So today I asked my French teacher what would be the appropriate thing to do since I forgot to pay the doctor last Friday and she forgot to ask me to pay.
He said ppffff (a most very French way of answering any question… you just sort of blow air out of the corner of your mouth and shrug your shoulders at the same time). Tant pis pour elle! Loosely translated, that’s tough shit for her!
It was a completely French response. But it still amazed me.
So today, for the first time since moving to France, I stood up for myself when I thought a store clerk made a mistake.
It happened at the fruit and vegetable store (yes.. there are several stores that only sell fruits and vegetables…). I’d picked up a few things.. some potatoes, cheese (ok, they sell cheese), avocado, plums, apricots, strawberries, red pepper. When I checked out the woman said cinquante-six Euros. That’s fifty six Euros. Plus some change. Now, I know that this isn’t the cheapest place to buy your produce. But everything was in season… I couldn’t figure out how I’d racked up such a giant bill for one measly bag of food. I looked at the receipt and realized that several items on it weren’t mine. They were things apparently the previous customers had bought (and possibly not paid for, but that’s not my problem). So I told the woman… I didn’t buy all this. And she fixed my bill. To the tune of 30 Euros. Glad I said something.
I had a doctor’s appointment this afternoon. I thought to go armed with a book in English to avoid having to leaf through the pile of French magazines in the waiting room. But I didn’t think to go with a French-culture-translator.
I got there just at 3, the time of the appointment. A tad later than I’d hoped, but it is France where being late is simply common courtesy. When you go to a doctor’s office, you buzz at the door (there’s a doorbell by a sign that says ring and go in). Then you just see yourself to the waiting room and the aforementioned pile of magazines. If you’re wondering where the receptionist is… well, there isn’t one. There’s also no nurse. There’s just however many doctors are in the practice (often only one) and the magazines.
Normally, I don’t mind the lack of staff. But today as I sat waiting and waiting and waiting, I wasn’t sure what to do. I wasn’t sure that the doctor realized I was there. I’d arrived at the same time as another woman; she’d rung the bell then opened the door for both of us. So as far as I knew, the doctors thought only one person had come in. And her doctor quickly came to get her. She hadn’t even had a chance to look at the reading options available! That left me alone in the waiting room. I read a couple chapters of my book. No one came to check on me. I could hear all sorts of banging around in the closet next door. Still, not a peep out of my doctor. At about 20 past 3, I started to wonder what I should do. How can I make sure the doctor knows I’m here? There’s no receptionist to check-in with. No nurse to interrupt. I tried setting my book bag down hard enough to make noise. My paperback didn’t create much of a thud. I contemplated knocking the pile of magazines off the coffee table, but I didn’t really want to have to pick them all up. I finally decided I’d just go to the bathroom and hope that the doctor would wonder who was flushing the toilet. She didn’t pound on the door to ask who was in there, but she did fetch me from the waiting room just a few minutes later.
It was one of the strangest doctor appointments I’ve ever had. The exam consisted of her asking me how things are going, reading my mammogram results, holding the slides up to the sliding glass door to see them, then taking my blood pressure. Uh… ok.
I realized on the way home that I’d completely forgotten to pay for the visit. Maybe I’ll just wait till she makes some noise about it.
I don’t hate dogs. I like them. I prefer them on a leash or somehow contained within the boundaries of a yard. The number of dogs loitering along the sides of our tiny road is multiplying seemingly exponentially. Today there were two who were apparently walking themselves. There are a couple of others who enjoy sitting guard at the end of their driveways… the prime starting point for car-chasing. I don’t want to hit one of these dogs. But I can only move my little car so close to the hedges lining the street. I’m afraid this isn’t going to end well. I really hope I’m just being paranoid.
Kaitlyn has a friend over for lunch right now. A French friend. Ok, so she speaks a little English, but it seems only polite to at least attempt to speak to her in French. I mean, we invited her over and all.
I asked Kaitlyn if she is going to try to speak French to Leanne, or if she is going to make her friend suffer with English. Kaitlyn just kept walking and said suffer with English.
They seem fine. One is speaking French. One is speaking English. I’m speaking Franglish. And we’re surviving. Luckily, words like spaghetti, ketchup and tomato are the same in both.
Kaitlyn’s teacher is out… recovering from appendicitis. This is the second week she’s been gone. Last week, the substitute seemed ok. This week, I swear she has it in for Kaitlyn.
Monday when I picked Kaitlyn up from school, the teacher told me not to let Kaitlyn wear bracelets to school anymore because she loses them and disrupts the whole class to find them.
Tuesday she stopped me outside the door in the morning wagging her finger at us saying the stuffed monkey Kaitlyn had brought with her was too big and had to go. Kaitlyn was in tears about it; the only way I had even gotten her out of bed that morning was with the promise that the monkey could go to school with her. Stuffed animals have always been ok.
Yesterday when I picked Kaitlyn up for lunch, the teacher informed me in a rather scolding tone that Kaitlyn had tossed her very small plastic pony up onto an awning where it remained stuck. (I asked a tall dad who was there to get it down. He did, no problem.)
Then this afternoon when I went to get Kaitlyn, the teacher rushed to tell me that Kaitlyn had not obeyed boucoup today. She tells me this while Kaitlyn is sitting there crying. She offers no explanation for my crying child, other than a French shoulder shrug and some mumbled comment about her fussing with her little friend. Then Kaitlyn tells me she is crying because she got whacked in the face by some little French boy.
Each of these things alone would not cause a second thought. But together… I think they tell a different story. And I think that story is that the teacher has it out for Kaitlyn. Maybe because she and I don’t speak French very well. I don’t know. Kaitlyn says all they do now in class is color and play. She used to practice writing letters and numbers. Yesterday her regular teacher stopped by on her way to a meeting with the headmistress (apparently to tell her she needs a third week to recover) and every kid in that classroom flocked to greet her with a huge smile on his or her face. I get the feeling no one smiles when the substitute enters the room. I know that between now and Tuesday (there’s no school Monday) I won’t be able to bolster my French skills enough to ask this woman what the f*%(_#$ her problem is. Then again… maybe I can.
This morning after ballet, Kaitlyn and I went to the marche in town to pick up a few things we need for dinner.
At the fruit and veggie stand, the nice man gave me the peach I was going to buy for Kaitlyn. He said it was for her. Sometimes it pays to drag her along on these shopping outings!
Kaitlyn spied the playground… it’s right next to where all the stands are set up.. and she asked to play there. So we went over there and she played quite happily for quite a while. I even heard her speaking French to the other kids there. Later I asked her if she’d even realized she’d done that; I don’t think she had. She got a big smile on her face and said Mommy, I’m getting better at it! At least one of us is.
The great drama that was our summer vacation is finally over. Today I reserved a room at a hotel a block off the beach in Viareggio… a big Italian beach resort in Tuscany.
I was so thrilled. I told Bill as soon as he got home and he said which one did you choose? I was so sure we’d decided together. But we did look at a lot and they were starting to get mushed together in our heads. I went with the one that isn’t on the beach but does have a pool. There wasn’t one with both. Well, there may be one but I only looked at ones in our price range.
I’m getting excited about the trip. Our hotel is 30 minutes outside of Pisa and 30 minutes outside of Carrara. I know, I said after Barcelona that you should stay where you plan to sightsee. But those places aren’t worth more than an afternoon. I also found a tour company in Florence (an hour away) where you rent a vintage Fiat and drive around with a guided tour. We aren’t sure how it works… maybe the tour guide is in the lead car with some sort of radio transmitter for talking to everyone. But Bill thinks that sounds cool. Which I thought he would.
Tonight before dinner, Kaitlyn was watching Scooby Doo and they were in Italy. She recognized the places she’s been and she got to see one place she’ll go. At least a cartoon of it.
I’ve stopped worrying about whether or not she can speak French. She’s surrounded by it all day every day at school but has no trouble going… says she likes it and always reports having a good time. So I figure she’s ok with the language and I finally realized I should just leave it at that.
But I’m still curious about whether or not she actually speaks any French.
Today when I picked her up for lunch, we had one of her little friends with us, waiting for her mom who was running late. Sophia fell and cut her knee pretty bad (on the asphalt play ground) so we went back into the classroom to clean her up and maybe find a band-aid. Well, Kaitlyn must have been so distraught over her friend’s injury, she forgot that she doesn’t speak French in front of me. We got to the door and with a perfect accent (so, in other words, no accent at all) she said Maitress! Maitress! (Teacher! Teacher!)
Later, she told me that she’d turned down the gouter (snack) because it was chocolate. I asked her how she’d let the teacher know that? She looked at me and said pas de chocolate. Again, in perfect French.
Then after school she was telling me how she and Sophia and her little French friend were playing on the slide pretending to be kitties. I said oh, I don’t know how to say cat in French. How do you? With no hesitation, she looked at me and said rather matter-of-factly chat.
I knew it. She can speak French. She’s probably been doing so for months.
I went out tonight to my book club meeting, leaving Bill home alone with Kaitlyn and his new Wii game. (He had it shipped to someone who was on a business trip in the US, who then lugged it back with him in his suitcase.) Surprisingly, he got Kaitlyn to bed at 8:30. Not surprisingly, it was so he could play his new game. I’m supposed to go out to a ladies dinner tomorrow night. We’ll see if he can pull that off two nights in a row…. we’ll see….