I’m sitting here at the Carrefour Bar, and Isabelle just walked by on the Rue d’Italie. She didn’t see me. Perhaps she’s going out to do some marketing for dinner. On the way here I stopped at a store down the street and bought a bottle of rose wine that I’ll contribute for tonight’s dinner. This morning Isabelle told me that her friend Catherine who I like so much is coming to dinner tonight. I’m looking forward to seeing Catherine again, and I sense this will be a much more comfortable evening than the couscous dinner.
In addition to enjoying the routine at school, this week I also find I’m much more comfortable at Isabelle’s. Now that her daughter Christine has left, I feel much better about my living situation. And since I know I can have Henri Tomas’ croissants in Bonnieux every day for the next five weeks beginning on Sunday, I’ve even accepted having yoghurt and toast for breakfast in the morning. I plan to continue my daily yoghurt diet, but I’ll be substituting croissants for the toast next week!
There’s another student at Isabelle’s this week, a young Italian man named Fillippo. He is 19 years old, from near Bologna, very tall and very handsome. The first night I didn’t think he understood or spoke French well at all, but he has turned out to be in class 6, so maybe he's just shy. Fillippo doesn’t eat any vegetables or fruit, which Isabelle finds shocking, since fresh farm produce is so plentiful and important in the Provençal diet. This has given her a new challenge in her dinner preparations. Isabelle seems to have bonded with Fillippo though, perhaps a motherly thing. I’ve been away the last two nights for dinner, and when I came home last night late, she and Fillippo were sitting in the dark in the living room, watching television together.
Isabelle and le grand Fillippo
Here’s something funny that Fillippo told me. On Monday night, his second night here, I suggested we go out for a little walk after dinner. I showed him the Rue d’Italie and the various shops, and then bought him a beer at the Carrefour Bar. It turned out that he had spent a month last summer going to school in America, in Ontario, California. (This is a place I know somewhat, since my former company had a plant there and I’ve been there several times.) He asked me if my family was like other American families and didn’t have a proper dinner together at night. Apparently the American family he stayed with last summer didn’t ever sit down together for dinner. Everyone just grabbed food out of the refrigerator at different times and ate kind of on the run. He thought that was the way all American families lived.
Here’s a similar story. When I said I was from Tennessee, Andrias from my class asked me if this was a part of the USA where brothers and sisters got married! (Mais non, non, non!!!) These are good examples of misunderstanding other cultures and developing stereotypes. It's always interesting to learn the impressions people from other countries have about America.
My relationship with Isabelle is much better this week. I like her and I think I was too critical the first two weeks. Perhaps the living environment was different because Christine was there most of that time. I talked to Marie-France yesterday in my private lesson about my experience at the couscous dinner, which was so different than my previous experiences in France. She thought that this really was more about the younger generation, many of whom don’t reflect the emphasis on manners has always been so important in France.
Isabelle and I are conversing much more easily now, and I’m sure my improved French skills help. Isabelle took my photo at breakfast this morning and showed me a book of photos she has of all her students. She has a page for each student, headed with the student’s name, town, country, age and length of stay. There’s a photo of the student and each one has written something to her. She has each student numbered. I am student 268!!!! Incroyable!!! No wonder I am not a novelty! Over some ten years, Isabelle has hosted almost 270 students! I looked quickly through the book. She has had students of all ages and races, staying with her anywhere from six days to over three months, and from so many different countries. The youngest student in this particular volume was only 15 the oldest was 72. (The average age of the students at the IS school is about 37.)
My comfort zone has definitely expanded during the past three weeks....
Comments (1)
Kathy,
Toby here, from Slow Trav and our too-brief meeting in Bonnieux a couple of years ago.
I've really enjoyed reading about your experience at the language school. We're taking lessons here in the States, but at some point we'll likely do something similar. I absolutely MUST keep up with our daughter, who attends a French language school; she's not going to have conversations with her friends right in front of me that I can't understand! ;)
As for your couscous dinner, I think your woes might have been a combination of just *feeling* like an outsider and a group of people who kind of saw you as a "non-entity." Unfortunate.
Your "stereotype" stories really made me laugh. Being from Texas, a state rife with stereotypes, I can certainly relate. I can't count the number of people who have asked me over the years how many horses I own, and how big my ranch is!
Your travels are making me jealous! We won't get back to France until next summer, when we plan on spending a few weeks on a self-hire barge in Alsace.
A bientot, and keep posting!
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July 6, 2007 11:21 PM
Posted on July 6, 2007 23:21