Merlet Girls in Paris

Just spent a few days in Paris with the girls. I tried to pack light and therefore left the stroller behind - I was quite apprehensive about roaming through Paris without a stroller but surprisingly Manolee was quite the trooper, walking everywhere and in general faring well without napping at all.

We took a boat ride through the Seine geared for kids called La Croisiere Enchantee (the Enchanted Cruise) with entertainment provided by two elves who recited the history of the city and the buildings on the riverbanks through song and dance. The girls loved it!

We also took in a magic show, again geared for kids, at a cafe in the Marais called Le Double Fond (the Double Bottom?) - again, the kids loved it, though it was really not to be called entertainment for the accompanying adults. Most of the kids got to participate in at least one trick - except for Manolee, who was the youngest kid there. She kinda felt left out because she asked me why the magician did not ask her to come help out. It was cute but I kinda felt for her because she feels that she needs to do everything that her big sister does... Hana was participating quite actively in the show -kept on interrupting the magician, like "oh that's so easy" or "oh that is not funny" - I was mortified but the other kids loved that. We met up with some friends from London that were visiting Paris - it was great for the girls to see their old friends again.

Then there was the Eiffel Tower, the Notre Dame, lots of cafes for hot chocolates, the Korean grocery store... but I must end this entry with an anecdote that shows how eerily cunning the little Manolee is:

On our last morning in Paris, I blew up at Manolee because I wanted to run out alone to the train station to exchange our tickets to a later time and Manolee didn't want to stay with Mitzi. So I had a few harsh words with her and she cried and cried until I agreed to take her with me.

Once back home in Rennes, this is the conversation between Manolee and PeeWee that I overheard:

Manolee: You know, papa, maman was really mean to me this morning, she yelled at me a lot. Can you yell at her please?

Papa: She yelled at you?

M: Yes, a lot and a lot, so please can you yell at her?

P:  If she yelled at you, maybe there was a reason

M: She yelled at me a lot and a lot and so I want you to yell at her

P: I can't yell at maman

M: Oh please papa, she yelled at me a lot and a lot, you have to yell at her

Rae: (showing herself from behind the door): What are you saying, Manolee?

M: (with no hesitation, without missing a beat, breaking out the sweetest smile): I love you, Maman!

Talkie-Walkies

When Hana asked me the other day where her talkie-walkies were, I thought to myself, gee, we gotta step up her English maintenance. Boy, was I in for it - flipping through a catalog later  I learned that here in France, walkie-talkies are actually called talkie-walkies. Yes! Why, you ask? Why, I've asked. Nobody seems to know. It's like the French REALLY did not want to take the English word for it but could not get around to inventing a French word for it, so they just reversed the order - to show the anglophones just who gets the last word when it comes to languages!

Sometimes the French not only just reverse the word order, they also use English words but in quite different meanings. The other day I read an article in a magazine about "relooking". Hmmmm - doing double takes? Meticulously checking oneself out in the mirror? No, "relooking" apparently means makeovers, as in before-afters. Why "relooking"? Why indeed? Why not "new looking" while you are at it? 

Another French-cized word that always makes me laugh is "footing". When you hear a French person say "je vais faire du footing" (which, admittedly, is not often), he is not trying to tell you that he is trying to maybe get a foot in the door somewhere, or to maintain his balance or to try to find himself even. No, it means that he is going for a jog. Now why turn a perfectly good word like jogging into footing? Yes, the French pronounce the "j" differently but why bother creating a new word that would confuse everyone that is not French?

Response from PeeWee: Because we are French and because we can. So there.

Manolee hits 3!

Yesterday was Manolee's birthday party. We had invited 9 kids and all but one came. Surprisingly only three moms stayed - I had expected everyone to stay actually - I mean the kids are only 3 and some are barely toilet-trained!

Anyway the kids had a great time. I had bought a carton castle in the US - for the kids to play in and color in. I took our babysitter a full hour to put it together - not sure if I could have done better - but the kids absolutely loved it.

The girls made foam valentine frames and the boys just made a mess. One boy in particular made a fine mess in the bathroom - details withheld out of courtesy.

Everyone loved the cupcakes (I made the 7-minute frosting - it was delish!), the canneles, my MIL's tiramisu, edamames and other assorted goodies.

And the French kids were introduced to the joy of "Pin the tail on the Donkey!" - apparently, this old-time kids' party favorite never made it to France...? Such depravity, I tell you.

All in all, a great fun day. Manolee was spolied with all kinds of gifts - before her birthday, on her birthday, and even today presents just keep on arriving, prompting mild jealousy from her now-very-mature big sister. Thanks everyone for your generous gifts, and for making her feel so special on her 3rd birthday!!

Merry Xmas!

My MIL has this tablecloth that the kids could draw on - and the above is Rudolph as lovingly depicted by Hanaya. She even drew him a little carrot. Hana is of course in on the fact that Santa does not exist - Santa, Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy - all baby stuff now. She was also fairly shocked to discover recently that she is in fact not stronger than I am - when I informed her that I used to just let her win at arm wrestling all the time, she was genuinely surprised and blurted out, "but maman, your muscles are so small!" - well baby, time to face the fact - adults lie.

Of course, Little Manolee has no idea. She just thinks that Santa is some nice man that comes around giving away presents. That much she knows. In the last few days we even got it into her head that he does not give presents to just anyone - oh no, you have to be a nice girl. She doesn't quite get it yet though and the threat does not seem all that ...well, threatening.

This Xmas eve, Hana got dressed up as Santa and ran around my MIL's garden, while Manolee looked out in marvel and awe and squealed with delight. I asked her later, "was Santa very big?" and she replied, "oh maman, very big, Santa!". Meanwhile, Hana does not betray the fact that she is indeed my daughter, as upon re-entering the house in her Santa guise, she launched into a diatribe about how muddy her shoes got in the garden. That is my girl!

The girls were endlessly spoiled. Some stuff like candy and chocolate, they did not even look at for more than 1 second, just onto the next gift. Gift after gift, not even stopping to marvel at the stuff. It was a bit of a rude awakening for PeeWee and me. We gotta do a better job instilling in them some perspective when it comes to these things!

I had a bit of a surprise this Xmas actually. PeeWee has been going on and on about what a big present he got me - that it's such a great present, how I was gonna be in tears once I see it and feel bad that I didn't get him anything nice (he should know, last year I got him a lint brush), how he cannot wrap it because it's so big, how he won't have it under the tree because it's so big, etc etc. He was going on about this for about a week. At first I was like, whatever. But the more he went on and on and the more proud he seemed of himself, I slowly began to be convinced that he did indeed get me a great present - a great BIG present - and for me that was only one thing - a Mini Cooper. Yes, it seemed a ludicrous idea, that he would get me a CAR for Xmas, but hey, it is possible and why else would he be parading around so proud of himself at this seemingly perfect and BIG present? My only worry was, damn, my parallel parking is really rusty, can't be damaging a new car in these small French streets.

So Xmas eve when he said that my present was in the garage, I thought to myself - did I hear a car enter the garage? Did I hear the engine running? Yes, I think I heard the engine just before. So I took my time, taking care to look completely nonchalant, even bored, not to seem to be in too much of a hurry to see my BIG present.

Lo and behold, there in the basement was a big machine.

It was an elliptical machine.

A beautiful machine in and of itself, of course, but a Mini Cooper it definitely ain't!

Now I laugh at myself that I thought he would have bought me a car for Xmas. I also laugh that he was so proud of himself at having picked out THE perfect gift for me. But there you have it, I am acting just as spoiled as my kids! Of course, it is a wonderful present. Sure beats a bottle of cologne I got for him! Thank you, PeeWee! I will try to make sure the elliptical machine does more than just hold up wet laundry! (Now, a clothes dryer, that is another big machine I could use)...

On that note, Merry Xmas everyone!

French Ambiguities, Part III (Tu - Vous - Whatever)

The above is a picture of Mr and Mrs Jacques Chirac, the former French president. After decades of marriage, apparently they still "vous" each other - as in "je vous aime" rather than the more intimate, "je t'aime". They do look a bit uptight, no?

Herein lies another cultural ambiguity I experience almost on a daily basis - the "tu" versus the "vous", or in English, "you" versus the "you" - see what I mean? For me, you is you is you! I tend to default to the "tu" because for me that is not only easier to conjugate, but I also just don't see the point of "vous". I noticed, however, that some people, notably some moms at the school, default to the "vous" when addressing me. Only after I repeatedly use the "tu" do some of them also start to "tutoyer". However, there are some moms that resolutely maintain the "vous" with me, as if "I would rather not get too close to you" - at least that is how I interpret it.

If the rule is always just use the "vous", say, outside your immediate family, I think I could live with that. However, at some point in the relationship, the "vous" becomes "tu" and where and what that point is, I think is very hard to figure out, and sometimes hard to agree on.

The confusion gets compounded because "vous" can also mean "tu" in plural. For people who pride themselves in the intricacies of their language, this lack of precision is quite astounding in my view. So someone who has been "tu"-ing me suddenly can ask me something with a "vous", meaning me and the girls, for example- and that throws me off and I start to "vous" back to the person, when I am just talking about her. Then the other person gets confused and starts "vous"-ing me back, thinking that I all of a sudden want to start being more formal. Confusion all around. Avoidable? Not in French!

A friend advised me to just ask "on peut se tutoyer?" (can we "tu" each other?) - however, what if that person ever says no? What to do then? Being a foreigner, I can get away with just "tu"-ing everywhere, I guess. But when the rights and wrongs are so unclear, I just find myself more annoyed than anything else...

Green or Stingy?

So I went to buy some candy to stuff into the kids' Xmas stockings. Above is what my purchases looked like coming out of the store.

Do you see the ends of the candy sticking out? So much so that I had a hard time grabbing the bag's two handles together on the way home!

I noticed that in France (and to some extent, other European countries I have been to), when you ask for something that you expect to be free (as in the US), you may get it but either begrudgingly (e.g., tap water), ill-fittingly (reference picture above), sparingly (e.g., one single napkin instead of a whole wad; two ice cubes instead of a whole cup full), or you have to pay for it. Witnessed at a McDonalds in Brussels last October, where an American Woman (AW) asked for extra ketchup, and the cashier said "15 centimes". The AW said, "what?", when the cashier repeated and the AW said, "what are you saying? I don't understand you", then grabbed the ketchup and started to walk away. Being a good citizen, I interjected and said, she is charging you for the ketchup. The AW was absolutely aghast, and said "I thought that is what she was saying, but I could not believe it!" - I sympathized, as that was my exact reaction too, at a KFC some years ago in London - see the following exchange:

Rae: Can I have some more ketchup please?
KFC Clerk: That will be 15 pence.
R: Excuse me?
KFC C: (exasperated sigh) 15 pence each extra packet.
R: (surprised) I have to pay for those?
KFC C: (losing patience): 15 pence each EXTRA packet.
R: How much is salt?
KFC C: Salt packets are free.
R: (quick on my toes as always) Can I have 12 salt packets?

I wonder, despite the Green and eco-friendly movement just recently gaining momentum elsewhere, that this is just the way the people are brought up here from way back when, that you must not use (nor give out) more than you absolutely need. In a way, I agree - when I was in college, I used to bring enough McDonalds stuff back to the dorms that I never had to buy ketchup, straws or napkins (I remain a fiercely loyal customer there to this date - wonderful memories). Stuff I actually felt entitled to, actually, since I spent good money there to eat in the first place (and often at that too). But imagine all that stuff that people take with them on their trays and then just throw out.

My good friend M. thinks that the French are just stingy. One too many times she has been galled by second-hand giftwrap paper, wrinkles and remnants of scotch tape in all the wrong places. Maybe the wartime mentality of never having enough that has lingered on and passed through this generation - is her theory. I'm not sure. But in any case, I sure wished for a larger bag for the candy because when I went to pick up the girls from school straight afterwards, I had a hard time trying to hide what was inside that itsy bitsy bag!

French Ambiguities, Part II (La - Le - Les - Whatever)

Why do nouns need sex?

Why LE chapeau but LA chemise? Why LA main but LE pied?

Who gave a gender to each and every noun in French and whatever for?

This must stump every student of the French language. At least in Spanish and Italian, it's pretty straightforward - if the noun ends in an "a", it's a pretty sure bet that it is a female noun. In French, however, there just seems to be no rhyme or reason why one noun is masculine, but another is feminine.

To make matters worse, the French act as though they have no idea what you are saying if you get the gender wrong; they don't understand the whole sentence if one gender is  wrong. I was given a key for the mailbox some time ago. I asked the guy, "ah, un seul cle?" ("ah, a single key?") - the guy looked at me as though I had two heads, with a look of complete bewilderment and confusion. He asked me to repeat. I repeated, twice, pointing at the key. Then it hit him and he says, "ah, UNE seule cle!" - Hello? Just because I got the UNE confused with UN, he had no idea what I was talking about? What about taking a bit of context into the equation?

It's not like the UNE and the UN are pronounced similarly, in which case I could just mumble the gender and hope to be understood. No, the UNE sounds very different from UN, unfortunately. I have an issue with the LA and LE as well. I am rather partial to LES personally, which cleverly and thankfully disguises the gender question - until you start writing, in which case all the other parts of the sentences have to change to accommodate the sex of the noun. Why so complex?

It's rather embarrassing when little kids get the gender right, but I cannot seem to retain the right sex for some of the words. It's like my friend S. was saying - foreigners walk around saying "je veux eau" - literally, I want wanter - and wonder why nobody understands. Whereas French kids learn words with definite articles, so "je veux de l'eau" (again, "I want water" but with extra complex grammatical rules added in for some incomprehensible reason).

Until someone can explain to me why nouns have sex and the reasons behind the assignment of said sex, I don't think I will ever get it right 100% - file this under another ambiguity uniquely French...