11.21.2009

Parties

So tonight is Saturday night, which means for the French: Party! So far I've been to two real parties, both on Saturday nights of course, but both were with my host family, for their family friends, and one of them was thrown by my host family themselves, so its not like they were too wild. Still there was plenty of loud music and dancing and refreshments, and general merriment. Tonight marks the third of these parties and its Gilles' nephew's 18th birthday. The French basically party like we do, though later and with more dancing, and probably harder than most middle-aged american parents party on an average Saturday night. The real difference comes in the fact that each of these parties has had a theme beyond the basic birthday party, or dinner party, or cocktail party etc. that americans are so fond of using. At first I thought it was just one wild exception, after all its not unusual to have a theme. This first theme was black and white, and we were all entreated to wear black or white, or get really wild and inventive and scramble the two. Not too hard, luckily just this summer I bought myself a 'I'm-going-to-France-for-a-year-right-on!' gift in the form of a black short-sleeved mini dress with a wide window pane stripe in thin white lines, from American Apparel, perfect for a black and white themed huge crowd dance party celebrating someone's fiftieth no? . . .yes! Well the next one, being thrown by my host family themselves, I had a bit more warning. They're chosen theme: Caribbean! A fun summery theme with good food, and great dance music to lighten up the month of November. Unfortunately, even with all my extra warning I still didn't have time to go shopping before hand which left me with two options, a little bright green sun dress, or a bright yellow thin sleeveless blouse with . . . I had no bottom save for a light purple over sized scarf that I attempted to wrap as a sarong. It would have worked too, but it was a little too little fabric between the unsuspecting friends of my host family and my 'bootie-shorts,' meant to be worn over a leotard in Dance class, which I employed as a safety measure; after all there would be dancing. As you might have already deduced I went with the sun dress.
Now I'm on to number three, and again there is a theme, which must be dressed for. This one is by far the hardest yet, and also the least respected ( already Thomas and Sarah have neglected it completely and Isabelle and Gilles haven't tried much harder). After must frustration, a 20 minute video chat, several minutes on the floor, and I lot of wishing for my Fairy Godmother to come change brunette (the dog) into a sports car for me, and get some local birds to sew me an outfit, I finally decided on my Ochre yellow tights, (very thick and opaque, and very yellow) a pair of grey tweed shorts and a black sweater.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

You forgot to mention the "theme" for the last party... "shocking".

E a la France said...

oh god you're right how did that happen?!

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