Au revoir

As I type this I'm sitting at Parc Paul Mistral, watching French hippies stand in a circle with their shirts off, rhythmically banging away on drums and quietly chanting while their friends in dreadlocks juggle nearby. I'd almost think I was back in Arcata or Santa Cruz again, except for the fact that 100 feet away are three disapproving French ladies in their troisième âge (twa-zee-ehm ahj: senior citizens) with perfectly coiffed hair and bundled in sweaters (keep in mind it's practically 90 degrees out today), shooting these hippies judgmental glances and gossiping behind cupped hands, while an equally old-aged Frenchman in dress shirt and khakis tries to dance to the music. And on the bench next to them is a girl no less than six months pregnant,simultaneously rubbing her belly with one hand and smoking a cigarette with the other while she giggles with her husband and watches three labs run around the grass, chasing after a toddler. Oh, only in France...

This is what my life in Grenoble has come down to: watching hippie ladies, old ladies, and pregnant ladies sit together in the park while they gossip, smoke, and giggle. And it's all about to come to an end. Tomorrow is Monday, which marks the first day of my last week of work. This week will be full of au revoirs (ohr vwa: goodbyes), but it won't be melancholy. I'm ready to move on. In fact, in French there are many ways to say goodbye, but most of them all mean “until the next time”, which sort of takes the sting out of the sentiment. Au revoir directly translated really just means “until the next sighting”. A bientot (ah bee-en-toe), another casual way of saying goodbye, really translates to “see you very soon”, and a tout a l'heure (ah toot ah loor) implies “until the next hour we see each other again”. So what do the French say if they never intend on seeing someone again? Adieu (ah-deeu), which means “to God”. This very formal word for goodbye is best reserved for a French person if they think they're about to die, or secretly hope that the person they're saying goodbye to is about to die and be sent up “to God”.

A bit like the French, I like to think of goodbyes not so much as a parting forever, but the chance to say bonjour (hello) to someone else. Sure, I'll be saying my goodbyes to my students this week, but I'll be saying hello to Andrew on Friday for the first time in months. I might be saying goodbye to my apartment at the end of May, but I'll be saying hello to my home in Boulder Creek for the first time since September, where my family and animals will be waiting for me. And I might be saying goodbye to Grenoble and all the friends I've met here, but I'll be saying hello to a new region of France in October.

That's right: on April 7^th, 2010, I received an email from the English Teaching Assistantship program in France informing me that I'd been offered a teaching assistantship position in the region of Versailles—a suburb of Paris. Knowing that I have a place in France waiting for me--giving me another year of trying hopelessly to seem French--means leaving Grenoble is not sad but just a necessary step towards more adventure, and I couldn't be more ready. Even though I've been spoiled with six weeks of vacation in the past seven months, I'm exhausted. Nothing about Grenoble has been easy, but rather one long lesson that has taught me that chasing after my rêves (rehv: dreams) is a whole lot of hard work, mixed in with a few sunny days in a park listening to hippies butcher the drum...and a lot of other nice moments too.

Quand la vie vous donne de citrons... aka Leith (in Romansh)

Quand la vie vous donne de citrons (kand lah vee voo dohn duh see-trohn)...when life gives you lemons, sometimes you feel like just chucking them right back in the face, plus throwing a few hard, sharp rocks for good measure. That's certainly how I feel right now, anyway. I don't want any citron pressé (see-tron pres-ay: lemonade); I'd rather have my niece be healthy, I'd rather the hot water in my apartment be working, and I'd rather be able to visit my sister in Sweden before she—and I—leave the continent. But no, sometimes life's just a bitch and you have to wait for the PMS to subside.

The past few days Iceland decided it wanted to be on my liste de merde (leest duh mehrd: shit list), so it started spewing ash into the sky, clouding any chance of my getting to Scandinavia for the week to see my sister. Full of optimism—or at the very least complete naivete—I decided to make a trip to Genève (Geneva) anyway to see if my flight from the city would eventually take off. If you read the news at all, you'd know it didn't. So I've spent the past two days wandering around this lovely city in Switzerland, where Romansh is one of the forgotten official languages.  What the heck does Romansh sound like?  I have no idea.

Geneva itself is beautiful, and fortunately I was able to score a room in an over-booked hostel and get out of Grenoble for a while. The thing is, the more I wandered around Geneva, the more I realized that the stereotypes about the Swiss are completely true: obsession over Swatches, immaculateness as religion, and shady Swiss banks are everywhere.

I've noticed you can tell a lot about a culture's values by what their buildings look like. In the States, we believe in capitalism and the free market, meaning our skyscrapers tower over churches and other less-important buildings like behemoths, dwarfing anything that gets in the way of the Corporate America. In France, they're a bit more lackadaisical about money, religion, and life in general and their skylines mirror this in a melange of white-washed concrete apartment buildings and the banks and churches that blend seamlessly in between them. In Switzerland, though, it's the banks that stand out among the crowd with their fluorescent signs that practically scream “deposit your illegal profits here”. Even the cathedrals on the hill can't help but feel inadequate and humiliated standing next to these Swiss banks that really are on every street corner.

And on the subject of money: for a country as conspicuous wealth-centered as Switzerland, I've got to say that the Swiss Franc is the fakest looking money I've ever seen. Unfortunately I didn't get a picture of the money while in Switzerland because, well, I forgot, but trust me: the money is just recycled rainbow vomit, and the coin francs are pretty enough but also big enough to double as tricycle wheels.

The Genevois (jen-ev-wa: people living in Geneva) are rich, the streets are spotless, the cars are all Ferraris or Maseratis or--at the very least--Audis, though the lack of grit means the city lacks a certain je ne sais quoi. What's a city without seedy hookers and petty street crime, anyway?!  Lac Lemin (lah-k lay-mahn: Lake Geneva) is a refreshing spot to relax after you've spent a day's salary on breakfast (this city is expensive!) and everyone here seems to speak at least three languages. Geneva also seems to attract a lot of Americans: I heard more American accents in Geneva in three days than I've heard in my entire time in Grenoble. I'm not quite sure what all these Americans are doing here, but seeing as Geneva's the home of the United Nations, I guess you can't help but expect everyone in the city to actually be  from somewhere else.

Anyway, as far as travel plans go not the hottest weekend ever, but since every single European on vacation this weekend was in the same boat (or lack of airplane, ha) as me, I can't say it's all due to my bad karma.

Notre Dame

Awhile ago I read an article about a woman who prayed to Sainte Thérèse (sahnt ter-ehz: Saint Thérèse), asking the saint to scatter flowers from heaven.  Saint Thérèse is from Lisieux (lis-ee-u), France.  A nun during the late 1800s, Thérèse showed her love for God and humankind by scattering flowers, hence her nickname "The Little Flower".  The theory in the Catholic Church is that if you to pray Thérèse for 14 days, then on the 15th day you will be presented with flowers in some form, a sign that your prayer will be answered.  Just as the legend goes, the woman in this article prayed to Saint Thérèse and, lo and behold, on the 15th day received 12 dozen leftover roses from her neighbor's garden.  Instantly the woman's faith in the Church was renewed and she's been claiming the healing power of prayer ever since.

As inspiring as an article like this can be, I'm not a religious person.  Sure, I believe in some strong greater-than-human force, and I also believe in the power of prayer if only in so much that positive thoughts cause positive actions.  But honestly, I really couldn't care less if someone needs Christmas, Krishna, or karma in order to express their spirituality--or lack thereof.  France, for instance, seems to be less and less religious everyday, but there's one thing the French still have faith in: Notre Dame (no-tra dahm: Our Lady), and there are plenty of intricate cathedrals around celebrating Her.

French love les femmes (leh fehm: women), and of all the women they love, it seems they love the Virgin Mary the most (well maybe second most to Bridgette Bardot or Chanel).  Most cities in France have at least one cathedral dedicated to the matriarch such as Notre-Dame de Grenoble, the cathedral in downtown Grenoble that I visited today in order to light a candle and say an Ave Maria for my beautiful, perfect, wonderful 3-months old niece who goes into Stanford Children's Hospital on Monday for major heart tests and, possibly, surgery.

There are a million-and-one ways to express spirituality, but in my desperate need of a physical way of expressing my inner-turmoil over my niece's condition, it was nice to have a cathedral close-by to just sit and think and cry and hope in peace in front of the powerful, sacred Our Lady icon with her baby in her arms.  Even if I don't believe in the power of the Pope, like most of the French I do believe in the power of women and the incredible strength of Sedona to make it through.  After all, ever since her birth Sedona has become the lady of the Maver family.  Her birth, existence, and beauty makes my faith in family stronger, and my prayers will always be with her.  I hope yours will be too.

Pâques

Pâques (pak : Easter) is here, marking the arrival of spring and--even for the French--chocolate eggs, bunnies and hens who lay said chocolate eggs, and lots of cakes and other delicious food.  Like any other dimanche (dee-mansh: Sunday), restaurants and shops on Pâques are shut and families are out enjoying the warmer weather in the park.  As a 24 year-old American in Grenoble, how did I celebrate this holiday, you might be wondering?  With alcohol and mes amies (mayz ahm-ee: my girlfriends), of course, who when loneliness kicks in substitute as a very fine adoptive family great for parties and English conversation.


This holy weekend was spent on Saturday lapping up the vino at lunch over pizza in le centre ville (luh sen-trah veel: downtown) followed by a happy hour cocktail at a bar followed by more pizza and cocktails over a dinner that ended at 11:30, followed by French club music and "wine juice" afterward.  We left the bar tipsy and tired as bells were ringing-in the holy day and fashionably dressed actually pious French women were leaving the Saturday vigil.

Naturally, a samedi (sahm-dee: Saturday) like that would have to be followed on Easter Sunday by a trip to Chartreuse, the famous distillery in Voiron (vwar-own) which manufactures industrial strength, green alcohol made by Chartreuse monks from an ancient secret recipe.  The distillery offers free tours and tastings of this blessed liquid  named Chartreuse, which happens to taste more like ancient cough medicine than it does an ingredient in world-famous cocktails.  The entire distillery smells just as strong as the liquor tastes: earthy, musky, spicy, with a bit of holy mixed in (thanks to the monks).  All in all, a very blessed French Pâques, a holy Sunday when oddly enough the one place in France still open is an alcohol manufacturing plant run by monks.  Joyeuses Pâques,tout le monde (joy-oos pak too luh mohn-d: happy Easter, everyone)!