Fontainebleau & Barbizon

On Saturday morning, my class took a field trip (very elementary school, I know) to Fontainebleau and Barbizon. Considering we all had to be in Paris by 9:00am on a Saturday morning, I was very impressed with our group-- only one person missed the bus. (Don't worry, she managed to catch a train and meet up with us later).   

What's there to see at Fontainbleau you ask? Well a chateau of course! The main structure of the palace that you can see today was built by François I in the 16th century, though like most palaces and churches, there are remnants of older structures on which the palace was built. Since François I's reign, others such as Henri IV and Napoleon Bonaparte (Fontainebleau is where Napoleon attempted to commit suicide) have also added and changed various sections of the palace. 

Like any chateau, Fontainebleau also has several gardens in various styles. I had no idea there were such things as a French garden and an English garden, but I guess it makes sense that the French and the English would have two very different ideas about what a garden should look like.

English style is more 'natural'

French style is very ordered and symmetric

After a break for lunch, we hopped back on the bus and found ourselves in the small town of Barbizon. Barbizon was made famous by a school of artists (suprisingly named the Barbizon school) who gathered there to paint the landscape. Dr. Costello had hoped to take us to the museum in Barbizon to see some of their works, but despite the fact that he called ahead to make sure it was open, the museum was of course closed. Instead, we walked through Jean-François Millet's atelier, where he produced some of his most well-known works. Then we took a little hike through the forest of Fontainebleau which lies on the edge of the village of Barbizon.

Millet's Studio

I know what you're thinking, but it's not bigfoot.
It's just Dr. Costello.

Flammenkueche and Apfelstrudel

Bonjour! or should I say Guten Tag?

Wow, where to begin? There's so much to tell! This weekend I went Strasbourg and if any of you ever find yourselves in France, I highly recommend paying this wonderful city a visit. Located right next to the border between Germany and France, it has a bit of an identity crisis which only makes it that much more unique. Everyone speaks French (with a slightly different accent than the Parisians), but most of the streets and buildings have German names (which are a lot of fun to attempt to pronouce). The Alsace-Lorraine region has long been a disputed territory between France and Germany, so although today Strasbourg is a part of France its German roots are easily apparent. That is also the region where much of my family on my dad's side came from, which probably made the Alsace historical museum a little more exciting for me than for my fellow travellers.

Gutenberg- The guy who invented the printing press.
 He's quite the celebrity in Strasbourg.

We left Paris late Friday night by the TGV (the train of great speed) and began our weekend adventure early Saturday morning. We started with the cathedral, located in the heart of the city. It was actually the world's tallest building for a few centuries and is famous for its astronomical clock which is one of largest in the world (sensing a theme here?) and has apparently proved to be unusually accurate. 

From there we explored La Petite France, a part of the city known for its medievel houses. It's very picturesque, in a sort of Busch Gardens way, but without the cheesy music. Then I managed to convince one of my friends to go to the Alsace and Strasbourg historical museums with me. The Alsace museum was incredible. From the outside, it appeared tiny, but once we were inside it turned out to be a maze of cultural objects from the region-- everything from clothing, to religious objects, to children's games and farm equipment (it felt like Mary Poppin's bag, who knew all that stuff could fit in such a small space?). 

As far as meals went, we tried out the local specialties. Tarte flambée or flammenkueche is very popular in Strasbourg. It's basically a thin crust covered in creme fraiche, onions, bacon and cheese. I also tried a variation of the tarte, but it was more of a potato based dish that still had the creme fraiche, bacon, onions and cheese. To drink, we tried some hot wine which is often sold on carts in the streets during winter. For dessert we shared black forest cake and apfelstrudel (apple strudel).

Tarte Flambee

Apple Strudel (yum!)

Flamingos at the Parc de L'Orangerie

Sunday, I had a lot of difficulty convincing my friends that taking a train to Strasbourg to sleep in was a very expensive way to miss out on a lot of stuff. Consequently I spent a good portion of the day exploring by myself. Strasbourg is the center of several European institutions, so I started the day by walking around the Parliament, Council and Human Rights buildings. Located right next to them is the Parc de l'Orangerie, known for its gardens and small zoo. As I was walking back through the city, past the university (where I spotted Kant on top of one of the buildings- shout out to Dr. Gatti) and a few other cathedrals, the sun finally came out for the first time all weekend (that's what they get for sleeping in). I stopped by the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, then managed to coax the sleepy college students from the hotel in time for dinner.

Anyway, that's the basic summary of my trip. I got back yesterday morning (we got up around 4:00am to catch our train, eww) and since then all I've been doing catching up on homework and going to class. Nothing much is new with my host family, except one of the older brothers is home on break from college this week. He gave me quite a scare on Friday before I left for my train. I was eating dinner in the kitchen, and I guess he had forgotten his key, so he hopped the gate and walked right in the door. I of course had no idea who he was or even that he was expected home, but thankfully vaguely recognized him from family pictures around the house.

A la prochaine fois!

Louis XIV and Caligula

Hey everyone,

Things have been really crazy lately and I feel like I have no time to do all the things I need to do, let alone the things I want to do, so I apologize for the lack of posts. Phonetics has started this week, so now I have to figure out how to work around one more class during the day. I had hoped it would be an interesting class, because I really enjoyed the phonetics class I took at Elon, but unfortuanately it's mostly just a lot of repetition. We have to wear these large headphones and record ourselves repeating sentences over and over again while the teacher stares at us. Every now and then she'll pop in to critique something you've just said, which can be a little frightening because you never know when she'll be listening to you. She also has an extremely high pitched voice, which I find difficult not to imitate as I'm repeating sentences back to her (I mean, we're supposed to say what she says exactly as she says it right?). Other than that, classes have been normal.

Saturday I went to see the Palace of Versaille, which was developed by Louis XIV in the 17th century. When it was first built it was in a small village outside of Paris, but today it's in the middle of a suburb. My host sister actually attends a university which sits pretty much right across the street (can you imagine looking out of your classroom window and seeing a palace?). Anyway, here are some pictures to give you an idea of the size and opulence of the building:



The Hall of Mirrors



The Queen's Chamber (I feel like 'bedroom' isn't a regal enough word)

The gardens of Versaille occupy around 800 hectares of land (which I'm sure is some enormous amount, but since it had started to rain by the time we got to the gardens we only saw the one hectare.)

Yesterday, I went with my class to see the ballet Caligula at the Palais Garnier. The ballet is a tragedy (the story, not the dancing) which recounts the story of the Roman Emperor Caligula. I admit I definitely had to read a synopsis of the ballet after watching it, because ballet leaves a lot of room for interpretation and guesswork. I think what I enjoyed most about it was the music. It was choreographed to Vivaldi's Four Seasons and the orchestra did an amazing job. Just being in the theatre was a fun experience. It was built in the late 19th century and the decor is extremely intricate, with painted ceilings, all sorts of statues and a very large chandelier. We all sat in elaborate boxes on the 3rd floor (well, I guess that would be the 4th floor in America) that were covered in red velvet and allowed for an awesome view of the stage.     

This is the requisite group picture of us standing in front of the theatre.

Anway, those are the highlights of the past few days. I'm sorry if I don't go into more detail, but it's crazy how much faster time flies in Paris.

A la prochaine fois!

"Meuh," says the cow!

So it looks like it has been a while since my last post, but I promise you're not missing anything too exciting (unless you find French grammar particularly interesting). This week has really been all about getting into a routine, discovering the daily rhythm of living and going to school in Paris. The commute to class is obviously much longer than it would be on a college campus, and some of my classmates are figuring that out the hard way (you know, the ones who usually roll out of bed 10 minutes before their first class). I have a 45 minute commute by metro, though most of the people in the program have to take a train into the city and then transfer to a metro. 

Another thing everyone's having a little trouble with is the length of the grammar classes- two whole hours everyday. No matter how great the teacher may be, it is extremely difficult to make conjugating verbs and choosing the right pronoun fun for that amount of time. That's probably why we all tend to gravitate back towards the foyer after class. It's a little bit strange, but I there's some sort of unannounced agreement in our group that if you're by yourself and have nothing to do you should go to the lobby of the foyer, because sure enough someone else will always be there.

Despite the length of the class, I am enjoying being in such an international environment. The other day, somehow animal noises came up and my teacher asked what noise a cow makes. It turns out American cows sound different from French, Turkish, Chinese and Swedish cows. It's really interesting to see how such a little thing like the noise we assign to cows can differ from country to country.

The members of my host family have slowly begun to reappear from their various vacation spots. The other night at dinner, my host mom asked me if I had received a package from my grandmother yet (my grandmother had told me she wants to send me a care package). My host dad became extremely curious as to what sort of things she was sending me, especially any type of food. He asked me something to the effect of, "What things is she sending that we savages don't have over here in France?" I don't think he was actually offended, but he definitly found the idea of a care package comical.

Anyway, I think that pretty much covers the past few days. Like I said, nothing very exciting has happened, but it was definitely time for an update.

Until next time!

  

Oh, the Places You'll Go!

Bonjour tout le monde!

I guess the biggest thing that's happened since my last post was the start of my French class. Thursday, we found out the results of the placement test we took upon arrival (probably the most difficult French test I have ever taken). I placed into the advanced level class, which I'm very excited about, especially since the placement test was such a downer. I'm the only person from the NC group in my class, which seemed scary when I went to class on Friday, but I'm hoping that will give me a chance to make friends with people outside of the NC bubble. There are probably 15 people in my class, most of them are from China and Japan. There are four Americans, including myself, and several people from Russia, Germany, Denmark, and Iran. It's interesting to hear French spoken with so many accents. It's also cool to think that our one common languge is French!

Today, I met up with several of my friends to plan some weekend trips. This of course quickly became a difficult task as there are so many places we all want to go and so little time. We purchased train tickets to Strasbourg for the last weekend in February! Strasbourg is in the Northeastern region of France, right on the border with Germany. Other possibilities we talked about included Marseille, Montpelier, Biaritz and London, but Strasbourg is about as far as our planning made it. Next weekend, I think we're going to take a day trip to Versailles (the royal palace built by Louis XIV). If any of you have any suggestions for awesome European cities to visit, I would love to hear them!

Anyway, that's about all that's happened-- the major highlights anyway.

A tout a l'heure!

A Walk Around Paris

Salut!

I suppose it's time for a quick update, though I haven't done anything too exciting in the past few days. Yesterday, I had my first class with the program director, Dr. Costello. The class has some long title about memory and trauma that I can never remember, but basically it's a literature course. We'll be reading several novels written by French authors during the WWII and post-colonial period, and discussing how the trauma and memories of these events are expressed in each example. There are only four of us in this class, so I guess that means I'll have to actually show up for class (just kidding). I really think that the class will be more fun becuase there are so few of us. Also, although the class was originally planned to be taught in English, the four of us have decided it makes more sense to speak in French. It's just another opportunity to improve our language skills. 




Today, I didn't have any classes, so I met up with some friends and we explored Paris a little bit. Here, I'll take you on a quick tour:





Ile de la Cite- one of the two islands on the Seine



Louvre Museum

Place de la Concorde



This is a wall in Montmartre where "I love you" has been written
in about 80 different languages



 A Demain!

Rockin' the Suburbs

Salut tout le monde!

Yesterday morning, everyone packed all their stuff up (or at least attempted to- isn't it amazing how much better you're able to fit stuff together the first time you pack?), then we all headed to the lobby to wait. I think someone said they felt like a puppy waiting to be adopted by a family! My host mother came fairly early, and I left most of the other students staring out the lobby windows, intently studying each car and person who passed the building.



This is my new home in Asnieres. We live in the left half of this building.



My host mother, Mme de Vilmorin, drove me through the center of Paris and showed me some of the sites (which was wonderful, because there's a lot of walking involved in order to see everything). Once we were home, I met Victoire and Pierre. I thought there were four boys in the family, but I misread Victoire as Victor, so it turns out there are three boys and one girl. Victoire is my age and goes to school in Versaille, where she studies architecture. Pierre is Ben's age and goes to their equivalent of high school in Paris. As far as I can tell, these are the two kids who will be around most often. Mme de Vilmorin works in real estate and M de Vilmorin does something with banking.



This is my room. The bed is bunked over the desk/closet space.



Mme de Vilmorin took me on a walk around Asnieres in the afternoon to show me the metro, train station, grocery store, etc. Everyone seems very nice and helpful. They are easy to understand in a one on one conversation, but at the dinner table when everyone is talking at once, whoa! M de Vilmorin, oddly enough, just read a book on the Cheasapeake Bay and was extremely excited to find out I'm from Chesapeake. I'm pretty sure he knows a lot more about Chesapeake than I do! 

Today, I've just hung out at home mostly. I'll be meeting some friends who live near me for dinner later and tomorrow I will have my first class (what? we have to actually go to school here?).

Their dog, Utopie (spelling?)

A demain!