A few things occurred to me as I was walking to school a few days ago, kicking through piles of leaves on the ground bigger than my face (the leaves, not the piles).
The first being that, rather than feeling like I am visiting this place, I have just started to feel like I live here. I can find my way through town without getting lost, I can even explore areas I have never been to and have a pretty good idea of where I am, where I will end up, and how to get back. I can give people directions (a lot of people ask. There are a lot of tourists here. They think I look French. Nice.)!
I have spent a lot of time hanging out by myself, a lot of times not because I didn't feel like I had any other choice, but because I discovered that I am actually pretty good company and it's fun to do things by yourself. Because of this, I have found myself recently recommending stores and restaurants and tea salons (my new favorite thing) to other kids in my group, and they keep asking rhetorically, "Why haven't I been over here? Why haven't I heard of this?" and my answer is always, "Well...I don't know. Maybe you should try hanging out by yourself." You don't get to wander in groups the same way you get to wander by yourself. There is always someone who has to go home soon, someone who is just trying to find their way to the nearest liquor store, ATM, place to sit down, or basically whatever you are not trying to do. And the plus side is, if you embarrass yourself, nobody else will ever know...except the locals but who knows if they like you to begin with, so it doesn't matter. They probably just think you are an odd, foreign cookie, and that's ok. When you are abroad, you are already odd and foreign.
The third thing being that, although I came here to learn French and it is working out pretty well for me so far, one thing I am glad I did not come here to learn is business. It's simply crazy to me that people can get anything done when they close for lunch for two hours, the majority of the month of August, and other things that are better left unsaid because I am not trying to call out anyone in specific.
I smiled, thinking that public toilets including any of the following would not make my list: turkish style toilets, seatless toilets, anywhere you have to pay to use the bathroom, and bathrooms where you are not allowed to flush anything that didn't come out of you--including toilet paper, making for some sketchy poubelles.
Then I realized all of the little things that I live with every day without noticing are going to be impossible to innumerate until I go home, and I decided to stop thinking about what I would think of Aix when I got home, and went back to sipping my chai. Taking a bite into a cute little noisette flavored macaroon, I added those to the list, and made a mental note to smuggle a box back into the States with me.
I have struck up an interesting friendship with my boss, the lovely Madame Rita. I am not entirely sure what my professor expects me to accomplish at my bookstore internship, but Rita and I spend the majority of our time together looking up music videos. I insist she show me French music, but it seems to be the general consensus that good French music is rare and does NOT include Patrick Juvet. I don't know if I have said this in my blog yet, but Anglophone music rules the world...be it American, British, Australian, whatever. It's everywhere. When we are not busy doing this, we are coming up with schemes to make lingering customers who are not intent on buying anything leave. For example, one time Rita saved me from a crazy old lady telling me some bizarre story by secretly calling the shop with her own cell phone, telling me I had a phone call, and then suggesting that maybe I go downstairs to the basement to retrieve whatever it was the anonymous caller was searching for.
Rita has introduced me to most of her friends, and since I will no longer be going on vacation to Beirut for les vacances Toussaint (in light of the recent car bomb leaving 8 dead and 80 others wounded), she invited me to dinner chez-elle next week, one of her friends also invited me to dinner, and informed me that her 21 and 19 year old children would be more than happy to show me around some more (she showed me a text she sent them reading: "you will occupy yourselves with an American next week!" in a friendly but definite tone).