I am now in a hilly, rural part of France with small towns and villages, working as a HelpX-er (similar to WWOOF except not limited to organic farming, essentially I work 4-5 hours per day in exchange for a room and meals). This is my first experience with HelpX and it is great! My main goal was to try to improve my very poor French through immersion, and it has improved, but so far my skill at playing charades is playing a bigger role than my ability to speak French.

But the much, much better part of the experience is joining in the local life. We've walked to the nearby river and swam in the pool below the waterfall and taken walks through the woods. Yesterday I went to a local fair where they was animal judging (including Limousin cattle, this area is called Limousin), demonstrations of old tractors and farm equipment, a flea market, stalls selling local food, games for the kids to play, a display of traditional dancing, and much more.

We had a lunch with the traditional 5 courses - apéritif, main (fries, steak, bread), cheese, dessert, coffee, along with wine of course. Now I know how the French can take a two hour lunch - they do not grab a granola bar and eat at their desks in between conference calls - and no, I do NOT miss work. An accordian player wandered through the tables playing songs that everyone seemed to know so at times the entire group of 100 to 200 people were all singing along. He played me a song (pour la Canadienne qui ne parle pas français) though he played a Quebec song (I "think" maybe the theme song from the Montreal Expo, but I'm not sure). No way that would have happened if I was just a tourist travelling through.

à bientôt en France.