La vie à Grenoble: Après Deux Semaine

Après Deux Semaine

Well I've been here now for two weeks and it is still wonderful. The frômage, the bread, the wine. All very good and cheap. In this post I have attached many photos, mostly for my Grandma to admire.

In the past two weeks I have gotten a bike, explored Grenoble, hiked to the medieval bastille twice, learned how to play squash, took the train to Lyon and also I found some time to work and cook. My french is also improving which is a plus. Grenoble I have learned is a fairly small and very international city. The french people also, countrary to popular opinion, have been very warm and inviting.

The Market

There is a daily farmers market outside my front door everyday but Monday. On weekends it gets enourmous. It streches for four blocks and it's packed full of local fruits and vegetables, meats, fish, cheeses, breads, honey, nuts, eggs, fresh pasta, and wine. Gahhh it's soo good. I already have my "cheese guy". I only buy cheese from him. He always has suggestions for what I should try.

I bought this awesome book of french tarte recipes. I'm going to try to make my way through the book while I'm here. My first trial was Tarte Tiflette. It's potatoes, bacon, reblochon (cheese) and onions. I used all fresh local ingredients from the market. I think it was very successful.

The weather has unfortunately been very Seattle-like. It's been wet and cold nearly every single day. I also heard that the weather in Seattle was fantastic. This reinforces my theory that wherever I am it is rainy and wherever I just was has great weather. There is still no end in sight for the rain but I managed to get some good sunny day pictures nonetheless.

I hiked up to the bastille on the mountain twice. Once with my coworker Denis and his friends and the other time by myself to take advantage of the one afternoon of sun. It was worth the sweat though to get the pictures.

Yesterday I journeyed to Lyon. A much larger city than I was expecting about an hour away from Grenoble. Lyon apparently is the center of french cuisine, I was expecting a lot out of lunch but I was sadly dissapointed. I mistranslated what the waiter was saying. Apparently "Parmetier de Caubillaud" means a cylinder of mashed potatoes with a tiny bit of fish mixed in. For 18 Euros = Robbery! Very disappointed.

Wandering through the streets of Lyon was great though. Lyon apparently vied with Paris as the central power in France. You can see a lot of grandeur everywhere. The best part of the trip to Lyon however was the train ride back where I spoke with an older french woman for over an hour all in french. Then when I got home I found out that my roommate was hosting a wine and cheese party with some very rowdy french people. They kept pouring me wine and making fun of my french accent and asking about Hollywood.