france trip!

Blog five

I havent written a blog in a long while, so it might take me a while to bring this up to speed. The last week of classes for January term went fine, I finished my 6 pg paper about The role of women in the Franco Era, only to discover that it was only 4 pages on the stupid longer sheets of paper that they have here. Luckily Jose, my prof, said it was fine. I got an 96 on it! On the last day of class there was a party here at the center where they give out free alcohol so naturally, we drank some. I took so many great pictures that nite! Too bad all of them are gone now, but ill get to that later. After the party we went out to our regular bar (that im quite sick of) called funducion. The only thing I like is that we get drinks for free a lot cuz carlos the bartender likes Americans. Later on Alex and I went over to Buddha to dance and say good bye to the St Thomas kids. Getting home around 430, I crashed into bed and set my alarm for 700 the next morning. The next morning I left from my house, took a taxi to the airport and boarded a plane to paris france. Gabby and I flew together and then waited for jessicas flight to come in 5 hrs later. We just slept in the airport because it costs 6 euro each way on the bus into paris and back. So that woulda been 18 euro, or roughly 25 bucks. Not doable. After we met Jessica we wandered around attempting to figure out how to get a train ticket to blois where we were staying in a hostel for 4 days. Blois (pronounced Blue-ah) is about an hour or so outside of paris. We boarded a train, and then realized we had to transfer… so we followed a nice Parisian who spoke English to the next train. When we got on that one about ten 18 year old French kids started talking to us. They wanted to know all about us and asked if we knew anything about French politics etc. embarrassingly so, I told them that the only thing I knew about their president was that his relationship with a model was the scandal on everyones mind. They gave us the “stupid American test” which consisted of questions such as: whats one country that starts with a U (dur, Uruguay, Uzbekistan etc) What countries are around north korea- again, dur south korea and china. After that they gave us a break and kept joking around/talking to us. They then insisted that we come out to the mansion in the country that they were staying at for the weekend holiday and drink/party with them. This sounded like lots of fun, unfortunately they didn’t know the address and we had to check into the hostel first. So we got one girls mobile number and said we’d call them later. Her name fittingly was Juliet. When we got to blois we caught a taxi to the hostel and got settled in our room. Its like an apartment complex for kids our age that come to blois to work. It was quite strange, but whatever. After a good night of sleep we got up the next day prepared to discover what blois had to offer…

Day two of blois

we walked 20 min into the center of town and went shopping because there are sales everywhere. We decided to hit up the chateau of blois the next day. So we went and sat down by the bank of the Loire river. It was beautiful. Sitting in the sun, enjoying the view of rushing water. It was calming. We found a little grocery store and bought some stuff for the hostel… cheap wine and fanta knock off. I also found seedless grapes!!! Which made me so excited because in spain they all have seeds. That night we called Juliet but she never called us back. Alas, we got tipsy off of tinto de verano with the wine and “fanta” we bought and had a great time bonding and chatting about politics, boys, religion, family, where we went to school and other things. Gabby somehow got me to walk into town, 20 min away in the cold, to see if blois had a night life. It didn’t. after a disgusting over priced cocktail and walking around aimlessly we stopped at a crepes restaurant. We walked in, there were about 20 people tops in there… it was crazy. So she asked for a plain sugar crepe with fruit and they started talking really fast French. We kinda just sat there, and he turned the entire restaurant and asked in French, “does anyone speak English here?” so a civilian came over and took our order. After gabby ate, we asked for the check and the owner came up to us and said, “ a present, free.” So gabby got a free crepe and we walked back to the hostel.

Day three of blois-

When we got up we walked down to town and went to the chateau. What we hadn’t realized before was that the loire valley area is well known for their chateaus and that there are 9 overall in this area. Blois chateau was gorgeous. It has 4 different wings that are in 4 different types of architecture. Theres one that’s gothic, classicism, etc. it was beautiful. We wandred around looking at all the rooms, the paintings, the tapestrys etc. after our chateau experience we walked back to the hostel to chill out, play cards, use the incredibly slow internet and sleep. I met a man who worked in the Cadbury chocolate factory and a Turkish guy with bad teeth. We decided that the next day we should hop a train to amboise and see another chateau and see Leonardo di vincis last house. Theres a huge exhibit there dedicated to him and his work. So we got up early, caught a 1 euro bus to the train station, bought our tickets to amboise, waited… took the train and wandered around town till we found signs to the chateau. It was a beautiful sunny day, and although it was cold, the sun helped. We went in the chateau and wandered around through the magnificent rooms that were painted dark blues, and reds and then decided to walk around the grounds. There were this great shrubs that were perfectly trimmed into circles sticking out of the ground. There was also a chapel located in the corner that I went in to check out. As I was wandering around I looked down at my feet and realized that I was almost standing right on top of a grave, and not just any grave… Leonardo di vincis grave! He was buried there by his own request because he was good friends with the king. After being in awe of this marvelous discovery, we decided to head to the home of leo called clos luce. It was located down the road a bit. We paid for a ticket and entered walking into his bedroom first. There were fires in all the fire places so a thin smoke filled the entire building. Maybe it was the smoke but instantly I felt a presence in the room that I had never felt. Jessica commented immediately after I thought this, “this place is so haunted” I agreed… it was creepy how it felt like Leonardo was still there. We followed the self lead tour around his house, through his music room and study down to the basement where all of his machines had been rebuilt in smaller models by ibm. I had no idea that he had invented so many crucial things! It was amazing. We then decided to walk the grounds of his house because there were life size models of his machines built and distributed throughout the property. We got to play around on them for a while before we decided to leave. It was around 4 so we stopped to get something to eat, of course since it was Sunday nothing was open, and if places were open, it was only to get something to drink. I had a diet coke(what a surprise) and we went back to the train station and changed our tickets to an earlier leave time. When we got back to blois, it was raining and cold. We walked down to the center because we wanted at least one good meal. I had the most amazing salad ever. It was melted goat cheese on homemade croutons with tomatoe, carrot, onion, and bits of cut up ham. So delicious. Then I got sorbet to top it off, and Jessica got a sundae the size of her head. We went back to the hostel via taxi cuz we were treating ourselves, and went to bed.

Day four blois

We left the hostel around 1030 and got to the train station right in time to catch our train to paris. When we got there, we found a bus that to the metro station and then the metro line that took us to the street our hostel was located on. The street was les gobliens, on metro line 7. the hostel is called oops. We got there, and left our stuff because we couldn’t officially have our room till 4. we went out, got back on the metro and went to the notre dame cathedral. It was beautiful. The gothic structure was striking. I later learned that gothic means to be light. So gothic churches strive to have natural light filter in which is why they used flying buttresses so that all the support was outside of the structure thus creating un obstructed areas for the light to flood in. after taking pictures and wandering around, we went back to opps to check into our room and get situated. As I walked in the door, and around the corner I ran into (literally) my friend Kevin Meyer from St. olaf!! I hadn’t seen him in forever and I was like, what the hell what are you doing here??? Him, angela(another friend) and 3 other oles were finishing up their interim trip. They had been in London and came to paris for a week. I was so excited! Gabby stayed back at the hostel that nite and jessica and I went wandering around in hopes to get to the Eiffel tower. We found it! It was beautiful and bigger then id ever imagined!. All of a sudden it light up, sparkling and flashing. It was beautiful. I made sure to stand directly underneath it. After we walked back to the hostel we went to bed. Our room was a four sleeper and being that we only had 3 people we were placed with another girl our exact same age named liz from purdue college. She was studying in paris that semester and was staying at oops till she found an apartment. Shes super nice!

So im going to quickly write bout what the hostel oops looks like. It is very trendy and “hipster” kind of like something youd see in an urban outfitter catalog. There is a huge rainbow like mural on the walls of the common area with huge paintins of 70’s type geranium flowers. Right when you walk in the door you see this huge wall of light up blocks that spell out Opps with red on white. The other walls are covered in squares that make up the wallpaper tand look like fur, but they aren’t. the spiral staircase to the different levels is wallpapered with a great black flower pattern on off white. It was awesome! Each floor was also painted another color, either lime green, bright pink, or a mustard yellow. I went downstairs and had a wonderful cup of hard cider with the oles and then went upstairs to sleep.

Day 5-paris

At 11 we decided to take the free walking tour that left from Saint Michael’s fountain. It was cold and rainy. But we bucked up and went ne way. After all it was free. Our tour guides name was Luke who was a European history major who had been living in paris for 2 years teaching English to kids and giving tours on the side. He was hilarious and even tho that’s the coldest ive been in a while, it was worth it. It began to rain more and the wind picked up but we learned so much! For example- pont neuf (new bridge) was built by henri the IV. It has all these faces sculptured into it. Luke told us that henri the iv was sort of a jokester. So he invited all his friends over, who were prominent figures in france at that time. He gave them all the free campaign they could drink and when that ran out he gave them all the red wine they could drink thus making them sloppy drunks. He then went to the palace sculptors and asked them to make a sketch of each guests face. He then had those sketches made into busts that were placed on the pont Neuf Bridge. We also learned a great deal more but when we stopped at the café half way thru the tour, we knew we were done. Ever inch of my body was cold. We had met a woman named Suzanne on the tour and started talking. Me and her decided we would like to go to the Opera Garnier which is the opera house where phantom of the opera was based. Gabby and Jessica didn’t want to come with so I told them id find them later. Suzanne and I set out and got to talking more. Shes from California, close to where erin lives and is going through a divorce after 6 yrs of marriage and 15 years of being with this man. She didn’t look it, but said she was 38. I would have guessed like 28. so we went to the opera house and it was the most beautiful thing ive ever seen in my entire life. It was beautiful. Highly adorned and ornamented ceilings full of murals. And every column, every stair and banister was pure marble. We wandered around and stumbled on this gaint dance room with chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. Everything in that room was gold. And it was amazing. I felt like I was in the castle in beauty and the beast especially when I entered the next room… the library. It was exactly like belles! There were books everywhere floor to ceiling. After marveling over the books, we went downstairs and found that they had old costumes on display. They were so beautiful and intricate… my favorite was the mermaid. After our amazing experience, Suzanne and I walked around more and saw the great shopping center that has the amazing stain glass dome in the center. Then we went and got something to drink to exchange emails so she could send me some pictures of the day. It was great getting to know her! Maybe ill get to see her when I go to California again. I went back to the hostel and gabby and Jessica had gone out to dinner so I sat and talked to the oles. They were going to the modern museum of art the next day and invited me along. I happily obliged. We then sat around in the common room making friends before going upstairs to their room to drink and chat. I met Dylan powers, who was their 6^th person in their room. He was from Canada. Lots of Canadians…after shooting the shit for a good couple hours, I decided to lumber off to bed. It was 4.

Day 6-paris

the next day we got up and gabby and Jessica wanted to see the opera house so I went to the museum with the oles. It was great! I loved it. I saw some amazing installations and other forms of art in the most modern section then upstairs I saw Picasso, matisse and DALI! Whom I love. After about 3 hrs there, I went to Sacre Couer with Kevin and Ted. We climbed the many stairs to the top and went into the sacred heart cathedral. It was drab. Although it has the largest mosaic in the world… I didn’t find this particular church mesmorizing in the least. Kevin and ted left, and I wandered around montmartre district till around 530. I bought a pair of 10 euro boots and they are plastic but sooo cute. I then hoped the metro to station Blanche and got off to take the night free tour of the montmartre distict. I met up with some of the kids I recongnized from the hostel and got to talking with the cute boy josh. They were from Canada and studying in Israel. Scary! But apparently not… anyway. We saw lots of the montremartre discrict… Moulin rouge etc. we also started talking to these other two people that were on the tour named Evan and Tennille. They were there on vacation and had been together about a year. They were also from Canada… so we all went out to dinner after the tour and I got a salad that had salmon, shrimp and other things. It was ok. And expensive. We decided to not go out, instead to get some alcohol at the 24 hr fruit place and drink in the hostel. Evan and Tennille came with and evan ended up buying 2 bottles of vodka, fanta, and ginger ale. So me evan, josh, Tennille, scott, ted, and angela sat in the common room and talked,drank. I got drunk… accidentally! So after evan and Tennille left, there was tons of alcohol left and josh told me to take it because he was leaving in the morning… so I took ½ liter of vodka back to spain with me in a gingerale bottle. Classy. After saying bye to josh, I went upstairs to sleep around 4.

Day 7-paris

Being that it was our last full day in paris we wanted to get it all in! but it was raining again. Jessica decided to go to the modern art museum and gabby and I were going to go to champs elysian. But instead went to the D’orsey museum. It was a fabulous decision! It was the impressionist museum and I saw all of my favorite artists. I mean all of them. Van gogh, cezanne, picarro, monet, goghain, renuat etc. it was amazing. And there was a exhibition of art novae furniture going on that was amazing as well. We stayed there four and a half hours. Afte we left we went over to the area where the louvre was because it was free after 6 for students. Gabby and I went to angelina’s café because it is supposedly the best hot chocolate you’ll ever have. Since I cant have it, she did and I got two scoops of sorbet, pear and mango. She let me try her cocoa, and honestly it wasn’t the best id ever had. But it was a great little store that was overly expensive. After our angelinas outing we went to the louvre. I hated it. It wasn’t my type of art at all. At least now I can say ive been and that I saw the mona lisa. Back at the hostel I packed up all my stuff and chilled out with everyone watching sex in the city on the big screen tv in the lounge. We went to bed and prepared ourselves for another day of travel.

Day 8-travel

We took the 1255 flight to sevilla and Jessica took a 6 o clock one, so she had to wait a bit. It was a fine ride back.

Thus ends the france trip

Back in Sevilla-

I was so homesick by the end of my trip to france. Not homesick for my real home, though I miss my friends and family madly, but homesick for Sevilla!. The people are nicer, the weather is better, and there is a better over all quality of life there. It was nice to be back. I walked into my room at the castle and saw a girl staring back. My roommate was here! I thought paula wasn’t getting here till tomorrow. We started talking, and decided to meet some girls for a drink. We wandered around and had some tinto de verano at the bar universal by plaza Sebastian. The next day I had to start classes so I wanted to rest up.

First day of classes-

I have a class called present day Spanish usage. Its really fun and interesting because we are learning words, phrases, and situations we will actually use here in sevilla. I haven’t met many of the girls in our program… and frankly they don’t seem very friendly or interested in meeting people. Bring back mo and lily and Melissa and Julie and everyone from January term! L sad day. Oh well what can you do. Now that its almost Friday, February 08, 2008 the end of the first week is upon me. Im glad! Im going out this weekend to a club/discotequa called dos hermanos with my guy friends from here. David david con rayas and fran. They are nice and fun, but can be bitches sometimes. Paula and I have been sunbathing on our roof almost everyday.

One night sara came over and we made tinto de verano, sat on the roof and watched love actually on paulas laptop. It was fabulous. One quality night.

Hasta luego para ahora.