Tag Archives: French

continuing the French food mood…

Posted in foreign food festival, French by

Edible French

It was our intern Kieu Anh’s last day at work today so we took her out to lunch, and she surprised us with parting gifts. (Isn’t that lovely? So unnecessary but so appreciated.) Throughout her internship I have repeatedly subjected Kieu Anh to impromptu French conversations, since I know she studied abroad in the south of France. She, in turn, knows I’m heading to Paris in a few weeks with the intention of spending 85% of my time eating, and she very thoughtfully gave me the perfect gift: “Edible French: Tasty Expressions and Cultural Bites.” It’s a colorful guide to French food-related idioms as well as a recipe book, and it’s beautifully illustrated with watercolors.

I actually mentioned wanting to read this very book a few weeks ago, but Kieu Anh had no idea since she didn’t even know about my blog til today. She’s just got a gift for good gifting!

Now I know what I’ll be reading on the plane… Thank you, Kieu Anh!

Pop quiz: What does it mean to say someone has “un coeur d’artichaut” (the heart of an artichoke)?

everything I’ll eat in France

Posted in foreign food festival, French, travel by

French Pastries

One (or, let’s face it, two) desserts per day:

Glacé fleur – the most delicious confection in the world. Here’s a handy guide to the best ice cream in Paris.

Creme caramel

Creme brûlée

Macarons

Chocolat pot au creme

Mousse au chocolat

Mousse aux noisettes

Flourless chocolate cake

Some sort of soufflé

Something from Chambelland and something from Helmut Newhouse, gluten-free bakeries

In addition my never-tasted but nevertheless-beloved choucroute garnie, I plan to dine on:

Raclette

Baekeoffe

Boeuf bourguignon

Brie and Camembert and Roquefort

Coquilles Saint-Jacques

Galettes

Oeufs en meurette

Coq au vin

Pot-au-feu

Confit de canard

Tartiflette

A French omelette (and by that I mean an omelette made in France)

Steak frites

Ratatouille

Brandade

Bouillabaisse

And last but not least, copious quantities du beurre, in any form or fashion.

I will accompany every single meal with a glass of Sancerre.

It’ll be hard work, but I’m up for the challenge.

a record-setting week

Posted in French, le week-end, learning tools by

taboo francais

Last night I left my work holiday party early to head back to FIAF for the second time in one week. This time it was for “Faites Vos Jeux” – game playing in French.

My love for board games knows no bounds. It is extreme and borderline obsessive. (When my sister introduced me to Carcassonne this summer I played so many times in a row that I started dreaming about tile placement and had to go cold turkey.) So the moment I heard about this monthly event I put it firmly on my calendar as a recurring appointment, though I wasn’t sure whether it would be more fun or work to play Taboo in French. It turned out to be both. I loved it.

So that’s four days out of five that I have spoken French – my best week yet. As I was walking home last night, a man moved out of my way on the sidewalk and without thinking I said to him, “Merci.” That’s immersion, baby!

On that note, the weekend feels well-earned. Have a good one! Til next week, I leave you with links:

I’m on an Argentine travel company’s mailing list and they sent me this delicious-looking traditional recipe.

Revamping the Louvre to lose that lost feeling

The New Japanese Masters of French Cuisine

français three ways

Posted in French, movies & tv by

CANARDCOUSCOUSETCETCETC

SUNDAY: At any given time, my ease with French varies wildly, with seemingly no rhyme or reason. Sometimes I’m faltering and incomprehensible, other times I’m confident and zippy. During my weekly Skype conversation with Philippe on Sunday, I was in my better mode, which I took as an encouraging sign (even though historically it has not indicated anything like linear progress).

MONDAY: The next day, I went to my weekly French Meetup and again, found myself able to warm up quickly and understand and speak a lot. I had what is probably my most high level, esoteric and interesting French conversation ever, with a neuroscientist from Nancy (in northeastern France), who is in New York to do a post-doc focusing on memory. I told him, fully in French, about an experimental film I had seen at the Whitney Biennial and then again at MOMA* that is actually more like a performance. The film is about a man who, as a result of a botched operation to relieve his epilepsy, lost all his long-term memory and can only remember the last 20 seconds of his life. Kerry Tribe specially designed the documentary to be screened through two side by side projectors. One reel of film runs on a loop between the two projectors so that the first screen shows the “present” moment in the film and the second screen shows the moment in the film 20 seconds prior. It’s such a creative and impactful way to tell the man’s story and beyond that, to convey a little bit of what it was like to live in his head.

The neuroscientist knew exactly who I was talking about even though I couldn’t remember his name (speaking of bad memory). He is Henry Molaison and apparently he is the most studied patient in the history of neuroscience.

He then told me, again fully in French, a rather tragic tale about another person whose brain injury was the first proof that damage to the frontal lobe can affect personality. Phineas Gage was a kind and upstanding guy until a freak accident blasted a piece of iron through his skull. He miraculously lived and at first seemed to make a full mental recovery, but then he started becoming a bit of a dick, to put it bluntly. His wife left him, he lost his job and he died penniless and alone. A sad story for Phineas, but a happy one for me because I actually understood it.

TUESDAY: I went to see Truffaut’s “The Man Who Loved Women” at the French Institute. It was the last of their CineSalon series, “The Art of Sex and Seduction,” and I liked it a lot…. though I tried to go “off-subtitle” and failed miserably. I gave up averting my eyes from the titles at about twenty minutes in and allowed myself to just enjoy the film without treating it as a learning exercise, but it was a little dejecting after two days of thinking I was actually getting somewhere.

Oh well, if it’s got to be this way I hope it’s at least two steps forward, one step back instead of the other way around.

*(where it is in the permanent collection – go see it!)

[Photo: Lisa T.]

 

the catchiest song ever

Posted in French, music by

Care of my brother, who plays it for my niece. I can’t wait til the day she attempts to sing along.

j’ai fait ma décision

Posted in French, le week-end by

rainforest

Got my new credit card in the mail, registered for the NYU Spanish class as my first purchase, and last night crossed the $1000 spending threshold that will trigger 50,000 miles to go into my Delta account some time in the next two to four weeks. That’ll bring me to just under 70,000 miles, enough to book a trip to Paris, should it still be available. (As of this morning there are plenty of seats left, because who in their right mind goes to France in January?) So now it’s a waiting game, and the cliffhanger remains… Will I or won’t I be eating crème caramel by the Seine in a month? Only time will tell.

As for this weekend… Some interesting reading and watching:

Trailer for the animated movie version of my favorite book, The Little Prince 

(I tend to think that children’s books all about the magic of imagination should not be turned into movies that do much of the imagining for you, but it does look beautiful.)

The White House turns an eye to study abroad

Completely unrelated to this blog, but awesome nevertheless – a 2014 mix tape!

Leadership skills multiply with language skills

This beautifully sums up the foreign language learning experience

And now I’m off to get a dose of greenhouse tropics at the botanic gardens – a kind of faux immersion in foreign climates, which I’ve come to find crucial to my sanity as winter descends. Have a good weekend!

[Photo: Ben Britten. Thanks also to Randy for the NPR tip and Jenny for The Little Prince tip!]

mon oreille

Posted in French, Spanish, travel by

ear sculpture

Tonight during my weekly French Skype conversation with Philippe, I said that if I did come to Paris this January, I would probably want to take a side trip to Alsace. He kept asking me to repeat myself because he had no idea what I meant. I said over and over again, “Alsace. Alsace. Alsace.” Finally he exclaimed, “Oh, Alsace!” I asked, “Isn’t that what I said?” Apparently the s in Alsace should be pronounced more like a z.

Immediately after my call, I headed to the laundromat to pick up my wash. I told Millie, the Latina woman who works there, that I was thinking about taking a Spanish class this spring and that if I did I’d start talking to her only in Spanish. Forgetting all about actual conjugation, I added, “Tratar,” which means, “to try,” though I intended to tell her, “I’ll try.” Millie kept asking me to repeat myself. I said over and over again, “Tratar. Tratar. Tratar.” Finally she exclaimed, “Oh, tratar!”

So there you have it. I can learn all the French and Spanish in the world but people are still going to have no idea what I am saying because my ear and my accent are so terrible.

Merde! (Another word I cannot pronounce correctly.)

(Photo: Colin Mutchler)

My own personal not-very-dramatic cliffhanger

Posted in French, Spanish, travel by

selfie in the parkMy new miles credit card arrived in the mail and I was thisclose to registering for the NYU Spanish class with it, but nagging doubts held me back. Is it completely stupid to begin studying one language when you are just getting the hang of another one? Will it confuse my brain and ensure I learn neither French nor Spanish effectively? Wouldn’t it be a more satisfying use of $500 to go on a vacation somewhere Spanish-speaking instead? Or to put the money into my savings account towards my immersion sabbatical? Do I have the discipline to attend three hours of class each week after eight hours at work? And will I actually put in the time to do any of the homework when I already spend two nights a week practicing French?

Then there are the misgivings about my nascent plan to spend my winter vacation in Paris. Why on earth would someone with seasonal affective disorder go to a place that’s even grayer and damper than the one where she lives? Shouldn’t sunshine and heat be on my agenda instead? Why would someone with limited funds go somewhere she has been before and did not feel the need to ever go back to? Is it not silly to spend my one week out of town in another humongous town, doing things that are the French equivalent of the same things I do back home?

Both decisions seem like they come down to one central question: Will I allow myself to embrace plans that are completely illogical simply because I really want to do them?

Stay tuned to find out…

(Photo: my most contented moment in Argentina, posted here to remind me that sometimes the best decisions are also the most random ones, made by an inscrutable heart.)

Post-thanksgiving Paris-centric links…

Posted in French, le week-end, travel by

French turkey

…because even on the most American of days I still had Paris on my mind:

A secret apartment in the Eiffel Tower

A fake Paris built to protect the real Paris

I googled “Paris January weather,” sure that the results would discourage me. Instead, I’m totally sold.

Avoir un merveilleux week-end, mes amis!

I love it when a plan comes together

Posted in French, travel by

blurred stars in parisAfter I went to see one of my favorite bands play in Williamsburg a couple of weeks ago, I told Philippe he should see them when they come to Paris in January. He had recommended Agnes Obel to me, and I liked her music a lot, so I thought I’d return the favor.

Well, somehow or other I started joking about jetting off to Paris for the weekend just to see the Stars show. And then somehow or another I started seriously considering it… And then I looked up the price of flights, reality checked myself, and went back to figuring out how to put my real January plan to take a Spanish class into action. I had heard about a 5-week course offered by Instituto Cervantes that would have been perfect in many ways, except that the 6pm start time would butt up against my work hours. I was searching for better options but I hadn’t found any.

Then today I came home to two pieces of mail that serendipitously fit together like pieces of a puzzle: the NYU Continuing Education course catalog, and the same Delta miles credit card offer I get on a monthly basis. I noted that NYU has a February – April intensive beginner’s Spanish class that starts at 6:45, costs less per hour than Cervantes, covers two semesters of Spanish in one, and provides a reason to leave the house all winter. Perfect.

I read the terms of the credit card offer and realized that if I put the class on my new card I’d be halfway towards earning the 50,000 miles they promise you’ll get after spending $1,000 on it within the first three months. If I hope and pray and wait for a post-holiday fare sale and then put a $500 Paris flight on the card (do $500 NYC-Paris flights still exist?), I’d get a $50 credit and end up with almost 70,000 Delta miles to my name, enough to go almost anywhere in the world for free for my next trip. Which would be really convenient in April, after I finish the Spanish class and want to reward myself with a week of immersion somewhere like Mexico City, or Valparaiso, or Southern Spain. Two trips for the price of one. Mucho perfecto!

I signed up for the card and I’m already fantasy packing my suitcase…

And listening to the people who inspired it all, on repeat:

(Photo by Ilhan Gendron of “blurry stars in Paris” – an appropriate choice for this post about my blurry plan to see Stars in Paris.)