Versailles!

This weekend was my school's excursion to Versailles. A group of 60 of us took the train on Sunday and we were there from 1pm-6pm. I've been to Versailles when my family came to Paris when I was in high school. Because of that, I wasn't too disappointed that the chateau itself was SUPER crowded. There's currently an exhibition by Jeff Koons that was really cool, so I pretty much rushed through the main chateau taking pictures of the Jeff Koons sculptures. I hate crowds and try to avoid being in them for too long. I did really love the sculptures though, even though everyone else seemed to hate them. I was especially fond of the balloons-- the dog, flower, bunny and especially the balloon in the hall of mirrors (once again comes the reminder that photoquality is dramatically compromised by the 400pixel width of my blog. To see the pictures as they're meant to be seen, check out my Flickr!) I also used pretty much any reflective surface possible to take pictures of myself. Do you see me? Hint: I have a pink sweater on Self-portrait with bear (see me back there?) In the hall of mirrors In the balloon in the hall of mirrors I also hit the gift shop here HARD. I got these awesome hologram postcards for my little cousins, and then I figured since I was buying things anyway, I might as well get books. And so I bought my first children's book of the trip. The Monument book is actually awesome, and I think will make a great addition to my classroom. I also bought a paperback about French history that is poorly translated from English. My friend Katie bought the same one. Katie and Joanne digging into 100 Dates of French History Told to Children The weather was beautiful and it was really warm, so obviously I bought MORE ICE CREAM! Also because of the whole fountain thing they were piping music through the gardens in the afternoon, which made for some very cool video.

Toward the later part of the afternoon we settled down by the water and people watched and walked until it was time to leave. My roommate Vicky forgot her camera, and Joanne's batteries died so I ended uptaking 80+ pictures throughout the day. If you'd like to see more you can check out My Flickr as usual, or glance through the slideshow below.

Gelato

Yeah, yeah, I know it's Italian. But the fact of the matter is that I have not been to Italy, and I love pretty much all forms of sweet frozen dairy treats. As such, I had gelato TWICE this week!

On Wednesday, my French class met up at Luxembourg Gardens to start a little... scavenger hunt, I guess? Anyway, there was a gelato stand in front of the gardens and I have to say, the cone of tiramisu gelato was the best part about that whole debacle. We had to follow a map that our professor gave us and answer questions that we were given in French. We couldn't answer ANY of them, so near the time we should have been finished, we ducked into a papetrie and asked the men at the counter to help us. It was an authentic experience in that they didn't speak English so the entire exchange took place in French, but at the same time I think we were supposed to speak to French people who already KNEW the answers we were looking for. These guys just made use of Google, which admittedly is probably what I would have done in their position.

On Thursday I normally don't have class until 2pm, but I had to meet up with a classmate at 11am to work on a project. We were done by 11:30, which left me with a bunch of free time. Luckily we had a paper due in my wine class, so it wasn't long before other classmates started showing up. I bumped into my friend Melanie, who has become my partner-in-crime when it comes to eating. We decided that lunch was in order before class, so we walked down the street to a Lebanese place. I had some sub-par schwarma (not worth photographing) and she had some delicious little treats that we don't know the name of. We were pretty full, but still had a few minutes to kill before class, so we wandered over to another gelato store. That's right, twice in 24 hours, bitched.

I ordered "Pamplemo Rosa," which was appropriate since the whole schtick of this shop is that they scoop your gelato in the shape of a rose!

mmmmm pink grapefruit

This is the second in a series of pictures we call, "Caitlin Holding Stuff," as documented by Melanie. You may recall the picture of me holding my Louvre card (that is now my facebook default). That's the first. We tried to find something I could hold at the Richard Avedon exhibit we went to that afternoon, but were unsuccessful.

Karl

Every time I walk past a glasses store I get a quick reminder of my uncle Karl.

Karl has been wearing the same round frames forever, basically. At least as long as my memory serves and I would guess probably since before I existed. Apparently he was way ahead of the curve because round frames are EVERYWHERE right now. I don't see them being worn very often, but they are prominently displayed all over the place in a multitude of colors. I snapped this pair on my way to class.

Not so much a reminder of home, but a reminder of family. In a way it's comforting, but it's also just another reminder of someone I love that's far away from here.

One last one

Okay, in case you didn't think I updated enough today, there's still more!

I have a few hours in the computer lab between classes, which is a good amount of time to spend updating, especially after I took so many pictures this weekend.

I had a few pictures that didn't make it into the photoset from earlier, because they weren't a part of the actual Gay Paris search. In wandering around I stumbled upon a few personal points of interest


A really dark picture of Vicky and I at Saint Sulpice


Pierre Herme, a shop famous for it's macarons. The line was out the door on Sunday afternoon while we walked from Saint Sulpice to Saint Germain des Pres.



Shakespeare and Company!

And my personal favorite:

Sandwich Grec! mmmmmmmmmm gyro with french fries. This thing was the size of my head and was only 4,50€
My mouth is watering just thinking about it.

In case you haven't noticed, I updated a TON today, so definitely keep reading, there are lots of new posts!

Gay Paris

I missed my Gay Paris class on Wednesday because I wasn't feeling well. We had an "excursion," which means class was held in the city! Our task for the day was to find locations that were given to us by our professor. The locations were chosen from the book Nightwood by Djuna Barnes, which we're reading in class.

Since I missed class, I took my roommate Vicky with me out to try and find the places I was given. I took 35 photos, which is way too many to copy into the blog, but they're in a photo set on my Flickr with really brief descriptions of what each picture is. I also tried something new this time. I created a slideshow of the photo set, so that hopefully you can just click through the pictures right here in my blog. Unfortunately the slideshow doesn't have descriptions, and the images are smaller than the originals. So, if you're really interested in seeing the pictures, I definitely recommend going to my Flickr, but if you only have a few seconds definitely try to click through the slideshow.



I visited a couple churches, and some streets and adresses that are probably pretty inconsequential to anyone who isn't reading the book, but by far the coolest place I visited was Cimetière de Picpus (Picpus cemetery). Picpus is located in the 12th arrondissement, near Place Nation. Nation is where the guillotine was set up during the French revolution, and Picpus happens to be the burial ground of those executed during the summer of 1794. There were 1306 people executed by guillotine, including 16 Carmelite nuns, all of whom are buried in a mass grave at Picpus.

In the years following the Revolution, the land was purchased by a family whose members were executed and buried in the mass grave. According to the information I was given at the church, "they realized that all these unfortunate victims had been buried in haste, without any religious ceremony, and that nobody would ever come and pray at their graves. For that reason, they decided to create a sacred place for prayer and meditation, they bought the surrounding land and built a chapel. They requested the nuns of a neighboring community, the Sacred Hearts of Mary and Jesus, to set up a perpetual praying service for the souls of the victims."

There are a lot of cool cemeteries in Paris, and this one is one of the most interesting. It's not very well known, there were probably only 4 other people there while Vicky and I visited. There are two small portions of cemetery, the mass grave and a seperate area where family members of victims are buried. Most notable of these is probably the American General Lafayette. His wife's family members are buried in the mass grave, and so he and his wife are buried right next to it. His grave has an American flag on it, and is very well-kept by the Paris chapter of the Daughter's of the American Revolution. Who even knew that the DAR had a Paris chapter? Not that it's suprising...

Anyway, I HIGHLY recommend visiting Picpus cemetery and chapel. It's a 3€ entrance fee, but well worth it. You'll gain access to the chapel, and when you walk past the chapel you go through a big metal gate into a huge courtyard with a tree-lined walk to the cemetery. I think part of it's charm is that the grounds are incredibly beautiful, but not immaculately maintained. It's still in the care of the nuns, rather than being over-groomed. The focus is very much on the victims and the cemetery still. And the grounds are all in the middle of a city block. There's a very well-hidden entrance, and then you walk into the block and around all sides of the property there are schools and a hospital... only the door faces the street.

If you do go, I also recommend making sure that you look up good directions first, I almost missed it! The only sign is about the size of my palm, you can easily walk past. The website I linked to earlier gives pretty good directions, just know that you'll have to keep a look out to find it.

Incredibly belated Sacre Coeur post

We went to Sacre Coeur for Lia's birthday on August 31st, but I didn't take any pictures of US, only of the church. This weekend my roommate put the pictures of us on facebook. They're weirdly blurry (taken with a self-timer) but still worth posting. My camera took really great pictures of the church, but I didn't (and still don't) know how to use my self-timer, so we used Vicky's for the group shots. But yeah, here they are:

My pictures:

Looking up the hill to the church


From behind


The front

Vicky and Jennifer's pictures:




I'm starting to get really frustrated by the width of the layout and how it totally cuts off my pictures, but I can't figure out what to do about it yet.

Friday, September 19

Friday was my roommate Jennifer's birthday. We planned on doing the Bateaux Mouches and then hitting up the Eiffel Tower, but of course we didn't end up leaving the house until 10pm. We live about an hour by metro from the Tower and the last boat leaves at 11pm. We decided not to try to make the boat.

It's a good thing we didn't try to rush to the boat, because we found out on our metro ride that the line we needed was closed before the stop we were trying to get. If we tried to go to Bir Hakim it would have taken about an hour to get to the Tower, and we decided to go to Ecole Militaire because it was only a 35 minute metro ride. Of course the line we needed was closed, and no other lines run to Ecole Militaire. So then we needed to get ourselves to Bir Hakim, which was only mildly confusing. Long story short, we were on the metro when we saw the Tower sparkling at 11, but by the time we got off the metro it was done (the Tower sparkles for 10 minutes every hour from dark until 2am).

Currently, the Eiffel Tower is blue with a ring of stars (the twelve stars of Europe), just like the EU flag! It's to celebrate the French presidency of the EU. I think it's also because they knew I was comnig back, and they wanted me to be able to take even more pictures of a landmark I already have a billion pictures of.



My roommates and I! Vicky, Lia, me and Jennifer


We met some Croatian guys, and shared a bench with some girls playing guitar. We drank Riesling to celebrate Jennifer's birthday, since she's a big fan of sweet wine.


A terrible picture of me standing behind the Tower while it was sparkling


Roommates in front of the sparkling Tower: Lia, Vicky, me and Jennifer


Sparkling Tower!

During the day Friday I took a class at CEA on making crepes! Guys, I am SO good at it.


mmmm leftover crepes


Me making crepes!

I have more pictures of crepe making and the Eiffel Tower on Facebook. The album is public, so you shouldn't need an account to see it, just click on the link!

Lavinia

While I wait for Flickr to upload some of the pictures I took today, I'll update about my class on Thursday. I had planned to take pictures here, but when I pulled out my camera to take a picture of the exterior, my battery died. Luckily I plan on going back with my roommates so I'll try to take some pictures next time.

My wine class was held in this incredible store called Lavinia. Lavinia was founded in 1999 with their first store in Madrid, followed by a Barcelona location in 2001, Paris in 2002, and subsequent locations in the Ukraine and Switzerland. The director of the store spoke to us and was so nice. Lavinia was founded with the intention of making wine more accessible to everyone. Their clerks are incredibly well informed, multi-lingual, and super friendly and open to questions. They hold classes and have memberships available.

The Paris location is 1200 square meters! That's almost 4000 square feet! It's three stories, with the lower level housing an enormous wine collection divided by geographic location. There was an entire wall dedicated to my region, Bordeaux. Most of the bottles of Bordeaux were priced between 20€ and 60€ (I bought the second cheapest bottle I could find, which was 9,90€). The shop is kept at exactly 19 degrees Celsius, with controlled humidity levels and a special foundation to keep the rumble of the subway from disturbing the bottles. The more expensive/more fickle bottles of wine are kept in a special "cave" (cellar) that is 14 degrees. Inside the cave I saw the most expensive bottle of wine I've ever encountered: 10 000,00€. That's like a $15,000.00 bottle of wine! AND I saw a bottle of Hennessey that was 30 000,00€! A $45,000 bottle of Hennessey! Insane!

The rez-de-chaussez, or ground floor, has a wall of food and wine pairings. For example there was "tarte aux pommes" (apple tart) and below that they had 3 different wines that would pair well with that dish. Also throughout the store there are little round, colorful tags that denote certain wines that are recommended by the sommeliers, certain "vins bio" (organic wines), and wines that were under 10€ (the yellow tag, which I am a big fan of!). Also on the ground floor they have a tasting area. You buy a prepaid card in denominations ranging from 15€-50€ and you can taste wines! You can taste wines that you may be interested in buying, or you can taste wines you could never afford. For example, a taste (3mm in the glass) of Chateau le Tour will run you 25€, but I saw some you could sample for as little as o,80€.

The first floor (which is the second floor to Americans) housed a collection of spirits. They obviously have far fewer spirits than they had varieties of wine, but I saw things like Glenfidditch, Bacardi, and even Pucker (sick). Also in that area they had several books, every variety of wine glass you could imagine, and a huge collection of carafes. There is also a little cafe-type area on that floor, where you can get food and if you buy a bottle of wine in the store they'll open it for you and you can drink it there free of charge at either their indoor cafe-area or a little terrace outside.

It was a very cool shop, and I would definitely recommend it to anyone even remotely interested in wine. I was super intimidated because I don't actually know anything about wine yet, but their entire premise is that they want to be open to everyone and a comfortable environment to ask questions, and it certainly is! It's at metro Madeleine on 3, boulevard de la Madeleine in the 1st.

Double update today. I thought the Pope visit deserved it's own separate entry, so when you finish reading this one don't forget to keep going! I have pictures and video and it was really cool, I wouldn't want you to miss out on it!

On Friday I don't have classes, but I didn't want to waste the day so I woke up and went out to lunch with Vicky and her friend Francois. Francois goes to Georgia State but has been living in France for a bit and was in Paris for a few weeks before he leaves. We met up at Gare du Nord and wandered around a bit trying to figure out where to eat. We're all pretty indecisive but Francois suggested kebap and we all agreed that sounded good.

I didn't take a picture of all of us together, but I obviously took a picture of my lunch.

mmmmm I had a Sandwich Grec Kebap. Do you see ALL THAT FOOD? (EDIT: no you don't, because the blogspot layout cuts off the bread they gave me, plus you can't tell that plate is humongous). That plus a Coca Light was €6.50. I was so full, it was awesome. I could totally go for more of that right about now.

On the way back to the apartment Vicky and I finally decided we needed to find the macarons shop. Oh. My. Gosh. It was beautiful

LOOK AT THAT. How could you not want to eat them all? I exercised some level of restraint and only bought two: coffee and dark chocolate. Did I say OH MY GOSH yet? They were heavenly, incredible, remarkable, there are not enough adjectives. I can see why they are famous. Tragically my two macarons cost €2.44, so they won't be a regular indulgence, but I can't imagine not going back for more. The saleslady hated us, though. We couldn't really communicate the fact that we were still looking and she got pissed. I bought stuff, though! Next time we need to go to the bakery next door, which is also fairly well known. And we found an independent wine shop. So that next block down seems to be a pretty amazing place.

Then I went and saw the Pope.
On the way home I went through the Concorde station, where I am constantly reminded of home/Michigan


I came home from early from seeing the Pope because we had plans to go out. Vicky knows a guy here who is Greek, and one of his friends had a birthday party last night. They told us they would pick us up and drive us home, and the offer of cars was all we needed.

Vicky's friend Nicolas doesn't speak English, only Greek and French. In the car, whenever I would talk to Vicky in English he would yell and me and tell me I could only speak French, otherwise I won't learn the language. But even though he wouldn't let me speak English, he was speaking almost exclusively Greek! They took us out to this really weird/cool bar in the suburbs. It was circus themed! You walked up to the front and paid cover at a ticket booth like you would at a carnival, and then walked through this tented hallway into a big circus tent! There was a dance floor in the middle of the tent and a bar along one side. Nicolas went straight for the dance floor and he won Vicky and I t-shirts. I now have a shirt that says "Don't Stop the Party" (in English) from France haha.

Going out with French speakers was very cool, and everyone seemed helpful. I met some guy (whose name I didn't get) who was a friend of Nicolas that spoke English. He was a total sweetheart because his English was about as good as our French, so we would try to speak French to him and he would try to speak English to us. It was probably the best conversation I had all night. And a guy named Julien tried to teach me a French handshake haha. It involved bumping fists and half hugging and all the normal stuff you would do in the states, but I didn't have the heart to tell him that. I also didn't really learn is so much as just mirror him for a few minutes.

Everyone was incredibly nice, teaching us phrases and helping us to pronounce words. The circus club closed around 2, so then we went back into the city to a bar, only to have that bar close at 3. At that point everyone else was headed on to another bar, but we only stayed long enough to say goodbye. We were all tired, and a certain roommate was dying for food. I didn't get to bed last night until 5, which means I didn't wake up today until noon.

Catacombs probably aren't going to happen this weekend. Also, we were supposed to go buy books, which I mentioned in an earlier entry. The bookstore is closed today because of the Pope! I have homework due on Monday from the book that I don't have, so I've been trying to find classmates on Facebook to borrow the text from, but so far no responses. From the looks of it we're vegging out here and then probably going out again tonight. We may go out with Nicolas and his friends again if they have the room to take us, or we may go to a club near Sacre Coeur. So of my list of weekend to-do's I have completed two already, and it looks like the other two will need to be bumped back for next weekend.

Don't forget to keep reading for the Pope visit!

Oh
My
Gosh.
Papal rendez-vous complete.

The Pope was supposed to be headed to Notre Dame between 6:45 and 7, but my roommates had class from 5-7, so I had to go by myself. It takes 30-40 minutes to get from my house to Notre Dame, and the papeaparis website said that the Metros would be running as usual, so I left my apartment at 6. I had planned on taking the 1 line to Hotel de Ville, by school, and just walking down to the Cathedral, but then Jennifer told me the 4 goes to Cite, which is the stop nearest Notre Dame and the 4 is the line I usually take to class so it seemed like a better plan.

The Pope website lied. They closed the station at Cité (which is a really creepy looking stop by the way, and looks even creepier when it's completely deserted) AND the next stop at St. Michel. So everyone was forced off at Odéon, which confused pretty much every person who was trying to see the Pope. So there were huge crowds of confused people all stumbling out onto the street and just stopping and clustering... pretty much the opposite of my idea of fun. I walked down onto St. Germain away from everyone else, pulled out my Paris Practique (a little map book type thing that CEA gave us) and figured out the best way to get to Notre Dame.

I planned on walking to St. Michel and taking the Pont St. Michel (bridge) across there. Of course, once I actually reached the bridge they weren't letting people onto the island there. Notre Dame itself is on an island in the middle of Paris called Île de la Cité, which is only accessible by three bridges on either side (and also the previously mentioned Cité metro stop). St. Michel is the middle bridge, the bridge closest to Notre Dame was completely closed, with no one allowed on it. At this point I just started following the crowds. We walked to the far end of Île de la Cité, since apparently Pont Neuf was the only point of access open at the time. Fun fact: Pont Neuf is called the "new bridge," but is currently the oldest bridge in Paris.

As I was crossing the bridge I got a call from my roommates. When I explained to them that the area was a total madhouse, and that the nearest metro stops were closed and the bridges were closed... well, they weren't quite up for the challenge. It didn't help that while I was on the phone with Vicky I got shoved by someone. The crowds kept going straight, but I decided to follow the water and basically just try to walk to Notre Dame. As I was headed back toward Pont St. Michel I could hear the music from the vespers beginning.

Once I reached Pont St. Michel there were thin areas in the crowds on the bridge, so I found someplace to slip in. I was behind three super short little old ladies, so I had an awesome view. They had screens set up across the river, so I had Notre Dame in front of me to the left, the Seine river below me, and Pope-vision on my right. Obviously, I couldn't understand a thing that was going on inside. They were holding vespers inside the church with the Pope, priests, seminaries, monks and nuns. The acoustics of hearing the chanting and singing from the services inside the church broadcast out into the city was just incredible, I've never experienced anything like that. I took a couple of videos mainly for the effect of the sound, but obviously a YouTube video can't exactly convey how awesome it was.

The whole event was a really interesting mix of worship and spectacle. There were tons of old people with their heads bowed praying, and then obviously throngs of people who were there just to see the Pope. There were several school groups there, too. You could see people holding up signs with their school name and grade and little clusters of students following them. I can't even imagine trying to keep track of a class in a place like that. I also heard more American English there than I have this whole trip, aside from school.

I have TONS of pictures on my Flickr, but I'll try to only post a few on here, since this entry is long already
(EDIT: the blogspot layout cuts off the right side of the pictures, so anywhere it says "screens" there is another screen that you can't see. The full pictures are on Flickr though)


Crowds of people on Pont St. Michel, where I ended up watching


My view: you can see Notre Dame on the left and the screens broadcasting from within the church on the right. Also you can see people taking what must have been an awesome boat tour.


The screens broadcasting. You can also see people out on their balconies watching, but what you can't see is how crowded that road along the Seine was


The Pope actually showed up in this picture! In the others it didn't work because he was wearing white, and the screen just didn't photograph well.


See! Awesome!


And videos!
The first is really short, but you can hear the music and it sounds amazing. If you think it's cool and you want to watch more then check out the second one, which is longer and a bit more comprehensive as far as surroundings go. I tried to give an idea of what was going on so I showed the church, the river, tried (unsuccessfully) to zoom in on the screens, and scanned a little bit of the crowd. The music sounds better in the shorter video though.





PHEW, got all that? I'm so glad that I went. It was a really incredible experience and only served to remind me just how lucky I am to be here.

Today was awesome. I didn't have class until 2, so I slept in until 11:30. The best part about that is the fact that I was the first person to get up at the apartment. I went to wine class, which is awesome. We had a lecture about champagne: how it's made and how it's marketed. Then after class my friend Melanie and I went to the Louvre.

Because we're students we get wonderful magical passes that let us into the museum for FREE! I was so excited about mine, I made Melanie take my picture with it.

My Louvre ID is more official looking than my CEA ID.

Melanie had to sketch the Venus di Milo for her drawing class, and by the time we got to the sculpture itself, it was already 4:50. The museum closes at 6, so I went over to the Ruben's room. I took a few quick pictures out the window on my way.



You know how in the states when a museum closes at 6, that's when they start kicking people out? Yeah, the Louvre isn't like that. They started roping off little rooms around 5:30. As we were trying to find an exit at 5:45 there was already a man mopping and they were roping off the hall with the Venus di Milo.

At that point, Melanie and I were both starving. We walked out away from the museum a bit, but were still in a touristy area. We ended up picking an Italian restaurant. Yep, after visiting probably the most famous museum in France, we went out for Italian. It wasn't too over-priced, either, which is what I expected from this area. I got a HUGE portion of tortelloni with cheese and spinach in a cream sauce and they gave us free bread, which is practically unheard of in Paris. Melanie got something called a "pasta cocktail" (rough translation) which was FOUR different kinds of pasta and sauces, and about a fist-sized portion of each! So she basically got 4 dinners for €13!

On the way home it started to pour, and my cheapy H&M umbrella didn't feel like helping me out. One of the... arm... things? It broke, and kept flipping up and just in general seems to need replacing. The rain (and my incredibly full stomach) didn't stop me from getting dessert though. I got off at the Lamarck stop (which is the one closer to my apartment but with stairs) and so I stopped at a different bakery than usual and picked up an eclair cafe. I prefer the one from my usual baker at the end of my street, but I still ate it all.

If it's still pouring and disgusting tomorrow, though, that may affect my papal visit. Pope events don't really even start until like 4ish, and that's just when the area starts to open. The Popemobile isn't bringing the Pope to Notre Dame until 6:45-7ish, so hopefully the weather will be a bit clearer by then.

Also on the list for this weekend:

• I want to go to the catacombs!!! I have wanted to go every time I was in Paris but have yet to actually visit them. Lia said she would go with me, so that should hopefully happen

• We need to go back to Gibert Joseph, because Lia and Vicky's books were sold out last weekend, and I just found out that I need a workbook I didn't know about. Oops.

• Lia and I really want to find Macarons et Chocolat a shop that from the looks of it, appears to be right down the street from us

I'm hoping that by making this list I'll actually do most (hopefully all!) of these things. I know for sure the last two will happen, if I'm luckily I'll also get in Pope and catacombs. Hope everyone else has weekend as good as mine looks to be!

So the past few days have been pretty relaxed. I had classes Thursday and Friday. Thursday was my wine class, I'm pretty sure I'm going to love this class. Basically all we talked about on the first day was how to taste wine. Next week we're talking more about terroir. We also were assigned regions for our projects. I'm doing the eastern half of Bordeaux, with an emphasis on sweet wines. My partner is Molly, who happens to be in three of my classes (all but French). I'm thinking a weekend in Bordeaux may be in order, since it is only 2 hours away by train.

Sidenote for those who have expressed an interest in my classes: my Gay class has a blog! It's full of interesting readings and I'm really impressed with the concept and with how well my professor has been making use of it, so if you're interested, Gay Paris CEA.

Friday I had my Expatriate Writing class. I'm excited, but a bit nervous. I have to read the first 3 books of The Ambassadors by Tuesday! Not sure how well that's going to work out for me, especially since we should have had a week to read it. I'm also a bit apprehensive about the creative writing aspect of the course, but we'll see how things pan out.

I had planned on going to the Jeu de Paume on Friday after class, but it was disgusting outside. It was gray and rainy and I just completely lacked any motivation. Which is odd, because you would think a rainy day would be a good day for a museum, but I've never been one to brag about my common sense.

Saturday was beautiful! Lia and Vicky had to go to buy books, so I went with them down to the area near the Sorbonne. Gibert Joseph (the bookstore) was insane! There were so many people, and I hate crowds so it wasn't my favorite experience of the trip, but it was that of an authentic French student. Afterward, the three of us went to McDonalds. Vicky had a Big Mac that she claims tasted exactly like a Big Mac from home, and I had a Royal Deluxe. It's a cheeseburger with mustard. It was good, but oddly enough it was way messier and actually way greasier than a McDonalds cheeseburger at home would have been.

On the way home we stopped at the grocery store. Champion was WAY more busy on Saturday evening than it was on the weekday, I'll probably try to go on weeknights from now on. I did buy real food this time though, instead of just pizzas. So for lunch today I had green peppers, celery, onions, macaroni and tuna fish! Also, I could SO get used to buying a bag of croissants instead of a bag of bread at the grocery store. Even the prepackaged grocery store croissants are good!

Next weekend I think my roommates and I are going to try to see the Pope! He's in Paris on the 12th and 13th before a pilgrimage to Lourdes. I'm sure it will be insane, but we're going to try anyway.

Well, I finished my Gay and my French homework for tomorrow, but I still have 120ish pages of Henry James to trudge through before Tuesday, so I'm off to attempt that. A bientot!

Fine, Amelia!

So my pesky sister has inquired about my classes, and boy did she pick a good day.

Yesterday I had my first classes: Gay Paris and Intermediate French I. I am so excited for Gay Paris. The instructor seems really excited, too, which I see as a great sign. on Monday we kind of just went over the syllabus (which is why there is little to say, Amelia) but tomorrow we're doing an excursion in Le Marais. Le Marais is the traditionally gay (and Jewish!) area in Paris, and coincidentally is also where CEA Global Campus is.

French was terrifying. I'm already relatively immersed from living here, but to be back in an academic setting where someone is speaking exclusively French and I'm actyally expected to understand??? Sort of overwhelming. Hopefully I'll be more comfortable after a few more classes.

Today I had Writer's Workshop: Expatriate Lit. Well. I hauled my lazy little butt all the way out to Le Marais-- a 45 minute commute-- only to be told that the class was canceled. Not only did I not have class today, but it's rescheduled for Friday. Friday! I don't even have classes on Friday! Oh well.

Since I was already out there, I wandered around, shopped a little (at American Apparel, hilariously enough), and took a few pictures of the neighborhood around school. On my way home I got off at the Lamarck metro stop and went grocery shopping at Champion, a larger chain that's just groceries-- less confusing than Monoprix. I bought a couple little pizzas, some Orangina (mmmm), pasta, and chicken flavored potato chips. In actuality I would describe them more as gravy flavored chips, but I'm not complaining.

Tomorrow I have French and Gay Paris again, then Thursday is my first day of Wine class! Friday is the rescheduled writing class, and then after that I think I may go to the Jeu de Paume, which is having a Richard Avedon exhibit. Friday night there is a Seine river cruise for CEA that I plan on going to. I'll have to write about that later, since I still need to update on Sunday, when the roomies and I went to Sacre Coeur for Lia's birthday. I'm waiting to steal some pictures from Jennifer still, though.

I do have neighborhood pictures though! Only a few pictures near both school and home.

The nearest metro stop to us is Lamarck-Coulaincourt


Unfortunately for my lazy self, the Lamarck stop looks like this on the outside:

See the little red Metro sign peeking out behind all those steps? ALL those steps? To go to school??? Yeah right.

So instead I walk about 2 blocks farther but NOT uphill, to Jules Jofferin:

The metro is across the street and behind the bus, but you get the idea.

CEA's Global Campus is on a tiny little street off of Rue du Temple

We're a stone's throw from the Jewish Museum.

Normally I would take the metro stop at Les Halles, which I would walk past Georges Pompidou and (duh) Les Halles for, but I wanted to go to American Apparel so instead I walked toward the Hotel de Ville


And the also notable BHV, a huge department store next to Hotel de Ville. Not gonna lie, I could shop myself to death in there. I've already been twice (don't worry, all I've bought so far was a can of dry shampoo)


I probably won't update again until the weekend, but until then you can check out my Flickr for bigger pictures of everything (and my Sacre Coeur pictures are actually up there, and they kind of speak for themselves!)