Wednesday, September 28, 2011

My Eating Habit: Cheap, Delicious, and Shameful

Sometimes, when I'm in a hurry or feeling a little down, I turn to Picard for my suppers. Oh, Picard! A magical land of wonder and freezers!


Picard is a frozen food store, but it's a frozen food store like no other. The quality is comparable to Trader Joe's, in that it's about as delicious as frozen food could ever be. But because Picard sells nothing but frozen food (and a couple random knick knacks like ice cream cones and balsamic vinegar), the selection is incroyable. They have frozen puff pastry hors d'oeuvres. They have frozen red currants. They have frozen waffles, crepes, french toast, bread, croissants, viennoisseries. They have fish. They have chicken. They have prepared pasta dishes and ethnic food dishes and traditional French dishes. They have juice. They have soup. They have pizza. They have ice cream. They have pies. They have cake. They have shrimp.

So if I don't want to have to think too hard, I go to Picard and I pick out exactly what I want to eat, already prepared, with simple cooking instructions in simple French. Twenty minutes in the oven and voila! Goat cheese and spinach pastries for dinner.

The only problem with this is that it encourages me to eat exactly what I want for dinner. Which was, tonight, quiche lorraine and lemon sorbet. It was less than 5€ for two meals' worth of food, but I can't say it hits a lot of food groups...

The other problem is that since Picard is a 30 econd walk from my apartment building, and since I only buy a couple things at a time, I just carry the boxes in my hands. And then the traditional French people eating traditional French dinners at the traditional French bistro on the corner eye my sorbet and quiche disgustedly. They know exactly what I'm doing. They are ashamed for me.

Actually, on second though, there's no way they could know that I eat my sorbet right out of the carton. But I swear to god, they can read it in my face. And then they judge me for it. 

Harshly.

"If you have sex with someone, you can call them "tu." No problem."

My film professor is hilarious. He also recommended a book by Jean Cocteau's lover, but then warned us that there was some "kinky stuff." He also thinks Le Jour Se Leve is a good movie.

Funny guy.

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

LIST TIME!! I don't have time for a legit update.

Sorry guys, 18 days is quite a long unannounced hiatus. But I'm alive! And I'm happy.

Here is a list of awesome things that happened in the past 7 days:


  1. Fall TV premieres finally started happening back home, and I watched a couple things online and started a television blog called Jam and Telly
  2. My weird word-vomit approach to job applications (where I just awkwardly explain with creative use of the English language that I'm good at everything but have no experience) finally worked!
  3. I went to what may or may not have been Israeli folk dance on the Quai Saint-Bernard. Regardless, I tried and miserably failed to join a circle dance, and then a couple dapper old men asked me to dance. One of them was a foot shorter than me and shuffled the whole time. I'm pretty sure the other one was a spy from a Slavic country. (He had a nuclear-code kind of a briefcase.)
  4. I saw my fabulous family! Auntie Ann, Uncle Michel, Cousins Tom, Emelle, Mehdi, and Lillia, and friends were probably the highlight of my week. It was so lovely to spend a little time with family. It's nice not having someone's opinion of me rely on me being the perfect exchange student or French speaker or bread-orderer. I don't even have to be the perfect niece! (Just a pretty good one.) I love knowing that there are a few people who know me pretty well and like me anyway. That's family. You're blood relations and you haven't murdered anyone lately? You're good with me!It's just a wonderful feeling when you're in a foreign country. Plus my fam-fam is pretty much the best ever. Uncle Michel told me cool stuff about Paris, Auntie Ann and I talked shop (ie discussed knitting), and the wee cousinskies just showed up and were too cute for words. Oh my god, so cute.
  5. I MADE A MOVIE. In 48 hours. I responded to some guy on Craigslist and next thing I know, I'm leaving the house at 5:15 am, on my way to orchestrate the one-day filming of a 4-minute fantasy short. I worked 19 hours straight. I made sandwiches, a postman's cap, and a bucket full of fake human feces. I learned how to keep a log sheet of all the good or bad takes and time codes. I probably got second hand lung cancer but I did NOT take up smoking, despite almost 24 hours spent on a team made up of 11 chain smokers and little old asthma-free me. I climbed the 5 flights of stairs between our set and our headquarters at least 15 times. I learned a lot about lighting. You know, I don't mean to brag, but I figure if you're reading this you like me enough to forgive me: I got an email the next morning that included the line, "Thanks to all for the really great time we had today, in particular to Jethro for letting us in his palace, and to Zoe for doing everything for everyone." Also, during one of our sleep-deprived delirious smoke breaks, a couple of the middle-aged professional filmmakers I was working with told me that if I could keep up this pace at multiple locations for multiple days, I'd make a really great producer. And even though I did not actually mean I wanted to be a film producer when I said I wanted to major in film production at our planning meeting, it's starting to sound like a possible option for me. I've never felt less like a lazy useless slob. It was beautiful.
  6. I actually paid attention in Cultural Identities In France! Miracles do happen.

Friday, September 9, 2011

Feeling Like Myself Again

For the past few weeks, I've been trying really hard to fit in here. Making friends, studying more than I ever do (not that that's really saying anything), and making a serious effort to acclimate to the general Frenchiness. I've been wearing makeup, eating breakfast at the table, glowering at passersby and using the magic words almost until their enchantment wears off completely. But I think I tried so hard to be French that I kind of forgot to continue being me. Up until a couple of days ago, I hadn't cooked, crafted, or been obsessed with a song because it made me feel like I was in a movie in weeks. And then I decided it had to stop.

On Tuesday I went to this awesome yarn store called "La Droguerie" with a new friend. After wandering around for three hours fingering the yarns (both fingering and worsted...YARN JOKE!) and generally being too wussy to ask someone who you had to screw around here to get a ball of yarn, someone finally came up to us and (rather pointedly?) asked if we needed some help. I came away with some really lovely deep purple wool and a set of dpns, and last night I started to make some sweet mittens for the cold unforgiving Paris winter to come!



It was just good to do something that I've always enjoyed, you know? I feel like being The American Student Living In Paris has kind of clouded my identity. I forgot that I was also Zoe Toffaleti, who likes to do things that are not related to France, French, or homesickness. I like a lot of things! Almost all of the things, actually. (Except mushrooms.) And I think it's really important that I keep doing stuff I enjoyed back home, even if it isn't "what I should be spending my precious time in France on." That's dumb. I should do whatever makes me happy. And you know what makes me happy? This sandwich.

Hello, sexy.
I think this is a really important breakthrough. Just because I'm in a different country doesn't mean I don't need to do the same soul-sustaining activities I did at home. I'm still the same person. I still need to knit and make elaborate dishes. And I need a sick soundtrack to accompany that! So here is a Ukranian polka band cover of Hot and Cold by Katy Perry:




You're welcome.

I promise I'll post something travel bloggy next time.