Chocolate, Baguettes and Valentine’s Day in France!
This year just might have been the best Valentine’s ever: I was able to take a 9 hour train ride to Lons le Saunier, France to visit my sister for a week! Although the train rides were long and sometimes boring, the trip was really worth it once I made it to Lons. Anna teaches English in the primary schools in the area and has made some wonderful friends with those living in the town.
While in France I had so many new and exciting adventures it’s hard to describe the
m all! The first day I was there Anna took me on a small tour of Lons and then to a chocolate shop. Talk about being in heaven! If you like chocolate, GO TO FRANCE! The chocolate melts on your tongue and they have all sorts of flavors imaginable. Honestly, you can’t eat just one, you want to eat the whole store! Needless to say, we bought some chocolate and then went to the grocery store across from Anna’s apartment, Ed. While there, I learned a big difference between France and Germany: the French take their time in lines at the check-out counter and buy most of their groceries all at once rather than coming back every other day. Such a difference from Germany where you are supposed to have your money ready and pack your groceries quickly so as to avoid getting run over. Okay, that was a bit over-exaggerated, but you get the point.
After Ed, Anna and I made an attempt to make a great American treat: Puppy chow! Of course, we ran into two problems:1. we didn’t have the right cereal, so we compromised and used some of Anna’s roommate’s health cereal that is like cornflakes and 2. we didn’t have very much powdered sugar. So we made the trek back over to Ed and waited in the long lines just to get powdered sugar. But it was well worth it. The Puppy chow tasted really good and lasted about the whole week! I was also able to experience the French version of American Idol, Star Academy that night. It was the final, so we stayed up to find out who won.
The next day, we ventured out early to check out a park in the city and go to the post office since there was a package for the both of us from home! However, the postman still had our package with him in his car, so we were told we would have to wait until Monday to actually get the package! That night we went to dinner at a friend of Anna’s, Colette’s, for potatoes and fromage (cheese) and canards (duck). That was a really good dinner!! Colette met Anna and her roommate, Abhi (who is from India) at the post office in town earlier and has now befriended them. It was a bit strange at dinner, however, since I was the only one that didn’t speak French, so I was given per
iodic translations.
Sunday we took a day trip with Colette and Abhi and Abhi’s friend Preeti all over the surrounding area to hike and see a waterfall that was absolutely gorgeous! After we all went back to Colette’s and made Bugnes, a French sweet that is kind of like a doughnut. Super yummy! I was smart enough to get the recipie from her, so now I can make them here in Germany and in the US!
Monday was a long day. In the morning Anna and I were able to pick up our package from our parents and treated ourselves to some sort of French pastry that was a doughnut with Nutella inside…I could have eaten those all day long! Then in the afternoon the three other girls and I met another friend of Anna and Abhi’s, René, who took us up into the mountains, which also took us to Switzerland! We found a small little town René typically stops at and were able to convince the border patrol at the Swiss and French borders to stamp our passports, since it is no longer necessary. 
We were all able to stop off and take a hike in the snow (the most snow I’ve seen since last winter) and have a small snowball fight.
Tuesday Anna and I were adventurous and decided to attempt to make banana bread with some leftover bananas she had. The batter turned out just fine and we stuck it in her oven that doesn’t have degrees on it…just numbers, so one has to guess at the temperature! Nevertheless, we baked the bread until we thought it would be done (it was brown) and tried it…it wasn’t done! So we put it back in the oven and took it out later: still no good. So we had to throw it away. It was sad, but slightly funny at the same time. Shrek 2 then was on the TV in French…quite interesting to watch when you can only understand about every 100 words.
I’m back in Jena now where it has decided to be gorgeous weather while I write my paper that is due in a few weeks. Perhaps I will have to bring my things outside and hike up the mountain to do my reading. Happy weekend all!