AUTUMN’S ADVENTURES

Nathalie had some errands to run today so I accompanied her to Nancy.  She brought me to this bakery that makes her favorite pain au chocolat and then we checked out a few stores and Place Stanislas, the famous and most beautiful plaza in France according to Nath and her family.  It was hard to photograph it, being it was so big and all, but it was pretty and gold and stuff.

For dinner we went to this restaurant chain called Hippopotamus which is a steak house.  A bunch of Nathalie’s cousins and their girlfriends/boyfriends also joined us for this dinner.  Nath told me that I had to try bone marrow so I did (and I liked it).  I also ordered a rare steak and it was a perfect blueish-red hue.  What a hunka meat I tell ya. YUM.

After dinner a handful of us went bowling around the corner.  I’ve internationally bowled only one other time in Buenos Aires.  I always have fun bowling but I never win.  In fact, I always come in last.  I don’t really care though because I’m only in it for the neon lights and the slippery shoes.  And it reminds me of the Big Lebowski.

Today we got a late start but I still ate croissants for breakfast.  This time I drank coffee from a bowl instead of a mug.  Before Nathalie poured the coffee into the bowl I thought it was going to be used for our fruit so I went to go get us some mugs and she said “we already have the mugs on the table”.  I was confused so I asked her why we would be drinking coffee from a bowl and she said, “I dunno, I suppose it is big enough for dipping the croissants in.”  There you have it.

For lunch Nath’s father brought out 8 different kinds of cheeses and fresh bread.  He said “I hope you don’t mind, we are only eating cheese for lunch.”  I don’t think I’ve ever heard such a wonderful thing in my life.  He told me there were over 300 different kinds of cheeses in France alone so I had a lot more to try on this trip.  We started with the goat cheeses then worked around to the hard cheeses and we ended with the brie and roquefort.  What a perfect melody of flavors and a perfect lunch.

For dessert we ate a special cake called la galette (three king’s cake) made of almond flour, eggs and other magical ingredients.  It had a trinket or la fève in the center and whoever found the charm was king for the day and got to wear the crown.  Nath’s mother was the “king”.  In tradition, the youngest person in the house has to climb under the table and call out the people who get cake and where to put it.  Baptiste was the lucky youngin’ under the table this time.  The cake’s center was a custard-like filling called frangipane and it was so moist and rich and delicious (of course it was delicious, everything I’ve tasted has been delicious. I need to consult my thesaurus for more variety to describe this wonderful food).  I am going to get the recipe from Nath’s father so I can make a paleo version of this rockin’ cake.

In the afternoon we headed to Nath’s grandparents house to chat with them. They were the loveliest little grandparents I’d ever met and they had the coolest tree wall mural that reminded me of my name and of fall in New York.  They were so excited to tell me all about Florida and showed me their USA souvenirs like a russel stover’s valentine’s heart box and a US flag and an air force baseball cap.  Her grandfather was a pilot so that explained the air force cap enthusiasm.  We looked at photos from their trips to the US and they told me they went up in the twin towers top floor in January before the terrorist attacks.

They also showed me a photo of the previous owner of their house along with a star of david patch that was from the Holocaust.  They said that the woman escaped and abandoned the house only leaving a photo of herself and the star of david behind.  I couldn’t believe I was holding a piece of history in my hands, let alone a history so horrible and sad.  After watching Inglorious Basterds last night, it was strange to be seeing evidence of the real war right in front of me.  I was emotionally stirred by the whole thing.

After leaving her grandparent’s house we went to her cousin’s house and played with his two sons who were 4 and 1 years old.  I played the wii with the 4 year old until my arms felt like they would fall off.  I love the friggen wii.

That night we went to dinner at a chinese restaurant with her brother, his girlfriend and Nath’s friend Jess.  I tried Leiche for the first time and it was really delicious.  After Chinese we went to a house party for the birthday party of Nath’s two cousins.  The apartment was cute and small and full of frenchies.  Most of the artwork on the wall was a tribute to NYC which I was happy to see.  Once people found out I spoke English everyone wanted to practice with me.  When the party got too crowded the owner started kicking everyone out so we left and went to another friend’s house in the city and did tequila shots.  The funniest thing I saw in their apartment was this.  Oh what a night.

After two months of laying low and resting up in New York and spending some quality time at home with the family, I am finally on the road again and living it up, international-style.

I arrived to Paris at 11am French time/5am New York time. My friend Nathalie picked me up and we drove directly to her parents house, 3.5 hours to Damelevières, Lorraine, France which is 20 minutes outside of the city of Nancy.  When we arrived to Nath’s parents house she gave me a tour and I met her mother, brother and father.  Her brother speaks English but her parents only speak a little bit of English so I am really trying to learn some basic french so I can at least talk to them on a comparable level in French.  If they are willing to make the effort with me, it is only fair that I do the same in return.  And also, not knowing a language sucks when everyone around you speaks it.

I smelled like super B.O. from my long travels so I changed my shirts and then we all headed to a restaurant called La Gavotte to eat the best crêpes in Nancy.  They are like the crêpes in Brittany, France, which are the best crêpes in France.  We drank apple cider wine with our meal because they told me that is what you drink with crêpes in Brittany.  My crêpe of choice was filled with mushrooms, bacon bits, a sunny side up egg and cheese (probably my four favorite ingredients!).  It is made with buckwheat flour that gives it the darker color and is only used for salty crêpes.  It was freaking delicious.  I also tried some of Nath’s dad’s crêpe which had cow intestine in it.  It wasn’t so bad.  For dessert I got a crêpe with butter and blackberry jam.  It was lighter and made with a different flour.  It was also delicious.

After dinner the whole family went to a small rock concert in a bar called Le Vertigo Cafe.  Nathalie’s cousin is in the band that was playing that night so the whole family came out to support him.  I really liked that about her family since I’m all about family gatherings these days. Her cousin plays the keyboard and the band was more or less experimental rock music, heavy instrumental long jam sessions.  They were good.  I met Nathalie’s friend Mimi who is an English teacher in Nancy.  She was really nice and she invited me to speak to her class in English some time this week.  We drank a lot of Stella Artois and the night ended somewhere around 1am.  I was surprised that I made it through the whole day without sleeping since I was so jet-lagged all day long.  When we got to Nathalie’s room I couldn’t wait to shut my eyes and rest my body.