Where tea flows from the kitchen faucets and a good cup of coffee is nowhere in sight

While I'm on my brief reprieve from my spring break travels, I thought I'd get a post in so that I don't have to write a super-long one after I return from Rome.

So the last six days were filled with amazing Londonness. Things didn't exactly start off smashingly, however. I took the bus from Paris to London. Overall, it wasn't a bad ride at all. About 8 hours in total, with a pleasant 1.5hr trip across the Channel via a luxurious British ferry. I occurred to me approximately one hour into my trip that despite carefully making these travel plans, I didn't have Delanie's number, nor did she have mine, and I also had no idea where she was living. In fact, the only thing I knew about Delanie's stay in London was that she was studying in conjunction with the University of London, which I only knew because she had mentioned it once in passing. Now, if you know us, you know this is quintessential Delanie-Justine. It's just what we do, it's how we roll. We're not ones for planning ahead, and we typically prefer spontaneity and fun over rationale. However, being in two separate countries and ones that neither of us has ever visited before, the stakes are a little higher now, and in retrospect, a little better planning would probably have been best. So, at approximately one hour into my travels, I felt sick to my stomach--not because of car-sickness, because I knew something was going to go wrong.

We arrived in London 30 minutes ahead of schedule. Knowing Delanie, I would be surprised if she even made it to the bis station on time, so I told myself I was going to give her 45 minutes, and then I would start worrying. I tried to sit in the terminal and read, but I couldn't concentrate on anything other than the gnawing feeling in my stomach telling me that Delanie was not going to come running through the doors fashionably late and slightly exasperated. At 9:40 I started to panic. My first act of desperation was asking the two young guys next to me if they happened to know anyone at the University of London. They did not. I left the arrivals terminals and headed across the street to the departures terminal thinking that Delanie might have gotten confused and assumed I would be there. Turns out the departures terminal was HUGE. Much, much bigger than the arrivals terminal. As I was walking I began to worry that Delanie mixed up the days. I remembered that she had a weekend trip to somewhere in England and that she had Mondays off. Perhaps she would not be back in London until Monday evening? What the hell was I supposed to do if that were the case? Stay in a hostel Sunday night and wait until she came back? But then how would she ever know where I was? I was really starting to panic at this point. Out of desperation I even started asking people if they had working internet on their laptops. Perhaps she sent me a message on facebook at the last minute telling me she wouldn't be in London until Monday. I went back to arrivals because I realized that it probably wasn't a good idea to be moving around. I stood outside of the arrivals terminal once again, this time talking to any random stranger I saw. They all thought I was crazy for not having my friend's cell phone number. I was beginning to realize just how stupid we were for not even thinking about exchanging numbers. They all asked if I could call someone else to pick me up. Nope. Delanie's literally the only person I know in the entirety of the United Kingdom. Shit. I'm beyond screwed.

I went to the information desk next hoping that I could at least flirt my way into getting the security guard guy with the computer to let me check facebook. Shameless, I know. He suggested I use the intercom thingy to request Delanie's presence, and give it five minutes. Ten minutes passed and I was on the verge of a breakdown. Then, if by some miracle, I heard someone say, "maybe you can ask at the information desk." And I turned around, and there she was. At 10:30pm, we had finally found each other. Turns out Victoria station is ridiculously big, and the tube drops you off nowhere near the Victoria coach station. She was as panicked, if not more, than I was. She also had to pay some random guy five pounds to help her find me.

Things got better from there. A lot better. Overall I had a really great time, no complaints. I got to see Big Ben (four times, actually. yeah.), Parliament, St. James Park, the Eye, Buckingham Palace, the guards (I even got to see two of them walk!! I didn't even realize they were allowed to move!), a gentleman's club, the official cobbler to the monarchy, the house where Clarissa Dalloway lived in Mrs. Dalloway, the Prime Minister's house, Abbey Road, Abbey Road studios, Kelly Jones of the Stereophonics emerging from Abbey Road Studios, the street where Oscar Wilde used to pick up young boys, Lawrence of Arabia's house, the British Museum, the national galleries, plus more that I'm sure I'm forgetting.

The ride back to Paris was less than enjoyable. I had to sit next to a nervous Franco-Italian, who kept fidgeting every ten seconds. I thought he was normal enough in the beginning of the trip because we casually talked about London and Paris and Italy, then discussed what I was studying and how I'm enjoying my studies. That was the first ten or fifteen minutes. Afterward he just got really fidgety which in turn made me feel really uncomfortable. I hoped that he just needed to get off the bus and walk around a bit, and after we got off the ferry he would be better, but he definitely wasn't--he was perhaps even more uncomfortable than before we left England. Maybe he was smuggling drugs or something. I don't know. But after I gathered my luggage and sat down in the metro, I don't think I've ever felt so happy to be home.

There were a few cultural things that struck me while I was in London. The biggest one was the supermarkets. I guess I never realized it because I'm so used to living in Paris, but the supermarkets here are so much smaller than in England (as well as the States). I'd forgotten that in supermarkets outside of France you can get literally everything you could possibly need all under one roof. But by having everything at my disposal made me wonder who in their right mind wouldn't want to buy their pastry, and bread, and cheese, and meat, etc, etc, etc, fresh. It boggled my mind.

I was also surprised at how much London reminded me of any random city in the States, specifically with all the chain restaurants and fast-food places on every corner. Paris has some of that, but probably only a 10th of what London has. As much as I enjoyed London, it made me really happy that I picked Paris to study in. I don't care what anyone says or thinks, a fresh sandwich from a quaint patisserie that's been in business since the 19th century trumps anything from Subway any day.

Burger King also threw me for a loop. I didn't realize France doesn't have Burger King until I saw them all in England. They've got quite a few McDonald's but no Burger King. I maintain that France's long-time adversity to the monarchy is the reason for their lack of Burger King.

Highlights of the trip:

1) The white cliffs of Dover. I have always wanted to see the white cliffs of Dover, and I definitely was not let down. Perched atop the beautiful cliffs were several unbelievable fortress-like castles. The nerd in me almost expected to see a Heathcliff-type character broodingly looking out onto the water, but alas, I saw none. It really was an amazing sight to see, especially because I've never really thought that I'd be able to see it in this lifetime. My biggest regret was not getting a picture. I'm really kicking myself over that one.

2) Delanie dancing into a chick in a wheelchair. Nuff said.

3) Burger King. I missed it a ton and I didn't even realize it until we were finally in England and I saw one with my very own eyes. We ate it twice in the six days I was there and I feel disgusting for doing so.

4) Getting to walk across Abbey Road like on the album. Abbey Road in general was a amazing. Kind of like my Mecca, I'd say. Seeing Kelly Jones of the Stereophonics was all kinds of rad too. I probably should have gotten a picture with him while I had the chance.

That's all for now. I'll update again when I return from Rome. Maybe they'll have Wendy's there. That would be pretty awesome.

Who says you need to plan ahead?

This will serve as an amendment of sorts to my earlier post about spring break.

I arrived in Paris 10 January . 6 weeks ago. I started classes the 19 January. 5 weeks ago. Around the first week of class I began hearing rumblings of spring break. Yeah, you heard me: the first week. According to these rumblings, it is imperative to have your spring break plans pretty much finalized by the first or second week of classes.

So did I have my plans finalized by the first or second week? Hell no! I was just getting used to living in Paris, how could I even think about where I was going to travel a month later?

As time passed, the number one topic of conversation wasn't "how are classes?", or "how's your apartment?", not even "what are we doing Friday night?" It was, "so, where are you going for spring break?" Most people LOVED when this topic was brought up, because they all had their plans wrapped up in a nice little package around this time. Me? Not so much.

For the record, I finalized my plans this past Monday evening when I finally got around buying my tickets. Three-four weeks ago, when everyone's plans were set in stone, I didn't even have an idea about what I was going to do for spring break, didn't even know what I wanted to do. I wasn't thinking about planes, trains, or automobiles, nor hostels or couch surfing or hotels. I didn't even know how a eurorail pass worked three-four weeks ago.

And yet, here I am, ready to embark upon my spring break travels, and everything worked out. Besides hitting a little turbulence when I went to purchase my tickets to Rome (turns out in all my years of studying French, I have absolutely no idea how to buy train tickets in French. it was quite an embarrassing situation.), I'll be in London and Rome (knock on wood) over the next two weeks.

Maybe it's because I've been living in France where seemingly no one is interested in working hard (except for the bakers, of course--they work their asses off to keep me in croissants and baguettes), or because I go to AUP where doing any kind of work typically takes a backseat to drinking and clubbing, but I'm really beginning to think hard work is over-rated. Everyone just needs to take a deep breath and relax, man. No need to get so stressed out about the little things in life, especially spring break plans, which are supposed to be fun, anyway. Things have a great way of working out in the end. I would know.

Spring Break

Spring break is upon those of us at AUP. Compared to past years my last days leading up to spring break were rather anti-climatic. I usually have a million papers due, some midterms, projects, blah, blah, blah, that make me reeeeeealy happy by the time I walk out of my last class. This time? Not so much. I have a fair amount of reading to do for this week. Didn't do any of it but still managed to get away with doing nothing. I had a midterm bright and early Friday morning. I spent all of 18 minutes studying for it Thursday night, didn't feel the least bit unprepared walking to class, and it ended up being a breeze. I had a walking field trip with my Cities and States class that was supposed to last a double period but ended up lasting less than an hour. So instead of having to hurry back to campus for my last class I got to leisurely walk back and even had time to stop in at Amex for an enjoyable lunch. And on top of that, my last class ended up being canceled. It was really the most anti-climatic week before spring break ever.

That being said, I don't even feel like I should be on break right now. We've been in class for what? 4 days? 5? I don't know, but it definitely hasn't been long at all. Ok I just counted. It's been 6 weeks since we arrived in Paris for orientation and 5 weeks since classes started. When we return to class from break we'll have like 9 weeks left of classes, 11 if you count reading week and finals week. Does that not blow? It's waaaay to early to be on break. I don't like it.

Arianna's fam got into the city yesterday afternoon. Since my class was canceled I was able to accompany Arianna to meet her family at a cafe on campus. From there we all walked back to our apartment taking our normal scenic route along the Seine. Afterward Arianna's parents invited me to dinner with them. We went to a cute little restaurant/patisserie on Ile St. Louis. Which reminds me, Ile St. Louis is adorable. I must go exploring sometime. The restaurant also was a ice cream parlor with homemade ice cream and sorbets. I need to go back when it gets warmer... or next week or something. Whichever comes first. They left this morning for Amsterdam or Belgium. I'm gonna miss that cerubic face these next two weeks.

That brings me to my own spring break. I'M GOING TO LONDON TO SEE LANIE TOMORROW!!! And if that wasn't any indication, I'm VERY excited to see her--and London. After London it's back to Paris for a couple days and then off to visit Dennis in Rome. Very excited about that as well. I have no idea what I want to see in Rome but the idea of wondering around Rome is very enticing. If wondering around Rome is even the least bit as enjoyable as wondering around Paris, I'll have an awesome spring break.

After spring break it's two weeks until Madrid and then two weeks after that I'll be in Amsterdam (and my birthday!!). Arianna and I are trying to schedule in a day-trip to Rouen. 10euro each way by train? Awesome deal. Many exciting adventures to come, so stay tuned.

Explorations

As of late, I've discovered a bit of the city, both intentionally and unintentionally, that I had never seen before.

Friday night was another AUP party. Side note: I need to stop going to these functions. They kill my soul. But anyway, this AUP party happened to be at a club next to Montparnasse out in the 15th. Side note again: Montparnasse is perhaps the ugliest thing I have ever seen. Why the city of Paris allowed that to be built boggles my mind. But back to the story. Arianna, Derek and I left the club around 3-something determined to fulfill our plans for the evening, which included finding some food and then finding trocadero and watching the sun come up, followed by Breakfast in America.

I just have to say, the 15th? Not Paris. I was recently in the 20th to go to La Fleche d'Or, and I was thrown off by how different it was from the Paris that I'm used to, but at least it still seemed like Paris. The 15th, not so much. We walked around a bit until we found a map to situate ourselves, and realized if we just walk up this one avenue, we'll hit the seine, probably somewhere near the 7th or 6th, and then it's only an hour walk back to the Marais. No worries. Easy enough.

Not easy enough. As we walked, we soon realized we were in the 14th. Slightly confused, but not coherent enough to think anything of it, we kept walking through what was also Not Paris.

Fifteen minutes later we came upon another map. Turns out we were walking parallel to the Seine as opposed to perpendicular to the Seine like we had hoped, thus putting us in the 14th, walking distance from the Catacombs, Fiap, and Place d'Italie. Not at all where we wanted to be.

That brings me back to my original point, the 13th, 14th, and 15th arrondissements, are not Paris, and I don't know how I feel about the city trying to pass them off as real Paris. I mean, there wasn't even a kebab place open at 3am. If that doesn't set off an alarm I don't know what would. Needless to say, I had to break my no-taxi rule and hop one to the 4th. No cool. I don't like Not Paris.

We were recently more successful in our explorations than we were Friday night. Saturday Arianna and decided to talk a walk around Notre Dame and along the Seine. During our walk we made our way over the the 12th and 5th and happened upon the Jardins des Plantes, Museum national d'histoire Naturelle (in addition to a woolly mammoth and stegosaurus), Gare d'Austerlitz, l'Institut du Monde Arabe (which is holding an expo on Napoleon in Egypt--very excited), Musee de la Sculpture en Plein Air, and perhaps best of all, the mosque from the Quais de Seine segment of Paris, Je t'Aime. Arianna and I were VERY excited about getting to see this, mostly because we just stumbled upon it, completely expectantly

We continued walking and ended up at Bastille. Not sure how, but I find it comforting to know that I can just set off in any direction and end up somewhere that I am familiar with.

I might make my way back over to Not Paris to give it a better, more objective judging at some point. I hear it has its own unique points of interest, as with all the arrondissements in Paris, but I can't say that I saw any of those the other night. Perhaps in the light of day?

My next major explorations will come from London and Rome when I visit for spring break. Totally stoked!!

Because Derek rocks

So, I don't know if I've mentioned this yet, but since probably day 2 of being in Paris, I've been craving Killian's. I don't know why, because there are plenty of tasty beers here in Paris, but all I've wanted to drink was a cold Killian's. As such, wherever I've been, I've inquired about the beer. I was determined. Seriously. I was willing to go to every pub in Paris in order to find the one that sell's Killian's. Unfortunately for me, I was not having any luck. And on top of that, whenever I talked to a bar tender and asked if he/she knew of anywhere I could get Killian's they gave me a weird look and said something to the effect of, "I've never seen it here in Paris." Hearing that response as many times as I have kind of got me down. It's not that I need the beer whatsoever, it just became like near-obsession to me. I knew that I couldn't leave Europe before I had a Killian's. Even if it meant going to Ireland just for this purpose, out of principle, I had to do it.

That's when Saint Derek came into the picture. I don't really remember the details of this part of the story, but at some point, I mentioned that I've been on a quest for Killian's Irish Red, and I can't find it anywhere. He casually responded, "Do you want it on tap at a bar, or will bottles work? Because they sell it at a bunch of supermarkets near me." I was floored. After all of my struggles and let-downs, Derek just breezes into my problems and fixes them in one fell-swoop. He brought a pack over on Friday night and we each a celebratory bottle before the AUP party. Needless to say, he made me very happy to know that I have access to Killian's whenever I need to satiate that craving, but it begs the question, why does Pigalle stock Killian's when seemingly the rest of the city does not? I'm going to ponder that for a while.

As I write this, it just now occurs to me that by craving Killian's--something that is very common in the States, but obviously not as common in Paris--I am actually showing signs of missing things that I am accustomed to in the States. Aka homesickness. I've vehemently denied feeling any feelings of homesickness until now, but I suppose that is what this is. Damn.

Settling in

Today marks four weeks in Paris and I'm finally really starting to feel settled. I'm starting to feel good about classes too. The first couple of weeks were a real adjustment, mostly due to the class size. Aside from French which has a whopping 22 students (craziness, I know), all of my other classes have a max of 12-15 students if everyone actually bothers to come to class, which is rare. At first I didn't really feel comfortable with such small classes because you can't really bullshit your way through anything, all profs practice the Socratic method and love to pick on students who clearly didn't do the reading for that class, and if you're not prepared for class you're pretty much screwed. But after that initial shock of so much newness all at once, I'm really enjoying my classes.

Because AUP is so small, and the size of the faculty is so small, and the classes are so small, profs and students have a much more intimate relationship than anything I've ever seen at NU. A lot of the students have the same profs for many classes over their four years at AUP, and are thus able to build a nice rapport with one another. To me, it seems like profs don't really see us students as their inferiors, but rather as equals who they have intellectual conversations with for 1hr20min a couple times a week. It's different, nice even.

Along those same lines, I paid for my trips to Amsterdam and Madrid recently. I've been excited about these trips for a while, but when I realized how small my classes are, I was initially worried that I would feel uncomfortable having to spend so much time, so closely, with my profs. But now that I've started to build a comfortable professional relationship with these individuals, I'm once again really excited about my trips.

Speaking of trips, I'm trying to work out my spring break plans. It's not been fun.

You're moutarded

Arianna, Elizabeth, Eric, Derek, Laura, Annie, and I took a trip to Dijon, France this weekend for the sole purpose of visiting their mustard museum. We've only been in Paris for three weeks now but it was really nice to be able to get out of the city and see the country. And Dijon was beautiful. The town itself was charming and quaint, and the medieval architecture was nice to see as well, mostly because there isn't anything remotely close to that in the States.
Our train left Paris at 8:30 in the morning on Saturday. We were all running on less than three hours of sleep due to the AUP back to school party that was held the night before.

We arrived in Dijon at 10:30 and had to wonder around for a bit until Derek's train arrived at 1:30. After speaking with a woman at the office of tourism and securing our beds at Dijon's only hostel, we stopped in for a bite to eat at a charming little cafe with great food and even better people. It was at that moment that I realized how happy I was to be out of the city. The owner was an older man who attentively waited on us. For the first time since I've been here I didn't feel like we were the noisy, impolite Americans intruding upon the French lifestyle. We also made friends with a young girl (6 and a half years old, as she explained). Talking to her made me realize how much I miss interacting with children in Boston. We also asked her if she wanted to learn some English. She said no. I don't blame her.

After meeting up with Derek, we checked into our hostel and made our way back to Centre Ville in search of the mustard museum. When we finally found it, not only came face-to-face with the history of mustard, but also a strong anti-capitalist campaign. I love the French.

We explored the city a bit more and ended our night at a small pizza and sandwich shop. Once again, the owner didn't speak any English, but somehow we were all able to order our food and enjoy a nice meal without any problems. And he was so hospitable! In addition to making pizzas to-order (Arianna and I wanted mushrooms on our trois fromages pizzas), he gave us a huge plate of delicious french fries, and kept us in as much ketchup as we could eat. When he noticed that we were singing along with the music on the radio, he turned it up for us and was seemingly amused by our singing and dancing as we ate our dinner. Laura noted that it was like living in a movie and I have to agree. It was fun, but almost surreal in a way. But once again I didn't feel like we were rowdy Americans intruding where we didn't belong. We were able to be ourselves and have enjoy our meal. We even brought some amusement to a Frenchman.

The following day was spent exploring the city some more, eating Kebab (the owner of this particular restaurant was kind enough--heh--to put ketchup on my vegetarian kebab for me. Gotta love American stereotypes.), and wondering around Dijon's Musee des Beaux-Arts. The museum was hands-down, one of the best museums I've ever been to. It had a fantastic blend of medieval Christian works, romanticism paintings, African and Egyptian sculptures, and French modern art. I loved it.

I think, the thing that I loved most about Dijon, was how different it was from Paris. Not that I don't love Paris, but it was nice to get out of the city and see something completely different from anything I've ever seen before. Also, despite the fact that I was traveling with several non-French speakers, the language barrier was almost non-existent. The majority of Dijonnais that we encountered over the course of the weekend didn't speak English. The only person who recognized that we were Americans and thus spoke to us in English was the manager at the hostel. It was truly refreshing. A lot of my friends here in Paris complain that when they try to speak French to a Parisian, they either realize quickly that you're American and default to English without even letting you try to speak/practice French, or if they themselves don't speak English and realize you don't speak French well, they just ignore you and don't even try to communicate in a way you both can understand. Dijon was the complete opposite. They spoke French, we spoke French, for the non-French speaking people in our group who had to struggle to communicate, the Dijonnais were patient and understanding. They were great.