and snake-skin boots, there’s always someone interesting. I like imagining their stories--why they’re here, where their going, what’s waiting for them.

We’re only two days into 2012--January 2nd--so most of the people I see are headed home. But I’m doing just the opposite. I’m about to board a plane to France and not set foot in the United States again for five months. I’m starting a study abroad program run by Syracuse University in Strasbourg. If you don’t know where Strasbourg is, (which I hadn’t a year ago) it’s in northern France, in Alsace, on the German border. Which means, climate-wise, I’m headed to a place where the weather will be somewhere between that of Oberlin and D.C. all semester, and apparently about as grey as Seattle. Coincidentally, I’ve lived in all three places in the last year.

Despite all that, Strasbourg is said to be a beautiful old city, and the 9th largest in France. They speak both French and German there, but considering I have only a semester and half of French under my belt and speak about 5 phrases of German, I will probably be a bit confused for a while. On the bright side, I’ll know much more French and German when I return. 

So, what am I doing there? Why did I pick an obscure cold French city to study abroad in? And why the hell didn’t I pick a place where I can actually communicate with people?

Well, I seem to have a knack for taking interest in somewhat obscure things. Oberlin sends students on Syracuse study abroad programs every year, but I’m the first person to go on the program in Strasbourg in over five years. So, I have some semblance of an idea of what I’m getting into. But do I actually have a clear concept of what it will be like? Not so much. And that’s the exciting-but-still-kinda-scary-in-some-ways part.

Most of Strasbourg supposedly looks like the image above. But there is one very large, very new looking building. And honestly, even just from the pictures, it really sticks out like a sore thumb in that city. But I think I can say that without it, I wouldn’t be going to Strasbourg.

This is the European Parliament, which actually looks quite pretty all lit up, with its floors upon floors of wall-to-wall glass windows and that weird dome-like thing in the center, and definitely a bit incongruous. Strasbourg is the official seat of the European Parliament. But I bet you didn’t even know that. It’s actually kind of confusing because when you think of the European Union, you think of Brussels, right? (Unless of course you don’t think of the European Union much at all and have no interest in European politics, in which case, I ask you to just bear with me a moment) 

Well, it’s not just Brussels. I had to look this up too. Turns out, the governing institutions of the European Union are spread between Brussels, Luxembourg, and Strasbourg. Brussels is the primary seat though, and every institution is based there to at least some extent. But the parliament meets and votes in Strasbourg.

And that is why the politics based Syracuse program is located there and I, as a politics major, ended up waiting in an airport to fly there for the next 4 and a half months. 

Ok, there’s a little more to it. 

I didn’t just want a politics program, I wanted a program on which I could learn French.

I decided to learn French about a year ago. Call it lack of foresight if you want. I already speak decent Spanish, and I wanted to learn French, because I figure if I can communicate in English, Spanish, and French, I can get by in more regions of the world except Asia (yes, I’m aware Asia is a very large, very important region, but learning Chinese is a way bigger time investment than French). I’ve also never been to Europe. Despite having done lots of traveling, I’ve never made it anywhere on the continent. So, all in all, Strasbourg sounded like a good idea.

As I sit in the terminal though, I’m a bit less sure than before. I’m pretty sure every apprehensive though I could possibly have has zipped through my head in the last 20 minutes. Like a bunch of those European trains that actually move really fast, unlike American ones. I’m gonna be in Europe in less than 12 hours. That’s a crazy thought. I’m definitely nervous, but there’s also a somewhat giddy feeling underneath that, looking forward to what is to come. It’s the knowledge that I’m starting a new adventure, and it’s gonna be unexpected. I think that emotion is excitement.

I’m excited, but also nervous. But I think that’s where I should be right now--halfway between scared shitless and totally ecstatic. And I think I just saw some vibrant orange luggage tags enter the terminal.

Time to go.