cravings i've had/i'm currently having

it all started with a craving for fries. not like burger king fries, but like real Belgian fries (they are not French, people, they are Belgian!) they serve them on a cone of paper over here at little stands, but for some reason, whenever i went to buy them, they'd be out of fries. so i've stopped trying (the fact that i'm low on money has something to do with that as well...)

then it was broccoli. good old green broccoli.
then it was "elotes la purisima", or at least my version of it anyway-- corn, sour cream, hot sauce, lime, and salt. then it was conchitas con elote. i'm not even gonna try to translate that. my immediate family understands.
then, enchiladas. not the american kind, the real kind. this is because they cook something in the apartment building that smelled to me like enchiladas. i'm sure it wasn't, but it made me crave it.
today it was chicken. now you might say, CHICKEN! i'm sure they have chicken in france! but you see-- both of my housemates are pescaterian (vegetarians who eat fish). thus, every night we have some sort of fish (yesterday it was a salmon and white fish quiche).... and i have decided i miss chicken.

les parents

my parents freaked out because i hadn't had any contact with them since thursday, but most importantly, i have not updated my blog. they said they want to see pictures!

well two things to explain:
1. photobucket has been running extremely slow (I upload everything to photobucket in case my computer crashes and makes all my pictures irretrievable)

2. i've been busy: on thursday i went to "La fete de la music" imagine downtown greenville with bands every couple of feet from each other. Now imagine all of Raleigh coming to take a look at that. that was the music in the streets festival on thursday. I heard everything from Brazilian percussion to one of those box things you go round and round with and music comes out. I was hoping to see a monkey do it, but instead it was a lady dressed a little funny. Still cool. We had dinner for 13 Euros which included Champagne, main course (for me it was steak with a side of potatoes, eggplant, and lettuce) and dessert (which for me was a cannoli, a pastry filled with mascarpone {sweet cheese filling}) on friday i went to les baux and arles. today {saturday} i went to St. Tropez. it was BEAUTIFUL. bright blues and oranges. it was just beautiful.

3. do not think that all the town is like what i show in the pictures. i've given a lot of thought into this. i mostly show you the pretty things i'm experiencing in aix, but there's also a lot of social inequality, common looking things, etc. i have thought of bringing my camera through a common day to show more of what i regularly see. it's not all cobblestones and yellow old buildings.

*phew* all of that said... here we go!

fete de la music

picture of the 6 € hand made ring with real pressed flowers, picture of my champagne and meal. for 13 € i got champagne, main course, and dessert.

following that, are the pictures of the music festival. this was in downtown aix, and i swear 1/3 of france was downtown aix that night. you can see the lady with the box, a rock band, the ones up on stage were latin music, the people with the red shirts and white pants were brazilian percussion. we left around 11ish so we could walk back home... the picture of the bright green trees and blue purple sky was not edited, those were very much the colors i saw that night. :)

Les Baux/ Arles

les baux has a medieval castle made out of the naturally occurring limestone. it had an incredible view form up top! after that we made our way to arles. arles is most famous by van gogh's many paintings of the area. the second to the last picture shows van gogh's painting of the hospital he was interned into after he cut off his ear. nowadays that place has cafes and other tourist shops in it. as seen in van gogh's picture, there is a fountain in the middle. after a long hot day, my friend erin (last picture) proposed we dunk our heads into that fountain. last picture shows the outcome. we are both art historians, so we really only wanted to be baptized in the waters of art history. we got into much trouble for it. i was told that french culture has protocols, and when those protocols are broken one is given hell for it. i was told the shopkeepers were highly upset and even threatened they could have called the police for disruptive behavior... but i did have fun. :)

st. tropez

beautiful beaches, contrast of the deep blue/turquoise ocean with the yellows and oranges of the town. we took a 20 minute hike to get to the beach were we actually swam. i didn't take pictures there because there was a lot of wind moving the fine sand, and i was scared my lense would get all scratched up....

false alarm

my computer is (thankfully) working properly. i have no idea what happened to it this weekend, but it's working fine now. woot!

on other news, i dreamed my dad came all the way to france to drop off a big suitcase, but he had to be back at work the next day, so he only had a couple of hours with me in paris. hehehe...

uh-oh!

my lappy has the flu! :( since it's a gentle old thing, it is sorta frail and sunday night and monday it would not turn on. i took it to the lappy doctor today and i was told that its internal battery is not doing so well, so we'll see how everything goes. right now it's working fine, but i'm trying to keep my laptop use limited... which i'm not sure how that will work with the pretty pictures... :'(

anyhow. hope all is well with everyone! thanks for all the comments, dara, erica, bruce, ed, miggyb, and lori. :) I really appreciate the readership! i hope not to disappoint! :-P

read the other post first

Second place in the Luberon that we v isited was Bonnieux












third place we visited was Roussillon, a red/orange mountain formation due to ocre. it was very much the color of bright terra cotta.

Finally, Saturday i went to Nice, but I don't have pictures of that because I didnt want to drag my bulky camera along. Let's just the say that the pretty bright aqua color was amazing, and the strong winds made it perfect to see the waves crash.



On other news, I'm experiencing slight homesickness... I love it here, but I'm scared to go bankrupt and I really miss Stephen and doing things my way back at home. and yes, i accept to missing my family and friends. which brings me to the last point:
FELIZ DIA DEL PADRE!!! :-D gracias por pagar mi viajecito pa. ;) te extrano, tengo la foto del close up de tus ojos aqui en mi panel de fotos y me da risa verte. no hay nadie a quien picar aca. :(

Mientras dormias...

Since the lavender field on Tuesday, I have
1. started both my classes (Women in the francophone world and "French Lit" which will be more of a study of Camus, really)
2. gone to Le Luberon (Friday)
3. gone to Nice (Saturday, yesterday)

okay, so a brief narrative about my classes. my women in the francophone world class is AMAZING. i swear my professor is the Algerian version of Roberto Benigni (read the crazy italian guy from "Life is beautiful". For class we have to read an essay and watch a movie per week and for our finals we have to write a short essay. Now the independent study class is a heck of harder. My professor is French and another girl added the class. She's been taking French since she was 7 or 8, so you can see i'm at a disadvantage. we have a lot of reading for my level of French... honestly, i'm quite scared about this course.... :scared:

Now Le Luberon. Luberon is a region and we visited 3 towns in Luberon:
first, Lourmarin. when we got there, it was really cold and raining. we tried to follow our guide through the city, but ended up in a cute little cafe where we had hot chocolate and dried up. the hot chocolate is amazing over here. (*hmmmmm* ^_^) after chatting for about an hour, we went back outside, where it was sunny again. so some pictures:

and more pictures

some pictures

i lied, i didn't travel on my own, my vicious panther kept me safe from french men hitting on me!!! ;)








arrival in paris!









yeah i know you know what this is.







lavender field!!!









more to be continued, it's almost 12 am and i have school tomorrow. a demain! :D

continued

grabbed all 20 lbs of baggage and dragged it down all 6th flights of narrow narrow stairs (i was on the French 5th floor, which is actually the american 6th-- their first floor is the american 2nd floor)...
made my way to the gare lyon with everything, and waited for the train to come. their system was so extremely easy to follow that i didn't understand it (i couldn't believe it would be that simple, look at a screen, look for your location/train ride, and they would tell you which station {a through z) you would be taking, 5 minutes before departure. i was station I, found my cabin, and rode all the way to aix. i pretty much slept the whole way, and actually, they don't check the tickts when you grab the train, but instead, they grab them when you are like halfway through haha...
made it to aix, carried my luggage up 3 flights of stairs and met my host mom. her name is Odile Cheminade, she lives on her own because her children are grown. she has short curly brown hair, glasses, and she's very expressive, quirky, and feisty. My housemate's name is Kate. She's a dance major who just switched to Natural Sciences pre-med. (needless to say, she's really smart!) She took one course of French in high school and I think one in college, so the communication between Kate and Odile had been very rudimentary (read: hand gestures and one word questions hahaha)... my housemate is partly vegetarian (she does eat seafood!) and Odile asked me if I was also vegetarian. I said that I liked meat, so she was happy. She asked me if I drank milk, i answered oui. since she seemed to think i liked all things, i made sure to let her know i was picky by telling her i didn't like mushrooms, to which she answered MAIS NON! (oh no!)-- she had cooked a musrhoom bacon quiche with a part that didn't have bacon for kate. i told her it would be okay. i tried the mushrooms (beatrice had told me the french ones were much different) but i still did not like them. so i picked out the whole top of the quiche which were the mushrooms and gobbled the bottom, which was AMAZING!
Sunday we were taken to a tour of downtown Aix. it's so beautiful! we saw a church that has a part from the 12th century, a part from the 14th/15th, and a part from the 17th/18th century. cea then took us out to lunch at a cute little outdoor cafe (with tents for the blazing sun) where i ordered a really great steak with potatoes on the side. for dessert, tiramisu. the waiter was REALLY handsome, so i made sure not to giggle. (no worries stephen, i'm too scared of french boys to even try talking to him hahaha)... then we went to a special artisan's market where i bought a really really cute ring. it has real flowers inside, and the artisan told me each flower means something different, and the one i picked meant sweetness and attraction.
monday was pretty much uneventful because we had orientation in the morning. everyone talks about culture shock, but i don't believe i've had any major ones. it was of course a little shocking in paris when i passed by a stand, the waiter called me back, i purchased an iced tea, and then he spoke to me in english, making small talk, saying i was "really beautiful" and asking me if i wanted him to come with me. i said no thank you. he said, "are you sure? we can speak! you can have someone to conversate with" i said i'm sure it would be lovely, but no, i didn't think so. i was on my way to a museum and i would be fine. more than shocking, i would say that was unexpected... but yeah. no culture shock yet... i don't think.

Safe arrival, no worries!

So I have wifi in Mme. Cheminade's home, but my lappy doesn't have a wifi card! OH NOES! Since stores aren't open on Sunday, I will try to get one tomorrow. :)

So let's see...

I arrived in Paris around 1ish 2ish PM, which is equvalent to 7 or 8 am over there, with great sleep at the flight (since I hadn't been able to sleep the whole previous week, i got on the plane and passed out, but mhy light sleep allows me to wake up at convenient times, such as when dinner is served or we have to put on our seat belts)

Anyhow. So I arrived and was scared out of my mind. I kept hearing little phrases from Big fish in my mind-- "I knew that if it wasn't my time to go, and that I could survive everything." But i didn't understand the metro system and not even where to take the metro. This is about when I was about to cry-- I had a huge luggage and only little me to carry it around. I kept thinking, no one's here to pick me up, no one here cares that I'm here. But then I reminded myself--- but I'm here for me, and I want to see all the beautiful things. I can do this, I'm competent.
I asked for information and was told to take a metro into Paris. I got tickets and was really really scared looking at my map, and a very kind stranger approached and told me what to take. His presence calmed me down a lot. My mom told me of a time she met her angel, a kind young fellow in London who grabbed her bags and took them to a taxi and told the driver where to go. I always figured I'd have my angel if I needed him or her.
So I couldn't figure the metro system and was scared to death to end up in the "bad" side of Paris and stuff, and by looking at the map, it looked as though not making a connection but just walking from the station to my hotel would be better. When I came out, I came out in what looked like a huge mall. I couldn't even find the exit to the huge mall, so again I was scared and tired. Finally, I came out of there, into the open street, where there was fresh air and a beautiful beautiful old church. Before proceeding, I figured taking it all in would be a wonderful idea. I just stopped, sat down, put my legs over my luggage and looked at the church.

Anyhow, I could keep on going, but knowing I tell pointless stories in painful detail, let's just say I made my way through Paris with the kind help of a LOT of strangers. I even had a girl physically take me to where I was supposed to take the train. I find that I didn't have just one angel in Paris, but many kind kind angels in Paris.

Since I took my TGV until afternooon, I explored the city in the morning. I actually felt pretty savvy by then-- I went to Centre Pompidou but it was closed, so I walked and walked and saw the stained glass of Notre Dame, so I kept on walking. I decided to take the metro from there to the Eiffel Tower to take some pictures hahaha. Then I came back to Centre Pompidou, saw some Kandinski and other random modern art, went back to the hotel and grabbed all 20 lbs. of baggage and dragged them all the way down 6 floors (no, no elevator!)...

more to be continued later!

i leave tomorrow!!!

i'm waiting for my "tension tamer" tea to brew. it's not that i'm stressed out, it's that i'm totally nervous! ahhh! i get to navigate the streets of paris all on my own on friday. i'm both excited and scared! i haven't picked what i'm gonna do in paris yet. i had the idea i arrived in paris at 8 am, but actually, i arrive at 1 PM. so maybe i'll go have lunch at a creperie near centre pompidou and check that out...
so you might ask, centre pompidou? what the heck is that? so i post a picture for you:

the centre pompidou "houses the Bibliothèque publique d'information, a vast public library, the Musée National d'Art Moderne, and IRCAM, a centre for music and acoustic research." and in the National Museum of Modern Art they have pieces by artists such as Kandinsky, Matisse, Miró, Picasso, and abstract expressionism. Americans are most acquainted to Abstract Expressionism via Jackson Pollock (aka-- guy who dripped paint on canvas back in the 50's and gets millions for it).

not sure though, i might do something entirely different, like visiting the Eiffel Tower, Parc Monceau, Montmartre (if you've seen Amelie this is where she lives), Montparnasse, or Champs Elysees. I've been to both the Eiffel Tower and Montmartre, but I would like more pictures with the Eiffel Tower and I just LOVED Montmartre. oh! if you've seen Moulin Rouge, that would be Montmartre too. i'm sure you understand now.

I'm still reading the first book. I'm in page 182 out of 300, with 3 more books to go. so maybe I'll go to Parc Monceau to just read...

if you're reading this, please pray for a safe and happy trip. :) thanks.