Samantha's blog

Goodbye ParisThe most valuable thing that I will take away from this year is speaking French. It has always been a dream of mine to know what it was like to speak another language, and I don’t intend to let it go. It has also taught me that I am more adaptable and flexible than I thought. It has been quite an experience to acclimate myself to French customs and manners (and sometimes lack thereof).
It’s hard to look back and reflect on the entirety of the experience, because there were so many moments that meant so many different things to me. I also think that I’m not ready to reflect yet. It’s still my life, my reality. I can’t imagine not waking up in my bed, saying good morning to the princess and the count, going for a run, seeing my friends, going to my favorite bars, just being here. I can’t think about what it meant to study abroad, because right now it just looks like my life.
I do know that when I go back to New York, it will be a shock to no longer have culture shock, or more accurately, a cultural barrier. It will be weird to walk into a party of strangers and just be one of the crowd, instead of the “American girl,” the novelty piece. It will be interesting when there is no longer any language barrier. And I wonder if my wardrobe will stay as centered around neutral colors as it has become.
But most of all, I think it will be weird to be living somewhere permanently. For the past three years I have lived knowing that I will be moving three thousand miles at the end of the year. That means no long-term relationships, friendships, houses, or financial decisions. But that also means, take advantage of everything you have because it will all be over too soon. Will I be as motivated to live life to the fullest if I know that New York will be there next month and every month after that? I hope so, but I think only my favorite French sentence applies, “On va voir, on va voir.”

the internetThis course was difficult for me because I felt very alone and isolated. Even though we comment on each other’s blogs, it felt impersonal and didn’t really lead to any discussion. And because I felt very alone, it became more and more difficult to hold myself accountable to actually doing my work on time and doing it to the best of my ability. I think it could be a really great tool to learn about places all over the world and share the common experience of immersion, but I don’t think I made it as meaningful as I was hoping. In the end, I’m not much of a technological person and the social barriers of internet communication really do affect my ability to interact. Blogging is probably not for me.
I think in the future, it would help those students who have my problem if there was more teacher/student interaction regarding assignments timeliness and quality. I still don’t know if what I’ve been writing is of the appropriate length, formality, clarity, etc. It would have helped me to hear that someone was out there reading and guiding me. Also, I think some form of discussion board could encourage more student interaction. In addition to commenting on blogs, if there was an on going discussion we could have more back and forth and dialoguing about our experiences.

When traveling to Paris, be prepared to do as the Parisians do.I think the most important piece of advice that I would give to anyone coming to NYU is France, is to find as much as possible to get involved in outside of school. For anyone interested in an immersion experience who wants to become fluent in French, it takes quite a bit of effort to leave the NYU community and meet French people. I have a lot of friends who never spoke French for more than 5 minutes and were never once isolated in a French environment. It can be scary and intimidating, but with a little bit of effort, taking dance classes, finding an internship, volunteering, having a language exchange partner, it makes a really big difference in your overall experience. I would warn anyone interested in France, that the French are infamous for their bureaucracy. Don’t expect things like opening a bank account, buying a phone, and signing a lease to always be easy, but NYU is very helpful in getting you started. I’m really glad that I stayed for a whole year because it made all of that work worthwhile. I know a lot of people who spent nearly half of a semester just getting a bank account open. I would recommend living in an area that has nightlife, like the Marais, Oberkampf, or the Latin Quarter, because the trains stop running at 1 or 2 and it gets expensive to get home late if you live far away. Also, these places have the best shopping, restaurants, and movie theaters so you’ll always have somewhere to go. Paris is a beautiful city, and all of the major sites are must-sees, but some of my favorite parts are a long ways from the open promenades of St. Germain des Pres or the spectacular monuments along the Seine. Explore the areas of the city that don’t attract tourists, La Goutte d’Or, the Algerian neighborhood, Belleville, the Arabic and Chinese neighborhood, the 15th arrondissement, with its chic new buildings and also Chinatown. There’s a lot more to Paris than just tradition, and your eyes, budget, and tastebuds will thank you. And last but not least, if you can only come for one semester, come in the spring. Paris is a very grey city so they’ll be a lot of winter no matter which one you pick, but the parks in springtime are not to be missed.

A place that will never feel like homeI am particularly intrigued by De Botton’s theory of travel as a mindset because I think it accurately explains the confusing and inconsistent feelings I have about Paris and New York. Last year when I was living in New York, I had already begun to notice the amazing quality of cities that allows you to travel without straying far from home. Each new neighborhood I ventured into for an errand, on my way somewhere, or to see some other attraction, was different enough to produce in me whatever bizarre mix of hormones and endorphins it is that inspires the heady rush of curiosity and otherness that is travel. A two dollar subway ride and I had a few hours of mini-vacation, far from the pressing worries of the everyday and full of pleasantries of newness. But even though New York held such an amazing capacity for travel, the areas that were defined as “home” spread farther and farther. The perimeters of “normal” and “other” were constantly expanding, shrinking, and occasionally overlapping.
When I moved to Paris, I thought that maybe I would have the thrill of travel all the time, or at least this was the idealized notion abstractly embedded in my subconscious. But I have not been a visitor in Paris for a long time. Yes, my everyday places are beautiful, and I don’t always take them for granted, but I haven’t had the sensation of travel as much as I thought. Just like New York, there are many places located just a quick subway ride away that are mentally categorized as “travel”, to the Chateau at the Bois de Vincennes, the Musée des Arts Décoratifs, the new Japanese tea garden, but the zone of “normal” extends in isolated regions and intricate patterns throughout the city. The neighborhoods around my house, my friends houses, my office, my favorite bars and restaurants, all have lost the sparkling luster of “otherness”.
So in going back home to New York, I don’t really feel like I am traveling any less. I am trading one home for another, but each of them is a home that includes travel, even travel more exciting than “room travel.” I will miss everything about Paris, both the familiar and the other, but I know that I will have the opportunity to continue to travel, explore, and see through the eyes of a visitor.

Marie Antoinette: The best friend of my host mother's ancestorWhen I came to France, it was really important to me to stay in a host family, and I think it was one of the best decisions I made while I was here. I live in an aristocratic French family, in a very fancy apartment on the Seine facing the Eiffel Tower, and enjoy free dinners whenever I want, or access to the massive kitchen complete with dishwasher, washer, and dryer. But most of all, I’m glad to have had the opportunity to get to know and hang out with my host family. They have given me an education in the practices of an aristocratic elite that is quickly dying away, but also always treated me with overwhelming kindness, generosity, and politeness.
The person that I spent the most time with was my host mother. A retired hostess to visiting ambassadors, I have never met anyone more maternal and solicitous. Most times I go to the kitchen she is either cooking, doing laundry, or ironing, and she always greets me with a smile and asks me about my day. She always likes to know what I’m doing, whether I have a lot of work, whether I’m going out a lot. But she is also has a very strong sense of propriety. Being a princess (yes, a princess), she was raised with very strict rules of conduct. I always do my best to make sure that I am polite and appropriate, and I hide the less upright aspects of my Parisian lifestyle…
Despite the formality of her social milieu, we have become remarkably close. We share and laugh and she always makes sure that I have enough to eat. She has even become slightly affectionate, which greatly surprised me. Several times she has embraced me or touched my cheek, and once called me like a second daughter. The French are very reserved about forming new relationships, especially ones that are necessarily temporary, so it means a lot to me that she has opened up a bit.
Of course, you have to keep in mind that not all French people are royalty…

Editions du SeuilOne of my favorite places this summer was actually my office. If your familiar with Paris geography at all, it’s in the 6th arondissement between Odéon and St. Michel, and if your not, it is near the Seine right by Notre Dame. It’s an excellent location, surrounded by restaurants and cheap take-away places selling crepes, Palestinian sandwiches, pizza, and “asiatique” food, which is the French version of take-away Chinese, a long bar of random Asian-like foods that will be microwaved and handed to you in plastic-sealed containers. As I working in foreign rights for a publishing house, it’s located in the heart of what is essentially the publishing quarter of Paris. Almost every significant French publisher is located with a 7-block radius of each other, and a good bet is that their authors aren’t far away. It is also the head-quarters of Gilbert-Joseph, a French chain of booksellers. They have four large stores in the area, that sell everything from technical academic books, to foreign language fiction, to art books, all at discounted prices because they will resell any undamaged books you sell back to them.
And tucked into a little corner, amongst the tasty cheap food and slightly-used, cheap books (what could be better?) is a little hotel particulier with a big, green, worn door. The only indication that there is a business inside is a small framed poster for “Le Seuil”. A quick ring of the buzzer, and you enter into a small hallway filled with cardboard boxes of freshly delivered books and samples, packages, and store displays to be delivered. Around the corner is the reception, with an awkwardly low couch (I think to discourage lingering visitors) and the coffee machine that spits out plastic cups of coffee, complete with little plastic spoons already inside, for only 25 cents. Up three flights of winding stairs of varying heights, or a slightly longer trip in the tiny elevator, and you arrive in my office. A large room with two big windows and covered on every side by enormous, chaotic bookshelves filled with children’s and arts books in every language imaginable and files and files and some more files over there. In the middle of the room there are three large desks, invariably coated in papers, books, and the weird, colorful French files essentially made of folded paper. The French don’t have the same filing system of manila folders with label tabs stashed in drawers in hanging files, instead they have folded paper of varying degrees of the thickness filled with paper and stashed in boxes, making things much harder to alphabetize or organize in anyway.
This room is where I spent the majority of my semester chilling with my young bosses, translating, and enjoying the fact that I finally felt immersed in France, the only foreigner in a building full of French women with great style, trim figures, and the job I can only dream of.

Transatlantic ExchangeIt seems very foreign to me that in less than a week I will speak, think, and write in only one language. I will no longer say words in the wrong language, have to ask myself, “Is that a word?” or have to ponder which language is appropriate for which person. I will also never have to be embarrassed of my accent or translate for friends. As much as I have struggled with my linguistic confusion, I have also really enjoyed it. It is always interesting to see in which ways my brain will get confused, which franglicisms have become rooted in my subconscious. I have also enjoyed watching the confused and surprised look on French people’s faces when the loud American actually speaks good French. Somehow, a world without linguistic crises just seems a bit boring. No more new expressions and swear words, no explaining the bizarre euphemisms and slang used by American teenagers (one French friend was particularly amused by “tots def”). And where is the adventure if you always know what you want to say and how to say it?
But at the same time, I am excited to go back to New York and finally have a secret language. Even though I am a foreigner in France, speaking my native tongue in no way distinguishes me from the crowd or provides me with any amount of privacy. In fact, I find it to be just the opposite. If I am speaking English in public, the French will assume that I am just one the billions of tourists who invade their city on a daily basis, and if they are rude, vulgar people, will proceed to talk about me or taunt me in French assuming that I could never understand. It is one unfortunate fact about Paris that I will definitely not miss, although responding in French and walking away can be very satisfying. But back in New York, I will finally have the experience of being able to talk openly and in relative privacy. Although, New York is full of French people, so a bit of caution is wise. I have often enjoyed listening to French tourists in public places like the Met because they assume that no one will understand, especially because they can spot other Frenchies from a mile away.
Because I am petrified of losing my French, I am hoping to find some French friends or at least a language exchanger partner in the city, but this may prove to be a rather difficult task. In France, there is a large community of Americans, of which I am currently a member, who associate with each other, attend each other’s parties, seek out each other’s company, and generally frequent the same places. In New York, there is a secret underground network of French expats who cling together as well. If I am successful in my infiltration, I will have access to nearly unlimited opportunities to practice my French. But if the expats are as reserved and difficult to befriend as the resident French, I may never find someone to talk to me.

What you won't find in France One of the books I am reading for class is called Paris to the Moon by Adam Gopnik, and is a collection of travel anecdotes by a journalist who spent a year in Paris with his wife and child. One of my favorite chapters is entitled “The Rules of the Sport” and is about the author’s attempts to find and attend a gym in Paris. This is a common concern for many NYU students, and one that does not have an easy solution and demonstrates one of the major differences between American (particularly New York) and French attitudes.
Gopnik, in his search for a gym, is constantly met by surprise and confusion when asking friends for advice. And when he does find a gym, the “rigorous” subscription is for once a week, and the pristinely manicured woman in a tracksuit behind the desk is forced to negotiate a price for an unlimited number of visits. At first, the gym is under construction and there aren’t any machines yet. Then, he must pass an oral exam with a “professeur” before touching the machines. Then, must have a walk through of how to use the machines with another “professeur”. And finally, he is allowed to work out. But when he asks for a towel, he is told that they have not been purchased yet, but they are “envisaged”.
The French have a very different attitude towards exercise. Since I have begun running, it has occurred to me even more. After the first time I went for a run, I was sore, and casually mentioned it to a coworker to explain why I was making funny faces when sitting down and standing up, and her only response was, “That’s why it’s better not to do sport.” When I bumped into my host mom all red and sweaty, she asked surprised, “You went jogging? Where did you go?” and when I told her my route, she was taken aback, “But that’s kilometers away!”
I suppose the cultural incomprehension of the New Yorker’s compulsive need for exercise isn’t so shocking, unless you consider the amount of calories in the average French dish. Everything is covered is cheese, butter, and fatty little pieces of ham called “lardons”, no need to explain that one. And yet, everyone is skinny. Chocolate is considered a necessary part of any well-rounded breakfast, every salad has cheese, and yet French women remain slim without feeling the need to hit the gym.
Gopnik has a peculiar way of explaining the French contempt for exercise. He has a theory that the French get the same rush out of battling French bureaucracy as New Yorkers get from a good workout. He says, “Three or four days a week you’re given something to do that is time-consuming, takes you out of yourself, is mildly painful, forces you into close proximity with strangers, and ends, usually, with a surprising rush of exhilaration: ‘Hey, I did it.’” But even if the French prefer the mental and paperwork workout to the sweaty and muscly one, it still leaves me wondering what melts away those calories in the bodies of French women who feel no shame in eating tarts, candies, and crème brulée. Certainly, the French attitude did not have the same effect on my hips.

The New Japanese GardenMy favorite cultural activity in France is visiting parks. I am convinced that nobody does parks like the French. From delicately manicured flowerbeds, to grandiose sculptures, to large, open woods, to green lawns filled with picknickers, the French have mastered both the art of landscaping and the ever-so-subtle art of good policing so that grass stays green and chairs stay in the park, even if that means that sometimes the police will ask you not to play your guitar… And since Paris is so consistently grey 87% of the year, on a rare sunny day there is nothing more delightful than a chair in the sun, a view of a chateau, a pretty lawn, and a fountain, and the best sandwich the local boulangerie can provide.
But this week, I had a slightly different park experience. In a neighboring town, still conveniently located only a few stops on the metro from my house, there is a very small museum, at the moment a temporary collection of photographs of India in the 1920’s, with the most magnificent garden. The visit starts in the Japanese village, with meandering streams, grassy knolls, bonsai trees, and pagodas. Through a gate-way of bushes, you pass into the English garden, with an open field spotted with flowers, a pond, and a wooden bridge hidden in a rocky cliff. After the English garden, comes a more typically French rose garden, with vines cultivated into different shapes and a stunning, white greenhouse. Around the corner is the rocky, alpine forest, complete with mossy boulders and twisting paths through ferns and pine trees, which then opens up into the “swamp” which is actually a man made pond filled with lily pads and surrounded by flowers. And then at the very end, comes the best of all, the new Japanese garden, which is a wonderland of ponds full of coy, rounded red bridges, enormous weeping willow trees, mountains of flowers, trickling waterfalls, and because the French are less lawsuit obsessed, rocks that you can climb on in the water. Each garden feels like it’s own oasis, bringing clarity and calm, even though from time to time you catch reminders that your still in Paris, the sound of chaos from the school next door, a glimpse of the street through the trees.
Paris can be a very monotonous city because most of it was constructed to look the same. Even when you take a trip to Chinatown or the Algerian corner, the vibrant street markets still take place under the typical Hausmannian balconies. But Parisian parks never cease to surprise me with their variety. Each one is unique. Luxembourg is grandiose, Buttes Chaumont is wild and monumental, Place des Vosges is calm and isolated. And in the little cultivated garden I found, you can take a walk around the world from the meadows of England, to the Swiss Alps, to a Japanese tea garden without straying far from home. And that, to me, the endless variety at the tip of your fingers, is what makes cities so spectacular, and worth putting up with the noise, pollution, and dirt.

RocamadourI am intrigued by McCannell’s concept of “front” and “back” spaces in terms of authenticity. I recently took a trip to the south of France over spring break, or to be more specific to the no-man’s land of fertile farmlands and river valleys between Orléan and Toulouse. Deep in the countryside, in tiny, quaint villages, a small number of people live and work off of the tireless flow of fleeting tourists. People rarely stay more than a few hours, at most a night, before floating on to the next town or region. I found a steep contrast between the vast “front” region of mystical, medieval villages untouched by time except for the vast array of tourist goods, and the miniscule “back” region tucked into living rooms safely hidden from the many prying eyes. I almost felt like I had stepped into a Disney version of a French town, a scene from Beauty and the Beast offered to roaming visitors, everything was meticulously conceived to herd tourists towards the right places, while performing a spectacle of authenticity and charm. Having traveled a decent amount, including several trips to various Disney parks, I was skeptical of the illusion, and curious about the lives of the few people who live in these idyllic places. Thanks to French skills and the fact that we didn’t have a car, and so were often walking from train stations to towns on tiny trails past private houses, empty woods, and trailer parks, I managed to catch a glimpse of what the “back” areas might be like. I had a long conversation with a waiter, born and raised within 10 miles of the restaurant, as the buses had left and we were the only customers. I watched a single woman return from a walk with her dog and enjoy a cup of tea and a book on her porch. I glimpsed into every nook and cranny, every back alley and open kitchen door, looking for a taste of genuine life. And I found it, or bits of it. My favorite town had a population of 120 in the summer, and only 24 in the winter. There aren’t any bakeries or grocery stores in town, so they have to drive at least 20 – 40 minutes to get basic necessities. But they are very proud of the natural beauty that surrounds them, proud that it is worth coming to visit from every corner of the globe, even if they take it for granted on a daily basis. But most of all, I noticed the toll that the language barrier between the performers and the audience takes on the residents of these towns. Any time I spoke French they were so enthused to not have to try to speak English. I found that there was a steep contrast between the simple, measured life that people were trying to live and the bustling, hectic, English-speaking masses that invade the towns on a daily basis. The irony is, that each one of those tourists is looking for the “authentic” experience that their mere presence makes impossible. They want to experience the calm, beautiful life of the deep countryside, but their presence makes these small towns feel more like a commercial shopping mall.