Life in Strasbourg!!

I feel like I should just make some comments on living abroad, in France, with a family I just met. It seems like such a weird concept to ship yourself across the ocean, to a country you've possibly never been before or don't know the language. Although I have been to France, but never Strasbourg, and do speak a good amount of French, the transition is still something that I am getting used to. Here I am introducing myself to a nice older woman who is letting me live in her house, cook me dinner 5 days a week and breakfast 7 days a week, allow me to do the laundry in her apartment and provide a room all for myself. Weird? Yes. But pretty great, I must say so.

Everytime I see Madame, we have a small conversation: "Bonjour Joanna, ca va?" "Ca va merci, et vous?" I have gotten a lot more used to dinners with Madame, John (my American roommate) and sometimes one of her children. We speak French the whole time, which I love and is really the whole point of living with a family. Most of the time, I can get by pretty well in all the conversations. Yay! If not, Madame can totally tell. She looks at me with this kind of smirk. Great. But, now I think I've gotten more comfortable and I'll ask questions to clarify any confusion I have.

A large concern of mine coming into this situation was the food. I have to eat what Madame cooks that night for dinner and that's it. So, I would say I'm a pretty picky eater. I did write on the housing form that I don't eat red meat, however, that has not been a problem, considering it doesn't look like they eat that much anyway. A common food I do see is ham. I mean, I didn't list out every food I dislike on this form, and unfortunately, ham is one of them. Ham just seems to creep its way into many dishes she makes, so I slyly try to push it off to the side without Madame realizing. Who am I kidding? She probably knows.

We also eat very random vegetables. There's this pale, cabbage like, extremely bitter vegetable that reappears every so often. I don't know what it is, but it is not the tastiest. I would definitely say that I've had my fair share of cheese since I've been here, it is somehow incorporated to each dish we eat, or the cheese course takes its place. Yum.

I just realized a few days ago that the building has an elevator, which goes right into the apartment, but she doesn't use it. Slow moment. There's also whole section of the apartment that I haven't seen. It's past the kitchen, and that is the farthest I go. Sometimes there is even a curtain pulled across. Hmm interesting. I often wonder where her children are? Or possibly they are just hidden somewhere in the remainder of the apartment? I really couldn't tell you for sure.

How about the laundry? Apparently they don't really believe in dryers in France, except for sheets. I think when I tried to ask her what I should do with my sheet when I wanted to wash it, it took awhile for me to even figure out what I was trying to ask. Then I turned her pink towel into one covered with blue spots. Rough.

Oh France...