Au Revoir Acquigny!

the river that runs next to the parc

Tomorrow I'm going to have to say goodbye to wonderful Acquigny and move on to my next adventure in Basse-Normandie at Chateau de Brécy where I will be living with Didier and Barbara Wirth. I'm not sure if they are American, living in France, or French but speak perfect English. I guess I will find out on Friday. There has been some debate on the issue. Originally, I was supposed to be leaving for Brécy today, but I don't think the family is even home right now. I actually have not been in contact with them myself, but my wonderful host mother here in Acquigny, Mme d'Esneval, has been making phone calls to the French Heritage Society's coordinator, Diane de Roquette.

the second night I was here we held an auction in the cider press barn to raise
money for the church that lays adjacent to the estate

So I ended up staying two extra days here, and I am trés content for that matter. Here's a few reasons (not in any particular order): the cuisine is incredible: Mme d'Esneval is a magnificent cook; the three people I live with are very kind-hearted, sweet people who are patient with me and teaching me French at a pace I never knew was possible; Adrian is probably the nicest guy I've ever met and great to work with; it's beautiful here and I feel like I'm in a fairytale. But the two extra days of being in Acquigny are giving me a sense of closure, so I feel that I can leave now. It probably will not come without tears tomorrow night though.

View of Chateau de Acquigny through an Iris

I wanted to write this last post before tomorrow's madness (I'll probably work all day, and then pack, and then have dinner, and then drive with Monsieur d'Esneval to Paris afterwards). And also before I leave Acquigny and going to Brécy. I know you all love pictures so I'm doing my best to post some more. The internet here is very temperamental, and therefore it sometimes takes me three days to get a post up because the pictures take forever to upload.

A wonderful little bar and restuarant we went to for the owner's 50th birthday party.

(I think I wrote earlier about how we ran into the owner earlier that day because Jennifer and I were on our way back from the post office and we thought the restuarant was really cute so we wanted to take pictures. Well, the owner pulled up and spoke in English, and I was shocked, and when I asked her, she's like of course! I'm English. And then she realized we were the two Americans coming for her birthday party. Her birthday party was great. I talked with an English couple about wine for an hour...hmm, I think I have something in common with people in France :)

I heard there was some interest in what I do all day. Well, in short, I just garden and eat (and sleep at night). Ha ha, I'll explain the long. During the week I try to wake up at about 7:45 am (more or less because I don't have an alarm clock, so I normally wake up at 7am, and then every 15 minutes after that). And then I wash up, get dressed, and go through Madame d'Esneval's room to check to see if she's up, or if I need to turn off the alarm (we have about 9 different alarms set throughout the estate, 4 around the house itself). And then after the alarms are de-activated, I quickly eat breakfast, make some tea and run out the door to try to find Adrien at around 8:30. He's usually in the Potager Garden (Kitchen Garden), but I don't always find him right away.

Above, all images from the lovely Potager Garden :)

From 8:30 to 1 pm, I work with Adrien in the garden. Our communication is getting better and better. He's getting better at English, and I understand his friend a lot more, so between the both of us it's working out quite well. We even had a conversation about James Bond today -- the ultimate test. However, his favorite is Pierce Brosnan, which scored him a lot of negative points. Appparently he likes Daniel Craig the least, and I told him, whatever, I LIKE Daniel Craig a lot and I think he's great. I also found out through the most rediculous conversation with him today that he's NOT married. He didn't understand why I thought he was married. He's like 'I'm too young' and I'm like, well I was told you were married. And then he was trying to explain to me that just because two people lived together and were dating in France didn't mean they were married, and I laughed and told him it was the same in the states (or Etats-Unis as they call it). But I told him, it wasn't that I assumed, but that I was told he was married. He laughed and then asked me if I was married, and I told him definitely no. The whole conversation came up when I asked him why he went for a month to South Africa and Madagascar and he told me his girlfriend's family is from Africa. And I was like, girlfriend? You mean your wife?! Hmm, ha ha.

l'Orangerie

Okay so getting back to gardening. Well, I've been doing a wide variety of tasks, weeding for one (but this is real weeding, not the kind for the faint of heart. Adrien is super strict, and I need to get out the entire root, as well as make sure that the weed's seeds don't disperse all over the garden beds. Also, many times I cannot distinguish the weeds from the plants he wants to keep!); deadheading bulbs and rhododendrons (both are also difficult tasks because apparently your not supposed to remove the leaves of a bulb while they are green, and because these are French formal gardens, everything has to be perfectly manicured, which leads us to the next tasks); cutting the grass with SCISSORS when it overlaps with the bed edge; cutting the grass with a hand mower when it's next to a bed; cutting the grass with a tractor (much fun but also like riding a horse because the ground isn't level); ripping grass out with its roots (I had to add that one in for fun because I keep talking about grass - actually grass in french is called herbe - I find that funny); pruning and thinning apple trees (this is not a difficult task, but a very time consuming one. I cannot prune pear trees however, because it takes a lot of practice and mistakes to really understand how a pear tree grows); thinning garden beds; setting animals that Adrien accidentally trapped, free; learning botanical and french flower and tree names; creating identification tags for the historic and interesting trees on site (I'm especially excited about these, spent the last two days making them. Adrien didn't want to make them because he doesn't like his handwriting. But I get to leave something permanent behind now!!); opening and closing the small dam we have for the canal system in order to clean out the canals; watering the potted plants; and that's all I can think of for now. But I've really learned a lot about plants and proper techniques over the last two weeks which I never considered before, which is great that I'll have knowledge to take with me.

A view towards the farm next to the parc. We have a few cows over there. I love looking out past the canal in this direction because it's very Romanesque

Lunch break is only supposed to go only until 2, but here it often lasts til 2:30 or 3, and so I return to Adrien a little late. I don't think I actually need to resume working after lunch, but I want to, because I really enjoy working, and working with him, so I go back and work with him til he's finished (usually between 5:30 and 7). Then I come back and either take a shower or mosey around the house until about 8, when Jennifer and I prep the table for dinner. After dinner (which can start as late as 10) I usually like to read in the den, or lately I've been going on my computer. By 11:30 I try to be in bed already and look forward to sleeping. Which means I should be getting ready to go to bed soon, but I do want to finish this post tonight! (It's 11:23 pm, Wednesday). And for those of you who don't know, I'm 6 hours ahead of EST. When I'm not working, which is on the weekends, I do have some free time. As I was mentioning briefly before and as you learned in the previous posts, we eat a lot, we spend a lot of time eating, and we eat delicious food. So that can occupy quite sometime of the day. The gardens are currently only opened to the public on weekends, so Monsieur and Madame d'Esneval take turns and sit at the gate to welcome the public and sometimes give tours to interested parties. I sit with them for a little while, soaking in some French, and then I often walk around the estate taking pictures, drawing, and writing letters, or writing in my journal. For once, I get to think without the stress of my next assignment. And it's like when I'm in the garden all day, I have this peace and quiet that I cannot get anywhere else.

La Cuisine

Bonjour mes amis et ma famille!

I am writing the next two post as by request from ma mère. She asked that I write about the food I am eating, my meals are quite spectacular, as well as what I do during the day, actually at Acquigny, my days are pretty full. I try not to spend much time online, maybe a half an hour each night before I go to bed, since I am only at Acquigny for less than two weeks, and I try to put in a full days work with Adrian during the weekdays.

Me and Jennifer in the Kitchen

Elizabeth and Mike prepping the strawberries

La cuisine

Every morning when I wake up, before I go off to work or start my day I have a petit déjeuner (a little lunch, aka breakfast). This basically consists of the same things that I normally eat in the states, yogurt with muesli, or granola. (or when I was working at College Town Bagels, this was throw a bagel in the toaster, turn on the coffee pot and run out the door with my breakfast because it was always too soon for my digestive tract to be ready, and classes always seemed so much easier when I was eating and drinking) Here I switch between making espresso or tea and then filling up my thermos and walk out to the garden and sip my tea throughout the morning.

our dining table

In France, instead of dinner being the largest, most important meal of the day, it is déjeuner (lunch) that receives the most attention. At Chateau d'Acquigny, we normally have lunch at 1 o'clock. The meal starts with a little salad (or large salad as Monsieur D'Esneval and I eat like rabbits). The salad will vary in combination of cabbage, roquette, endive, fennel, tomatoes, lettuce leaves that resemble iceberg, and various herbs (parsley, tarragon, or coriander) The salad is served with a little vinaigrette and sometimes Jennifer and I have bread alongside it. Today's salad was chopped fennel and tomatoes with parsley and vinaigrette. It was quite agreeable (although you do have to get used to the licorice taste when eating fennel).

only part of the lunch menu

Next on the menu is the main part of the course with normally consists of a type of meat, or fish; vegetable and/or starch. We've had a wide variety of meat over the past week and a half such as veal, pork cutlets, beef, chicken, ham, and duck. As for fish we've had herring, mackerel, haddock, manta-ray, and salmon. I really could get used to eating like this, it's quite magnificent. Yesterday, Jennifer and I went to the open market with Madame d'Esneval and we felt like we bought out the entire fresh produce market!!

behind the scenes at the open air market

apricots and strawberries

Jennifer and I carried huge shopping bags full of fresh produce (as well as boxes of pineapple, peaches, nectarines, strawberries, dried figs, dates), I want to be able to shop like that. Then, just as we thought we were done we bought 6lbs of flounder and a whole chicken, and then went to the supermarket to pick up the rest. Which resulted in buying about 12 boxes of cheese! (Cheese is so much cheaper here, and more delicious, I could move here just for the cheese alone).

jealous mommy? our cheese platter twice a day ;)

Today for lunch we had an entire roast chicken and stewed zucchinis with bay leaves.

Madame d'Esneval preparing the roasted chicken

After we eat the main course we proceed on to slicing bread (normally sourdough) and having it with a wide variety of cheese that is placed on the platter. Camembert, Roquefort, Brie, Fromage du Chevre, Pont L'eveque, and Bleu d'Armeunt to name a few. And then, aprés the cheese, we have dessert. Yes, the cheese and bread was NOT the dessert, there's more! There is sometimes fresh fruit (like today with had strawberries in a mint, lemon, and sugar mixture), and cherries, as well as dried fruit, such as the dried figs and dates.

beaucoup cherries!

dried figs = very dangerous

One special occasions we have wonderful tarts and pies that Madame d'Esneval creates (such as rhubarb pie). After we're finished eating we either have coffee or espresso. One of the family's friends sent a really nice Krups Espresso machine that uses individual cups of espresso in miniature capsules – it's quite fabulous, and very expensive, but I may look online later to see if there's a cheaper version because as old school as I am, I know how much of a pain it is to clean out a real espresso machine and tamper down the ground beans correctly at a certain pressure. Oh, and one more thing, we often have wine with our lunch – could meals here become any better??

For dinner, we normally have a much lighter meal somewhere between eight and ten o'clock. The meal consists of a larger salad, a light entrée, such as thinly sliced ham or salmon, and bread. Dinner is normally cold or really delicious leftovers.

How to communicate in French without really trying

SO you may be asking yourself now. How does Elizabeth work with a gardener that only speaks French! I know she only knows English. And the little Spanish and Russian she knows won't really help. Well, I am happy to respond to this question you may be asking. First of all, Adrian is very nice, and very well mannered, but not only that, he wants to talk to me too. I was afraid he might be like, I don't want this American girl screwing up my precious gardens. But he's not -- actually I did my best to work hard on Monday, so that he would teach me things. The first day I met him, last Friday, we were just laughing and smiling and I made him demonstrate everything to me. But we wanted to talk more, so he drove to his house on the premises to grab a French-English dictionary. He actually does know un peu (a little) English and I accused him of studying it in school and just not wanting to use it. It's funny when I make fun of him, or try to be sarcastic or make jokes, because I usually have to spend the next ten minutes trying to explain the joke. Like this morning, he was pruning the ancient pear trees in the kitchen garden and he showed me this nest of ants in the leaves he was cutting off. I told him he was slacking. It was very hard to explain, actually I think I gave up in the end.

After I spent around two hours thinning out some of the flower beds behind the walls of the kitchen garden, I decided that I wanted to try to have a conversation with Adrian about his tomatos. I wanted to explain that it would be better if we removed the flowers on the tomato plants and then they would be able to better use their energy in growing, and then later, when they are producing fruits, would produce bigger fruit because the plant would be stronger. Then, I wanted to talk to him about different trellising methods and about different planting methods that I learned in the garden growing up with daddy, when we had our forty tomato plants and he would want to have the best fruits possible! In order to communicate this with Adrian, it involved a lot of hand signals, drawings, and the dictionary. In doing this, I realized that the growing seasons are the same in New York as they are in France. However, the humidity here is much worse. Plants either have to be thinned out or gowned far apart in order to keep them from rotting, getting mildew, or to prevent insect infestations.

It's great working with Adrian, because although we don't verbally speak the same language, we have a similar passion, working outside in the garden, and being obsessive compulsive about how it looks, and knowing botanical names. It's fun. We'll point to things and ask the other what it is. Often, it's me asking qu'est-ce que c'est because either I never learned the animal or tree, or flower or can't remember. I was thinking today, that I really enjoy working with Adrian because he reminds me so much of Daddy. I mean, we both enjoy each other's company, we both struggle to explain things to each other, and we run and show each other things to smell (i.e. the crysanthamum I tried to eat, because it smelled like mint, and I thought it might be tasty...so I ate it, and he laughed and told me it wasn't for eating, and then I made a 'it's disgusting' face, and he laughed again and then ate it too!) or he picks up cool looking catepillars and brings them to me. I brought him a cool looking insect and he's like, oh! you've discovered a new insect (mine you this convo is half french, half english, half...oh wait, we're out of halves). He reminds me of Daddy because he's just pleasant to work with even if we aren't talking. I have to earn his respect and meet his approval to be given more critical tasks. And at the end of it, I want him to be happy with the work I've done, just like Daddy.

Here's a cute story from today:

So when I came back from lunch I found Adrian cutting the grass on one of those small tractor lawn mowers. And after a few minutes of weeding, he called me over, and pointed to the tractor. I was excited, because he wanted to teach me how to use it, and terrified at the same time for fear of killing myself, him, and the plants. I tried to explain to him I was not very good at driving manual, and he's like, it's easy. And then, he had me get on and showed me how to use it! Learning how to cut the grass has never been so exciting as when taught by a French man!!! Ahh! It reminded me of the scenes in the movies where the guy teaches the girl how to hit a tennis ball or shoot a rifle, it was just like that...except this is not a romantic trist, but an 'educating' moment from a guy that's married. Hmm, I've said that a lot, I think I'm trying to convince myself.

Adrian and I posing on the lawn mowers. We both argued to take pictures of the other!

Oh and by the way, Adrian was supposed to come for lunch tomorrow, and Madame d'Esneval just remembered that she's not going to be here. Ha ha, I am going to try to explain to Adrian tomorrow morning that I have to leave for lunch early in order to cook him lunch!!!

Au revoir!

I was on the news in France!

This past Saturday, a television crew came to film our gardens to do a short clip in the news. It was very funny, because Madame d'Esneval had Jennifer and I go with Monsieur and Adrian (the gardener, and yes, they got his name wrong on the clip) to have them film it. They asked us to walk around like we were walking and talking in the garden. But basically, Adrian and I were laughing and arguing about the name of the willow. We both had it right, as Jennifer pointed out, but we were just saying them with our prospective accents. Then I would laugh at Adrian, because they kept having him walk about like he was continuing throughout his work day, and then made it clip roses in the background. Anyways, this clip with only be available for a few more days, so watch it now. You can find it at 18:30.

Cliquez ici pour voir la vidéo

the adventure begins

It's been four days since I first arrived in Acquigny, and already, I am on the fast track to learning French. It's tres bizarre, a cause de I never thought I'd be learning this language. Because if you ask me, there is not really a point unless I intend to live there. So...I started really trying to learn French. Because, I think, I may want to move to this country! Never before in my travels so far could I imagine living in any of the places for an extended time. But between the food, the customs, the language (so romantique!), the manners (okay so maybe I am living and dining with the top 5% and my house is a chateau...but the speculation is a reflection of all the frenchies I have encountered so far.

Well I know you're all dying to see where I live, so I will start with some pictures and descriptions as my first post:

Chateau de Acquigny

I live at Chateau de Acquigny with the Baron and Baroness d'Esneval, as well as with Jennifer, a student from Princeton University studying French and Pre-med. Jennifer is helping me understand and learn French. You can visit the Chateau's webpage at http://www.parc-et-jardins-acquigny-27.com/.

taking pictures at my window

My bedchamber is located on the third floor over looking the lawn expanse with a tributary of the Seine to the left and the church and L'Orangerie to the right.

the view from my window

Le Potager (the Kitchen Garden) in located past the forest to the left. I think the Potager is my favorite place on the estate so far. I spent a few hours there on Sunday, sketching, and journaling. And then today, all day pruning vegetables and flowers with Adrian. Adrian is the twenty-six year old gardener that has won awards in Normandie for his botanical techniques, and is the gardener here. He barely speaks English, and I barely speak French, so we communicate with a dictionary, our hands, gardening techniques, latin terminology, drawing pictures, and laughing a lot. It's really nice working with him, and its funny how we both try to have real conversations with each other and struggle to get the other to understand!

my room

I love my room. I feel like I'm Juliet when I'm looking out my window. When I was picking a room, we came into this one and I immediately fell in love. Oh! Speaking of love, I accidentally told Adrian I loved him. I was trying to tell him that I loved the Dawn Redwood next to him, but I said J'tem, instead of jem!!! He kept looking at me, and I finally got it when Jennifer told me yesterday that I was saying in wrong. How embarrassing, but funny! Go me to tell the gardener I love him on the first day of meeting him!

I love the wood inlays in the furniture. Daddy would have loved the burled sleigh bed I sleep in at night. I think that's why I picked this room, because I knew he would have thought the furniture beautiful. I have a little closet/wash-up room where I place my belongings, as well as any toiletries. It's great having a closet! It's almost as big as my room on Long Island!!

Below is the hallway on the second floor where Madame et Monsieur live.

the kitchen where Madame D'Esvenal makes the most delicious food I have ever had!

Really! I have never eaten so well in my life. I think I'm going to do a blog entry just on the incredible meals :)

Okay, that's all for now. More to come, many funny stories that have happened. It's funny because when I don't understand what people are saying I make up what they're saying. For example, tonight I first thought that the D'Esneval's were going to Paris for dinner. I thought Jennifer and I would just heat up some leftovers and I would work on my blog and write in my journal, and write thank-you notes for graduation gifts. Then at lunch I think Madame D'Esneval is just going to take Elizabeth and Mike back to Paris (a friend from Cornell in Landscape Architecture that did this program 6 years ago, and her new fiancee, he proposed to her on the Grand Canal at Versailles on Monday!!!) and then she would go to dinner and come back in the morning. And then, on the way to the post office with Jennifer this evening, we passed by a beautiful little restaurant, and I think Jennifer tells me that we're going there tonight for Aperitif for Madame and Monsieur's 50th wedding anniversary. Well, no. I finally got the real story when I was taking a picture of Jennifer in front of the Restaurant (because it was so perfect) on the way back from the post office and this woman pulls up in a car (we're in her way), and I say pardon and she responds to me in English! And I'm like, wait you speak English? Shocked, I know. And she's like, of course! I'm English. And I'm like oh, ha ha. And I'm like, we're coming here tonight. And she's like, no you're not, it's closed. And we're like, we know, we're at the party. She's like it's my birthday party. OH! you must be the two American girls! And she laughs, and we laugh, and introduce ourselves and tell her happy birthday. Oh, how I do love small towns :)