Raw and Unprepared: Or What I Learned from a French Chicken
People talk about respecting cultural differences between different groups. Sometimes I think it’s like respecting differences between individuals: it’s not the big things that are different, but the nuances. Or to get more specific, it’s the chicken. I’ll explain what I mean by that in a minute. I know it sounds strange. But the chicken was a real one, and it was French.
When I moved to France, I discovered a lot of cultural differences. It wasn’t about looking chic and knowing about wines (or at least not just that) but much more specific things: such as how to place your hands at the table, which side of the door lights would be on and why you don’t bring a gift of food to a dinner party. Most of all, for me, it was about the chicken.
One day, after I’d been living in France for a little while, I went to a butcher shop and bought a chicken. I’d already learned to say “bonjour, Madame” and “bonjour, Monsieur” when I spoke to people, so I thought I knew everything. I bought a chicken. And when they asked me if I wanted it “prepared”, I said no and took it home.
And unwrapped the chicken and discovered it had everything inside it. Absolutely everything. Not just the gizzards, and all this everything was…attached. And did I mention the pinfeathers? Well, to make a long story short, I ate something else for dinner. And from then on, I bought my chickens “prepared”. And I paid a lot more attention to specifics.
We all take things for granted, if we didn’t we couldn’t get through a day. They range from assuming the sun will rise in the morning, to what to eat for breakfast or how to talk to people at work and what side of the bathroom door the light is on.
I, like most other people, had grown up and lived in a world where ways of doing things were taken for granted. I didn’t know I had rules about some of the things I did, until I discovered that in France people did things differently. In my world you talked the same way in most environments (not in France) you shopped for food maybe once a week (daily in Paris) and certain subjects (the state of one’s heart and psyche, pocketbook and family relations) were frequently discussed among family and friends, while in France they were not. Others (politics, fashion, sports, music art) were. Lots of other things had unspoken rules too.
In France, my expectations didn’t fit the way the world was. It was not one surprising experience, but a long series of them. Most notably, the chicken. And then the surprises became the normal way of doing things and my life settled down for a while.
I am back in New York City once again. And it is once again a time of great change for me in many aspects of my life.
Once familiar things and ways of behaving don’t fit anymore. My reference points seem to be gone and my old assumptions about how things are don’t work anymore.
I am bewildered and uncertain, unsure of the meaning of things and what to do. I have to remind myself that not knowing what to expect is a normal part of life. Moving to another country can bring that into relief, but so can changes in personal or professional life. It is part of the cycle of life. But right now it’s leaving me raw, like that chicken. But maybe just a little bit less unprepared. Or maybe not.
I welcome comments. If you enjoyed this post, please also share it with friends.
