Day 227: Painting Frontenay: Bonjour French!

I might have to edit a few bits of my experiences here in France because after the first day's post, my mom, kind of, freaked out... I got emails from my sister with a few words of advice... like, don't take drinks from strangers, be careful, be cautious, be careful, be cautious... and so on...

Not to say that I won't be careful and cautious, but I will be holding a few things back because the family is following so consistently. A message to the family: I'm fine people!! I'm doing good! Thanks for the concerns though, momma... Love you...

I have never heard such quiet as I do in this house. The silence is amazing... it's almost too loud. The sound of my teeth chewing on my Milk Duds, right now, is so comforting. I never thought I'd appreciate such a sound...

Today, I walked right into French culture... We went to a town called "Saint Loupe Sur Thouet," which is about 20 minutes from where we're staying. It was a small, picturesque French town that probably never gets tourists. As soon as I stepped out of the car, I saw a small cafe and asked one of the girls to join me in there. "Karen, you wanna go speak some french? Let's go to that cafe over there..." She agreed to accompany me and we started walking towards the cafe. It looked like it was out of a storybook. As we walked in, Karen looked over at me and asked, "You know how to speak French?" I turned to her, smiled, and said, "Nope... why? You don't?" She started giggling and answered, "NO! I thought you knew how to speak French!" I replied, "No, but it's okay... we'll be fine, come on..." So, we sat down at one of the tables and set our stuff down. I got up and looked over at the lady standing behind the counter and took notice of all the wine bottles behind her... I looked back at Karen and asked, "Do they only serve Alcohol here? No coffee?" She answered, "No, they have coffee..." I turned back around, looked back at the woman and said, "Cafe?" She looked at me with an annoyed look on her face and replied, "Cafe? Wee, Wee cafe..." So, "wee" meaning "yes" in French, (atleast I knew that) I said, "Ok, un cafe si-vou-play" meaning "please" (I knew that too... I wasn't totally lost) Then, I realized I wanted a latte or something with foam on it so I said, "Cafe latte?" The lady behind the counter looked confused, but she replied, "Cafe O'le?" Now, I was confused, so I said, "Wee, wee" thinking, "ok whatever, just give me some caffeine..." A couple of minutes later, I was handed a small cup of Espresso. This not knowing French thing was not working out for me... but, I got my caffeine, so I sat down and shut up...

As we sat there trying to decide on a subject to draw, about 15 professional bikers, with pink biking outfits on, arrived at the cafe. That scene was so stereotypical of France... it was pretty funny. As they sat outside, I looked over and saw her making lattes for them with whip cream on top. I stopped what I was doing and said, "What is that?" hoping she'd understand me. She looked up at me and said, "CAPPUCCINO" (Ok, I should've figured that one out... that was my blonde moment of the day) Of course, CAPPUCCINO! What else would they call it!

We sat there for a bit trying to figure out some more French words we could use to conversate with the lady. We found out her name was Silvi... she was just like the French woman I had pictured in my head... dark hair, a long shaped face, pointy nose, stiff attitude, and a bit of masculinity... she was interesting...

The hours went by as I drew Silvi and Karen sculpted her from clay. While drawing, I had talked so much, I had almost all the people in cafe teaching me French. I refused to speak English, so I asked for the translations of everything I wanted to say, as I wrote them down. Here are some of the words I learned today: (they're typed out just as they're pronounced but good luck with the pronunciations)

Bon-jour - Hello

Si-vou-play - Please

Ou-rev-wa - Goodbye

Tre-bon - Very good

Kei-ghe - Wine & liquor drink

De-so-le - Sorry

Sa-va - How are you? (informal)

fgho-maje - Cheese

kiv-es-sympa - You are very nice

Megh-ci Bo-kou - Thank you very much

A-la-votgh - Cheers

Jo-voud-khe-pieh - I want to pay

Com-bi-en - How much?

Li-ou - water

Pogh-toi - For you

Ji-vout-ghe - I want

I wonder how they say, "These Milk Duds are so good!" - "Mil-khe Du-ddes es muy trebon!"

Tip of the Day: When you put yourself in an awkward situation on purpose, you force yourself to learn new things and meet new people, which can be the most memorable experiences.