With my first full weekend in France approaching I couldn't have asked for a better line-up really. England v Montenegro, Wales v Ireland and of course England v France were all on in a packed sporting schedule. It was pretty clear how my weekend would go.
Picking one of the many British bars around to watch the football proved quite tricky really but Oli and I settled for Corcoran's, a lively Irish pub and, after having a few beers beforehand, rocked up fairly drunk! After paying 6.50 for a pint we pretty quickly decided it would be our last and it'd have to last us the game!
The match itself was shit but it was an enjoyable warm-up to the losing of my French Party Virginity.
We made our way into le Marais and found out it was what is known as a cremaillére. A housewarming. Expecting to walk into an apartment with music blaring and people everywhere we were a bit let down as we entered to a fairly mellow room of people around a table, all smoking (no clichés here, literally everyone smokes). I had a good mixture of anticipation, nerves and self consciousness at testing, for the first real time, my "chit-chat" spoken French. Nevertheless, with several Koenigsbier in me I was confident.
I didn't do too badly. It quickly became apparent that most of them were dying to practice their English so I settled into a routine of speaking French and hearing English. It is slightly embarrassing to see that pretty much everyone can speak very good English which, compared to in England, would not be the case with French.
We were oblivious at the time but everyone was thrown out by the angry host (I've no idea why). I arrived at a second cremaillére with no alcohol and tiring so I settled into the corner and kept with the people who I'd come with. One thing that struck me straight away, about both parties, was that everyone greets everyone. My natural British sheepishness when entering a room full of strangers will be cast aside forever now. Even those that didn't get chance to say hi to us came over before they left and said bonsoiré. A very nice touch I think and I'll be taking that back to the UK with me.
I'd say I did fairly well overall and I had a great time to go with it. Between being taught various swear words by a couple of guys and "bantering" about the rugby, conversation flowed well. However, there were a handfull of moments where I spectacularly let myself down. When I was able to understand perfectly a group conversation, and these were scarce, I thought I should try to make the most of it and contribute. Unfortunately, either due to a suspect accent, terrible grammar or the Koenigsbier slurring my words, what I said was not understood. An initial repeat didn't do the trick and on one occasion it took me 4 goes and an explanation of what I was trying to say to get my joke across. Part of me died each time. As everyone knows, explaining a joke means it was shit. I will let myself off though, it being the first time and all and I will not be put off.
Lectures start tomorrow so I'll have loads more chances to practice my joke-making...
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