Daily Bread & The Flow Of Life In France
Ever seen a baguette vending machine? Honestly neither had I until I moved to France.
The first one I saw took me so much by surprise that I literally screeched the car to a halt. Once I’d verified that it was real and not just some kind of roadside decoration, I went to collect dad and Paul for a proper test.
The locals must have though we were nuts the way we giggled and “ooohed” over the thing, but the experience was quite spectacular. We fed in the required one euro, waited around in tense anticipation as the machine whirred and clicked, and then all let out a “wow” in unison as the door popped open and a fresh, crusty, baguette was presented for our enjoyment. It was so exciting we bought a second one right away, just to experience the whole process again.
Of course these days baguette vending machine are par-for-the-course, and something I use regularly with an attitude of French blasé. Why aren’t they standard everywhere in the world? Such is life when things that were once novelties become everyday items.
Which of course got me thinking.
Travel is an fascinating endeavor in that you do it for the novelty and to experience things that are new, and yet you always tend to relate back to what you know. These French mountains remind me of the Tetons, or this crusty bread reminds me of San Francisco sourdough….
But if you stay in one place long enough, or revisit it often that newness eventually wears off, and what was once strange becomes part of your shared history, of the vast network of mental things that you relate back to and consider normal, and almost taken for granted. This pizza vending machine reminds me of the baguette machines we used to have back in France…
See how that works?
So I thought it would be interesting to write a bit about that. To reminisce on the things I considered strange when I first moved to France, and yet now take completely for granted. Some are positive, some are great and some are not-so-great. France is a melange, like everything and everywhere you go.
Baguette For A Euro (And Other Delights)
French bakeries are an intricate part of French life, and a symbol of their history and pride.
I’m sure many of you have read the words famously attributed to Marie Antionette before the French revolution. While the general population were starving due to shortages of grain and lack of access to affordable bread, she apparently scoffed “qu’ils mangent de la brioche” (“let them eat cake”), a comment that obviously showed a complete lack of understanding of their distress. As it turns out those words were never actually uttered by Marie (that’s a myth), but they became a symbol of the elite of the time, and so they stuck.
Marie’s story ended badly of course, with a chop in the guillotine, but the grain struggle carried on, which in turn led to enduring changes for bread in France. After the revolution bakeries became strictly regulated, not only when they could close or take vacations, but also how much bread could be sold for. The right to bread for all.
Things have changed quite a bit since those times. The price of bread is no longer fixed by the state (since 1986), and bakers can now vacay mostly when they want (within reason), but the modern baguette remains sacred, and for a shop to carry the name of a “boulangerie” they can only be made on-site out of 4 ingredients (the Décret Pain of 1993) and must never be frozen or contain any additives or preservatives. Over 30 million are produced every single day in France, and they remain superbly inexpensive, selling for a mere euro or less.
Bread remains a right, even today.
I’ve come to love French boulangeries, so much so that I find towns that don’t have one rather sad & depressing. Plus of course everything else they sell is delectable from cream-filled delicacies, to mini-fruit tarts that look like sculptures of art, chocolate creations that melt in your mouth, and creative combinations of sweet that delight. Our little village has three and it’s a real treat. May they forever endure.
A Slower Pace Of Life
Je vous appellerai de suite (I will call you soon)….and when exactly would that be???
The French countryside is known for its slower pace of life. People work the fields, neighbors stop to chat, things are made by hand, vegetables are eaten in season, and cooking is an art that’s deliciously slow by it’s very nature. It’s refreshing and the very reason many seek to live here, but it can also be a double-edged sword.
For example our septic tank broke this week. Or rather it stopped working. The details are murky and probably best not shared, much like its history which dates back to some unspecified time that no-one can quite recall.
It’s a simple system, just two large concrete tanks separated by a plastic bucket filled with lava rocks (our only filtration method), the output of which flows by gravity into a large drainage field. It’s also old, and very likely “non-conforme” (not to spec) with a basic manhole cover that doesn’t quite fit and a field that has probably collapsed in multiple places over the years. It’s not pretty…
Of course no-one really worries about such things in the countryside, where “simple and working” does the job no matter what a thing looks like. And if we were true country hacks we’d probably just bypass the whole thing with a pipe to a sneaky out-of-the-way outlet (I’ve seen it done). But alas we’re rule followers and Scandinavian to boot, so we feel obligated to do everything “by the book” which means we’re going though the motions to get it properly fixed.
Which is where the whole slower-pace-of-life thing can become a bit of a bother….
First there’s an organization called Service Public de l’Assainissement Non-Collectif aka SPANC who you have to contact that are responsible for all septic tank installations throughout France. Then you need a registered guy to come out and do a soil-study, then (based on those results) you can get someone else to come out and actually build a new system for you. Finally the whole thing gets approved by SPANC again.
And how long all that takes is anyone’s guess!
Folks will promise to call you de suite which could mean tomorrow, or next week. Parts will come on an ad-hoc basis, workmen may show up or decide not to, and no-one will understand if you get impatient about it all. So it could take a few weeks, or several months and that’s just the way things are.
Since we’ve been living in France I’ve learned to become patient, or rather more patient since it’s not exactly my default state of mind. The countryside has a flow and and a cadence that you simply can’t push, and if you want to live here with your sanity in-tact you just have to give into it.
I love it but darn it, it also drives me crazy sometimes.
Bureaucracy, Paperwork & Time
Fill out these 2 forms, send it in with these 5 things and then plan to wait for about a year
WHAT??? A year?
I was on some forums trying to figure out how to get our US driving licenses swapped to French ones (which is a requirement for anyone who wants to legally drive beyond a year of residence in France). Our Florida licenses were on the approved swap list, which was a massive positive (not all US state licenses can be swapped in France), but of course the process wasn’t straight-forward requiring multiple forms, appointments, and specifics that varied just slightly enough to be annoying from préfecture to préfecture.
And then that year or so of waiting….
When we first came to France we anticipated all this. After all, this is a country that loves process, and forms, and all things in duplicate. But I have to admit that the reality of it has exceeded our expectations. There is a form for everything (yes, even that little garden shed you might be thinking of erecting in your backyard), a process for everything (woe be to thee that tryeth to circumventeth the sacred process) and time to work through it all that will always take longer than you expect.
As it turns out our French licenses only took around 8 months to get, a speedy exchange. And we’ve become near-experts at all the rest.
Next week we’ll be printing off another few inches of paperwork for Paul’s CDS (Carte de Sejour, or residence card). This is his third renewal so we know exactly what to prepare, and since he’s already in the system the whole process should (fingers & paws crossed) go pretty smoothly. We may just have to kill off a few trees to get there first…
Community Spirit
But yes, it’s all worth it in the end. Despite the paperwork, and the sometimes aggravating slowness of things, what I’ve come to love the most about country living in France is the community spirit.
We’re entering summertime now, a time that’s usually vibrant here in the Southwest with village festivals, music, get-togethers and community dinners. We volunteered at our local event last year, and would have done the same this year if COVID-19 hadn’t halted everything in it’s tracks (as of today, it looks like all festivals are cancelled until Sept). Instead we’ve received free cloth masks from the Mairie, a little delayed perhaps (that country time, ya know) but nonetheless a community touch that’s much appreciated.
Folks here care and check in on each other, and it’s something I’ve really come to value. It takes time to integrate, time to get things done and time (so much time) to figure out how it all works, but you’ve got access to baguettes 24/7, and all the time in the world to share them with your friends. That’s a compromise I can live with.
So, my dear readers my question for the week. What have you found while traveling that seemed strange at first, but is now second nature? I’d love to hear!
“Slide-Outs”! Yeah it’s that simple. Basically everything to do with “RV’s” and “fifth-wheels” was totally alien to me when I came from the land of simple ‘caravans’ in UK in 2006, but has been a wonderful life that (not wishing to sound unfair) I can’t imagine trying to do in UK, but works well in the spacious western USA allowing years of wonderful locations, experiences and sights.
So true…everything RV was completely foreign to us 10 years ago, and now it’s all second nature. I can barely imagine being without.
Nina
Well written post with alot of much-needed humor! Thank you 🙂 Chuckled all through it! So, what is second-nature now but never was? Sleeping anywhere in my stealth van purchased five years ago, which has a fullsize bed mattress (and stove, potty, etc.). Let’s say I spend a night downtown listening to jazz until midnight, I can return to my van, fall asleep and leave in the morning. Let’s say I’m tired and need a place to sleep for the night, I can pull over at a local hospital parking lot and fall asleep and no one bothers me. I can go anywhere and not worry about tonight or tomorrow; totally different thought-pattern of going anywhere. And when I meet travelers who do plan everything (reservations, highway plans, etc.) it sounds fussy and funny to me.
Sounds like you’ve really slotted beautifully into van life. It’s not an easy transition at first, but once you get the hang of it, it’s such a freeing feeling to travel like that.
Nina
Dumping the black tank. 🙂
HA! Yes, black tanks. Totally.
Nina
Ha! Nina your experience of awe and wonder over the baguette vending machine reminds me of a time in the 90s when I was sent out by my employer to the University of British Columbia to locate and test a new game changing vending machine offering up french fries.
I can’t recall liking the product and I haven’t seen or heard of french fry vending machines taking the world be storm so I think it was a bust.
Thanks for your great posts.
Sincerely,
Lisa Reich
A french fry machine, eh? Yes, I can only imagine that working somewhere like Belgium where french fries are a regular, and welcome snack. Actually, now I wonder if they have them….?
Nina
While volunteering in Texas we were 27 miles from shopping. Which was ok, but speed limit on back roads were 75 miles per hour. No sight seeing. Coming from Oregon that was really strange to us. At the end of eight months were driving like the home folks. Adventure for sure.
Thanks for the great article.
I’ve never been able to get used to fast backroad driving. They do it here in the countryside in France too…folks speed along at near 80 km/hr on teeny backroads, some of which are barely big enough for a single car. I’m far too chicken for that.
Nina
Hi Nina,
When I came to the US for the first time in 1977, I was a shy and very self-conscious high school kid, Even though I was raised in a fairly liberal family, I was shocked and nervous when I found out that in the boys locker room, both for PE and for the extra-curricular athletics, everyone stripped completely naked for changing and showering. Not only the showers, even the toilet stalls were open. But I had no choice so I said to myself, well if everybody does it, why not. After a few weeks I got used to it and in the end I really liked the relaxed atmosphere and the positive effect that the intimacy of being naked together had on the relationship with my track team mates.
When I returned to my high school here in The Netherlands, the school was planning to build a new gym and new locker rooms. They had decided that separate shower stalls were too expensive, both for the room they would cost and because they figured people would take longer showers in a closed stall and shorter showers in an open space, so they would need fewer showers and save on water and energy. So we were to have open showers. The push back from both students and parents was considerable. I understood that, remembering my own response a year earlier. But I was glad I had been through this already and I really liked the new set up. Of course, everyone got used to it after a short while.
So when I finished High School, being naked around guys my own age was perfectly OK for me. But it did not end there. On a holiday in France, we ended up on a naturist campsite. That was a whole new adventure for me, because there were naked people of all ages and also females! I felt the same discomfort as back in 77, but after a few days it felt perfectly natural. Over the years, I have grown to really love the freedom and unconditional acceptance of everyone regardless of shape, color, age, background, etc. that comes with nudity. Thanks to the USA and France: still two of my favorite countries on this planet.
Koos
I stop at a lot of YMCAs and community recreation centers to swim laps (and shower afterwards) all over the USA and Canada and I’ve noticed each bathroom/shower is different! Some have 4, adult only ones for folks with no kiddies. Apparently each is built according to local customs. In France, remove shoes before entering the pool area in a foyer area, community showers among all swimmers with bathing suits still on, then walk to individual tiny stalls around the pool (no gender distinction) to change in/out of clothes. In China, gender separation, but community shower/changing rooms with no private stalls whatsoever, just a bunch of naked people! Amusing 🙂
Banking online. One person or another always paid our bills for us back before the internet age. Online banking has totally changed how we conduct our personal business–and we love it!
Wearing a smile after reading this post…. Good luck with that septic situation!
While RVing, I now look for the off the beaten path routes as opposed to the fastest way to get to the destination. Seems I was always in a hurry to ‘get there’.
And, also, dumping the black tank is no longer a daunting task – thank goodness!
You continue to be my favorite ‘update’ and first read email when I open my computer. Cheers!
Learning to take it slow and enjoy the road was something we really had to learn when we were fulltime RVing too. Once we did, it became our favorite way to travel. We take a lot of back roads here in Europe too. Love it.
Nina
There was (and still is, no doubt) a bread vending machine in Delden when we lived in The Netherlands, about which I sort of skeptical at first, but when you come back home on a Sunday and everything is closed, it sure did come in handy. And the bread was fresh!
I’m surprised how good the bread from the machines here are. I asked a local about it once and they told me it gets re-stoked daily from the local baker. If it weren’t fresh, there’s no way the French would accept it.
Nina
We lived in Meylan (a suburb of Grenoble) in the early nineties. It was always an adventure to visit the Marie for anything. It was strange that the “receptionist” (my view) in the Marie sent me to the police department when it came time to renew my CDS. It was apparent the desk sergeant in the police station didn’t really appreciate my 20 year old high school french but he leaned back from the counter that he was leaning on looked down to his left and pulled out a form and handed it to me without saying a word. Looking at the form I saw there were at least ten supporting documents required of which I had only four or five with me (I thought I was prepared). The next day I took the previous days form and all of the required documents sure that all would be well. On this day there was a different officer behind the desk and after making my request to renew my CDS he leaned back and looked to his right and pulled out a completely different form which had at least a dozen supporting documents required. Of course, there was some overlap but only about two thirds of the documents that I had appeared on both lists. The next day after compiling a dossier of ALL of the documents on both lists I asked one of my French coworkers to accompany me just to make sure that I wasn’t losing something in the translation. This time yet a third officer leaned back and pulled out yet a third form that luckily required only items that overlapped the previous two forms and I was able to complete my request. BTW, I don’t think my coworker said more than half a dozen words during the whole exchange but I told him he was my good luck charm anyway. And yes 25+ years later I still miss the crusty baguette with a sampling of cheese at the end of a meal.
Your explanation of French bureaucracy is SPOT ON! You never know what you might be asked for, paper-wise and the “official” list can change depending on who is reviewing it. It’s always an adventure. But yes, crusty baguette is so very good.
Nina
When we arrived in the Netherlands all of or grocery shopping was about finding what was an approximation of things on our list we didn’t linger. There were usually a few people around the baked goods counter. I guess in my mind they were waiting to make requests of the baker. A few months in (yes, I was that slow to figure things out) we realized this was not necessarily the case; people were waiting to use the bread slicing machine. A bread slicing machine! Now we had to get a loaf just to cut it! The locals thought we were crazy as I took a couple of photos of my husband beaming ear to ear holding his freshly sliced loaf of bread! Europeans certainly are more innovative with their baked goods.
Thanks for your stories. Our wanderlust is kicking in.
Ah YES, the bread slicing machine!! We have one of those in our local French supermarket. I think we used to have them in Denmark as a child too (if I remember correctly). It’s quite a snazzy piece of machinery.
Nina
Another lovely post. I am not sure about answering the question about what is different or the same. We have done this: found a place to stay for the potential long term, like as long as forever if necessary. We have planted a new garden and are doing work projects on the property. We are looking to do some local “trips” in the RV to get back into nature. It is still really weird for us here in WA where it is still pretty restrictive COVID-19 wise.
Not sure if we will see life back to normal for a long, long time.
This year is a strange one, and I fear it’s not over. And to think that it all started with the wildfires in Australia…which were the biggest news item at the time, yet now seem SO long ago? I’m like you, not really planning any big trips, not really knowing where things will go.
Nina
Nina, you got my mind running on this post!! This morning while eating breakfast I remembered that grinding my own sea salt and my own peppercorn in my own shaker/grinders was a major change in my daily life as a result of traveling in European countries and eating at their wonderful restaurants. The taste is 500 percent better then processed powder! Gee, when will USA restaurants realize this???? For the past couple years, I take my grinders with me everywhere and buy bulk sea salt and peppercorn so I never run-out of it.
Indeed, ground spices are the BEST. We always carry a grinder, both in the house and the RV.
Nina
I love being in a different place each week! We’ve had such a great time wandering and finding new things to see/do. 2020 has been a unique experience, but we are back on the road. 🙂
Knowing where things are in the grocery store! Although I’ve moved many times in my life, I never realized how much I depended on knowing where everything could be found in my local grocery. Once on the road it took so much longer to do my shopping. After a few months though it just became second nature to “search and find” every time. Back in a stationary home (can’t wait to get back on the road!!!) I again became familiar with the aisles and what they offer. THEN I started having my groceries brought to my car so my “new normal shopping” is online now. Alas, back to learning where everything is when I return to store shopping 🙂
Hope your wait for a septic tank fix isn’t eight months!! Lovely shot of Miss Polly.
Yup, the grocery store thing was weird for us when we first started traveling too. And online ordering…yup that’s become second nature for me these past months (and never was before).
Nina
Your experiences with French country ‘time’ made me chuckle. We have been here for 3 years now and I’m just about accustomed to it. Mind you, my blood pressure has dropped considerably.
Lovely to “meet” you on the blog! I just checked out yours, and I see you bought a mill here. How fascinating! I’ll be following your story.
And yes, blood pressures do drop here, as long as you’re willing to go with the flow. We’re getting slooowly used to it.
Nina