Once again embracing the golden retriever

Peur du jour - 30 Avril 2012: Sharing American Culture

So yesterday at the lycée where I volunteer we had our journée americaine (America day). My fellow American students helped to plan and lead a day full of cultural workshops for the English classes here.  We split into about five teams, each one composed of both American and French students. The team captains (the Americans) had to wear different colored bandanas. We were team "Yellow Submarine." Cute, n'est pas?


We had a dance workshop where two Americans thought dances like the Cupid Shuffle, the Soulja Boy, and the Dougie.

Cupid Shuflin'

We had a baseball workshop lead by the Montpellier Baracudas (the baseball team in Montpellier).

Me, stepping up to the plate

We had an quiz on American trivia and music at which the French students did surprisingly well. They knew a lot about American geography, politics, and pop culture!

In the spirit of America, our kids were very competitive

The consul from the American consulate in Marseilles came to share a word about the importance of sharing and understanding different cultures.

The cafeteria even made an American style lunch for all of us! We had chicken wings, "country potatoes", chocolate milk, cookies, and "sundaes" (little ice cream cups). There were still, however, baguettes, French style appetizers, and real silverware and plates. Much nicer than my high school cafeteria.

A very delicious meal

We had an art workshop where we made pieces in the style of Keith Haring, an American artist. We traced the forms of each other and then designed the interior and the exterior in contrasting colors. This was probably the most fun I've had in a long time. The kids were SO creative and it has probably been at least a decade since I've gotten to have arts and crafts time (other than my stress-time coloring books).

We didn't get time to finish, but I still think it's pretty cool!

It was really fun to get to know some of the students I work with better. It also felt pretty good to just be our goofy, kind of loud, enthusiastic American selves. While in Montpellier, I've really tried to make a connection with the natives around me. Even though this day was kind of about us, I still really felt that we connected with French culture. Our students taught us a French dance, we got to see more about French high schools, and we got to just hang out with the students and talk with them. It was a very long and tiring day, but one of my best in Montpellier! (and that rhymed!)

Tongue Tied

Peur du jour- 29 Avril 2012: Accepting correction with humility

The great thing about kids is that they are straight-talkers. If they notice something that is out of accordance with what they know, they don't hesitate to remark about it.

This characteristic of children is what led me to realize a flaw in some of the things I've been saying in French. There is a vowel complexity that can be particularly tricky for Americans which shows itself in the past participial of the verb courir (to run), "couru".

I can't tell you how many times I've used this word with my host mother. I run every day, but never in my nearly four months here has she corrected me. The second I used this word with some children from my church, however, they were all over it.

"Repeat after me. Cou-ru. No. Cou-ru. No. Cou-ru. No not couru, couru!"

I attempted to repeat after them for several minutes. Incredibly frustrating. But now I whisper this word as I walk to myself in the streets (definitely keeps the crazies away). And I'm thankful that they had no shame in shaming me. Because that's how we learn.

We don't need no (French) education

Peur du jour- 24 Avril 2012: Final exam at the French University at la journée americaine

So today I took my first (and only) exam for my history/geography course at Paul Val. Gross.

Let's not even talk about how this exam was at 8:15 (INSANELY early by French standards) the Tuesday after a two week break. Thankfully, I had already planned to be back by last Friday to recuperate, so I did have time to study hard for three days. But, as I am the type of student that usually starts studying a week in advance for regular tests and TWO weeks for finals (yeah, go ahead and tape the "kick me" sign to my back, I'm a nerd), I was still really stressed.

Not to mention that I wasn't really sure what I was supposed to be studying. I had asked the professor, but he said that it wouldn't be fair to give me any sort of direction. Really, France? In the end I ended up going through my notes and trying to organize it into outline form so I could catch the big themes and memorize some small details/examples.

So the morning rolled around. I left super early to avoid being late due to any tram delays and breezed past the students enjoying a pre-exam cigarette outside the classroom. The prof passed out some scratch paper and the French equivalent of blue books (at least I didn't have to pay for it like at UNC! Silver lining.) and then began to explain the exam.

Because this class was taught by two professors, they thought it necessary to have two different essay prompts (normal). They had both professors develop a subject (also normal), but did not feel that there would be enough time for each student to answer both questions (okay). So, they divided the class up into two groups by last name (getting wonky) and then proceeded to have one student from the first group draw a subject from a hat (seriously?). As the French student deciding my fate walked to the front of the room, Jason was muttering "this would never happen in America," and I was singing the Price is Right theme (COME ON DOWN!).

I ended up getting the subject for the professor that I've been whining about all semester. On top of that, we recieved the prompt via dictation (here's to hoping I didn't mishear a word!). In a fortunate turn of events, however, it was the prompt I felt more comfortable with. In fact, it was the last section of notes I had read before getting off the tram to walk to campus. Not that I know how I'm going to be graded, but I didn't feel that the exam itself was that hard. I had an hour and a half to answer one essay question--kid's stuff compared to my poli and history exams at UNC.

I only need a 9 (maybe I'll talk about the French grading scale in a cultural lesson) to get credit at UNC. And if not, at least I got some great stories out of this class and a deep appreciation for my home institution.

Final thoughts about Paris

Paris was just as magical as everyone has always said it would be. In fact, it was more magical.

La tour eiffel from le centre pompidou

I have had a lot of contact with people who talk Paris down:

La Basalisque Sacre-coeur

"The metro is so dirty."  Honestly, the metro was no dirtier than any American system I've seen. To be fair, I may be accustomed to a certain level of filth after living in Montpellier for so long, but honestly, that's life in a city. I also enjoyed never waiting for more than two minutes on a platform (and this wasn't just traveling at rush hour times).
 

L'avenue des champs-elysées

"The Parisians are so rude." I think that this is a big cultural difference. The French (and Europeans in general, I think) are a lot less expressive than Americans. We are loud. We let everyone know how excited we are. Other than a snooty waiter at Angelina's who made fun of my French, my interaction with Parisians was very positive. Admittedly, speaking their native language helps.

A view from the top of la cathédrale Notre-Dame

 "The Mona Lisa is so small." Whoever told me le Louvre was a waste of my time was definitely wrong (I don't remember who you are, but let me take you there! I want you to have a good experience!). Not only was I thrilled to see The Winged Victory of Samothrace and other great works of art, but the building itself was incredibly beautiful. I spent three hours there and maybe got through a fourth of the museum. A revisit is definitely in my future.

La seine

I could definitely never live in Paris, but I could never live in any big city (I need fresh air when I run and green grass when I walk barefoot and trees to climb when I want to escape from the world). Paris is truly an incredible city, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to realize the error in some of my preconceptions. I can't wait to go back!

An energizer bunny in Paris

Peur du jour- 19 Avril 2012: Being a traveling machine

On this day in Paris, I literally did not sit down for more than five minutes until my metro ride back to the hostel at 11 pm at night. I ate all three meals sur le pouce (on the go, literally "on the thumb") while walking from destination to destination. I may have felt like I was going to collapse at the end of the day, but I got to do everything in Paris I had planned to do. Worth it.


We spent about three hours at la tour eiffel waiting in line to go to the top and enjoying the beautiful views!

La Tour Kathleen

 We walked from la tour eiffel to le louvre because it was such a beautiful day! We stayed there until they literally herded us out at closing.

Lauren and I went to the extended hours at le musée d'orsay where we drooled over Monets and Renoirs and Degas and Manets and Sisleys and Gauguins and Seurats and Toulouse-Lautrecs until we were once again herded out at closing. Heaven.

Le Musée d'orsay is housed in an old train station

These magnificent clocks overlook la seine

We ended the night with a walk along the Seine and a viewing of la tour eiffel's light show.

Paris-ing in the Rain

Peur du jour- 18 Avril 2012: Ignoring physical discomfort

If there's anything worse than trying to discover a city in the rain, it's trying to discover a city in the pouring rain.

Unfortunately, a lot of my time in Paris was plagued by cold and wind and rain which left me really missing my rain boots, but really thankful that I remembered to bring an umbrella with me to France. Fortunately, Paris is not like the South of France which shuts down at the first sign of gray. People in the South are so accustomed to the sun that they just shut themselves indoors until those golden rays make their reappearance. Parisians are very much like Chicagoans; life goes on in sun, rain, and snow.

Some things I did in the rain: waited in line (outside) to climb Notre-Dame, wandered around le Quartier Latin down some streets a friend had recommended, took shelter in a wonderful cozy restaurant for lunch, took shelter under the awning of a delicious pastry shop while devouring a chocolately treat, did a quick run through les jardins de luxembourg, saw La Sarbonne, took shelter in Sainte-Chapelle (or the most beautiful church that ever was), grabbed a cup of hot chocolate in a café to thaw out, waited out the storm in a cozy Irish pub and had a really delicious crepe dinner.

Picture attack.

Notre-Dame pre-rain!

I like this one because it looks like he's about to eat la tour eiffel

There's a storm blowin'!

Les jardins de luxembourg- pouring at this point

Sainte-Chapelle (ignore the construction)

One great thing about rain is that all you want to do is sit in a warm restaurant and eat. Wednesday was definitely the day where I had the most food adventures in Paris! Regardez:

 At the end of the day, my freezing toes and sopping jeans were definitely worth it.

Le gare du nord? More like, la labyrinthe du nord!

Peur du jour- 17 Avril 2012: Navigating that thing they call a train station

So on this Tuesday morning, I woke up early to go fetch my friend Jack from the train station. I left myself plenty of time to stop by the bakery (friends who visit me in France get a complimentary pain au chocolat), take the 45 minute metro ride, and find the platform to be there when his train arrived.

Little did I know, le gare du nord is a maze of underground tunnels and misleading signs when you're coming from the metro station. I got off the metro and started following the signs to le gare when I ran into another line of ticket-takers. I had already swiped my ticket to get on the metro, so I thought those tickets must have been for the RER train or another line. Plan B brought me up the escalator and into the gray morning (note the weather change...). I was kind of just going with what I remembered seeing on maps and what I thought to be North and South when I picked which direction to start walking.

As it would happen, my often-excellent sense of direction was spot on and I made it to le gare in about three minutes. Inside, I started following the signs to les grandes lignes where my friend's train would come in. This sounds simple enough but for the fact that sometimes the signs would just disappear and you would have no idea whether to go up, down, left, right, forward, backward, diagonal, or what have you. At one point I was back in the metro and was forced to use a metro ticket to follow the grandes lignes signs.

Goodness gracious, Paris.

Naturally, as I fumbled around with escalators and hallways, I started imagining the worst. I wasn't sure that my friend would have a working cellphone and I wasn't even sure that he had put my number in his phone. What would happen if he got off the train and couldn't find me? How would we find each other? (Kathleen, stop freaking out.)

Eventually I resurfaced, found the platform, and bought some hot chocolate to hand to my sleep-deprived friend as he got off the train. And we had quite the lovely day (despite the pouring rain...)

Jack and me at Versailles! (in the rain)

Elyse and I doing a myspace style photo in the Hall of Mirrors

Slap happy after being so cold and wet...

And then it turned into a beautiful evening

Our view from the top of the arc de triomphe

Versailles was closed

Peur du jour- 16 Avril 2012: Being flexible

On Monday, Elyse and I had planned to spend a wonderful day at Versailles. We stopped by the boulangerie (bakery) on the way to the metro to get breakfast (pastries and baguettes... being poor sure is delicious!) and a picnic lunch (sandwhiches! yum!) to enjoy in the beautiful gardens of Versailles. When we got to Versailles, we quickly found the chateau and excitedly made our way to the tourist office to buy tickets. But when I asked for our free student tickets, the woman behind the counter gave me a blank stare and said "you know that the castle is closed today, right?"

D'oh.

So Elyse and I wandered into a Starbucks in search of free wifi so we could salvage our day and get on with the adventuring! It always throws me through a loop when plans fall through because I plan EVERYTHING, so then I have to change all of the plans that were around the original plans. But one of my goals in coming to France was to become a little more go-with-the-flow, so that's what Elyse and I did! We took the train back to Paris and shuffled a few items in the week around and this is what my day ended up looking like:

While waiting to meet up with Lauren, we ate our sandwiches on the steps of Montmartre with a spectacular view of Paris, sunshine on our faces, and the melodies of quintessentially French songs being played by a harpist in our ears.

Sacre-Coeur

 We wandered from Sacre-Coeur to les jardins de Tuileries where we stopped by Angelina's for the best cup of hot chocolate in Paris.

Angelina's hot chocolate = like drinking brownies straight from the oven

We walked les jardins de Tuileries from start to finish

Lauren and Me; Le musée du Louvre- one end of les tuileries

 We walked to the place where the guillotine sat during the French revolution.

La place de la concorde

 We took a stroll down Paris's most famous street.

Il y a tout ce que vous voulez aux champs-elysées

 We marveled at one of Paris's most iconic monuments

L'arc de triomphe

 And then we marveled at another one.

Elyse and me; La tour Eiffel

Basically, Paris wooed me with its history and charm and nice weather (even if it was only for that day!). Which I had really been needing. Paris, je t'aime.

The Paris Metro

Peur du jour- 15 Avril 2012: (Successfully) Navigating the Paris Metro on my lonesome

It's always a little unnerving when you are navigating a new area on your own. It's a little more unnerving when this area is congested and complex. It's even more unnerving when you've heard about everything that could go wrong (in this case: pick pockets and not going the wrong direction and getting horribly lost).

But I am here to tell you that the Paris metro is not so scary. After my six hour train ride from Nice to Paris, I groggily entered the bowels of the city (the metro, not the sewers). I even figured out how to buy tickets in one try! Nothing was stolen from me. I was not attacked. I didn't miss my stop. I didn't get lost. All in all a very boring story.

And sometimes it's better that way.

St. Jean Cap Ferrat: Where dreams come true

Peur du jour- 14 Avril 2012: Jumpin' on the back of a moped

So it was definitely on my unofficial bucket list to ride on a moped while in France. I guess it's kind of silly, but, like snails and frogs legs and accordion music and berets and baguettes, it's just something I associate with France. And I want to do everything French (even the things that are quasi-french).

So when Marc and Tammy found this out, they wanted to make sure I got to do it! It rained a lot of the week, so we kept putting it off for Saturday when the weather was supposed to be nice.

It rained all day Saturday.

I was trying to be cheerful, but I just knew I wasn't going to get to do my moped ride (I'm so silly, I know!). But finally, as the day was drawing to a close, I asked if it would still be possible despite the rain. And Marc was kind enough to humor me and take me for my ride. We rode around St.Jean Cap Ferrat looking at the beaches and all of the fancy houses (Paul Allen has a house there!).

And even though my face was being pelted with rain, it was still really fun to buzz around the winding mountain roads with an unobstructed view of the sea. And I looked pretty cute in the helmet.

When in Italy...

Peur du jour- 13 Avril 2012: Crossing the border

So this is another one of those peur du jours that isn't actually a fear I had to overcome. What anxieties could I possibly have about going to a huge market in Italy? Niente. Italian markets are just as wonderful as French markets

These strawberries smelled out of this world!

Well hello there, gorgeous

It's funny how you can take a thirty minute train ride and actually feel like you are in a different country. Tammy told me that since they have opened the borders, the contrasts are not as stark, but the signs and announcements are still in Italian, the market is full of pasta and parmasean cheese and foccacia, and the third color on the flag is green.

Scrumptious

Parmesan and Sausages 

Desserts, Italian Style

We also had a wonderful Italian lunch: pizza, wine, profiteroles, and a complimentary limoncello.

Italian Wine- I prefer French!

Delicious Pizza

Profiteroles (Cream puffs, normally in France they aren't slathered with chocolate mousse, but these were delicious!)

On the contrary, I prefer Italian coffee to French coffee!

Limoncello

But at the end of the day, it's nice to come back to a country where I speak the language. I could tell my "grazi"s and "bonjourno"s wouldn't get me much farther than the few hours I spent there.

Wandering in Cannes and Antibes

Peur du jour- 12 Avril 2012: Not planning ahead

Normally, I am the type of person who loves to have a map. And addresses to put on the map. And the best route between the addresses I'm going to put on the map. And approximate times that I would like to be at these addresses and taking these routes on the map. Basically, I like to plan.

So today, when I went to Cannes and Antibes with no plan (other than remembering the directions and sites that Tammy had told me at the breakfast table), you would imagine that I had a terrible time. Quite the contrary. In my quest for a free/clean bathroom in Cannes, I found this:

Musée de la castre - a tower I got to climb!

A view towards the West

A view towards the East- the port and downtown Cannes

After seeing this from afar in Antibes:

Something intriguing from the port of Antibes

I decided to pull a Julius Cesear and conquer it.

Fort Carré- Antibes, France

Mission accomplished.

And everything's a little more fun when you're not stressed about fitting in everything you planned.