Europe: Little Town, It's a Quiet Village…

Tour de France passes through Facougney, which
explains the presence many creepy dolls on bikes.

The nearest town to Jean le Moine is a village called Faucogney. Till described it as “a place with a lot of empty shops and old people. It is almost a ghost town.” However, the first time Till drove through it with me in tow, I was in awe. Yes, it does have a ghostly, uninhabited feel to it. The cobbled streets are empty. But the houses make up for it. I thought that Disney was just making things look extra picturesque for Beauty and the Beast. I was wrong. They are spot-on. From the varying shades of brown, to the artistic lace curtains in every window, to the fountain in the town square, I felt that I had been dropped into the middle of Belle’s “provincial life.” I was fascinated.

Till took me to the house of one of his friends, Gudrun, a woman in her late middle age. She has short bleached-blonde hair that sticks out in an Einstein fro, pasty skin that looks like leather, and a smile that makes her whole person glow. She sat me down on a chair in her garden, which is a labyrinth of plants and flowers reaching above my head. While I petted her crooked-tailed cat, she served me a glass of coffee and spoke in broken English, often switching to French or her native German. “My garden is a mess,” she said. “But I have not time to keep it up.”

Later in the week, Till, Alejandra, Shanie and I visited town to buy groceries. Shanie and Ale bought vegetables from a woman who sells them right out of her garden. The woman, jabbering in French even though she knew neither of the girls understood her, wrote down a recipe for ratatouille, and put together all the ingredients, throwing in some spices for free. 

Eating french fries… in France. Booyah.

I got to see Faucogney for a longer period of time on Sunday, the 2nd of September. Shanie and Ale were determined to visit the local flea market and set up a table to sell some high-quality soap they had brought from Mexico. Of course I tagged along. For several hours, I sat next to the booth, wandered around the market seeing all the things I would buy if I didn’t have to lug them back to the States, and then exploring the town a bit. Everything is closed on Sunday, so the town felt extra deserted, except for the square where the market was held.

All four of us girls ate some “barquette frites,” that is, French fries. Need I say that they were delicious? Still, all of us were hungry. Near the end of the afternoon, one of Till’s friends, a woman whose name for the life of me I can’t pronounce or remember, invited us all over for supper. We gratefully accepted. 

Her two daughters, who looked to be about six and nine, guided us to the house off one of the main streets. I was able to speak enough French to ask them their names (they sounded completely foreign to my ears and I forgot them immediately) and tell them mine. The younger one gave each of us girls a splash of her toy perfume on our wrists.

I have an imaginary book so I can feel like Belle!

Their house was unassuming. We walked down a narrow corridor painted in bright southwestern colors, emerging into a little courtyard with a swing hanging from the ceiling! The six-year old jumped on the swing to show it off. We proceeded upstairs to a little smoking area, then inside to an open room with stairs built into a column in the wall, and a mess of instruments lying around. Till and the father chatted, the girls ran around showing off their costume dresses, and the mother made the best zucchini curry that I have ever eaten, served with quinoa. After that she showed us around the house, which was a literal maze of rooms, each one a surprise. She is an artist who paints inventive watercolors, silhouettes of creatures playing music and sailing on curly-tipped waves. She showed us her studio as well as several of her paintings. 

I said goodbye to Faucogney when Kristine drove me through there to get to the train station at Lure. It’s a quiet village, every day like the one before, but it’s amazing in its own little way.

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