When compared to Paris, Tours smells like a bouquet of fresh flowers on a warm spring afternoon. That's because it actually does. The Loire and Cher Rivers sparkle. The Seine in Paris sparkles if you catch it on a good day and if the wind is blowing in the right direction, but every time I pass the Loire, it shines away without fail.
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| The Cher River |
Tours is my newfound favorite bread capital because it has this boulangerie with the BEST BAGUETTE I have ever had in my life. I have eaten quite a lot of bread in my life. Some might say too much. But yes, I paired the baguette (which was a perfect blend of crunchy outside and soft inside) with hummus and blue cheese and ate the whole thing. Bien sûr. I did not take a picture of it. I was too busy eating. Next time!
Some days, as I sit next to the Loire river in the autumnal sunlight and eat my baguette by a group of traveling musicians, I am reminded of my immense privilege. I have talked about this in many previous blog posts, but it deserves repeating. Who in the world has the ability to travel the world before they reach their 21st birthday? Who can go to London for a weekend for fun? Who has the luxury to not have a job and to rely on their parents as an emergency source of income? Who has their college education paid for entirely and will only have to worry about student loans during graduate school? Who can assume that, if she wanted to, graduate school is entirely feasible and attainable? I can. Very few men and even fewer women in this world can say they have the same opportunities as I do.
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| Picnics by the Loire River |
Similarities to India (otherwise known as, India: The Country about which Sarah Never Stops Talking)
- Food culture: French mothers and Indian mothers (and aunties) love to cook. They also will not take no for an answer. I was at a potluck (pot d'acceuil) for the choir I just joined in Tours where all the French women had me try their own dishes. After 6-7 treats I was stuffed... so naturally, I promptly went home and ate dinner with my host family.
- Heteronormativity: The standard, and albeit cute, "average" family in France consists of a mother, father, and their adorable 2.5 children. Much is the same in India, though Indian families of 5 have the adept ability to all fit on the same tiny scooter, a feat which I have yet to see repeated here in France.
- Classism: social class is easily determined - How many times do you kiss your friends on the cheek? 1, 2, 3, 4? That's indicative of one (possibly two) things: 1) Your social class or 2) The region of France in which you live. I also learned that the more unique a person's name, the more likely their family is bourgeoise. In the Indian Hindu community, social class is determined by last name (e.g. Sharma is often a Brahmin name) as well as by the number and style of forehead accouterments (think bindis, but with more artistic variation in color, size, shape and number).
- Public urination due to lack of public bathrooms. France takes a third-world approach to public bathrooms, something I cannot understand. If you want to use the bathroom, I suggest carrying around 1 euro coins for the rare pay-to-use bathroom or brush up on your ability to persuade hotel receptionists to use their establishment's facilities. But humans aren't alone in this predicament. Judging from the amount of dog excrement I see on the sidewalk, France is largely devoid of either a) green space (sometimes true) or b) doggy bags (never true).
- From dogs to cats (cat-calling that is...): Cat-calling is possibly one of my least favorite things about being a woman. I thought France would be different than India on this account, but the universal pastime of making women feel uncomfortable walking down the street prevails all around the world.
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| I still liked more than I did not like about Paris. Case-in-point: Parc Montsouris in the 14th arrondissement |
