srah blah blah

1) Vincent

When I was teaching in Vichy, I would go out with a group of my older students from time to time, whenever they had a class social event. One night, we all went over to Benoît's apartment for apéritifs before heading out to dinner. Camille and Charles were running late, though, so we ended up just going out to the one supermarket that was open late-ish and buying things to eat instead. That was kind of nice just because I got to hang around a French person's apartment and see how young Frenchies live.

As the course of the evening went on, people drank more and more wine and mixed drinks. I nursed my pineapple-juice-and-Malibu because, knowing I'm a lightweight, I was always concerned about getting drunk in front of my students. I still giggled at their antics, however, even though I couldn't really speak fast enough to participate in conversations unless people addressed me directly.

At one point, Vincent started dancing around the room, trying to get everyone to join in with him. Everyone else was pretty much interested in sitting around and chatting and since he was pretty drunk, I didn't take him up on the offer when he got over to my side of the room.

He didn't seem to think he was getting enough attention where he was, so he climbed up on the chair and continued his dance. People laughed and clapped along, which only encouraged him, so he danced from that chair to the one next to it, then over to the open windowsill.

People started looking at each other, wondering if someone was going to make a move to stop him, when he lost his balance and fell backwards out the window. There was a collective gasp and people ran to the window... then we realized that this side of Ben's apartment was at ground level and Vincent was flailing on his back in the flower bed.

2) X-rays

In order to be a legal resident in France, you need a document called a carte de sejour. If you are from certain countries, obtaining this document requires a medical visit. When I was in Grenoble, I was able to go to the clinic on campus for my visit. I had a short interview with the doctor, then I had to report to the x-ray van for chest x-rays to make sure that I didn't have tuberculo--

X-ray what, now?

The x-rays were taken in a big van that was parked just outside of the clinic. I had to go into the van, go behind a curtain and strip down torse nue before emerging and standing around and waiting while the male (!) x-ray attendant prepared the machinery.

As I am wont to do, I just chanted "Cultural differences, cultural differences, cultural differences" in my mind as a sort of mantra to get my pudique American self through the situation.

3) Cider and calvados

I didn't even realize I was drunk at the time, but now I think it explains a lot of things. When I was 15, I went on a trip to France with a group from my high school. We had to get permission slips signed by our parents in order to drink wine with dinner. My parents signed mine, but I wasn't tempted - wine tasted yucky! So we had the option of wine all across the north of the country, from Strasbourg to the Champagne region (I tasted some champagne, but that was even yuckier than wine because it had bubbles in it in addition to the icky alcohol taste) to Normandy and down to Brittany.

The night we stopped in Brittany, we were offered a local apéritif with dinner - a mixture of cider and Calvados (apple brandy). Other people tasted theirs and rejected them. I tasted mine and it was rather nice and appley, like apple juice or cider with a kick. So I finished mine. Everyone who had rejected theirs pushed it towards our teacher, who was sitting next to me. So I helped her out by polishing off a few extras.

I don't remember being particularly outgoing or otherwise outwardly drunk that night, but that may be because I often act drunk when I'm not. It wasn't until much later, though, that I made the connection between all of the alcohol I'd had and the fact that the next day's trip to Tours was the one where I was sick all day long. Hmmmmm.