Week 11: Prolongé

As in grève encore prolongée, the subject line of the most recent email received from our advisor at school here. Strike extended again. Until next Monday, bien sûr. Well, you already know how I feel about that (if you are a loyal reader), so I won't talk about it anymore. Though it really is hard to talk about anything else. I haven't done anything as exciting as travel to North Africa, and nothing nearly as exciting as making and eating a huge cookie (again- have you been a loyal reader?)

Now I go to school to try to study a bit at the library there and also to get lunch (because it's good and 2.50 euros) but of course not to go to any class. Some new graffiti appeared on campus today, and we also happened to get there when they were re-voting about the grève. A lot of people voted, though I didn't get a shot of all their hands up.


I noticed one of my teachers leading the vote (wearing the sunglasses). He's supposed to be teaching me about American Civilization right now!


There was an anti-police sentiment in the graffiti today- not totally sure what that's about besides the police = The Man. This one is pretty funny- "We want to study so we won't end up being policemen." Notice the - now unreadable - school map.


And finally, "Police everywhere, Justice nowhere. Free (as in liberty, not as in price) and open university for all!"

My host parents told me to write something up about the grève to give to my profs at home. Unfortunately, I really don't think my History major advisor wants to give me credit for being there when history was made.

Terrible news received today. They may start classes up on April 15th again, in which case they would cancel our spring break. I already bought 100 euros worth of train tickets for spring break. I really, really hope that this doesn't happen or at least that my tickets are refundable. If I do get to take my planned spring break, we will being going to Basque Country (Bayonne, San Sebastian), Provence (Aix-en-Provence, Avignon), and the Riviera (Nice, Monaco) for about 3-4 days each. I am so excited and will be so sad if I can't go!

I'll try to achieve something during Week 12 so I don't have to write another bummer blog entry, but right now I'm looking forward to a week of more café going, pain au chocolat eating, and complaining about the grève. Anyway, bisous!

Supplementary Rant

So, no vocab words or cute pictures or even a week number since I am smack dab in the middle of Week 11. No no, I am just PISSED. Overall, my stay here has been great and I am so glad I came- a pretty incredible thing for me to say considering how terrible my health + this university has been. I blame my time getting sick, being sick, and recovering from sickness for this belated anger at the Université de Bordeaux, UC Berkeley, and EAP. I guess before I just thought that class would eventually resume and that when I had a final assignment I would at least have a couple lectures worth of notes or SOMETHING. I was also just never really that upset because I always assume the grève would end soon. Here is how it works: grève organizers (students and profs, I think) hold a general assembly to vote on whether the school should be bloqué for the next week or so. The only people's whose votes count are those present (organizational pitfall here!) They schedule "re-votes" pretty arbitrarily but it is always at 12:30pm and usually on Monday, with that vote lasting until Wednesday or Thursday at which point they vote again to have a re-vote the next Monday and on and on and on...

I didn't really want to think about this in depth beacuse it makes me sad, but here goes. We started our classes on January 19th. As of the week of February 2nd, there was grève partielle and only a couple of my profs would talk about the grève during class instead of teach, and we thought it was exciting and cool that we were here to see history being made, and funny that the French really are always on strike. I thought it was pretty cool and also pretty funny that it was my college (Bordeaux III) and my department (History) that were leading the charge. A week or two off of school? Cool, right? But we began to wonder how long this was going to go on...it had been a month...the government was doing nothing in response...more and more of my classes weren't being held...how were we going to get our credit...I support their cause wholeheartedly, but... then it hit us. The school was blocked Monday, March 9th. Blocked meaning tables block the doors and you have to talk to angry grèvistes to be able to be let in. They decided on Monday to be blocked until a re-vote on Thursday...aaaand then the cycle began. Today they decided to stay blocked until Monday, March 30 when (you guessed it) they're going to re-vote. Classes end on April 18th. That means that 3 weeks remain in which they could start teaching again suddenly. What would they teach? Where would they start? If the government hasn't made any changes, why would they stop the grève now? They've already come so far, right?

So we are "teaching ourselves." This is not what I signed up for. I was always understanding of the situation because honestly I don't know what else EAP or Cal can do. I am still understanding, but at the same time incredibly frustrated. Work based completely on self motivation without any form of deadline is probably my worst nightmare.

Well you know what? It doesn't matter. It really doesn't because this is what I need to do if I want credit for my courses and for my time here not to have gone to waste- period. So I might as well stop complaining and start working. (There's that Protestant work ethic!)

Weeks 9 and 10: Les Beaux Jours de Bordeaux

(The blog says this is from March 15, 2009 because that's when I wrote the title and the first paragraph, but I finished it a week later so it SHOULD say March 22, 2009. I can't fix it so that's that. Note that I am approximately halfway done living in France now...)

The beautiful days in Bordeaux... Good times in Bordeaux... you know, I'm not sure how to translate the title because it English it just sounds funny. It's halfway a joke- last week I was super sick with a nasty virus, but just as I was beginning to feel better, the sun came out and the weather here got gorgeous. Being sick abroad SUCKS, but it was nice to have my host mom here asking about me all the time and giving me French tylenol for my fever. So that was a week totally wasted and gone. Luckily, the grève continues and I have only one class per week (EU History for non-native French speakers at 8:30 on Thursday- yuck) so I didn't miss anything.

But then Spring arrived in Bordeaux and my fever left and all was good in the world again. We went to a picnic and I was kind of in a daze because I had been in bed for 4 days and I might have still had a little fever. Note the tanktops and skirts! (Sorry, Shaz, it's the only photo I had)


The weather has been so beautiful and we have had no class. So we have picnics, take boat rides on La Garonne, the river that runs through Bordeaux...


... walk along the Quay, where they have a skate park and a good ice cream shop...


Yeah, no helmets on any of the kids. French people are literally too cool to wear helmets. We go to museums, and sit for hours talking in cafés. We complain about the grève, but I'm not sure if I've ever been so relaxed in my entire life. I really don't know how I'll be able to go back to late nights up writing, long days of reading long books, running around like a chicken with its head cut off, and barely any time at all to actually enjoy good food, good friends, good weather, and how wonderful my life really is. I'm going to cross that bridge when I get to it.

On Thursday, after Moravia and I had our 8:30 am midterm canceled because not enough students were present (the trams were only running halfway because of a national, general grève for the day), we miraculously got invited to go to the beach with April and some of her newfound French friends. So we spent most of the day on a beach with NO ONE ON IT, the sun shining, doing nothing at all but collecting shells and digging holes in the sand. It was so, so beautiful and such a perfect day- but no one had a camera. Just imagine an almost untouched, calm, sunny beach, with clear blue water and no one in sight- it was really just wonderful. Very interesting fact: the beach had a few leftover German bunkers on it still. That's right- German bunkers. In terms of History, Europe beats California hands down. Thanks so much for inviting us, April!

On Friday my host family left for a weekend at the beach. So I had a party! Well... Moravia and Shahzadi came over and we made a gigantic chocolate chip cookie to eat with ice cream...


... yeah, we felt like we were going to throw up after we finished it...


...and then we watched Out of Africa until we fell asleep...


So not exactly a party but still my idea of a crazy fun night. The next night we had a potluck, which was also very nice, but I have no pictures.

Well there you have my life here in France for the moment. I think it was probably good that I saved two weeks for this entry- nothing much happens in the day to day here. I'm planning a Spring Break trip around southern France in a few weeks, a trip to the UK when I get out of class with Ali, and (drumroll, please) Italy, Sicily, and Paris with Mike at the end of May! He bought his ticket and applied for his passport, so we are on our way. I will update more on our official itinterary when it actually becomes official, but for certain we are starting in Rome, I want to visit Ragusa, where my great-grandpa was born and raised, and we are ending in Paris. I think we'll be traveling almost exclusively with Eurail passes.

That's all for now! Bisous!

*Thanks Shahzadi and Moravia for pics

Part I: Holiday in Spain, Part II: Le Maghreb, Part III: Why aren't we in Marrakesh anymore?

Weeks 7 and 8 have been late because I have just been too overwhelmed with how much I have to say! February Break was easily the most fun trip I have ever been on, it was way overstimulating, and such a huge break from what my life here has been like up until then. My life in Bordeaux is VERY relaxed, lazy, nice, and quiet. My one responsibility is classes, and those haven't even been taking place for a few weeks now. And then I go on this crazy whirlwind trip to Spain and North Africa for a week and a half- talk about shaking things up!

The break has three parts because we went to Barcelona, Marrakesh, and then back to Barcelona. By the second trip to Barcelona we were pretty tired and not too active and also most of the pictures I lost were from that part of the trip- so Part III is actually pictures from Part I, if that makes any sense.

Part I: Holiday in Spain (February 19-22)

So Thursday I left with Moravia and Elita to take a train to Paris. From Paris we went to Beauvais, an hour outside Paris, because we got tricked by Ryanair into traveling from "Paris" (really Beauvais) to "Barcelona" (really Girona, an hour away from the real city). In any case, we finally got to Barcelona at 2 in the morning Friday morning, checked into the hostel, locked our bags up, and crashed.

We met up with Shahzadi on Friday and the 4 of us spent most of the rest of the vacation together. Barcelona weather was very nice and so sunny! I actually got sunburned and I think my body went into shock after being in the cloudy and cold Southwest France (yuck). We stopped by the beach with a picnic that we had picked up from the giant, gorgeous, and overstimulating market called the Boqueria. The beach was pretty, but very Santa Cruz... the water was freezing.

What else did we do? We had tapas, went to the Sagrada Familia, saw Gaudi's Park Guell (sorry, sp?), made a fun dinner in the hostel (well Shaz and Elita made it and Moravia and I ate it), and saw a carnavale parade. Many of these photos are courtesy of Elita:

Barcelona was pretty relaxing for me- it had none of the pressure that Paris had to see everything that I had been dreaming about for so long. This made it more relaxing, but also less fulfilling because I really couldn't appreciate a lot of the history and culture as much as I might have. Also, I had two Spanish speakers with me and I can't speak it at all so I was pretty dependent on the girls. This, by the way, has made me much more confident of my French abilities because I see what it means to actually not speak a language!

Part II: Le Maghreb (February 23-26)

Le Maghreb: my favorite kind of French word- the kind with no English equivalent. Well, we actually just call it North Africa, but I don't think that really catches the whole meaning. It's actually the area of Africa caught between the Sahara, the Mediterranean, and the Atlantic- so basically Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia.

Monday morning we made the trek back to Girona to catch our flight to Marrakesh. An hour and a half later, we were in the Marrakesh airport- and it was heaven at 75 degrees. After going back to our beautiful riad we went to get lunch in the square (couscous with raisins and chicken). We started talking about trips we had taken with our families when we were younger, and I started to think about my trip to Hawaii when I was 11 or 12. I remember getting off the plane and being struck by the humidity and by how good it smelled there- but nothing else. I'm not sure what 11 year old Julia was thinking, but I guess I was expecting a different world- I mean we were on a plane for something like 6 hours! But the world in Hawaii just wasn't that different from the world in California, apart from the astounding natural beauty. Everyone looked the same and spoke the same and dressed the same as we did (we even met people from my school and some of my mom's students there). The people all acted the same, the street signs were the same, and the food was nothing too different from what I've already had (except the massive amounts of pineapple which rocked!) I'm not complaining about Hawaii, seriously I'm not, but when I got to Morocco I felt like I actually did enter a different world. (Almost) everything was foreign- and it was great.
We didn't actually accomplish all that much when we were there- it isn't like a trip to Paris where you can say I went to Louvre, le Musée d'Orsay, the Latin Quarter, blah blah. I feel like a lot of my trip was just soaking up the area around me- the sights, sounds, smells, and tastes of a place so very different from what I'm used to. The shot above is from the terrace of a café where we sat to take a break after a long day of haggling for souvenirs and ignoring calls of "Mademoiselle! Excuse me! French? English? Fish and Chips?" or, for Elita, "Nee how! Konnichiwa! Chinoise? Japonaise?" Yeah... political correctedness is not a priority.

Isn't the square beautiful? It's called the Djemaa el Fna and those are the orange juice and tea stands that are there during the day. At night it looks like this:


There are snake charmers, little bands playing music, women selling henna, and kids selling little packets of tissues at the outer edges. Further in, where you see the light there, are the 50 or so food stands selling kababs, couscous, etc. mostly to tourists. There, at stand #22, is where I had some of the best food since I left the states. I had some kind of meat kabab- I think it was lamb but was not sure (aren't you proud of me, Dad?), a veggie kabab, olives, fresh bread, and some kind of spicy red pepper dipping sauce for it. And guess what? This is the biggest surprise of the whole trip, especially if you know me well: my stomach was fine. Like seriously fine. I've had way worse stomachaches eating at places in Berkeley. (House of Curries, anyone?)

Every morning we woke up to this breakfast, for 2 euros (22 dirhams):


Oh my gosh- fresh bread, butter, jam, freshly squeezed orange juice, and tea. The middle of the building was like a courtyard with the roof able to be open or closed. So we ate our wonderful breakfast with the sun shining down on us and the little birds singing from the roof and sometimes even flying down to hop around by our feet as we ate. Such a nice way to start the morning, and such a contrast to the rest of our day spent in dusty, kind of stinky, kind of stressful, but very fun streets and souks of Marrakesh.

We went to a hammam, a traditional Moroccan bath, with some of the very, very kind and welcoming women who worked at our riad and who soon became our friends. The story of our trip to the hammam is just too epic for my little blog and so you will have to hear it some other time, but it was a very mind-opening, puritanical tendency-erasing experience. And afterwards we were hungry because we were there for 3 hours! So Khadija and Rachida showed us how to make a tagine. This is it before it was cooked. I guess after it was cooked we were too busy eating to take pictures of it- it tasted as good as it looks:


When the ladies were making the tagine I suddenly became very verklempt. I say that, but I'm not joking- I almost started crying. They were cutting carrots, and Khadija gave me a piece of carrot to eat while they were working- so much like my mom and my grandma. I love my host mom and my host family- but I still haven't felt like they are like my family- probably because they have very little in common with my very affectionate, very emotional, very into food, kind of loud, Italian-American family (sorry about the stereotypical caricature, but it's true!) I know I'm a mushball, but whatever- I was verklempt.

A bit about safety, since it's something everyone is worried about. Everyone I know thinks I'm crazy when it comes to safety. My mom thinks I'm foolishly trusting and my friends think I'm foolishly worried. Anyway, we had no men with us but the four of us stayed together the entire time. That advice about having men with you when you travel to Morocco... I'm not sure how important that is in a city like Marrakesh. We were very careful to stay in populated areas, were not out late at night, and had really researched the place where we stayed. Maybe if we hadn't been so careful we might have felt more of a threat- maybe if we had stayed longer. But speaking French was very helpful, as was having so many of us. My fear for the most part was of being ripped off, which I probably was a few times. But I was never really genuinely afraid for my safety at any time.

I was so sad to leave Marrakesh- actually from the first day we got there I was dreading having to leave in only a few short days. It was not enough time at all- we didn't go to the desert and we didn't ride camels, which was actually ok for me, but I would have just liked to stay there longer. But on Friday morning we left to go back to Barcelona...

Part III: Why aren't we in Marrakesh anymore? (February 27-March 2)

We got back to Barcelona and stayed in the same hostel as before because it was super clean and had free breakfast. Shahzadi went to Madrid for the second weekend (which I wish we had done too, kinda) so it was just the three of us. Barcelona is beautiful, but it really is a bit of a letdown after Marrakesh.

These guys were playing a Spanish version of bocce up near the Olympic stadium, a beautiful spot looking over all of Barcelona. They were pretty funny and really reminded me of playing at Campo di Bocce in LG- they had their measuring tape and would every once in awhile get into a little amiable shouting match about something or other. Don't worry- I didn't get verklempt- but it did remind me of home.



I stupidly got a 6:50AM flight out of Girona to Paris on Monday morning, while my friends bought one for 11:50AM. This meant that I had to get up at 3AM to take the metro to the bus station where I could take the hour long bus to Girona from Barcelona (remember? an hour away from the actual city) I forgot that the metro was closed at 3AM (of course! idiot) and tried to walk to the bus station from the hostel but quickly got lost. Now it's 3:30 and my bus leaves at 3:45. I get a taxi and the guy tells me something in Spanish like "You only had to go back one block and turn left and you'd be there. Yeah, really complicated." I was just like whatever, no hablo espagnol, but he was like "Si, muy complicado, muy complicado" the whole time! Mean, sarcastic old man. Anyway, I missed my bus, and had to wait until 5:15 for the next one. Luckily, I made friends with some very cool and sweet girls from NYU who are studying in Paris and we hung out at the bus station and at the airport where we had to wait until 11:50 after paying 75 euros for missing a flight by 10 minutes.

I met up with Elita and Moravia again, and we got on our flight ok, but when we got to Paris we had missed our trains. For the girls it was ok since their train was a later one than mine, but since my flight was earlier, my train was earlier too, and I missed it by about an hour and fifteen minutes. If you miss a train by more than an hour you need to buy a ticket for a new one. If you buy a ticket at 5PM on a weekday the day of your trip it costs 45 euros. At this point I may have broken down a little. I eventually got home to Bordeaux around 10PM, tired and with a migraine- that was one of the worst days ever. But I did make new friends!

Other than that last day, the trip was a dream- it was even worth that last day of hellishness. And when I got home I had a nice dinner waiting for me and a hug from my host mom. When I got back to school, we learned that the grève has gotten even more intense and that the school may be blocked soon. The History department was blocked (ie, tables blocking the doors so that no one could enter) on Thursday and the rest of the school may be shut down this week- possibly for weeks to come. The French folks are all very nice about it. They shrug apologetically and say "Bienvenue en France." What can you do? I'm told I'll still get my credits and my grades so all I can do is try to go to class and when it's cancelled go drink coffee in the cafeteria. Life is hard.

Another update is coming soon. Love and bisous à tout le monde.

Week 6: Saint Valentin

...Valentine's Day. Very quiet and uncommercial here- I couldn't even find valentines to send out. And the massive amounts of candy and little cards for everyone at school? The girls had no idea what I was talking about.

It has been a pretty quiet week this week. Most of my classes are still canceled, a fact that I only learn after going to the class. I took some pictures of the posters all over campus.


La fac stands for la faculté, or school, university. The next one says 'Students on strike against the education reforms,' which I'm sure any of you who have studied a little Spanish or French got!


I did have a few classes on Thursday last week and one of them was just way too fun. First of all, it was in English because it's in the Anglo-American studies department and it's on British History after 1945. So I think being in a lecture that was so similar to home, even though it was 2 hours long, was just so stimulating and interesting. But also, the professor was just hilarious! He must have been French, but with a perfect English accent- he even dressed English- like Bridget Jones' dad or something. Really ugly sweater- anything un-chic around here really stands out. He was talking about how England had to become much more socialist during and after WWII than it had ever been. He taught the French kids about the Protestant work ethic, and mentioned that in England (and in the US to a certain extent) being lazy was a very very shameful thing. (To us it's like duh, right?) He said, "Can you imagine calling an unemployed person lazy? Can you imagine?" and he repeated it in French for them, just to make sure. Later, I literally could not stop laughing after he said, "In France, we believe you must help the poor, in Britain, you don't help the poor- you kick them!" God, I can't recreate how funny it was but I almost died. I guess it was also context- these kids were actually taking notes and no one laughed besides me when he said that. Like their notes must have been "a. French = help poor, British = kick"

I was actually thinking about that before I had that class. It's one of the huge differences for me here- there is no shame in being lazy. I mean, this is a country that invented joie de vivre, a word that we had to hijack because we don't have an equivalent, even though we have almost seven times the number of words in the English language than the French do. (I know I should cite that number but I really couldn't find a good source. I don't know what the exact number is, but we do have a heck of a lot more words for things than they do.) In any case, I will definitely come back to this point soon, since I spend a lot of time thinking about it here.

Saturday was Valentine's Day and my host family was gone so I had some friends over for a potluck. It was really nice to cook and to have the place to myself. I didn't realize how much I miss having friends to live with- and having my own place.

Anyway, I better get going- I have to pack. Spring Break is next week and I am going to Barcelona and (drumroll, please) Marrakesh, Morocco! I'll be in Barcelona 3 nights, Marrakesh 4, and back to Barcelona for another 3 before heading home on the 2nd. So I'll miss a blog entry but the next one will have TONS of pictures, I am sure. And yes, my mom knows and is only having a minor heart attack. Yes, I will be with many friends and am staying in a safe place. No, I don't even know what hashish is. And finally, yes, I do hope to ride a camel. Bisous!

Week 5: La Tempête

La tempête: the windstorm, gale, or just ordinary storm. Of course the tempest takes a feminine article- French is such a misogynist language. (just kidding... kinda)

So my university is still up in arms about the education reforms. I hope I can get some pictures of all the signs up, etc. Classes are canceled more often than not, but we still need to go and check every day- I guess shooting an email out to your class would be too difficult for some profs. At the same time, France has been dealing with another tempête. This time though, we were allowed to go outside, it just wasn't encouraged. The wind is so strong the rain is basically falling horizontally and it's very hard to stay dry. What a crazy time for me to have come to France!

Even though things here are pretty crazy, I'm still very glad that I came and very psyched to be here. Even la grippe, which in my humble opinion was bronchitis, can't keep me down! My listening comprehension skills are improving, I think, though I still catch myself saying totally grammatically incorrect things. At least I catch myself now! I'm so lucky to have a host family who don't laugh at the ridiculous way I sometimes speak. I need to talk more, but I am still very shy about talking in French- I really hate sounding stupid. And even though they try not to, I think people still stereotype people who speak with incorrect grammar as uninformed or not as smart as someone who speaks correctly.

So my weekend was pretty quiet- I had fun at my host sister's birthday party. I organized a treasure hunt with her older sister (that's right- in French) which turned out well, I think. Except that when I asked Léonie if she liked her treasure hunt she said, "Yes, but it was a little too easy," after having cried all morning that we were making it too difficult and she wanted it to be very easy. What can you do? I took a few photos but I think there is some law against putting up pictures of kids so I avoided those ones.


Interesting fact for you: I'm not sure how common this is, but my host family and all of Léonie's little friends sing Happy Birthday to You in English, even though most of them speak very little to no English at all.


It's nice to see the pretty laid back parenting styles of French parents. No theme for the party- no real food, just a LOT of candy, cake, and fruit juice. Defrosted cake with a candle on it- no Icing on the Cake extravaganza. It wasn't very planned but I guess it was assumed that as long as kids could run around and play with each other under the influence of candy they would be happy- and the assumption was correct! I loved my big birthday extravaganzas when I was little, but this was nice too.

I just got Valentines from my mom and my grandma- so cute! I have a Skype date with Mike on Saturday to watch a movie, in case you were wondering. I'm not sure how dorky that is so I'm not sure if I should tell everyone about it- but I think it's cute. Hope everyone has a good Valentine's Day!

I thought I would be blogging on Sundays, but I guess I'm switching to Wednesdays now- I only have one class at 4:30 and it doesn't take place every week. Sunday is my Skype day- let me know if you want to chat some Sunday morning! I would love to hear from any of you guys!

Love and bisous!

Part I: la grève, Part II: Rick Steves is My Homeboy (Week 4)

Part I: la grève (the strike)

Last week there was a general strike throughout France on Thursday to speak out against many of Sarkozy's reforms lately. 70% of the country is an agreement with those on strike. Since one of the main reforms has to do with education and universities, my school was in a tizzy all week. We had classes that were banalisé, meaning that the teacher wouldn't teach and would only give us information about the grève during class. I have a pretty good understanding of what they're upset about, but I am still a little fuzzy on the details.

We went to a demonstration in one of the amphitheatres and it was really incredible- standing room only. People talked way too fast, the sound wasn't great, and there were a whole lot of idioms in there. But I could understand that when the head of the history department took the mic to speak, the entire amphitheatre cheered and clapped for this little old man in tweed and glasses. (by the way, the history department is leading a lot of the strike- yay!) In fact, almost all of the professors got rounds of applause before and after they gave short talks about how the government is trying to take away our most fundamental right- our right to learn. (yes, they really talk like that) Crowds of people were cheering on professors. Later on in the week, the streets of Bordeaux were packed with more protestors- a lot of teachers, parents, and students, especially. Once again, crowds of people who were very, very angry about the state of their education system. I keep thinking- if only the US could be like that! If only we could love and respect our professors and teachers so much that we cheered for them and marched for them and went on strike for them.

EDIT 2/11: This pic is of the meeting in the amphitheatre- there have been many more good opportunities lately to take pics at school but who would think to bring their camera to school? Guess I have to start! Photo credit: my friend Elita, traveling companion and badass photographer.


I don't think France is perfect or that we can really compare France with the US very well since the countries and the citizens are so different. But there is a certain love and respect for intellectualism here that I think we are really missing at home.

So no class last Thursday because of the grève and no class on Monday because the history professors are still not satisfied, and I'm never actually quite sure if we will have class or not.

Part II: Rick Steves is My Homeboy

His book was my Bible this weekend in Paris- and the map inside of it started getting worn at the edges. I actually got into Paris alone and navigated the metro system to get to where I was staying with my friends. But I was never actually alone because I always had Rick! (sorry, lame, but I seriously love this guy)

I rented an apartment for the weekend that I found on Craigslist with two other girls. The area was nice, very central (3rd arrondissement, near the Marais), and it was cool to have our own, safe place! It was also cheaper than anything, even the hostels. Bummers were that it smelled like smoke and was kinda dirty in that way that guy's studios tend to be. But the owner was very nice- he even showed us around a little bit and fed lunch to my friend who met him in the morning to get the keys.

We did a good amount of the touristy things but definitely not all of them, and a lot of them not very thoroughly. My trip to the Louvre was short because it was free after 8 for students and we only had about an hour and a half- so it was like Mona Lisa! Winged Victory! Venus de Milo is closed! We have to leave! But we did get some cool shots of the pyramid.

I saw Versailles and though the inside was interesting and beautiful, the gardens were freezing and depressing. All the planters were covered like this one.

Paris itself was really really cold the entire time- at or below freezing, and it snowed the morning I left. The top of the Eiffel Tower was colder than I have ever been in my life and it was also kind of terrifying to be up so high with the wind so strong. The only picture of me there is out of focus because I was so scared and cold to be up there. (I know- wuss.)

Montmartre, where the movie Amelie takes place, was very cool and pretty and Sacré-Coeur basilica was one of the most beautiful things I saw in Paris. We got there just when the nuns were singing in the evening and it was so beautiful, peaceful, and spiritual after a day of absolute craziness. Here's a shot from Sacré-Coeur looking down on all of Paris.

Anyway I can't wait to go back to Paris, especially when the weather is better- maybe with Mike this summer? And really do it thoroughly. I heard that I will never get the 20 minute line to see the Eiffel Tower again- but there's a reason why it was only 20 minutes.

Interesting facts for you:
- first Sunday of every month museums are free in Paris (maybe the rest of France?)
- Friday nights museums are free for students
- I never get asked if I'm American- only English (anglaise), and I take that as a compliment
- instead of Groundhog Day they have a holiday where they eat crêpes on February 2
- the movie Groundhog Day is called the Never-ending Day in French
- the West Wing is called the White House (la maison blanche)
- there are little to no commercials here on TV, and none after 8pm (which my host dad said is because Sarkozy has buddies on certain channels)
- the Jewish Quarter in Paris is one of the only places really busy on Sundays because most places are closed. I tasted the best falafel/gyro of my entire life there. (thanks to Rick Steves)
- French primary schools don't have school on Wednesdays so my little host sisters have been underfoot all day today.

I also have a small Part III about French medicine. It's a little different. See, I've had a cold for the entire four weeks that I have been here (yes- four weeks! crazy, huh?) I haven't slept very well, had a crazy 3 days in Paris, and can get pretty stressed out about things when they are out of my control, as they have been often in the past month. So I thought it was just an ongoing cold. But coughing for weeks, and a continued fever are worrisome so I listened to my French mom and my real mom and went to the doctor. "A homeopathic doctor or a traditional doctor?," my host mom asked. Um, traditional, please.

The doc wasn't too weird but at the end she was like, "I'm going to give you some medicine and if after 5 days you don't feel better we can start antibiotics because I don't know if it's a virus or an infection." To me, this was a bit odd. Either I have a cold, in which case you tell me to sleep, drink fluids, and take tylenol, or I have an infection, in which case you give me antibiotics. But no. I got 4 prescriptions: one for fever, one for throat pain, one for coughing, and one for prescription cough drops-- what? I mentioned I have a slight heart defect (well I actually said something like, "Um, my heart? There is something to pay attention infection to my heart," in French) and immediately got some antibiotics too.

So now I'm taking antibiotics that I'm not sure I need, and staying in bed and watching Scrubs on www.surfthechannel.com all day. (By the way, a wonderful website for all TV shows and a lifesaver for me here. ) I'm missing a trip to Lyon this weekend, but will at least get to go to my little host sister's 8th birthday party! No, not sarcastic, I am actually excited for it.

I'm off to drink some tea my host mom made for me- Mariage Frères, a really nice French tea! I hope everything in California (in the Latin American rainforests, Hayley, and in Budapest, Ali) is doing well and I miss you all.