E-mail Update

Dear friends and family,

I told you that I would update you a few weeks ago, and so finally here I am! In case you were wondering, my fractured nose is healing nicely. Right now it sports a tiny bump and a couple of scars, but it's not too noticeable. Other than tracking the recovery of my sniffer, I have been enjoying la vie française!

Since I last e-mailed you, I've been on some excursions, my favorite so far being in Bayeux. It's absolutely one of the most charming towns I have ever seen, and if you're ever in Normandie, make sure you spend part of a day there. I think we'll go back for Thanksgiving to eat at the restaurant we went to—best food we've had in France so far! Next week I'll be going to Paris for the first time, and I'm so excited! We'll be visiting Pere Lachaise on Halloween—spooky. In two weeks we'll have some days off of school and I will be staying with my host grandparents in Deauville for a party for students involved with the Twin Cities organization. I'm here on scholarship because Lexington is Deauville's sister city.

Caen is treating me as well as the places I've been visiting. The classes are challenging and the professors are so sweet and patient. Though my kitchen contains only two burners and a sink, I've been managing to find things in the store that do not require refrigeration, microwaving, baking, or any more utensils than a pot and a spoon, that actually aren't bad! My favorite of my meals is pasta with basil pesto. I'm aware that pesto needs to be refrigerated, but part of the challenge of cooking here is lowering one's standards for what needs to be kept cold…

Despite the fact that Caen isn't a very big city, there's a lot to do. Last Friday I went with two French friends, Emilie and Marie, to go see the opera of A Midsummer Night's Dream. It was in English with French subtitles. I enjoyed it very much, as did the other two girls. I think I'll be seeing Le Mariage de Figaro in Paris next month. It makes being away from my voice lessons and voice teacher at UK so, so difficult.

That's all for now! Thank you so much for your e-mails, prayers, Skypes, phone calls, and your letters. I can't tell you how wonderful it is to hear from people I love, especially because some Americans have a Crazy Switch flipped in their brains once their feet hit European ground (but let's not go there)! All of my mail is put on my wall to add some color to my room. I really, really appreciate it.

Á bientôt!

Suzanne Emmert

Cherbourg

Erica, Courtney, and I went to Cherbourg yesterday. Compared to the rest of the places we've been to it was nothing special, just a cute town along the English Channel. We got there at lunch time after a train ride of lovely countryside scenery and ate by the port, then wandered around for a few hours. We stopped by a lovely, dark Cathedral and a basilica. The picture in this post is of a statue above an altar at the basilica-- isn't it gorgeous and eerie?

On Friday night Emilie Roussel called me and we went with a girl named Marie to see the opera of A Midsummer Night's Dream, in English, with French subtitles. The French subtitles turned out to be beneficial for me! I think it was my first time seeing an opera, and I wasn't disappointed. It was very interesting! The music was written in the mid 20th century which isn't exactly to my taste but I still very much enjoyed it, the voices of the singers, the light-up costumes, and the creative scenery!

To be honest, this has kind of been a down week. I just miss a lot of things. I miss my family and friends, obviously. I miss singing so much. So, so much. I can't even sing in my own room without disturbing a neighbor! I miss my books, because I have run out of things to read in English and reading in French is fun, but not relaxing. I miss having the internet in my room--right now I have to go to a restaurant and spend money to use it, or sit outside of a building at school, and it's always very slow and limited. I miss washing machines, dryers, microwaves, refrigerators, and ovens! I've been cooking, though, by which I mean I've been making pasta and mixing delicious basil pesto in it!

I guess I'm bound to have my down weeks! It's often so inconvenient and expensive to live here. But next week, on Halloween, my friends and I will be in Paris, and I will have another huge reminder that everything I have to put up with is very insignificant!

I'd Bayeux Love!

Fromage du jour: Camembert, which I’m developing a taste for even though it tastes like grass.

Yesterday morning Kylie, Courtney, Erica, and I hopped on a train to Bayeux, which is about a fifteen minute, 8 Euro round-trip ride from Caen. Bayeux is famous for the Bayeux Tapestry, which is a looooong tapestry that tells the story of William the Conqueror. I listened to the French version of the audio guide and was pleased to find that I could follow the story quite well! Blood, gore, etc, etc. It was a fascinating panorama—well worth the visit.

Afterward we went to a café I can’t remember the name of at the moment and I had the best meal I’ve had since coming to France. Grilled turkey with Camembert sauce, sweet potato fries, grilled zucchini, and potatoes au gratin. I thought I had died in food Heaven. We met some Americans who were spending the month in Normandy (there were lots of Americans and Brits about), and they took a picture for us.

Then we visited the Notre Dame cathedral of Bayeux which was the most beautiful cathedral I’ve seen so far. The stained glass was exquisite. We visited the crypt beneath the sanctuary, which, though small, still managed to be very creepy! I don’t know how I’ll manage the catacombs of Paris should I see them this year.

After window shopping and tea at an adorable tea room (where I also ate a raspberry tartelette for my good friend Dorothy Brown!), we decided to head back to Caen. The internet is now shut off on campus on the weekends, so we plopped down with our laptops at the good old McDonald’s. Talking to multiple family members and friends via Skype and other forms of instant internet communication was the perfect ending for such a nice day.

Perfect ending to a rough week!

Fromage du jour: Does ice-cream count as a cheese?

Yesterday I felt woozy all day long, and so I took the entire afternoon to sleep. I gave Kylie some money to buy me a dinner because walking put too much pressure on my head—isn’t that pathetic? Who knew that a broken nose and a bump on the head would make walking difficult? I had a delicious dinner of kebab sandwich, Coca Cola, and no preservative, no artificial flavors Twix bars. Oh, mama, it was delicious. I spent the evening alone in my room, just resting off the week by napping and watching House and the season premier of Pushing Daisies. I felt bad that I didn’t feel well enough to go out with my friends (the Chinese waitress, Karen, at our favorite restaurant asked where I was!), but it was exactly what I needed. Today I woke up to the Calvados I love and have been missing during this cold, stormy week: it was warm, sunny, and I felt great!

We had kebab sandwiches for lunch and then Courtney and I went shopping (Kylie and Erica were too sleepy). I found a beret, a sweater, and a skirt at H&M and a much-needed pillow from Eurodif. Eurodif is one of the most amazing stores! It’s a home decorating store with clothing and accessories as well. They have a small selection of yarn that reminded me that I need to attempt knitting again.

Courtney and I swung by the dorm and took Kylie and Erica along to our favorite patisserie (raspberry donut* for me!), and then to Marche Plus (formerly 8 a Huit) for. . .

Cereal and milk.

That’s right. We bought Frosted Flakes and cold milk. Milk in France doesn’t taste good at all, but we couldn’t tell when it was poured over the cereal, and so we had the best afternoon snack! I can’t even tell you how much I’ve missed cereal! Our kitchen doesn’t have a fridge and so we can’t store milk, but I guess we figured that if we all had milk and cereal for dinner we could drink it before it needed refrigeration.

So, how could it not be a good day? The cuts on my nose are healing nicely, I had a great shopping trip, and now I’m at McDonald’s for some WIFI. Let me tell you, I will not take Super Value Menus or WIFI for granted ever, EVER again!

*Forget all you knew about donuts, and pastries in general, if you ever come to France. They’re otherworldly here. How will I ever be able to leave?

Don't worry, kids!

I'm fine!

Some of you may have heard that I got to experience French healthcare first hand! It's true, it's true. My friend, Erin Risch, whom some of you may know, is studying in Paris currently and she came to stay with me. On her last night here, I took some NyQuil to alleviate the symptoms of a cold that was hindering my sleep. Something, whether it was a lack of enough sleep or something else, reacted badly with the NyQuil and when we woke up in the morning I fainted. As I fainted I hit my nose on the edge of my bed, then hit the floor. While I was unconscious, Erin used the emergency phone on my dorm floor and then knocked on the doors of my friends. Very soon firemen came and took me to the hospital.

I'll spare you a lot of the detail, but I will say that a lot of nausea and dizzyness was involved, plus a bit of a headache! They took an X-Ray and found that I had broken my nose, just slightly. I was surprised to find this out because it didn't hurt that badly, and it wasn't very swollen. After I had been on an IV for about ten minutes I felt perfectly fine and ready to go home, but the nurses and doctors would have none of that. They told me that I had to stay the night, just to be on the safe side. Everyone was very, very sweet, and apologized for their broken English (which was silly, as it was I who needed to be apologizing for my broken French!). My friends were so good to me. Erin called a lot to make sure I didn't need her to come back to Caen and stay with me, and I told her that I had to stay at the hospital overnight so she couldn't. Erica stayed at the hospital with me for hours, and later Emilie (French friend) and Courtney (American) came to visit with a goody bag of magazines, Jane Eyre (which I read most of during my stay), a brush, mirror, apples, and chocolate.

My roommate was a woman named Valerie whose husband stayed with her as much as he could. I noticed her looking at my chocolate earlier in the day and when her husband left I offered her some, and she took it. Today I think she became overwhelmed with her condition (which I think has to do with depression-- I think she OD'd on some medication), and her husband wasn't in the room so she sat on my bed and held my hand for a long time. We talked, and I told her that I was a Christian and would pray for her. She closed her eyes and nodded, and I held her hand some more. Later, her husband came in and gave me a gift of fine, dark chocolate, for which I was grateful! Later, she had to be moved to a different room, and when she said good-bye she cried and hugged me so tightly and kissed my cheeks.

I'm not going to say that it wasn't a hassle going through all of this. I feel awful for how badly I scared my friends, and I hated being hooked up to an IV for so long! But you know, if I went through it all to give a sad woman a piece of chocolate and a hug, it was all worth it! Please keep me and the rest of Caen in your prayers. It's been a rough couple of days!

In a few days I'll send another update about the rest of my life in Caen. It's an amazing place, and every day I wake up so excited that I get to spend another day here. I miss my friends in the United States very dearly, but I'm so grateful for the experiences I get to have in France! The city, my classes, and my friends are all wonderful.

Liberty

France is so interesting. I feel like life is so laid-back and charming. People spend all of their time outside reading, biking, shopping, dancing, and napping on the lawn of the castle. We can't figure out when our favorite pastry shop opens and closes, but I have a theory that it goes something like this:

When the planets are aligned in just the right way and the breeze is light, the store opens. By the time a cat has walked by the front door three times, the store closes. When the direction of the wind changes, the store opens again, then closes when the cat walks by three times, then opens again when the planets realign themselves properly, and the cycle continues. The French seem to understand this delicate harmony between pastry and galaxy, but it's a secret we hungry Americans who want nothing more than a strawberry tartelette have yet to discover.

I like France a lot, and this makes me wonder why they are so fascinated with America. They really are. Many people we talk to in restaurants and all over talk about how much they want to live in New York City (Karen, our waitress at the Chinese restaurant, wants to live in Manhattan), and how much they love our culture: apparently our movies, music, and tv shows make up for the fact that they think we're lazy and fat. A few have said that they just feel like Americans are more free. I wonder if that's because we really are, or if it's because that's what we keep telling everyone? Apparently there must be something to it because the French people I know in America feel that they have more freedoms. I need to do more investigations on this!

I guess one thing people have said is that they are fascinated that a black man can run for president and a woman can run for vice president. That's still unheard of in parts of Western Europe, and I think it's just something I've been taking for granted.

Classes & Open Market

Fromage du jour: Chevre. Yes, France, go ahead and correct me when I mispronounce the name of a Monseiur Seguin crepe and then turn around and pronounce a Jose crepe “Jo-suh”.

This weekend has been so lovely, which is great, because we received our class schedules. Nineteen hours of class each week isn’t so bad, I suppose, because I will not have a job. Here’s my class list:
• Comprehension and Expression—writing/grammar (4 hrs/week)
• Corrective Phonetics (2 hrs/week)
• France History & Culture (3 hrs/week)
• Comprehension and Expression—oral (3 hrs/week)
• Language and Literature (3 hrs/week)
• Writing & Oral Expression Workshop (3 hrs/week)
• Phonetics & Phronologie (1 hr/week)

One thing that is very different about French class schedules is that the classes meet at different times in different rooms each time they meet, and one day the class may be scheduled to last for an hour, while another day it may be scheduled to last for two. On Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays, I have two classes, which is nice. On Thursday I have three classes and on Wednesday I have four. Wednesdays are going to be loooong days for me! Class begins at 8:20 and I don’t get out until 5:10. There’s a one hour break in there somewhere.

Also, to answer a question many people have been asking, every word in every class will be French. Even when we’re asked what a certain word means we have to respond with a synonym in French. That’s the only common language between the students since we all come from different countries!

Enough about class! On Friday we went on a boat ride with the rest of the foreign students. It was free because it ended up being an advertisement for a local bank. They had representatives trying to get us to sign up for various deals the whole time. We made up for it by going to our favorite Chinese restaurant where we finished off a delicious meal with huge bowls of ice-cream. Yesterday we went downtown and had amazing goat cheese crepes. I also went to Carrefour to buy a hotpot, tea, and other things. The hotpot blows a fuse every time I use it in my room, but not in Erica’s room. I nearly cried! I’ll have the maintenance man look at that tomorrow.

Today is Sunday, and that means Open Market at the Port! Ooh, I am still so excited about it. I bought a beautiful winter coat for 35 Euro. It’s not exactly the coat I want, but it’s fairly close, and for that price I couldn’t pass it up. Plus, it’d make me look like a spy if I only had a fedora. I didn’t want to spend too much on one because when I go home for Christmas I can get the one I bought last year. The coat I really want is probably well over 200 Euro anyway! We wandered around for a long time, bought crepes, and went home for lunch where I am now. Open Market days are going to be my favorite, I can tell. There’s so much to see, so much to buy, and it’s very inexpensive.

Here is my class schedule. Each color of pen represents a different class.
I took this at the open market today.