Rediscovering France: One Week in Angers

It has been over six months since my last foreign trip, where in Buenos Aires on New Year’s Eve I had the horrifying experience of being violently attacked. It felt like the final straw in a year of turbulent travel moments, each begging me slow down and re-evaluate both what I was doing, and where I was going. I came into 2025 not only nursing a fresh wound to the forehead, but also in no hurry to go off abroad any time soon. I returned to the US, where an abnormally busy work schedule kept me rooted. My gigs included a month-long stint as the violist of on the second national tour of the hit broadway musical Dear Evan Hansen, followed by substitute performances with the orchestras of Nashville, Hartford, and Helena.

The last bit of my gig line-up was an early-summer week in Angers, France to perform in an orchestra accompanying a production of Offenbach’s La Belle Hélène, as part of the the Franco-American Vocal Academy. I’d previously worked for FAVA twice – in Périgueux, France, in 2016 – and in Austin, Texas, in 2022. Come June I’d had plenty of time to recover from the trauma of Argentina, but I felt impervious to the excitement many of my friends and colleagues had for me. I was also unsure if I’d enjoy being back in France, where I expected my total lack of French language skills to detract from the experience.

Come time for my travels to Angers I first flew into Amsterdam, where I spent a spontaneous afternoon reconnecting with a few backpacker friends I’d met last year in Sri Lanka, and Argentina. I then caught an overnight bus to Paris’ Bercy Seine station, arriving at a ripe 5:30 AM. There I had another nine hours before my second bus trip to Angers. With the whole morning free, I headed straight to the Eiffel Tower. Barely anyone was there so early in the morning, aside from a few grounds cleaners, runners, and an American father and son who threw around a football for a photo-op. Otherwise I had the view of the iconic structure to myself as I wrote my previous day’s journal.

Sitting there on the blanket I stole from the flight I reminisced on the last time I was in this spot … it was after nightfall in August of 2016, I impatiently waited for my sister to meet me after her return flight from Romania, where she had been while I worked in Périgueux. We were set to fly to Miami in the morning, where I would begin graduate school a few days later. Neither of us had foreign SIM cards on our phones back then. I looked for her all evening, lugging around my suitcase and instrument. Eventually we reunited, certainly at a different spot than we’d agreed. The two of us spent the night roughing it along the Seine – drinking a bottle of wine or two, taking silly photos, and comparing our separate adventures. Being here now in 2025 these memories seemed like another lifetime ago.

My Flixbus from Paris arrived to Angers central bus station in the late afternoon. I was assigned to stay with a local host family for the week, the mother was our orchestra clarinetist – Emilie. In all my trips to Europe, this was my first time staying with local hosts. Considering my apprehension heading into it, I had zero clue how culturally eye-opening it was going to be to live amongst the locals instead of in a private space or hostel. On this first night I enjoyed dinner with my hosts and their daughter Paula, whilst sitting under the vines of a kiwi tree above their backyard patio. Fortunately Emilie and her husband Arnaud had a good understanding of English, which dissolved my fears of a language barrier.

Most of my stays in Europe have been in the large and touristy capital cities. Angers, on the other hand, is a medium-sized city with a population of around 160,000. In 2017 it was ranked as France’s top city for quality of life by L’Express magazine. I would describe Angers as having three separate zones – a medieval hilltop village in the center, a surrounding grid of regal late 19th century Parisian-like residences, and beyond this a wider spread of simpler contemporary homes. My hosts were in this outer area, but getting anywhere was a breeze thanks to the well-connected public transit. A newly renovated tram network featured quirky rainbow colored cars running above neatly trimmed grass. A sizable local bus network also connected to villages throughout the region.

Though the Argentina-trauma still weighed on me, I was also happy and grateful to be outside of the United States amidst the quickly changing political climate there. In the early months of 2025 moving abroad came to feel like a possible necessity that I was privileged to pursue. Even before things changed, I saw little of myself in America, and to an increasing degree I couldn’t imagine a long-term future there. To start gearing up for a potential move I spent the spring saving money, selling an old instrument, buying a new one (to replace one I’ve had generously loaned to me), and making PDF’s out of my 16 years worth of hand-written journals. Coming to Angers I was ready to soak-up what I already knew were the positive (and dare I say, superior) lifestyle qualities much of Europe holds over the US.

On our first day of opera rehearsals I walked with my European orchestra colleagues a short distance across town to get lunch from a small supermarket. There I found healthy and filling pre-packaged meals for less than $8. I took so much time browsing that everyone left without me! I expected maybe my colleagues would pack lunches, or that we’d all go to a restaurant (as would be typical in America) – but the natural inclination for the locals to stretch their legs and get a meal from the supermarket seemed like an all-round beneficial use of a lunch break.

For most of the week I got around completely by walking. My hosts owned a car, but it was only used if time was extra short, or if we were heading a good distance outside of the city. Emilie told me that her and Arnaud were about to sell their car and would rely fully on other means of transit. And it wasn’t just them, most everyone here got around in other ways, and so perhaps I shouldn’t have been so surprised by how healthy the population looked. I’m not saying any of them were super-models, but people of all ages had great mobility and there was virtually zero obesity. The sight of someone limping or in a wheelchair was rare, and it would surprise me, whereas these are common in America’s highly sedentary population. In Angers I never once encountered anyone who appeared to have substance abuse and/or behavioral mental health issues, and I always felt safe being out late or on public transit.

Part of the appeal to life in Angers was that no-one ever seemed to be in a hurry. My host and her colleagues at the city conservatory would stay around after rehearsals to chat in the courtyard, or out by the tram stop, sometimes for 15-20 minutes or more. It got me thinking, when people can get around without a car does it naturally lead to a population that interacts more? And with residences and businesses built side-by-side, could this mean less busy running around for errands? In America it seems that outside of the largest and most walkable of cities our lives are a giant gig-saw puzzle requiring our cars to connect the pieces. And speaking of cars, I counted just two (underground) parking garages during my stay, and the cars themselves were minuscule compared to the things we Americans drive.

With the sun setting after 10:30 pm there was no excuse to not dine and socialize till late. One night a number of us from the orchestra car-pooled 45 minutes out of the city to a riverside outdoor restaurant in the Anjou wine region and didn’t leave until midnight. The night after this, my hosts hosted a BBQ with some of the same people. We sat out eating/drinking and socializing for nearly four hours. Even in the summertime in America I can’t think of a recent instance where I’ve spent that much time at a meal with people. Perhaps us Americans are too focused on moving to the next item on our to-do lists, or on finding the alone time we desire after a hectic day’s work. In Angers I had the illusion that work didn’t exist, and that there was nothing better to do than to enjoy lots of time with friends.

My week in Angers came to be more about appreciating the culture than the actual job I was there for. However, I enjoyed performing with local musicians, and I came to learn some basic French numbers throughout our rehearsal process. I’d never played in an ensemble where everyone spoke another language than I, but more than half of them had enough English to help me whenever I was unsure of something. In my previous years doing this job the orchestra had been mostly comprised of Americans, so this experience in Angers felt especially immersive.

Leaving Angers I felt that I’d had a truly inspired experience, and different than any of my previous European trips. For the first time I was interested in learning French, which is something I never thought I’d say. Being there for work and staying with Emilie and her family really helped me feel like I had a community, and I balanced it well with my own personal exploration of the city. I also felt re-invigorated to do a follow-up foreign trip, and to spend the rest of July leisurely before getting back to orchestral auditions both foreign and domestic in September.

Next trip: The Huayhuash Trek, Peru – Part I