5 septembre 2014

My friends (*coughJustinecough*) LOOOOOOVE sushi, so for lunch today, we went to eat sushi. Again. Not that I mind because I have learned the joy of eating raw things ^_^

This + raviolis japonais (HAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHA) + miso soup + salad was 12 euros. Not bad, considering we were in a very expensive part of Paris (in other words, the neighborhood I live in)

Afterwards, we ran some errands before heading to class. But of course, one of my classmates, Nancy, is taking baking classes at le Cordon Bleu. Yea, that's right, THE CORDON BLEU. Oh and did I mention she baked us a cake?

YEEEEEES. NANCY YOU'RE THE BEST <3

Class finally ended (yes, two hours is a long time, even when there is chocolate cake!) and Justine and I headed off to the Latin Quarter to buy our textbooks and meet up with Curran and Natasha for dinner. Although we were told the bookstore closed at 8PM, they closed at 7:30PM and stopped letting in new customers at 7:25ish. We got there at 7:25. Boohoo sucks to suck. We went to go eat dinner instead and I had delicious steak aux frites:

Okay, I think I say that all the food in France is delicious but it honestly, truly is delicious.

* ~ * ~ * ~ *

So anyone who really knows me knows that I love french fries (potatoes in general, but especially fries). But I think I enjoyed these fries a lot more than they deserved to be enjoyed (they weren't necessarily mediocre but they definitely weren't amazing). And, since I am writing in hindsight, I will tell you what I realized over the next couple days; so ever since maybe Thursday night/Fridayish, I began to craaaave salty snacks. At first I thought it was just because that's totally me; I love chips and salt and yummerz and things that make you fat. But this craving was incredibly strong; even things I would normally find really salty, weren't very salty. I thought I might be getting sick -- I remembered one time I got chicken noodle soup while I was sick and when I ate it for dinner, I thought it was disgustingly bland so I dumped a ton of salt in it. The next day, I was feeling a little bit better and I ate another can of the same exact chicken noodle soup and it was TOTALLY FINE! -- so maybe I was sick and couldn't taste correctly? But on Saturday, I found out that craving salty things means you're extremely stressed out. I spent the next day or two trying to figure out why I was so stressed out and I think I've figured it out now (it is now Wednesday):

• Every morning, when I wake up, I realize I'm in a different world; a francophone world. And it's scary.
• I am living in someone else's home so I have to be extra careful to clean up after myself and stay quiet and not bother anyone.
• As soon as I wake up, I speak French.
• Everyday tasks that normally take very little if not no brain power now require a lot of effort on my part to speak French and do as the French do.
• Even when I'm speaking in English with my friends, I am constantly worrying if I am being "too American" (READ: loud).
• Even when I'm speaking in English with my friends, if I accidentally bump someone, I have to immediately think to say "désolée" instead of "sorry."
• All of my stress is only worsened by the fact that I am not very good at French.
• Added bonus: it's stressful to know that I am one of the worst French speakers out of all the USC students
• Ironically, I feel additional stress because I feel guilty for being stressed when I am living this marvelous life and I've been granted this amazing opportunity
• Speaking of amazing opportunities, it stresses me out that my fear of speaking French is keeping me from practicing and improving and getting the most out of this experience
• And of course, all of this is just being stacked on top of my normal level of stress caused by a crazyhecticstateofpanicbecauseiprocrastinatebuti'maperfectionistandthatisnotaverygoodcombination and my tendencytoputwaytoomuchonmyplateandwanttodoeverythingallthetimewhenreallywhatineedisrestandjusttodonothingatallevenifitsjustforashortwhile

Anyways, basically, I just needed to get this off my chest. Yes, France is fun and beautiful and delicious and awesome, but. It's hard. and I think it's getting a bit harder everyday.

4 septembre 2014

I didn't do much today. In the morning, we had a really short, to-the-point seminar titled "Very Contemporary France." We just went over some basic French political structures (like who's the big man in charge, what political parties are there, etc.), popular music, different newspapers, etc. It was... semi-interesting. Haha, but I was very thankful that it was matter-of-fact and Coraline didn't keep saying the same thing over and over again.

Afterwards, Justine, Natasha, Curran and I went over to this little street a block away from the ACCENT Center and ate at Crêpe Show. We, unfortunately, learned the hard way that most restaurants don't open until 12PM. We got out of the seminar at around 11AM so we had an hour to kill before we could eat real food. The little tiny street (almost an alleyway haha) we were on had a lot of bars and, surprisingly, even a club! We also found a super cute little story that had this in the shop window (which is what lured us in):

For those of you who don't speak French (or have a limited French vocabulary OR can't assume what the pun is by looking at the picture), "biche" = "doe"

There was a lot of really nice jewelry and bags and such but much to expensive for me. So instead, I decided to knock some things over with my big camera bag T_T Why am I so awkward?!?!

Here's the menu for the restaurant we ate in. I didn't include a picture of the galette I ate because 1) the pictures I did take of it was very rushed so it came out badly and 2) it didn't taste very great so meh no body needs to see it. The crêpe, on the other hand, was DEE-LEEEEEE-SHUSSSSSS. Sosososo good. Hence, the picture.

I ordered the chocolate chantilly (whipped cream) and I was not-so-secretly hoping that it'd be chocolate whipped cream (like, the whipped cream itself is made of chocolate). But alas, it was not. Luckily, my disappointment did not last long ^_^

* ~ * ~ * ~ *

Today was the first day of class for la Sorbonne (my 8 unit intensive language course). I somehow got placed into Intermediate 2 and I'm pretty sure I am the worst (perhaps the second worst) speaker in the class. I mean, my accent is surely better than many of the people in the class. But in terms of my ability to express myself and novel ideas, I truly am awful at French. I don't know why. Sometimes, in the shower or in my room or when I'm just walking by myself, I try to imagine a conversation with someone (i.e. my host dad, a waitress, a shopowner, etc) and I can carry on a conversation! But when I am in class and I have to speak, I just freeze up. I forget all my French. I just can't seem to be able to do it in real life. Some people have an irrational fear of placing an order over the phone/at a restaurant or even just picking up the phone and speaking with a stranger; if you're one of those people, take that fear and multiply it by like 9000. That's where I am now. Ugh, please, God, help me get over this fear.

* ~ * ~ * ~ *

So obviously, I am writing in hindsight because I'm super lazy and I'm really bad with keeping up with any sort of journal-y, diary-like things. But I think this was when I started to get close with my peeps and finally feel like I was part of a group! I know a couple posts earlier I said that I was disappointed that everyone else seemed to be making friends with each other so quickly, but I've determined who I get along well with out of our small USC group. Donc, je suis contente.

3 septembre 2014

Things that happened.

Tour of the Opéra (where Phantom of the Opera takes place):

Academie National de Musique - AKA Opéra Garnier

Bust of Charles Garnier, the genius, then-unknown architect of this building

In an era where architects were often not given credit, Garnier subtly and beautifully left his signature in the lobby of the building

Ceiling of the salon where the men and ladies with bad reputations would socialize during intermissions

Look at the details!

The salon

The theatre

The chandelier featured in The Phantom of the Opera

The chandelier itself never fell but the idea of the chandelier falling in The Phantom of the Opera was inspired by an incident where a counterweight for the chandelier fell and almost killed someone.

French placement exam at Cours de Civilization Français de la Sorbonne - I somehow magically got placed into Intermediate 2! (There is Beginner, Elementary, Intermediate 1 & 2, Advanced, and Superior) Everyone from USC is in the same class except for one who is in Elementary.

I went to the Champs Élysées with Justine during our free time.

Le Petit Palais

Le Grand Palais

"Paris

Outraged Paris

Broken Paris

Martyred Paris

But Liberated Paris"

Photo installation to celebrate the 100 year anniversary of the start of WWI and the 70th anniversary of the liberation of France in WWII

There it is!! Arc de Triomphe!

Q: What is this??

A: The fanciest freaking A&F in the world.

I'm telling you, France just does everything better.

I am going to eat here one day and subsequently starve for a week because I spent all my money on this gaudy place

Hey that's me!

Arc de Triomphe in all of its splendid, triumphant glory!

I got to watch these wonderful buskers perform in the Metro!

They were really good and accordions make me so happy ^_^

I went to a grocery store called Picard where they sell ONLY frozen foods. I was able to buy a couple frozen dinners for only 2€ each!

Fries-to-Go at Picard. Look at that immaculate packaging.

I'm afraid to go back to this store because I will probably buy all of these.

So this was the first frozen dinner I had (actually ate it on 4 sept but whatever). It doesn't look very appetizing but it was absolutely delicious. All French food > all American food

For dinner, we went out to a restaurant and, again, we had dinner guests. This time it was two couples that are good friends of the Bouteillons, but do not know each other. One couple were Chinese expats whom Jacqueline met during her stint in China. The husband of this couple looked like Jackie Chan (and no I'm not being racist)! The other couple was French and they looked super preppy (striped shirt with cardigan tied around the shoulders? WOW) and it turns out they met at a country club. Who would have thunk. Anyways, the wife was Jane Lynch. Not actually, but she might as well have been. So basically, I ate dinner with Jackie Chan and Jane Lynch ^_^ So cool.

2 septembre 2014

Today we went on a tour of Montmartre, which is a really artsy district of Paris. It was actually a country-ish region on the outskirts of Paris but it was annexed in 1860. And I learned something really interesting about where the name Montmartre comes from. Apparently, the first bishop of Paris was Saint Denis and this was when Christianity was still against the law. Roman soldiers kept telling him to renounce his faith, but when he refused, they cut off his head (I stood on the spot he was supposedly killed!; this is right next to a Catholic church or a convent or something.. not the Sacre-Coeur). According to the legend, he got up, picked up his head, and marched several kilometers (I actually don't really know how far it is) until his body collapsed. He was buried there and then the Basilique Saint-Denis was built on top of it. Tales of what happened spread quickly and the area became known as Mount of Martyrs (in Latin, of course) which eventually evolved into the French "Montmartre."

Cool story bro. Alright so right outside the Metro stop, I saw this:

I was very excited to see this because I just recently watched the movie "Moulin Rouge" (and it was AWESOME!) It was a lot smaller than I expected though... Anyways, as we went up the hill, into Montmartre, I saw this:

When I first saw it, the guy was carrying one and walked right in front of me. You know, just delivering some animal carcasses. It's chill.

Anyways, there was a beautiful view of Paris and I got to pass by Le Bateau Lavoir, which is a collection of studios that artists like Picasso and Matisse. Although it was very beautiful, it was definitely the wrong day to wear heels. Sigh. Pictures are here:

This is "the Catholic church or convent or something" that I referred to above.

Unfortunately, Le Bateau-Lavoir no longer allows tourists to go inside the studios! They used to though... that would have been so cool to see where Picasso painted Les Demoiselles d'Avignon!

The back of Le Bateau-Lavoir. So pretty!

This statue is based on the short story "Le Passe-Muraille" (One Who Passes Through Walls) by Marcel Aymé. In the story, this guy can walk through walls and so he would steal stuff and pull pranks using this skill. One day, he meets this beautiful woman and they have a wonderful night together. But when he tries to leave, he doesn't have enough energy to walk completely through the wall and gets stuck forever -- hence the statue. I'm pretty sure there's more to the story, but the guide spoke in French so this is what I got. HAHA sorry #isuckatfrench

These random dudes work for the equivalent of KTLA5 or Channel 3 Local News in Paris and apparently they are in charge of highlighting a neighborhood every day? week? Anyways, they happened to be filming areas in Montmartre today and they asked us to walk by as they filmed us. LOL I didn't see it but I GOT TO BE ON FRENCH TV WOOHOO

Uh, pretty streets yay

More pretty streets yay

Vineyard in Montmartre. Apparently, their wine used to be very popular because it was cheap and close to Paris (as opposed to being brought in from the countryside or even different nations). Anyways, it's super awful and the side of the mountain it sits on (I believe it was north) is taboo for vineyards because it won't get enough sun to make good wine. However, the wine label features a different artist's work for each season so now it's auctioned as a collector's item. The proceeds go towards the upkeep of the vineyard for the next harvest.

These stairs were killer. Note the random cat drawing on the lamp.

The Sacre-Cœur. At this point, I was too hungry to really appreciate the beauty of it and just snapped a quick picture.

Afterwards, me, Justine, Curran, Natasha and Audrey went on a little picnic. I had a jambonette with rice -- not exactly sure what was going on with it (some sort of chicken and ham thing) -- which was REALLY YUMMY. We ate at a little park that had this tile wall full of "I love you"s in different languages. Please excuse my awkward pose; I don't know how to take pictures.

***

For dinner, we had several guests and it was the craziest, most interesting dinner I've ever had. My host parents have 2 rooms upstairs (in what were historically the maids' rooms) that they rent out. Both tenants had just moved in so they were invited for dinner. One of them was this sweet Chinese girl (Dien, 24) who is in Paris for an internship. Although she is from China, she went to UW for college. The other one was a Mexican man (Rosalio, 27) who went to boarding school in Canada where he learned English and a little bit of French. He was a lawyer in NY but began to work for a non-profit that helps Spanish speakers obtain their green cards, visas, and, eventually, citizenship. They also help with everyday stuff like finding an apartment, getting a job, insurance, etc. THEN we had two other men (Pierre, 40 and I forgot the other one's name but he was 39). Pierre was born in Lebanon and my host parents were good friends with his parents; the other one, Pierre's best friend, was born and raised in Chicago. 20 years ago, when they were 20 and 19, respectively, they came to Paris to study abroad!! They actually did the same CCFS program at the Sorbonne as I am doing now. And what is more mind blowing is that Pierre's best friend happened to be placed into the Bouteillon's home for his host family! What a small world.

Apparently, Pierre met his wife during his time in Paris. He was here for two semesters as well, so when second semester rolled around, he just went to the same building for his Sorbonne class. When he realized he was in the wrong place, he got lost trying to look for his actually classroom. He turned to the person next to him for directions, but she said she was looking for that class too! They went together and at the end of class, she turned to him and said:

_Do you have a phone number?

_Yes.

_I want it.

They ended up dating and eventually got married. We joked a bit about me being careful of who I ask for directions BUT I soon found out that they dated for 4 years and got divorced after 3 years of marriage sooooo... Maybe not. His friend just got divorced so he's on this epic journey of traveling the world and living out of a 10kg backpack. He, like me, tried alcohol for the first time at the Bouteillons. He, unlike me, loved wine and eventually became a sommelier! He is one of the most famous ones in the USA apparently. How cool.

I also found out that my host mom, Jacqueline, lived in China for several years and she was part of the movement that led to the Tiananmen Protests! She was pretty crazy... traveling all over the world... protesting for democracy and human rights... Plus she speaks fluent Chinese sooo that's pretty cool. Have I mentioned yet that Claude is an excellent cook? I am eating way too much...

1 septembre 2014

It is actually Wednesday, September 3, 12:18AM right now (basically Tuesday night) but I am writing about what happened on Monday. I woke up and left for our ACCENT orientation. It was pretty pointless; a waste of time. Afterwards, we had about 2.5-3 hours to kill so we went to the 4th arr. and got some sushi. It was decent and, since we ate family style, it only came out to 7€/person. It was my first time having rice since leaving the States so that was nice. The best part, though, was when I looked through the menu and saw a picture of dumplings/gyoza labeled "ravioli japonais." HAHAHA They call dumplings ravioli. Isn't that so weird? But when I think about it, it totally makes sense. Ah, so strange. Afterwards, we went back to ACCENT and had an "intensive" French lesson. It was completely pointless; a waste of time. We were going over conjugating basic verbs and turning singular forms into plural forms. Ugh. Basically the second week of French I all over again.

THEN, Justine and I went to la Place des Vosges (again, for me). When we first sat down, there was a kid, maybe around 10 years old (give or take a year) doing some cool aerials and flips and stuff with his dad filming him. Soon after, a group of high schoolers came and this super arrogant, cocky-looking guy struts over and starts to try and shop up this 10 year old kid. Mind you, this high schooler is probably like 17 or 18 and almost twice the kid's height. It was cute later though because he started giving the kid advice and showing him how to do something else. But his cockiness was super annoying. When he sat back down with his friends, the little kid went to him, tapped his shoulder, and asked to play some more. So cute! But the cutest part was when this nanny showed up with like 5 enfants (ranging from babies to toddlers) and we watched them play. First there was this super derpy looking kid:

Seriously, though. Just look at his face. I probably captured his face at the least derpiest moment and voilà. He didn't really play with us but after a while, this happened:

They just started looking through my bag, playing with my phone, etc. etc. This girl:

When she first came up to us, she just kept saying "Ça va?" "Ça va?" "Ça va." "Ça va!" (How are you doing? How are you? Doing well. Doing well!) So cute. I kept asking her what her name was and how old she was but she would either reply with "Ça va" or point at things and name them (ex: she pointed at the fountain and said "l'eau" (water)). She also spoke jibberish. At first I thought I just couldn't understand French, but alas, she was speaking jibberish. When I spoke back, she got really excited and started jibber jabbering and it was très mignonne. When she got my phone she would hold it against her ear and say "Allo? Allo? AlloOOOOoooOOOo~?"Eventually, I learned to try and converse with her by pretending I was on the other line. Unfortunately our conversation never really got past ça va... Later, the nanny started drumming a beat on a pail she had (you can see it in the background), this little girl and I started dancing. It was pretty fun. And if you know me, I never ever dance so it was quite special ^_^ The boy was cute but it was really difficult to get Justine's phone back from him:

Je ne l'aimais pas parce qu'il était trop difficile (même pour moi qui travaille avec beaucoup d'enfants chaque été!).

My family eats super late so I decided to get a crêpe -- my first one since coming to Paris, actually:

It's not a very good picture and I mean, it was pretty simple; it only had Nutella. But it cost 3.5€!! Can you believe it? Tellement cher. But it tasted really good and I had a pretty fun conversation with the lady working the stand (albeit in English).

Then I went home and met la tante de Jacqueline, ses fils (Olivier et Bertrand), et la fille de Bertrand. At this point, though, I was exhausted. I actually fell asleep on the Metro coming home which never happens to me. In the beginning, I listened and added a little bit to the conversation, but as dinner wore on, I got so tired my brain couldn't even process what they were saying. Pas du tout! Eventually, Claude caught on and he excused me from the table. I said merci et bonne nuit before stumbling into my room and passing out on my bed. I was going to just close my eyes for a few minutes before washing up, doing my homework, and then going to bed but alas. I did not wake up until 2:45AM at which point I washed up and went straight back to bed. Despite my grogginess, I did notice that someone came in my room and turned off the lights for me -- merci beaucoup to the kind soul (not sure if it was Jacqueline or Marianique(?)).

*Side note: I forgot if I mentioned this, but on my first night (Sunday), I tried champagne for the first time! It was absolutely disgusting. Then, on Monday, I tried wine for the first time. Again, so gross. But Claude is an excellent cook and I eat like a king every day! I am basically the only one in the group who really looks forward to dinner with my host family. More stories to come later, but my host family LOVES dinner parties (we had one every dinner so far) -- and I love how full and jolly and diverse the dinners are (both in terms of food and people and conversation)! J'aime ma vie à Paris!