I ate lunch at a place called Flunch.

Tell me that isn’t hilarious, and you will clearly be lying.  It was cafeteria style and I had some delicious spaghetti for just under 4 Euros!  I felt like it was a deal.  This was after we went to Centre Pompidou to view some modern art because it is free on the first Sunday of the month.

Friday night we went to the ballet and saw The Rite of Spring.  It was pretty intense but really good!  We also saw the Eiffel Tower at night which was kind of pretty.  But the real exciting part of the night came from taking the Metro across Paris to pick up our friend Heather who went to see the JayZ concert alone and didn’t want to ride the train back to Versailles alone.  Okay, I lied. It wasn’t that exciting.

After going to sleep around 2, I had to wake up at 7 to go see some chateaus south of Paris.  We came back and tried some Tex-Mex in France, something I don’t recommend doing.  I was exhausted after all of this, but had some minor problems falling asleep due to Ludovic’s crazy dinner party.

All in all a pretty good weekend.  We are getting more comfortable about going to Paris whenever, which is pretty great.  It is just a 40 minuteish train ride away and our Carte Orange covers it, so there is no reason we shouldn’t go fairly often.  Sadly though, it is Sunday and time to crack down on my studies. Booooo.

A whole new level of confusion…

Today at lunch we ate at a Chinese restaurant.  Now I know this does not seem that “crazy” or “out there,” but it totally was.  We went with Lixin, who is from China, and therefore speaks fluent Mandarin.  I would’ve been confused enough about ordering Chinese food in French, but adding in Lixin speaking Mandarin with the woman that worked there reallllly threw me off.  But at least I had a verifiable expert in Chinese food with me!!!  It was pretty exciting.

In conversation, we had chocolate, madeleines, tea, and coffee.  It was amazing.  It may have made my day.  Speaking of which, I’m developing a taste for coffee and espresso, among other things.  I just feel oh-so-adult and mature.  But let’s be honst, I don’t think mature persons say “oh-so-mature.”

One more thing…

I have received a microphone from Matt, so now I can use Skype! If you have Skype and want to chat with yours truly, just name the time and I’ll be prepared. Also, speaking of contacting me… My email is pamela.henderson@furman.edu just FYI. If you want a postcard, email me your address and I’ll put you on my remarkably long list of people I want to mail things too (I’m SO popular it is INSANE, so I have to mail stuff to a lot of people.)

Exhausted

Today we visited Musee Rodin and got to see The Thinker.  These Wednesday visits always make me quite tired, especially since I had my first paper due today.  It was a sweet three page handwritten paper on French food.  It sounds easy, and it was.  But somehow I will likely not have done so hot due to intense French grammar mistakes.  Perhaps it is better than I think though??

Nothing that eventful or remarkable has gone on lately… Gosh, Europe is so boring!!! Kidding, don’t worry.  I went shopping instead of HW, but I mean that is really pretty typical.  Other than that, just typical French life.  The only kind of life for me, really…

I better get on my homework though.  It is SO much harder to do homework while you are in France.  Something about the air, perhaps?? I don’t know, you tell me!

I should be studying

But I clearly think that blogging is much more fun than studying.  Maybe this is a bad attitude to have and could explain my less than perfect grades.  I mean I am in France afterall, you can’t expect me to study ALL the time.  I have to enjoy the fab. culture too!

This weekend we had some crazy touristy times in Normandy.  We saw lots of Cathedrals, the beaches of Normandy, this really long (70meter) tapestry, and Mont St. Michel, which was way way lovely.  We also spent hours on a sweet bus and ate some delicious food.  Lots of tourist action and delicious food is becoming my day-to-day life in France.  I also had an interesting experience with people lying to me about a mango being an australian banana but that is really a whole other story altogether.  Don’t worry, I didn’t buy their lies for a minute.

I’m quite exhausted from the weekend because Anna and I had some sweet slumber-partyish times in our hotel room.  It involved matching Salty Dog t-shirts, so I’m pretty sure you are jealous you weren’t there.

The weekend ended with me eating quiche from a gas station that was actually quite delcious.  But really, what kind of country has quiche at gas stations but not PEANUT BUTTER!  It is ridiculous.

I better go study some sweet irregular verb tenses that I likely can’t pronounce very well either.  I may update later, but I have to write a paper for civ class.  I also am going to try to make a new photo album with ALL my photos and I’ll post the site on here whenever that occurs.  Hopefully my camera will decide to not be difficult!

Birthday Edition: Anna’s 20th

WOOOO HAPPY 20th Anna!!!!!  Today is Anna’s birthday.  Pretty much one of the more exciting events of the term, no doubt.  We went to a creperie for lunch and I had the most amazing dessert OF MY LIFE.  (Somehow I think this blog will slowly turn in to just me describing my desserts each day…)  It was a crepe with hot chocolate, ice cream, bananas, and almonds.  It was pretty much to die for.  I could go for one now actually…

Tonight we are going to the sweet cyber cafe and then who knooows!!!!  The celebration will likely continue on into the evening for hours and hours.  It will then continue further into this weekend as we travel to Normandy for some sweet sight seeing.  We leave tomorrow at one and get back Sunday afternoon I believe.  Should be a swell time!

Sometimes, a fun thing to do is to pretend to be homeless.

Yesterday at lunch, it was raining.  We’d gotten lunch somewhere but were lacking a place to eat it.  (We usually eat on a bench somewhere when it is pretty.)  We were not coming up with anything good, but were right by the train station. Genius Leslie suggested that we go sit on a train and perhaps go to Paris for a cafe and eat on the way.  Our Carte Orange lets us take any train to Paris anytime so it was a lovely plan.  We got on the train, but it didn’t leave for 15 minutes so we ending up eating and getting off without anyone even checking our tickets…  It madely feel pretty homeless, but it worked out oddly well.

Today we visited the chateau in Versailles.  It was outrageous.  They don’t keep all of it open but the part we did see was likely the most ridiculous place ever.  Every little detail is SO elaborate.  Plus it is HUGE!  We’d already spent an entire day covering the grounds without going in. Now I finally understand what all the fuss is always about.  It is kind of weird that I live within a 10 minute walk to the front gate, and even closer to a gate that leads to the gardens.

It is time to get ready for bed though.  Big day tomorrow and big weekend.  Anna’s birthday is tomorrow AND I have a quiz in the morning.  This weekend we are traveling to Normandy.  Pretty pumped for that.

I added photos —->

Yay photos! They are pretty swell if I may say so myself…  Well, that is actually a lie.  Matt added the photos because I’m computer retarded apparently.  He also chose which ones sooo don’t ask me about the selection.
Things are pretty great over here in France except for all the rainy days lately (boo.) I had the most delicious chocolate eclair with chocolate filling today. It pretty much made my entire day because it was SO good. The food here HAS to be the best part. Readjustment to the DH is going to be oh so difficult and painful. I’m surely going to be a brat about it.

Last night, I watched a ridiculous French satire horror movie. It had about the same comedy level of Airplane! so I clearly rather enjoyed it. I didn’t know they made things like that here…

I’d like to give some birthday shoutouts for this week, as I have several!!! Firstly, Grandpa’s birthday was last week (the 16th I believe.) Terribly sorry I missed it. I believe he is turning 25. Thursday is Anna’s birthday. She’ll be 20!!!! And we are totally attending the kareoke at McDonalds in Versailles to celebrate (which is pretty much the most ridiculous thing EVER.) Check out her blog, it is over on the right of my website. And finally, my dad’s bday is Sunday soooo Happy Birthday!!!!!!! Yay!

Charlie, Olivier, and Monet…

I had quite a weekend I must say. Well not really that exciting, but I first must begin this post with some very ridiculous news. In France, Where’s Waldo is called something different. I know what you are thinking, clearly it is called something different because it has to be in French! But no, what I mean is, they changed Waldo’s name. VERY upsetting I know. In France it is Ou est Charlie? Yes, they changed Waldo to Charlie. Who are these people really??? But it is exactly the same thing! Very strange.

Friday, we went to Paris for the afternoon and I did some crazy shopping with Anna and Heather at H&M. But don’t worry, this was only after we ate at McDonalds (because it has free wireless and most are not as lucky as I, and do not have wireless in their homes.) Firstly, the McDonalds was totally cool and really nice. It was bizarre. It was absolutely PACKED and it was pretty good sized. Also, the food was undoubtedly better than in the US and they had the “McCafe” (I swear I’m not making this up) where they sell cute French things like croissants etc.  We also had to share a table with three French men because there was no other space.  It was kind of hilarious.
Friday night, I had a lovely dinner with Gwenola and her 3 friends, but mainly I just stared at them because who knows really what they were talking about. They did ask me some questions about Mormons and Shakers though…

Saturday was a group trip to Giverny to see Monet’s house (which was LOVELY and I would have lots of photos but my camera won’t upload!) and a chateau that was built for Henry the 2nd’s mistress. I somehow ended up sitting at lunch (which was AMAZING) by Olivier, the bus driver, who knows no English. Therefore, I awkwardly spoke in French to Olivier while drinking wine to my heart’s content. Very bizarre compared to my usual lunches back home… We have learned a couple things during this lunch, such as, Olivier does not know who Jay-Z is and I think he may have said he understood my English better than my French, which has to be a bad sign.

Last night we had a little dinner at Rachel’s house because her parents were out for the evening. It was cute and fun and all quite hilarious.

Today I think I’m supposed to go see Marie Antoinette’s house. But this just really isn’t interesting me for some reason. Maybe we will come up with something more fun.

I think I’m beginning to love it here!

Not that I ever really disliked it, but my comfort is definitely growing.  So with that, of course, comes more and more happiness.

Today I had some sweet classes.  Absolutely nothing out of the ordinary.  But I did have this delicious little quiche for lunch!  Just 2 euros!! Pas mal if you ask me.  I passed out after class because I was exhasuted.  This could possibly be because Scarlett (the dog) was trying to get in my room for an hour or so while I was trying to sleep last night.  Finally I just let her and she stared at me for a while then decided to sleep on my floor.  I am not sure why this was better than sleeping outside of my room on the floor…

My French family gave me an extra cell phone so I have my very own French number!!! So if you are interested, you could call me there.  I’m pretty pumped about it.

Tonight, the group and all the professors had a dinner at a restaurant called Pakito!  It was Spanish I think.  It was really good and fun.  It also involved endless sangria…. It was quite ridiculous really, but I really enjoyed myself.  Tomorrow, its the weekend!!!!!! Hopefully I’ll come up with something totally awesome to do tomorrow night!