I can't get away!

On Sunday I met my host family, the Chamayous. From Dr. Costello's brief description of them, emphasizing how much they like soccer, I thought I would be staying with a family of jocks. Happily, this scenario was most definitely not the case.

M. Bouzoud, who is my friend Brittany's host father, dropped me off and let me in to the Chamayou's apartment. I introduced myself very formally to M. and Mme Chamayou, who introduced me to their middle son Etienne and their youngest, Jean. The latter was a bit distracted because he was playing a certain game on his computer. I struggled to keep my eyes from widening in delight.

He was playing the most influential game of my gaming life: not Half-Life. Not Age of Empires. Not even Claw.

Age. Of. Mythology.

Feel free to comment below on how much of a geek I am. But that's the thing! Talking with Etienne a bit later, he mentioned that he and his older brother Amaury would both be considered geeks by American standards, because they're so into computers. This past week I've been starved for the company of nerds, so to hear him say that was like a breath of fresh air. I was really looking forward to the rest of the semester.

Until we all sat down to Sunday lunch. This particular Sunday, I was not their only guest. They had also invited their priest; I didn't get his name, because they only referred to him as père, but he looked a lot like Liam Neeson, so I will henceforth call him Père Neeson. I only understood about half of what was said at the table, but I did catch some distinctly familiar dogma from him:

"Buddhism forbids love."
"Mohammed was a pedophile and a killer, while Jesus was a man of peace."
"The Catholic Church is the only legitimate church, which is shown by its prevalence in the world."

When I said that I was an Episcopalian, he got that patronizing little half-smile on his face. Y'all know the one. I shouldn't have been surprised that it's universal among self-righteous Christians. I thought that going to France would get me away from nutters like him. I've heard that Sweden's less religious, maybe I'll go to Sweden.

Turns out M. and Mme Chamyou are REALLY, REALLY Catholic. I'm not sure if they agreed with Neeson's rants about other religions, or were just hearing him out to be polite. It doesn't make that much of a difference, because I'll probably be able to tiptoe around the issue. I'm still happy to be here.

On a very different note, I've been talking to people in Paris about the chances of staying here over the summer, and from what I've heard, it's incredibly hard to find an apartment and equally hard to find an internship unless you know someone. Seeing as you can't have one without the other and I don't know anyone of consequence, I'd almost given up hope. Until I looked at the Beyond Tourism section of my Let's Go guidebook. It suggested volunteering for a summer at Club du Vieux Manoir, a nonprofit project which restores decrepit chateaux and fortresses in France. My only worry is the price: 14 euros a day, plus food and the cost of a tent. But how cool would that be, to be camping in a field for days on end, restoring some medieval hall? And it would look good on a resumée.