For my September excursion, I went to dinner at the house of a lady from MLK church. Our hostess was Erika and it was my first time having a meal in the home of a French person. The biggest thing that stands out from my experience is how LONG the meal was. The meal easily lasted four hours and I couldn’t believe it! When we first arrived, we were seated in the living room area for light refreshments and drinks (don’t worry, by “drinks”, I mean Oasis). We spent time talking and getting to know each other. Erika is so great and was such a lovely host! She is involved with the bookstore at MLK and she does work with publishing and writing. It was very interesting hearing about her life and career.

After maybe an hour, we were led to the dinner table for the main meal. We were served salad, a rice and chicken dish, and baguette. I’m actually not positive what was in the rice and chicken dish, but it was amazing! After eating the main meal, we sat around the dinner table and talked for a while longer. Finally, the best part of the meal was served, dessert. For dessert, the ORU girls who came to dinner brought flan. Paige and Lauren were in charge of picking up the flan and they picked a “coco” flavor thinking it was chocolate but it was really coconut. Lucky for me, I hate anything coconut so I was given chocolate ice cream instead. Not mad! By this time, we had eaten so much food it felt like Thanksgiving, when you need to go lay on the couch and let the food coma wear off for a bit. But, alas, it wasn’t over.

Next, we had hot tea and more conversation. Unfortunately, I picked a tea with chamomile in it which was a seriously wrong decision. After, I was so tired I could barely keep my eyes open and I saw no end in sight to the evening. Not that I wasn’t enjoying myself! It was a great evening, I just wasn’t prepared for the marathon. Thankfully, however, not too much later we decided it was time to leave if we were to make it back before the metro closed down. The evening was so wonderful but it was such a change of pace for me to have a dinner that long. It was really weird to think about how that is the norm for French people. In America, I don’t think anyone could function doing meals that long. We focus on work way too much. I guess what they say is true: the French live to eat and Americans eat to live!