Arianna, Elizabeth, Eric, Derek, Laura, Annie, and I took a trip to Dijon, France this weekend for the sole purpose of visiting their mustard museum. We've only been in Paris for three weeks now but it was really nice to be able to get out of the city and see the country. And Dijon was beautiful. The town itself was charming and quaint, and the medieval architecture was nice to see as well, mostly because there isn't anything remotely close to that in the States.Our train left Paris at 8:30 in the morning on Saturday. We were all running on less than three hours of sleep due to the AUP back to school party that was held the night before.
We arrived in Dijon at 10:30 and had to wonder around for a bit until Derek's train arrived at 1:30. After speaking with a woman at the office of tourism and securing our beds
at Dijon's only hostel, we stopped in for a bite to eat at a charming little cafe with great food and even better people. It was at that moment that I realized how happy I was to be out of the city. The owner was an older man who attentively waited on us. For the first time since I've been here I didn't feel like we were the noisy, impolite Americans intruding upon the French lifestyle. We also made friends with a young girl (6 and a half years old, as she explained). Talking to her made me realize how much I miss interacting with children in Boston. We also asked her if she wanted to learn some English. She said no. I don't blame her.After meeting up with Derek, we checked into our hostel and made our way back to Centre Ville in search of the mustard museum. When we finally found it, not only came face-to-face with the history of mustard, but also a strong anti-capitalist campaign. I love the French.
We explored the city a bit more and ended our night at a small pizza and sandwich shop. Once again, the owner didn't speak
any English, but somehow we were all able to order our food and enjoy a nice meal without any problems. And he was so hospitable! In addition to making pizzas to-order (Arianna and I wanted mushrooms on our trois fromages pizzas), he gave us a huge plate of delicious french fries, and kept us in as much ketchup as we could eat. When he noticed that we were singing along with the music on the radio, he turned it up for us and was seemingly amused by our singing and dancing as we ate our dinner. Laura noted that it was like living in a movie and I have to agree. It was fun, but almost surreal in a way. But once again I didn't feel like we were rowdy Americans intruding where we didn't belong. We were able to be ourselves and have enjoy our meal. We even brought some amusement to a Frenchman.
The following day was spent exploring the city some more, eating Kebab (the owner of this particular restaurant was kind enough--heh--to put ketchup on my vegetarian kebab for me. Gotta love American stereotypes.), and wondering around Dijon's Musee des Beaux-Arts. The museum was hands-down, one of the best museums I've ever been to. It had a fantastic blend of medieval Christian works, romanticism paintings, African and Egyptian sculptures, and French modern art. I loved it.
I think, the thing that I loved most about Dijon, was how different it was from Paris. Not that I don't love Paris, but it was nice to get out of the city and see something completely different from anything I've ever seen before. Also, despite the fact that I was traveling with several non-French speakers, th
e language barrier was almost non-existent. The majority of Dijonnais that we encountered over the course of the weekend didn't speak English. The only person who recognized that we were Americans and thus spoke to us in English was the manager at the hostel. It was truly refreshing. A lot of my friends here in Paris complain that when they try to speak French to a Parisian, they either realize quickly that you're American and default to English without even letting you try to speak/practice French, or if they themselves don't speak English and realize you don't speak French well, they just ignore you and don't even try to communicate in a way you both can understand. Dijon was the complete opposite. They spoke French, we spoke French, for the non-French speaking people in our group who had to struggle to communicate, the Dijonnais were patient and understanding. They were great.
