“you are in a stranger town, with a stranger language, living with a stranger, in a stranger time. You are a stranger. Your brain is  << poof >>”  - wise words my host told me (while making hand gestures of her head exploding) for why I should be getting more sleep .

I’ve been living in France for one week now, while taking immersive French language classes in Montpellier. Classes include room and board at a French-speaking household so I am living with a French woman in a residential part of the city.  I would call it a suburb, but I have learned that I use that term too liberally. I call Los Angeles a suburb. And this is less suburban than all of LA. 

It is different experience to live some place than just to visit it on vacation. I have stayed with a family in France before but never for so long and at that time, being overwhelmed by the completely unknown language and customs, missed a lot of quotidian things. This time, I am making sure to pay more attention.

“Weird” things they do in France

1. House or flat, there is a room for the toilet and a room for the bath (or shower). This is why on Duolingo (a language learning app) if you say “Ou est les toilettes” means “Where is the bathroom” you get it wrong. The toilet and bath are not in the same room.

2. The door to both rooms is always left completely closed, even if no one is in it. I remember my first time in France, staying up late waiting for someone to get out so I could use les toillettes. I kept the door to my room open so I could spy on the door to the toilet-room and rush immediately when someone exited. No one ever did. I started counting the family members I saw or heard outside the toilet-room and eventually realized no one was in there! I’d been rocking back and forth for an hour (why do we think this is effective?) for no reason. My only advice is to keep track of bodies and voices in your head. It doesn’t get easier.

3. At restaurants and homes alike, instead of each person getting up and filling their individual glasses with water, there is a shared pitcher for each table (room temperature of course) that is filled and used communally to refill each person’s glass. It makes so much more sense than everyone making a trip during the meal to fill their own, especially at restaurants where that may be far away.

4. When getting off the bus, everyone, and I do mean everyone, says “Merci, A revoir” (Thank You, Goodbye) to the bus driver. Children riding to or from school, alone or with their parents, adolescents, adults, elderly. The bus driver can be heard responding “a revoir” to the group as well. Today, during rush hour and a well-trafficked stop, the bus driver said “a revoir” as he was opening the door and the people standing to exit responded IN UNISON “Merci, A revoir”. I was already impressed with this custom but that was still really fun to be a part of. 

While I’m here I’ll keep the list running, and may include weird things I’ve noticed about the language as well. I hope you enjoy!

Until next time, what are some weird practices you’ve noticed on vacation in other countries, states, or cities? Are there things you grew up thinking were normal and later learned it wasn’t so for people who grew up elsewhere?