France in January

This is my first January in France, and it seems to me that this month is mostly reserved for three things:

- galette des rois
- les soldes
- New Year's greetings

Galette des rois is a traditional cake, meant to commemorate Epiphany (galette des rois roughly equals cake of kings). There is a little figurine baked into the cake and whoever gets it in their piece becomes the king or queen for the day (theses cakes are always sold with little paper crowns). It also serves as an excuse to eat cake. I've had four "galette des rois" celebrations this month, not one of which fell on Epiphany!

"Les soldes" are the huge yearly sales that sweep France every year after Christmas. Yes, the gov't regulates when stores can have sales. Things can, of course, go on sale during other times, but "les soldes" are really a free-for-all, lasting for about a month, in which EVERY SINGLE STORE has huge markdowns on nearly all of their merchandise.

New Year's greetings...it might seem weird that I cited this as being particular to France, but France has a particular way of delivering it's New Years wishes. Not particular weird, but particular as in specific. The first time you see someone you know after New Years, even if it's one, two, three weeks after the fact - you MUST wish them "Bonne Année" and fais le bise (the kiss on the cheek thing). However, most people don't stop there. It's "Happy New Year and best wishes for you and all your family. I hope that this new year brings health and all the happiness you desire" and on and on and on. Not at all a bad tradition, kind of nice actually - but it does get slightly awkward when you've forgotten who you've seen already and who you haven't. Or when all you said was "Happy New Year" and you receive a 10 minute disseratation as a response.

Anyway, that's January in France. I'll let you know what February's like in a few weeks. Ciao!