The Quero Family

Alright so I am finally going to introduce everyone to my new family! I now live with the Pierre and Sophie Quero family. They are both in their mid-thirties. Pierre works in his own company that deals with architecture. And Sophie stays at home to take care of Piha, the now 17-month-old daughter. They needed an au pair because Sophie wants to study to become a dietitian/nutritionist. They can't get a nanny because Piha has a medical condition, and for some reason, nannies aren't allowed to be responsible for kids with conditions or diseases. So they searched for an au pair.

As I have told before, I looked into multiple sites, agencies, whatever, to find a new family to work for so I didn't have to leave France. Sophie and Pierre were one of the families I found on aupair-world. Which, by the way, is a good place to find a host family in all places of the world if anyone is interested. I had called a few families, and emailed a handle full of others. Out of all my options, the Queros stood out the most. I don't know how to explain it other than they just felt right for me. Anyway, so obviously I chose the Queros and they chose me, so I arrived on October 1st.

Getting here was semi-crazy. I woke up way too early in the morning (so did Juliette and her dad) to get to the train station. I don't remember exactly how early my train was, I think around 6:30 AM, but it was early. And luckily, my bags were fewer and lighter this time, although not by much, but it still helped! There weren't many people on the train yet, so I had a whole four seat open area to myself. A few stops later, a family with two young boys had seats in my little area. They were cute, and antsy. I could tell the mom was getting a little frustrated so I tried to help. I got out my laptop, and turned on Rio. They didn't speak English, but I figured the kids would like the colors or being able to watch something. The youngest boy who was probably about three years old watched for a little, but he couldn't understand so he lost interest. Every once in a while he would come back to watch, but the oldest, he was probably about six years old, stayed the entire time. I was getting hungry, so when they shared their snacks with me, I was happy! I guess one kind act is repaid with another act of kindness. We finished Rio and then started Tangled, but they had to leave before we got to finish our second movie. They thanked me, said goodbye, and left.

When my train pulled into the Bordeaux train station, I had to get off and wait for my next train. I had no idea which platform my train to Pau was. And I had two heavy bags that I didn't want to drag around in my search, so I decided to just stay put. Later I realized that I couldn't find the platform on the train information screens because the train was arriving in an hour and a half. All if the information on the screens were for trains that were arriving within the hour. Once again, I got lucky because my train to Pau was picking up where my train from Douai left off. All I had to do was get my bags on board.

When I got off the train, I didn't know where to go. Luckily I had seen pictures of the Queros, and they had seen pictures of me, but I didn't know if I should go right or left. So I followed traffic. Well, after they all past because I was having technical difficulties with my luggage... I saw someone that I thought was Pierre, so I started smiling. But I got nervous because what if it actually wasn't Pierre... Then I would look like a smiling idiot, dragging two large bags to a complete stranger. But he asked if I was Annalise so I knew it was the right person. I was so excited! Everyone was there to pick me up except Sarah, the ten year old. She was at her friend's birthday party. Piha was very friendly. She waved hello to me, she smiled, she danced, she laughed. It was adorable!

I find it very easy to talk to Sophie and Pierre, which is great! Since Sophie stays at home, she and I have already had plenty of serious and funny conversations. Sophie has traveled a lot. She lived in Ireland for a little bit. At the time, she didn't know English, but she got a job as a waitress anyway because they were in desperate need of workers. She has also been to Thailand. Sophie spent ten days there, with monks, without talking. So freaking cool, right? And she has lived in New Zealand for a long time. That is where she learned English so well. And I feel like she has been to other places too, but she hasn't told me about all of them yet. Hearing her stories really makes me want to travel more. I want to spend a week without talking in a monastery. I want to live a normal life in a different country. I just want to see the world! There are so many things I want to see, and places I want to go that I am afraid I will never get a chance to see them all. So I have spent the past week exploring options on how to travel more after France. But then I run into the problem that I should be going to college...

The Queros are a really fun family. Like my family. We have dance parties. We play loud music in the car and sing along. We joke and laugh. It is fun. It is relaxing to me because it makes me feel like I am at home. So my homesickness level here is a minimum. Well at least for now. Of course I have moments where I just miss my family and friends, but it is not near as bad as my homesickness in St-Malo.

One thing I should mention is that the Queros are vegetarian. However, Sarah is not, so when she is here every other week, Sophie will cook meat for her and I. We always have hamburgers on Sarah's last night, and we have duck very often because Sarah loves it. Duck is pretty good. It always comes with a thick layer of fat, so you know it is flavorful. And lucky for Sarah, I hate eating fat because it is chewy, so she gets to eat the duck fat I cut off. A treat from me to her. Sophie is happy that I am easy to please and not picky in the slightest because if I was, she would have a hard time making special orders all the time. And I am not a huge meat eater, so I don't really miss it.

Speaking of food, I have tried some strange and scary dishes. Sophie, Pierre, and Piha may be vegetarian, but everybody else is not. I forgot to mention that the French frown down upon vegetarians. When Sophie came back from New Zealand as a vegetarian, her parents thought she had joined a cult... Anyway, I have tried most new dishes at Sophie's parent's house. They live next door, like in My Big Fat Greek Wedding. I think they are afraid that I am getting malnourished here so they invite me for lunch or dinner with meat sometimes. One night, they had a plate with two types of sausages and some clumpy dark reddish-brown blob on it. I was going to try it all without asking about the questionable items, but Sophie told me what it was anyway. The strange looking clumpy stuff was coagulated pig's blood with onions. Oh ew! I was repulsed by the thought of eating blood like some creepy vampire wannabe, but then I remembered one of my the pacts I made with myself. I would try anything and everything new, even if it sounded disgusting. So I scooped up some pig's blood and plopped it onto my plate. It actually didn't taste that bad. It definitely wasn't the most scrumptious food, but it wasn't the worst. But I still decided I didn't want more. I tried it and that was enough for me.

Another day, I went to Sophie's parents for lunch. There were serving a Spanish dish of rice and different seafoods. There were shellfish, chicken, rabbit, and shrimp mixed with the rice. Whole shrimps. Like I'm talking tails, eyes, legs, and antenna things. I didn't even know shrimp had antennas. To eat them, you would cut off the head and then peal off the shell until it looked like an American shrimp. I discovered that rabbit is actually pretty tasty, although I thought of Maurice, Pepita, Regis, Jean-Michel, Chantal, Martine, and the little baby bunny when I was eating the rabbit meat off the bone... There were also little fish served as a side dish. They were served like you would serve chips or fries. And they were fried.. whole. Their little eyes were staring at me. Once again I had to remind myself that I was going to try everything. So I closed my own little eyes and popped one into my mouth. I tried not to think about all of the scales, bones, fins, and organs I was eating. And it wasn't that bad, but I didn't want anymore whole fish in my digestive system.

I am turning into a huge herbal tea drinker. Sophie knows that I don't drink alcohol, coffee, or tea, so whenever they are ordering/offered coffee, she asks if there is a herbal tea for me to drink. And she makes she it is herbal tea and not regular tea. So because people drink coffee here like it is water, I drink a lot of herbal tea. And I have found that I like it a lot. For one it is getting cold, so a warm drink is nice to have. And for two, it is soothing for me to have a minty drink before bed. It helps me sleep better!

All in all, I think I am going to like it here. I will get to see a legitimate autumn season in the country, I have a church close by, the family here is amazing, and most importantly I am comfortable. I fill like I fit in here. Sophie and Pierre said I am welcome for as long as I want, so now I don't know when exactly I will come back. I plan to stay as long as it takes for me to become fluent in French. So it will be a while before I come home. But people are welcome to visit, so start buying plane tickets! I would love a visit from family or a friend! :)

Unfortunately the only family pictures I have are from my Photo Booth on my MacBook. So most of the pictures are distorted. But at least you get an idea of my family! And a good laugh...

This last one is classic. Every time I look at it, I am instantly thrown into nonstop laughter.

Douai/Lille/Arras

This post is for the entire week I spent with Juliette (who I also call Juju or Ju). I love her. And I have discovered that her family is amazing and I love them! They were so beyond generous for letting me invade their home for a week while I figured things out. I am so happy I got to spend time with them. They didn't know much English, and I still don't know that much French, but we were able to communicate. Juliette's brother only knew the phrases, "Amazing!" and, "I can't believe it!" And he said them all the time.

I arrived in Douai Friday night on September 23rd. Getting there was very easy, except for having to drag all of my very heavy luggage around. Hey, don't judge me. I was packing for a year, and I wasn't supposed to repack my bags and move at all during that year. Luckily, two British women helped me move my bags from one train, to the next. I felt bad for Juliette's dad because he carried most of luggage, and he was the one who carried them up and down the stairs. Juliette kept saying that I brought too much stuff, and she is totally right. So by the end of the week, I sent some things back to Arizona, but not much. And it cost me 70,30€ to do so. That night was Juliette's dad's birthday. So they had friends over for dinner and a little party. But Juliette and I went to a burger stand (it has the best burgers I have had in France so far) and ate back at her house.

Saturday, Juju and I went to Lille to meet with Annie who worked at an au pair agency. This could just be any city in France, but it was packed with people and people were smoking everywhere. It wasn't my favorite place. It was a beautiful city, but I did not like all the smoke. We got to our meeting place (Australian Bar) early, and we realized we didn't know what she looked like, and she didn't know what we looked like. But Ju asked around and we found Annie and her coworker. Eventually, more au pairs started showing up. I guess they were having a big au pair meeting. There were people from all over. There were groups speaking Russian, Spanish, French, English, and I am sure there was another language around there somewhere.

After the au pair meeting, Juliette and I went her friend Mathilde's house. It was her birthday, so their friends were getting together to celebrate! Mathilde's house was the best decorated house I have ever seen. It was so stylish! First we stayed at her house for a while so we could wait for people to arrive, open presents, and hang out. Then we went to a club and had some fun dancing together. It was a lot of fun, and we stayed out very late. Unfortunately, Juliette and I missed the last tram back to Mathilde's house, so we stayed at one of her other friend's house for the night and went back to Mathilde's in the morning.

We went to Juliette's grandparents house a couple times. Her grandparents were very nice people too. They made the best fries that I have ever had in my life! They were so heavenly! They had just the right amount of salt. They were warm. They weren't crunchy or soggy with grease. They were perfect! They were fresh.

When Monday finally came around, Juliette and I went to school. I didn't have anything else to do during the day, so her dad arranged for me to go to school with Juliette. So Monday morning we woke up bright and early so we could drive to the train station, take a train to Arras, take a bus that dropped off close to the school, and then walked the rest of the way. School in France is different. They have different schedules each day instead of the same schedule every day, every week. Juliette's first class was economics. It lasted for two class hours. I felt bad, but I kept nodding off. I was bored by economics when I took it in English, so sitting through it in French was even worse. In one of Juliette's English classes, they talked about what people think about when they think of America. The biggest things were fast food, McDonald's, and Coca Cola. So congratulations Americans. We are sticking to our stereotype of being an obese society.

I was supposed to go to that same class on Thursday to share what reminds me of my home country. But unfortunately Juliette got sick so we didn't make it to school for the rest of the week. We were extremely lazy for the rest of the week. Juliette had an excuse because of the sickness, but I didn't. I watched Grey's Anatomy started from season one, and Juju watched Fast and the Furious starting with the first one. We both got pretty far in our series by the end of the week.

One day, we attempted to make cupcakes. With the exception of Juliette, her family has never had a cupcake before! Crazy I know! So we looked online for a recipe and started cooking. I am so used to baking with a Bosch mixer, and measuring with simple measuring cups and spoons. Luckily, the recipe was in the French style, so all we had to do was weigh our ingredients and mix it with a wooden spoon. Right at the beginning we received a sign that we should stop. I tried to get an egg out of the carton, but it was stuck. I was pulling and pulling (I don't know why I didn't just go for another egg) until it broke. And it was oozing everywhere and still stuck in the carton. Juliette's mom couldn't find cupcake holders at the store, but she did find bigger, but still small, cardboard cups. We filled those 3/4 full. When the time was done, the cupcakes were not. And they were about to spill over. So we took them out and put them back in. When the little cakes were finished, they looked hideous. They were connected to the tops of the cups, and then they sunk down like a crater. And they looked like dry sponges. We ignored our ugly cupcakes, and made the frosting. Once again, this was a failed attempt. We added too much milk, so it was too runny. We tried to fix it by adding more powdered sugar, but then it was wayyyy too much sugar. The French don't really eat super sweet things. Chocolate pastries are with smooth, dark chocolate. Cakes don't have frosting on top. So when we frosted a cupcake for each of us to test, we got sick from so much sugar. And after I felt like my lips were sticky. Everyone in the family tried one, but I felt bad that the cupcakes weren't good.

So Here Is The Story...

Okay so I am finally getting time to tell everyone what happened and why I haven't been posting. I have a lot to write about so it might take a while to catch up. But I might get lazy and just leave out a lot of details. I will try not to.

This story takes place starting on Wednesday, September 21, 2011.

 Anyway, I am not with Karine and Bertrand's family in Saint-Malo anymore. I woke up Wednesday morning, skipped breakfast because I wasn't that hungry, and caught up on emails to my family. My family emails me a lot. Especially when I don't respond or go MIA on Facebook. I love you family. Back to the story. So around ten o'clock in the morning, Bertrand knocked on my door asking if he could come in. Of course I said yes, so he sat down on my bed and started talking. He brought up the bus situation (I started feeling guilty again) and eventually said that he thinks it is best that I leave. Okay! That was definitely not what I wanted to hear. Ever. I think he saw my very shocked expression on my face because he started explaining his decision more. He said that he doesn't think I am ready for the job, and that I don't have the responsibility to get things done. That made me think about all the things that I had to suddenly change in order to do my job here.

For one, waking up the girls. Anyone who knows me knows that I am definitely not a morning person. If I have the chance, I can sleep all the way into the afternoon. Even though it makes me feel groggy and disgusting when I finally get out of bed. I am the type of person that sets their alarm an hour earlier than they intend to wake up because I press snooze every time my alarm makes a peep. But when I wake the girls up for school, I hear the alarm and jump up out of bed to the girls' rooms.

Maybe I am wrong, but doesn't that take responsibility to change yourself so you can do your job? I don't know maybe there were other things that show how 'irresponsible' I am for myself and for others. Okay, the bus thing. Yeah that was big. I got to the bus stop five minutes early, just like any other day. I guess if the bus is earlier than I, then I am still late. After I Monday, I had definitely learned my lesson about busses, so I changed and made sure I was at least ten minutes early for the bus. Enough, I have to stop obsessing about the bus ordeal. I can't change it now.

I asked Bertrand if there was anything I could do to prove to them that I wanted to be here, or if there was anything I could change to please them more. He said no. I couldn't believe that this was it. After all the work, time, and crazy adventures I went through to get myself to France, all of it was over. And I wasn't even getting a second chance to make things right. I didn't even know what I did wrong, other than the bus of course. I asked a number of times what I did wrong, but I never really got an answer besides that it isn't anything personal, they just don't think I am ready. I am still frustrated that they didn't tell me because how am I supposed to change or adjust in order to better myself if I don't know what is wrong. I never had a warning, and the whole thing is very confusing. No one really knows what happened. I am sure part of it is because I am only their second au pair. They had Andrea who, by the time she left, knew the language, knew the family schedules, knew how to do her job the way the family wanted. I was still learning. And I know I am young and I still am learning more about myself and trying to mature, but I still wish that they gave me a warning about this first... I think I am going to email them. I want answers!

Also, when I was talking to Bertrand, I was under the impression that I needed to pack and get on a plane that night or tomorrow. I thought that they were kicking me out on the street! Well at least to their parents' house in Paris, so I could catch my flight the next day. He told me to look at flights, which I did and they were very very expensive. While looking at tickets, I had one big thought. No. I was not going home. They could ask me to leave their home, but they can't make me leave France. I have a visa that lasts until next August! There is no way that I was only going to use it for a month in France. And I haven't even seen any tourist parts of France! No Eiffel Tower or Notre Dame. No Mont St-Michel. No Louvre. No anything! So then I went on the internet to find au pair sites.

I signed up on a free one called aupair-world.net and I also started calling people to find a place to stay. The first person I called was my friend Juliette. I met Juliette my sophomore year of high school during softball season. She was a foreign exchange student from France, and she was the manager of the softball team (a girl from her host family was an athletic trainer for softball). Obviously we became close friends because softball ruled my life both inside and outside of school. She suggested that I try studying at a school instead of the au pair thing. And if I decided to stick with the au pair thing, I should definitely go through an agency. So she gave me a number. I called that number, and they gave me a new number. I called the new number and it was an au pair agency called Solution Au Pair. I talked to a lady named Annie and she told me not to worry or stress and go to Juliette's in Douai while she looked for a family to place me with. I was discovering that it is very easy to find family's to au pair for in France. I was already getting emails from families on the website too.

Despite the crazy circumstances I was under, I was very calm. I felt like France wasn't over for me. There was no way that all the small miracles that happened to get me here were only for a month in France. So instead of blubbering in bed about how I got fired and have to leave France, I searched for other opportunities.

I was packed and ready to go by 2 PM, but I had to wait for my dad and Bertrand to talk about what was going on, and what I was going to do, and things with the contract. That didn't happen until after dinner. It was very awkward for me to be around for dinner. I knew I was fired, and that it was my last night, but I didn't know if the girls knew. If they did, they didn't seem sad. Ever. That is kinda a sad thought. And by this time at night, there were no more trains to Rennes.

Apparently, it was okay for me to stay for a few more days, but since I was packed, and I was fired, I didn't want to stick around. I could've stayed with Brooke, but they were relatives to the family that asked me to leave, so I thought that would be a little awkward too. So the next day, Karine drove me to my bishop's house in Rennes. I was going to stay there for the night until I could get on the train to Douai where Juliette lived. The bishop and his family were very generous and kind for letting me stay. And I was very grateful for that. (P.S. I love that my bishop's family owned South Park glasses. When you think of South Park, you don't really think of the bishop). I stayed there Thursday, and halfway through Friday, and then I was off to Douai to see Juliette!

So that is the basic story of what happened. There is still a lot more to this story, but I cannot handle typing anymore right now. I feel like I am writing a paper for school... But don't worry! I am still in France and I am with my new host family. They are awesome!