Hills, literal and figurative.

This blog hasn't been an enormous, bulging catalog of every great experience I've had in France. I simply haven't been updating very often. However, I can now rest calmly knowing that, looking back on this blog, I'll have this meaningful moment, captured as it was. The following post is here to tell you, future self, that your exchange in Provence really made you happy. This post can't tell you exactly when you played that soccer match in Val-en-Sol, but it can reassure you that you had a good time doing it.
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I just got back from an afternoon in Forcalquier. Which means that I wasn't in Forcalquier before the afternoon, and am currently not there either. Which means that yes, I have switched host families. My second host family, les Parents, live in the countryside just outside of Forcalquier. Staying here (it's currently my 13th day!) has been great: les Parents are really nice, they have a dog and cats, and I'm lucky enough to have a piano in my room now. However, living outside of town means that I depend on my host parents for rides, limiting my independance. Or I can choose to take the bike. This afternoon, I tried out the second option.

Direction Forcalquier: Uphill. It wasn't a grueling test that pushed my body to its last breath, and it really only took 20 minutes, but it was nonetheless significantly less pleasant than the 7 minutes it would take me to walk to the center of town from my last house. It was nonetheless something that I had to push through, and will have to push through again the next time I bike to Forcalquier.

Direction Chez Moi: Happy. I didn't just go downhill, I happily went downhill. And not because I simply wasn't working as hard. But because I felt good about life. I was mostly alone for ten minutes, save for the occasional strolling Frenchman, rolling with the countryside, the sun lingering, giving a few more moments of yellow, energetic light before its typical orange descent. I had just had a pleasant afternoon with friends, where we goofed around, ate junk food, and played music, and I had Jeff Buckley stuck in my head. Feeling courageous, I sang out a little louder than one would venture with houses to their left and right. Then louder, and louder. I wanted to sing at the top of my voice, because moments like that don't come everyday. So I did. It was just a moment of pure happiness. I may have paused while passing a pedestrian, but I didn't feel bad about having sung. In those moments, I was aware of how cheesy I was acting, riding through the sunlit countryside, singing. But I didn't dwell on it, like I have before. I just let it go. I was just happy being there.

And that's not to say that life was perfect in that moment, that life is easy. That I don't miss my family and friends back home, and my mom. That I don't crave Mexican food, American sports, and the feeling of being at home. That I haven't had my share of battles in life. That I hadn't, a few hours earlier, been on that same road, struggling uphill in the cold, planning to never bike to Forcalquier again. Those things could have held me back from enjoying that moment. But I was in the frame of mind to let them go.

And that, I think, is the ultimate thing that a youth exchange can give you. It raises a big hill in front of you, sometimes figuratively, other times literally, and says, "Climb. It's gonna be the best year of your life." So you climb. And at times, the climb sucks. But if you buy into it, if you let yourself learn from your year, if you, well, climb even though it sucks, you reap the benefits. For me, it was a gorgeous, happy moment, that only Provence could have produced. But the climb happens anywhere. The transformation a youth exchange offers occurs within you, it gives you a certain frame of mind that, in my opinion, is the most important thing in the world: Openness. (The movie A Room With a View calls it the "Eternal Yes"). If you're not open to life, you feel held back. No matter your surroundings, your external situation, what you feel is governed by how open you are to the moment. And a youth exchange shows you that first hand by placing you in those different surroundings so you can see the strength of this openness in action.

The Jeff Buckley song I had been singing with my friends, and later singing alone in the countryside, was his version of Hallelujah. Stuck in my head were the lyrics, "I heard there was a secret chord that David played, and it pleased the Lord, but you don't really care for music, do you?" That chord David found, it sounds really good, from a religious standpoint or not. But you have to care for music to hear it. A youth exchange teaches you how.

À la prochaine,


Chris

I'm Dreaming of a...Cold Christmas?

Well, maybe dreaming isn't the right word for it. More like, "I'm noticing that this is not a White Christmas, nor ever a Cold Christmas, seeing as I'm wearing flip-flops and eating the lunchtime Christmas Eve appetizers on the porch."

That's pretty much how all of Christmas went this year: I was still enjoying good food with my (host) family, and the Christmas spirit was still there, but it was just different. While everything this year has been different, you notice it most when the more "special" things change. If I eat duck at school instead of tacos, I accept it as part of a different culture (honestly, though, each country should have both!!). But when something changes with a Holiday tradition, you feel it a little more. I was aching for Christmas carols and endless Christmas specials on TV.

Getting past all of that, however, Christmas was really nice. My host family took me with them to see their family (my host dad's parents, his sister, and her husband and three kids) in the South-West, about an hour North of the Pyrenées, and an hour East of the Atlantic. The week, I spent there, then, was marked by a trip to the Pyrenées for skiing (or, for me, falling), a trip to the Atlantic city of Biarritz, relaxing with board games and, of course, eating. A whole lot of eating that saw the likes of black truffles, chocolate truffles, duck, smoked salmon, oysters, yellow kiwis, leek tarts, and a chapon (the traditional Christmas roasted chicken), but what really took the cake was certainly the fig foie gras. As unappetizing as fowl liver made into a paste sounds, the taste makes up for it.

Christmas morning brought the same smiles here in France that it did back home. My host parents' 10 year old niece insisted that we scatter the presents around the room, adding a little search to make each unwrapping a little more worth it. And after each and every present, the giver and the getter shared what the French share best: two bisous, a kiss for each cheek.

All and all, I'm happy and grateful that I was able to enjoy a Christmas with so much warmth, not only in the weather, but also in the people I spent it with.

Happy New Year and à la prochaine!

Chris