"Sol Calcaire, Belle Couleur"

Well, dear blog reader, it's a good thing I was extra productive this weekend. Because I can't say I have done one minute of homework in the last three days. I'm feeling more guilty now that I just typed it out, but there you have it. It's not really a problem since I got everything that's due this week finished...but it still doesn't seem like a good precedent. Anyway, I'm going to jump ahead and tell you about all of the cool and engaging things I've been doing instead. First, here are a couple of pictures from this past weekend:

The ladies (minus Mary-Kate, who was in Toulouse this weekend). L to R: Carleigh, Jenn, Carolyn, me, Kara

This was Saturday night, I straightened my hair for a change of paceSo last night I went out to dinner with the Ultimate Frisbee team, Les Discjonctes. We met at Franck's apartment and then walked to Le Palmier, a Moroccan restaurant. This was the first time I've hung out with the team outside of practice, and I was really looking forward to it. When I arrived at Franck's apartment though (it was only a 20 minute walk from my house), I was immediately intimidated. I guess I hadn't realized how at practice I am not required to speak or follow a conversation for a majority of the time - just play. Here it was me and 20 other francophones, and I was doing my best to keep up with the conversation and not sound too much like a bumbling American. Don't get me wrong - everyone on the team was just as friendly and welcoming as usually, maybe even more so. I was just much more aware of my language flubs, without the game to distract me. It was a lot of fun though. I'm so glad that I have the team here in Dijon. Not only is it fun to play Ultimate again, it's so cool to get to spend time with Dijonnais. CIEF is a good program, but it isolates the international students from actual French students. So while I am taking classes at the University of Burgundy, I have yet to actually talk with a French student there. Anyway, dinner was great. My chicken tajine was delicious and not too pricey, I would definitely go back. When I went up to pay for my meal, I discovered that our two servers were both native Fassis (from Fez, Morocco) and that they had been there this summer when I was there. Obviously Fez is a big city, but I still felt like it was kind of a cool coincidence.

And then this afternoon was degustation #5 with Monsieur Lafond. Tonight we learned the rest of the basic terminology for following a professional degustation. Part of me is a little frustrated that we didn't really learn how to assess the wine completely until this evening, but the other part of me understands that there is no way we could have absorbed everything in the first session. I'm going to attempt to sum up our course so far in a few brief lines:

Session #1: Why are Burgundy wines unique? The answer being the soil, specifically the amount of calcium in the soil
Session #2: How grapes are grown to make wine
Session #3: How the grapes are turned into wine
Session #4: How to "déguste" (sample, taste) a wine (assessing the level of acide and moelleux [mellow, or "buttery"] in a white wine)
Session #5: More on how to déguste a wine (assessing the level of acide, moelleux, and tanin, assessing the aromas (based on four categories: végétale, animal, épices, feu)

A few quick facts I've learned about Burgundy wines:

• There are only four cépages grown in Burgundy, two white (Chardonnay and Aligoté) and two red (Pinot Noir and Gamay). Chardonnay and Aligoté always come from grapes with white skin and white juice, and Pinot Noir and Gamay come from grapes with red/purple skin and white juice.
  
• Gamay is the only one of the four which is not grown on a calcium-rich soil, it's grown on granite
• For a white Burgundy wine there are four classes (in ascending order, according to quality/finess): Bourgogne --> Village --> Premier Cru --> Grand Cru. So wines of a certain quality are only allowed to put "Bourgogne" on their label, not the village name or "Premier Cru." The difference in quality of wine is all about location, the best crus come from the places where the cépage is best acclimated to that particular soil's composition.
  

This evening at the degustation we tried five different wines: Aligote 2007 (our reference wine, the same one we have been trying every week since the first session), a Bourgogne red 2006 (this is by default a Pinot Noir because almost all of the Gamay is made into Beaujolais), a chardonnay village 2005 we tried on Monday evening, than a Mersault chardonnay village 2005, and a Mersault chardonnay premier cru 2005. What was really interesting about the progression of wines that we tried tonight was that I was able to identify and savor more flavors/aromas in the Mersault chardonnay village than the premier cru. You would think the premier cru would be definitively better, since it's of a higher echelon. The aromas were much finer, but not as well developped. M. Lafond explained that that particular wine would be much better in a few years, it was still too young to really achieve its full potential. Having him explain the four categories of aromas made it easier to approach the wine. Rather than just looking for n'importe quoi (anything), I could think to myself, "okay, do I smell any flowers, white fruits, earthy/grassy aromas...okay...now animal scents like meat, leather, animal skin..." and so forth.

Our next session isn't for another two weeks, but if you can't tell, it can't come soon enough for me. M. Lafond really has done an excellent job imparting so much of his knowledge to us, but in a way that's concise and approachable.

Oh but the day's adventures weren't over yet. I raced home on my bike and just caught Noelle, Orane, and Pedro finishing dinner. Pedro is a Swiss student who is staying in Dijon for two weeks on a "séjour linguistique." When I asked what that entailed, I was informed it means that he takes French classes all day long and spends the night with a host family. Pedro is actually from Brazil and he speaks German, Portugese (and the Brazilian variety of Portugeuse, sort of like the Mexican version of Spanish), French, and a little English. I thought I should tell you just in case you were starting to get impressed with my French and humble amount of Arabic...

After dinner Orane and I font des cookies ensemble! My extensive searching and trips to various grocery stores paid off because the two of us together made a batch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies to rival any which have ever come out of the Dayton family kitchen (and without baking powder!) I chopped the chocolate chips by hand, but they were dark chocolate and probably even better for it. It was really cute, actually. Noelle turned the kitchen totally over to us and Orane and I donned aprons and everything. She tried to speak only in English (to practice), but we abandoned that pretty quickly. I feel like I haven't spent very much time with my host family this week: classes, Les Discjonctes, the degustation, and everything else, have kept me running around like crazy. Orane is really very sweet. She was so eager to make the chocolate chip cookies and I think we were equally pleased that they worked out so well. I helped her with her English homework afterwards too. It required translating English sentences into French, so it was good practice for me too. Tonight was a great example of how home-stays can be so rewarding. I got a chance to hang out with Orane, a French girl very close to my sister Holly's age, and just do something fun together. We got to make one of my favorite treats from home, which is one of her favorite treats too. We spoke a lot of French and she got to practice a little English. We ate cookie dough. I can't think of a better way to overcome cultural barriers.

So tomorrow: Dublin! Ah!! Now, time to sleep. Oh, and since you made it to the end of the blog post, I should probably explain the title, as a kind of a reward. "Sol Calcaire...belle couleur" is one of the first catch-phrases M. Lafond taught us (I think this was our first or second dégustation). He told us we can use it whenever we're examining a Burgundy wine (except Beaujolais/Gamay, of course). It translates to "hm...grown on a calcium-rich calcium....beautiful color." Basically it makes you sound smart, even if you don't know anything else to say about the wine. It's become kind of a joke with our group, and we've started to use it to describe random liquids/food/objects. Okay, maybe you have to be here. Anyway, bon soir! (good night!)

"Attendez, j'ai une SUPER idee"

The title of this blog post is a quotation from a little boy who we overheard while he was running around with his brothers at the "Foire Internationale et Gastronomique de Dijon." He couldn't have been more than five years old and his excruciatingly articulated French accent was absolutely endearing. A translation: "Wait guys, I have an awesome idea!" The adjective "super" is much more popular here than you would think. At first I resisted using it because it seemed like such an Anglicism. But I have heard so many Dijonnais use it, I've started to pick it up too. For example: "Il est super comme chien" which means "What a good dog!" I used it today when I was walking with Noelle, Joseph, their friend Helena, and Hendrix. We got sort of a late start this afternoon - I ended up having lunch with them unexpectedly and we didn't finish until nearly 3pm. We walked along the canal of the River Ouche, which runs through Dijon. We actually walked on the same path which I took to get to Lac Kir, just further down. Apparently that path, sort of similar to the Loveland Bike Trail, except very fine pebbles instead of paved, meets up with the road to Paris and goes for quite a way. Maybe if it's nice sometime later this week I'll try to ride my bike out that far. Anyway, we walked along the Ouche and threw sticks for Hendrix, who eagerly plunged into the canal to retrieve them. His energy really is boundless. It has been sort of rainy and foggy this weekend, but the sun peaked out for a little while and it wasn't too cold. The trees are truly in their full glory now - they seem to take on an even more ethereal quality in the mist.

So this weekend started on Thursday after class, with Les Discjonctes practice outside from 7-9pm. This time 10 people showed up, so we got to play 5 v. 5, much more agreeable than 3 v. 3. We also used forced a side again - which was much appreciated on my part (sorry for you blog readers who are non-Frisbee players, forcing a side means designating a side and trying to force the offensive player with the disc to only throw it to one side of the field. This makes it a lot easier for the defense to stay in front of their player). I really can't say how happy I am to have the chance to play Ultimate here in France. Not only is it wonderful to play again, but I really get a chance to practice my French in action. The guys give me a hard time about my pronunciation sometimes, like when I tried to shout "Prends ton temps!" quickly and it came out as a garble of syllables. But really, it's all in good fun. I also found out this weekend that we're going to have a Discjonctes soirée on Tuesday night - we're going out to dinner at a restaurant on Place de la Liberation. I'm very excited.

Thursday night the whole Wake gang went out to a club called Le Chat Noir. This club has been talked up by the other international students, our professors at CIEF, etc., so we figured we should check it out. We had a good time and Kara, Carolyn, and I ended up going back last night. Thursday night there was a 4 euro cover (plus 1 euro for the coat check) and Saturday night it was 6 euro to get in. Now that I type it out, it doesn't really seem like that much, but I had made it all semester without paying a cover, so it seemed sort of exorbitant at the time.

Friday morning I woke up reasonably early so I could make it to the market. Inspired by my humble success at cooking earlier in the week (I made penne with an eggplant/parmesean sauce and added sundried tomatoes), I wanted to get some fresh veggies. I had a very interesting experience at the market. In our CIEF classes all of our lessons revolve around current events: so in my Comprehension Ecrite class (basically reading comprehension) our homework each week is to read an article which Stephane gives us and then answer questions about it. The article for this week is about the la peine de mort (the death penalty), which is currently outlawed in France. We talked a little bit about the history of the death penalty in France in class on Thursday to get some background before reading the article. It was outlawed in 1981 in France, which at the time was the last country in Western Europe to do so. Lately there has been a resurgence of French citizens who want to reinstate the death penalty, particularly in relation to instances of child abduction/sexual assault against children. So, the reason I am bringing this up is that it came up in conversation at the market! I was chatting with one of the produce vendors - about nothing of real note (a lot French people recognize after the first exchanges and then proceed to guess where I am from, this guy went through Denmark, Norway, and Germany before I told him I was from the US). So, at the end of the conversation when I've gathered up my purchases and am preparing to walk away, the guy pauses and then adds "You know, you've got it right in the US" (in French, of course). Curious, I ask him what he means. He says "well, you have the death penalty there, don't you? Here [and he indicates a little kid walking by, holding his mother's hand], little kids get abducted and bad things happen and the government doesn't really punish the people who do it." I am paraphrasing, of course, but I was a little offput. I've never had anyone bring up the subject of the death penalty, and certainly not someone I just met. It's interesting to see which issues are really charged here, and to experience that in real life and not just in a textbook. Obviously this is just one guy's opinion, but I thought I'd share, because it made an impression with me.

So anyway, I bought brussel sprouts, mushrooms, 4 carrots, 2 peppers, 1 head of garlic, 2 onions, 3 oranges, and 3 apples: all for less than 10 euro. That is why I love France: the cheapest food you can buy is freshly-baked bread and fresh produce. Last night I cooked up the brussel sprouts and mushrooms and added them to quinoa and then tonight I made penne with the eggplant/parmesean sauce, but I added sauteed garlic, mushrooms, onions, and sundried tomatoes to the mix. YUM. It's funny, you would think for someone who spends so much time sampling and describing food, I would have more experience cooking my own. But it comes down to this: neccessity. When I am home, I have my mom and her cooking is so delicious I never need to cook (I have plenty of experiencing baking breakfast things and treats). And then at school I have the Pit, which is not always super healthy or super tasty, but always super convenient. So, now that I am sans Lisa Dayton and the Fresh Food Company (aka the Pit), I have taken the plunge into cooking my own meals. So far, it has been great success.

Friday afternoon Carleigh and I went to see a film called Le Ruban Blanc ("The White Ribbon"). I saw a preview for it when I went with Carolyn to see Le Petit Nicolas and I noted that it won the top prize at the Cannes Film Festival this year. After seeing it, I understand why. Carleigh and I saw the original version (German) with French subtitles. The viewing itself was an interesting experience. My overall impression of the German language is that it is very harsh and gutteral. But in this film is was much lighter and more musical as a language and I recognized many of the English cognates. So it was a weird feeling to hear something vaguely similar while reading the translation in a language which is becoming more and more familiar. Between the two mediums, I think I understood all of it. The film itself is a piece of art. I don't want to go too far into the plot, because I sincerely hope all of you see it. It was a little dark and I certainly wouldn't recommend it for the pre-PG-13 crowd, but as an intellectual and sensory experience it was captivating.

Here's a Wikipedia summary (which I altered a bit):

"The White Ribbon is the story of a village in Protestant northern Germany in 1914, just before the First World War, as children and adolescents in a choir directed by the village schoolmaster, and their families: the Baron, the superintendent, pastor, doctor, midwife, peasants. The plot revolves around their lives and the strange accidents which occur."

I think it's important to note that I did not know that the story was taking place right before WWI when I went to see the film, and that is an essential element of the story (but one that I recognized on my own). You may or may not remember that earlier in the semester I made a pledge to see one film in French per week. Well, this is the conclusion of my 10th week here in France and I have seen 6. And 2 of those were this week-end. Oops. Well, hopefully I can make those up, although I'm not sure I'll have the time between Dublin next weekend and Prague the following week. Here's the list of the films I have seen so far:

1. Harry Potter et le Prince de Sang-Melee
2. Les Regrets
3. Le Petit Nicolas
4. Le Pensionnat (a Thai film dubbed in French, which I saw with my host family)
5. Le Ruban Blanc
6. Mademoiselle Chambon

The best one so far has most definitely been Le Ruban Blanc. I saw Mademoiselle Chambon this evening and thought it was alright, but nothing earth-shattering. In theme it was somewhat similar to Les Regrets.

So Friday evening Kara, Carolyn, Jenn, and I went to the "Foire Internationale et Gastronomique de Dijon." There have been posters for it all over Dijon: bright blue posters featuring a gorgeous Greek girl and reading "Bienvenue a la Grece" (Welcome to Greece). This fair is an annual event in Dijon and each year a different country is invited to share their native food/dances/products/etc. Our CIEF professor Stephane has been talking about taking a group with CIEF to the fair next Friday (when we're in Dublin), so we thought we'd go this weekend. Friday night was the opening night and the fair lasts two weeks I believe.

Overall, I was pretty disappointed. I was under the impression it was going to be like the Taste of Cincinnati, with lots of different vendors selling small plates for a euro or two. I was expecting to have the opportunity to try all different regional products from around France. The actual event was held inside what in the US would be called a convention center and was more of a convention than a fair. There were lots of restaurants inside, each selling different regional French cuisines, but all involving a full three-course dinner. There were also lots of vendors selling jewelry, clothes, gadgets, and pretty much anything you can think of. The Greek room was fairly small. There was a restaurant, where we ended up eating and a few stalls with sugared nuts, Greek pastries, olive oil, and a few souvenir-type products. I'm sort of sorry we ended up eating there. My moussaka (which tasted a lot like lasagna) was good, but certainly not worth what I paid for it. Next time I would skip it, but we had no way of knowing that in advance.

Saturday was dedicated to homework. I got practically all of my assignments for the coming week out of the way, because I need to work ahead for Dublin and Prague. Carolyn, Kara, and I went for a run, but besides that I didn't really leave my room all day. The three of us went out to Le Chat Noir and had a good time (after hanging out with Carleigh a little). I have lots of cute pictures, but I left my camera at Carolyn's house, so I'll have to add them later. It was certainly strange not to participate in any Halloween celebrations, but I noticed that my host family's neighbors had a very small Jack-o-lantern on their steps, and it made me smile. Last night was also super foggy, which gave the evening a truly Halloween aspect.

So overall, a good weekend. Not the most exciting, but certainly well spent. I promise to add more pictures later, plus a detailed update on our wine course with M. Lafond, which has its fourth meeting tomorrow evening. Happy November to you all!