Pain in the Ash

'Europe's largest air traffic shutdown since WWII'

So my spring break trip to Ireland has been lengthened by mount Eijli&%df£idljk exploding, senting hundreds of thousands metric tons of ash into the atmosphere- grounding planes across Europe. This means, despite the CLEAR BLUE SKIES here in Dublin, no one can fly in or out. For how long? On Friday we were told 36 hours. Today all flights are down again. Headlines are saying 'Projected to Worsen'. We just got off the phone with Irish Ferries. Anticipating our flights being cancelled, we've booked a ferry from Rosslare, Ireland to Cherbourg, France the soonest available being wednesday night! Our ferry leaves at 9:30pm and gets in at 5pm. Welcome to the 19th century...

Its great being stuck in Ireland- really I'm not complaining- its just wildly expensive being stuck for what will be nearly a week longer than anticipated. If anything this is a great adventure and EVERY day so far we've had sunny skies.

I wish I could share some pictures- I've taken over 300 and Ireland is a truely beautiful place. Here's hoping I get home soon...

So Much to Say

Ok, listen guys.

I've been doing a LOT of things I want to share with you all, and in order to write it concisely while maintaining a degree of amusement is going to take some time. So I deeply apologize for the hold up.

You can look forward to:
Normandy and La Rochelle
More Bike Excursions
The Destruction of my Bike
The Glorious Release of Paul and Paulette
The Flickering Flame of French Family Traditions

What tantalizing titles! Really I know, enough alliteration already.

Here's a teaser photo:

Naive is a French Word

I really do applaud the French. They are an active group- they walk nearly everywhere, they watch how much they eat, and in my six weeks of being here I've seen maybe 2 people that could be classified as obese.
I see many of them on bikes.

Now then, obviously this is a population that thinks through the ramifications of their actions so I am astounded at their idea of "securing" their bikes. Observe:


I laughed out loud when I first saw this. These short poles designed to keep cars off the grass have no top and it would take all of 4 seconds to pick a bike, lift it up four feet from its tether, and cruise away on your brand set of wheels. Many are secured so that they could be easily ridden:



Perhaps they are just a trusting group. Honestly, Angers has a very low crime rate, and if I had never lived in Ypsilanti perhaps I would never have found this peculiar. However, this is my favorite- which I get to see nearly every week parked outside the University Cafeteria:

Brilliant.

One Good Crepe

I've had many inquiries into what exactly I'm eating over here in this land without peanut butter or pancakes.

Here's a little look:
Morning: I normally don't eat b/c I'm ALWAYS running late for class (big surprise) - but if time allows, I take the remainder of last night's baguette and dunk it in my jam 'chip and dip' style.

Lunch: Le Resto-U (le restaurant universitaire) basically a french DC-1 (otherwise known as "The Commons" for all you Eastern young'uns). Its a cafeteria affiliated with the university. For 2.90 euro I get a lil salad or soup, a hot plate, and dessert (which is often whipped cream with sprinkles on top). Bread and water are free. How nice.
Otherwise there's this cute lil boulangerie that sells a pretty good lunch "formule" a baguette sandwich and drink or dessert for 3.60 euro.

Dinner: Many things. A soup-pot portion of cereal (I FOUND SPECIAL K RED BERRIES), baguette purchased on the way home from class w/ butter and ham, couscous w/ soup, frozen dinner mix, nutella by the spoonful...

I have endeavored, on one occasion, to make crepes. When in France, right?

Well, here's what happened:

First things first- crepes are just eggs, milk, and flour. I've watched a real french person make them right in front of my eyes and really this looks like a no-brainer: FIRST MISCONCEPTION.

Mixing the batter is a science. You want to break the egg and mix it up first- so that you don't have tentacles of egg-slime permeating your batter (le pate). Next you add a little bit of milk, and then slowly flour- stir- milk- stir- flour- stir- milk etc until all the flour you want is added and the consistancy is thinner than elmers glue. Ideally without chunks. HOW DO YOU AVOID CHUNKS? I don't know. My batter was chunky. See?

SO- that failed. I added some more milk to try to dissolve them, but in the end, I scooped the chunks out of the batter w/ my fingers (I don't have a wisk - don't judge) and tried again:



Result: Disgusting scrambled eggs. The batter was too thin- or too fluffy after all my stirring- or something. In any case the result was a wet, hot mess that tasted like diluted eggs. Adding nutella didn't help. ADD MORE FLOUR!


Omigosh. Look at the color! Look at the shape! Its a perfectly cooked, golden brown PANCAKE.
I found this particularly spiteful. For a number of years I have tried and FAILED to make pancakes- many of those reading have suffered through (out of the goodness of their own hearts) my undercooked, burnt, dense-as-hell-because-katie-can't-make-batter-from-a-box, pancakes. Now I'm in France trying to make CREPES and the muses of cuisine decide to deliver me the perfect pancake. I slathered Nutella on this and moved on.


The key is to let the crepe cook. Trying to flip it too early (with that pathetic wooden substitute for a slotted turner you see in the pic) invites disaster. Once you can poke around the edges and not get batter- and you can shake the non-stick pan and the crepe moves around- its time to flip- with an elegant flick of the wrist (which often ended with omelette-crepes) and let that side firm up a bit. I think I made one good crepe out of a dozen attempts. I blame the last failure on my host-mother. She came upstairs to grab my sheets (contractually she washes them every two weeks) and we got talking about the words for pillowcase and douvet cover and by the time I returned to my skillet I had one big tortilla chip. I slathered Nutella on it and moved on.

En Plein Air

This saturday morning I found another reason to love France. Every Saturday morning, in TWO places in Angers, there are farmers' markets. Now, when I say farmers' market- I'm not talking about the little collection of stalls in a parking lot that will happen twice a week in Ypsi during the warmer months. No, here in Angers you can buy mattresses, shoes, toys, underwear, lingerie, watches, home goods, cds, unitards, fresh cut flowers, potted plants EN PLUS there's food- fresh baked bread, fresh sea food, skinned rabbits, pickled goods, any vegetable you could want, imported fruit from Spain and Monaco, home made jams, the list goes on... There's really no reason to go to any stores. Just wait for Saturday.

The market was FREEZING cold. It had snowed overnight and traces of snow were still lingering on the sidewalks. Snow doesn't stick here, it melts- but then the air is damp and soon the cold soaks in through your coat and shoes and you're chilled to the bone. We looked around for a good hour until none of us could feel our fingers or toes...

Later that night we had a crèpe making party to celebrate the fact that Nolan's host family is gone for the week. We watched the Olympics, ate crèpes, played cards and savoured the feeling we used to take for granted: hanging out at night with your friends.

All the friends I've made through this exchange program are living in host family situations like I am. Its great for learning the french culture and speaking the language- however, its a little like living with your grandparents. In order to be respectful guests, its expected that we don't make too much noise, invite too many people over for too long etc. As a ramification we all spend a lot of nights alone in our rooms, not making too much noise and trying not to feel too bored or lonely. Going out is always an option- but the cost adds up and none of us here can afford to spend 5 euro each night on top of other expenses. In short, we're all a little socially deprived and a night in the kindred company of college students was well appreciated.

The Market and Crepe Party

Angers at Night

To look at any of these close up, just click on them!