In her best-selling travel memoir Almost French, Australian journalist Sarah Turnbull documents her trip to Paris to visit a French lawyer she meets while on assignment in Budapest, only to find herself, drawn to both the man and the city, unable to leave. At the risk of ruining the ending, Turnbull marries the lawyer and moves to France permanently. But her account, though at times deeply personal, is not about romance or falling in love. Turnbull instead chooses to focus on her efforts, usually thwarted, to understand and assimilate into French society, an undertaking which, though challenging, is not without its rewards.
Though technically an expatriate, we see Turnbull struggle with issues familiar to travelers and expatriates alike – an often insurmountable language barrier, a society unwelcoming to outsiders, an unfathomable government bureaucracy, and cultural norms that defy even the most devoted of students. She struggles to make French friends and survive at French dinner parties, imagining that the secret to her happiness lies in being accepted into the local culture. But she finds solace instead in relationships with other expatriates and, though she eventually discovers the secret of Parisian friendships, is bound to them by their shared foreign-ness. Turnbull’s struggle between a desire for French friends despite their constant rejections and the ease with which she connects with other travelers is a common one. This phenomenon – the need to share frustrations and stories with other outsiders, is how Irish bars in Tokyo and Mexican restaurants in Hanoi stay in business.
We see her cook the wrong food, say the wrong thing, and unintentionally portray herself as lazy or feminist or foolish, among a host of negative adjectives, despite her best efforts. And finally, we see her contend with the status conferred upon her by her specific nationality. In the beginning, her Australian citizenship makes her exotic, a curiosity. During the subsequent period of tension between the French and Australian governments, however, her nationality becomes a liability elevating her from foreigner to enemy status. She isn’t just Australian, she’s a symbol of Australia. Her constant struggles to adapt and assimilate, to connect with her host nation, with failure all too often a forgone conclusion, is familiar to the most experienced of travelers.
Turnbull’s story is equally evocative of the joys of traveling. We see her celebrate the tiniest of victories, buoyed by the slightest progress or sign of acceptance from her French acquaintances. She delights in the secret Paris her now-husband reveals to her, one of ornate gardens, “dark, sculpted doorways, and quaint, crooked shops.” About her early days in Paris, Turnbull writes “with Frederic as my guide, we mostly avoid the main monuments, spinning around them on the motorbike so that they seem merely a stunning backdrop to our adventures.”
There are several versions of Paris in Turnbull’s book, the one in which tourists race from the Eiffel Tower to Sacre Couer, pausing in their mad dash only to gulp French wine and feast on French cheese. Then there’s the second Paris, the idealized one, the one full of secrets and history and doorways, the one Turnbull inhabits as she falls in love. And finally, the third Paris, the gritty one with sweat shops and a rat infestation and a vague discontent directed at foreigners. Most travelers only see the first Paris, despite a concerted effort to experience the second. Turnbull, however, survives them all and, despite the difficult and occasionally hostile reception from the locals, discovers the true nature of the city.
Turnbull’s story is universal; it applies to anyone that has left home for an unfamiliar place, the distance travelled and time spent irrelevant. Her quest is one that tries to make a foreign culture become familiar, or at least comprehensible. The only drawback to Turnbull’s memoir is that it’s one-sided. The reader fully experiences her struggles and successes in France, and we understand logically that she chooses to stay because of her relationship with Frederic. However, despite the deeply personal aspect of the narrative, Turnbull does not provide insight into her romantic relationship, which is crucial to understanding why she tolerates the never-ending obstacles to her success. Though we understand Turnbull’s struggle, it’s hard to sympathize with her. We can relate to the difficulties of being a traveler, but we can’t understand why it’s worth it to her to stay, particularly as she emphasizes the cultural barriers in her own relationship without balancing them with why she’s in love.
Early in the memoir, she writes, “I’m carried away on a kaleidoscope of cliches straight out of a trashy romance novel. It is magic.” For much of the novel, Frederic is relegated to second-tier character status; the reader imagines him as the vaguely comical hero of the trashy romance novel Turnbull is living. He becomes a caricature of an artistic, cravat-wearing French museum enthusiast. Despite Turnbull’s honest and often revealing writing, we never know Frederic the way we know Paris. Truthfully, Almost French is not about her romance with a French lawyer; it’s a love story between a woman and a city.
Let’s be fearless,
Jen