I figured out pictures! So here are just a few...


This is Jessi (ma camarade de chambre) and me at a castle in the Loire Valley two weekends ago. The castle was beautiful, but I was terribly sick. But check it out, the castle even has a MOAT.


This is Jessi and me again... Last weekend at Versailles in a fountain-surrounded arena in the gardens.

This is the garden in the courtyard of the apartment where I live. Jealous? When we asked Madame if most French apartments have gardens like this, she replied, "Oh, non, non, nous avons de la chance!" (No, we are just very lucky!) To get to this garden, we have to take the main spiral staircase all the way down past entry level to the bottom back door. And this is the epitome of Frenchness: The door to the garden has an automatic lock, BUT NO ONE HAS A KEY OR KNOWS THE CODE. No one. Not even the gardienne of the apartment (like a doorman who lives in) knows it. So when you go to the garden, in order to not get locked in the courtyard two floors below where anyone lives, they leave a large stick next to the door, and you have to make sure you put the stick in the door so it doesn't close while you are out there.

The gardens of Luxembourg, with the Senat in the background. My favorite place to go read, write letters, and eat gaufres au chantilly (waffles with whipped cream).

Hands down my favorite site in Paris thus far. Fontaine des Medicis in the gardens of Luxembourg, built 300 or 400 years ago. AMAZING.

This is Rachel (ma meilleure amie de lycee) and me on the Pont des Arts in front of the Assemblies Nationales last week.

More to come soon!

~Blair

In order to understand exactly WHY living in France is so different, there are some things you should know.
1. There is no word in the french language for "seventy." So when you count, it goes "sixty-nine, sixty-ten, sixty-eleven," all the way up to "sixty-nineteen, eighty." But there is also no word for "ninety." This is complicated by the fact that the word for "eighty" means, literally, "four-twentys". So when you get up to ninety-seven, it is "quatre-vingt-dix-sept," or "4 twentys and seventeen," which requires both addition and multiplication, and always makes me pause and add it up in my head.
2. Baskets of bread at restaurants here come without a cloth lining the basket, and that is completely normal. Sour cream (or Creme Fraiche, which is the closest thing they have to it here) is sold in the grocery store out of big buckets in a chest of ice. Bugs could land in there. But nobody cares. But walk around the house barefoot and you are ridiculous and dirty.
3. There is this widespread stereotype that American young people do nothing but drink alcohol. And so it is bizarre to everyone here when I can’t open a bottle of wine and don’t want more than one glass with dinner.
4. I look French. Fair skin, light eyes, straight brown hair. But that makes things complicated when I open my mouth and people immediately know that I am not. Because then it is, "oh, but you look so French, you act so French," whatever, but they are so surprised they start speaking English, which is exactly what I don’t want.
5. Eggs are not kept refrigerated in the grocery store. Or in the kitchen of the woman we live with. And it is nearly impossible to find white ones.
6. Milk is only sold in two varieties: "entier" or "demi-ecreme," Entier is basically whole... and I haven’t figured out demi-ecreme yet. It is either like half-and-half or like half of whole milk, but it is what we always buy.
7. Milk is way more expensive if you buy the kind that comes in plastic bottles by the liter. If you buy the kind that doesn’t have to be refrigerated and comes in a box, it is cheaper. But drinking room temperature milk out of a box is a little too shady for me.
8. People USE phone booths here. I always feel like Superman when I step into one though.
9. Clothing stores, even smallish boutiques in normal neighborhoods almost always have security guards installed at the doors. Not like rent-a-cops, but real security people in suits and ties. I don’t really know why. But they are always really polite when you come in and leave.
10. Today the woman we live with invited us for Sunday lunch with her and her daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter. The first course was oysters. I have eaten oysters before, I thought. But in the US at Chinese restaurants or out of a can, oysters are nothing like these suckers. It was like being Ariel in "The Little Mermaid." They were the size of my fist, and the oyster part was too big to swallow all at once, but you aren’t supposed to CHEW them... and they still had their... LIDS attached to them.
11. The French put hazelnuts in EVERYTHING. Candy bars either have whole ones or hazelnut paste that is kind of like peanut butter; nutella is pretty much its own food group here and made of chocolate and hazelnuts; street vendors sell them warm at night; coffee has it mixed in; I mean really the telling thing should be the fact that I know the word for hazelnuts (noisette)... and not the word for doorknob.
12. NOBODY eats Mexican food here. No one. There are no restaurants. And it crushes me to the core, since I pretty much subsist on that in the States. So here we have crepes. All the time. Which I try to convince myself are like tacos, but really they are nothing the same. I still eat them almost everyday though... Here they will put anything in crepes, jelly, sugar, nutella, cheese, ham, it doesn't matter. And they are usually pretty cheap. BUT they are not tacos. If anyone can figure out a way to mail me queso or nachos or taco shells... I would be eternally grateful. Ha.
P.S. Pictures are too complicated to figure out. I don't have the time to mess with it. But perhaps, someday, they will come. If you are lucky.
Just kidding.

Follow that P!

The last few days have been ridiculously French... I spent Thursday wandering the Ile-de-la-Cite on my own– that’s the island in the middle of the Seine where the Cathedral de Notre Dame is located, it used to be all that there was of Paris. Way back in the day. So I went with the intention of visiting the Crypte Archaeologique in front of Notre Dame, which I managed to talk my way into for free. Chivalry may be dead in this country, but if you are not DRESSED like an American and you are "une etudiante de l’histoire de l’art," you can do pretty much as you please. So I talked my way into this tiny underground museum full of ruins of ancient Paris– like, 1st century ROMAN Paris. Pieces of buildings, random artifacts, pretty cool but glad I didn’t pay for it. I’ve become good at making myself read the exhibit notices and plaques in French even when the English translation is right there, which I know is helping me. From there I wandered to Les Halles, an open forum/marketplace with amazing shopping (that’s cheap!!) And great cafes. I sat at the corner table of an outside café, anxious for a break after wandering the Ile all morning, ordered a baguette au fromage and a soda that does not exist in the US and cost as much as my sandwich, but it came in a tall cold glass full of ice and ice cubes, and I would have paid 20 Euros for it if I’d had to. I watched a nun, in her habit, ride through the intersection on her bicycle, followed closely by 3 Jewish boys in school uniforms flying through on their bicycles, bells ringing loudly as they went. So I sat there, trying to read my copy of Cyrano de Bergerac (in French, of course) and act like this was not the most quaint thing I had ever witnessed.
I wandered from there to the Musee d’Orsay, which I also talked my way into for free, though with significantly more difficulty... Had to explain to the ticket man why I should get in free, then the woman at the door, then the man doing security checks. Each time I just told them the person before had said it was fine, but the French love their paperwork so I had to bust out my European student ID card everytime. Ha. The Orsay was cool– I was just wandering, I thought, when I looked up and realized I was in an entire WING of nothing but Monet. And FAMOUS Monet’s at that– so I saw all the Waterlilies, the Garden at Giverny, the Houses of Parliament and the Haystacks– all in one room! Then the Van Gogh wing with Sunflowers but alas, no Starry Night. Lots of other cool masterpieces, but all behind really shiny glass so not as cool as the Louvre, which doesn’t have glare. Spoken like a true Art history nerd/snob. Haha.
Friday I went out again alone (classes have not started yet, which is why I have all this free time). I went to the Palais Royal-Galeries National to see an exhibit on the sources of the art of Walt Disney. If you know me at all, this should not surprise you. At this one I had to pay for a ticket (oh, the horror), so I made sure to get my money’s worth, reading every plaque (AND they were all ONLY in French so I have already begun to add to my French art vocabulary). It was the most amazing exhibit, though... full of French art that inspired Walt and all kinds of things from the Disney archives. It’s called "Il Etait Une Fois" which means "Once Upon A Time" and made me desperately want to go visit EuroDisney while I am here. So fun.
From there it was back to the Ile-de-la-Cite to visit the Cathedral de Saint-Chappelle, which really ought to be more famous than Notre Dame. It had an hour long wait when I arrived, but again, thanks to being an art history snob, I stepped to the front of the line, with my crepe d’abricot confiture in one hand and my euro student ID in the other and got to BYPASS the hour-long wait to get in. Amazing church... 20,000 stained glass scenes and all kinds of sculptures, all up a tiny stone-hewn spiral staircase that made it feel more like being locked in a tower Cinderella-style than going to a cathedral. Got into that one free, too, and even the guard thought I was French when he opened my bag to search it and a French novel fell out. As I bypassed the line (this is not just something they do for me, apparently if you are an art history student you have priority EVERYWHERE in this city, and it just works out well that they put your major and minor on all your student ID cards), I heard an American man say to his wife in the line, "Oh, THAT is how you get to the front of the line. You just have to be young and French and well-dressed." And it was the best compliment of the day. Ha.
I’ve learned the good shopping here, affordable but stylish stores with exotic names like NafNaf (my favorite), Etam, Zara, Pimkie, Celio, Printemps, and Monoprix. Then there are other more British-sounding ones like H&M and Benetton, but even those here are still so... European. So the trick is to find those stores NOT on the Champs des Elysees, where everything is priced twice as high as in other parts of the city... I picked up a few Christmas presents already, and can hardly believe I am so ahead of the game.
Oh, I also went to an international student picnic on the Pont d’Alexandre III with a friend from high school, Rachel, a few nights ago. We were there at sunset, and got to see the Pont Neuf (a famous bridge spanning both of the two halves of the Seine) light up and took pictures of the Assemblies Nationales. We even decided it was too much of a shame that I had yet to see the Moulin Rouge, so at the last minute we boarded the Metro for Pigalle, the shady district where the Moulin Rouge is still located. It is not nearly as cool as in the movie, and there is no giant elephant, but there is a neon windmill that still spins, and for 170 euros you can go see a show there. If you are a sketchy American willing to pay that much to see can-can dancers. But now I have been and it is one less thing to check off the list.
I’m feeling more and more "at home" here, as odd as that may be. It took awhile to get used to the food, the way of life, the style, and the punctuality, but now that I have, it seems like it is all just... NORMAL. Normal to eat pain au chocolats for breakfast, normal to spend 2 and a half hours loitering over lunch, normal to walk past Victor Hugo’s house IN MY NEIGHBORHOOD and normal to see works of Bernini, Michelangelo, Monet, Whistler, and Klimt all over the city. I love every minute.
~B

Chivalry is dead in the city of Paris...
As learned by me, riding home on the Metro in the middle of the night, scrubby from the doctor’s office and feeling awful, stuck standing without even a pole to hold onto as 4 men used up all 8 strapontins (the fold down seat things in Metro trains...). It’s not like they were all old and needed them; or all young and didn’t know better– they definitely ranged from 20ish to 80ish and none of them got up to give me their seat. Not that I’d have taken it anyway. Who am I kidding, I totally would have. I felt awful and the Metro cars are always so hot that all I wanted was to sit down... But instead I learned the important lesson that, in Paris, you just have to watch out for yourself.

Why, you may be asking, was I coming home from the doctor in the middle of the night? Because I have mononucleose infectieuse. Or, as they say in the US, mono. Great. Fabulous. Ha. I suppose, really, it is not that bad. It explains why, after leading hikes and running around on the mountain all summer I can barely climb the stairs to my second floor (really the third floor) apartment without having to stop for breath. It just further goes to prove my motto: why do life simple, when you could complicate the absolute bejeebees out of it? But really, everyday is an adventure... who else do you know that moves to a foreign country for four months, loses all of their worldly possessions for a week, then contracts a potentially months-long illness. Better question: from WHOM did I acquire said illness?? I don’t even know anyone (in the States) with mono... right? The doctor told me not to tell people here-- since it is called "the kissing disease" and everyone greets each other here with cheek kisses, it is presumed to be extremely contagious and apparently has kind of a stigma... "Oh, yes, stop kissing people! And no alcohol either!" were the doctor's two words of advice for me. Not that I was on my way to becoming a raging alky over here, but honestly, send me to Paris for 4 months spanning my 21st birthday, get me used to drinking wine with the woman I live with at dinner, and then, nope, quit. Thanks.

I think this is truly my country... everyone here wears flats, everywhere, because first, who really can walk up and down stairs and rickety wooden escalators in the Metro in stilettos and second, if you have to walk nearly a mile round trip to class or work or whatever, who wants to do that on cobblestone streets in heels? So the selection of flats and espadrilles and slides at the store is vast. And fashionable– significantly moreso than in the states, where the shoe salesmen look at you as though you have three heads when you ask for shoes without spike heels. AND the pointy toe has FINALLY gone back out of style.

The mono thing is really quite frustrating, but now I feel like I have an excuse when I am dying from exhaustion and it gives me a good reason to take breaks during my exploration of the city of Paris, to sit at a café with a Gini Limon or a Café au Lait and watch the world go by, instead of BEING the world flying by.
Love and surely more to come,
B

So much to say this time!

I had what I consider to be my first REAL French conversation yesterday at dinner with Madame Laudet. She is an amazing cook, P.S. But the point is, it was the first REAL OFFICIAL French conversation for me because it is the first time I have ever been able to articulate exactly what I wanted to know and understood everything she had to say back, and I was genuinely interested in the subject matter, AND had we been conversing in English, I don't think there would have been anything else for me to ask/say. For dinner she made chicken curry (which reminds me that I should probably tell you I have been eating meat. 4 years of vegetarianism in the States, I get here for 2 weeks and shoot it all to pieces.) but the curry here is pretty much NOTHING like curry in the states. It's sweet, made with apples, golden raisins, sugar, all kinds of spice, and tiny lumps of chicken. Then you put "hot" mango chutney on it which isn't really very spicy at all, and finely shredded coconut. Delish. Oh, and then you eat it with noodles if you want. Weird. Anyway, dinner was that, plus salad, baguette and cheese plate, which I am now getting used to-- I should be when I think of how much of it I have eaten since arriving here 2 weeks ago... and dessert was "cromble," kind of like cobbler a little bit, with raspberries (which are cheap here), strawberries and more groseilles, which are clear and apparently do not exist in the US yet. Such a shame, considering how delicious they are. In the anise family I think, but that could be a misunderstanding, I don't really know. I am even getting good at drinking wine without having to chase it with water or baguette to get the taste out of my mouth. Ha. In fact, I have discovered that I really do like kirs... White wine with peach or strawberry or cassis syrup in it for flavor. Anyway, the point is that the food here is wondrous and amazing. But back to my first real conversation...

It turns out the woman I lived with was 10 or 11 when "Les Allemans" invaded Paris during WWII. She remembers the Occupation very well; when the threat of the German invasion became inevitable she and her family moved to the country for 3 months to live with an uncle who had a farm there. She couldn't take classes or anything but the uncle was so intent on all of them learning something that he taught her some farming stuff and signed her up for a stenography class (is that even the word in English? I don't know if it is shorthand or dictation or what, but the French word is "Stenographie" and I think that is the same??). After the summer they spent in the country, they had to come back to Paris, so they moved back home and she went back to school, but the Germans occupied Paris for FOUR YEARS (who knew? why do they only teach us the American version in high school??) so they just went about their daily lives with German soldiers everywhere. She said they had no radio, they couldn't take pictures in public, and everything the Germans did was "tres tres estricte!" She was scared of them, and even when the Americans were about to liberate France at Normandie or whatever, the German radio broadcasts kept saying it was all a lie. She said her mother came in and woke her up in the middle of the night when the Americans began to march through the city-- the Germans had imposed a curfew during their whole occupation, but as soon as the Americans came into the city everyone flooded the streets, she said it was like all of Paris had a reunion and finally they could all be French again. Talk about fascinating... It was amazing talking to her about all of it... and feeling like a "vrai Americaine" for not knowing how long the Occupation had lasted or really a lot of other major details about the European side of the war.

So besides the fact that the whole thing was so interesting, I also managed to conduct it all in French and know what was going on. I have also noticed that I have begun to think in French, even when I am in situations where I don't necessarily need to. Walking down the road today I realized I was making a grocery list in my head in French, and I sometimes have found myself translating American songs that I like into French, without even realizing it. Weird. Today I had to go get bloodwork done because even after two weeks here I am still sick, and NO ONE at the lab spoke any English but I still managed to make myself understood in a medical environment where I didn't even really know what was going on.

Which brings me to last night and going to the French doctor. My word. What an adventure. I'll spare you the details of how complicated it was to make an appointment and then to get into the building (french buildings are almost never, with the exception of shops and restaurants, just unlocked, and this one had no buzzer, making things exceptionally complique.) , but once all that was done and I was IN, the building itself was tres shady-- dark and kind of dingy, till I got to the doctor's floor, which of course had chandeliers, murals, ceiling roses, and original art on the walls. Oh, and a fireplace in the waiting room. But the French apparently do not do the receptionist thing-- you just show up, sit down and then the doctor herself comes out of the exam room and yells "Entrez, Entrez-vous!" which means, duh, "Come in." So people just go in the order in which they get there. Luckily this woman was bilingual-- mostly. Though she pegged my weight for me in kilos and then had to convert my temperature so that I would understand that, yes, 39 degrees is way too high. Only, once I had explained everything to her she told me that I was running a 102 degree fever (who knew?) which she found out by sticking a REGULAR thermometer dipped in alcohol into my mouth. NOT just a non-digital thermometer filled with that red stuff, but a legit MERCURY thermometer. I HAVE NEVER EVEN SEEN ONE OF THOSE. She didn't wear gloves but did wear a mask-- ha. And the French are way concerned about the possibility of... what do you call it, the fact that the world is becoming accustomed to antibiotics and soon they won't work or whatever. So in order to prescribe pennicillin or anything like it, here they have to first do a government-issued strep test to make sure they aren't prescribing things needlessly. Weird. The lab was the same way-- ballroom-style rooms with fancy trim and crown moulding, angels carved into the corners of the rooms, but no gloves anywhere to be found. They were very nice though-- even though I didn't answer the first THREE TIMES they called my name because I didn't understand what they were saying. ("Mademoiselle Yurn? Mademoiselle hYuuuurn? Mademoiselle Eeeyurn?" Oh, wait, no one else is moving, that must be me)

I even have become friends with the bartenders at the cafe/bar where I always go to check my email. They are both very nice, very young, and speak french to me even though they HAVE to know I am American. Also, they give me cold wine and ice in my juice, which is a very polite thing to do for Americans here. Since no one drinks ANYTHING cold. I never thought I cared about having things be cold, and I still don't really like ice in my drinks, but after two weeks of room temperature wine, juice, and water all the time, it is soooo nice to come here and have cold drinks. Speaking with them is awesome because they have to be very nearly my age, but they always do their best to understand me even when I don't really know exactly what it is I am ordering.

The French, I discovered this weekend while eating lots of expensive French food provided by the exchange program (as opposed to Parisian food, which really is drastically different-- it's like... Southern home cooking versus "normal"eating elsewhere in the States), drink coffee in the mornings out of large cereal-bowl sized "cups" but they really are bowls-- no handles, just a tiny little pedestal to keep it on the saucer. Coolest thing ever, especially since for the most part here with lunch or dinner they just drink espresso in tiny demitasse cups, so it is really amazing being able to have as much as we want. When I come back to the States, I want to drink coffee out of cereal bowls. But I feel as though it won't go over as well there...

I suppose this is really already much too long, but just to add about this weekend... We visited the Loire River Valley, south of Paris, somewhere in vaguely central France. Tons of beautiful chateaux, which are not just mansions but completely legit castles. I had never really been inside a castle, so visiting these was fabulous. It's still nice enough (especially in the Loire, which is South enough that the weather is about like Atlanta's at this time of year) that the gardens were in full bloom, and I spent as much time wandering gardens, labyrinthes, and wooded trails as I did in the castles themselves. Beautiful artwork, tilework on the floor imported from Delft, Holland, cloth wall-coverings made to match the beds, which all had canopies and curtains, portraits of the owners and just all around Disney-esque fabulousness. So I wandered around after the tour guide gave us free time, feeling out of place in NorthFace hiking boots and Guess blue jeans... like I should have been in a ball gown or a cloak or something, getting ready to dance. SO astoundingly beautiful though. Sunday morning we were up superearly and arrived at Chateau de Chenonceau by 8am (8h00 if you are European). It was still damp out and we could see the mist floating off the moat surrounding the castle. The moat was SOLID green with leaves that had fallen in, but around back it was completely clear and we could see the whole castle reflected in it. It had a real wishing well, a keep that we could climb into to see the view, and the most wonderfully manicured gardens I have ever seen. We have nothing like this in the States. Not the White House, not Biltmore, not the Magic Kingdom. Beautiful.

I stopped and thought yesterday about the difference between life here and the way I spent my summer. I have been to 2 winetastings since coming here-- not because I love wine, but because I was invited, and so I went. So here I go to winetastings; over the summer I made slushpuppies, 100 a day. I've LEARNED to taste wine here-- how to properly go through the long and drawn out process of sniff, swirl, sniff, swish, approve that is required each time you have a glass of wine here. And I have learned that champagne, though delicious and quite elegant-looking, is really no match at all for sparkling cider, which I do not think they drink here. They do have "eaux de vie" here though (literally, water of life) that come in various flavors, but I do not know exactly what they are. Ok, that is enough for now... I have nothing left to say.

Bisous,
Blair
P.S. Last night I discussed with Madame the difference between the US and France-- in the US peanut butter is supercheap and found everywhere; Nutella is expensive and relatively hard to find. Here it is the exact opposite. And she responded "Oui, les Francaises, nous n'aimons pas beaucoup le beurre de cacahuates comme les americains parce qu'il est tres... tres gras!" which means, "yes, you are right, the french don't like peanut butter the way americans do because it is so fattening." Think about the things you know about French food, and you will see why it was hard to hear her say this and keep a straight face.

Back in the Internet WiFi bar again because the wireless that we were able to harness in our apt. is gone. Sadly.

Today in grammar class Jessi and I were called on to act out a scene for everyone else to guess. We each drew names of who we were supposed to be acting-- she was George Bush, I was Jacques Chirac, oddly enough, and then we drew our scene. We were supposed to be "en boite." Now, the French word for box is boite, so we just thought "ok, we are supposed to be 2 leaders of the free world in a box. If anyone can do it, we can." So we sat down on the ground and began to act out our scene, all the while watching our grammar prof giving us odd looks. Pretty soon she figured out what was going on and doubled over laughing so hard she couldn't explain what was so funny. Eventually she caught her breath and told us that apparently "en boite" is different than "en UNE boite" and it means "in a nightclub." And we were acting like homeless people on the side of the road. Hilarious. At least we made that mistake in front of her instead of some unsuspecting frenchperson.

Leave it to me to get a 25Euro traffic violation in a country where it is not even legal for me to drive. Tuesday we were coming home from school, much later than usual, me still sick, when we see French RATP agents (I have no idea what that stands for, BTW) stopping everyone in the Metro station and wanting to see their tickets. At the beginning of every month, we buy these things called "Cartes Oranges" that cost 52,50Euros but let us use the Metro as much as we want all month. So I whip mine out, but it turns out it is mandatory that these silly little tickets have my PICTURE on them. So the guy (who does not even look official, with this RATP rubber band around his bicep) pulls me aside and tells me it is a 25Euro fine. I tried to play the "I don't speak your language" card (which was not difficult, since I barely do) then the "But I didn't know" and then "Are you sure? Why should I believe you?" But he would not let me off and so I blew half the cost of a MONTHLY pass on one silly infraction with the ridiculous French bureaucrazy.

I am feeling better, finally rid of my fever, which is lovely, and the weather is amazing too. Last night we went to the Louvre (it's open late, so we were there till they kicked us out at 22h00), which was amazing and fabulous, even though most of the galleries in our wing don't have electric lighting (it's expensive and bad for the paintings anyway) so after dark it got... really dark. But we did the whirlwind tour and hit up the major things, dodging tourists on the DaVinci Code tour and pretending we were natives. Ha. Then to a cafe for a 8,50Euro bowl of ice cream with chantilly, which I thought was white wine, but as it turns out is just whipped cream. SO DELICIOUS having something familiar though... Yum.

Last time we went to the grocery store (INNO) we bought cereal-- we ended up getting these things called Frosties with Tony the Tiger on the box, thinking they would be Frosted Flakes. Or at least similar. No. Of course not. That would be so very not French. They are these weird pillow shaped... lumps that are orange with brown tiger stripes on each one filled with Nutella. I feel like such a petite fille francaise every time I pour a bowl... Especially this morning when a set of Asterix playing cards fell out. Ha.

Other than that, we chose classes today. A lot of art history for me... A lot of promised visits to the Louvre and a lot of fingers crossed that the credit will transfer to Emory. I really have eaten nothing, it seems, but bread, eggs, cheese, and wine since getting here... and a lot of room-temperature water. They don't refrigerate drinks here, which is well and good when it is 60 or below, but right now it has got to be in the 80s, but I don't really know because all they ever use is Celsius. So it is 23degrees right now. Useful, no?

Useful fact of the week, gleaned from a French tour of Les Invalides, the place where Napoleon is buried: Napoleon was 1.69meters tall. This is only like an inch or something shorter than me, which is fairly impressive for 200 years ago and all the criticism about him being so short.
~B

Ahh, Paris.

Things here are ridiculous. I feel like I am getting used to living in a foreign country, which is a little ridiculous, but yesterday Jessi and I went to an Anglican church a little bit reminiscent of where I worked this summer and it was SO ODD to hear people speaking English. I kept beginning conversations in French, only to receive odd stares from the Brits that largely make up the congregation. It was fun being in church and realizing that the same things go on in France as in the States... though we made fools of ourselves at Communion time when I realized a summer at an Episcopal camp was not enough to teach me how to receive communion from a priest.

Before church we spent the afternoon at the Tuileries, a huge jardin behind the Louvre. At first glance it is much like an American park, but then I realized that all the grass is blocked off and everything is perfectly manicured-- topiary trees, trimmed flower bushes, neatly mown grass but none of it for touching or sitting on. So we found a bench on a shaded path of squared-off trees where we could see kids sailing tiny toy boats in a large fountain and a lot of sculptures throughout the garden, and settled in for an afternoon of reading, writing letters, etc. So parisian.

Today I went walking in our arrondisement (neighborhood) looking for a pharmacy where I could by cold medicine (good luck since I don't know the words for "non-drowsy" or "runny nose") and encountered a building just 3 blocks from my apartment that I wrote a paper on last semester for a modern architecture class I took. JUST DOWN THE STREET FROM ME. This city is so surreal.

Everything is different here... It's like the US was turned upside down, shaken around, and then let go. The first floor of buildings here is called the 0 Floor, which means that what we consider the 2nd floor is only the first. The first night Jessi and I were here, we learned this lesson the hard way when we spent 10 minutes (literally) trying to jimmy our way into an apartment on the second level but first floor of our building. Eventually the owner came out, as our key was still in the door, demanding to know what we were doing. I contend it wasn't our fault, the apartments here are not numbered, there is no way we could have known... but I still felt like a fool and now everytime I walk past his door I cross my fingers he won't come out.

I'm learning to appreciate wine, but the trick at dinner is to drink the first glass slow enough that I finish just at the end of the meal, otherwise I get a refill from the woman I live with, which then puts me back at the beginning of trying to drink it without pulling a face.

We've been to the Arc de Triomphe (at night, superchouette), Notre Dame during mass, so I want to go back because I feel like it didn't count), and a lot of other tourist sites already. Still to go, this week: Les Invalides, the Louvre, the Jardins du Luxembourg, and lots of others.

The bits of American culture that have seeped through to here are so random: a Kelly Clarkson song at the wireless bar/cafe we visit several times a week; a GAP just down the road from us; Cheerios in our grocery store cereal aisle full of Muesli. The stereotype of wine, cheese, and bread has not yet proven wrong... Jessi and I have coffee and croissant (or better, pain au chocolat) for breakfast, quiche or crepes for lunch, and for dinner, baguette with... something that probably has cheese in it. Luckily they do have fruit here, though, so I have been eating my share of melon and pamplemousse. Salad here, though... is truly lacking and really just gross. Note to you: if ever in France, avoid ALL salads at ALL costs.

Enough for now, hopefully soon I will figure out how to put up pictures... Until then, I love you and I miss you.
Lots.
~Blair

MES VALISES SONT ARRIVEES!

If I had ever known how true the idea of me being a gypsy would become, I never would have supported it... ALL my possessions have gone everywhere with me because all I had was my purse. Wearing the same clothes the first two days I was here because I had no euros and no idea where a store was anyway, I truly lived up to the dirty Frog stereotype. A week after I left my house in Raleigh, my bags have arrived here with me. Fabulous. So I have existed the past week without computer (power cord in suitcase), clothes (except for new ones I bought at Monoprix and H & M), and toiletries (except for the bare necessities from Inno). But now "mes affaires" have arrived and I am stoked.

Since I now have time to breathe and quit freaking out about that... The most ridiculously French moments since arriving here: Two days ago I went with Jessi (the other girl I live with in an apartment with one older woman) to a cafe a few blocks from our apartment. We walked in with books to read and letters to write, ordered our drinks (these odd French mixes of wine and something fruity... they are called Kir and I tentatively like them), and looked for a table, but the only one we saw open, though it was only 4pm (16h00), had a dog laying asleep on one side of the booth. We looked at each other and whispered, "well, we will just sit on the same side then..." until Jessi pointed out, "It is a DOG, we could just ask it to move..." This reminded me that in fact we didn't really even need to ASK it, as it probably speaks better French than us anyway, but before we had a chance to introduce ourselves, the dog's owner called it off the booth. As soon as I had sat down on the dog's claimed side, though, he jumped right back up next to me and pushed up against me, then promptly fell asleep. So there I sat, looking out the window at the MotorScooters and SmartCars driving past the Eiffel Tower, sipping my kir, and trying to move as little as possible so as not to disturb the "petit chien" asleep next to me.

Yesterday I made an emergency trip to H&M to buy clothing to wear today since I had no suitcases. Today I put on the black dress I had bought and rushed out the door to my grammar class, sat down on the Metro to head across town and noticed that the woman sitting right next to me was wearing the EXACT same dress as me. As soon as she noticed she put on her sunglasses and turned to look out the window, apparently not as excited to look like a 20-year-old American as I was to look like a 30-year-old Frenchwoman.

The apartment where we live is AMAZING. Paris is in the midst of what MUST be a heat wave; we've worn shortsleeves everyday since I got here. Buildings here are almost never airconditioned, so we sleep every night with the windows open... these huge, door-size old windows with sheer curtains billowing in with the breeze. My street is SILENT at night unless a motorbike drives by or at 1am when the bars close and people, quite literally, walk down the road singing some kind of French drinking song. So I open the windows at night and stand out on the tiny balcony, looking across the cobbled street to the ancient beautiful building across the street that blocks most of my view of The Eiffel Tower. My room is so much bigger than anywhere I have ever had to myself... with some of my favorite artwork hanging on the walls and a weird drying rack contraption on pulleys above the bathtub because I guess they don't dry their clothes here. Who knew? So basically the place is amazing, in the 16eme arrondissement, which is kind of like a district. My grammar prof says it is "tres chic" and perhaps old money. By which she might mean old PEOPLE but that is cool with me. The elevator in the building is also amazing... we haven't quite figured out how to work it, but it is wooden with wooden glass doors that have to be pulled in, and then an iron gate that has to be pushed out so getting in and out is a huge ordeal. We just take the stairs, usually. Ooh, must go, computer going to die, but more to come ASAP.
I guarantee I miss you and I love you a lot.
~Blair