Tunneling to Turin

          The Italian Association in Bonneville sponsors a trip to Italy every couple of months. The very deluxe bus (complete with hardwood floors!) left Bonneville at 6:30am. We got to the foot of Mont Blanc and had to wait for it to be cleared by the snow plows. We slowly climbed through the mountains and finally got to the Mont Blanc tunnel. The tunnel takes 12 minutes to go through! And once you're out, you're in Italy!
           The Italian side of the Alps struck me as having a different style than the French side. The French side has wooden chalets while the Italian side has stucco chalets. Both are gorgeous. There are ski resorts nestled everywhere.
           Our first stop was an Italian supermarket where the Italian-origin Bonnevillais like to stock up. I thought I'd pick up some olive oil to take home so I went up to one of the saleswomen and asked her to recommend something for my mom. In French. Then I remembered I was in Italy. So I apologized. In English. She didn't understand (obviously). So I said the same thing again. In Spanish. I tried saying "Christmas", "Noel", "Navidad", and gestured "25" in hopes of relaying the Christmas present message. After ten minutes, she realized I was trying to say "Natale", or the Italian word for Christmas, which, of course, was plastered all over the store. They had lots of samples so I ate my embarrassment in Italian Christmas cake, Panettone.
            It took another hour and a half to get to Turin, where we went to biggest market I have ever seen. There were thousands of little stalls selling fruits, vegetables, spices, cakes, candies, shoes, clothes, sheets, you name it. I wandered around the market for a bit and then ambled into the town. Because the bus got stuck in the snow, I only had an hour to be a tourist but I got to see the Mole, the royal Palazzo Madama, and the Turin Cathedral. Next time I take the bus, I want to go to the Egyptian Museum and tour the palaces! I also squeezed in some shopping and finished up present shopping! We headed back to Bonneville and all of my new friends stuffed me full of the food they had bought and sang Christmas songs!
     

Santa's Helpers

          Santa has himself a little crew of French elves. We wrote letters to Santa Claus today. After I explained "naughty" versus "nice", a fight ensured as to who had been naughty and who had been nice. One girl stood on top of her chair and started pointing at her classmates, outing them for all the naughty things they had done. These included being clumsy and dropping pens. Not heinous crimes in my book, but the students all think one another should be getting coal.
          I had to judiciously avoid the topic of whether Santa was real or not. It brought me back to being six and asking Mom outside the car at the Flower Market whether Santa was real and she told me no, but not to tell Brendan or Cate (yes, it was that harrowing of an experience that I vividly remember it!). I'm very curious as to what the French children think of Pere Noel and when they stop believing, but I got the impression, festively enough, that some of them still believe! This was mostly because one kid reported that he had actually been to Finland, seen the elves working, and written down Santa's address. But he wouldn't share it.
         Joyeux noel!

Le Pire Potluck

          You don't wear the band's teeshirt to their concert, you don't cheer for the opposing team at the Giants game, and you try really hard to bring a delicious, un-French dish to a French potluck. Unless you're me.
          Last night, I attended the film selection committee meeting. The committee picks all the films for the monthly movie night in Bonneville. I had no idea choosing a film would be so difficult - they have to pick films that address particular subjects, are a particular length, and are French, which is oh-so-much harder than you would think. This is because the committee is made up of retired teachers who deliberate a lot about which movie to pick. The meeting was an entertaining learning experience for me!
           Then came the potluck. I was nervous about what to bring. I obviously decided to steer clear of French food, so I was going to do something Mexican, meaning I'd have to make my own chips, salsa, and guacamole. Except the tortillas sold here aren't great and I could not seem to make good chips out of them. I hate Celcius ovens. Anyways, I remembered that Mom always make a delicious melon and prosciutto dish. I went to store and could not find melons. I finally found one melon, the name of which was written in Cantonese. I bought it, and lots of prosciutto. I merrily returned home and started making my dish. I began cutting my melon. It was a pomelo. It had not occurred to me or that when making a dish for the first time, one should ensure one is purchasing the correct ingredients (particularly when said dish only has two ingredients). It had also not occurred to me that it is winter, and there aren't melons in winter. I panicked and decided to make the disgusting dish anyways because, I thought, maybe someone will like it, and I didn't have time to go to the store...
         The dish was a disaster. I was delighted to notice it wasn't brought out for dinner. I hoped it was forgotten. I must have accidentally told the hostess it was for dessert. I cringed as it was brought out and decided to honest about "experimenting". Everyone politely tasted it. And uncomfortably swallowed. And remarked on how odd it was in the US that this meat/fruit dish was served for dessert. Its awfulness was only accentuated by the delicious food the other women made. Le tragedie.

Loving Lyon

            I love Lyon. It's known as the gastronomic center of France, so who wouldn't want to visit? One of my favorite teachers invited me to drive down with his family this weekend and I did! He and his family picked me up and we left a very snowy Bonneville for a rainy Lyon.
            Every December, Lyon hosts the Fete des Lumieres (look at pictures here!). The city was packed. Fabrice kindly wrote me a tour guide for the day. Lyon is shaped like a Y, divided by the Saone and the Rhone. I started off at in the middle at the Place Bellecour. It's in the trendy shopping district of Lyon. I ambled along the very chic streets and storefronts and found a huge Christmas market (where gifts where purchased, hint hint!). Obviously, I had my favorite vin chaud there after strategically discerning which booth had the longest line and therefore the best VC.

View from the river up to Fourviere!

View from the top! 

            Fabrice then told me to take a furnicular up the Fourviere mountain. I started waiting in the furnicular line. I asked several people if tickets were needed and was assured they were not...I got to the front of the line and was told otherwise. Ignoring everyone's orders not to walk up, I walked. It was like walking up my street at home in San Francisco. The view from the top was worth my sore calves (and was good prep for next week's visit home!).

Roman ruins, photo courtesy of my new Roman friends 

            The cathedrale is at the top and it's beautiful, although under complete restoration so I didn't take pictures. In the St. Just neighborhood, there are Roman ruins! My new Italian friends took a touristy picture of me. I also sat on one of the walls and accidentally kicked the side of it and a stone somehow fell off and oddly ended up in my pocket. So, Cate, a bit of Roman is my suitcase for you.
         

St. Jean

           Pillaging completed, I leisurely walked down the colline to the St. Jean neighborhood, which is nestled at the foot of the mountain. It's full of bookstores, art shops, and restaurants...and traboules. Here's a little history of the traboules. They are basically secret passageways beneath and between city blocks in Vieux Lyon. In Lyon, they were originally used by silk merchants for winter-time transport. They were also used by the French Resistance fights in World War Two!        

Traboules!

            I then crossed the Saone again and went to rue Merciere, which is speckled in traditional lyonnais bouchons. I found one that looked promising and as I was waiting, I heard "Excuse me, are you American?" In a huge city, I somehow manage to run into American assisants like me! Apparently my little North Face hat and coat were a dead giveaway. I had lunch with the girls and it was delicious. We had warm goat cheese toasts with salad and typical lyonnais sausages in a beaujolais sauce. And Beaujolais wine. I then scurried off to the swarming, but free for the day, metro. I took the metro to Part Dieu, which is where Lyon's massive mall and train station are. I shopped at Galeries Lafayette and bought more presents and then caught the last train back to Bonneville.

Dancing by Myself

           You know that Robin song, "Dancing On My Own", that everyone is sick of by now? I am especially sick of it today because it became a reality for me this afternoon. I was trying to get the kids to stop talking. Poor kids, they get stuck inside all day when there's snow to play with on the ground! I've found that the French teachers yell to silence them, but when I yell only dogs can hear my high pitched voice. I've been searching for ways to get the kids to settle down. I've tried counting down, but that doesn't work because then they scream in English to show me that they know the words. I have tried looking sad and not talking, but that doesn't do anything, and, in the course of me being quiet, I inevitably overhear something hilarious a kid has said and burst out laughing. Last week I tried talking to myself, and, as if that wasn't embarrassing enough, singing to myself. Neither worked. Today, I tried clapping. I remember my second grade teacher would clap different patterns until the entire class had joined in. The French children did not get this. I tried to ask one of them to mimic my clapping in hopes that it would catch on. It didn't. He just gave me a dismissive, eight year old look. Naively hopeful, I continued clapping for a good minute, adding in a light dance routine. I danced and clapped until all the kids were staring at me in horror. But also in SILENCE. It was golden, even if my dancing and clapping weren't.
            I am also a rapping celebrity in one of my classes. I can "three hundred thirty thieves" very quickly. It's nice to know eight year olds think I'm cool and that I now have a backup career as a professional tongue twister sayer.
           In other eight year old news, I was told today that my writing was "Wow! Bizarre!" which, in French, means "Wow! How weird!" The French students because they default write in cursive. They learn print a bit when they are in the equivalent of kindergarden and first grade. Then they abandon it. I tried to explain why I have to write in print: I used to write in cursive, but then it turned into a curlicue; even allowing for a long stretch, you couldn't call it cursive. In eighth grade, I was fired from my homework recorder duties because everyone complained that they couldn't read my writing. I have relegated myself to print. I also explained to them that American children seem to write less and less in cursive, (thanks to) the Internet, because print is omnipresent. I was attempting to get pity for my inability to write in cursive but they remain unimpressed with my writing. I've consoled myself with the fact that I'm getting better at writing on the chalkboard. I am no longer writing at 30* and I remember that what I write is taken literally. If I put a blue underline underneath a word, the entire class will raise their hands to be allowed to get a blue pen to do the same thing. Now I just need to go sit in on the kindergarden cursive class!

The Turkey Police

        Update to "Turkeytime": I used this lesson in another class. The students think that there are Thanksgiving Turkey police. I'll attempt to explain... We were going through the Thanksgiving feast and the students were intrigued by the specific foods: mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, gravy, turkey, stuffing, pumpkin pie, etc. One student raised his hand to stay that he didn't like turkey and could he please have chicken? (If only I could've made a feast for them.) I said yes, but that would be a bit odd because the food we eat at Thanksgiving is traditional, but, of course, each family has its own traditions. Another student simply answered, basically, "Duh, no. There are turkey police and you will not be allowed to have Thanksgiving if you have turkey." At least turkey offenders would have had fabulous last meal.
         It's snowing every couple of days now and it's beautiful! Bonneville's center is being renovated, so it's not picturesque at the moment. You'll have to ignore the construction site to appreciate the Alps!

Sampling My Way through a Snowy Sunday

         It's snowing in Savoie! We spent this snowflakey Sunday in Annecy at Marchés de Noël. Annecy hosts two markets all December long! Booths were full of food and wine and jewelry and clothes and set up like wee Swiss chalets.
         The vendors were very generous (think Costco on Sundays) with their samples. In appreciation of such generosity, and the busyness of the markets, I mastered the "I am looking intently at your products so you think I am deciding which one to buy, but really I am angling towards your second plate of samples in anticipation of that third plate over there that I've just spotted, as I'm casually elbowing this older man out of my greedy hands' way before said older gentleman snags the biggest piece of cheese" look. I also figured out that, "Can take this on an airplane? I want to bring back French treats for my family at Christmas," landed me loads of mileage and larger, cut-fresh-just-for-me fresh samples. In addition to the delicious sausage hot dog I actually paid for for lunch, I sampled Nougat de Montelimar with #speculoos, about seven different cheeses, cranberry/lemon/ginger/apricot bread, baguettes, Italian chocolates, macaroons, raclette and prosciutto, and several other goodies that I now can't even recall after my day of (glorious) gluttony.
          My favorite snowy treat, however, was the mulled wine. Here's a recipe: Ina Garten's Probably Authentic, and in Definitely English, Mulled Wine. (I will be happy to make this for you at Christmas.)         After the markets, we went to a Christmas concert at the Cathedrale, which was full of my favorite demographic - the over-60 set - and was fabulous.

Me at the Marche!