Meet My Host Sister, The Monkey

Wine and Macaroons All Darn Day

my host sister is cooler than yours, sorry not sorry

You know you’re having a really rough study abroad experience when your program sponsors a wine-tasting course.  The sommelier (vinter? Advisor of fancy people concerning which wines to purchase?) actually gave a great teaser on how to taste wine, identify and understand its origins, and how to talk about vineyards.  But my main takeaways were how to talk pretentiously (“Ah yes, madame, the mouthfeel on this Orange Fanta is particularly exquisite”) and how not to manhandle the wine glass (treat it like it’s a blind date, not the wedding night), both of which are useful skills the high-society circles I will no doubt become a part of in the future.

My Main Man Lacan

Everywhere I turn it’s “Lacan-this” or “Lacan-that.”  I mean, my God, you’d think he’d invented the mirror stage and the graph of desire or something!  Jacques Lacan, also known as France’s Freud (actually, no one calls him that, but they should) follows me from course to course because apparently he had his hands in all the cookie jars.  You’re studying mass consumerism and cinema?  Why not pick up Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Lacan: But Were Too Afraid to Ask Hitchcock.  Are you delving into French universalist feminism?  Oh, good news, Antoinette Fouque consulted Lacan on this matter.  This man knows no bounds.  Are you, bychance, experiencing an overdose of Lacan?  I’m sure Lacan wrote a book about that too.

Les Escargots

In a blind study of three of my American friends, results prove conclusively that the French walk approximately seven times slower than the average non-Frenchman/woman.  Paris has a reputation for being full of driven, intense, no-nonsense people (this is clearly manifested in the unfathomable emotional and physical strength Parisian women use to sprint through the metro in stilettos) but I swear, if I am suddenly accused of manslaughter it’s because people here walk too darn slow.  Hey there middle-aged business man, I know you’re in the middle of the Chatelet station, but now seems like as good a time as any to stare at your shoes and ponder the intricacies of string theory, don’t you think?  Dearest young woman in the leather boots, rush hour on the busiest street in France is the optimal time to practice your jumping jacks longways across the sidewalk, in case you were wondering.

The Monkey

My host sister is a monkey who gives kisses on the cheek.  Commence jealous rage now.

Hating the Eiffel Tower

I hate the Eiffel Tower.  Before you go Joan-of-Arc me to death (Best. Verb. Ever.) let me explain.  The Eiffel Tower, when you go to see it, is not actually that cool.  I have never really understood the allure of hunks of metal in fancy shapes.  (Example A: “Wow, look at the majestic architecture of the Louvre!”  “Clancy, that’s a grocery store, we’re twenty minutes from the Louvre.”) BUT, the Eiffel Tower finally won me over because it stopped being a destination and started being a fancy hunk of metal that was part of my life.  I once got impressively lost (I may have not even been in France anymore) and then, bam, I look up and there’s the Eiffel Tower just casually hangin’ out.  I drank one euro wine on a grassy bank with friends and, voila, there it was again shinin’ its pretty lights on down.  I’m proud to announce that the Eiffel Tower is my homegirl, but only when she’s not trying.  In the immortal words of Drake:

sweat pants,

hair tied,

chillin’ with no make-up on,

that’s when [the Eiffel Tour is] the prettiest,

I hope that you don’t take it wrong

Au Revoir!

Clancy T