Last post!

Hi, everyone!

My last day. Phew. It's very hard to believe that I've already been here for two months, yet at the same time it's not hard to believe that I've been away from home for seven months so I'm feeling ready to get on the plane. Besides some last-minute packing, of course...

Today was lovely (I wonder how many posts I've started out like that this summer...). After finishing up a painting for my host family (shh! don't tell!) Reid and I went to Versailles, despite a sprinkling of rain (a nice farewell from France). We each brought parts of a picnic to eat under the shelter of the perfectly-trimmed trees, across from some beautiful horses and funny-looking goats. We both agreed that it was nice to get some fresh French air, and spent a few hours walking around the, again, bizarrely perfect gardens. So it was nature, but it was very far from wilderness. Baby steps, I suppose.

By the time we got back we didn't really have time to have a fancy sit-down dinner like we planned, so my last meal in Paris (besides tomorrow morning, which I already know will be bread, jam and yogurt. too predictable) was actually a crêpe. In a way, it's very fitting: simple, cheap, a little bit messy, but definitely worth it. Kind of like how this summer has been for me. I ordered nutella and banana -- the man at the kiosk handing me a few napkins in premonition of the bit I would spill on my blazer -- and hungry licked the piping-hot chocolate from the gaps in the folds. I then took the subway to Montmartre, where I met up with Reid and Mandi for what truly was a perfect last night in Paris.

I had made reservations at the Lapin Agile (which means, "quick rabbit." Wait - I just made the connection between the pizza chain, "Speedy Rabit Pizza." Sweet! Love when things come together like that.). Since I'm not uploading any photos tonight, you're welcome to check out their website (watch out, they sing to you) here: http://www.au-lapin-agile.com/

It's funny how life comes full circle. When I was a sophomore in high school, I'd taken part in a play called, Picasso at the Lapin Agile, written by THE Steve Martin. It is by far the best play I've been in, but back then I had no idea that the Lapin Agile was still an actual place. In fact, it's where the boho-intellectual class (the likes of which include Picasso, Einstein, Toulouse-Lautrec...) would frequent for a cheap drink and a cabaret. This past week, my French teacher sort of mentioned it in passing, like, "oh, have any of you been to the Lapin Agile?" as a way for us to practice our prepositions. I just about had a heart attack. You mean I can actually go there?? I made reservations as soon as I could.

So we get there, and by "there" I mean a little cottage on the other side of the Sacre Coeur, and he takes the name of our reservation, careful not to confuse "Anneli" with "Amelie" (which happens often in Paris.) We are lead to an upstairs not much bigger than the size of my bedroom, the walls of which are covered with original artwork by the frequenters. We then are serenaded to for close to three hours (at which point we left in order to catch the Métro). It was spectacular. The accordion, the red mood-lighting, the Edith Piaf songs... It was like going back in time. I'm not sure if the other girls enjoyed it as much as I did, but then again it didn't mean as much to them.

We made our way to the Sacre Coeur to see the view (if you thought Paris was pretty by day....), and then found the nearest Métro stop. We were going different directions, so we said our goodbyes and promised to Skype in the near future. Luckily, there's only about a month until I see both of them again.

Then I took the longest subway ride ever, and here I am, chez moi. I really should get on that packing.

Bonne nuit et merci pour me suivre.
-A

Ah! Last day in Paris!

I'll probably do one more blog entry tonight, wrapping up what I hope will be a great last day in Paris and of my trip, but still I wanted to make sure I said a little something this morning. Plus, it is super hot in the city (around 34°C here) so I woke up real early from the heat and couldn't go back to sleep. What did I do instead? Pack! It was imperative to get an early-ish start on packing (rather than starting, oh, say tomorrow morning) because I have so much stuff it's going to take some serious creativity to fit everything in my suitcase.

Starting to hit me how soon I'll be home. Although I have a day of layover in London (and then another whole day of traveling and too much time in airports) ahead of me, I can feel that it's just around the corner. Seriously I cannot wait. I love traveling and I love Paris and there are things I'm definitely going to miss, but it's about time I went home.

For your enjoyment, I've been saving up pictures of rooftops. Or rather, I've taken a million pictures because they're all so beautiful and am finally deciding to post them now. Et voilà.

 

du Centre Pompidou

Montmartre

Whoever lives here...

From le Musée d'Orsay

Just some kids in Paris

I’ve had a really nice past couple of days. Jan’s been here – he left this morning – and even though he wasn’t here for long it was really fun to be together in Paris, rather than in Cambridge. He, Reid and I would often have meals together back at school, so it was a little weird (but completely wonderful) to be, say, sharing a baguette in the Jardin du Luxembourg, rather than dining under the beams of Annenberg. We did a lot of tourist-y things together (read: Eiffel Tower, Le Louvre, ice cream at Bertillon, an attempt at the catacombs…) and, naturally, took lots of pictures. 

Last night was lovely. The three of us went to a Lebanese restaurant for a very non-French but very enjoyable dinner (Side note: I never thought I would say it, but I have had my fill of bread. Laree, try not to be too shocked. I honestly can’t wait just to have vegetables from the farmer’s market and freshly picked blueberries. Oh, and peanut butter. I have restrained myself from buying any here but I’m craving it badly.) Mind you, Jan just came from spending two months in Egypt, so he speaks Arabic pretty well. The benefits of this in Paris? He was able to bargain with the server in Arabic to get us a better deal on a bottle of wine. Meanwhile, Reid and I spoke to the server in French. It was such a mélange of languages, I loved it. Jan and I have had obviously different cultural experiences with studying abroad this summer, but similar experiences with learning the language, so he can relate a lot to what I’m going through. We sat there, talking about cultural stereotypes and politics over hommous and salade de fruits, interjecting with words from our native or learned languages to explain things that English couldn’t quite cover. Honestly, it doesn’t get better than that for me. The first night he was here he had dinner chez nous with some of Sophie and Vincent’s friends, so he was fully thrown into French conversation, despite never having taken a French class. He knows Spanish so he could often follow the gist, which was impressive. Sophie knows German, so sometimes she would translate in German instead of English. And Vincent – well, Vincent is always full of surprises. Not only could he throw out a few German words, but he knew also some Arabic slang. I spoke in French almost the whole time, except when he needed translating. When I have conversations like that, I feel so happy to be here, to have this opportunity, to feel like a more well educated global citizen, simply because learning a language teaches you about the culture. And then Reid, Jan and I of course get along so well so naturally we laughed a lot last night. It made me quite excited for the fall.

Then we walked along the Seine to the Louvre, took some bizarre pictures by night, and got on the Métro to go our separate ways for the night. I met up with him this morning for a quick coffee at a café before saying goodbye to him. Funny, I never in a million years would have thought when I met him this past fall that we would be seeing each other in Paris, but that’s Harvard for ya. It’s a very small world, indeed.

Nice is nice.

Goodness, where to begin. Salty, turquoise water, sparkling under the golden Mediterranean sun; a beautiful apartment with a beautiful view to stay in for FREE; lots of laughter and great food, accompanied by a dear friend—in short, it was one of the best weekends I’ve ever had.

Thursday morning, I packed all of my things in my by now well-loved backpack, including a tiny sleeping bag in case we didn’t have a bed to sleep on. Then after class, Reid and I headed to Orly to catch our plane to Nice. I have much greater respect for EasyJet now that I’ve had a positive flying experience with them. The plane was very clean and, contrary to the jokes my dad likes to make, I’m pretty sure they had a sufficient number of engines. Reid and I talked the whole way there, and before we knew it we had arrived.

First off, our hosts (friends of Sophie’s) were honestly too generous. The husband offered to pick us up from the airport fairly late at night (and then drove us this morning at the ungodly hour of 5:15 – perhaps the only downside of EasyJet). Upon ascending the gorgeous, tiled stairs up to their apartment, we were greeted by the wife, cool glasses of water and a view that people dream about. And – surprise! – we had a huge bed in a room to ourselves, so the sleeping bag was gratefully unnecessary. After chatting for a bit, we went right to sleep, our heads spinning full of ideas for what to do the next morning.

Day 1: I’m pretty sure I had a smile permanently plastered on my face for the entire day. We woke up at the same time, thanks to Reid’s alarm, opened the shutters (yes! They actually do serve a purpose here!) and just about fainted from beauty overdose. Here I insert a photo that Reid took, because my camera simply could not capture how stunning it was.

After breakfast of fig-jammed-bread and yogurt (also included, free of charge – seriously we were so spoiled), we put on our bathing suits and headed out into the already baking sun. I will never forget what it felt like to get in that water. Living in the Pacific Northwest, the water is too cold and the current too strong to really swim in the ocean, so it was my first experience treading salty water. Utter bliss. The water was so clear and beautiful, I could see the tan rocks beneath my feet. Heck, I could actually see my feet. Looking around at the panorama of Nice and the Mediterranean, it was too much to handle. I was so happy that I was breathing too hard to really stay afloat very well so I had to come back to shore after not too long, much to Reid’s amusement.

Reid in the Mediterranean.

For lunch we had ice cream and some cheap-but-delicious strawberries we bought from an old woman at the market in Vielle Nice, the old part of town. Then, another highlight of the trip, we rode bikes along the beach. Nice has this great system where, after calling and typing in your debit card number, you can rent these blue bikes from many of the docking stations in the city and return them whenever you want. The trick is to re-dock and re-rent them every 30 minutes, before which it’s free to loan them. So we biked to the airport. Seriously Paris makes Nice look tiny. We biked along the entire coastline in around half an hour. It was so nice to just be able to go like that, without having to worry about traffic or red lights or air pollution, like in Paris. This whole weekend was quite literally a much-needed breath of fresh air. Despite being full of other foreigners, the slow-paced way of life, the sun and the salt in Nice allowed us to relax with every fiber of our beings.

After our little bike ride we hiked up to the top of a hill that I’m sure is somehow militarily significant to regard the view. Need I say it again? Stunning. Zigzagging our way back down the other side, we kept stopping to take photos, each corner offering another angle of the terra-cotta-roofed town. The lighting was perfect, the temperature was perfect; we felt very lucky.

Dinner was at a place called “Chez Pino,” a hole-in-the-wall, jam-packed place so good it received mention by Lonely Planet. We started out with some crunchy bread appetizer and a tiny portion of delicious pizza, but their specialty was socca, a flatbread made with roasted chickpeas on top. The reputation did not disappoint. We hungrily wolfed down the whole portion in a matter of minutes. Although we had a cranky waitress, the food was so tasty it made up for any lack of service. We finished off with the most authentic (and maybe the only, if I recall correctly) tiramisu I’ve ever had, the lopsided cream sinking beautifully into the warm chocolate at the bottom. This, too, we finished off more quickly than I would like to admit.

We went back into Vielle Nice to observe the very happenin’ night life and ran into a huge group of Englishmen on stag (spelling?), their term for a bachelor party. Honestly, going to Nice for a bachelor party? I guess that’s what can happen when all European countries are so close together. After they had hilariously harassed some street musicians into playing “Wonderwall” and sang along off-key and without reservation, we wandered around with them for a while before heading back chez nous. All-in-all a successful day.

Day 2: The next morning we got up a little later… Again blown away by the view. Again received breakfast, over which we half-jokingly talked about politics with our hosts. The husband asked how well-liked Barack Obama was in the US, and said, with a smirk on his face, that we ought to return the States with the impression that François Hollande is a “communist pig.” Although obviously kidding, it was interesting to hear him say in all seriousness that sometimes the amount of aid given out in France is too much, something that’s easy to speculate but different to hear directly from the mouth of a French person.

After breakfast we walked around, took pictures. After walking around we changed, grabbed some pizza à emporter (to-go) and went back to the beach. It had artichokes and kalamata olives on it. After our pizza we sunbathed. After sunbathing we swam in the water. After swimming we sunbathed. After sunbathing we swam. After drying off I sketched the landscape, Reid journaled. We topped it all off with some sunbathing and swimming.

It's a rough life we lead. 

Wearing the dress that Mormor gave me. Thank you! :)

By then it was about dinnertime and we walked back to our house, changed into dry clothes and walked in search of a place with good pasta. We didn’t have to walk far. Just around the corner was a restaurant with tables outside where we could eat our pasta in the yellow light of the evening sun. And boy, did we eat. That may have been the best pasta I’ve ever had. I ordered a heaping portion of freshly-made gnocchi, smothered in pesto, layered with partly-melted ribbons of parmesan cheese and sprinkled with pine nuts. Good heavens, I thought my taste buds were going to jump for joy. Reid had risotto with real slices of truffle. Let me tell you, the proximity to Italy has done wonders for the food in Nice.

Also taken by Reid.

The weird thing about our dinner was that, slowly, I began to realize we were literally surrounded by Scandinavians. I at first asked a family that I heard speaking a familiar language where they were from. Norway. Okay, cool. Then I noticed that the couple to our right was speaking Swedish. And the family to our left. And the family behind us. This after having passed several people on the street that day having conversations in Swedish. What was going on?? There really are not that many Scandinavians. I actually asked this of the couple, who said that it was just because flights were cheap and there was a car show going on in Nice. Somehow I doubt it was because of the car show… But still, understandable. If it were cheap, why wouldn’t you go to Nice? Before I knew it I was having a full-blown conversation with these people in Swedish, which was so nice. It was a little uncomfortable at first, after speaking so much French for so long, but soon enough I got into the rhythm and I was enveloped by the melodic tones and guttural vowel sounds of what is still my favorite language. Reid just sat there amused, laughing to herself at what must have been the most random conversation she’s listened to during her time here. I love that we’ve been speaking in French much of the time, but it was nice to take a break.

Anyways, dinner was incredible. We finished the night and our stay in Nice by sitting on the stony beach, talking and listening to the waves until late, before heading back and falling into a deep sleep for a few hours. This morning we reluctantly said our goodbyes to Nice, who had treated us so well this weekend, threw our things in our backpacks and got on the plane back to Paris. I haven’t done much today apart from taking a nap in the sunshine (yay! Finally good weather in Paris!), but am very excited to have dinner with Jan tonight, yet another good friend from Harvard who was able to come over from Germany. These days, I look at my life and I can’t help but feel blessed.

Only a week left!

No rain today!

I’m not usually one to talk about the weather (although it’s impossible to avoid doing with strangers, aka my host family’s friends), but it sure makes a difference not to have to carry an umbrella with me everywhere I go.

He's been thinking for a long time.

To celebrate the sun, and as suggested by my mom, I decided to go to Le Musée Rodin today. I have to admit, I was pleasantly surprised. Because I have never tried sculpture myself, I tend to get less fulfillment out of looking at sculptures than say, paintings by the Impressionists (*cough cough Musée d’Orsay*). But Rodin was an exception.

There’s so much life in his sculptures. He manages to make every face and physique different, despite often times using the same material and even subject matter. And boy, does he know how to represent the human form. He captured back muscles I didn’t even know we had (well, I probably don’t have them, but you know what I mean). With sculpture, it’s especially apparent that the artist once touched – and indeed, toiled over for countless hours – the very same piece you grant perhaps a few minutes. Very cool to literally be able to trace his fingerprints.

The garden itself was beautiful. Lots of trees (and we all know how appealing that is to a foliage-deprived Oregonian). Very quiet, even in the middle of Paris. Although that’s something I’ve noticed here; if you’re not at one of the major tourist attractions (read: the Eiffel Tower), it’s possible to be very much by yourself. Which is nice sometimes. I was able to wander around as I pleased, not minding (too much) when other tourists got in my pictures because I could take my time perusing amongst the sculptures. Plus, the house was also beautiful. I should know the history behind it (it looked awfully historic), but alas, I was more focused on the artwork. An added bonus: I was able to quickly read a synopsis of the temporary installation—in French—without much hesitation.

[On a related note: I just saw a friend of Sophie and Vincent’s, here for dinner, who I’ve seen a couple of times before. The first time I saw her was a week or two into my stay here, and she stopped in the kitchen today to congratulate me on how much I’ve improved since then. Small victories, I tell you.]

For lunch, I had a millefeuille, a flaky, French pastry filled with an eggy cream. If I’m translating the name correctly, it means literally, “a thousand sheets.” Hence why it immediately collapsed as soon as I tried to dig in with my plastic fork (for which I embarrassingly forgot the word when I tried to ask for it at the bakery – it’s fourchette, by the way). The phyllo dough that was so nicely stacked sloughed off in what indeed appeared to be “a thousand sheets.” Oh well. It tasted just as nice.

Speaking of Nice… (see what I did there??) Reid and I leave for Nice tomorrow! Asdfkjlk! So excited. We were a little nervous because, earlier in the week, the forecast predicted thunderstorms just during the days that we were going to be there (really, France? really?), but it now appears to be just peachy. Again about the weather thing. Makes a big difference. Our flight leaves tomorrow at 8-something (pm), and then we’ll get back very early Sunday morning, just in time to greet our favorite German (or one of them, at least), Jan. He’ll be staying in Paris for a few days, which should be fun to re-do (or do for the first time, in some cases), the more touristy things with him. The next little while will be quite busy, but that’s a good thing, considering I don’t have all that much time left. Can’t wait to see you all…

xx

La vie en rose

Another example of my dependence on technology: the Wi-Fi at my house hasn't been working. Thus, I've been forced to come to Reid Hall to check my email, upload photos, etc. Not to mention, I have a presentation to give today, for which I hadn't been able to do any research until this morning... yikes.

Also yikes -- I got my phone bill for June today: $72.50 (!). Good heavens. The worst part is that it's not entirely my fault! I looked in my call log and my phone has been making a bunch of calls on its own to random, non-existent numbers when it gets tousled around in my backpack. Still, I should probably cut down on texts unless absolutely necessary. Not exactly how I wanted to be spending my grant money, but I've learned my lesson.

Anyways, mundane problems aside, Paris has been good to me lately. It hasn't rained in the past couple of days (cue knocking furiously on every piece of wood available) and it's starting to hit me how soon I'll be going home (11 days - crazy!) so I'm trying to soak up little aspects of my daily routine, as well as hitting up things I haven't done yet.

Yesterday was the perfect example of how my French has proven useful for me. I decided to walk to l'Orangerie, the relatively small museum in the Jardin Tuilleries along the Seine, featured in Midnight in Paris and famous for housing huge canvases of Monet. I would have taken pictures had it not been so heavily monitored.

First of all, going through security at the entrance (as is normal here in a city with so many museums full of foreigners), the man inspecting my bag thought I was French. I said a few phrases about my backpack being heavy, and he asked me, "D'où en France êtes-vous?" (where in France are you from). It was so flattering, even if false flattery. Yes! I don't sound (as much) like such a foreigner anymore!

I then spent a long time looking at art. In addition to the famous waterlilies (called, Les Nymphéas - so much prettier), there was a slew of Cézanne, Renoir and artwork by a dozen other artists downstairs. I'm not a huge fan of Renoir, actually, but Cézanne is my vice. I was so immersed in his work, trying to figure out which colors he put down first and how he got the shadows so perfectly, that I didn't realize I was standing about three inches away from the painting I was looking at. The security guard came over to me, tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Attention, il ne faut pas être aussi proche à l'oeuvre" (excuse me, you can't be so close to the work). I was a bit startled and so quickly moved backwards, unintentionally bumping into the man behind me (who was surely trying futilely to get a glimpse over my shoulder) and subsequently stepping on his toe. Oops. I guess that's what you get for being such an art fanatic. Also, the plaques next to each painting had no English translations, so I wouldn't have been able to understand the titles had I not known French. Not life-changing, but personally useful.

Then I walked around Paris for a long time (I don't have class until 5pm on Mondays), traversing the Jardin du Luxembourg (see above). While strolling along the Seine for the thousandth time, I stopped to buy some artsy-and-cheap postcards (the best kind) from a vender at one of the bouquinistes: a beautiful name for the people selling books, posters, and touristy trinkets out of these green, metal pop-up treasure chests that line the sidewalks by the river. The vender was a bit grumpy at first. Perhaps she'd had one-too-many finicky foreigners already that morning. Regardless, she softened up once I started speaking French with her. I even got her to smile by the end of the transaction.

The little pleasures of learning a language. And I guess the view's not a bad perk, either.

Also, I looked today and the country with the second largest number of followers of my blog (next the United States) is Russia. How....?