Thursday, February 26, 2009

The daily life of one temporary Parisian

Salut tout le monde!

Thought I would get another update in before I head about for the weekend tomorrow. This time it's off to Normandy for some d-day beaches and Mont St. Michel...updates to come :)

Without further ado my continuation of "what I love about France"

11. True French jobs. So specific and have remained almost unchanged for hundreds of years. I'm talking about bread and cheese makers...it's incredible the work they do. They honestly keep this country on it's feet. It's such a talent that deserves some recognition. The beauty is in the details. They've got something going here.
12. Being able to run here. For all the walking I do I think my legs just feel restrained because everytime I go running I don't want to stop. It's also a great time for me to just have to myself and reflect. I love running by the parks and watching the little kids play and laugh at the overly serious frenchmen who jog in all spandex and never like when a girl runs past them ;)
13. Becky and I have been slowly transforming into true French citizens as our dinners have gradually gotten later and last longer. It's amazing how we can end up sitting there for 2 or 3 hours just talking and eating. It's really a great way to end the day. Lets see if I can incorporate that into my life at home.
14. My "l'histoire de Paris" professor. He's got to be at least 70 years old but doesn't have any signs of alzheimers. He lectures for an hour and half without referencing anything and all the dates, names etc. come right out of his head. It's amazing. He's like a walking textbook on the history of France.

As for interesting events of the past couple weeks here are a few to take note of...

-Since I'm dumb and used a blowdryer with an adapter that said not to, I managed to ruin 2 adapters now since I've been here. So in an attempt to save money I headed to Fnac (an equivelant to Best Buy) where I bought it to try and exchange it. After a 50 min wait (when I was told by the handy "take a ticket" machine that it would only be 12 min) I got up to the counter armed with excuses and simply said en Francais "l'adapteur ne marche jamais" meaning this adapter never worked. He smiled at me (probably my accent) and just said back "well a new one is a good idea then." A signature later I was out the door with my new adapter. No questions. Sometimes I really like this country.

-Visited the Cluny museum (medival art) because we needed to for a class, but went to the musee d'orsay (impressionist museum) this week with Becky before class. Why? simply because we can, and since we're taking an art class we get a special art students card that gets us into all public museums for FREE. So we enjoyed the morning and then had lunch at a great little place we stumbled upon on the way to the metro. Will for sure be going there when Kelly and I go to the orsay.

-Last weekend was pretty eventful. Thurs night Becky and I after having dinner with a couple friends decided to hit up a bar that we always pass on the way to the metro. So we saddle up to the bar and after a couple beers we decide to call it a night. Well as soon as we move to put our coats on this man about ohh 55 or 60 walks up to us and tells us he wants to buy us a drink. We politely decline, telling him we're on our way out. Then once the coats are on, one of the waiters approaches us and tells us these 2 guys near us at the bar have offered to buy us drinks. They looked more our age so we gave in and sat back down. The guys ended up being really nice and within normal age limits for us-24 and 28. They were from Biarritz which is in SW France near Spain and own a microbrewery. They invited us to dinner for the next night, so we exchanged numbers and told them we'd call them the next day. Well, our friend Amaresh here had a friend coming from London and asked us to go out with them the same night. We decided to go with our friends here and told the guys maybe another time...

-Went to a great live music bar near St. Michel/Latin quartier on friday night after dinner and met up with some other people from our program. We also had a little (almost american) gathering at our apartment early this week. It was the day of Mardi Gras, but we never made it out anywhere but it was nice to hang out and just have some drinks with friends. The only thing that's unfortunate about being here for just a short amount of time is that I'm sure once you just start to feel like you are getting to really know people it will be time to leave. Just the way the cookie crumbles I guess...

I will be writing again after my trip "up north"

Keep it real.

<3katie

1 comment:

  1. Salut la Parisienne,

    Je parie que tout va en bon train. Encore une fois, Je viens de visiter ton site et j’ai decide de t’ecrire quelque mots. Okay!! I will stop here with my French. I’m sure that things are going well for you and you are enjoying your stays there while focusing on the main objective. Great London pics! The one I like most is the classic fish and chips. Are you writing down the recipe of the European foods (Just kidding)? Don’t forget that Dave and I will ask you to cook European meals for us. You better be ready :)
    I’m convinced that kelie can’t wait to join you soon. It will be a very nice girls Trio for few days.
    Mademoiselle la Francaise, takes advantage of your trip to have fun. Time is flying so fast and pretty soon it will be time to come home.

    Aller, Je te laisse sur ce point.

    Bisous, bisous

    Anani d’Almeida

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