THE PARIS LETTER: The Problem with Dr.Seuss

One thing that happens a lot when you're an American learning to speak French is that you unwittingly make some kind of sexual joke without realizing it, and French people laugh at you. This is because just about every word in the French language is a double entendre, no surprise there. Some of my favorite examples:

The word for "line" is "queue" but intead of pronoucing this like the letter Q, as you would in England, you pronounce it "keuh" (I guess - its still hard for me). The word that sounds like the letter Q is "Cul" which is slang for "ass". So often I'd be asking some people outside the boulangerie Is this the ass? instead of Is this the line? Super awesome.

The word for "lower" is baisser, but the slang word for "to fuck" is baiser. Got that? Bahsay - lower; Bayzay - fuck. Yes, I've messed that one up so much that I try never to ask anyone to lower anything for me ever.

This brings me, interestingly enough, to Dr.Seuss, that children's classic author that basically does not exist in France. In large part, this is because its nearly impossible to translate his awesome rhymes into French - Usually, you end up with a literal translation:

Yes, that's Green Eggs and Ham in its literal French translation. They make a good effort to translate the book into rhyming French, but its just hard - for lots of reason, but mostly because these need to be easy readers,  so you can't really reach far for a synonym.

BUT, another, perhaps lesser known reason why Dr.Seuss isn't read much in France - The name Seuss sounds the same as "Suce" which means "suck" which .... yes you guessed it....is slang for blowjob.

So one American friend of mine was telling her French husband about getting some Dr.Seuss books for their daughter, and her husband turned to her, horrified.

"Our daughter is not reading anything by someone named 'Seuss'!" he said.

Interestingly enough, there's a company here in Paris that specializes in digging holes in streets - for electrical work, etc - that call their trucks "Les Suceuses de Ouest". Yes, that means "the suckers of the West" but also....well, you get the idea. And the trucks are all PINK and have women's names. I believe one of them is even called Monica if you can believe that.

Yes! That's their ad! Its a winking elephant and the caption says "Janine, Monica, Linda and the others are ready to help you out whenever you want." Oy. 

Here's a pic of one of them on my street recently. The French, still not super up to date on the whole women's rights thing...
 

THE PARIS LETTER: Getting "Bonjoured"

Montmartre Stairs

France and America - we have such a long history together, both of fascination and irritation. We love each other but we hate each other. Its very complicated - like, goes back to the Revolutionary War complicated. 

Lots of Americans feel the French are rude -they come to Paris and they try to be nice, and the French won't give them the time of day. What gives? As you get a little more deeply into the culture here, you realize that many French people find AMERICANS rude - they come here in droves, crowding into subway cars shouting in English and bumping people with their fanny packs, demanding hamburgers at 4PM and wondering why things aren't open on Sunday. 

Clearly, this is a very complex issue, too complex to really handle in a blog post. But there's one word at the center of so much of this, and that word is: Bonjour.

Yes, Bonjour, the simplest French word, the first one you learn - Hello. 

Allow me to explain, after the jump:

THE PARIS LETTER: Maison Des Examens!

Hi Everyone -

Whew, I gotta get cracking on this letter now that the Rapture has passed us by. You won't be surprised to learn that there was basically NO talk about the predicted end of the world here in Paris, though it seems like every one of my American-based Facebook friends was into it yesterday. Glad to see that I'll be spending the end times with all of you.

First of all, thank you all so much for your good wishes on the pregnancy! It was so nice to hear from so many of you about it - There was no letter last week because I was SUPPOSED to be in Cannes for the film festival, but then canceled my trip at the last minute because of illness - after my experience in Bologna, where I had the double-whammy of morning sickness and bad-cold sickness, I didn't want to go to another conference/festival in less that perfect health - so, sadly I will have no stories from the red carpet for you guys in this letter. It was hard for me to finally shut the trip down - it took me until 3 hours before my train was to leave to finally cancel - but it was really not the year for it.

THE PARIS LETTER: Bagels & Regret

Hello everyone -
It's a beautiful spring day here in Paris, almost impossible not to be outside - unless you're like me, with my terrible spring allergies...which apparently are even worse this year as I get used to the new European pollens. However, I did just hit the pharmacie and loaded up on medicines, so hopefully I'll be out there drinking at an outdoor cafe soon enough -

This week was a pretty quiet one, but Friday marked the beginning of French spring break, another 2 week school holiday that runs through Easter weekend - I'm off from the Sorbonne for those two weeks, and we have some good upcoming travel - I'll be in London this week at the London Book Fair, and happily catching up with some New York and London friends, and then Easter weekend Matt and I will be in Helsinki, Finland, and I'm sure we'll have lots to report from there -

BAGELS
Strangely, here in the land of the croissant, I've been craving a good bagel and cream cheese lately, and wow are they actually hard to find. I may have mentioned before that there's a bagel craze that's been sweeping Paris - I guess its been around for a few years at this point - and there are a few restaurants here that claim to be "New York style" bagel bars - But, there are very few places where you can find bagels to buy and eat at home. I made a pilgrimage the other day, walking all around the Marais looking for bagel shops (I had heard a rumor that there was a place in the Marais where you could buy frozen H&H bagels from New York, but it has since CLOSED, boo)

THE PARIS LETTER: A sort of long letter about the job hunt, plus some phonetics

Hello everyone -

Matt's parents were in town this week, so I didn't have time to write the post last Sunday, but I'm BACK today with a few more Parisian updates.

After several months of rev-ving the job search engine like an old car on a winter morning, it seems like it's coughed to life a little bit and I'm starting to take more meetings and even work a little bit - At the same time, I feel like I'm trying to start about 6 different businesses at once. My general look-for-work philosophy has been to knock on every door and try every angle, and then see what ultimately works out, but that often results in a middle period -like right now- where you are kind of going down several different paths and not sure what will ultimately happen.

For my own sanity, I will try to outline for all of you all the different things that are happening - this might help me keep them straight, actually. Then we can do an AMERICAN IDOL type voting and you can tell me which things you think sound the best:

THE PARIS LETTER: Fancy Parties and Rude Parisians

Hello All:

It is a gorgeous day in Paris today - Sunny, with bright blue clear skies, reminding us all that spring may actually be on it's way - and that Matt and I have been here for almost 6 months now -

UNESCO Globe and Eiffel Tower

This week was particularly event filled because a friend of Matt's parents, Jill Banfield, was North American winner of thethe L'Oreal Women in Science Award, and was in Paris all week to receive it. The Award is presented jointly by L'Oreal and UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, which is based in Paris. This meant we went to not just one but TWO fancy events this week - a cocktail party at the US Ambassador's residence, and the Awards Ceremony at the UNESCO Headquarters. We met a bunch of young State Department employees at these events, which was pretty cool - a whole new contingent of Americans in Paris. In addition, for this week's funny story, I will tell you about my continuing attempts to defend myself in the big city using my limited French - with decidedly mixed results.

THE PARIS LETTER: The Political Intrigue of the Job Interview

Hello everyone, Happy Oscars and Cesars weekend -

As most of you know, the Oscars are TONIGHT, but the Cesars, the French film industy's awards show, was on Friday, so we already know what the best French films of the year are, thank you very much.

As predicted, Xavier Beauvois's DES HOMMES ET DES DIEUX (OF GODS AND MEN in English) won Best Picture, as well as Best Supporting Actor and Best Cinematography - The film is being released by Sony Pictures Classics in the US and I urge you all to go see it - I saw it at Cannes last year kind of accidentally; I didn't know any of Beauvois's earlier films, and just stumbled into this screening because it was a competition film that fit into my schedule. Its a really beautiful film and one of my favorites this year - as you may have heard, it's based on true story of a group of French monks at a monastery in Algeria during thethe civil war of 1990s, and their decision over whether they should stay or leave as things became more and more harrowing for foreigners and French in particular to stay. Its a contemplative film that has a lot to say about humanitarian aid and action, but says it in a quiet and thoughtful voice. Several of thethe actors are leading stars of the film industry here - though may only be known by American audiences for their small roles in international blockbusters - the film's star, Lambert Wilson, played the creepy albino twins in the 2nd Matrix film, though he's a serious and reknowned actor here in France. Ironique, as the French would say.

THE PARIS LETTER: French Rom Coms, Bitchy Yoga Teachers, and La Pharmacie

Hello from our sickbed - well, really Matt's now - where I write this letter in between checking for updates on the fall of the Egyptian government. Crazy stuff. I'm both excited and a little worried.

Matt and I have basically spent the week in bed sick - first me, now him - making it not the most exciting week. Thankfully I think we are both on the mend now. My cousin Hillary, who has lived here for 5 years, told me to expect to be sick more often this first year as the body adjusts to a new environment with new germs and whatnot - This seems to be true. We're going through our second bout of colds since we got here 4 months ago, which is a lot for us.

Getting sick in Paris means a trip to the Pharmacie, where all drugs are sold. While you can get shampoo, toothpaste, and kleenex at your local supermarket, you cannot get aspirin or cold medicine. For this, you must go to the pharmacie, an institution that will seem totally weird to many Americans, as they sell homeopathic and herbal remedies alongside more traditional medicines, often with makeup and skincare thrown in as well. The French are famous pill-takers and hypochondriacs, so there are multiple "Soins" (treatments) for everything; its very difficult to leave the pharmacie without some form of herbal remedy, usually given in conjunction with the more traditional medicine - why take one pill when you can take four? However, there are some things they don't have, weirdly- like Melatonin, which is illegal to sell here for some reason (I still don't get it). 

I went to the pharmacy when we first arrived to try and find some and was given an armload of herbal stress and sleep remedies instead that I bought because I didn't know how to politely say no in French at that point.



This week we are taking "Fervex", sort of like Theraflu - pour la Rhume et L'Etat Grippal (for a cold and "flu state") - seems to be doing the job. I'm having my neighbor pick up some Lemsip when she's in London next week, this British invention is truly the top cold remedy I've found.

This week I started my registration for coursework at the Sorbonne's Cours de Civilazation Francaise - a special course they have for foreigners to study French language and french civilization. Registering reminded me what a famous student city Paris is - I registered with people from all over, including very fashionable Saudi girls in Versace headscarves whose brothers registered for them while they talked on their cellphones, hip Japanese teens doing their year abroad in France, Dutch fashion models, and some requisite Americans who didn't understand why they had to wait in line or bring the right paperwork (They are American, after all, right?).

I have to go back next week to take my language placement, but then I will be taking a combination of language classes and seminars on French life, politics, and culture. I'm already very excited about my seminar choices, which include things like Introduction to French Political Life, Economy and Society in France and Europe, a whole course in French screenwriters and Directors, and one in 20th Century French Theater. There's also one in French Gastronomy, food and culture - but guys, I think it's only offered at a lower level of French than I'm at. Sorry everyone.

I also passed a major milestone for myself this week by going to both a French film AND a French play and understanding them both - I would say at about 80% understanding, enough so I wasn't lost at all about what was happening. I don't know if I can explain how liberating this was for me - there's so much happening here in terms of film and theater, and I haven't been able to fully experience it because I basically haven't been able to go to anything without subtitles for the past few months. Now, I feel like I can at least begin to experience culture same way thethe Parisians are, which is HUGE.

The French film was a good example of the differences between our two cultures. It was a romantic comedy that's been quite successful here, called LES NOMS DES GENS, or, basically, The Names of People/ People's Names. Its got a traditional set-up in that there's a sort of buttoned up older guy who meets a free-spirited young woman that he falls in love with, almost loses, and then finally is able to get together with. The free-spirited young woman, played by actress Sara Forestier, has a sort of Kirsten Dunst/Kate Hudson energy to her - thethe beautiful fun-loving girl that comes into your life and shakes it up. Except in this French movie she is naked almost all the time, in a way that wouldn't be true in the American version. At first this irritated me, as I'm not a fan of romcoms that seem to have a female lead that's more male fantasy than real person.

HOWEVER, then the French movie turned POLITICAL in a way that I loved but that would NEVER happen in an American film. You see, our two protagonists have very political French histories - our guys mother was Jewish, and her parents were sent to the camps during World War II, but not before placing her in an orphanage and changing her name so no one would know she was Jewish. This became a big family secret and they never, ever spoke of their Jewish past while the boy was growing up. Meanwhile, the girl is half-Algerian, the daughter of a father who was a refugee from the French Algerian war, and a wealthy French mother who turned to counterculture in the 70s and rejected her bourgeois past. So the girls family is very open and outspoken about politics.

The other part is that the girl has decided to sleep with political hardliners - both Islamic and French - to convert them to her more liberal point of view. This is not why she sleeps with guy in thethe film - she actually loves him - but is another part of her character. So you see, more sex and more politics in the French rom com than we would ever see in the US one. And it works! At least for me. Though I prudishly found some of the nudity a little annoying. But most people won't, and this chick has a great body.

One final funny story from the week and then I'm off - I will tell you about my yoga class with The Bitchiest Yoga Teacher Ever.
Have I mentioned that I'm taking yoga here? This is also a good way to learn new French words, as you basically have to relearn all the parts of the body, but if you've done some yoga before you can pretty much make all the necessary connections. For example - Les epaules = shoulders as in "relacher les epaules" (relax your shoulders), 'cheville" = Ankle as in "attraper la cheville" (grab your ankle), etc -

I've been taking with a GREAT teacher (recommended again by my cousin Hillary), who is very funny and generous and I've generally been happy taking her class - However, there's this very fancy yoga studio down by the Sorbonne called Rasa Yoga, that's supposed to be amazing, so I went to a class there after registering this week just to check it out. And it was a beautiful studio, all skylights and hardwood floors in an old Left Bank building that felt very "Catherine Deneuve does Yoga". I was excited at first. But then I took a class with this teacher - I KNEW it would be a problem when I introduced myself at the beginning of class and mentioned that I was American, and she fixed me with a cold stare and asked if I'd ever done Iyengar yoga before. Hmmmm....this was supposed to be a beginner class ...

The teacher, it turns out, was American but a very unhappy American who proceeded to treat the class like shit for an hour and a half, saying things in French like "I'm only going to demonstrate this once; if you don't watch, well then it's your practice, not mine"; and "How do you expect me to teach if you're not listening to me?"; and "No one is doing what I'm telling you to do" and ... I think she actually said something like " You guys are idiots for spending hte money on this class if you're not going to practice between classes". Then she would literally come over and kick you into position with her foot if you asked a question. So of course no one wanted to ask her ANYTHING, we just prayed we would get out without her focusing her disdain on us.

This was one of my better zen moments, I thought, because I had this very Claire Lundberg moment at the beginning where I was incensed and was going to storm out in protest - but then I thought...well, then I will have accomplished nothing except paying for a yoga class and not taking it - So I just decided to find this poor unhappy woman very funny rather than monstrous, and that helped me get through the class basically unscathed, physically or emotionally .... Ah Paris, apparently where unhappy American yoga teachers come to retire ....

Okay, I'm running long again, so I'll sign off now and wish everyone a good week - More to come next week as I continue my cultural adventures -

A bientot!

Claire

THE PARIS LETTER: Thanksgiving is a Difficult Holiday to Explain to Non-Americans

Hello everyone -

The Turkeys are here! Who knew??

For those of you following along, you'll be happy to hear that it's NOT raining this Sunday, though the temperature in Paris has dropped this week and we even got some snow flurries on Friday.They didn't stick around, but it was kind of a magical moment as my friend Emily and I were just passing the Louvre on our bikes when the snow started. Pretty gorgeous, though thankfully we were on our way to get our hair cut and could park the bikes and watch the snow from the salon window.

We managed to have a record 12 people for our expat Thanksgiving dinner, using up all the place settings/silverware/serving plates of not just our household but also many from my neighbors as well. It was our first time cooking Thanksgiving and let me tell you, it is a challenging meal! There were no major mishaps thankfully, and no mental breakdowns, but definitely trying to get hot food out of our tiny kitchen to twelve people made me feel like an ill-prepared line cook... But the party lasted until 2:30 AM, and one really nice thing about it was that everyone talked to everyone else, even though most of the people didn't know each other necessarily - 

Okay, first UPDATES from Last week. Our Tonka Bean discussion prompted a friend with a background in science to respond that it might NOT be such a good idea to infuse vodka with something that also harms your liver. This gave Matt pause, and he spent several hours looking up the scientific literature on Coumarin, the chemical that's present in Tonka Beans. He quickly decided that our vodka was in fact TOXIC, containing enough coumarin to be used as rat poison. Then there was some back and forth about whether rat livers work differently than human livers in terms of processing this chemical, which it seems like they might, but we still decided perhaps it might be better NOT to serve it at Thanksgiving. Though it did make an appearance as a discussion piece for sure - The duck confit, thankfully, was not toxic at all and came out quite well.

So - On to the meat of this letter, the difficulty of explaining the Thanksgiving holiday to non-Americans. As many of you know, Thanksgiving is just another day here in France, people going about their business, shops open, etc. In fact, most of the stores are already decorated for Christmas, with Joyeux Noel signs and whatnot. There's no bridge holiday for the French - they can basically start advertising for Christmas in early November. Also, though turkey (called "dinde" in French) is seen at the butcher shop, I'd never seen it whole - you'll see turkey breast, but not much else. So I assumed it would be impossible to get a whole turkey here - but NO, I was shocked to see the following sign at my local butcher last weekend: "Les Dindes de Thanksgiving sont arrivees!" (the Thanksgiving Turkeys have arrived!) What?! Are there French people secretly celebrating Thanksgiving out there? Can there really be that many American expats in Paris?

But then I learned from our local caviste (wine seller) that turkey is a traditional Christmas meal in France, though served with chestnuts and not cranberry sauce. This was part of a very funny discussion as Emily, Victor, and I tried to buy wine for the meal

"Ah, Thanksgiving." the caviste said, "That's on October 31st, when you have turkey with corn and chutney, right?" I explained that it was actually in November and that yes, we had a kind of cranberry chutney. 'But don't you also stuff the bird with corn?" he asked. I was totally puzzled but just said "Oh, you can stuff it with lots of things, I'm doing a bread stuffing."

He was mock-incensed that we weren't cooking a turkey (we did 2 chickens instead). I told him I had thought we wouldn't be able to get a whole turkey here. "Mais si!" he said, again incensed that I thought France might not have a certain ingredient. He did the same thing with cranberries, which are pronounced (as far as I can tell) "cranberries" with a french accent. I said they didn't have them in France and he said "Yes, of course we do!", though thethe only place I've seen them is in the imported cans of cranberry sauce at Le Grand Epicerie de Paris. BUT I learned a valuable lesson - never imply to a Frenchman that he might not have the same variety of ingredients as the rest of the world. Even if true, he will deny it vehemently.

Another difficulty with explaining the holiday involves its origins and its non-religious context. I feel like "religious" means very different things to Europeans - witness the following exchange with a Swiss-German woman in my French class. She asked why I wouldn't be in class following week, and I said I'd be hosting people for Thanksgiving. She said "Thanksgiving! I know about Thanksgiving - with thethe turkey!' Yes, I said, it's a holiday that many Americans enjoy because its not religious, and just gets to be a time of family and food. "But it IS religious" she said, "Don't you thank god before every meal? And weren't the Pilgrims all religious?" Yes, I said, but its not a specifically Christian holiday. "But it IS" she insisted - and seemed very skeptical that we could have a secular holiday. And that's when my ability to speak French ran out. How could I explain to her that while the people we celebrate this holiday for were religious, the holiday itself doesn't involve churchgoing, or that in America saying Grace before a meal doesn't make a holiday religious?

Well, this woman was a 70 year old Swiss German, so there may not have been much I could do to convince her (How's that for being ethnically judgmental? Well, she WAS very Germanic, though, I promise). But I think for many Western Europeans, much of America seems to have fallen into a Christian fundamentalist cult. Heck, I feel that way sometimes. What I try to say to French people now is that America is a huge and hugely diverse country, and that there are few Americans who would feel comfortable in every part of it. I think being from New York is really saving me here, because they at least know what that city is, but I worry that if I were from anywhere else they would secretly believe that I was here on my Mormon mission and might one day try to convert them ...

I'm going to close by attaching this editorial that Art Buchwald wrote for the Washington Post a few years ago that attempts to explain Thanksgiving - or MerciDonnant - to French people. Enjoy!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/11/23/AR2005112302056.html

Keep your responses coming, I really love getting mail from everyone -

xo Claire

THE PARIS LETTER: Paris, Rabbits, and Mexican Food

Hi Everyone -

It's ANOTHER rainy Sunday here in Paris (Paris's secret is that it's actually just as rainy as London), and I'm taking a stab at writing another letter, maybe making this a weekly thing since people seemed to respond well to it last week. If for any reason you DON'T want to get these updates, just email me - I know we all get a lot of email.

But anyway, assuming you want to hear more about Life in France, here we go -

It seems like no American can move to France without talking about food. A Lot. And, since most of you know that I am a big cook, I'll probably be no exception. However, I'm sort of an ambivalent French cook - I enjoy a lot about French food, but I also really like cooking food from around the world - Middle Eastern, Southeast Asian, North African, Mexican, etc - So part of what I'll be writing about is all the cool food options here, but part of it will also be about my various food frustrations - while France has far better and more readily available ingredients, they just don't have the variety of different cuisines that we're used to having in the US. I need to note that these are fighting words for most Parisians, who will dismiss the idea and tell you that Paris is as diverse as any other city and that French food is the most diverse in the world. Do not argue with them (they will get really pissy about it), but also, don't believe it for a second.

Witness my experience at Mexi & Co, one of Paris's only Mexican restaurants. Now, I know I know, why was I trying to eat Mexican food in Paris, where it was probably going to be bad? Well, I needed to know what I was dealing with in case I ever got a serious burrito craving - and also, I had heard that Mexi and Co was the only place in town to buy staple mexican ingredients I was used to getting in the states - chipotles in a can, tortilla chips, corn tortillas, etc. This was correct - though the products were expensive - but lets discuss the burrito.

Now, here is how the burrito was described on the version of Parisian Yelp: Vous pouvez gouter un "Burrito", une galette avec fromage, haricots rouge, et le guacomole!
This sounds so weird in French, right? It basically translates as "You can taste a "burrito", a crepe (a galette is a savory crepe) with cheese, red beans and guacomole! -
The burrito came in a flour tortilla with a reasonable chicken/rice/beans combo inside, and salsa on the top with creme fraiche, which actually can be like sour cream. It was served with a weird little salad of cucumbers, tomatoes, and onions, sort of like French salsa fresca, and guacamole that definitely came from some kind of tube, which is odd because avocados are pretty plentiful in Paris (they are imported largely from Israel and North Africa). But the real killer was the fact that the cheese in the burrito was shredded Emmental, what we know as Swiss cheese. Which destroyed the burrito taste for me - imagine delicious burrito flavors with swiss cheese melted on them. Sigh.

So, I thought - I will make mexican food at home! Which you can KIND OF do - they have black beans, cilantro, harissa that can stand in for chilis a bit - but the cheese turned out to be a problem. French supermarkets DO have an aisle of "ready to use" cheeses, like we have in most American supermarkets - bags of shredded cheese for pizzas, cubes and slices for melting onto sandwiches and burgers. But guess what 99% of that cheese is? Emmental! Yes! Swiss cheese is the only meltable cheese you can get! Or you can get pre-wrapped slices of "Burger Cheese", just like Kraft Singles - but No cheddar, no monterey jack, not even shredded mozzarella. Everything we made with cheese on it ended up tasting like a crepe.

Okay, so I haven't yet abandoned my dreams of Mexican food, but lets say it is a challenge here. But, on the flip side, I just bought a whole rabbit to cook today into a rabbit ragu. Yes, rabbit is a pretty common meat here, and France is the land of excellent butchers, which has been fun since I mostly spent my days in the US browsing the prewrapped meats in the Fairway cold room. Now, within a kilometer of my house there are at least five butchers, two of which are amazing, as well as three Poissonnieres, or fish markets. What this does require, however, is bringing your dictionary to the market, as many of the cuts of meat are different, and all the fish have different names - And there's no way, of course, to ask the fishmonger "Which of these is halibut?" in French because he will not call it halibut anyway and will just look at you in confusion. Also, you have to be ready to have a real conversation with the butcher, which can be intimidating if you don't know the language - I saw an American couple trying to get short ribs at the meat counter the other day and just looking stumped because they didn't know the phrase for "short ribs" in French and couldn't explain in french to the butcher what they needed the meat to be. I did in fact bring my dictionary to the fish market, and discovered that halibut is "Fletan" and cod is "Cabillaud", but everything is also slightly different because it comes from different parts of ocean than what we're used to in thethe US.

Wow, this didn't go where I was expecting it to go! I had this plan that I was going to explain different kinds of markets here, starting with Monoprix, which is thethe supermarket next to my house and which is sort of like a combination of Whole Foods and Kmart - in that it has a fish counter and decent vegetables, but also sells housewares, makeup and clothes (Matt bought two sweaters there when we first arrived) - But I'll save that for another letter. I thought I would close with some "Faux Amis", or French words and phrases that SOUND the same as English words, but mean something totally different - always a fun way to be tripped up here.

Some Faux Amis:

Attention - Doesn't mean "attention" quite, but more like " Watch Out" or "Pay Attention"

Juste - Means right or correct, but not "just" as in "I just did that" - when I first got here I kept saying "J'ai juste demenage ici",which I thought meant "I just moved here" but really means "I rightly and correctly moved here". Whoops.

Actuellement - Doesn't mean actually, means "right now" or "currently"

Avertissement - Not an advertisement, actually a Warning. An ad is a promotion or "publicite"

Finalement - Means more like "In the end" as opposed to "finally".

Rester - Means "to stay" as in "Je suis reste chez moi aujourd'hui", meaning "I stayed at home today", as opposed to I rested or took a nap or something.

Librairie - Bookstore

Raisin - Grape

Robe - Dress

I will sign off here, hope everyone has had a good week - More about food next week as we will be planning for American Thanksgiving in Paris, which Matt and I are hosting this year and will be an Expat Extravaganza. Liz Gately already smuggled cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie filling to me in her suitcase when she visited two weeks ago, so we are ready.

Lots of love, and would love to hear from you and how you are all doing!

xo Claire