Letters from Camp

Here are some choice excerpts:

"Dear Kazz and Anthony. [Ed note: our children usually call us "Mom and Dad", not by our first names.] I had to right a letter to you! THEY MADE ME!!!!"

Pippa then proceeds to write about her time at camp and closes with:

"I do not miss you, but just pretend I do."

Fabulous.

Her next letter reiterates that point, verbatim, but closes with this:

"...but I do still love you very much!"

Well, thank goodness for small mercies.

Gigi's letter is not much better, frankly:

"Dear Mom and Dad, We are being forced to write to you, even though I don't have a stamp..."

You're imagining our children in an American summer camp: rustic cabins and lake-swimming. Think again. That may exist in France, but it's not where our girls are. They're at a 1000 year old medieval castle, riding ponies bareback (literally). To find out more, check out A Year in Fromage.

While They Party

This year's Mother's Day poem from Pippa:

 

You love orange.

I like blue.

You love black.

And I like to snack.

This is my mom

that I've known for long.

She took care of me

While I partied.

Besides the obvious issues with the rhyme sequence and how the poem scans (and don't even get me started on the spelling, which I corrected for you), is anybody else concerned that my 8 year old is out there partying?

I will say this, though: This year's French Mother's Day turns out to be the greatest ever. The picture below, taken this afternoon, gives you just a tiny hint why. But I'm saving that story for another day, because it's a doozy...

 

Carbo Loading

It's that magical time, the breadiest time of the year. For those of us that live by Notre Dame, at least. This year, not only does Pippa go as a field trip (and this means me too, as a chaperone), but the girls also get to make some bread once when we stop in to buy a baguette. Gigi gets private lessons from one of the most celebrated bread bakers in France (and, therefore, in the world, the man on her right). No, I don't know his name.

Here are a few photos from our latest visit, too late to make the story at A Year in Fromage.

 

 

 

Left to their own devices, this is what they choose to make. Gigi wants to make (and eat, entirely by herself) a classic baguette. It is so hot from the oven here that she can barely hold it, though you'll notice she somehow managed to eat one crouton (end of the bread) already. And Pippa makes the braided ring she's been dreaming of. She wasn't allowed to on the field trip, since they had to fit almost 30 loaves on a baking sheet. The ring turns out perfectly, and we dub it a baguegel (pronounced "ba-GAY-gul", a.k.a. a bagel made of baguette dough). I think it's beautiful and, with a little refinement, it could become a hot new trend.

  

There's a dairy booth open today that has this poster. You know what I'm thinking...Three Years in Fromage? A Life in Fromage?

 

Four Bulletins & A Snafu

Bulletin #1 -- a language one:

I know we've been living in France for a while now because the girls are speaking strange franglais.  Their latest: Pippa talks about all the science experiences she's doing in school. At which point Gigi yells, "experiments! Experiments!" At which point I point out that Gigi recently says that if she doesn't get a good grade for something she'd worked really hard on, it will be "a big deception." At which point I correct "disappointment! Disappointment!"

Also, Gigi talks about the book Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Uzbekistan. Perhaps she's not hearing quite enough English.

Bulletin #2 --  a gym one:

I realize it looks like I'm being one of those bragging parents who keeps pointing out my children's accomplishments, but I swear it's because I myself am amazed. They're doing stuff in gymnastics that I was never able to do, and learning and progressing so quickly it's crazy. So just know that this honestly is not coming from a place of vanity. It's coming from a place of pure jealousy, frankly. I so wish I could have done this when I was their age! And I harbor no illusions about them being Olympians or even serious competitors in the States. The level here is lower, and mostly recreational, and they're not fanatical about pointing toes and straightening legs. But still, I'm impressed.

Bulletin #3 -- a yummy one:

Near the Bourse, on and around rue Saint-Anne, I have finally found the Japantown part of Paris. I feel like the food here is better and more authentic-tasting, relatively speaking, than Parisian Chinese food. Having lived in both Japan (for many years) and Taiwan, I feel like I can say this with some authority. It fills a craving in a huge way for ramen and gyoza, and it's delicious, but it's still not as good as actually eating Japanese food in Tokyo. Naturally.

 

 

Bulletin #4 -- a bureaucratic one:

It turns out my latest carte de séjour had the wrong expiration date on it -- months earlier than it should be. Luckily, I look at my card a week or so before that date, and I manage to get my paperwork in just in the nick of time. Of course, that means I don't have a valid card for several months until the bureaucratic wheels (powered by Flintstone woodpeckers) have approved my legal status and manufactured and delivered my new card. That's OK: I don't carry it with me, ever since the multiple pickpocketing incidents, and I've never been asked to provide it, anyway.

And the snafu -- or is it?:

We still don't know where we'll be next school year, but we do know the girls will not be back at their school in San Francisco: The school didn't have any vacancies for them! By staying away more than two years, we lost our automatic, guaranteed spots, and the school had record-low attrition. With no available spots to give, we can't be insulted at all, got a really nice personalized note, and still love the school. We are not devastated. Those of you who know me know that a) I have been gunning to stay longer in Paris anyway and b) I generally find that life works out wonderfully -- and often in the most unusual ways. In fact, the more unusual, the better, in my mind. In case you're wondering, they do still have their spots guaranteed here at their Paris schools (which they love), and the girls are both excited about the idea of staying longer, too. So we're gearing up for the very real possibility (though as Anthony will tell you -- not the inevitability) that we might stay yet another year....Stay tuned.

 

Transitions

Pippa hits two new milestones in 24 hours:

She transitions from this:

to this (video taken from far away, I know, but it's a back handspring/ back tuck combo):

And then, she transitions from this:

 

to this:

 

She donates over eight inches to Children With Hair Loss, which provides free wigs and hair care products for kids who've lost hair due to illness and medical treatments. Pippa has only had three or four haircuts in her whole life, and those were simply trims, so this is pretty life-changing for her, too.

 

 

 

We've known it was too long for a while, but she had two distinct goals in mind before we could cut it: one, she wanted to have it reach down to her butt (a noble goal, I know), and two, she wanted to have enough to donate to charity but still have longish hair when finished.

 

 

Worst Parent Ever (Me)

I just did the WORST PARENTING MOVE EVER -- crossed a street with the girls through (stopped) traffic and not at the cross walk -- and watched Pippa get hit by a motorcycle. Oh how I wish I were kidding. Before you panic, she is fine. Nothing broken. No permanent damage. She does have a little neck-ache, though.

 

The motorcycle was going about 5-10mph between a row of stopped cars, and she mostly just bounced off the plastic on the side. She did not hit her head, and got up immediately, without a bruise on her body. It frankly seems less severe than the time she hurt her neck doing the vault at gymnastics, about a month ago. When distracted, she doesn't seem that bad off, but still, she does have a stiff neck. She is SO angry at me. And with good reason. Anthony and myself are so angry at me, too.

I am normally extremely safety conscious, so this was out of character and just beyond stupid. When it happened last night, I was somewhat numb, because the self-loathing that was completely flooding me was neutralized by the simultaneous relief and joy in seeing that she wasn't hurt in any major way. Around 5:30 this morning, however, what I mostly felt was the self-loathing.

We made it through last night. She woke up briefly a couple times because of her neck, so I'm the one who got the bad night sleep. Pretty hard to sleep like a baby when you almost got your own baby killed. Yikes. That means that today I am exhausted, and guilt-ridden, but also nearly ecstatic. Given my theory of alternate universes, I am so, so, so thrilled that I get to live in the universe where my daughter is in the next room singing, playing, laughing, and goofing off with a long-lost San Francisco friend. She's twisting and moving and not even thinking of her neck -- when I'm not around, that is. But I really can't begrudge my most dramatic child any amount of rubbing it in when I am around. Needless to say, I am in the doghouse, and she's a big fan of Daddy for the moment.

So since this isn't funny and doesn't do much to enlighten you about Paris (other than to warn you that this is a city where you really should cross with the light at the crosswalks!), why am I publicly shaming myself by telling you this story? A) to give you the news B) to serve as a cautionary tale, and C) because I know I fully deserve it.

 

Labor Day

Labor Day has a lot of significance around here: not as a national holiday, but rather as the trigger for la rentrée -- Back to School. In our house, it means even more than that, since it's the anniversary for, well, being in labor. At all three of the schools Gigi has attended, her birthday has actually fallen on the first day of school. Luckily, this is a child who likes school. In fact, this year, after her first day of middle school, she runs out to me and declares enthusiastically, "Today is the best day of my life!"

Well, it marks exactly ten years since one of the best days of my life, which is the day we went to the hospital to have the son we were expecting and came out instead with a bald, chubby, big-eyed girl. A decade later, she has grown into this lovely little lady seen below in the hall of her new school on orientation morning ("Take the picture quick! This is so embarrassing!") and then on her way to her first full day of school on her birthday. Conveniently, the first full day is spent on a class-bonding field trip. She tells me she prefers school to being on vacation. Happy birthday, indeed!

 

Pippa returns to her elementary school, on the world's greatest walk-to-school. Since she is in an entirely new class this year, however, she sits shyly to the side before the starting bell rings. But she comes out as enthusiastic as her sister, with a full list of all her new best friends. So, I guess I don't need to worry about her at school, either.

 

Gigi's choice for this year's birthday dinner, which we celebrate the weekend before, is at Happy Nouilles (Noodles), a hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurant in the 3rd arrondissement, near metro Arts & Metiers. We discovered it when we randomly walked by it months ago, and the girls were attracted to the guy actually hand-pulling noodles in the window. Though we had had only mediocre-at-best Chinese food in Paris up till that point and were pessimistic, we gave it a try. The place is filled -- staff and diners -- with Mandarin Chinese speakers, and it surpassed all expectations. The dumplings even rival (Sacrilege Alert!) San Francisco's.

 

 

 

On the way to birthday noodles, we discover a tiny storefront called Stanz that sells excellent bagels (described accurately by the owner as being chewier than a Montreal bagel, and less chewy than a New York bagel) and one called Berko that sells, frankly, the best cupcakes I've ever tasted. It could just be because I haven't had cupcakes in years. Or it could be because they're delicious. Naturally, on the actual day of her birthday, I buy us Berko cupcakes to celebrate.

 

 

If you're wondering why, for her 10th birthday, there are nine cupcakes on the plate, a number which divides unevenly among the four of us, it's because that's the biggest box they sell, at about 23€. Possibly because it would bankrupt somebody to buy a whole dozen. One of her birthday presents is everything needed to make mini-cupcakes, including a Berko cookbook. Which means we get to enjoy birthday cupcakes, round two, a few days later.

 

 

 

Back to School also means I can finally get Back to Work. It's the first time in two months I haven't spent basically all day, every day, with the girls. I'm not complaining, mind you, but being with them does make it hard to get any work done. So having them back in school is something of a respite, and it means I can start writing again more regularly.

 

 

Faster than a Bullet

It's a plane! It's a train! Actually, it is a train. And it's not really faster than a bullet. Or even a bullet train. But it is, in fact, very super. It's the train system throughout France, and Europe, and we've made good use of it, especially thanks to our "Carte Enfant +" which is a card we buy in Pippa's name for 70€. It lasts one year, can be re-purchased annually till she's 12, and means that up to four people who travel with her by train get a discount -- minimum 25% and often 50% -- on rides in France. There are other discount tickets available (frequent business traveler, retiree, large family, etc). The prices can be so low, they're shocking.

 

For example, our two hour train ride to Normandy costs me and the girls about 30€. They're not all this cheap, of course, but it's still a great way to travel -- and nearly always cheaper and faster than going by car. Just this summer alone, the girls and I trained to Normandy, Paris, Avignon, Cinque Terre Italy, Florence, night train back from Munich to Paris, Auxerre Burgundy, Joigny Burgundy, Paris, Bretagne, Paris, Aigle Switzerland, and one final trip back to Paris. Anthony flew or trained to meet us and travel with us for various parts of it, but had to work, so we often came through Paris for the weekends he couldn't join us. It was a confusing and utterly exhausting summer, to say the least.

 

 

All that train time means snacks at the train station, snacks on the train, card games, story time, snuggle time, sleep time, video games, and even the occasional (mild) motion sickness.

 

 

While most of our trips are on the high-speed TGV (in general running up to 320kmph or 200mph), our trip to Avignon is on the new Ouigo train. It's equally high-speed, is owned by the national train lines, but is being positioned as the People's Express/Southwest Airlines of French trains in terms of pricing. The downside of the Ouigo is that the "local" station is not actually in Paris but rather a half hour train ride outside of the city at Disneyland, and you have to wait on a long line to check in. It only runs to a few cities, but they are key ones down South. The upside is the price of the tickets: the trains are clean, fast, and comfortable, children cost 5€ each at all times, and my ticket costs 30€ -- for a 3-hour high speed train ride all the way across the country. My ticket would only have cost 10€ if I hadn't been picky about the time and day.

 

As we train around Europe, our girls recognize many of the names from one of our favorite board games. We call it "the Train Game," but its real name in English is "Ticket to Ride," and the French name is "Les Aventuriers du Rail" (Adventurers by Rail).

 

 

After all those train rides, we feel like we really need a vacation from our vacation. But exhausting and exhaustive as our summer travels are, we remain thrilled by how much better it is to travel by train than by plane. Even in 2nd class, we're traveling in style.