versailles, minus the gardens

i keep forgetting to mention my quick foray into american apparel here in paris. i know, for shame! apparently, american fashion is all the rage here, and i wanted to check out the french approach to these new fads. every time i see "abercrombie" or "gap" on someone's sweatshirt i immediately assume "oh my god, another american tourist" but that's really not the case! every other parisian has this sweatshirt:


sorry, erinrose. and when i was in AA, there was a gang of 10 and 11-yr old boys all dying to buy the green version of the above sweatshirt. bizarre!

we went to versailles yesterday. the weather was absolutely miserable - cold, rainy, and extremely windy. we brought a fromage, baguette, and pear picnic, and had to eat it under an ugly overhang where construction is being done on the front facade of versaille's central chateau. i'd like to return to versailles when we'll actually be able to see the gardens and enjoy the weather. thanks to our institute ID cards, which claim that we are art history students, we get in free to the chateau! we took a tour using an audio guide, which had some great trivia. for instance, 19 royal children were birthed in the queen's chambers at versailles. also, the queen was always forced to give birth in PUBLIC, in order to make absolutely certain that the child was indeed the proper heir to the throne. can you imagine? how embarassing!


hall of mirrors.

not only was the weather gross, but we got on the wrong train to versailles. it was headed in the correct direction, but forked a different way. so, we spent an extra hour trying to figure out the extremely complicated "RER" train system. each train has a different name; sara, elba, etc. our train was named vick. the only image that came to my mind was that of a new jersey mobster. however, our vick turned out to be clean and spacious, and got us to versailles just fine in the end.



last night we sat outside at a cafe for quite a while. fortunately, on these cold days, cafes have overhangs and intense heat lamps which warm their outdoor customers. it was very pleasant, but these cafes are so expensive, whether they're in a touristy area or not. euro:american dollar = 1:1.5. Outrageous!

After the cafe we found a little bon-bon shop in the street. look at this array:



i just had to get a bag, and the candy was delicious. because the three of us had all decided to buy a bag, the guy selling the bon bons even gave us an extra scoop of chocolates. so nice.

soiree!

tonight i attended my first parisian soiree.

it was just a couple blocks off the champs-elysees, at my host-sister's fiancee's cousin's apartment. everyone there already knew each other because they were all either friends or cousins, so my host-sister, angelique, and i were both in the same awkward place, not knowing anyone. the music was exactly a playlist i could have chosen myself (nelly furtado, shakira, etc.). they served good french wine, some '99 merlots, and served chips and cheese&tomato on toothpicks. the people there were very nice, especially when they found out i was "russo-american", as they called me, and complimented me on my french. yeah right. it was hard to follow most of their conversations, both because it was noisy and because they spoke so rapidly, but it was a good experience altogether. lots of french cheek-kissing.

so PDA is well-known in paris, as it is in all big cities, really. (PDA = public displays of affection). what amazed me tonight was how freely my host-sister and her fiancee hugged and kissed and lovingly spoke to each other in front of me as we were heading to the soiree. i mean, it's sweet and all, but every 5 seconds it was "mon coeur" this and "mon amour" that. i guess they barely see each other, seeing as how they work so much. so anyways.

tomorrow, versailles!

WIFI

I HAVE WIFI. i am so relieved. now i can skype, i just need a microphone. woohoo!!!!

le soleil!

i'm running out of time at this internet cafe!

today we had grammar class in the morning. i love grammar, actually, and really need to work on it so i'm very grateful for this class, despite the fact that it's going to be a lot of busy work.

it was beautifully sunny today, finally, and i had 2 (yes, 2!) nutella crepes. i just couldn't resist.

tonight i'm having dinner with my host family and then going with my host sister to meet a couple of her friends and go out for a drink. i'm so terrified! real french people! i'm not going to be able to follow the conversation AT ALL. oh well. it'll be a good experience, meeting frenchies other than my family and speaking with them.

hope the snow is melting back home! miss you all.

fromage

parisians really need to start picking up after their dogs. there's no law regulating poop-pick-up. these dogs poop EVERYWHERE. i wish i had a euro for every time i've had to avoid a petit pile.



today i met a couple of the girls for breakfast. the 'french breakfast' on the menu came with freshly-squeezed juice (i chose grapefruit, or pamplemousse, juice), coffee, a croissant with a tiny jar of jam, bread, and a fruit cup. it was beautiful.

afterwards, we went to the musee d'orsay and learned about the neo-classicism of david and the romanticism of manet and courbet. we spent 2 hours in 4 small galleries. our art history teacher is a great guide, very engaging.



after the museum, andrea and i looked for a fromagerie (cheese shop) we had seen earlier and bought two kinds of cheeses. then, after an hour of searching for a boulangerie we finally bought two baguettes and went down the steps near one of the bridges to eat cheese and bread next to the seine. it was a semi-sunny day, so sitting outside wasn't so bad, and the cheese was delicious. i swear, if the french didn't love cheese, i probably wouldn't still be studying this language.

andrea, avec du fromage.

notre dame, not south bend

getting around paris on foot is truly baffling. once you begin walking down a street, there’s no telling when it will begin to be called something entirely different. rue de medicis becomes rue st. michel just because it curves slightly. I hate feeling like the typical tourist and pulling out my handy-dandy tourist map, but it’s practically impossible to get around otherwise.



speaking of touristy, I accidentally stumbled upon tourist central today – notre dame. I know, how do you accidentally stumble upon notre dame? see, what's rather amazing about this city is that despite its incredible denseness, in various places the sky opens up and the buildings clear and you see giant structures like the notre dame simply looming above you. so that’s what happened. and I finally crossed the seine for the first time. I really just need to go exploring more.

april fool’s in france is called “le poisson d’avril”, or the fish of april. of course, the only person to play a trick on me this year was my mother, all the way from the states. well done, mom.

had my first patisserie panini and pain au chocolat today. delicious. so buttery. how are all the women so thin here, despite eating this stuff all the time?

I can’t wait to actually go on an organized tour. we’re heading to the Musée d’Orsay on Thursday (the old train station converted into an art museum). we’ve done very little actual guided city-viewing, so I guess we’ll have to set up our own, for the most part. this weekend our homework is to go to Versailles! and next weekend we are seeing ‘Le Misanthrope’, by Molière, performed by the Comédie Française.

almost every café has a million small tables and chairs set up immediately outside it, and what’s surprising is that all the chairs face outward. the obvious and express purpose of these chairs is to PEOPLE-WATCH. I cannot wait to have some coffee and a brioche and watch people as they’re passing by. French people who do this are rarely alone! they are usually sitting with someone, having some coffee, and watching people TOGETHER. what a beautiful life they live, seriously.

it has become a tiny bit colder here – it’s in the low 50s – but at least it’s not snowing. ha-ha Minnesota! that’s what you get for not coming to Paris with me!

partout, partout, partout

these are the views from my bedroom window. pictures of my room to come soon.





and below is something i found written on a bench on one of the seine bridges. it says "make love everywhere, everywhere, everywhere, etc." HOW TYPICAL.