A speedy update: more pictures, less words

My favorite bad English translation to date, found on a menu in a touristy area: "fine believed ox sections"? What on earth??

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I leave tomorrow evening for Paris... then Wednesday morning I'll be in Athens! (Sometimes, the question is really "why not?"). It's our fall break, so I'm going with two girls from my program and we're making the most of it. I's a little crazy going to a country where I don't speak the language, with no real plans-- I'm sure it will be an adventure. I'll be sure to let you know how it goes and post some pictures when I get back.

Sorry it's been a while-- here are a few of my experiences from the last month or so:

• Going to a French wedding with my host family
• Having French people ask me, during conversation club, what to see in Paris (they’d never been there)
• Eating my first sandwich with French fries on it (always called “American” sandwiches)… I ordered mine rather unintentionally.
• Experiencing the effects of the equivalent of 2 glasses of wine and champagne within an hour, on an empty stomach… during a wine tasting event organized by my study abroad program (IES)
• Being forced into a piano duel with a slightly inebriated dinner guest
• Seeing my first French movie in a French movie theater
• Discovering I can here the soccer games played in Nantes from by bedroom window
• Going to a Harry Potter release party (for the French version), being “sorted” into Slytherin (“Serpentard”) for a trivia game in which I was useless, and then translating questions into English for a group of non-French speaking Chinese exchange students during round 2
• Seeing 5 chateaux during a trip to the Loire Valley (including Leonardo da Vinci’s grave):

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And something I found entertaining, in case you wondered if Halloween exists in France-- we translated this into French in my translation class. It's from a book called Sixty-Million Frenchman Can’t Be Wrong (Why We Love France But Not the French):

Halloween is only a few years old in France. It’s not an easy custom to adapt, partly because French urban structures don’t lend themselves well to trick or treating. Kids would need to know the four-number digicode of many buildings just to get through the door to ring doorbells and there aren’t many front porches for people to decorate. In Honfleur, local authorities found a way to surmount these logistical obstacles. They organized a Halloween parade so local children could trick or treat en masse in the cafés and shops along the port.
People, or course, draw on the models they already have—Halloween in Honfleur looked and sounded lore like a labor strike than the traditional children’s ritual we are accustomed to. The Honfleur children marched in a crowd between police cruisers, their little fists raised, chanting, “We want candies! We want candies!” And what did they do as they proceeded along the port? They actually stormed all the restaurants and boutiques in their path ordering merchants to hand over the goods. We were stunned to see this hostile pack of rampaging ghosts and ghouls, but when we thought about it, it made sense. Begging for candy—even pretend begging—isn’t very noble, especially in a county where there’s no tradition of philanthropy. People draw on the models they have. Demanding candy via a legally recognized, police escorted manifestation made more sense to the French, even when they were just having fun.

So much for trying to teach an old country new tricks.

Happy Halloween :)