To Do

I love everything about making lists - writing them, adding to them, crossing items off them ...

I always keep a list of clothes & shoes I want to buy, household chores, work tasks and projects, packing lists, movies to see, music to download, books to read, restaurants/bars I want to try as well as the ones I have been to ... but perhaps the most fun of all my lists is the never ending, always growing, one of things I still want to see and experience in New York.

So I thought I would share just a couple of my “To Do’s” in the City coming up in the next month or so.

Queues waiting for Eataly to open last week!

 Graze around Eataly
 The latest Mario Batali venture is a huge Italian market/restaurant/grocery store opposite Madison Square Park near the Flatiron called "Eataly".

I actually popped in there with my brother and sister last week but I think the beautifully designed and wonderfully stocked space requires a more thorough exploration. As it is, I got an enticing sneak peek at their extensive range of cheese, wine, fresh pasta, vegetables, meat and fish.

And as there is nothing I love more than a platter of cheese and cold meats washed down with an excellent red wine (which is what is served at various high chairs & tables dotted throughout), this is at the very top of my list!

Stone Street by Katz & The City(c)

Go to the Stone Street Oyster Festival
I used to be very sceptikal about oysters and frankly quite grossed out. While it is customary to eat them every Christmas in France, I was never one to partake.

But in NYC, oysters are bountiful, delicious, cheap and served pretty much everywhere - so when I moved here and started meeting my friends for Happy Hour drinks after work, I saw them sharing huge platters of the things ... and I really felt like I should give them another try and now I love them!

This annual festival takes place on September 25th this year in cute and cobbled Stone Street (one of the oldest streets in the City, in the heart of the Financial District) and the restaurants and bars lining it will be hosting tasting sessions, but also serve lots of beer and feature live music acts. I believe that another festival will also simultaneously be held at the Oyster Bar in Grand Central.

Photo Alexandre Rizos (c)

Watch the Bryant Park Petanque Tournament
What can I say? I am still French after all! Petanque is a very old and traditional game played most prevalently in the South of France.

I (like every other French child I would assume) grew up playing it and while I don't normally seek out French activities around the City, there cannot be a Petanque tournament in Bryant Park without me at least seeing it briefly!

This particular tournament will be taking place on September 28th & 29th but I understand that there are some throughout the year, as well as free lessons available, weather permitting - you can find more details here.

Country Girl

I am in France with my family for a few days and following the same reassuringly predictable and relaxing schedule I have described in the past.

I have been spending more time than usual with my brother however as he off work at the moment and most days have included games of squash, cross-country cycling with Dad and cooking with Mum.

We made a day trip to my parents' country house to enjoy the fresh mountain air and to go for a long walk in the woods surrounding their property. No walks in my family is without purpose however and ours was to pick wild mushrooms (specifically a vibrant yellow variety known as "chanterelles") which, as surprising as it may sound, is one of my favourite things to do in the world ... yes, as high up the list as drinking cocktails on rooftop bars!

Mushrooms tend to grow in the same areas over and over again and therefore the first rule of mushroom hunting (and second and third) is to never divulge your best picking spots. My parents for example would never tell their friends or even their siblings where their spots are and in fact, Mum and Dad themselves don't even know all of each other's hunting grounds as they tend to split up when going mushroom picking and only meet up later, each smiling widely and carrying a wicker basket brimming with delicate and aromatic fungi.

There is something very eerie but also incredibly freeing about being in the middle of a forest and not knowing where you are, which way you came from and more importantly, how to get home. Thankfully my parents seem to be equipped with an almost alien sense of spacial awareness and can not only find their way back very easily (thankfully, as neither of them carry a mobile phone!) but can also tell exactly where they are, even down to the actual ownership of the plot we are standing in!

My Dad's family owns several acres of forest in the area as it was customary for my grand-father to buy plots for his children and grand-children. I guess that for his generation it represented the safest and most long lasting form of financial investment. I must admit that I do always get a tinge of pride when, after having apparently crossed some kind of invisible boundary lines, my Mum or Dad casually drop in that we are now on my very own piece of land.

From country-side lover to stereotypical New York City girl, I realise that I am describing two different lifestyles that should in theory not co-exist very happily together. But I have come to terms a long time ago with the fact that they are both "me" and that I would never truly be able to appreciate one if I didn't also have the other.

City Fatigue

"New York is a great city to live in if you can afford to get out of it".

I have reached the wall, that point of no return when no matter how much sleep I get. Or how much I try to limit my activities and nights out in an effort to slow down. Or how many extra workouts I do at the gym to "reboot" my brain. I am constantly exhausted. Quite simply burnt out.

This "city fatigue" is something that I have only ever felt in New York, where the pace of the City and of my life in it, can be quite terrifying.

In my first couple of years here, I felt it even more than now, needing to desperately escape the City at least every 6 weeks. I am a little better equipped to deal with its relentless speed now but with my last trip being almost 9 weeks ago now, I am well overdue a break.

And there's no better place in the World for me to get a true break than at my parents in France. I never sleep as well as in my childhood bed. I never feel more relaxed than when I am eating a long and leisurely lunch in the sun with my family. I never feel more at peace with myself than when I am walking in the empty forests surrounding my parents country home.

My flight to Lyon is booked for July 31st.

Can't wait.

Just Married

Julien, my little baby brother, got married last weekend.

At 27 years old and standing nearly 6 foot tall, there is nothing remotely little or baby-like about him but to me he will always remain the fragile little thing my parents brought home from the hospital when I was 6 years old.

While the vast majority of my coupled-up cousins skipped the wedding step altogether in favour of immediate procreation, my brother was always the more traditional one in our family so it was not a surprise when he announced his engagement to us last year.

I think I have already mentioned that I have a large family as my mother has 10 brothers and sisters, who in turn have up to 3 children each, so the wedding was not a simple affair. Add to that a lot of family friends, as well as Julien and Catherine's own friends, and you are left with an awful lot of people to entertain.

The day started early as my sister & I had our hair done at 8.30am at the local salon. It was quite surreal for me to go back there after a 13 years hiatus but the salon owner (who used to cut my hair when I was a teenager) looked after me and when not lamenting the fact that I don't do anything special with my hair (thanks!), literally bombarded me with questions about my life in London and New York.

We then headed back home and Julien picked us up so we could meet his future wife in a nearby picturesque village for the official wedding pictures with a professional photographer. My sister and I were the "little helpers" during the shoot - our job being to alleviate their pre-wedding nerves, re-arrange Catherine's dress or Julien's tie for the photos and generally carry umbrellas, coats and scarves ...
This was actually the best part of the day for me - Julien, Catherine, Laurie and I are very close and spending that time together as a tight unit, away from the rest of the wedding party, fooling around and laughing was very special for us. It was also when we shed our first tears of the day as Julien welled up when he saw Cath in her wedding dress, prompting us to spontaneously burst into tears at the sight of him crying.

Traditional French weddings follow a long established pattern. They start mid-afternoon with a civil ceremony at the local Townhall, followed by a Church blessing, a "vin d'honneur" (drinks essentially) and finally the wedding dinner and dance - all of which with their own etiquette regarding the guest list.

While only very close friends and family are invited to the civil ceremony (primarily because townhalls tend to be small), a much larger group is welcomed to the Church blessing and the vin d'honneur, in this case just over 200. Catching up with so many people was overwhelming and, I have to admit, rather tiring as I found myself delivering a set of standard answers to the exact same questions that were asked of me: "What is New York like?", "How is the economic crisis affecting you?" and of course the dreaded "Why aren't you married yet?". I had fully expected the latter question (tactfulness is not always a quality the French possess, at least not in my family!) and had already prepared a flippant answer to that one: "One has to kiss a lot of frogs to find a prince and I'm having a lot of fun doing just that!". Not entirely true anymore these days as I gave up frogs, princes and anything in between for lent (ha ha!) but seeing their shocked faces provided me with endless amusement.

The dinner and subsequent party are the best part of the whole affair of course and 120 of us attended it in a lovely restaurant that we had hired for the night. The DJ was spinning great tunes after each course and I had almost forgotten how easy it is to get our friends and family on the dance floor. There is no need for ridiculous amounts of alcohol to loosen their inhibitions ... All of us were dancing, widely different age groups happily mixing together, enjoying old-fashioned Waltzes and Tangos as much as the latest pop anthems, until 5 o'clock in the morning! The French are particularly fond of group dancing to well established choreographed moves - it's difficult to describe but there are some songs (like Bonney M's "Rivers of Babylon") that we seem to know the exact dance routines to and can all perform in perfect synchronization. In many ways, it looks just like a flashmob event or this video that a friend helpfully pointed me towards (thank you D!). I also surprised and embarrassed myself by knowing all the lyrics to some 80s French pop songs I hadn't heard since that era - surely ruining any street cred I had left.

But mainly, the lasting memory I will cherish from that day is the overwhelming love I felt for my brother, for his new wife, for my lovely sister, my mum and dad and all our family and friends - very cheesy I know and ever so American of me to be quite so "in touch with my feelings". But I often feel removed from them because my life is so different to theirs, not only geographically but also in its essence, yet the sense of belonging I felt that day reminded me that I am safely part of a group of people all tied together by an unbreakable bound.

Bonding

There are two events in the year that I would never spend without my family - my birthday and Christmas. Not because of the presents but because being with them on these milestones is a tradition I am not willing to change.

And so I made my way to JFK for the former event at 6 am at the end of April, blurry eyed and craving caffeine, having woken up too late to grab a coffee before jumping into the cab.
I was less than amused when the BA clerk told me that my luggage could not be checked all the way to Lyon as I was landing in Terminal 4 in London but my onward flight was departing from the new Terminal 5, leaving me no time to transfer. My mind worked fast, despite the despicably early hour, and within 30 minutes I had called my friend Marie, arranged to stay with her in London for the night and booked myself on the first flight out to France the following morning.
The unexpected extended stop over gave me 12 hours to catch up and gossip with her over dinner - a very pleasant interlude as it were.

My family and I quickly settle into a reassuringly familiar routine as soon as I arrive home. The first few hours are usually spent decyphering what I am trying to say as my French always takes a little while to come back. After that, it feels like nothing has changed much since I left home 13 years ago.

My sister lives at home with my parents and my brother, despite living a few miles away with his girlfriend, usually takes time off when I am in town so that we can all spend as much time together as possible. And so, for a week, our family unit is intact, almost suspended in a time warp where we are somehow ageless - not quite children anymore, but not quite adults yet.

Each day is anchored around dinner, a sacred time during which everything is discussed but primarily politics - how bad Sarkozy is, the collapse of the sub-prime market, the state of the national health service ... Our extended family also keeps us busy, my mother having 10 brothers and sisters - and therefore us having a myriad of uncles, aunties and cousins - mean that life is sometimes uncomfortably, but entertainingly, close to a sitcom.

But the main theme of my holidays back to France is "bonding".

Bonding with my brother and my sister as we play squash every day - 45 minutes filled with raw energy, excitement but mainly laughter as we nearly miss hitting each other with the racket on numerous occasions, swear in a perfectly bilingual manner or giggle at my sometimes Monica Selles'esque grunting! We leave the court exhausted, high on happy hormones and ready to do it all over again the next day.

Bonding with my father as the two of us head off for our daily cross-country bicycle ride along the river and the neighbouring fields and forests. I remember the days, only a few years ago, when Dad (the man who can never sit still) had to force us to go cycling but I am now the one asking to go. I thoroughly enjoy these rides, whizzing through the small paths, hitting rocks and tree roots, jumping obstacles, crossing muddy puddles. This is when my long lost Tom boy comes out to play again.

Bonding with my mum, usually while helping her prepare dinner, trying to explain that it is normal to have to kiss a lot of frogs before finding a prince, while never actually telling her how many frogs there are or have been ... Trying desperately to make her understand me and my decisions, while knowing she never really will as our generations are so utterly different.

Another tradition I love is my mum recounting the day of my birth on my actual birthday. While I could probably do with less of the gory details (12 hour labour without a peridural or even gas and air!), I never tire of hearing it. I am looking forward to my next birthday already ...

Call me Indy

I must give a quick update on the “skyline” thing I did with my dad, which was not quite what we expected … We thought it consisted of a few adrenaline fuelled jumps from trees on a cable-system but it turned out to be some hard core training which would have surely left Indiana Jones weeping like a girl.

Two and a half hours of walking on single ropes, on moving logs (sideways and lengthways), uneven & broken steps, Tarzan style jumps into nets, climbing and crossing rivers while suspended on a steel cable – all of this while at least 12 meters in the air.

The result: rope burns in places I didn’t think you could get them (under my arms before you ask), bleeding hands, bruised and scratched legs …
I have also learnt that I do not possess the essential skill of being able to do a Tarzan swing from a rope, should I find myself stranded in a tropical forest (although I can do everything else).

But I absolutely loved it! It was scary and exhilarating. I cursed my adventurous spirit more than once but I would do it all over again – well, after nursing my wounds that is …

La douce vie

My life in France couldn’t be more different than my life in New York or London. Of course, my parents have a big house and garden in a relatively peaceful small town in the Loire region of France - hardly a hub of urban activity! I also only go there 3 times a year on holiday so I am in a different state of mind.

But my days here have a marvellous and soothing routine to them …
They start with breakfast on the patio outside and must involve lashings of Nutella on any kind of toasted bread. My mum makes all kinds of wonderful jams from fruits we pick in the garden or the forest, but I need my fix of the nutty chocolate paste every time I’m home, much to her despair.

Breakfast is then followed by an energetic 2 hours mountain bike ride with my dad on the small paths along the riverbank. Although we are breaking with the cycling tradition tomorrow as my dad and I will be trying “skyline”, which involves swinging between trees, above the river, while hanging on for dear life on (hopefully very strong) ropes – Dad & I are the adventurous ones in the family, so I can’t wait! (click here for more details on skyline: http://ghettolocker001.free.fr/forezaventures/)

Lunch will obviously be taking place outside too and will last for a minimum of 2 hours as we tend to linger over a full platter of cheese and afterwards a few cups of coffee (with a small piece of dark chocolate). Lunch time in France (or certainly in my family) is the perfect time to talk about politics, global warming, unemployment - generally how bad the world is basically (the French are a pessimistic breed) - or the latest news about our extended family & friends. As we tend to all have different opinions, these conversations are never dull.

In the afternoon, we’ll all don swimming suits and try to catch some rays while reading our books, apart from my dad who will have found something to fix in the house/garden/computer (or even in a neighbour’s house) and will be busy attending to it. Today, there was nothing to fix, so he made alcohol – “Verveine Liquor”… pretty handy to have my dad around …

If my sister & I are feeling brave, we’ll play squash for an hour and work out any deep seated frustrations we may have – I may only be 5’3 and her 5’1, but when we play together, there is no mercy and we’re like tigers!!

At some point in the afternoon, we’ll be foraging the garden in search of the latest young courgettes or tomatoes that seem to grow overnight so that we can cook them in the evening.

At around 5pm, we’ll all start thinking about dinner, debating whether to grill the fresh sardines or the huge prawns on the bbq tonight or would it be too greedy to have both? We’ll have an aperitif or two (Martini for the girls, Pastis for the boys) and enjoy a leisurely dinner on the patio again, sometimes carrying on with some of the heated debates we started at lunch time …

To say that it is pure relaxation is an understatement. Nothing is required of me apart from being there, lending a helping hand from time to time and generally be happy.

I am amazed at how I feel equally at home here, in London & now in New York considering the immense difference of lifestyle in each places … perhaps I have a multiple personality disorder I am not aware of …