Notre Mariage

After 10 years together, Copain and I finally decided to tie the knot. Our friends and family's reaction: freaking finally people! They were right, it was time.

We hemmed and hawed about getting married in Toulouse, where we first met in 2004. We made fake guest lists. We wondered who would actually FLY across the country for us. I called a restaurant and put together a delicious southwestern French menu with six courses and cheese and lots of wine. We had visions of taking people to the place where we met at the Beaujolais festival when we were just 22, and making them drink bad Beaujolais wine...we seriously had some great ideas.  But guess what - France doesn't like to make things easy like that. In France, the civil ceremony is obligatory and must come before any religious ceremony (not that we were going to have one, but just so you know). Also, the civil ceremony must take place in:

A. the townhall where the couple resides

or

B. the townhall where the couple's parents reside

or the option for any French red tape technicality:

C. you put up a big fight, find a loophole, yell a lot and like magic, things work out for you.

Since we live in Paris, my parents live in the states and Copain's parents don't live in Toulouse, we realized that our idea was going to make things difficult and we didn't have the energy to yell - we had already done that to all of the bankers offering us crappy loans for our apartment. Given that we were  basically on the brink of mutual mental breakdowns, we threw in the towel and made things easier on ourselves: the wedding would be in Paris, and it would be just the two of us.

You know that when you feel instant relief, you have made the right decision. 

Beyond the whole legality of figuring out a Toulouse wedding, we didn't like the idea of people watching us (though clearly I have no problem sharing after the fact...!), of organizing flights and vacations and making a wedding website and sending invitations and planning a big hoopla.  I hear that nowadays, people even send a "Please be my bridesmaid gift" - what? I couldn't deal.  You can't ask people to fly across the world for you and not plan something fabulous.  Thanks for flying for 16 hours! Meet us at the park for some Beaujolais! Instead, our money went to our new home and we planned the perfect wedding sans hoopla for ourselves. As the French would say: ouf.

After gathering all of the necessary paperwork (I'm a pro at this now) and making a rendezvous at the townhall in our neighborhood, we set the date for our 10 year anniversary (what's a few more months after 10 years?!). We could just drink bad Beaujolais on our own!  Though we wanted it to be just be us Frenchies, we still had to have témoins - witnesses.   Non, you cannot get married in Toulouse and you cannot do it alone. Vive la France. Thankfully, we have understanding friends who agreed to come to our townhall, sign the document and be on their merry way (merci les amis!).

Our plan was to get married in the morning, take photos around the city, drive to the airport, hop on a flight and enjoy our wedding dinner in Budapest, a city that would be new to both of us and a cozy place to enjoy our honeymoon in November.  On the day of the wedding, my témoin, Dancer Friend, was supposed to come to my teeny apartment and help me finish up hair and makeup, but her doctor said Non! She was 9 months pregnant and couldn't walk up the 5 flights of stairs to my front door without her water breaking! Fortunately,  the magic of technology allowed me to text a play by play to my mom and her BFF, kind of as if they were right there with me. 

Dress and jacket found online - what do you wear to a November wedding in cold weather?!

I met Dancer Friend at the local café and she was waiting with my bouquet, her giant bump protruding from her jacket that wouldn't close. "Please don't go into labor for the next hour," I pleaded with her. We walked across the street to the town hall and waited for Copain to arrive with his témoin. At 11am, we ascended the red-carpeted stairs, into the salle des mariages, and the mayor of the 11th arrondissement entered the room.

photo by Greg Finck

photo by Greg Finck

photo by Greg Finck

He opened the ceremony with: We are here to discuss the important topic of sustainable development...(ah, politicians). Then he read us the laws by which we would be married, we both said oui (phew!), signed the mariage documents and became mari et femme.  We went with what our photographer deemed the "self-wedding" all the way out the front doors of the townhall and threw rose petals for ourselves :-) Who needs guests?!

Then our wonderful photographer, Greg Finck, took us around our favorite city to capture the moment:

Photo by Greg Finck

photo by Greg Finck

photo by Greg Finck

We stopped at the rue de Beaujolais in the 1st arrondissement of Paris to say our vows that we had written ourselves. Civil ceremonies in France are quite short, to the point, and don't really allow for anything other than "oui", so we thought it would be nice to take a moment for ourselves. It seemed fitting to say them on the rue de Beaujolais, which I had only happened upon the week before!  Merci Paris! Then we walked through the Galerie Vivienne, where there were serving and selling bottles of the Beaujolais Nouveau - parfait. 

photo by Greg Finck

photo by Greg Finck

photo by Greg Finck

Of course we bought a bottle for next year.

Our bags were packed in the car, so we jumped back in and the driver took us to Orly airport where we checked in right before boarding.  The sign that greeted us at the airport could not have been more perfect: 

You are a few meters from a new beginning. How right they were.

Locked and loaded.

We first checked in at the Corinthia Hotel - AKA the Grand Budapest Hotel - and upon learning that we had literally just been married in Paris, still in our wedding outfits, bouquet in hand,  the hotel staff upgraded us to a Junior Suite (bigger than our new apartment!). If you ever want an upgrade, I highly recommend showing up to hotel check-in in a wedding dress and suit. Then we high-tailed it to the Halaszbastya restaurant, on the Buda side of the city. 

A castle restaurant? - ok!

We filled our bellies with paprika-spiced Hungarian food, delicious Hungarian wines, and took in all the cheesiness of a serenade at our dinner table over-looking the Danube. When we got back to the hotel, they had a bottle of Hungaria - the Hungarian version of Prosecco, waiting for us in our room.  Hey - bubbles are bubbles. We appreciated the sweet gesture.

The rest of the trip, we got to know Budapest and practiced saying, "my wife" and "my husband". Hard to do when you've been calling each other something else for 10 years. It still doesn't roll off my tongue. Maybe in another 10? 

In any case, Budapest is beautiful, full of history, magical even. It was the perfect place to celebrate a 10-year journey and our big year of FINALLY GETTING OUR SHIT TOGETHER.   

Merci nos témoins, merci Greg Finck, merci Paris, merci Budapest, merci Beaujolais, merci Avancer, merci mon Copain Mari.

Home

Copain and I just fit what most people do in five years, into one. Almost exactly one - seeing as how last time I left you was one day shy of one year ago today.

I'm happy to be on the other side of it, still in one piece and not rotting in a French jail for strangling my boyfriend or throwing baguettes at idiotic bankers. 

We have been through the wringer people.

This all sounds horribly bad - très mauvais - but basically, we used our driving force of 2013 - Avancer - and took it to a whole new level for 2014.

In 2014 we:

1. Put in an offer on the cutest apartment in the world. In our favorite Parisian neighborhood.

2. Realized the that the apartment was above a dry cleaners (dangerous perc!). Freaked out.

3. Urgently visited the environmental police office in Paris and combed through their files to research the dry cleaner's level of danger - finally decided it was okay to move forward and that we wouldn't die of perc-induced cancer.

4. Bankers! loans! Documents! Different banks! Different loans! More documents!

5.  Took a trip to Vietnam and Cambodia - almost got hit by lightening in the plane to Siem Reap. Hiked to a remote village, stayed with the villagers. Swam through the Dark Cave, tried not to die.

6. Decided to get married in November. French paperwork! More paperwork! But then this:

7. Said, OUI! then flew to Budapest -bouquet and all- for our wedding dinner... just the two of us.

At the airport: You are a few meters from a new beginning...

8. Moved out of our Teeny Parisian Apartment into our new humble (but adorable) abode in the 11th arrondissement - down five flights of stairs on one side, up five flights of stairs on the other side! 

9. Celebrated the holidays as mari & femme - in a heated apartment! With lovely stockings from Budapest, and our first Parisian Christmas tree.

10. Got rid of the taupe couch! 

Before:

After:

11. Bought our first dinner table, first new bed, a rug,  and finally hung photos on the walls. I even bought a Le Creuset casserole dish and made a boeuf bourguignon.

We are finally home.

So you understand why French Cannes Cannes went on hiatus for a year there. It was nutso up in this heezy. I was a crazy lady - une folle! 

But I'm happy to be back and to share 2015 with you.  We are done with Avancer, so now we can VIVRE.

Copain-isms : The Strap On

I reluctantly rolled out of shavansana at the end of my Vinyasa yoga class and Namasted along with the other tourists, island hippies and first-time zen-seekers on Gili Trawangan.  It was our first day on the island after 10 days in Bali, and I was determined to yoga it up during my four-day island adventure.

Copain had decided to take a stab at stand-up paddle boarding while I was in class. We had met an English expat with spectacularly crooked teeth and an SPF-oiled-up hairy chest who was renting them out on the beach down from our hotel- he even advertised a free lesson when you rented a board. Our plan was to meet back at the hotel after our respective activities.

As I floated into our traditional lumbung, I was hit with Copain at his irritated best:

Babe! Mon genou!

Your knee? What happened to your knee?

P*tain de English paddle-board guy didn't tell me about the coral!  The water was too shallow and I fell off the board onto the coral - right on my knee! Aiiiiiiiiieeeeeeeeeeeeeee! Don't touch it! It hurts too bad!

Now, let me just clarify that this guy being English was not helping any part of the situation. It all dates back to a lot of wars you know...

What do you mean he didn't TELL you about the coral - couldn't you SEE the coral underneath you?

And on and on we went, as Copain hobbled down the hotel stairs in a manner closely resembling Frankenstein on our way to dinner, left leg advancing, right leg dragging a Havaianas flip flop behind him.

----------------------------------------

3am, Hotel room on Gili T

Copain: Aieeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!! Mon genou!!!!!!!!!!!!!  I've torn my meniscus! I just know it! Our vacation is ruined! Why does this always happen to me??? I should just lay on the beach and do nothing. Why was that English guy so stupid! 

(English men - always forgetting to tell you about coral in shallow water - pffffff)

FCC, half asleep, remembering this special moment:  Take an anti-inflammatory. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

-----------------------------------------

We woke up three hours later to the sounds of the Mosque calling for prayer, and Frankenstein was in full effect. Despite the now four anti-inflammatories I had force-fed Copain, he was convinced that his knee was shattered for life and that he would have to walk with a cane. A CANE.  I tried to remind him of his Emmy-award winning dramatic interpretation for back pain, but the damage was done. He was going to die an old man with one working knee and a cane from Indonesia.

Since we were staying on an island that doesn't even have cars, it was no surprise that there was not a doctor's office either, but after Frankensteining around the island for about an hour, we did find this:

Worried about just exactly how creative they would get with his knee, we decided that a simple bandage with a lot of ice and elevation would be the best route until we got home and had access to reliable, less creative, more science-based healthcare.  We walked inside, trying not to touch anything, and searched our guidebook for vocab that would help us out. Unfortunately Lonely Planet left out very useful words for falling on coral from a stand-up paddle board rented to you by a buck-teethed Englishman.

Fortunately for everyone involved (you, dear readers, included), Copain found his words faster that I could and confidently asked the "nurse / doctor / antibiotics distributer": Do you have a.... strap-on?

All I can say people, is that thank god the Indonesian in front of us wasn't familiar with this particular vocabulary word, and that once I had pushed Copain behind me and taken control of the situation, we had an over-priced ACE bandage in our hands five minutes later.

When I translated the word for him (yes, Copain, a strap-on is a sex toy) and asked him what the heck he was thinking, he told me, "Well, it's a strap, and you put it on. A strap-on."

And just like a five-year old who needs a bandaid for a paper cut, suddenly the "strap on" made Copain's knee feel so much better.

My Ancestors, the Plouks

I took a delicious four-day weekend to unwind after a particularly stressful couple of months at work. I told Copain that we absolutely had to get out of Paris, even if it was just for a night. I needed a change of scenery.

I also told him that I couldn't plan any of it. Thankfully, he was more than happy to take on the job. 

He gave me two destination choices, to which I replied, "I don't care."

He gave me train time choices, to which I replied, "I don't care."

Then he asked me which hotel we should stay at, and I said, "just make sure we can walk there from the train station."

This is how we ended up on a train at 7:45am on the way to l'Hôtel de L'Europe in the little fishing town of Dieppe in the north of France.

Dieppe wasn't just chosen par hasard; this is where the French side of my family began. According to our family tree, our first ancestor was baptized at la Cathédrale Saint-Jacques, right in the middle of town. Having lived in the south up until three years ago, I'd just never taken the time to visit mes racines.  Since it was just a 20-Euro, 2-hour train ticket away from Paris, there was really no excuse - off to Dieppe we went! 

We transfered trains in Rouen and I scrambled through strollers and a cloud of summer-induced B.O. to find two seats together, yelling to Copain to come and join me. When the train started moving and the three small children next to us started to whine and cry, Copain and I started to notice our surroundings...

Fake tans, gold chains, visible bras and bra straps, acrylic nails, mullets....

Were we on a Jerry Springer set?

I checked our train tickets again - Déstination: Dieppe. This must the right train.

We arrived in Dieppe and watched as the train unloaded. Our suspicions were quickly confirmed - we were in Plouk-ville! When I told Copain we were surrounded by plouks, he thoughtfully commented, "they're your ancestors!" Génial.

Well, when in Rome...

Copain put on his plouk tank top and just like that, he fit right in! After a quick walk on the beach, we both got plouk sunburns which sealed the deal - we were super-plouks for the weekend: When we ordered cheese at the marché, we appreciated the thoughtfulness of the vendor when he swatted the flies landing on our slice. When our ray dish came covered in cream sauce that floated over to the side salad, we just ate around it. And when the seagull bombed us, getting Copain down the back and me down the front, we just rolled with the punches and suddenly felt... Dieppois ourselves.

Though somehow I had hoped that my old French famille had some nobler beginnings, Dieppe was just what the doctor ordered - sun, sea, beach picnics, apéros on the port, fish dinners, and of course, the best people-watching EVER. Waaaay more fun than stuffy Cannes or jet-set Monaco in the south!

Are you my ancestor?

Un pêcheur Dieppois...this is obviously why my Dad and Grandpa like to fish. 

When we arrived at 10am, the fish market was in full effect. Nothing like a little fish stench to get you going in the morning!

Despite the wind and millions of rocks, the Dieppois were à la plage. We had a picnic there, fell asleep and woke up with stiff necks from the rocks.  Mais bon, this was an important step in our sunburn plouk-dom.

The big marché was going on in centre-ville ...how adorable is this salad to plant? We got afore-mentioned fly cheese, ham with herbs, cherries, nectarines, peaches and fresh bread. 

Port de Dieppe, where the magic happens.

Saint-Jacques - where my first 'cestor was baptized.

Chateau on the cliffs...pretty sure my peeps lived right here.

Too bad they peaced out to Montreal...I could get used to this.

Foie de lotte, the local specialty. Who knew you could eat fish liver?

And just for good measure - the ray with crème Normande (and floating salad):

Don't worry, that's pretty much how I left my plate. My plouks left town waaay back in the day, which I am assuming means that the percentage of plouk in my blood must be pretty low at this point. 

I guess I was all plouked-out.

Le Gigot d'Agneau

Yesterday I got a scary text from Copain:

Copain: I'll be your top chef tonight. I'll send you the menu later.

I responded: Haha ok (not to doubt his cooking skills, buuuuut, remember the calamari and spinach hot pocket?)

10 minutes later...

Copain: I'm going to get filets de Dorade and gigot d'agneau for tonight.

Worried that I was going to end up with a surf and turf disaster, I answered: Or maybe just one or the other?

Sure enough, Copain came home from Picard with Dorado filets, a bag of frozen broccoli and a gigantic gigot d'agneau.

Then, in true form, he cooked the fish and the broccoli for dinner (because cooking fish and broccoli isn't rocket science!) and declared me the cooker of the gigot d'agneau. 

Like I've ever cooked a gigot d'agneau.

ps - what the hell is a gigot d'agneau?

At lunch I told my colleagues that I would be cooking a gigantic gigot tonight - Copain's idea. One of them jokingly asked me if it would fit in my oven.  I laughed and told him of course it would, but what I didn't think about was the Pyrex dish:

This is one enormous gigot. I had to put the dish on a cookie sheet to catch any fat that may drip off the end. I obviously have no idea what I'm doing.

I decided to bust out the cookbook from Belle Mère to help me in my gigot feat. I had most of the ingredients, so I went with this option:

The gigantic gigot is now in the oven and Copain and I are noshing on olives while the darn thing cooks - for over an HOUR.  

This is so not a weekday dinner. 

Stay tuned - in an hour I'll put this thing out of the oven and cross my fingers that it's edible.

Copain-isms - Chapstick

Copain and I were trying to decide where we would go for dinner on Saturday night.  I was rooting for La Cave de l'Insolite and he was rooting for sushi.

I love sushi, but I wanted to try something new - like my brilliant idea of La Cave. Clearly the better choice.

I told him that I wasn't doing my hair and putting on good makeup (a rarity, I assure you) for our standard sushi place on rue Dauphine. I wanted a bottle of wine, some ambiance, a dessert that did not include red beans or sticky rice. 

Then, in an effort to convince me that sushi was the better option, Copain said, "but I can use chapstick now!".

FCC: chapstick?

Copain: yeah, now that my thumb is almost healed, I can use chapstick. 

FCC: (drawing a blank - probably from a dry shampoo fume overdose in the miniature bathroom...) After five seconds of confusion,  the air cleared, I came to my senses and put two and two together - 

You mean CHOPsticks?

'Ze Kinder Surprise

It's almost Pacques (Easter!) in France. Every year I find myself with no plans and somehow totally bummed out that I don't have little kids to organize Easter egg hunts for. I'm not religious, but it was a big part of my childhood, and for some reason, I feel a strange need to celebrate this holiday every year. Since I can never seem to get it together, I just end up completely and utterly disappointed.

As a kid, we went to my aunt's house for Easter weekend. We would wake up to Easter baskets put together by the best Easter bunny ever - AKA, my mom - we'd put on our hats and dresses, go to church, and then, while we "took naps" or "went on a walk", the Easter Bunny would come back and leave a gazillion eggs in the backyard. We each had one egg full of money from our uncles who would join in on the holiday fun.

I remember one year when we were traveling, the Easter bunny left flour footprints down the hotel hallway and a trail of coins and candies to our baskets. No matter what the circumstances, our Easter bunny always made it special.

Since I don't have my own kiddos just yet, I decided that this year Easter would be FUN! No bummer holiday for me. 

I started it off by getting a tube of Copain's (and every Frenchie's for that matter) favorite childhood candy - Behold the Kinder Surprise!

I left it on his side of the taupe couch so that he would see it when he came home from work. As I reheated our weekend quiche and threw together a salad, I forgot about my little surprise. Copain came home, got himself a hunk of cheese,  I yelled at him for not taking off his shoes and then, out of nowhere, I heard, "Is this for Copain??!!!!!" 

Dude was ex-CITED. 

After dinner, I asked him to give me a Kinder tutorial:

First you try to open the chocolate egg, perfectly in half...

Then you immediately take out the toy and try to figure out what the heck it is...

When you finally figure it out, you try to see what your friend got and compare -

Once you realize that your toy is waaaay better (umm, I got hologram car stickers), you shove your face with chocolate!!! 

(then Copain showed me how when he was a kid, he used to 

dangerously pop the plastic toy holder in other kids faces. Nice.)

Easter is already off on the right foot I'd say... Let's go Easter 2013  (or something super positive and uplifting like that).