Springtime in Paris, and the Eduardo Saga

1- It is officially springtime in Paris! It is almost always warm, occasionally rainy, and perpetually pleasant. (Exhibit A: me and the thursday-afternoon atelier crew in Luxembourg Gardens, watching the boys make fools of themselves playing basketball). I'm enjoying it tremendously, especially since I can go running in shorts and t-shirts now! My run yesterday actually reminded me of a gvxc river run-- I ran down hill to the river bank, along the river for a while, crossed a footbridge, and came back on the other side through a park. It was a whole lot like "stevens to fox river to footbridge to wheeler park," except instead of seeing the smelly fox river, i saw the Seine, and instead of crossing a footbridge by a water treatment plant, i crossed one by Napoleon's Tomb. So yes, i suppose they were semi-similar.

2-SPRING CLOTHES. I bought some. They are very Parisian. I also realized that some things here that are stylish might not be in the states. Dear reader, do people wear the following in the USA?: -navy horizontally striped sweaters or t's; -striped sweaters with bedazzled epaulettes, -jean shorts, black tights, black leather boots; -white, oversized t's with black graphic print and an oversized cardigan. Merci for your input!

3-The Eduardo Saga.
Okay, so Eduardo. On St. Patrick's day, me and my friend Christina went to an Irish pub called Corcroran's to meet up with her french friends. They were really cool and nice, but there was this one not cool, obnoxious, fat friend with them that I suspect they keep around to make themselves feel better about themselves. This friend is named Eduardo. He's portuguese and living in Paris. He's also old (24), and awkward. Anyways, Christina goes off to chat with her friend Luc for a while, leaving ME with Eduardo, who then tried to get me to dance with him (no thank you). He asks me what I've been doing in Paris so far, I list the long list of churches, monuments, and museums I've been to, and ask what he suggests....

Do you know what this guy who lives in Paris permanently suggests? The Eiffel Tower and a Seine boat cruise. No kidding, genius.

...Discovering that I have not been on a bateaux-mouche (boat cruise) in five years, Eduardo decides that he will take me on one. Oh great. I decide Christina's coming with me so that it isn't a date. After two weeks of "being busy" (which we actually were most of the time!!), we realized we finally have to suck it up and go on the bateaux-mouche with him. And so we shall. Today. GAH.

Wish me luck, dear readers. I shall be posting soon with updates on how me and Christina survive.

Provence, Je T'aime...and then back to Parisian Reality

This past weekend was glorious indeed-- it was a grand Sweet Briar excursion to the countryside of southern France (Provence), and the group consisted of around 25 girls, Madame Gree (our lovely academic advisor), and a grand total of two males: Giles, our tour guide/historian, and Jonathan, who lamented his lack of Versace suit for most of the trip. Erego, it was pretty much a relaxing girl's weekend in the country.

It was a curious adventure, and we saw a whole lot of ancient Roman ruins and ancient Medieval ruins, plus a wide array of farm animals. Like sheep, and horses, and bulls. Arles is one of the places in France where bullfighting is still allowed, and we saw the arena and many a toro in the field. The famous lavender fields of Provence were not in bloom, however, so we missed out on that.

My favorite site we visited was Baux-de-Provence. I do not know what that means, but what it IS is ruins from a medieval fortress-town-built-into-a-rockface. It was really cool to explore. It reminded me strangely of Anasazi cliff dwellings (can you see the resemblance in this picture? Eh, eh?), but the french edition. It also made me really want to go rock climbing. We climbed about and explored for a while, and it was absolutely lovely.

However, then it was time to come back to reality in Paris. It's started to get warmer, and sunnier, thus hanging out in the park by school with some gelato (Jardin du Luxembourg) has become the thing to do. For example, my afternoon consisted of: 1- Library, 2-Walk through garden, 3-Class, 4-Get Gelato, 5-Eat gelato in garden. A delightful afternoon indeed.

However, I'm beginning to worry about tomorrow, because it will be the first transportation GREVE (strike!) that I will have witnessed in France. The internet informs me that due to this strike, 2 of every 3 metro trains will be running, and buses will run at a "quasi normal" rate. I'm not sure what quasi normal implies, but I suppose I will find out!

a brief literary exercise

Reading way to much Charles Baudelaire does crazy things to you. For example, I have written a Haiku to the Bibliotheque St. Genvieve, and I dont even write haikus:

Dear French Library,
Lets study together please.
Oh. Youre closed again.

In conclusion, I keep trying to go to this library and read this one book, but everytime I do, its either legit closed for the day, or the reading room is completely full and its closed for the rest of the afternoon. Boo, Bibliotheque St. Genvieve fail. Wish me better luck tomorrow at this!!

Found: Spontaneous Orange Jazz Concert

After getting cocoa with Brianna in a lovely cafe in the 5th, we

meandered towards the 1 Line so I could head home. En route, we discovered a spontaneous array of orange-clad teens, rather drunk, playin' some jazz. Got to love France, public drunkenness, and musically inclined teens. There were also adorable french four year olds dancing like mad to the music. I felt like it would be slightly creepy to photograph them, too, so i restrained myself.

In other news, Dayne just visited for the week and I had a most lovely time showing him around. He was my first visitor from home/WashU, and hanging out in Paris seemed curiously out of context. I'm used to us hanging out in Whispers or the DUC, not so much the Eiffel Tower or Montmartre! I switched in to tour guide mode, and we saw many a thing. In list form, our sight-seeing included:

Arc de Triomph, Champs Elysees, Place de la Concorde, Tuileries, L'Orangerie, Angelinas, Jardin de Luxembourg, CREPES! on Rue Mouffetard, Montmartre, Moulin Rouge, L'Opera, Food from the Former Colonies: Thai, Algerian, Pho, the Marais, Bastille, Montparnasse, Versailles (note emo mirror pic in Hall of Mirrors), the Seine, Invalides, Tour Eiffel!

Thus, it was a busy and adventure filled week and oh-so-much-fun! But now it is back to reality, after two weeks of vacations and visiting, and time to do some work. Like that literature paper thats due in a few weeks. Or the 45 minute speech on the Pope and Totalitarianism between the wars. Or that ten page paper on Paris and the Colonial Exhibition. I tried to go to the library today to research-- but alas, it was closed on Sunday. Darnit, overwhelmingly Catholic nation. You are messing up my study schedule!!

Mi Piacci l'Italia!

A (Late) Recap of My Adventures in Italy:

I arrived in Milan on Monday, after a 7-hour-long train ride through the alps. I had realized mid-train ride that I do not speak Italian, and that this may be problematic. In the end, it wasnt problematic, but slightly scary/limiting. I don't like not knowing the language! I couldnt say "thank you for letting me stay in your lovely home!" to Fede's mom, or ask a guy at a store how much things cost. Well, he probably spoke english, but its not the same!

In the end, I became sick of not knowing Italian, so I had Fede give me a few short lessons during our train rides to and from Milan. I can conjugate verbs in the present tense now, and know how to say things like "I would like THIS please!" and "how much does this cost?" which proved useful in Venice, when I didn't have a native Italian to order things for me and help me buy tickets and such.

My trip was amazing overall-- I met Fede's family, ate a whole lot of homemade Italian food (nom nom nom), ventured to Bergamo and Milan, and saw a lot of churches and museums. Bergamo was an amazing city to visit. It was divided between the upper and lower cities, the upper is old and medieval, and the lower is new and commercial. It was very interesting to walk around, and probably my favorite place I visited in Italy!

We also went to Milan twice, and climbed to the top of the Duomo, ate a lot of panzerotti (like doughnut bread, with cheese and tomatoes and prosciutto inside!), went to the Palazzo Reale, the Castel, andddd the Blind Institute, where we did this really cool blind-simulation-thing. It was an hour and a half in complete darkness, guided by blind people, where we got walking stick things and had to explore different environments ("city", "forest", "boat") without being able to see them. It was a really interesting experience, but slightly terrifying considering it was all in Italian! I basically clung to Fede for dear life.

After five days at Fede's, I headed off to Venice to meet Sweet Briar friends. Venice looked a lot like a Disney facade, but then you realized that it's actually real, and people actually do live there (strange realization indeed). The #1 tourist activity in Venice is to get lost, and I was really good at that. En route to the hotel, I got lost twice. The first time, I was helped by nice old Russian ladies (how did they know where to go??), and the second time, a middle-aged Venetian man was like "oh, im walking that way, i can guide you for a bit". Thennnnn he asked "can i see you again?" Awkward....

After successfully arriving at the hotel, I met up with Sweet Briar kids, and proceeded to get lost more in Venice, see San Marco's, avoid pigeons (difficult task), eat lots and lots of pasta and pizza, and visit the Doge's Palace, which was amazing. It was a good way to learn about the history of Venice, after my super touristy days there!

When I hung out with Fede's friends, they made fun of France a lot, and pointed out that Italians were nicer and generally better. While I certainly agree that Italians were soooo nice, and that Italian food was sooo amazing, I am still glad to be back in Paris-- its starting to be more of a home base now that i've been traveling more!