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Category: Blog Posts

Location: Montepellier, France

Program: UGA en France

Living in the south of France offers so many wonderful everyday experiences. The south is completely different from the north. In my opinion, Montpellier is a more slow-paced city. This is one of my favorite aspects. Not too big, not too small. Montpellier is the 8th largest city in France. As I’ve started to settle in, I’ve began to get acclimated to the daily life, as a French person! As the time flies, I’ve began to reflect on some of my favorite first time experiences.

So my favorite types of desserts are apple and pear anything. I’ve really enjoyed trying almost everything apple and pear. Whenever I decide to be fancy and eat out, I always get an apple dessert, if they don’t have anything apple chocolate it is! The French in the south have a different opinion on apple pie than Americans. I remember the first day I came to Montpellier, I went to lunch with everyone and I ordered a “tarte tatin” which is basically an upside-down apple pie. Now in my mind, I’m thinking this is about to be the best apple dessert I’ve ever eaten because I can eat my favorite part of the pie, which is the bottom crust first! When the server brings out my dessert this is what I see. Not entirely what I was expecting. The flavor was interesting, but definitely took some getting used to. I knew that finding an apple dessert that I would immediately love would be difficult. It was then that I decided that I would try every apple dessert I came across and I DID!

Now that I’ve lived in the south of France for over two months I realize that there are so many things back home in Georgia that I’ve taken for granted. For instance, BREAKFAST! I really miss my typical American breakfast, cheese eggs, grits, hash browns, biscuits, pancakes, waffles, bacon, sausage, all that good stuff. In France, my breakfast every day is literally two pieces of toast and a cup of hot chocolate. I’ve been craving some really good cheese grits for about a week now! Another thing that I really miss about Georgia is the spicy food. Hot sauce! My life. The French in the south don’t each hot food. If they do, it’s not my type of hot. I want some flaming Hot Cheetos or Hot Fries, some TexasPete or something! Although the food is great, it’s nothing like American meals.

One thing that I’ve come to appreciate about southern French culture is that no matter where you eat, the French will never serve you more than one course at a time. It’s very rude actually. In the States, most restaurants will bring out your next course before you’ve eaten half of your appetizer. This is one of my new pet peeves. From now on I plan to eat one course at a time, and not feel like I’m being rushed for the next customer.

Read more of Cequoyah's Blog! https://cequoyahgatesword.wordpress.com/2015/11/07/first-time-experiences/