Nantes

Nantes is a city southwest of Paris – about an hour’s drive from the ocean.

It’s advisable that you come here with someone who knows the locals. Maybe, someone who lived here for a year, and lived with three different host families, and has friends. Said host families and friends will be happy to invite you to dinner… and lunch… and dinner again… Eating is the main priority here. Menus will be shared.

You will plan to spend a few days here, but you will end up staying for over a week. So much for plans…

Upon arrival, the people you meet decide to call you “Roger” because “Seth” is too hard to pronounce. You tell them that “Set,” “Ses,” even “Sef” are ok. But they like “Roger.” Oh well…


You will be invited to Christmas Eve at the Amieux residence. The family will be extremely warm and hospitable. But first – Christmas mass – at an amazing old church. The service will not be long. You will not understand much of it. You will be distracted by the architecture and frescos surrounding you. They don’t build houses of worship like they used to…

The main event, however, will be dinner. The menu:

Appetizers: sandwiches, chips, cheese, bruchetta, champagne
First Course: faux grois with bread and fig jam, sweet white wine
Main Course: venison in current sauce, mashed potatoes, salad, red wine
Cheese Course – brie, stinky camembert, bread, more red wine
Dessert: cake
After Dinner… Course(?): coffee and chocolates

Wow… A guy could get used to this…

On Christmas day, Nantes will become a ghost town. No long lines outside of movie theaters. No packed Chinese food restaurants. In fact, the Chinese restaurant will be closed. Closed! Who doesn’t celebrate Christmas around here… Arabs! Today, you will feast on kebobs. Twice. Don’t look so sad. This is Christmas.

The next day: a lunch invitation at Sandrine’s! The menu:

First Course – tomatoes and onions, bread with butter, white wine
Main Course – rabbit, green beans, red wine
Cheese Course – brie, camembert, chevre, butter, more red wine
Dessert – King’s cake

After lunch, take a drive to the coast, where it will be freezing, but scenic.


Dinner at Fabienne’s! The menu:

Appetizers: chips and guacamole, sweet white wine
Main Course: raclette (absurdly heavy), red wine
Dessert: ice cream cake

Seafood lunch at the Amieux’s: But first, an oyster opening class. Opening oysters is harder than it looks. The first thing you’ll need is the obligatory oyster-opening wine (sweet white). You can’t open oysters without it. The next things you’ll need are a knife and a mitt. Hold the knife in you strong hand, and put the mitt on your weak hand.

Step 1: Hold an oyster in the mitt, and jab the knife into the back of the oyster. It won’t go in.
Step 2: Shimmy it, twist, and struggle for a while. It won’t go in.
Step 3: Take a sip of oyster-opening wine.
Step 4: Repeat steps 2 and 3 until the oyster opens.
Step 5: Feel a sense of accomplishment.


You will get six opened while your mentors open, like, twenty. After struggling to open each oyster, you will look up to find the plate with 6 newly opened oysters on it.


The meal will start with (of course) oysters (and white wine – different from oyster-opening wine), then move on to shrimp, crab, and little booger black shell things – bread and butter throughout. When the meal is over, you will think, “Oh good, a light meal…” But then, the table will be cleared, and you will be told to stay put. “What’s happening now?” “Now we have turkey.” Tricked! The whole thing was only the first course…

Second course: turkey (in a cream sauce), potatoes (both boiled and mashed), salad, more bread and butter
Dessert: buttery sugary pastry and clementines
After Lunch… Course(?): coffee and chocolate

People say the French like to eat. This is inaccurate. Everyone likes to eat. The French like to eat well. This difference is very important.

Having not received a proper invitation to attend a New Years dinner party, you will decide to go with your second option: an invite from someone you don’t know to attend a get together in the middle of nowhere, France. There will be three big dogs (people will get scratched) and a salad bowl that may or may not contain salad. To ring in the New Year, you will take the dogs for a walk in the pitch black countryside, passing a champagne bottle amongst you. It will be weird. The next morning, you will be told that you had a conversation about existentialism and extra-terrestrials with someone who speaks no English. You will not remember this. Everyone else you know will also be told this story.

After many goodbyes, hop a plane back to Prague.