I am in such a Christmas-y mood! Saturday night my friends and I took a train to Strasbourg, a city in Alsace-Lorraine on the border of France and Germany. At Christmastime, Strasbourg is known for its huge Christmas market that lasts all through December. It was absolutely adorable! In different parts of the city they have rows and rows of wooden huts selling everything Christmas-related you could imagine – thousands upon thousands of Christmas ornaments, every color and style of Christmas light, jewelry, toys, Christmas trees, hundreds of different figurines for the all-important crèche – nativity scene. And the food, oh my Lord, the food! Hot spiced wine (delish), sugary and salty pretzels, roasted chestnuts, chocolate-covered marshmallows, beignets, hot chocolate, fudge, gingerbread everything, waffles drizzled in Nutella, tarte flambée (a kind of flat, thin crust pizza with bacon, cheese, and onions), choucroute (sauerkraut and sausage), the list goes on. It was absolutely incredible. The city was adorable, too – it’s truly a combination of French and German everything. It had these adorable half-timbered buildings and lovely canals. We walked around all day and took everything in, and it was such a blast.

Monday night I was invited by Madame de Billy to attend a wine-tasting at her and Jean Claude’s country club. (It was really cute how they explained country clubs to me – I had to tell them we have exactly the same thing in the States!) So, Madame told me to be home around 6:30 so we could leave, and I rushed in at about 6:25. I had been browsing at Galeries Lafayette and Printemps, the two major department stores in Paris that are absolutely gorgeous (not to mention packed) at Christmastime. So I get home, and she immediately asks me if I’m going to change. (I was in a grey jumper, black turtleneck, and tights and heels, which, although not super-fancy I deemed acceptable for a wine tasting.) So, of course, I changed into something un peu plus élégant. It made me laugh! Oh, the French.

So then, along with Florian, her nephew that she has shamelessly tried to set me up with, we hop in the old Renault and drive to the club which is by the Bois de Boulogne in a very swanky area of Paris. When we get there, it turns out we weren’t invited to actually taste wine, we were supposed to help Jean Claude by bringing in wine from out back for his customers! So we go out back and we’re crawling in this old truck looking for bottles of Beaujolais blanc with Antoine, Jean Claude’s assistant who always looks like he’s on the verge of tears and who didn’t say a word to me all night. I think I freaked him and Florian out a bit when I hiked up my dress and crawled in the back of the truck – I bet Parisian girls wouldn’t dream of it. It was also kind of a weird situation, because were it me and two American guys, I’m sure we would have just said “screw it” and opened a bottle of the good stuff, or at least joked about it, but these were French boys, and they were very serious and completely dedicated to the task at hand.

After about an hour of this, we were finally relieved of our duties and given permission to walk around. We walked around to all these little stands and tasted wine from all over France. I was so proud of myself! I met lots of people and carried out small talk in French, aucun problème! This cute old Frenchman was telling me about how his brother was a cowboy in Austin for six months twenty years ago and we talked about Stetson hats and cowboy boots. Love it!

One thing I did learn, though, is how seriously wine is taken here! I mean, I suppose people take it seriously in the States as well, but as I tasted more and more of it last night, it became harder and harder to keep a straight face as Florian and the vendors discussed bouquets and aftertastes and all that business. It was fun to compare the different regions, though, and I learned that you really can taste the difference in cheaper from more expensive wines. I also learned that France actually has laws against putting pieces of wood in their barrels of wine as they age, which some other countries do to infuse their wines with a more “woody” taste – something that the French consider cheating. All in all, an interesting and quite sophisticated night!

I have only a couple days left here and I am freaking out.