Région de la Loire: The Loire Valley

It all started on Saturday, Sept. 24 with a 2 hour train ride out to Tours in the Loire Valley area which was spent making use of my Kindle. I haven't had as much time to read as I had hoped, plus I played games on it with our program director's 8-year-old son Blaise who came along for the trip. We went from the train directly into a big coach us and off we were to our first chateau! Let me say for the record that when I heard the word chateau I imagined cute little cottages in the woods with some flowers and such, maybe that was naive lol. Where the French are lacking in peanut butter they make it up with the size of these insane castles!

The first one we went to was Chateau de Villandry. This one had moats and fountains and a HUGE intricate garden. The many different sections of garden had various flowers, trees, bushes, vegetables, all carefully organized in special patterns and shapes. It was nice to be able to kind of wander around alone because I really do love to just wander quietly and absorb my surroundings. We were not, however, able to go inside this chateau, but I was happy enough in the gardens anyway. I got some great photos for my photography class, too, so hopefully those will turn out well! We had lunch at the restaurant at this chateau which featured fresh vegetables from the gardens and some incredible pork.

Next we were on to Azay-le-rideau. This one really looked like a castle and we spent most of our visit here inside the chateau. It was interesting to see all of the different rooms and secret staircases and it was all made of smooth white stone. It was hard to walk around these castles without imagining that I was in the movie Pride and Prejudice (which may sound very stupid, definitely the wrong part of Europe, and maybe the wrong time period, too, but you know what I mean).

The Chateau and the gardens of La Chatonniere. This was probably my favorite place we visited, not because the chateau was massive and incredible but because the gardens were so intricate and interesting. I loved how they were named: The Garden of Intelligence, the Garden of Romances (arches of roses), the Garden of Abundance (vegetables, shaped like a giant leaf!), the Garden of Sciences (mostly herbs), the Garden of Senses (brightly colored flowers), etc. All of these gardens had interesting overall shapes and designs within themselves and the chateau was more homey than the others we had seen so far, which I liked.

Next (yes, we went to 4 different chateaus in one day!) was le Chateau de la Roche for an organic wine tasting. There was not really a chateau there, per say,  but it was something fun and different in our trip. The tour of the barrels and small factory used to make the wine was great, and so was the tasting, but it would have been better if I actually liked any of the wines they made. I felt so bad, but some were too dry, some too bitter, some just not pleasing to my taste buds, and I was surprised because normally I am not super picky when it comes to wine. Hahaha!

After that long day we were ready to eat. We were able to stop by the hotel where we were staying so we could freshen up very quickly and drop off our bags. We went to Le Martin Bleu, which was in Tours right by our hotel and right around the corner from the train station. I had raw salmon with lime juice for an appetizer, an awesome steak and these super-thin cheesy potatoes for dinner and I was blown away. So nice to have a few good meals that we didn't have to pay extra for because the whole trip was included in the program! Needless to say we crashed pretty quickly once we got back to the hotel after dinner. I roomed with Leanne which was fun because we get along really well but don't end up getting to spend nearly enough time together.

We were provided with a great breakfast in the morning with crossaints (which I ate with apricot jam, yummmm) yogurts, hard-boiled eggs, and all kind of other treats. That was a great way to start the day. The first place we visited on Sunday was Chateau de Chenonceau. This was definitely the biggest castle we visited and, again, it had beautiful intricate gardens with fountains and such. This castle had a really serious moat though, those other castles had no idea what a real moat was haha. The rooms in this castle had pressed velvet on the walls in the study and black and white tiled floors. My favorite room was the kitchen in the basement because it had these beautiful copper pots and pans hanging on the walls and I can't even describe how much I loved all the old cast iron stoves and kitchen utensils. They made for some really great pictures for class, too! We had lunch in the restaurant here, chicken for me, which was alright, but I can't really be picky because pretty much all I have been eating are baguettes, apples, and pb&j. Haha!

Last, but certainly not least, we went to a garden festival/competition thing called Festival des Jardins au Chateau de Chaumont. There were 18 different garden beds that pre-screened gardeners were able to design with plants and sculptures and they all had different themes. That was pretty cool, but I was pretty tired from the weekend at that point. Still got great pics from class (am I sounding a little repetitive at this point?). Anyway we hopped the bus back to the train after this and headed "home" to Paris. Wow, that sounds like a weird phrase... "home to Paris"... haha still hard to grip the fact that I am living in France until December, I still have to keep reminding myself.

Anyway it was an amazing weekend overall and I never would have gotten to see these things without Anne Marsella (program director) and Charlotte, her assistant! Great trip and I am so thankful!

Bisous! Until next time!

Juste quelques photos: Just a Few Photos

Place des Vosges, 

a beautiful park we saw when we took a tour of the Marais area of Paris

Elise, Emily, and I at the Notre Dame

The food festival we went to, sooo good!

Look at all the colors and flavors!

This chocolate was the death of me... and my wallet... it was so worth it!

Eiffel tower lit up at night

Me, Elise, Emily

I will get to posting about the Loire Valley soon! Followed by pictures once I load and edit them all!

Cette Semaine: This week

It hasn't been an especially exciting week so far, nothing that makes for exciting reading anyway, but there have been a few notable occurrences...

• Got to develop my first two rolls of film in Photography on Monday! I didn't get to make any prints yet but I am so excited to start! The film turned out really good so we will see how they turn out!
• I have really been enjoying my dance classes. My ballet teacher, Wayne Byars, is American so he is really nice to us and gives a great, hard class. My jazz teachers have excellent movement, great music choices, and have been really nice so far too!
• Last night (Wednesday) after taking a jazz class I went to the Eiffel Tower with Elise, Emily, and some guys we met that live in our dorm building. We brought a few bottles of wine and the guys had some beers and such and we just decided to go sit my the Eiffel Tower because it is all lit up at night. It even sparkles every so often, which is sooo beautiful to see (but really hard to photograph!).
• This weekend we are going to the Loire Valley with our Wells College program! Its already included (with some awesome meals) so we are really excited!

I will follow with some general pics soon!

Voir le Vrai Paris: Seeing the Real Paris

I have done a few pretty cool things the last few days that really make it sink in that I am really living in Paris, France.

1. On Thursday I didn't have any classes so I took a modern dance class with Elise and then we decided to go over by the Georges Pompidou comtemporary art museum, first to shop around a little (just a little mom!) and then we went through the museum (well, at least the top 2 floors, then we were exhausted). The few exhibitions I saw blew my mind and I am so mad I did not bring my camera! Seriously the Pompidou is one of my favorite new places in Paris <3  
2. Friday after french in the morning I went home to relax and do a little laundry, in my sink, before I met up with Elise and Emily for a yoga class. It was exactly what we needed, so realxing, and it didn't get us too sweaty so we could go out for drinks after! We grabbed a few bottles of wine and went over to our friends' Neely and Ann Marie's apartment they rented instead of staying in the dorms or a homestay. We hung out with them for a little while and then we headed out for dinner, but had to split up because there were too many of us. Emily, Elise, Leanne, and I ended up at a resturant called Cosi and yes, those of you who are familiar with the name, it is related to the American resturants! The chain in the U.S. is based on this place and they have the same amazing sandwiches (with better topping combos, actually) and brick oven pizzas and stuff! After Cosi we tried to go over to Champs-Elysses which is like New York's 5th Ave in Paris. Shopping galore! Though we didn't go there to shop we were trying to find a club, which we didn't really find, but we still had fun walking around and seeing the Arc du Triomphe from a distance (note to self, this is one of the many places I need to go revisit and see more in-depth).
3. Yesterday, Saturday, was close to perfect... :) We heard about a bunch of art exhibitions and random festivals going on this weekend that are usually closed to the public or only happen once a year and we headed for a food and wine festival along the Seine river next to the Notre Dame. C'est tres bon! Free samples of wine after wine, cheese after cheese, pastry after pastry, and some incredible pate and escargot (yes, I have to admit I LOVE snails now... maybe I am a little more French after all). I ended up getting some Cranberry spice bread and 2 HUGE shards of chocolate from this special chocolate stand to take home. Seriously this chocolate stand was just stacked up with thick sheets of chocolate of all flavors, and I got milk chocolate with caramel and dark chocolate with raspberry. Little did I know until she weighed it for me that it was 20 euro worth of chocolate... I didn't even care I had to have it at that point. Haha! I also got some nice cheese and a free bag of apples, garlic, and a huge bunch of grapes. We went to wander around for a little while to kill some time before we knew a jazz band was supposed to start up and ended up in Shakespeare and Company, an adorable English book store right by the Notre Dame. I started getting lost in the selection of poetry books but decided to save the actual purchasing for a when I would have more time to really look through the store. We meandered through the pittoresque streets, saw a riot (protesting something about capitalism and America being a nightmare and the whole bank system in France being messed up right now) and headed back to hear some jazz music back by the river. After we grabbed some dinner (REAL french onion soup for me) and ran back to our metro stop in the rain.

It's really starting to feel like I am settling into the rhythm of Paris better and seeing things like the Arc du Triomphe and the Notre Dame keep reminding me that I am actually living in Paris, France, one of the most beautiful and famous cities in the world. I can never really express how truly grateful I am to even have this opportunity because I know it will forever shape the person I become.

 C'est tout pour aujourd'hui! Bisous!

That's all for today! Kisses!

Lentement mais Sûrement: Slowly but Surely

I have been settling in here a little better. There were a few days there that were really shaky but I am starting to get the hang of things. French is starting to sink in a little more, I am settling into a more set schedule, which allows me to pretty much have afternoons free, I have more food and just household objects I need for daily life, basically I have had more time to nest haha. 

We have done a few interesting things recently. On Friday night the program directors from our Wells College program took us to a nice french dinner where I tried escargot and duck for the first time! Plus, the chocolate cake I had for desert was heavenly :) Afterwards we stayed in that part of town, called Bastille, for a few drinks before we headed home. Saturday we took a walking tour through the Marais area and saw the Hotel de Ville and all kinds of historical sights that I unfortunately do not remember because I was more so looking around curiously and taking pictures for my photography class. That night a few girls from Wells, myself included, tried to meet up with some new friends from my French class to go out, but it ended up kind-of being a bust because no one was familiar enough with the city to find a good place to go. Sunday Elise and I checked out a big market in Bastille, which turned out to be awesome (I may just become a regular sunday afternoon customer!). After that we met up with a friend I met in Chicago, actually, at the French Consulate while I was getting my student visa. We went to coffee and talked about all the things we are loving about Paris so far and the dilemmas we are getting ourselves into. Basically, it was so nice to just have another English-speaking American to talk to who was having as much trouble adjusting as I was. Plus, since he is staying for 2 years he has a whole mess of things to deal with that I do not, thankfully. On Monday I had my first Photography class which was great! Elise and I are the only ones in Photo 2 so when we arrived he decided it would be nice to just walk around some pretty areas and take pictures and get tea at a Mosque turned tea shop for our 3 hour class.

Other than that I have just been taking more dance classes (I am sooooo sore!) and I am possibly going to Versailles for a day trip this weekend which would be fun! More later! 

XO Bisous!

My first few days...

The Cite' Universitaire

The back of my building, Fondation des Etats-Unis.

My room, with a beautiful view of one of the parks on campus.

Elise, Emily, and Erica as we enjoy our first crossaints in a cafe in Paris <3

Yummm crossaint, the only thing that would make this better is chocolate in the middle... lol

Basilique de Sacre' Coeur in Montmarte

All of the girls in the Wells College Arts in Paris program

Elise, Emily, and I at the Eiffel tower <3

L'aventure commence: The Adventure Begins

Paris is one of the most beautiful and most loved cities in the world. I am so lucky to have the experience to even visit a city so legendary, let alone live here for a whole semester. I would love nothing more than to share this experience with my friends along the way. Let's start from the beginning, shall we?

So... the first few days here in Paris have been quite a wake up call...

It started out with my flight to JFK, where it was interesting to find my next terminal, but eventually I found Elise (another dancer from Point Park studying in Paris), my next terminal, and a lot of the other girls going on the trip (not to mention a wine bar to loosen up a little with an overpriced glass before the long flight, lol). About 7.5 hours later we landed in Paris and were escorted from the airport to the Fondation des Etats-Unis (United Stated building) in the Cite Universitaire campus by our Program Director, Anne Marsella, and her young, parisian assistant, Charlotte. The Cite Universitaire is a whole campus of dorm buildings for students in Paris from all over the world: there is the American house, the German house, Argentinian, Japanese, etc. and it is a beautiful campus with lots of green parks and lots of people running and picnic-ing and such. Anyway we pulled up to our beautiful ivy-covered, red brick dorm building and settled into our (single!) dorm rooms for a few hours before Anne and Charlotte brought us a Lebanese dinner (sooo good!).

The next day they let us sleep in a little and once we met up in the lobby we were given a tour of the campus and showed how to take the RER train to the Metro to get to our French class every morning (MTWF). Then we walked down near where the Wells studio is to have a lunch of cous cous and vegetables (which we learned was also a 3-stop metro ride), after which we actually went to the studio. The Wells studio is just like a one-room art studio with a small office and kitchenette where all of the art history classes are. While we were having a meeting there we learned that our French classes are in a separate place from the Wells studio, which is separate from all the art classes, which is also separate from the dance studio which is in a totally different part of town. All of our studio art classes take place all over the city, in the studios of our professors, so we will be riding metros all over town all day every day pretty much, which has all been a little overwhelming, so far. After the visit to the Wells studio we hopped on the metro to see where the bookbinding studio is, saw a beautiful view of Paris from up by the Basilique du Sacré Cœur in Montmarte, and walked around the area for a while. We had some time after so Elise, Emily, Anna, Ashley, and I couldn't help but head straight over to the Eiffel Tower :)

The next day, Monday morning, we headed to the French school at our normal time for our first day of class/ placement tests at 9:00. After my first exhausting, 3 hour, French class which does not really cater to beginners, even though it is the Beginner level, we met back up at the Wells Studio to have lunch with some of the art and art history professors to hear about their courses. We finally got to hit up a grocery store after, which proved to be a challenge with french labels and lack of familiar food selections. That night I went to my first photo class, which I think I am going to really enjoy, and then I went home to frantically study all my new french packets from the first day.

This morning French was not much easier. My studying did not help as much as I had hoped it would, and we ended up learning a lot of new stuff, too. It's already becoming overwhelming. We met up at the Wells studio again after to have a meeting about dance classes and were shown how to take the metro over to where the studio is. When we walked in the studio I exhaled the biggest sigh of relief at the sight of something familiar. Music, dance, classes, a studio, I seriously started choking up a little bit because in the middle of all my overwhelming new places, experiences, and a new language, it was so unexpectedly comforting to walk into a familiar atmosphere. Movement is a universal language, and I think dancing will serve as my comfort food, here. I met up with Elise and Emily after their painting class and we tried to get our pay-as-you-go phones near the Centre Pompidou but the store where we got our phones wouldn't let us buy prepaid cards there and we were sent from place to place to end up with, what do you know, no prepaid phone card. UUUGGHHHHH We did find some cool shoe stores and a vintage clothing store which lightened our spirits ever so slightly, but after all of this we were so exhausted and frustrated we took metro to metro to go home.

I hope I don't sound like I am complaining too much. I want to paint Paris as a beautiful place and share how truly amazing my adventure is and will be, but I also want to present an accurate portrayal of all the challenges I never anticipated. It makes me smile as I have to remind myself every so often that, "I am in Paris. I LIVE in Paris," it will just take some settling in and getting used to before I feel comfortable and blend in as a true Parisian.

Bisous, Leah