One of my faithful readers (perhaps the only one remaining) has just e-mailed me for the second time in as many months asking for my blog address, again. She is apparently very embarrassed that she keeps losing it (as well she should be--one would think that someone who earns a living as an IT journalist would know how to bookmark a website!) and promises that she will never lose it again, because she's going to have the address tattooed on her left buttock.
So I thought that if she's willing to submit to bodily mutilation to be able to read my blog again, the least I can do is give her something new to read.
Here's a summary of the past month of my life:
- August 21: furniture and belongings finally delivered from France, after weeks of delays and annoying negotiations with French moving company and U.S. moving agent about whose fault it was that the shipment was stuck in the U.S. customs port for 10 days, incurring $1500 in additional storage costs, and who had to pay aforementioned costs. (Good news: it wasn't me!)
- August 22-25: unpacked bedding, so as to be able to start sleeping in my new apartment in St. Paul; moved most other belongings from temporary apartment in Minneapolis to permanent new place in St. Paul; waited in vain for my passport and West Africa visa to arrive from DC in time for my scheduled August 24 departure for West Africa; had to delay trip 2 days; do not unpack any boxes (except aforementioned bedding).
- August 26-September 6: go to West Africa (see two previous posts); get dysentery.
- September 7-12: return to St. Paul for a business conference; recover from dysentery; prepare for trip to North Africa; do not unpack any boxes.
- September 13: get phone call from mother at 7 a.m. (confusedly try to answer cell phone on nightstand, pulling charger out of plug and flinging cell phone across room before realizing that it's actually the fixed line ringing in the other room) to tell me that my father is hospitalized with acute pancreatitis. Spend day waiting to hear how serious it is, to determine whether I should delay trip to North Africa. Also discover car is leaking oil, so scurry to find trustworthy garage open on Saturday in new hometown and try to decide if should leave car in garage while away or must keep car to rush to Mankato if father is seriously ill. Or maybe shouldn't drive to Mankato in car leaking oil. Or if father not too ill, need car to drive to friends' joint birthday party that night. But really should get car fixed while away. And so on with decision loop until news arrives that father will be okay, just needs gall bladder removed; I should go to North Africa; I find car garage open on Saturday and leave car there and friends drive me to party; do not unpack any boxes.
- September 14-19: go to North Africa; do not get dysentery; call mother on Tuesday, hear that father is doing well, she promises to let me know if any changes; call mother on Thursday, find out father has been in ICU since Tuesday night (she didn't call because she "didn't want to worry" me) due to seizure, chest cavity filled with blood, collapsed lung, other badness; she assures me father will be okay now; get off phone and decide that it's stupid to remain in North Africa on Friday when only have one meeting scheduled, so call travel agent and get departure moved from Saturday the 20th to Friday the 19th; arrive at MSP at 10 p.m. on Friday. (Note to self: for future trips, if have choice, will always choose to have dysentery myself rather than father with blood-filled chest cavity.)
- September 20-21 and beyond: in Mankato, sitting with father and family at hospital. Dad got out of ICU on Friday evening and is gradually getting better. We're still waiting for the inflammation of his pancreas to go down (extra credit to those of you taking Biology this semester: please describe the location and function of the pancreas, or simply donate your own for my father's use), and then they'll remove his gall bladder. Maybe later this week, or maybe he'll come home for a few weeks and then go back in for the surgery.
For the time being, my boxes remained packed and piled in unnavigable and teetering towers in my new apartment. But they'll get unpacked eventually (maybe by Christmas?!). They're not going anywhere, and neither am I. Right now, I'm glad to be living in Minnesota, right where my family needs me to be.
I might even be willing to get that tattooed on my left buttock.
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Saturday, September 6, 2008
My Fabulous Jet-Setting Life
I'm back in Paris' Charles de Gaulle airport (I think this is my 4th post from here--please can I just write "CDG" and trust that my readers are sufficiently cosmopolitan to understand) and was all set to taunt you with the fabulousness of my life: the food poisoning followed by days of an all toast-and-Sprite diet, the hours of waiting in a hot and humid airport for a midnight flight, the night spent in a cramped seat praying for it all to be over, followed by my morning ablutions in an airport bathroom (I washed my face with hand soap and then realized that the airport roller towel was jammed and I was going to have to dry my face on a soggy and previously used bit of cloth). But they've started boarding my 7? 8? hour flight to JFK, which will be followed by a 3-hour flight MSP.
I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to doing this all over again a week from tomorrow, when I leave for North Africa! I'd be glad to trade this glamourous life for two straight weeks at home to start unpacking the boxes from my move. OK, I'm off to sit in a teeny tiny seat some more.
P.S. This morning, at the airport snack stand, I discovered that the correct English translation of croissant is apparently "milk-bread pastry." I just thought you should know!
I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to doing this all over again a week from tomorrow, when I leave for North Africa! I'd be glad to trade this glamourous life for two straight weeks at home to start unpacking the boxes from my move. OK, I'm off to sit in a teeny tiny seat some more.
P.S. This morning, at the airport snack stand, I discovered that the correct English translation of croissant is apparently "milk-bread pastry." I just thought you should know!
Monday, September 1, 2008
Family Matters
On Sunday, one of my colleagues at the Corporation's local affiliate in West Africa asked me to attend the presentation of his new baby at church. I asked him if it was his son's baptism, and he explained that he's an evangelical Christian, so they only do adult baptism, but this would be the formal presentation of his son to the congregation, and mark his entry into the church community. I felt very honored by this invitation: the opportunity to witness this important event in a friend's life, to meet his family, and to experience a church service in this country. Not even the realization that much of my day was bound to be spent without air-conditioning could dampen my soon-to-be-sweat-soaked spirits.
The church is in a new building, made of concrete cinder blocks (you can see the walls in the photo below), with a corrugated metal roof. There were huge industrial-sized fans everywhere, so the temperature was bearable until about the last half hour or so. The congregation was seated in those plastic/resin lawn chairs, and I would estimate there were about 500 people there. They had a band (big drums, trumpets, electric guitars, etc.) and sound system with enormous speakers. The preachers (there were several, and the entire service was bilingual, with everything translated from French to English and vice versa--why, I'm not sure, since this country is almost entirely francophone, although it did have the benefit of making the service twice as long) were good, old-fashioned, fire-and-brimstoners, shouting for our salvation. Imagine all that amplified noise reverberating off bare concrete walls and a metal roof! I didn't even realize exactly how loud it was during the sermon until I saw a woman one row ahead of me taking her baby out of the church. As she was leaving, I vaguely wondered why, and then when she was just a few feet away from me, I saw from the baby's face that she was obviously crying very loudly. And I couldn't hear a peep from her, nothing but the sermon. Wow.
But I can tell you that for any of you who were worshipping God in a quiet, WASP-y way yesterday, that we made up for your lack of enthusiasm: Jesus was praised in West Africa! Shortly after I arrived, the preacher announced that now we would stand up and sing and dance and celebrate God. And so we did! The band played, the choir and the congregation sang, and everyone danced to the beat of the African gospel drums. Just in case the sound system didn't get the praise out into the whole neighborhood, many of the congregants had their own party-makers with them. A lot of people had white handkerchiefs that they waved in the air as they sang (or during important moments of the sermon); brightly colored plastic whistles were also a popular way to add to the jubilant noise; and I saw a couple of tambourines and paper trumpets out in the congregation as well.
My favorite part of the service was the celebration of the events of August. They asked people to come forward for marriage dedications, and at first I thought that it was some kind of blessing to follow up civil marriage ceremonies. It turned out that it was a blessing for all the couples who had a wedding anniversary in August. They were asked up on the stage/altar area and danced together to celebrate the gift of another year together. Then everyone clapped for them, and the couples cut a special cake and fed some to each other (after the service, the cake was broken into little crumbs, like communion bread, and distributed to the whole congregation). It was really quite lovely. After the marriage dedications, then people brought forth their babies for presentation. There were half a dozen or so being presented yesterday, and we crowded up to the front to stand in support of our colleague. Although the babies weren't baptized, the preachers anointed them with oil (literally, from a plastic bottle of vegetable oil).
Another colleague was supposed to pick me up at the hotel between 9:30 and 9:45 on Sunday morning, so I assumed that meant that the service would begin at 10 am. Since my ride didn't show up until 10:30, and when we arrived at the church shortly before 11, the service was already well under way, I guess I'll never know exactly when it really started. But that didn't seem to matter much--the baby-presenting family was just driving up as we got to the church, and the service ended at about 1 pm.
The church is in a new building, made of concrete cinder blocks (you can see the walls in the photo below), with a corrugated metal roof. There were huge industrial-sized fans everywhere, so the temperature was bearable until about the last half hour or so. The congregation was seated in those plastic/resin lawn chairs, and I would estimate there were about 500 people there. They had a band (big drums, trumpets, electric guitars, etc.) and sound system with enormous speakers. The preachers (there were several, and the entire service was bilingual, with everything translated from French to English and vice versa--why, I'm not sure, since this country is almost entirely francophone, although it did have the benefit of making the service twice as long) were good, old-fashioned, fire-and-brimstoners, shouting for our salvation. Imagine all that amplified noise reverberating off bare concrete walls and a metal roof! I didn't even realize exactly how loud it was during the sermon until I saw a woman one row ahead of me taking her baby out of the church. As she was leaving, I vaguely wondered why, and then when she was just a few feet away from me, I saw from the baby's face that she was obviously crying very loudly. And I couldn't hear a peep from her, nothing but the sermon. Wow.
But I can tell you that for any of you who were worshipping God in a quiet, WASP-y way yesterday, that we made up for your lack of enthusiasm: Jesus was praised in West Africa! Shortly after I arrived, the preacher announced that now we would stand up and sing and dance and celebrate God. And so we did! The band played, the choir and the congregation sang, and everyone danced to the beat of the African gospel drums. Just in case the sound system didn't get the praise out into the whole neighborhood, many of the congregants had their own party-makers with them. A lot of people had white handkerchiefs that they waved in the air as they sang (or during important moments of the sermon); brightly colored plastic whistles were also a popular way to add to the jubilant noise; and I saw a couple of tambourines and paper trumpets out in the congregation as well.
My favorite part of the service was the celebration of the events of August. They asked people to come forward for marriage dedications, and at first I thought that it was some kind of blessing to follow up civil marriage ceremonies. It turned out that it was a blessing for all the couples who had a wedding anniversary in August. They were asked up on the stage/altar area and danced together to celebrate the gift of another year together. Then everyone clapped for them, and the couples cut a special cake and fed some to each other (after the service, the cake was broken into little crumbs, like communion bread, and distributed to the whole congregation). It was really quite lovely. After the marriage dedications, then people brought forth their babies for presentation. There were half a dozen or so being presented yesterday, and we crowded up to the front to stand in support of our colleague. Although the babies weren't baptized, the preachers anointed them with oil (literally, from a plastic bottle of vegetable oil).
The first photo shows me and several colleagues with the baby and his mother (to my right, in light blue) in the church after the service.
The second photo is of a few colleagues at the lunch reception--the man in dark blue is the baby's father, and the woman is his mother.
It's very interesting to me to talk to people here about their families. This is a country where polygamy was historically very common, although it's less so today. The father of one of my colleagues (the one in the black and white outfit, on the far left of both photos) had eight wives--my colleague's mother was the last one. When I asked him how it worked, if the wives fought or were jealous of each other, he just laughed and said that it all depended on how the husband handled everything. His father had a total of 48 children, and the family all lived together in a sort of complex with many houses. His father died several years ago, and all of the siblings gather once a year in memory of the father and to have a sort of family meeting, led by the eldest brother. They catch up on each others' news, support each others' business endeavors, and make sure that the youngest children have what they need to finish school (the youngest sister, who is my colleague's sister "same father-same mother" is still in college).
My colleague thinks that in the past, polygamy was a demographic necessity. There just weren't enough men, because of wars and the ravages of slavery. As the gender gap has narrowed, fewer men today are polygamous. My colleague who has 47 siblings has just one wife and one son and is very concerned because his new job at the Corporation here in the south of the country means that his wife is going to have to quit her job in the north to move here to be with him. He feels guilty that her career is taking second place to his and tells me proudly how good she is at her job. He also called her on his cell phone after the church service yesterday, so that she would be able to "meet" me over the phone, and yesterday evening, he stopped by the hotel with his little 7 year-old son, to introduce him to me as well.
It's really very touching to see how attached these men are to their families. When I was here in May, the father of the baby who was presented at church yesterday told me all about the maternity leave system and the problems he and his wife had to find good childcare for their two sons. In June, one of my colleagues in Washington was getting married, and the team in West Africa sent him a really beautiful e-mail, congratulating him on "this wonderful event in the life of a man." That phrase really struck me--maybe I'm wrong, but in the U.S., it seems to me that although we may congratulate a man on his engagement or his marriage, we really treat weddings as being more emotionally significant to the woman.
I come to this place full of judgement on the inherent sexism of polygamy and leave very moved by the grace and dedication the men I've met show to their families.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Back Where I Belong
My French is very good. (Not really--see my comment on my last post, but I wanted to throw Ann off the trail of this new post.) Real topic: I'm in Paris! Specifically, I'm at Charles de Gaulle airport outside of Paris, and since I never went through immigration or showed anyone my passport, I suppose it could be argued from the standpoint of international law that I am not actually on French territory right now. But most people around me are speaking French; many things are not clean and perfect; and at 7:45 in the morning, someone's already been mean to me. I'm home, and all is well with the world again!Unfortunately, this uncomfortable airport seat is as close as I'll get to Nirvana on this trip. I'm only in CDG for five hours, on a layover on my way back to West Africa for a week and a half for work. And my plans for a three-day stopover in Paris to see friends and stock up on staples, like fleur de sel, unavailable in the frontier wilderness where I now live, have been foiled by the West Africans changing the work schedule last week without telling me. Someday, I may forgive them.
Instead, I can only try to console myself with a decent croissant and perhaps some real yogurt.
If any of my French readers see this today, Wednesday, August 27, they can give me a call on my French cell phone until about 13h!
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Context, Part 2
My French is very good. And it should be: I started studying French in high school; I majored in French in college; I have a master's degree in French Studies; and I have lived and studied and worked in France on four separate occasions for a total of about eight years, or one-fifth of my life. My French is not perfect--I have an accent, and I make grammatical mistakes, and there are words I don't know--but it is very good, and there are basically no life situations or conversations or reading material that I don't think I could handle just fine in French.
But I still often feel like I only understand a fraction of what's going on around me while I'm in France. Why? Because even after all my studies and all my time there, I still lack huge portions of French cultural context. Most of the background, the subtext, the soundtrack, the footnotes of conversation and posters and the daily noise that make up our interactions with the world around us get filtered out by my brain when I'm in France because they seem to be just noise, with no meaning or importance. I can't even tell you how much I miss, because there's absolutely no way for me to judge how much cultural information is around me that I'm simply unaware of. All I can say is that there are a lot of inside jokes that go right over my head.
When I first moved to France in 2002, I was over at some friends' one night while they were watching Qui veut gagner des millions ? (the French knock-off of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?). There was a new contestant who was at the easiest level, and my friends were outraged at how easy the questions were: "Everyone knows that!" "Our five year-old could answer that one!" and so on. I finally told them, very quietly, that I had absolutely no idea what the answers were to any of the questions--that I'd never even heard of the topics. My friends stared at me like I was brain-damaged. They didn't realize how culturally specific the questions were, and how rooted in French history and pop culture. The challenge of living in a foreign country is how very often you feel stupid, just because you don't have the same knowledge, the same cultural context, as most people around you.
There are some examples of insider details that I did understand, but they're few and far between, and I'm inordinately proud of them. A couple that come to mind:
1) The chain of movie theaters that I went to regularly, UGC, had an ad that it ran before most movies. The screen showed a dark blue background, with bubbles floating up, as if it were filmed underwater. Words flashed rapidly across the screen (in French): "Anguish," "Stress," "Anger," "Rushed," "Long Lines," "Movie Sold Out." Then the words "UGC Prompto: The Anti-Stress of Cinema [phone number]" would come up, advertising the way to reserve your movie tickets ahead of time. Okay, fine. I'm guessing that most good French students would be able to understand all the text in the ad with no problem and would probably assume that the underwater bubbles were just some random background graphic chosen for no particular reason. But any native speaker would look at those bubbles and mentally identify them with the French word "bulles," bringing to mind the French expression "avoir les bulles," which literally means "to have bubbles" and figuratively means to be upset or angry about something. The bubble graphic was (subliminally?) underlining the angry, upset words flashing across the screen, and I was always very pleased to "get" that one.
2) One of my co-workers at the office was very plugged in to the French political scene because his mother was mayor of a small town in the South. One day last summer, he was telling me about the rumor that President Nicolas Sarkozy was actually separated from his wife Célia; that she was being paid some specific amount for each public appearance that she made with him; that their divorce would be announced in the coming year, once his presidency was more established; and that Célia was already in a relationship with a man named Marc Lévy. I responded, "Et si c'était vrai !" ("And if it were true!"), which made us both laugh. What was so funny about my seemingly banal expression of surprise/disbelief to all these stories? Well, Marc Lévy is a contemporary French author, and Et si c'était vrai is the title of one his most popular novels (made into the movie Just Like Heaven, starring Reese Witherspoon and Mark Ruffalo, in the U.S.), so my response was actually a mild little pun. I love verbal banter, but the opportunities for me to make even this kind of very weak pun were very, very rare in France, just because it was unusual for me to have the context, to recognize the names of all the people involved and rapidly be able to pull in a relevant comment about one of them.
So, after six years of feeling like I'm missing out on a lot of what's going on around me, what is it like for me to be re-immersed in my native context? Stay tuned for Part 3 . . .
But I still often feel like I only understand a fraction of what's going on around me while I'm in France. Why? Because even after all my studies and all my time there, I still lack huge portions of French cultural context. Most of the background, the subtext, the soundtrack, the footnotes of conversation and posters and the daily noise that make up our interactions with the world around us get filtered out by my brain when I'm in France because they seem to be just noise, with no meaning or importance. I can't even tell you how much I miss, because there's absolutely no way for me to judge how much cultural information is around me that I'm simply unaware of. All I can say is that there are a lot of inside jokes that go right over my head.
When I first moved to France in 2002, I was over at some friends' one night while they were watching Qui veut gagner des millions ? (the French knock-off of Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?). There was a new contestant who was at the easiest level, and my friends were outraged at how easy the questions were: "Everyone knows that!" "Our five year-old could answer that one!" and so on. I finally told them, very quietly, that I had absolutely no idea what the answers were to any of the questions--that I'd never even heard of the topics. My friends stared at me like I was brain-damaged. They didn't realize how culturally specific the questions were, and how rooted in French history and pop culture. The challenge of living in a foreign country is how very often you feel stupid, just because you don't have the same knowledge, the same cultural context, as most people around you.
There are some examples of insider details that I did understand, but they're few and far between, and I'm inordinately proud of them. A couple that come to mind:
1) The chain of movie theaters that I went to regularly, UGC, had an ad that it ran before most movies. The screen showed a dark blue background, with bubbles floating up, as if it were filmed underwater. Words flashed rapidly across the screen (in French): "Anguish," "Stress," "Anger," "Rushed," "Long Lines," "Movie Sold Out." Then the words "UGC Prompto: The Anti-Stress of Cinema [phone number]" would come up, advertising the way to reserve your movie tickets ahead of time. Okay, fine. I'm guessing that most good French students would be able to understand all the text in the ad with no problem and would probably assume that the underwater bubbles were just some random background graphic chosen for no particular reason. But any native speaker would look at those bubbles and mentally identify them with the French word "bulles," bringing to mind the French expression "avoir les bulles," which literally means "to have bubbles" and figuratively means to be upset or angry about something. The bubble graphic was (subliminally?) underlining the angry, upset words flashing across the screen, and I was always very pleased to "get" that one.
2) One of my co-workers at the office was very plugged in to the French political scene because his mother was mayor of a small town in the South. One day last summer, he was telling me about the rumor that President Nicolas Sarkozy was actually separated from his wife Célia; that she was being paid some specific amount for each public appearance that she made with him; that their divorce would be announced in the coming year, once his presidency was more established; and that Célia was already in a relationship with a man named Marc Lévy. I responded, "Et si c'était vrai !" ("And if it were true!"), which made us both laugh. What was so funny about my seemingly banal expression of surprise/disbelief to all these stories? Well, Marc Lévy is a contemporary French author, and Et si c'était vrai is the title of one his most popular novels (made into the movie Just Like Heaven, starring Reese Witherspoon and Mark Ruffalo, in the U.S.), so my response was actually a mild little pun. I love verbal banter, but the opportunities for me to make even this kind of very weak pun were very, very rare in France, just because it was unusual for me to have the context, to recognize the names of all the people involved and rapidly be able to pull in a relevant comment about one of them.
So, after six years of feeling like I'm missing out on a lot of what's going on around me, what is it like for me to be re-immersed in my native context? Stay tuned for Part 3 . . .
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Context, Part 1
A couple of years ago, I attended my high school class reunion. I had a great time, but it was a very strange experience for me. Why? Well, part of it was the normal class reunion experience of seeing people with whom you have a shared history, some of whom you haven't necessarily seen in many years. But for me, this was amplified by the unusual sensation of being surrounded by a group of people with whom I had not only a shared culture but also a personal history.
Three or four of my closest high school friends--people I still see once or twice a year--were there, but there was also the girl who was my reading partner, starting in first grade and all through elementary school. Another girl whose grandparents lived three doors down from me, with whom I spent many, many wonderful summer days playing with hula hoops and eating Pringles in her grandparents' RV parked in the back yard. Classmates who told me that they see my dad in Wal-Mart every week and remember that my ex-brother-in-law was in the Navy and know his brothers and sisters. Since he and my sister got divorced in 1986, most of my closest friends today don't even know my ex-brother-in-law's name, much less what he did for a living or anything about his family. But there I was, surrounded by people whom I hadn't seen for 10 years or more, who knew so much about my life's history. They knew my historical context.
This felt like a very strange juxtaposition to my daily life in Paris, where most of my friends knew very little about my life history. Oh, everyone knew that I was American, but their ideas of what that meant, of what my childhood and life might have been like, were based on what they'd seen on TV and in movies. Most of them would politely ask where I was from, and knowing that there was little chance that they would have heard of it, I had my stock reply of, "Minnesota, it's-in-the-center-of-the-country-on-the-border-of-Canada, where-the-Mississippi-River-starts" (sadly, that gave them a much clearer idea than it would to most Americans). Occasionally, I would be pressed for the name of my hometown, and it was always funny to see how many French people actually recognized the name "Mankato" from their years of watching La Petite maison sur la prairie as children. But there was no easy way for me to adjust their mental image of my history from that of the Ingalls family to my truth of a childhood of riding my bike to the swimming pool and eating Pringles in my friend's grandparents' RV in the backyard. Context is hard to communicate.
I think that's partly why immigrants tend to group together in a foreign country: shared cultural context is a powerful bond. It was comforting to hang out with other Americans who missed peanut butter and knew the same TV-comedy punch lines as I did. But even though we shared the same culture, a big chunk of personal history was always missing, because family and past friends were far away and rarely seen in person. And even though the other Americans probably understood about riding bike to the swimming pool in the summer, many of them seemed surprised to learn that it gets warm enough to swim in Minnesota (I couldn't believe how many of my American friends asked if I really needed to get an air conditioner for my apartment here in July)!
But even though a part of my historical context was always missing for everyone I knew in Paris, those were the people with whom I shared my day to day experiences: metro rides and strikes, office tasks and tales, dinners and movies and parties and fights and laughter and worries about loved ones thousands of miles away. They knew the name of my boss and what project I was working on that day, and when I was stressed out or happy and why. They shared my life, my present context.
Skip back to my class reunion, where I was surrounded by people who knew my history and couldn't begin to imagine my present-day life. When classmates asked where I was living, and I said, "Paris," the most frequent response was, "Wow . . . what's that like?" And I would just shrug and say, "Oh, it's really pretty normal. I mostly just go to work and plop down in front of the TV to eat my dinner at the end of the day." Which was true, except that I did it all in a context where I could buy fresh baguette and croissants and amazing cheese whenever I wanted, and see the Eiffel Tower on my way to church on Sunday morning, and wander through the courtyard of the Louvre on the way to meet a friend for a drink. A very normal daily life, in a very special context, which I somehow didn't think I'd be able to explain to my Pringles-eating playmate.
On either side of the ocean, it often feels like half of my context is missing.
Three or four of my closest high school friends--people I still see once or twice a year--were there, but there was also the girl who was my reading partner, starting in first grade and all through elementary school. Another girl whose grandparents lived three doors down from me, with whom I spent many, many wonderful summer days playing with hula hoops and eating Pringles in her grandparents' RV parked in the back yard. Classmates who told me that they see my dad in Wal-Mart every week and remember that my ex-brother-in-law was in the Navy and know his brothers and sisters. Since he and my sister got divorced in 1986, most of my closest friends today don't even know my ex-brother-in-law's name, much less what he did for a living or anything about his family. But there I was, surrounded by people whom I hadn't seen for 10 years or more, who knew so much about my life's history. They knew my historical context.
This felt like a very strange juxtaposition to my daily life in Paris, where most of my friends knew very little about my life history. Oh, everyone knew that I was American, but their ideas of what that meant, of what my childhood and life might have been like, were based on what they'd seen on TV and in movies. Most of them would politely ask where I was from, and knowing that there was little chance that they would have heard of it, I had my stock reply of, "Minnesota, it's-in-the-center-of-the-country-on-the-border-of-Canada, where-the-Mississippi-River-starts" (sadly, that gave them a much clearer idea than it would to most Americans). Occasionally, I would be pressed for the name of my hometown, and it was always funny to see how many French people actually recognized the name "Mankato" from their years of watching La Petite maison sur la prairie as children. But there was no easy way for me to adjust their mental image of my history from that of the Ingalls family to my truth of a childhood of riding my bike to the swimming pool and eating Pringles in my friend's grandparents' RV in the backyard. Context is hard to communicate.
I think that's partly why immigrants tend to group together in a foreign country: shared cultural context is a powerful bond. It was comforting to hang out with other Americans who missed peanut butter and knew the same TV-comedy punch lines as I did. But even though we shared the same culture, a big chunk of personal history was always missing, because family and past friends were far away and rarely seen in person. And even though the other Americans probably understood about riding bike to the swimming pool in the summer, many of them seemed surprised to learn that it gets warm enough to swim in Minnesota (I couldn't believe how many of my American friends asked if I really needed to get an air conditioner for my apartment here in July)!
But even though a part of my historical context was always missing for everyone I knew in Paris, those were the people with whom I shared my day to day experiences: metro rides and strikes, office tasks and tales, dinners and movies and parties and fights and laughter and worries about loved ones thousands of miles away. They knew the name of my boss and what project I was working on that day, and when I was stressed out or happy and why. They shared my life, my present context.
Skip back to my class reunion, where I was surrounded by people who knew my history and couldn't begin to imagine my present-day life. When classmates asked where I was living, and I said, "Paris," the most frequent response was, "Wow . . . what's that like?" And I would just shrug and say, "Oh, it's really pretty normal. I mostly just go to work and plop down in front of the TV to eat my dinner at the end of the day." Which was true, except that I did it all in a context where I could buy fresh baguette and croissants and amazing cheese whenever I wanted, and see the Eiffel Tower on my way to church on Sunday morning, and wander through the courtyard of the Louvre on the way to meet a friend for a drink. A very normal daily life, in a very special context, which I somehow didn't think I'd be able to explain to my Pringles-eating playmate.
On either side of the ocean, it often feels like half of my context is missing.
Monday, July 14, 2008
First Incident of Being Seriously Annoyed by a Stupid American
Huge shock: it happened at the Post Office. I went in to buy stamps and mail a couple of letters. I asked for a roll of stamps and 20 international stamps and immediately peeled off one of each to put on my letters. When I removed the domestic stamp, I noticed that it was marked "42 cents", which means that it will no longer be sufficient the next time postage rates increase, so I asked, "Oh, the rolls aren't permanent validity stamps?" The postal worker burst out laughing and said, "Well, that's a new term!" I guess I looked confused, because she finally added, "No, they're not Forever Stamps." Yeah, "permanent validity stamp" is laughable, but "Forever Stamp" is a name we can all take seriously.
The postal worker continued to chuckle and asked what I had called them again (evidently so she could repeat the funny joke to all her vocabulary-impaired colleagues). I refrained from asking if the Forever Stamps come with a promise ring, and instead just said, "'Permanent validity Stamps," adding in an appropriately sneering tone, "I just moved here from France, and that's what they're called there." And where they've had them for years, and where you'd be hard-put to buy a domestic-postage stamp that isn't permanent validity, unlike the price-labelled domestic stamps still sold by the stupid U.S. Post Office, I thought to myself but did not say out loud.
I am a paragon of self-restraint.
When I got back to my apartment, my one piece of mail today was my "A Paris" magazine, the quarterly publication of the City of Paris, letting all us Parisians know what's going on in our hometown, promptly forwarded to me by the lovely Poste française. Very appropriate for Bastille Day. Take that! you stupid American postal worker woman.
Also, today I was shown an apartment by a real estate agent who was carrying a binder labelled "Inportant [something]" The label was printed, not hand-written, so someone had to look at it at least twice: once while typing and once while sticking it on the binder. Had I been able to see the rest of the label, there is no doubt in my mind that I would have seen at least one inappropriate apostrophe as well.
If someone doesn't take me out for ice cream soon, I'm moving back to Paris.
The postal worker continued to chuckle and asked what I had called them again (evidently so she could repeat the funny joke to all her vocabulary-impaired colleagues). I refrained from asking if the Forever Stamps come with a promise ring, and instead just said, "'Permanent validity Stamps," adding in an appropriately sneering tone, "I just moved here from France, and that's what they're called there." And where they've had them for years, and where you'd be hard-put to buy a domestic-postage stamp that isn't permanent validity, unlike the price-labelled domestic stamps still sold by the stupid U.S. Post Office, I thought to myself but did not say out loud.
I am a paragon of self-restraint.
When I got back to my apartment, my one piece of mail today was my "A Paris" magazine, the quarterly publication of the City of Paris, letting all us Parisians know what's going on in our hometown, promptly forwarded to me by the lovely Poste française. Very appropriate for Bastille Day. Take that! you stupid American postal worker woman.
Also, today I was shown an apartment by a real estate agent who was carrying a binder labelled "Inportant [something]" The label was printed, not hand-written, so someone had to look at it at least twice: once while typing and once while sticking it on the binder. Had I been able to see the rest of the label, there is no doubt in my mind that I would have seen at least one inappropriate apostrophe as well.
If someone doesn't take me out for ice cream soon, I'm moving back to Paris.
Thursday, July 10, 2008
French Resolutions
If you've read the comments on my last post, you know that all 2.5 of my regular readers have been insistently demanding that I start blogging again, here in America. Well, actually, there were just a few half-hearted inquiries as to why I had stopped writing, and now my former readers seem more excited about Ann blogging about the porn she's writing in Iowa, or something like that. Also, one reader compared my writing to compost.
It's so nice to feel loved.
Anyway, wanted or not, I do eventually plan to write about what it's like to be back in the U.S.A., but like some blind and soft-fleshed little creature crawling out from its protective shell for the first time, I'm not feeling quite ready to tell you my impressions of this strange and frightening new world just yet. So for now, I'll just share a few of the resolutions I've made to maintain my own personal integrity, as well as that of my adopted other-homeland.
THINGS I WILL NOT DO, NOW THAT I AM BACK IN AMERICA:
1) Use the word "entrée" to refer to the main dish of a meal. Has anyone in America ever noticed the striking similarity between "entrée" and "entry"? As in "beginning", or "starter", or "appetizer"?! That's right, folks, "entrée" means "appetizer", and I can't even stand to think about the idiot who got the entrée=main dish mistranslation started and managed to spread it nationwide! Every time I open a menu here, I spend several moments trying to figure out why the restaurant doesn't have any main dishes, but two separate categories of appetizers. So while speaking English in restaurants here, I will do my best to protect la belle langue française and never let the word entrée cross my lips.
2) Say "I'm good," when I mean "No, thank you." (For P & A)
3) Pronounce words in English as if they were French (sorry, Ann). I don't care how many cool kids whom I've never heard of (Stacy and Clinton, Ina? Seriously, I have no clue.) are doing it; it's just pretentious. I don't want everyone around me to think that I'm trying to be better than them just because I've lived in France and can pronounce French words correctly. I much prefer to live in the silent certainty that I don't need to pronounce French words correctly in English, because I've lived in France and am therefore obviously superior to everyone else.
4) Say "ATM machine" and "PIN number." (Actually, these are long-standing resolutions of mine which have nothing to do with loyalty to France, but they're important enough to merit mention here.) If you don't know why it's evil to say these things, please take a moment to consider what the final letter in each abbreviation stands, and then leave my blog and never come back.
5) Anything else that comes to mind.
P.S. Thanks to Ann for the lovely, if unsolicited, guest blogging. Feel free to continue whenever you want.
It's so nice to feel loved.
Anyway, wanted or not, I do eventually plan to write about what it's like to be back in the U.S.A., but like some blind and soft-fleshed little creature crawling out from its protective shell for the first time, I'm not feeling quite ready to tell you my impressions of this strange and frightening new world just yet. So for now, I'll just share a few of the resolutions I've made to maintain my own personal integrity, as well as that of my adopted other-homeland.
THINGS I WILL NOT DO, NOW THAT I AM BACK IN AMERICA:
1) Use the word "entrée" to refer to the main dish of a meal. Has anyone in America ever noticed the striking similarity between "entrée" and "entry"? As in "beginning", or "starter", or "appetizer"?! That's right, folks, "entrée" means "appetizer", and I can't even stand to think about the idiot who got the entrée=main dish mistranslation started and managed to spread it nationwide! Every time I open a menu here, I spend several moments trying to figure out why the restaurant doesn't have any main dishes, but two separate categories of appetizers. So while speaking English in restaurants here, I will do my best to protect la belle langue française and never let the word entrée cross my lips.
2) Say "I'm good," when I mean "No, thank you." (For P & A)
3) Pronounce words in English as if they were French (sorry, Ann). I don't care how many cool kids whom I've never heard of (Stacy and Clinton, Ina? Seriously, I have no clue.) are doing it; it's just pretentious. I don't want everyone around me to think that I'm trying to be better than them just because I've lived in France and can pronounce French words correctly. I much prefer to live in the silent certainty that I don't need to pronounce French words correctly in English, because I've lived in France and am therefore obviously superior to everyone else.
4) Say "ATM machine" and "PIN number." (Actually, these are long-standing resolutions of mine which have nothing to do with loyalty to France, but they're important enough to merit mention here.) If you don't know why it's evil to say these things, please take a moment to consider what the final letter in each abbreviation stands, and then leave my blog and never come back.
5) Anything else that comes to mind.
P.S. Thanks to Ann for the lovely, if unsolicited, guest blogging. Feel free to continue whenever you want.
Monday, June 30, 2008
BNT: Every New Beginning
BNT = Blog Not Titled
In one of my early posts, I mentioned that there are two lines I love in the Semisonic song "Closing Time." One is "Time for you to go out to the places you will be from." The other is "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." I love this line because it acknowledges the bittersweet reality that having the opportunity to start something new often means leaving something else behind.
That's exactly what I'm experiencing as I leave Paris to make a new beginning in the Twin Cities, and so "Every New Beginning" was one of the original titles I considered for this blog. That name was already taken, so then I thought I'd use "Some Other Beginning." I registered that name and had even starting setting up the blog template, but then I realized what the obvious abbreviation for that name would be. Neither the word "sob" nor the common usage of "S.O.B." was pleasing to me for my blog, so I scratched it and went back to the drawing board.
.....
My last new beginning was on March 28, 2002, when I moved from Washington to Paris. Officially, my legal residency in France began on May 14, 2002, and ended today, June 30, 2008. At 5:20 p.m. CDT, I cleared U.S. Immigration Control at the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, where I declared myself a U.S. resident for the first time in over six years. My profile in the sidebar has been updated accordingly.
Every new beginning.
In one of my early posts, I mentioned that there are two lines I love in the Semisonic song "Closing Time." One is "Time for you to go out to the places you will be from." The other is "Every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end." I love this line because it acknowledges the bittersweet reality that having the opportunity to start something new often means leaving something else behind.
That's exactly what I'm experiencing as I leave Paris to make a new beginning in the Twin Cities, and so "Every New Beginning" was one of the original titles I considered for this blog. That name was already taken, so then I thought I'd use "Some Other Beginning." I registered that name and had even starting setting up the blog template, but then I realized what the obvious abbreviation for that name would be. Neither the word "sob" nor the common usage of "S.O.B." was pleasing to me for my blog, so I scratched it and went back to the drawing board.
.....
My last new beginning was on March 28, 2002, when I moved from Washington to Paris. Officially, my legal residency in France began on May 14, 2002, and ended today, June 30, 2008. At 5:20 p.m. CDT, I cleared U.S. Immigration Control at the Minneapolis-St. Paul airport, where I declared myself a U.S. resident for the first time in over six years. My profile in the sidebar has been updated accordingly.
Every new beginning.
My Last Post from Paris
I'm sitting at the boarding gate at Charles de Gaulle airport, waiting for my flight to Minneapolis, which has been delayed about 40 minutes. That's okay, because it gives me a few minutes for one last post as a resident of France.
Since Ann asked, I'll tell you about my last weekend in Paris:
- Saturday afternoon I went to the Marie-Antoinette exhibit at the Grand Palais, with my friend M. The exhibit was fantastic, but you can't see it, because it ends today. (I can only assume that all of life in France will come to a screeching halt immediately after my departure.)
- After the exhibit, M and I sat and chatted over drinks at a sidewalk cafe for a little while, then I bid her au revoir.
- I took a bus from the Champs-Elysées to Gare du Nord--I wanted to avoid the métro, because RER B wasn't running, due to a strike.
- I had a lovely dinner with P and A, including a gorgeous caprese salad the P served up sushi-style, to be eaten with chopsticks. And we lounged around and chatted until it was time for me to catch a train back into Paris. A and I agreed not to say good-bye, pretending that I would see them at church the next morning. But I cried a bit anyway.
- Sunday morning I went to the American Church to say good-bye to everyone there.
- I had to take a bus across the Left Bank, and I realized that I would be getting off right by the Jardin des Plantes, so I took a 15-minute detour to wander through these gardens, which have been on my "to-see" list for years. Now I can cross them off the list, but I definitely want to go back and explore them in more detail some other time!
- I met EJ & Isabelle and their boys, as well as friends N & G and Baby F for a lovely Sunday afternoon picnic in Parc de Choisy.
- I took a bus back to Montorgeuil, so that I would ride past Notre Dame and see the Eiffel Tower down the Seine, rather than being underground for my last tour through Paris.
- After spending the afternoon and early evening getting my many massive suitcases in order, I went out for a slice of pizza, which I took back to EJ & Isabelle's along with a carton of gelato to share. The kids were already in bed, so the three of us sat around chatting and laughing and eating ice cream. A perfect last evening with friends in Paris.
- This morning, I realized I had the choice of either ironing my very wrinkled pants or going out for fresh bread and pastries for my last breakfast in Paris. The pain au chocolat and the croissant were absolutely perfect, and I choose to believe that my pants look elegantly crumpled.
- EJ and Isabelle helped me haul my luggage to the curb, and we said good-bye as I climbed into the taxi to the airport.
I haven't cried (much) yet, but then . . . it was a lovely weekend, and it's been a great six years, and I know I'll be back soon to see everything and everyone in France that I love. Bon voyage to me!
Since Ann asked, I'll tell you about my last weekend in Paris:
- Saturday afternoon I went to the Marie-Antoinette exhibit at the Grand Palais, with my friend M. The exhibit was fantastic, but you can't see it, because it ends today. (I can only assume that all of life in France will come to a screeching halt immediately after my departure.)
- After the exhibit, M and I sat and chatted over drinks at a sidewalk cafe for a little while, then I bid her au revoir.
- I took a bus from the Champs-Elysées to Gare du Nord--I wanted to avoid the métro, because RER B wasn't running, due to a strike.
- I had a lovely dinner with P and A, including a gorgeous caprese salad the P served up sushi-style, to be eaten with chopsticks. And we lounged around and chatted until it was time for me to catch a train back into Paris. A and I agreed not to say good-bye, pretending that I would see them at church the next morning. But I cried a bit anyway.
- Sunday morning I went to the American Church to say good-bye to everyone there.
- I had to take a bus across the Left Bank, and I realized that I would be getting off right by the Jardin des Plantes, so I took a 15-minute detour to wander through these gardens, which have been on my "to-see" list for years. Now I can cross them off the list, but I definitely want to go back and explore them in more detail some other time!
- I met EJ & Isabelle and their boys, as well as friends N & G and Baby F for a lovely Sunday afternoon picnic in Parc de Choisy.
- I took a bus back to Montorgeuil, so that I would ride past Notre Dame and see the Eiffel Tower down the Seine, rather than being underground for my last tour through Paris.
- After spending the afternoon and early evening getting my many massive suitcases in order, I went out for a slice of pizza, which I took back to EJ & Isabelle's along with a carton of gelato to share. The kids were already in bed, so the three of us sat around chatting and laughing and eating ice cream. A perfect last evening with friends in Paris.
- This morning, I realized I had the choice of either ironing my very wrinkled pants or going out for fresh bread and pastries for my last breakfast in Paris. The pain au chocolat and the croissant were absolutely perfect, and I choose to believe that my pants look elegantly crumpled.
- EJ and Isabelle helped me haul my luggage to the curb, and we said good-bye as I climbed into the taxi to the airport.
I haven't cried (much) yet, but then . . . it was a lovely weekend, and it's been a great six years, and I know I'll be back soon to see everything and everyone in France that I love. Bon voyage to me!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
