Ethnic Foods

I always chuckle to myself as I walk down the ethnic food section of the grocery store. The selection is very small, which is not surprising because the French like French food. Most ethnic restaurants that we have tried have adapted their country’s food to satisfy the French palate. Our favourite pizza restaurant tops their pizzas with French emmental, crème fraîche, and a raw egg. At the local Indian restaurant we received the blandest curries that we have ever eating. And in case you are not a connoisseur of Indian cuisine, bland and curry should never be used in the same sentence. Even the Blue Elephant, our favourite Thai restaurant in Paris, has scaled back the heat to satisfy the French’s wimpy tastes. The ‘three elephant’ dishes (elephants being the indicator of heat), only cause a mild tingling sensation in our mouths.

In the ethnic food section in the grocery store there are the typical Chinese, Thai, and Japanese items that also line the ethnic food aisle in Canada. But what amuses me are what they consider ‘ethnic’ here, but are commonplace at home. Here are some examples, most at ridiculously high prices:

-Tiny jars of cranberry sauce
-BBQ sauce
-Small jars of a mysterious brand of peanut butter
-Salsa
-Worcestershire sauce
-Fake maple syrup
-Can beans
-Marshmallow Fluff (!)
-English cream crackers (the only crackers to be found in the grocery store)

The list is very interesting, but perhaps what is most intriguing is not what is available, but what is not available. Who decided which items to import? I am unable to buy yellow mustard, baking powder, molasses, chili powder, or chocolate chips, but I can buy Marshmallow Fluff?!

French Holidays

I often get asked whether the same holidays are celebrated in France as in Canada. And if so, if they are celebrated in the same manner. So I thought I would start writing an entry describing each of the French holidays as they take place. I'll include statutory and non-statutory holidays, if the latter involves something interesting. I will start with le jour d'Armistice, since it was only last week.

In France, Armistice Day is a public holiday. As is the case with most statutory holidays, large grocery stores remain open and smaller businesses are closed. And as is the case 365 days/year, the boulangeries remain open. A day cannot pass without fresh bread!

Unlike the anglo-saxon tradition (yes, the French still call us anglo-saxons), November 11 strictly celebrates the end of the first world war. France's participation in other wars is not commemorated on this day, yet as there are no WWI veterans remaining in France, there is talk of expanding this practice. Ceremonies are held at large war memorials, usually at the location of battles (ex. Verdun). There are not ceremonies held throughout France, as is the case in Canada. Poppies are not worn, despite the fact that the famous poppy fields are in France and Belgium. In fact, very little is made of Armistice Day in most of France. Maybe that will change if/when they anglo-saxonize the holiday. And yes, I just turned the term anglo-saxon into a verb....

A Visitor + Treats = a Good Week!

This week we had a visit from an old friend from home. Kimberly London was a great friend during our days at Mt Allison and an old roommate of mine. She knew us both before Gilles and I started dating. In fact, during our reminiscing we recalled that she met Gilles before she met me. We have done a poor job of keeping in touch with Kim during the last few years, so her visit gave us the chance to get caught up. And a visitor from home always means treats for us. Kim graciously filled her suitcase up with licorice, peanut butter, and raincoast crisps for us. Yummy! And the empty space meant she could buy more treats in France to bring back with her.

She split her time in France between here and Paris, where she has another friend. She had never been to Europe, and really enjoyed her first trip. She was very brave and tried several foods outside of her comfort zone, including tartare, escargots, and veal liver. I was very proud of her willingness to try new things.

The visitor count is up to ten people, with more guests scheduled to arrive in one month. I love our traveling friends and family!

Some of our Favourite Things, Italian Style

Oh Italy! I don't think I could ever tire of travel in Italy. We recently spent two nights in Rome and three nights in Florence. The two main purposes of the trip were for Gilles to get a Gabonese visa in Rome and to buy a watch in Florence. But we managed to also fit in plenty of eating, sightseeing, and shopping. So here is a list of some of our favourite Italian things (plus Gilles' most hated thing):

1. Gelato. And Florence is the top gelato town. There was a gelato shop on every corner, beautifully displaying their product in heaped mounds topped with the main flavour ingredient. While these presentations are pretty, they usually indicate that the gelato is factory produced (with added colour and artificial flavours) rather than artisanaly made. I did some pre-trip homework and found four gelato shops in Florence that make their product in-house using only natural ingredients. We tried all four, and they were perhaps the best gelato that we have ever had in Italy. And that is a big statement considering how much gelato we ate during our six week trip to Italy last year. We named a little shop called Vestri as our top shop in Florence.

2. Nutella. Gilles swears that Italian Nutella is better than French and Canadian Nutella. You may think he is crazy, but he has eaten enough Nutella to be an expert.

3. Campari Soda Cocktails. My favourite cocktail is nearly impossible to get elsewhere, but commonplace in Italy.

4. Italians for their fashion sense. They are amazing to watch.

5. Italians for their craziness. The further south one goes, the more chaotic things get. Coming from conservative countries like Canada and France, it is fun to watch such animated people.

6. Free snacks with drinks. A necessity after a full afternoon of walking. At 6 PM it is too early to eat supper, so these little treats really hit the spot.

7. The food. We love French food, but for us it is hard to beat Italian cuisine. The French win out on cheese, bread, and maybe wine, but for everything else, head to Italy. It's simple, fresh, and delicious.

And now for the hated thing: paying to get into a church. And the Catholics know how to get the most money out of tourists, charging more than non-religious sights for equivalent viewings. For example, we paid 12 euros to enter one church to see a single famous painting, and 12 euros to enter the Uffizi gallery, a large museum containing many famous paintings. To appreciate how angry this makes Gilles, refer to photo above. That's not a happy tourist!

Dream Come True

As most of you probably know, Gilles is a lover of watches. Specifically, top-quality, handmade watches. He marvels at the craftsmanship and science of these time pieces. For years he has been saving money and researching watches to determine which watch to buy. Last week, the day finally arrived to make the big purchase.

After much research and consideration, he decided he wanted a Panerai watch. They are an Italian company, whose watches are now made in Switzerland. Last week we paid a visit to their flagship store in Florence to buy the watch. It was a special experience for Gilles. After buying the watch, we got to see their private museum containing several watches that have been made since the company was founded in 1860. It topped off a perfect afternoon of shopping in beautiful Florence.

Good Intentions

We recently attempted our first hike in the Pyrenees, the mountain range that is just south of us. It is a large range that divides France and Spain, and goes from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean coast. It was the first time that our hiking boots came out of the box that they traveled here in, but better late than never, right? We consulted a French book on hikes in the area, and selected one that promised a Roman ruin at the top of the mountain. This intrigued us greatly as fans of Roman history, and we have certainly never come across a 2,000 year-old relic at the top of any of the peaks we summited in Alberta.

It was a beautiful Sunday morning when we set out for the hike. We assumed the drive would be about 1&1/2 hours. Unfortunately, we did not anticipate the type of roads that would lead us there. About every half hour we turned onto a road that was smaller than the last. As we entered the foothills, we turned onto a road that was barely meant for two cars. Then, as we drove out of the forests and onto the grassy mountains, we switched to a road that was barely wide enough for our tiny car. Our speed of 130 km/h dropped progressively down to 20 km/h, leading to a 2&1/2 hour drive. Once we arrived (ie reached the end of the road), we spent the next hour trying to find the beginning of the hike. Eventually we gave up, and enjoyed lunch surrounded by the beautiful scenery. We may have been wearing our hiking boots, but there was no hiking to be had that day.

Our misadventure did not mean a waste of a day. The area that we spent the afternoon is magnificent. The mountains in the Basque (western) area of the Pyrenees could not be more different than the Canadian Rockies that we know so well. The Basque mountains are rounded, soft, and grassy. The grass is lush and green, much better than that in our backyard. This is where shepherds bring their flocks in early spring to graze freely on the grass. They remain there until the fall when they are led back down the mountain to their farm for the winter months. These animals are mostly used for their milk production. The milk from the high-alpine grazing makes wonderful cheeses. In fact, the sheep’s cheese from this area is one of the oldest known cheeses in existence. These animals are the epitome of free-range. Although we saw cows, horses, and thousands of sheep, we did not see a single shepherd or fence. The animals roamed wherever they wanted to, including on the tiny road and all around our car. It was quite a sight! We didn’t get to see the Roman ruin, but we did get to see something pretty special.

Fungii = Drugs??

Autumn is here, and with it brings a favourite French pass-time: mushroom hunting. The whole family bundles up, and heads for the woods on Sundays in search of delectable, edible fungi. Yet how do they distinguish the edible from the poisonous varieties? Are the French taught the distinguishing features at an early age, or are mushroom related poisonings an issue in France? Turns out, they head to their pharmacist for species identification. Each different type of mushroom is placed in a separate bag; the pharmacist then consults their reference book and gives the green light if the variety is edible. Can you imagine?! This is just another reason why I cannot be a pharmacist in France. Unless I was asleep that day in class, our studies steered nowhere near the realm of mushroom identification! And I am not sure that I would want the responsibility of differentiating a deadly from a non-deadly mushroom for others. I can only imagine that that would boost a Canadian pharmacist's insurance fees!

Canada is Scary!

I am a proud Canadian and think my native country is wonderful. It is a large country with varied landscapes and cultures, offering something for everyone. Canada is a safe, politically stable country, with a great worldwide reputation. And even though I love France, my adopted country, it is sometimes hard not to compare things here to Canada. And because of my patriotic bias, Canada often has an unfair advantage in these comparisons. So imagine how astounded I was when I recently met people that fear life in Canada!

In the past several weeks, I met three French people that were given the chance to move to Calgary with Total, the company that brought us to France. It was three separate encounters, but each one of them looked at me in awe, saying “but it is so cold!” .

One of the families decided to take the position and move to Calgary. I met with the lady of the family to discuss life in Calgary and Canada. She has lived her whole life in southern France, and was clearly uneasy about her pending move. We discussed many aspects of her new life, but somehow about every ten minutes, she brought the conversation back to the weather. Here are some of the questions I received, many of them more than once: How cold does it get? When does it get cold? Do the kids play outside at school? Where do I buy boots? You plug your car in? I tried my best to put a positive spin on things. I explained that Calgary gets several chinooks every winter. I told her the kids would love playing in the snow, sledding, making snowmen. Maybe they will learn to skate. I tried not to mention that the temperature can sometimes drop very low in October, or that it can snow in May. She was anxious enough as it was, I did not need to fuel her fear.

Last week I met a lady that turned down the chance to move to Calgary because of the weather. I was dumbfounded! I would think that being posted in Calgary with Total would be equivalent to winning the lottery. This is a company that does work in some very unstable, isolated, and potentially unsafe locations around the world. This family could alternately be offered to move to Nigeria, Angola, Myanmar, Qatar, but they refused to go to Canada because of a little snow!?! They would prefer potential car-jacking, civil war, droughts and developing world conditions to freezing temperatures!?!

Is life that unfavourable in the winter? Are Canadians really living at a disadvantage? I obviously do not think so, but it is interesting to see how others perceive our country.

Our French Anniversary

Sunday was the one-year anniversary of our arrival in France. We celebrated in a wonderful way: driving around beautiful Provence, shopping in a local outdoor market, visiting vineyards, and picnicking under the warm Provencal sun. Here's hoping our second year in la Belle France is as memorable as the first!

This is where we used to live

It’s a little overdue, but I figure it is time to add an entry about our recent trip to Calgary. Truth is, I have been putting it off because I was a little sad upon our return to France. Turns out it was much harder leaving Calgary this time than it was a year ago. For those who don’t know, we spent three days in Calgary earlier this month. Gilles had a conference in Houston, and we figured we could not pass on the opportunity of being so close to our old home, so I tagged along and we extended the trip from Houston to Calgary.

I knew our return trip to Calgary was going to be emotional, and I was right. The overwhelming feeling of returning ‘home’ hit me as soon as our plane started its descent over the city. I looked out the plane window toward downtown, and thought, “this is where we used to live”. We had great lives in Calgary, and it was hard to leave. I was starting to see that it was going to be hard to return too.

The thing about Calgary is it holds so many wonderful memories for us, and our visit became a 72-hour walk down memory lane. A little bit of nostalgia is one thing, but memories were jumping out at me everywhere we went. I looked at the river trails, and not only thought, “this is where we used to run”, but was reminded of training for half-marathons, running late at night, having great chats. While eating paninis at Mercato, I thought about all the times we went there during our condo renos, stocking up on the prepared salads and sandwiches while our kitchen was out of commission. I walked by the Petro-Canada in Kensington, and remembered the day we fuelled up there before a camping trip. It was a warm summer day, and I couldn’t wait to be in the mountains, going for a hike,…. That last memory made me realize how carried away I was getting. Who becomes nostalgic at the sight of a gas station?!

I would like to thank everyone for making themselves available for us in such short notice, and on a long weekend. We would have loved to spend more time with everyone, but even our short visits meant so much. We have so many wonderful friends in Calgary, and while there we slipped back into our relationships as though we had never left. It was a bit shocking, and a little unsettling. I think being reminded of such great commeraderie made me miss it even more.

But now, here we are, back in the land of wine and cheese. Do I want to hop on the first plane with all my belongings and move back to Calgary? No. Despite my feelings, I know that I am not ready to leave France yet. I am just starting to feel as though I have a good handle on life here, and there is so much more I want to do before leaving Europe. Hopefully once it is time to move back to Calgary, we’ll fit right back in again.