I figured it out! I successfully flashed the french firmware!
Ok so for readers who have the same issues here are all my steps:
1) Grabbed the official firmware using the CheckFusDownloader from
http://fus.nanzen.se/
*here's a list of all firmwares:
https://sites.google.com/site/rizandroid/home (oh btw this account tweets all the releases
https://twitter.com/#!/sgs2update i watch it constantly in hopes of seeing lebanon pop up -nshallah- :P)
2) Now that you have your firmware, don't make my mistake as chosen2k pointed out, I flashed i9100 rather than i9100G and it messed me up.. Now what you want is Odin, you can google around for it, the latest version I found was V1.85, in case you don't find it I'll keep it hosted here:
http://www.pulpish.com/files/Odin3_v1.85.zip
3) So you have your firmware and Odin but that didn't work for me alone, I had a special little secret ingredient I dug up from some forum, which I put here:
http://www.pulpish.com/files/omap4_all_20110627_emmc.zip
This is the partition file that worked for me, you'll have to include it under the "PIT" option in Odin, and check the "Re-Partition" box as well.
4) Next I included the firmware under "BOOTLOADER" and "PDA", make sure "Auto-Reboot and F.Reset Time boxes are checked and hit Start
So glad it worked out, thanks a million chosen2k! <3 I appreciate it! I've been a lurker on these forums for a few years now, glad I signed up, loving the community :D