Categories
Europe France Research Grant

Paris, Pt 2: Crêpes, Champagne, and My 21st Birthday

Ok, time to finally post about my 21st birthday.  I know, it’s actually been several weeks since I did the beginning of my trip, but since then school has started and I’ve been dragged into having real responsibilities, like homework and work and applying to jobs.  So here it goes.

On Monday morning, Christine arrived to a rainy Paris.  After she took a quick nap and I ran an errand, we headed out to the Louvre for a little culture.  The line was long, but we waited it out and then wandered through the halls aimlessly and saw some cool statues, beautiful furniture and jewels, and some French artwork.  Some of the places I remembered going the last time I was there, although the Louvre is so huge I’m confident that we wandered to some new places as well.  We headed over to Opera Garnier once we’d had our fill of art, and then stopped by Galleries Lafayette to marvel at the designer clothing.

At that point, it was getting close to dinner time.  For my birthday present, Christine had surprised me with tickets to the Moulin Rouge!  We had dinner with champagne, which was lovely, and then watched the show, which was unlike anything I’d seen before.  Partially because it was topless, but it also had some pretty crazy acts.  There was the rollerskating couple that did the kinds of lifts that you see in ice skating, but they were just twirling in a circle on a raised platform.  And there were acrobats who had incredible strength.  The man lifted the woman above his head and then got all the way down to a laying position, keeping her above his head the entire time.  The dancers did the can can, a woman danced in water with some boa constrictors, and they brought ponies out onto stage.  There were black lights, feathers, light up costumes, and giant headpieces.  It was a cool experience.

After the show, I wanted Christine to see the Eiffel Tower and L’Arc de Triomphe at night, just as Kelcy had done for me with my first night in Paris.  They’re stunning when they light up.  We started at L’Arc de Triomphe, and then walked down Champs Elysée for a while until we got close enough to the Eiffel Tower to see it sparkle.  It was magical, as always.

The next morning, we started with one of my goals, and climbed Notre Dame.  Which is a lot of stairs.  The view is incredible, though.  Totally worth it.  The gargoyles were a lot creepier than they seem in the Disney animated version, by the way.  A lot of them were eating small animals.

From there, we walked around and took in Paris.  We went to Le Marais, where I got my gift from my parents- a ring with my birthstone- and we wandered into an exhibit on Paris Fashion Week.  Then we headed across the Seine to the Latin Quarter.  The theme of the afternoon was to feel parisienne, which I think we accomplished.  The Latin Quarter is the epitome of Paris to me, with the cafés and bookstores, the boxy shops along the Seine, and that fountain when you get off the metro near Odéon.  I actually remembered my way around this time, and took us to the place where I had eaten crepes nearly ten months before since it’s reasonably priced and delicious.  We also got ice cream and enjoyed the relaxed atmosphere for a while.  From there, we went to one of the other places I remember as feeling Parisian, which is the Jardin de Tuileries.  It didn’t disappoint.  The whole day was perfect.  It captured the essence of the city, with the café culture and magic of Paris.  As the sun set, we found our way back to the metro and headed back to the apartment.  Both of us had to pack, since I was leaving for the US and Christine was heading to a hotel the next day.  Although I wanted the trip to last forever, I’m so glad that Christine joined me for my last two days.  I still don’t quite believe that I got to spend my 21st birthday in Paris with such an amazing friend!

À bientôt.

Categories
Europe France Research Grant

Paris, Pt 1: Monet’s Garden and Modern Art

Paris is special enough that it deserves two posts.

Here’s the thing about Paris: everyone romanticizes it.  You watch Midnight in Paris, for example, and see the city devoid of people, with tranquil, clean streets where everything is in its place.  And certainly, before I visited, that was my view as well.  It’s not quiet, though.  It’s a proper city, with noise and dirt and crowds of people moving rapidly through the metro and cars that honk all the time.  And I think if Paris was exactly like my romanticized imagination, I wouldn’t like it very much.  I love that it’s alive, bustling with movement and culture and even tourists.  It’s that atmosphere that draws me in and makes me want to keep returning.  Paris is the perfect blend of romantic beauty and realism, livable and yet still mysterious.

For those of you who have been following me for the past year, you may remember that I’ve already traveled to Paris, last November (x), and loved it.  This was the first trip I booked after the initial details for Strasbourg were taken care of.  Due to the timing of the quarter system, I arranged to spend my 21st birthday in Paris.  While I originally thought I would be alone, my oldest and very dear friend Christine arranged to fly in on my birthday, so I’m splitting these posts into my time before and after she arrived.

I arrived Friday afternoon by TGV and quickly made my way to my Airbnb, which was adorable but made me feel terribly out of shape with its seven flights of stairs.  I had done some research on reasonably priced shops in Paris since I had a lot of shopping to do for family Christmas presents, which led me to the 6th and then into the Latin Quarter.  I stopped by Shakespeare and Company, walked along the Seine, stopped in Notre Dame, and got a cinnamon crepe.  I ended up in Le Marais for the first time and went grocery shopping on my way back to the apartment.  It was so strange to see some of the places I had visited last November.  They looked the exact same but so much has changed in my life.  This time, I didn’t get lost in the Latin Quarter, and I even managed to find my old hotel… nice to know that mental map took 10 months to develop.

Saturday was a day trip out of the city!  Back when I visited Berlin, I took a bike tour with Fat Tire, so I had checked out their Parisian tours and found one to Giverny.  We all met up at the train station, and of course it started raining.  I apparently don’t have great luck when it comes to bike tour weather.  Our group ended up being me and nine Australians.  We all took the train to Vernon, where we went to a market and shopped around.  I wish the US had bakeries the way France does.  After we had all gotten our provisions for lunch, we headed to a picnic spot by the river.  It was gorgeous, and as I ate my bread and cheese and strawberries, our guide explained how impressionists were the punk rockers of the art world.  Although I’ve already learned about impressionism through DIS, I found the information about how art has evolved from these paintings very interesting.  For the first time, I actually saw something in a Jackson Pollock painting beyond meaningless paint splatters, so that has to count for something!

From there, we biked out to Giverny, which is a tiny town that seems to only have bed & breakfasts, art galleries, and one token café.  We headed to Monet’s garden, which was stunning.  I think if I lived somewhere like that, I’d take up painting!  It was split into two parts, the water lily area that contained the Japanese bridge and plants growing freely, and the area near the house with neat rows of flowers organized by their colors.  When it started raining, we headed into the house.  His studio was the best part of that because they had recreations of many of his pieces on the walls.  After we were all done in the gardens, we visited his tomb and then headed back to Vernon to catch the train.  During the course of the day, I had befriended an Australian family and they invited me to dinner with them, so we found a place near the train station between our two apartments.  It was great to have an intellectual discussion about our cultural differences; we talked about politics, education, art, and how our countries handled their indigenous people.  I learned a lot about Australia (which is still on my list of places to go!)

The next day, I left the apartment relatively early and went to a flea market, Marche aux Puces de la Porte de Vanves.  Side note, I’m terrible at restraining myself from buying breakable things… but I was pretty productive and got a lot of Christmas shopping done!  It was a nice little market, with a good variety of objects and decent prices.  Personally, if I lived somewhere that had markets like that, I’d never buy a regular dish again when I could get something beautiful.

I stopped back at the apartment to drop everything off and then I headed out again.  I finally walked around the two islands, starting with Île Saint Louis and then crossing the bridge toward Notre Dame.  I ended up finding Saint Chapelle, which I had read about due to its stained glass.  As anyone who reads this blog knows, I love stained glass, so I figured I should check it out.  After waiting in a very long line, I made my way up the stairs into the high tower.  Wow.  It was AMAZING.  Truly beautiful, and well worth the wait and the cost to get in.  As much as I would have loved to just sit in the stained glass room all day, my time in Paris was unfortunately limited and I had other places I wanted to go!

So I headed off to Centre Pompidou, the modern art museum in Paris.  I remember learning about the architecture in high school, about how they wanted to take the parts of the building that are supposed to be on the inside and put them on the outside.  The views from the top are pretty great, with views all around Paris.  I spent a long time wandering around the various pieces, trying to see what caught my eye.  A few I liked:  the strange reflective red glass, the three dimensional mirror, the teal stained glass piece, the dark carpeted room with a loop of rain sounds in the background, furniture aesthetic of the 80s.  The works that made me think the most were a series of pieces by a photographer dealing with the uncanny valley, where she would take mannequins and manipulate them to look realistic, and make models and celebrities and turn their photos doll-like; through the pieces she considered what makes people alive.  Creepy, certainly, but also intriguing.  After a meal at the café, I headed back to the apartment to repack and skype my parents, because the next day was my 21st birthday!

I’ll talk about that on another post, though.  À bientôt!

Categories
Europe France Study Abroad

Paris: Everything I Dreamed It Would Be And More

Five days was not enough.  I fell completely in love with the city.  It was vibrant and gorgeous, and for the first time since coming to Europe I could actually communicate properly with people in their native language.  I never thought I would be excited at being able to read advertisements and other signs on the street…

Strangely enough, though, there was a little culture shock.  When I first got on the train it struck me as so inconvenient that I would have to put my ticket in the machine, since in Denmark they just assume you’ve paid.  I realized I’ve lost my ability to jaywalk.  And, as I walked by a shop, someone who worked there said “Bonjour!” and it took me an absurd amount of time to respond since Danish people would probably rather vote for a Republican than talk to a stranger on the street just to say Hi. (yes I’m totally exaggerating no Dane would ever vote for a Republican)

My first day I went to the Louvre and wandered around until I reached my daily art limit.  Then I walked through the city along the Seine and soaked up the beauty of the city.  That night, Kelcy took me to the Eiffel Tower to see the lights as they sparkled and L’Arc de Triomphe, and I could barely contain my excitement at seeing the two most iconic monuments in Paris.

The next morning, Kelcy had to go to class and so I met up with Chen He, my friend from Northwestern.  We went to some of the less touristy spots, like a taxidermy shop/museum (“Do you like dead animals?”) and France’s oldest library!  It was great to get to see some places I wouldn’t have necessarily explored on my own, and after that I met up with my Impressionism class.  We went to the Opera Garnier and got a tour of that, which was beautiful.  I wish I would have been able to see a show there!

After that, we had free time, and I had my most successful encounter in French to date.  I went to one of the really nice department stores, and went to the bookstore part because I decided I wanted another book in French.  In the mystery section, I found Agatha Christie, and figured I could get And Then There Were None.  Except it wasn’t called that, so I had to ask a sales assistant, which meant I had to give a few details of the plot so that he could tell me what the French name was.  Dix Petits Nègres, if you’re interested.  Political correctness is not Europe’s strong suit.

The next day we got a sightseeing tour and then headed to Versailles!  It was beautiful, but honestly after seeing the palaces in Russia I wasn’t as impressed as I thought I would be.  The Hall of Mirrors was cool, and I think the gardens would be amazing if they had flowers (that’s the struggle of visiting during November….) but overall, most of the rooms seemed fairly normal.  Later that night, I went back to the Louvre and finally saw the Mona Lisa.

The art didn’t stop there, because our next morning started with Musée de l’Orangerie, which had Monet’s water lilies, followed by Musée d’Orsay with most well known impressionist works.  It was pretty awesome to see art where I knew the pieces and their context, and impressionism is my favorite movement (based on my very limited knowledge of art).  This was followed by more free time, in which I went with a friend to the catacombs.  I’ve now seen more bones than I ever expected to, although the basement part of Hamlet’s castle was actually far creepier.  It was definitely worth the visit though!

The final highlight of the trip was our Seine dinner cruise.  Everyone got dressed up and we had three hours of floating down the Seine, with a three course meal and quite a bit of free wine.  The views were lovely, as was the company and the alcohol.  Afterwards, Alanna and I went to find a bar to experience Parisian nightlife and we ended up finding a wine bar!  The atmosphere was relaxed and the bartender recommended a very good light red wine.  We felt very classy and French, and he even gave us a 3 euro discount at the end of the night so that was exciting.  (But also confusing.)

My last morning, I went to part of the mass at Notre Dame.  The music and stained glass windows were very beautiful.  After I left, I went to L’Arc de Triomphe again to climb it, which had amazing views of the city.  I took a lot of selfies.  When I got down again, Kelcy took me to Shakespeare and Company and then I spent the rest of my time wandering around the Latin Quarter before meeting up with my class once more to head to the airport.

Everyone says Parisians are rude, that they’re the New Yorkers of Europe.  Having never been to New York, I can’t really make that comparison, but the Parisians I interacted with were not rude.  I usually spoke to them in French, and they apparently deemed it acceptable.  In fact, the one person I talked to who switched to English asked me in French first if we should switch to English (which was great since I was getting directions).

Overall, it was a fantastic five days.  Paris is my favorite place I’ve ever been to, and I know I’ll be back.

À bientôt, Paris.  Je t’adore.