Jessie Love in Paris

God Damn the French

2010-01-24T15:54:00.000+01:00

Seriously France. I'm hungover. I need pizza. Why do none of your delivery places refuse to deliver at 4 in the afternoon on a Sunday. I HATE YOU.

2010-01-24T15:46:00.000+01:00

Yesterday, three Parisian cops took time out of their criminal chasing schedule to... wait for it..... block off a whole lane of traffic in order to protect une cygne. What could this be? A huge multi car pile up, a pregnant woman having her baby in the road, an elderly woman who tripped and fell and needed emergency services? No. It's a swan.

Have you ever seen what the French do to geese to create fois gras? They stuff food into them until they die. But yesterday, the French cut off an entire lane on a 2 lane bridge to protect a swan. Oh France and French, the day you stop amusing me is the day the French finally admit the British are a decent culture of people. And I'm pretty sure we are a long way from that.

There's No Place Like Home for the Holidays

2010-01-23T02:08:00.002+01:00

What can I say? I guess it was silly of me to think that I wouldn't miss home at Christmas. I didn't think that I was one of those people who needed that once every year same tradition to keep sane, but I am pretty sure it's a necessary in my book. Even though I spent my Christmas on beautiful golden sanded beaches in the poshest spot in Australia, I couldn't get passed not being with my family. I really missed everyone.

I just noticed this, as my two year mark in Paris approaches, that I am downright homesick. Just talking to my aunt the other day online made me cry. I miss seeing my cousins grow up, I miss hugging my parents and I miss just being able to grab a drink with an old friend. Even though I love Paris and everyone I have here, I find myself hermitting myself in my apartment to fend off the winter cold.

I really can't complain, I'm a lucky girl. So hopefully I can shed this homesickness before I head to Barcelona next weekend!

The Airplane Dilemma

2010-01-16T09:07:00.002+01:00

Does anyone ever get the sense that flying in an airplane is pretty much the worst form of torture ever invented. I mean you are trapped in a tiny ass plane with strangers for occasionally more than 10 hours? OK, so right now it's not a small plane, it's the A-380, but still, I feel like I'm in my own claustrophobic coffin where I am most definitely the subject of some painful form of torture which most likely will happen on any flight.

Let me just give you some examples, that happen all the time.

1) The Screaming Baby: I don't think I've been on a plane that hasn't had one. Sadly for me, my 12 hour flight from Singapore to Paris includes one who hasn't shut up for more than five minutes. Yes, I understand babies don't understand the whole equalizing thing, but seriously I think parents need to thoroughly evaluate if it's a good idea to take their child on two TWELVE hour plane ride.

2) The Urine Squeeze: If you, like me, prefer the window for head resting abilities, you face the difficult fact that you most likely will have to hold your bladder for over 4 hours at a time possibly 6, depending on your neighbors. Of course, there is the obstacle of the sleeping neighbour who you always feel bad waking up and then also the hassle of the obstacle course escape from your seat.

3) The Self Humiliation: On a plane you are degraded down to the worst possible form of yourself. No makeup, no deodorant, no teeth brushing. What do you do if you get gassy? You have to face the facts and try and go for the quietest, SBD fart you can put out there. Then you have to try and control your involuntary blushing reactions. Next, everyone on the plane can see you as you sleep. Luckily for me, I'm not a snorer BUT there are a couple of Chaka's on the plane. So if the crying baby wasn't enough, i now have a cacophony of raspy phlegm swishing to lull me to sleep. And once finally asleep, I wake up every hour to see that I have created a massive pile of drool on my pillow next to me, so even if I had any chance of meeting some cute person on the plane (as apparently people do in romantic movies) I will look like a slobbering makeup free braless wench.

So let's just say after flying for over 24 hours on both my journey to and from Australia, I can say with confidence that I am pretty sure the an airplane is involved in the 3rd layer of hell. Thank you Dante.

The Land Down Under

2010-01-07T23:24:00.001+01:00

So I am in the land down under. To tell you the truth, I've been way to busy getting out and doing things to write here, BUT I am leaving this afternoon and in 24 hours I will have a most glorious post with highlights that include my austrailan new love (HINT: his name is Jack) and the bridge climb so see you in 24 hours and hope I have a safe flight!

New Years' Resolution

2010-01-02T13:33:00.003+01:00

Ok, I know I've said it before. But here am I, again, apologizing for being totally lame and not writing. I think I'm at the point where I realise typing up a nice little blurb each night is highly possible, seeing as I find the time to stalk facebook for at least 15 minutes every night. So, in honour of the New Year (Rock on 2010!) I am making a resolution (resolving, possibly) to chronicle all of my adventures (I hope to have many) for this year on this here blog. If things go as planned, there will be photos, blips, smarmy commentary and maybe even quotations from famous people, if things don't hopefully there will be at least a couple more posts so those who did read this, will find me back in their good graces.

Bonne Année!

Back in Action

2009-08-20T22:26:00.002+02:00

After what seems like an eternity, I have finally decided to start writing in my blog again.

Woo hoo!

It seems all I needed was a swift kick in the hind region from a couple of good family and friends. According to said persons, I am a difficult person to keep up with and they miss reading about my crazy hi-jinks.

So I have made a mid-year resolution to bring you at least one up date a week. Be it travel high lights or just plain Paris ridiculous-ness.

Be warned, Jessie Love is BACK and in Paris.

Bisous!

Paris EXPOSed

2008-10-21T21:04:00.003+02:00

I have decided that I should be cultured. Luckily I have a new buddy named Hannah, who like me wishes to partake in all that Paris has to offer. Thus she became my culture buddy. Every Thursday afternoon, the two of us meet up for a nice "cultural" experience. Since there's only been 2 Thursdays since the grand inauguration of culture buddies, we've only been to 2 cool expositions going on at the moment in Paris.

Our first foray into the world of artistic culture was the "Picasso and his Masters" exhibit. Despite the hour and a half wait, it was absolutely incredible. Luckily for us, it was a beautiful day outside, so we just stood and chatted to each other while we listened to the sounds of some man playing the clarinet. Before attending I never knew that Picasso took already famous classical works and would "chew it up and then spew something totally new out". What the exhibit did was place all of the classical works that inspired Picasso's paintings next to the actual Picasso painting. It was absolutely incredible. We also got to see some very interesting print work Picasso had done earlier in his career which was very different from what you think of when you think Picasso.

The next Thursday we headed over to the Musee du Luxembourg where they had a private collection of some Portuguese oil tycoon on display. It was quite small and ranged from the early 20th century to more modern artists. Some of the most interesting art I found to be some of the Pop Art. I think I personally enjoy the private art collections more than a museum because it gives you an interesting perspective on the reason why art is chosen. Often times even though art is not strike you as similar visually you can see a connecting theme in the emotions it makes you have.

So that's all us culture buddies have done so far, stay tuned for pictures from the exhibitions

I Want to Take You to a GAY Bar

2008-10-18T12:18:00.004+02:00

My good friend in Paris, Steph invited me to come see this band perform up by Republique in one of Edith Piaf's old clubs. Sounds pretty cool to be checking out the Little Sparrow's old haunts, and it was. It was a dark club stained with years of cigarette smoke and spilled glasses of wine. The scene itself was pretty cool... well dressed women (very Parisian chic) gathered around sipping on their red wine or beer pints... very many women... in fact, no men. Other than my friend Steph's boyfriend we were all women there. So we're hanging out enjoying the cool indie scene and it suddenly dawns on Steph that this is in fact a lesbian bar. She took me to a lesbian bar. I have to say I've never been to a lasbian bar before but I think it was definitely way cooler scene-wise than any straight bar I've been to in a long time.

So Steph and I danced to the androgenous sounds of Patricia, a blond woman with a Beatles haircut in a nicely tailored grey pinstripe suit. Her voice was actually pretty incredible. When the two of us sat down to have a little conversation, some crazy man started to hit on us and Steph whispered under her breath "Grab my knee and start speaking really fast" as to prevent any unwanted advances. During our hour long conversation, this same man (the only other in the club) proceeded to attempt to hit on us at least 5 times. We continually dissuaded him with fast English and good ole fashion knee caresses.

Editor's note: Luke (Steph's boyfriend) had abandoned us for 2 hours at this point.

After the concert finished up and Steph and I got out all of our girly talk out we went in search of Luke, much to our dismay, not only was Luke talking to the man who hit on us 5 times but it appears he had made lifetime pals with him.

Overall my first lesbian bar was a success, thanks to androgynous musicians, knee caresses, Edith Piaf and some delicious red red wine.

Something Scary...

2008-10-14T18:41:00.002+02:00

For the first time ever in Paris, I have been slightly scared walking on the streets. I was worried when I first came over because the man at customs asked me if I knew karate or judo for the area I was working in. Luckily for me, I find Les Lilas to be a nice quiet, clean suburbs and the kids to be generally nice and well behaved.

This is not the same case for Bondy, where my teacher training is. Bondy is like dirty, people push you off the bus, and everyone just looks plain mad. I took the bus from my school to Bondy and people actually got on a fight on the bus and they had to stop it.

The high school in Bondy has a locked gate which you need to get access to get in and get out. Children are basically held prisoners in the schools.

I guess it's not like walking through Grey's Ferry or Harlem or Compton (there are no guns here) but still it was a little bit scary...

Facial Oddities

2008-10-13T23:39:00.003+02:00

My friends and I can sculpt our faces in bizarre ways.

Be very jealous of the following images, but DO NOT ATTEMPT THEM AT HOME for you may end up with that look permanently on your face*.

*This is actually how Lucy looks... she sacrificed alot to make this face

One Week Down...

2008-10-11T17:52:00.005+02:00

As you all know, I recently started work as a English assistant in a French high school. I have to say it is one of the most amusing things I have done here. I really enjoy the kids and find them to be absolutely amusing. The school itself, has a rather contemporary design with the building settling around a sky-lighted atrium with several trees and plants. Personally I think it's a nice area and the kids are nice, but it is supposedly one of tougher areas of France. Here are some pictures from the school that I stealthfully took between classes, as to not come off as a weirdo to all the students.

The kids I teach range in age from 15 - 20, and they are pretty respectful and motivated to learn English. Funnily they all call me Madame or the english equivalent of which is Mrs. I've tried to explain that I am not married and therefore am not a Mrs., but that generally ends in marriage proposals or offers to buy me a drink after school, so I have just accepted that in France I will have to be a Mrs.

Below are some lovely picture of Salle 222 where you can find me from 8:30 to 12:30 every Monday, Tuesday and Friday.

As my classes rotate every week, I won't see the same faces until the third week of class, so right now I am doing ice breakers where everyone tells me a bit about themselves and what they like to do. Some highlights from these conversations include:

Me: What is your favorite thing to do? French boy: Smoke weed. You know, ze pot, ze marieee-juan-a.
Me: Where would you go to in the U.S.A if you could go anywhere? French boy: I would go to ze Me-am-e for ze bitches. Me: That is not a very appropriate word. French boy: Non, Non madame. Ze bitches, the girls in ze bikinis, you know, ze bitches. I want to go to ze bitches. Me: OH! You mean the beaches!

After the ice breaker I let the kids ask me some questions about me. Usually I get the "Why are you in France?", "Do you like France?", and all the other general niceties but there have been some amusing questions such as:

Madame, do you have a boyfriend? Yes. OK, would you go on a date with me?
How old are you Madame? 23. Oh well, I'm 23 too, want to grab a drink?

I also asked the kids to describe me in English and one girl raised her hand excitedly and said, "Madame is leeetlle and not-fat". She is obviously getting straight A's and will not be required to do any homework.

After this, I have everyone partner up and describe how their partner looks in English. Usually the kids will ask me what the equivalent of a French word is, and I will tell them. After about 10 minutes they have to stand up front and present the partner to the class.

During one of these presentations, this French boy looks over at me and asks, "Madame, what is French for ugly" and I say "Moche", he then looks back at his partner and says "Well, then, he is ugly", which made me smile for the rest of the day.

To finish up the introductory lesson, I do a little trivia on America and then ask them who they think is the most famous American. Sadly my one class said possibly the worst American. I do not want her to be known as the American the whole world thinks of, but apparently in France, she is the most well known. Before you scroll down, think of the worst possible example of an American and see if you can even guess. I was completely blown away when I heard this.

Paris Hilton.

I am seriously saddened by this. My heart actually broke a bit when I heard it. I mean if it was George W. at least I would understand that he's a politician and governs a lot of the world's policies, but Paris. I mean, Come on, Frenchies. That's just sad.

This is the window I considered jumping out of when they said that.

So anywho, teaching is really enjoyable and highly amusing, expect pictures and more reports to come as I continue this grand adventure.

Fun with Jess and Jill

2008-10-10T17:57:00.005+02:00

I really have all the luck in the world.

Not only am I living my dream (to live in Paris and do whatever I want) but I also have friends who live in the area. For some reason I forgot that my best friend in the whole world's other best friend lived in France with me. Luckily (all the luck in the world), Jill found me on facebook and decided to come visit me/she was going to take the LSAT's in Paris.

She arrived on a Friday and I had already planned a whole assistant in Paris get together at one of my local bars that I frequent (WOS), so we headed over there. The original philosophy was "Don't get too drunk as tomorrow night we have to stay out all night" which slowly evolved into "Let's get wasted!"... Typical me, right? This man below is Pierre. He is one dangerous Frenchman. He is the reason for drunk me.

So shot after shot, nice sober Jessie transformed into crazy drunk Jessie (not too crazy) and I began to spew unending philopsophies from my mouth...

I'm not that drunk compared to how drunk I could be... the question really is how drunk could I be?

Jill, how many weekends have you been here in Paris? Zero. Well you may not sleep but you'll have a good time.

Another thing I learned, Jill doesn't like Jaeger shots. She had a bad experience with a Jaeger rep and about 3 hours of vomit after.

You will see in the following picture her distaste for jaeger.

And this is her acting like she liked it...

I got us some nice girly shots to appease Jill.

After a drinking/dance fest we left to go to another bar but then just decided to crash and wake up and go to the Chloe fashion show.

The Sexiest Tantric Man Alive...

2008-10-10T17:51:00.003+02:00

That's right everyone, I saw Sting (the Police) in concert. It was possibly the most awesome concert experience of my life. Thanks to my mom (she didn't want to go after dad had the heart attack) I got to attend the coolest concert known to man.

I don't think there is a man, woman, hermaphrodite, or living creature who doesn't find Sting to be the sexiest male on the face of this planet. Seriously the man wore a yoga shirt and manpri's on stage and my heart was beating quadruple time.

Outside of Sting's unstoppable beauty, I have to say the Police put on a pretty incredible show. Every single song they played was awesome and you couldn't sit down. Sting's voice has perhaps gotten better with age.

Pictures to come as soon as my mom emails me some!

Nuit Blanche

2008-10-08T23:15:00.008+02:00

By staying awake all the night, Parisians celebrate French culture with a bit of fun...

Throughout Paris' center, all the museums, private and public art galleries and other cultural institutions offer free admission to all, with the downtown core of a city itself being turned into a de facto art gallery, providing space for art installations, performances (music, film, dance, performance art), themed social gatherings, and other activities. It lasts from sundown til sun-up and happens once a year. As this was the case, several assistants, myself and Jill decided to hit up the event in true expatriate style.

We met up on the Pont de l'Archeveque for a nice agenda planning and some wine drinking. As you can tell from the following pictures, Jill has majored in the art of drinking wine while outside.

She is in fact a double black belt specializing in the removal of every last drop.

After about an hour and a half of "bavarding", a french word that basically means sitting around and chatting, we decided to get a'moving. Off we were to Notre Dame, a convenient 5 minute walk away where we were treated to the lovely sounds of classical music for about half an hour.

Afterwards, I decided to pull a Mary Poppins or an exotic dancer, your choice, and spin nicely around a lamppost.

At this point, Mae was desperate. Desperate and cranky for a crepe. So I, the fearless leader led us to the crepe salvation, which happened to be right at the entrance of the famous Centre Pompidou. After devouring the most delicious fast food ever offered to the world, us girls headed into the modern art gallery to reflect on the deep philosophical meanings behind the artwork.

For instance, Phil and Lucy are looking into the deepness of this deep blue canvas and trying to figure out why in the world it is classified as modern art, as they could do it.

Here, I recreate the traditional hunchback Mexican bride's position for her marriage. The face represents her constipation at the thought of marriage.

This myriad of faces caused Jill, Philly and myself to attempt to replicate the pain and sorrow we saw in this one man's many faces. Please note: Philly's expressive use of teeth.

Here is possibly the best example of a modern art piece in the Centre Pompidou. You see the phallic imagery chasing the man. It obviously expresses his homophobic tendencies as he is fleeing the mean manly symbols that chase him.

Here you see Philly and my interpretation. I am the homophobic man and Philly is the phallic imagery in hot pursuit.

Once again, Jill and I were inspired by the faces of the Centre Pompidou and couldn't hold back the expressions that just took over our faces.

Here we are leaving the Centre Pompidou, at this point, Philly and Lucy will leave us for a 2 hour adventure to their home which is only 20 minutes away. Apparently this involves the wrong train and some creepy frenchmen... how typical.

After our contemporary art adventures, Jill and I made an executive decision to bike down to the Eiffel Tower. It was 3 am at this point. It took us about 20 minutes to arrive there, but it was well worth it. I think 3 am is one of the only times you can be at the Eiffel tower without thousands of other people. You get to just enjoy this massive piece of construction without the creepy keychain salespeople who stalk you around constantly begging you to buy something.

We biked back and immediately crashed, as to get to my house one must bike the dreaded hill. So needless to say, we both were about dead once we managed to go up the 6 flights to my tiny room.

Drink a beer...

2008-10-08T10:44:00.007+02:00

There are few things the Germans do well (Vince would highly disagree with this statement). They do a very nice Christmas and pretzels, but that's about all I can think of. Some claim that they do beer well, but as I only like Guiness, you would say I'm slightly biased. Also many claim, German sausages are the best. As a vegetarian, I would say Morning Star has the best veggie sausages out there.

But after a nice 4 day trip, I can officially say the Germans do Festivals quite well. Oktoberfest is like nothing I've seen before. It's a 2 week event based on drinking huge mugs of beer. Some say Americans have a drinking problem, for the Germans drinking is the national pastime, right along side of football.

Walking around Munich during Oktoberfest is how I choose to picture Germany in my head. About 80% of the population is wearing lederhosen and dirndls (the funny Bavarian traditional outfits). No matter how many times I told myself to not laugh at the ridiculous men in man-pris or hot pants with suspenders, I couldn't control myself, it's just too funny.

Not only do they drink it in large quantities at this festival, but the whole "opening ceremony" is a parade of kegs. People (including myself) line the streets of Munich in hopes of seeing their favorite kegs drawn into the festival grounds by either huge Clydesdales or oxen. Sometimes floats filled with Bavarians (you can tell because of the lederhosen and dirndls) drinking the huge mugs that are associated with Oktoberfest. After an hour of watching kegs and kegs of beer go by, Vince, Josi, the Sablowski's, and I ventured into the fair grounds.

On a side note, I was given a lovely Bavarian beer drinking hat to wear during Oktoberfest, I personally think it was Vince trying to tell me I am a witch, albeit a Bavarian one.

Oktoberfest is not just tents and tents filled with beer guzzling Germans, it's an outdoor carnival, with hundreds of games, rides and food vendors (all of which cost you either an arm or a leg, rollercoasters take both) AND tents and tents filled with beer guzzling Germans and tourists.So with money in our pockets (our pockets being Vince's two pockets on his jeans), we decided to try out some rides since the beer tents were already full and there was no space for 6 people to sit together. The first thing we did was the Devil's wheel. From the name you would think it was scary, but in fact it was like I was on Ninja Warrior. You sat on this disk that spins quickly and tried to be the last one on it. For the first time in my life, I was an American Gladiator. The disk spun so quickly you would get sick to your stomach if you didn't focus on a part of your body. Once the spinning of the disk itself had knocked off a couple of the competitors, the moderator then lowered a giant swinging ball onto our heads to try and "knock" us off. Now, you are not only clinging to the spinny disk thing but you are also trying to not get your face flattened by a huge swinging ball. FUN. After a severe trauma to my nose and desperately struggling against the circular momentum pulling me away from the center, I was defeated.
Whatever, I wasn't the first off so it doesn't matter. If they couldn't get you with motion sickness or huge balls in your face, the last resort was trying to lasso you off. This was how they captured Vince. He wasn't able to get the rope off once it was around his neck and was pulled off. That left, the ever valiant Josi trying to be number one. Sadly after one too many giant ball in the face and ropes under her butt, Josi was taking down. Causing our clan of six to stumble out of the Devil's wheel and go eat some delicious sugar coated toasted almonds.... mmm.

After 2 rides on the swings (one gave you a view of all of Munich, we decided the beer tents were too crowded and to try and go to one of the halls in the city which is basically the same thing, but not as touristy) After one giant beer and too much meaty German things (did I mention that I am a vegetarian), the adults (Susan and Ralf) decided to go to the hospital (Susan was having an allergic reaction) and we decided to go to another beergarten (I was having a beer reaction). Part of my Oktoberfest goals included being thrown over Vince's shoulder and carried around. Well it slightly came true as I was on Vince's shoulders saying HALLO (with a German accent) to random Germans on the street.

Needless to say, Oktoberfest was well worth it.

I just discovered how to use italics if you can't tell.

Back in Paris...

2008-10-08T10:39:00.000+02:00

Although leaving the states and the comfort of my parents and boyfriend, it feels really nice to be back in my second home that is Paris.

I am happy to be back with the girls and even happier to be back in my little corner of Paris. It's nice to have fresh bread at the entrance to my building and even better to have my Kremly available at all times.

The only thing Paris is missing is my family and friends. I guess it would be the perfect place to live if only I could transplant around 50 people here also...

I guess that's life though, trying to have 2 homes 3,000 miles apart.

At home with the boy....

2008-10-06T17:03:00.000+02:00

After an adventurous three weeks with my parentals at home, my lovely boyfriend was arriving in North Wales after about 5 months of not seeing each other.

For the first couple of days, I let Vince adjust to the change in time by playing lots of Rock Band. The first weekend he was here, several family members came over and we were able to impress everyone with our mutual Rock band skills (mine being the guitar, his the drums), we were an unstoppable force when combined with my mom's singing skills...

The first Sunday, Vince and I left on an adventure down to Washington to get my visa, which was surprisingly very easy and hassle free, especially since the French were involved. After about an hour filled with a trial sit down in the park (we ended up leaving because of mosquitos) we decided to head down to the beach.

We arrived in Cape May (thanks to the Cape May-Lewes Ferry) about midday so we had at least a good 3 hours on the beach, where I proceeded to get paler (sunscreen) and Vince proceeded to get burnt (lack of sunscreen). Once we had had enough (I was hungry) we (I) decided to leave and go meet up with my friend from high school, Lauren.

We spent the night with Lauren, her fiance Ryan and their baby Gabriel. The baby was adorable and an absolute pleasure to see (he also slept soundly during the night). It was so nice to see Lauren.

We then headed off to Avalon to meet up with my Aunt and Uncle and 3 cousins to spend the night at their place. It was nice to get some time with my cousins as I don't get to see them too often. I took them to a local arcade where I helped the two boys win some cap guns and the little girl a Webkinz.

We said goodbye to Avalon, and were off on the next stage of our adventure: Baltimore. We arrived mid afternoon, about an hour after my parents. That night Vince and my Dad were going to a baseball game and my mom, cousin and I were going to go to dinner and shopping. Leaving the boys in the capable hands of my Aunt and Uncle, Mom, Cousin and I journeyed over to the shops right on the main harbor, where Stephy was able to find a lovely trench coat, and I found some cute J Crew Ballet Rain Flats. Afterwards we ate a delicious seafood filled meal, dropped Stephy off and then crashed back at the hotel room.

The next morning in Baltimore, Vince and I managed to wake up relatively early to go to the Body Worlds Exhibit. SO COOL! If you get a chance you absolutely must do. It basically is a display of real human bodies which a German professor plastified. From the exhibit you get to see the importance of each muscle, nerve, organ, etc. in the body. It's really incredibly interesting.

Once we finished with Body Worlds, Mom and I went back to the hotel to take naps and the boys went to get hamburgers. Upon waking we headed over the Bicycle, a nice restaurant in the "Fancier" part of Baltimore, where we all had an extraordinary 3 course meal. Vince and I then took a half an hour walk home where he whispered romantic nothings into my ear (haha).

The next morning we had to leave Baltimore, but not without a little aquarium fun! We got to see cool sharks and stingrays and poison dart frogs. One of the coolest things was when they fed the stingrays!

After 5 days of living out of the car, Vince and I were glad to be at home for a couple of days. We hung out with my family, visited friends, and had an all around nice time. It was quite spectacular getting to spend 2 weeks with my boyfriend.

First Day Blues

2008-10-03T15:41:00.000+02:00

School's finally started and after highly anticipated and anxiety ridden night of waiting for my first class, I woke up at about 6:45 to start my journey to my school. It's about a 40 minute commute door to door to the Lycee, but I have to switch at Chatelet onto a new metro, which during the morning rush is a bit jammed.

It's one of the first mornings I saw the Manet's before 4:30 pm, and it seems they, like me, aren't especially morning people, BUT Raphy was kind enough to buy me a lovely brioche suisse from the boulangerie which really made my morning.

After my lovely commute with all the stinky parisians on the metro, I arrived at the lycee to... an empty classroom. I thought maybe students like their adult counterparts are all on the fashionably late side. I waited til 8:45 (my class starts at 8:30) and still no students. Finally I went down and talked to my responsable who informed me that one teacher forgot to inform 3 of my 4 classes of the day that I was there, so basically instead of 4 classes I had ONE. And the one class I DID HAVE only had 3 students out of 12 show up.

The three girls I did have were quite nice and we had a nice class where I got to talk to them one on one a bit.

Luckily with the extra 3 hours I had at school I ended up getting all my administrative stuff done which includes my direct payment paperwork so that I will be paid end of October instead of November. I also have my own cubby hole, photocopier password and log-on ID, it's like I'm a real teacher...

I guess as they say in Paris... metro, boulot, dodo for this one right here...

High Anxiety

2008-10-02T21:36:00.000+02:00

Tomorrow, I teach. 12 teenagers at a time. 1 hour of conversation. Nothing but stressful, right?

Well I hope the teaching gene does in fact run in the family, as I will be a teacher for the next 7 months of my life and I hope it goes as well as I want it to.

So I guess what I am going to do for tonight is look past the anxiety of teaching tomorrow to the fun of going out to play tomorrow night with all my new and old friends.

WISH ME LUCK!

My New Love

2008-10-02T16:20:00.000+02:00

I did something crazy today.

I bought a bike. She's a beaut. White with black and pink accents. She's a liberty Lady and she's all mine.

After checking my email, I received a message from my CS group saying they were desperate to sell their bike (live about 10 mins from me) for a lovely sum of 60 euros.

It's a lady's bike and it came with a cute black basket and a nice U shaped sturdy lock.

As soon as she handed over the keys (to the lock), the weather changed and it was a downpour. So my first ride with my first love was during a maelstrom... up a huge hill... but we made it together because of the power of love (thanks Celine Dion, I now understand exactly what you were singing about)

So if anyone has any awesome ideas for her name, I'm all ears... right now I am considering Penelope...

Vacationing at Home...

2008-10-02T16:01:00.000+02:00

I spent most of my time at home doing one of the following things: *

Catching up on American TV
Watching Jeopardy with my Grandmother
Making jewelry
Reading a book
Hanging out with Mark Register, Tim Frisch and Dan Faga
Playing poker with those 3
Eating food at my favorite North Wales/Philly restaurants
Visiting New York for a weekend with my girlfriends
Shopping with my mom... ALOT
Cuddling with mom too
Hanging with the Aunt Lou
Entertaining all the visitors with stories of my European adventures
Uploading the pictures for Paul Cross
Going to the outlets or KOP with my mom...

*All of these were before the lovely Vince came to visit...

I had an amazing vacation at home and enjoyed so much seeing all of the people who matter to me. But it was tough knowing I would again have to leave and go back to Paris. It's sort of like I have two separate lives, one with all these people I love that I can easily see when I am in America, and the other where I live a dream in the city of lights. It's a bit sad that I can't necessarily have the best of both worlds, all my family and friends in Paris with me, but I am very happy to have had a month spent with my loved ones.

Thanks everyone for making my vacation a dream!

There's No Place Like Home... to find out bad news

2008-10-02T15:47:00.000+02:00

After an adventurous trek home, I was actually there... After 2 days of recovery, my Dad decided to surprise me and make it an adventure at home by having a heart attack. He had had the actual heart attack the day I flew home. Probably was all the stress of the stand by flight and the tornado and the thought that his daughter was flying through a tornado... We didn't go to the hospital til Wednesday, and still the ER docs thought that it might still just be a pinched nerve. But NO, Dad had a heart attack.

I know.

Who would have thought someone so apparently healthy and active could have any sort of cardiac problems. He had even quit smoking a month and half before the actual event.

So needless to say the week after that was filled with lots of nervous anxiety as Dad went to the hospital to have 3 stints put in. Two operations later and about 8 days, he was out of the
hospital with the OK from the cardiologist. Basically he ended up being very lucky and should be at least 150% better/more active than he was the past year...

So Dad I guess we're expecting you to dig a pool than after all your cardiotherapy is done.

I can't express how happy I was to be home with my Dad at this time. If I had been in Paris when something like this happened, I don't think I would have handled it very well. I guess you never really realize how things will effect you til you are living them. Luckily I spent an amazing month and a half with my parents at home and saw how well he was recovering, which I am so glad for.

I love you Daddy.

Jessie's TOP 10 Guilty Pleasures

2008-10-01T15:32:00.001+02:00

TRAVELING... There's nothing I love better than the feeling of visiting somewhere new and experiencing something different
A nice bubbly bath... I don't do it often but when I do, the whole day is better.
Shopping. Period.
A phone call from someone I love... though it's hard to get these or call people from the US now that I live in France, sometimes just hearing the sound of someone's voice can change my outlook on a day.
My Laptop or as I like to call her Daisy Buchanan... I'm slightly addicted to several websites and checking my email, and thankfully with Daisy I can do it whenever I want.
French boulangeries... the French equivalent of an American bakery but at least 40 times better with at least 20 different treats a person would like to try.
How I Met Your Mother... if you haven't started to watch this show, you must. It's possibly 30 of the funniest minutes on TV... and I have a slight crush on Jason Segal.
Naps.
A good book... this means something that I can't put down, and I finish instead of doing anything else (this includes checking my email).
Kremly... the most delicious yogurt that ever existed, too bad they don't sell it anywhere but in the south of France and in the Nestle store.

Flying Home

2008-09-25T23:08:00.000+02:00

After six months of living with the frogs, I found myself almost desperate for a little hometown glory. Baguette and brie no longer appealed to me, all I wanted was some Monk's french fries or Craving's Cafe.

Luckily I had already planned in advance and had a whole month and a half at home. July 20 couldn't come any quicker and when it finally did, I was at the airport a whole 2 hours in advance, praying I could make it on my flight to JFK... of course, I didn't. This is all because of my mom's good friend Dave. You see, Dave is a pilot for Delta and "hooks me up" with buddy passes. So let's just say I fly a lot cheaper round trip to and from France, which is great but that means I am also flying stand-by. Every other time I have flown there's been no problem and I have gotten right on the plane, but of course this wasn't the case, and I had to try and change my flight.

After a mad rush to find the correct agent, I was told I would have to find my baggage, take it all the way back to check-in and re-check it. I did this with a smile and a skip in my step, hoping with all my power that I would make it on a flight to the USA... anywhere. I didn't care where I went just as long as I was out of France and in the good ole US of A. Some how my amazing luck pulled through, and not only was I on a flight to Cincinnati Airport (which is in Kentucky) but I was also in First Class and treated like a princess (although the audio didnt work on my TV, but alas I can't have all the luck, right?)

Once at the Cincinnati Airport, I again waited my turn in the standby line for a flight to Philadelphia. There were 3 people in front of me and only 2 open spots. I kept hoping and praying for a connection to miss so that I too could be on that flight... my hopes were dashed and I was forced to call my mom and tell her that I was stuck in Cincinnati, unless I could find another airport closer to home to fly into. As luck would have it there were flights to Scranton, Lehigh Valley, and Harrisburg all leaving the airport at the same time at night. I had to decide which flight was my "best choice". I opted for Lehigh Valley, and sat and prayed that it would work out.

After 15 minutes of waiting in the terminal, I hear over the loud speaker, in a certain southern twangy but remotely ominous voice, that a tornado warning is in effect and the terminal must be evacuated... it appears my luck has definitely changed and for the worse...

So I grab my laptop, my leftover subway hoagie (my first expense in the USA) and my carry on bag and head down into the depths of the Cincinnati Airport. If I were a director and in need of a horror set, I think that the basement of that airport would be an ideal choice. Not only do the walls echo sounds, but you hear what I assume is water, dropping about every 4 seconds. The walls are covered in what could be asbestos as it continually flakes off whenever something touches it. The dank smell that accompanies an abandoned building clings to your clothing. For some reason, even the lighting adds to the movie appeal as it casts everyone in a jaundice murky pallor. As I sit and wait for what seems like hours (probably only 45 mins), I realize what a story this is... Seriously, who has been in the Cincinnati Airport basement, let alone any airport basement?

Once we're given the all clear, the thousands of stranded passengers march upstairs to wait for our planes to have clearance to fly once again. I'm again waiting for the all clear to board the plane and don't even find out til 5 mins after the plane was supposed to depart that I CAN fly to Lehigh Valley.

Finally after almost exactly 24 hours of trying to make it home, I am in my Dad's convertible comfortably riding back to my home...

Official Update

2008-09-24T09:31:00.000+02:00

Hello One and All to the Greatest Blog of All,

As I know it's been quite a while but.... I think I may officially be back, up and running with this whole blog posting thing... As is apparent several things have made blogging quite difficult for me in the past couple of months;

a recurring and ever vigilant case of writer's block that hit me every time I even logged into my blog
a lack of natural blogging resources, specifically wireless (or as we say here in paris wifi)
and the greatest difficulty, a lack of genuine bona fide blogging time

So I thought it would be nice if I gave you a sort of review of where and what I've been visiting and doing over the past 4 months of the time I have been neglecting my blogging responsibilities.

Where in the World I have been*:

Bruges, Belgium: Possibly one of the most beautiful places to visit as a beer lover (which I discovered I am when it comes to cherry flavoured beer) As you explore the city you feel as if you are transported centuries back to a time of knights and maidens. Lucky for me, I was traveling with Paul and we managed to make the most of all things Belgium; waffles, fries, chocolate and, of course, beer.
Amsterdam, Netherlands: What was I to do, when I heard my semi-good friend Ben was coming to Europe and NOT making a stop in Paris... well meet him in Amsterdam, of course! Although I had already been to Amsterdam before and it was lovely, it was nice to visit it again with some dudes (Ben and Lee).
Newquay, Cornwall, England: The land of Faeries and magic. Autumn and I visited the lovely English Countryside for 5 days of adventure and exploring. I was lucky enough to meet Jane, family of a friend, and we explored all that Cornwall has to offer; from biological sanctuaries to a duke's own personal island to hidden walks to ancient villages... Cornwall is truly one of the most magical places I have ever gone...
Mimizan, France: Despite the appeal of France's most popular surfer village, I had an awful time here... mostly because of horrific work experience and a concussion... but the 2 days I spent on the beach almost made up for all the nasty French...
Giverny, France: The French equivalent of Longwood Gardens, but infinitesimally more awesome. In Giverny, Monet built several grand gardens to "inspire" him as an artist... If you have ever seen any of Monet's artwork involving flowers (best known being the Waterlillies), just imagine the real version. Just walking through the gardens is like being in one of his pieces of art, absolutely incredible.

*Please note: By clicking on any of the hyperlinks you will be transported to an awesome photo album filled with pictures of these beautiful places, enjoy!

People who have visited:

Paul Cross: My very nice English friend (he says he is, but I have a better accent them him) came for my birthday and to visit Bruges. He was soo awesome to get me a nice present too and bring all my parents' birthday presents to France for me, so he gets a nice BIG SHOUTOUT.
Jon Little and Ellen Cusworth: These two are deserving of remaining a couple of this list as Ellen has described Jon as "her other half"... They have visited me several times and are the co-creators of the official title of my room, "Chessie", which is abbreviated from Chez Jessie. Like Paul, they also attended the 3 day celebration of my birth, and enjoyed in the merriment.
The Edwards Twins: Two nice and identical boys from Maryland were kind enough to come and visit (along with bringing a huge suitcase of summer clothing), sadly they were taking all the pictures so I don't have any to post of them.
Tiffy: How lucky am I that my best friend in the whole entire world came to visit me? Pretty damn lucky! She was here for 5 of the most fun days in Paris ever.... Even more awesome is the fact she was here for her birthday and with her very nice boyfriend Dan. We got to see fireworks at the Eiffel Tower and listen to Dan play music with some Frogs...

And that's all folks!

Hope you enjoyed the update of my life, be prepared to be bombarded with blogging updates within the next couple of days... so STAY TUNED!

I'm Back

2008-09-11T13:33:00.000+02:00

Good news everyone! I am back in Paris and raring to write me some blog... haha.

Today I am headed off to give into the man and convert over to the "new" system of Metro pass. I am not too excited about that, but hey life is changing right?

Where have I been?

2008-07-14T07:39:00.000+02:00

Sadly for the last month ish I have had an awful case of writer's block when it comes to my blog... so things have just built and built up.

A few highlights that I haven't written about and most likely won't, include my birthday, a trip to Belgium, a vacation in Cornwall and a trip to Amsterdam. Although all of these were amazing times, I felt I had to catch up on the other things I'd been doing instead of writing about them.

Just wanted to reach out and tell everyone I am still alive and doing just fine. In fact I am so well I am headed back to the States for a month and half, hopefully I will get to see most people at home.

Biz,

xoxo

Jessie

German Invasion of PARIS!

2008-05-21T15:18:00.000+02:00

I probably will get in trouble for that title, but it's so true.

My german came to Paris to pass a lovely weekend together and celebrate our second anniversary (April 7/8, I never remember).

He arrived late at night on a Thursday, and we didn't really get much time to do anything after we came back from the airport. But Friday we got up early and wandered around the streets of Paris as I was on a mission to convince Vince (haha) that he could love Paris like I do.

Our first stop was at the Pantheon. I think he was quite impressed with my knowledge of the old buildings, thanks to my prof Christophe. Originally a church dedicated to St. Genevieve, the patron saint of Paris , the building has seen many changes over the years. Construction started in 1744 when a church in that area was destroyed. King Louis XV decided to construct a grander one, suitable to honor St. Genevieve by the great architect Soufflot (thus the name of the road that leads to it Rue Soufflot)... After at least a century the Pantheon that is standing was finished. During the French Revolution the building itself lost a lot of its religious ties and became more of a monument to the French heroes of the war. Several famous writers, scientists and thinkers are entombed there including Marie and Pierre Curie, Voltaire, Emile Zola, and Victor Hugo.

After a nice hour or so walking through the Pantheon and its crypts, we carried on to the ile de la cite and one of my favorite parks in the city.

Right at the back of Notre Dame is a sweet little park that despite its location is never too busy. Vince and I paused a bit, but then I took him for a nice stroll along the Seine until I had to pick Raphy up for school. But before we got Raphy I was kind enough to introduce him to the most delicious chocolate cake that ever existed... wow I am a great girlfriend!

While I babysat the girls, Vince hung out with us and helped to make some delicious raclette. Steamed potatoes and sauteed mushrooms with melted cheese that you pour over it.

That night we went out to one of my favorite local bars, the Fifth Bar, and had some drinks and played some beer pong...

Although I don't remember all of the night, I do remember that we walked away from the table victorious, and that for some reason the bartenders gave us a striptease?

Saturday morning we woke up early and I took him on a nice walking tour of Paris and showed him all of the sights. Also as a nice anniversary present I bought him a delicious dark chocolate and banana crepe, I am a great girlfriend!

We ended up walking from Notre Dame to the Eiffel Tower along the Seine so he got a pretty nice view into Paris.

Right before the Eiffel Tower we took a little detour and had a lovely little late lunch at a cute cafe.

Afterwards, a nice photo op outside of the Eiffel Tower being ridiculously romantic and such!

Then dinner at a sweet Belgian place right down the street from where I live. We shared so sumptuous escargot, and Vince got to have a nice big Belgian beer while I had a HUGE glass of wine (the size of my head). We both had excellent meals despite the baby crab in my mussels.

Overall the weekend was pretty incredible, it's nice to see your boyfriend, and especially nice to see your boyfriend and celebrate your anniversary! I do love Vince, but sometimes it's tough being far apart for so long, so that made this weekend together all the more special!

Amusing Luxembourgish Things

2008-05-21T10:40:00.000+02:00

So after my last post where I completely obliterated everyone's "idea" of Luxembourg, I thought I would go for something happier...

The funny things that Autumn and I discovered in Luxembourg, the Grand Douchey of the North.

1) Miniature doors, too small for an average human probably only appropriate for midgets. The door below was attached to the Palace for all tiny Luxembourgish people who came to visit.

2) Luxembourgish taste in jewelry. Seriously a ring with some turf and a panda on it? The only person I could think of who would wear this is Bama, and it would look gigantic on a little Bama finger. That second picture is a necklace made out of little guinea pigs accompanied by a matching set of earrings... Guinea pig jewelry? What is the world coming to?

3) That's right Backstreet's Back, ALRIGHT! But they are playing in Luxembourg with only 4 band members. Last time I checked there were 5 right? Maybe one died or something...

4) False advertising in perhaps Europe's coldest country... These signs were EVERYWHERE as if Autumn and I needed reminding while we were freezing our butts off.

5) ALL ART HAS BEEN CONTEMPORARY... pretty witty sign, right? I got a kick out of this, as it was on the front of the Luxembourgish main Casino.

6) Ok, so this doesn't have anything to do with Luxembourg, but there is a place in France called Bitche... how cool would that be???

7) Luxembourg has combined two of the most awesomely awesome and flamboyant people together into the name of their main street... Siegfried and Roy, meet Rue Sigefroi.... Possibly the best moment in all of Luxembourg.

8) Yellow cow that was jailed off from public viewing but that Autumn and I managed to get a picture of. Luxembourg why you keeping the yellow cow all for yourself?

9) Another awesome job naming a road.

So Luxembourg definitely had some amusing moments....

Oh Luxembourg, Oh Luxembourg, Who even goes there?

2008-05-20T23:34:00.000+02:00

Let's just start this post off by saying that I am an awesome friend. Not only did I go up north to visit Autumn in her town of Nancy, BUT I also satisfied her life long (since 9th grade) dream of visiting the tiny country of Luxembourg, lucky her.

So we leave Nancy at some godforsaken hour that I hopefully never will again see in my life. It was one of those times when the whole world is shut down, including public transportation and you have to take a taxi...

Once we get on the train, Autumn and I immediately fall asleep. Lucky for the both of us, this is the first time we get to experience the joys of the "couchette", chairs that look like chairs but actually recline so much that you can basically lay in them. One word for them is AWESOME.

Upon arriving in Luxembourg, the weather looks bleak and cold and the first sign I see is "HOT CITY"... This is propaganda and lies, Luxembourg is not a HOT city, in fact it is the antithesis of HOT in that it is freezing freaking cold.

So we had officially arrived in Luxembourg, the grand Duchy of Europe. I chose to pronounce Duchy as Douchey whereas Autumn claims it is a Dukey... But in the end, Luxembourg I would say was definitely more of the first then the second.

The first view of the city was down into the valley with the Cliffs of Insanity! How amazingly awesome was that!

After a quick view of the Eternal Flame, which I swore to God was not called that, we moved on to view what can only be deemed, the flag garden. Completely separate from the rest of the park in the valley of Luxembourg, sits a garden not full of people or flowers but full of 8 flags that just wave in the wind. Autumn and I decided then and there, that we would sometime in our 8 hours in Luxembourg conquer the flag garden for Jon Little.

After wandering around what turned out to be the "heart" of Luxembourg, Autumn headed over to a building that we called a castle, but turned out to be a bank, sad news right. Note to self, when you go to a foreign place try and at least do a bit of research on it.

Sadly for us, we were in Luxembourg on a Sunday and apparently the people of Luxembourg don't like to work on Sundays as everything was closed. EVERYTHING was closed, so our sole choice was to walk around and look at things and listen to bells. Seriously, every second we were in Luxembourg a bell was ringing. I don't know if it's just a Sunday thing but that amount of bells is unnecessary, there are people in the world who don't have bells, Luxembourg should donate some of theirs.

The Bell Playing Notre Dame, Grand Cathedrale of Luxembourg

I believe this was Grand Duchess Caroline

After more wandering we eventually discovered the palace of the Grand Duchy, where the Grand Duke William lives... It's actually quite quaint and attached to the Parliament building which is very convenient and it's only guarded by one large gun handling man, whom Autumn told me to go past and ring the doorbell... such a dumb idea. That's when we were arrested and put in a Luxembourgish jail....

Yea I wish that was true because that would be a much better story.

So we continued on. At this point, Autumn and I discovered a small shop with what appeared to be postcards that was actually open. We went inside and as Autumn began to flip through some postcards a CRAZY Luxembourgish (it's a funny word, right?) slaps Autumn's hand away and hits her in the arm, THEN she starts screaming at us in Luxembourgish (not French their Other official language) and we run out fearing for our lives.

At this point the two of us are quite grumpy with Luxembourg. It's cold, nothings open and its people are violent. The only good thing I can say at this point is that it knows how to take care of dog poop unlike Paris.

Luckily the weather turned sunny and Luxembourg started to get better and better as it had secret passageways carved into the Cliffs of Insanity! So Autumn and I attempted to “trouve” (find) the entrance to the secret passageways, but alas we couldn’t get all the way down to the valley where the monks gardens were…

BUT then we found the Wenchel Walk (it’s sorta like a penguin’s walk), you bobble back and forth as you walk down the side of the Cliffs of Insanity not too bad. At one point the sky opened up and began to poop hard balls of hail on us… Luxembourg was so confusing, seriously hail?

The scenery as we walked down the Cliffs of Insanity was gorgeous.. It was like we were in the middle of a fairy tale... Pretty incredible!

Here is a view of the old city which at its heart has an abbey where the monks grow different fruits and veggies on the sides of the river in the center of the valley (we really made up facts about Luxembourg)

After another walk around what turned out to be an abbey, Autumn and I were starving and it was a PERFECT time to eat some delicious bread, crackers, brie and Mirabelle jam before stupid Luxembourg decided to have a hurricane or a tornado or something. Possibly the most delicious picnic that’s ever been had.

Afterwards Autumn and I were kind enough to share some of our bread with the ducks, there was one tramp of a suck who kept leading 2 boy ducks on, so we tried to give her more as she obviously was going to have a baby, that’s how big a slag she was…

Here comes deathstorm one, this one had killer hailstones the size of tennis balls...

After a delicious picnic in the Luxembourg sun, the clouds turned dark and Autumn and I knew suddenly that the weather was not happy. It’s like the sky changed like in Independence Day and then all of a sudden a shower of death hail fell from the sky. I swear if we hadn’t found that cave we would’ve been knocked out by some of those pieces of hail…

I tried to knock on a big scary door for shelter but as we noticed earlier the Luxembourgish aren’t very nice (probably because they live in Luxembourg)

At this point, Autumn and I were just a bit ennervé (annoyed) by the Douchey of Luxembourg, BUT Luxembourg did have a chance to redeem itself, as it did lend itself perfectly to the recreation of the most awesomely awesome movie of our lives. Basically with the last 5 hours we spent in Luxembourg, Autumn and I remade the Princess Bride in a Series of Photographs… Possibly the only exciting-esque thing to happen. (See future blog entry)

After a difficult (and what we thought perilous) journey to the bottom of the valley, Autumn and I began the search for the illusive flag garden..

It took about an hour but we finally reached our destination and once there Autumn and I both realized the amazing thrill that comes with being in Luxembourg, come on who else do you know who has been to Luxembourg, yea no one. Not even Europeans. And now we know why.

This is the culmination of all 9th grade Autumn's hopes and dreams right here in this photo. Little did she know that she would need me to realize her dreams.

On the train out, in began to hail cats and dogs AGAIN for the THIRD time and we both said good riddance to Luxembourg.

On reflection the trip to Luxembourg was an excellent adventure, not because of the city itself but because of the time Autumn and I spent together. It seriously is one of those things you look back on, and laugh hysterically at…

Still I don’t think I will be heading back to Luxembourg for 20 years.

Not even for the backstreet boys

Destination: Nancy

2008-04-30T23:32:00.000+02:00

I came to visit this picturesque city thanks to my dear friend Autumn. So picturesque is it that it's been named one of the 1000 places you should see before you die! Awesome right? So one down, about 999 more to go.

First lesson. How to pronounce Nancy. No it is NOT like Nancy Drew, it is with a French accent. Pretend you are British and pronounce Nancy like the Indian bread Nan (Nahhhn) and to see. Thus Nahhhnseee.

Upon arrival, Autumn realized we had much to do in a short time, so we quickly took my bags to her place and I was given the grand tour of Nancy.

Autumn, my Nancy history buff, informed me that Nancy is located in the highly prized Lorraine region of France (I believe the Germans fought at least 2 wars to try and get their piece of Lorraine). As Autumn kindly pointed out, Nancy was never officially occupied by the Germans, and rests very proud of their unwillingness to bow to the occupation.

Our first destination in Nancy, the beautiful Place Stanislaus, reminds me of something right out of a 17th century decadent dream.

Apparently Louis the Somethingth (Aut couldn't remember) gave his father-in-law a dukedom as a present when Stanislaus was kicked out of Poland (he was the former King of Poland). With this dukedom came the difficult town of Nancy, which really didn't want to be a part of France. So the king said, hey Nancy, you can be on your own until Stanislaus dies, but then you become a part of France, thinking his father-in-law would die shortly. But Stanislaus had the last laugh, living to a ripe old age, at least 20 years after the king had given the dukedom.

Everything in the Place is bedecked and gold leafed. Aut gave me a symbolic tour of all the bedecked items, that tried to link both Stanislaus and the King together. The fleur de lis and the coq, signs of French royalty and the thistle and the Lorraine cross, signs of Nancy. It was very interesting. In the French Revolution the statue Stanislaus erected of the King was torn down and the people replaced it with one of Stanislaus himself, as he became a great loved figure in Nancy.

This is a cool looking monastery in Nancy, apparently monks live in there, but Autumn has never seen one of the supposed monks.

This is the declaration from Charles de Gaulle saying that France was liberated. Nancy is quite proud of their ability to remain unoccupied during Nazi occupation of France.

Nancy is a beautiful place but definitely only a day trip. Luckily Autumn and I occupied our time with a nice trip through the Musee des Beaux Arts right in Place Stanislas. It actually a remarkable collection of renaissance and contemporary art including a couple works by Picasso, Manet and Monet.

And Autumn was lucky enough to find a picture of her love, Mr. Darcy. Of course this was the perfect opportunity for a photo op of the happy couple.

After the classical art, the museum had a really amazing display of contemporary pieces. Once piece was this room that only one person could enter at a time and when you shut the door behind it looked like you were in a wonderland of lights.

Part of the contemporary display...

After a lovely afternoon of satisfying our cultural thirst, Autumn and I hit up the most delicious bakery in Nancy for some ficelles, possibly the French equivalent of stuffed pizza or a calzone. What they do is they take a baguette and stuff it with anything they want. We chose 3 cheese as one and then figs and brie. 3 cheese could have been incredible had they not included blue cheese as one of the three cheeses. BUT fig and brie was absolutely INCREDIBLE!

Afterwards we headed to this huge foire (fair/carnival) happening in the center of town. It was a huge carnival full of candied apples and carnies... pretty cool. The only VERY uncool thing about it was that it cost an arm and a leg to even go on a ride. Seriously 4 euros for a fun house? I am not a millionaire.

So Autumn and I just wandered around, eventually watching a game that spun in circles for about 20 minutes. Very cool you had to get a ring to go completely over really cool electronic devices (ipods, iphones, digital cameras, etc.) Spent 20 minutes watching other people win, pretty cool right. Next we ventured over to the exit from the Haunted House. If you have never seen a French person about to pee their pants in fear, I suggest, nay, I authoritate it for everyone. Just look at the photos... the live action though is SO much better.

After another 20 minute stop at the Haunted House, Autumn and I stopped for a minute to take a couple shot at the how intense is your love booth... obviously we are "explosif". Afterward all of the residents of Nancy now thought we were a lesbian couple, awesome right?

Well finished it up with a nice 3 euro ride on the most awesome french rollercoaster ever... Can't get any better than a rollercoaster in France right?

Anywho I had an awesome day and a half in Nancy, I would recommend that everyone visits it once in their life.

Herbeville: Population 1,000, maybe with 500 cows

2008-04-30T23:18:00.000+02:00

I went on a mini vacation with the Manet's out to the French countryside! About an hour outside of Paris is this adorable little village called Herbeville, which is known for it's Antiquities and outdoor markets. Although very tiny, less than a thousand people live there. It is practically untouched by all of the dirt of Paris. Situated in grassy knoll surrounded by farmland. The town itself has one Mairie (town hall) which just happens to be attached to it's sole ecole (school). The Manet's friends live right on the outskirts of the town limits, far away from the little village. The old home reminded me of something that my Mom dreams about living in one day. The family said that that house had belonged to their family for over 150 years and that they think it was built a little over 300 years ago.

Right in the town...

Raphy getting a push from Suzanne

The lovely view...

Overall very fun, except the ride to and from as I got to partake of the joy that is Jasmine's carsickness. Let's just say I feel really really bad for her.

I am Dumb ( Do not read if you vomit easily)

2008-04-30T23:11:00.000+02:00

So, during the Olympic Torch Relay in Paris, there was a huge riot. I happened to be walking home from my class in the northern part of the city and ran into the protests against China. Things got a little rough and someone threw what I can only assume was a glass bottle (most likely wine, as that's the only thing they drink in France). The bottle broke and glass ricocheted in my direction, severing my left pointer finger...

Sadly this is not the truth. I cut my finger while cutting baguette to put some cheese on it. Seriously how French of me. Any who for the price of 2 stitches and 10 euros I got an insider tour of Hotel Dieu (the oldest hospital in Paris located right next to Notre Dame), which just happens to be the closest l'Urgences (ER) to me. AWESOME.

PS the orange stuff is iodine not blood, bc apparently the French like to see that it's disinfected.

Frohe Ostern

2008-04-30T19:25:00.001+02:00

Spring is in the air! So the only reasonable thing I wanted to do was be with my lovey for Easter. This was not an easy feat as the cheapest way to get to Germany was by bus. Lucky for me the bus ended up being 2 hours longer than it was supposed to be and I arrived in Munich to a freezing cold Vince.

We went straight into the city and visited the Neue Pintathek. It was actually a pretty incredible museum with artwork ranging from the Middle Ages to my personal favorite, Klimt. After a good 2 hours at the Pintathek, Vince and I went for a lovely drink and lunch at a corner restaurant. It was actually quite delicious, and my tummy was content. Surprisingly Germans DO have vegetarian meals!

After our meal we then headed to Vince's family friends, the Sabalowskis for a nice early Easter dinner. I even tried lamb, which was interesting... Afterwards we played Wii, I am perhaps the most awkward person to ever play this game, although that is closely followed by my bright red boyfriend. After a couple of rousing hours of Wii, Vince and I headed back to Erlangen, I was lucky enough to not be the designated driver and also be quite tired!

Vince and I then spent a relaxing morning at home and went and grocery shopped for something to make for Easter Dinner with the Sablowskis, we ended up choosing a green bean casserole and some gross German vegetable mayonnaise thing. After a day of cooking, we headed back into Munich for some Easter celebrations.

Another delicious lamb meal and a rousing game of 6 nimmt, and the younger crowd was ready to head out to check out the German club scene. Let's just say, Germans can for the most part not dance. Originally I thought it was just my boyfriend, but after a closer examination, it is all of them. Although inherently the German females have more grace and composure on the dance floor than the men. Secondly, German club music is either AWESOME 80's music or AWFUL hard German rock, which is the worst music to ever been played. After one too many drinks and some awful music we headed home only to find we missed our bus by 5 minutes.

Once home, we went to our respective sleeping areas and I was pleasantly surprised by a huge bottle of water! Unpleasantly it was bubbly water....

The next morning after lovely German waffles, Vince and I headed back to Erlangen to take care of the cat (who after months of residence with the Buergers still has no definite name) Vince somehow coerced my lazy bottom into a lovely hike around Erlangen (it took 2 and a half hours) and it was quite cold but beautiful. We then lazed around watched a movie and the next day headed out to take me to my 12 hour bus!

What a lovely way to spend your Easter! I guess if I couldn't be with my family I could at least be with a boy I love!

Planned Absence

2008-04-20T05:44:00.000+02:00

Just to warn my loyal readers... I will be taking a nice little paid holiday to the South of France to watch... 40 kids. Yea though not the perfect holiday, it's actually pretty great, 40 little French kids 7 animateurs (3 of which speak English), 40 ponies, and the beach. And they are paying me a bit under 600 euros to do this... for 10 days. Seriously this could be quite incredible!

Love and miss all of you... you'll see new posts April 30th!

Jessie

The Best Damn Holiday of the Whole Entire Year

2008-04-16T09:52:00.000+02:00

St. Patrick's Day, Oh St. Patrick's Day. Oh beautiful day when all the planets collide to make what can be only termed the most wonderful celebration of mankind and it's love for all things but most of all alcohol.

Back in the olden times, St. Patrick was being persecuted yada yada yada yada, so he drank some Guiness then a shot of Jameson and his life was better. So in honor of the holy man, we all get really drunk and sing loudly. This year thanks to the Pope, St. Patrick's Day (usually March 17) was moved from a Monday to a Saturday! How awesome in the Pope thinking about everyone's hangovers the next day!?! Apparently, it was actually because St. Patty's day fell during Holy Week but Pish posh, we all know Benedict wanted to get down with his bad self, and couldn't go to work on Tuesday if St. Patty's was left on Monday.

I went out. Friday night I went out a little to hard and wasn't quite prepared for St. Patrick's Day. I don't really remember any of Friday night and sadly there is no photo documentation, I can only go on reports that I *ROCKED* at beer pong, and that I am an international goddess.

Little to say, I was not quite ready for partying again Saturday night as I woke up at 5pm in the evening. I got ready quickly and I went over to my favorite Rue Mouffetarde for a little fun with John and Sarah (my English friend). As Sarah and I walk in we are serenaded by the sounds of little (not really) Irish men and immediately were handed Guinesses from John. John introduced us to his friend Ruairi, the butt grabbing Irish man who declared we would be the most awesome couple had we both not had significant others. So for the rest of the night the Irish men kept grabbing Sarah and my asses, so it was only fair that we grab back.

Then the 3 Irish boys, Ruairi, Cian (real Irish) and John (Boston Irish) burst into song and dance right there in the pub. I don't think ST. Pat's day would have been more fun even if we were in Ireland!

At this point I believe I told Sarah to steal a Guiness print which now hangs in my room.

Once Sarah and I started to do shots the night turned from great to wonderful to awful all in one turn, as at some point I forgot about my previous hangover and decided to stay awake til the early morning.

Any who let's just say, after what can only be termed the most ridiculous night into morning I ever, I arrived back in my bed at 7am.

Moulin Rouge

2008-04-08T22:45:00.001+02:00

Ok, the whole idea of the Moulin Rouge is awesome right? Dancing, champagne, Paris, and music. This all sounds good until it's foreigners lip syncing to french music.

Lucky for us, it was free as normally the Moulin Rouge costs 90 euros and that doesn't even include a glass of wine or champagne. Contiki once again hooked us up and we were VIP's at the moulin rouge. We had our own table and 2 glasses of champagne (which is the only reason we survived the whole show)

There really are no word to describe the show. It was a mixture of cheesy and awful.

The end of my vacation...

2008-04-08T22:33:00.001+02:00

March 9 ended our wonderful vacation.. we left Amsterdam in the afternoonand got on a bus that took 10 hours to get to Paris. Luckily for us there were stinky pot smoking French men behind us.... so fun.

Not too much happened on the bus, except when we crossed the French border and were stopped for 1 hour so a drug sniffing dog could come on the bus and search it for drugs. Surprisingly the pot-smoking frenchmen didn't get in trouble. But Angie did.

At least she was yelled at when she took a photo of the dog.

We arrived home, and were so glad to crash.

Brownies are delicious!

2008-04-08T22:32:00.000+02:00

March 8, 2008, this was Vince's Birthday!

We started this morning shopping for my cousin in Leipseplein Straase, where Angie bought herself some pretty awesome sparkle shoes. After about an hour, we were on the hunt for the I AMSTERDAM sign, only to find out that it was hiding behind the Rijksmuseum the whole time. After an hour photo shoot which was later copied by all the other tourists, we went to the Van Gogh Museum.

Absolutely incredible, if you even slightly like Van Gogh, I recommend the museum. It's amazing, not only do you get to see some of his most famous works (Sunflowers, The Bedroom, Self Portrait, the Potatoeaters) and some lesser known sketches as he was constantly sketching on everything. After about 2 hours in the museum, we went to the special exhibition on John Edward Millais, famous for his painting of Ophelia from Macbeth. I almost liked this exhibit more than the museum. I really enjoyed the paintings by Millais and found the way it was arranged to be amazing.

Sadly though, we lost Robb. We went in together and lost him in the museum. We tried to find him for at least 30 minutes but he was gone or we kept passing him. It was weird. As we weren't in Amsterdam long we really couldn't waste time waiting for him so we left and continued to explore the city, specifically we went to the Bloemenmarkt to see all the flowers. Once again I was tricked by Amsterdam. Instead of fresh flowers or cut flowers being at the market, it's a market for bulbs mostly. Still beautiful and I bought myself a beautiful pink tulip.

After we decided to go to the Grasshopper (this time the big one) and try another space cake. It was delicious again especially with a cappuccino. This time Angie felt it a bit more than me.

We returned to Robb's only to find that he had spent the same time searching for us, but he was glad that we had gone exploring.

I tried to cook, but I think I was a bit effected by the Space cake as I scalded my stomach and I now have a pretty atrocious scar on my belly button because of it.

After we ate dinner and went to sleep after packing as we left the next day.

Is Immediately Emailed to my Mom...

2008-04-08T22:29:00.000+02:00

Angie and I actually woke up relatively early to do some laundry and get going to see all of Amsterdam.

We arrived in town around 11 and we went straight to the Anne Frank Huis to tour the house where the Frank family hid out during World War II and the Holocaust. It was a very good representation of the house and I feel like it really made you get closer to understanding the fear those people lived with every day. If you never read the Diary of Anne Frank, I think you should. If anyone could put what happened during the war in a way that could transcend age and culture, I think Anne Frank did. From her diary you get a feeling of what life was like, and what real fear is. It's sad, but also necessary.

After Anne Frank Huis, Angie and I needed to just walk and recover from the experience. We walked down one of the main canals and crossed over into Jordaan and explored for a bit. The architecture in Amsterdam is awesome. It's 5 story canal houses squeezed together in bricks and bright white lining the cobblestone streets. They surround the canal which are brimming with canala boats of all shapes and sizes and colors. The city radiates happiness and seems to be all embracing. Every Amsterdammer I spoke to was quite nice, they all seemed to want to help.

After wandering a bit, we happened upon the first and only homosexual monument to be built in Europe (possibly the world). It was 3 triangles of the same size in pink marble, who made a bigger triangle when all put together. I thought it was a nice way to commemorate the Homosexuals killed in the Holocaust, as the Pink triangle was the patch they wore (like the Jews wore the Star of David)

At this point I was starving. We decided to go to a traditional Dutch restaurant and try some Broodje (savory pancakes) That was the most delicious but weird spinach and feta pancake ever. The pancake itself is somewhere between the American think pancake and the French crepe. It was definitely interesting.

After I think we walked past every canal in Amsterdam until we finally found Nemo and the big body of water. We were a bit lost but we did take lots and lots pictures!

We finally made our way over to the Rijksmuseum, and despite renovations we still saw some of the most amazing Dutch art ever, mostly Rembrandt and Vermeer. The nice thing about this museum is that they had classical museums inside the exhibit rooms playing classical music, which went really nicely with the museum's art.

Around 7 we finally got on the bus to return to Robb's where we were greeted with some lovely couscous!

As a present to Robb as a thank you for letting us stay at his place, Angie and I (mostly Angie) had arranged a special showing at the Casa Rosso, Amsterdam's most famous sex show. Let me tell you that was the most ridiculous thing in the world, as one of the girl's behind me said "It's better than figure skating", which I think is the most appropriate comment ever made. So Contiki hooked us up, we were treated as VIP's at the place. Free admission and free drinks. The first one leads to laughter the second leads to being ridiculously silly and gullible. They kept not only refilling them but also making them ridiculously strong.

During the show at some point, a woman put a cigarette in her private part and smoked it... seriously someone paid 40 euros to go see this. I mean I didn't know it was possible but 40 euros? And even the sex part of the show wasn't even sexy. The guys were not attractive but quite well, errr, endowed, which I eventually figured out after I said very loudly, wow that guy is not hott at all and some guy behind me was like "But look at his d*$%"

Here's a tip to men, it is not advisable to hit on women at a sex club, especially when they are obviously constantly sipping their vodka pineapple because they are AT A SEX SHOW with their cousin. Some Irish dude claimed I worked there too. That was awesome.

After 3 or 4 drinks, Angie and I were successfully drunk. The person on stage was asking for volunteers so of course I volunteered my cousin. So she goes up and she's all alone. Somehow this lady behind me talks me into going up there with her. Let's just say, I got to know Oksana very well and also got to eat a bit of banana... Oi!

Finally Robb took our drunk butts to some Thai place where we drank more and were ridiculous until finally we were on the verge of collapsing and we went home.

Here is an excerpt of the email sent to my mom once home:

"Dear Mom,

Last night was ridiculous! Let's just say that we got into the sex show in Amsterdam for free because of my wonderful cousin and her tour company. Let's see, I saw a woman smoke a cigarette NOT from her mouth but another orifice (you can guess), a bunch of couples fornicating on stage and looking rather bored while doing it (which Angie did not think was possible), one of the couples were lesbian vampires... who would've thought....

Included in the fun were free drinks because we all "worked" for Contiki. Alcohol loosens your inhibitions. Whether or not Angie and I made an appearance on stage may be seen on Youtube. Never did I have a goal of eating a banana like that.

Any way we're going to get some tulips and see some Van Gogh's!

It's Vince's birthday, send him a message!

Love

your daughter and niece, the new stars at the Casa Rosso ; )"

Check out day 3 in photos!

What happens in Amsterdam....

2008-04-08T21:22:00.000+02:00

The next day we wake up and just sort of hang around the hostel... I of course buy myself a new camera COMPLETE with tripod, possibly the best feature for a camera EVER! After waiting about an hour, Angie and I drag our bags to the airport bus (really just me as there is only one). Nothing really exciting happened now.

We got on a plane, a fluorescent green and blue Transavia one, if that gives you any indication of Holland. And to Angie's delight the fabric was made with embroidered emoticons! Just the fabric my mom is looking for, right?

So we arrive in Amsterdam and take the train to Centraal Station, which is a beautiful old building located right in the heart of the city. Luckily for us, we were able to find our couchsurfing host amongst all the men in "black overcoats", which luckily is NOT what Keanu Reeves wore in the Matrix.

So we meet up with Robb and he tells us all about why he is in Amsterdam, as he is originally from Cali. Apparently he is some sort of silicone molding scientist, who coats his silicone models in gold? I don't know I sort of stopped listening after a while. We dropped off oru things and headed back into the main city.

Robb first took us to Leipsestraat, where all the shopping is and also a delicious Wagamama* Restaurant. For those who have never heard, Wagamama* is a delicious British asian noodle house. I had most delicious shrimp in a thai coconut broth with some noodles, YUM! Angie was thrilled with her vegetarian noodle dish. Angie and I went on a big splurge and even ordered up some most delicious fried bananas! A bit expensive but worth every single penny as we were starving!

After our hunger had been satisfied. We went for a little tour and just happened upon the Grasshopper, a coffeehouse of Amsterdam. As most of you know, I am not nor have I ever been a smoker of any kind. So I thought, when in Amsterdam do whatever you can do legally. Angie and I ordered a Space cake, which was moist chocolatey and delicious. As we were eating it, we were reminded that Aunt Lou specifically asked us to think of her while in Amsterdam... she knew we were going to Spain and Holland yet Amsterdam was her choice place for us to think of her? So the first bite of my space cake all I did was think of Aunt Lou.

Nothing really happened at first, and then MmmmBop came on and the world changed.

Let's just say if you are ever going to get high in Amsterdam MmmmBop is the song to do it to. We then sat in the bar for what seemed like hours watching Dutch TV's really big things. Angie claimed the next day she really wasn't that high but I don't believe her as she was making up pretty funny conversations of a man flying on a blimp.

Afterwards we decided to try ad walk off the high and see some more Amsterdam. I am not going to lie, I felt a little woozy and like everything was blurred together, and there was nothing I could do about it. At this point, we walked right into the Red light district. It's not quite what I imagined, especially while high.

I guess for some reason I romanticized the idea of the red light district and I envisioned vine colored buildings with old iron work balconies and girls sitting on the window sill beckoning the men to come visit them. BUT instead it was strictly on the ground floor of buildings. Basically doors were replaced with pure glass panes that women stood behind in underwear, so that men could get a full view of them. And there were ALL the different types of women possible, big ones, small ones, all races, etc. Supposedly there are prostitutes who are not 100% woman who also work in Amsterdam and they specifically register themselves that way... interesting.

Another nice thing about prostitution there, the prostitutes have a union, so they can reform there business and try and scare all the pimps away. Each prostitute is required by law to be tested for STD's at the end of every month. Well at least Amsterdam likes to keep their tourists clean. Another trivia fact 40% of the prostitution business' customers come from the United Kingdom.

After a brief walk through the Red Light District, we returned back to Robb's which was basically the Ritz of our vacation as we each had a clean bed to sleep on with tons of covers, and free internet access! WOOT!

Check out Day Two's photos!

Why the Hanson Brothers are Musical Geniuses...

2008-04-08T16:13:00.000+02:00

The day my world ended... in Barcelona

2008-04-03T16:04:00.001+02:00

Last Day in Barcelona in Photos!

We woke up relatively early for us, and attempted to find the Dali museum, which was absolutely incredible. So many not famous works that were absolutely incredible. We saw original illustrations that Dali did for Dante's Inferno which were incredible. Included in the exhibit were original glass works by Dali.

We headed to the funiculaire, which we thought was going to be similar to Madrid''s Cabines, but ended up being like a ride up a mountain on a train... oops

Beautiful views of Barcelona then my camera broke so alas I was a little miserable for half of the day. Luckily I let Angie go her own way and I took a nap.

After my nap, I woke up and hung out with some of my new friends in the hostel until my cousin came back. When Angie was back, we went to the free flamenco show, which was to say the least.... interesting. It was a man who could move his feet faster than anyone I know or anyone I ever want to meet.

Afterwards we decided to go find what I originally termed the Rocket Ship of Barcelona. A big what I assumed colored building actually an office building called the Torre Agbar. Little did I know, when we got there it appeared to be a giant dildo.

Of course we had to pose with the phallic symbol.

Then we wandered around taking funny pictures until we came to the Sagratta Familia the amazing church Gaudi was in the process of building at his death. Currently Barcelona is spending 100 years rebuilding the church, ridiculous, right? So for the next half century at least the cathedral will be under construction.

Afterwards we tried to go to sleep early as we had a lot of traveling the next day.

Playing in the Mediterranean

2008-04-03T16:03:00.000+02:00

As of March 4, 2008

Photos from Barcelona!

Angie and I, AGAIN, woke up late on our vacation, and decided since it was a relatively nice day we should head to the beach of Barcelona.

So we headed out to Porte Olympico and the Mer Mediterane... aka one of the most beautiful places on Earth. We walked along the beach for 2 hours.

At one point my cousin Angie bravely dipped her tootsies in the sea. Whereas I the "crazy cousin" went for a little swim in the sea.

Let's just say there is nothing as cold as the Mediterranean Sea in February.

We also went for an awesome climb on the beach at a Spanish playground for adults.

Afterwards we decided to go to the Passeig de Gracia to see some of Gaudi's amazing architecture. Sadly, every building that looked slightly interesting we thought Gaudi had designed but once we found the real Gaudi, we were thoroughly aware of what he creates.

These buildings were gothically incredible, balconies that looked like skeletons, roofs like dragon wings, and crazy bone columns. He was also known for his ability to incorporate incredible mosaics into the designs.

The first building we saw was the Casa Batillo.

The second was La Perdrera or Casa Mila, which was Gaudi's last work.

After much discussion, Angie and I headed over to Parque Guelle for sunset with one of the best views in all of the city. It was absolutely incredible... We got to see lightning from a sea storm and the clouds pass over the city at night.

We finished the night with free dinner at the hostel and then attempted to go see the Celtics vs. Barcelona... We ended up seeing it in an Indian restaurant, which was at most interesting. Every irish bar we tried to go in was full with Irish and Scots there to celebrate the game. Sadly for them, the Celts lost.

Afterwards, I hung out in the hostel and made some friends.

A special Grandmother Shout Out

2008-04-03T15:22:00.000+02:00

This post for my Granola bar back home...

Happy Early Birthday with a little JP2 action!

Bar...THA...lona?? A little lisp anyone?

2008-04-02T17:01:00.000+02:00

Barcelona Day One: The Celtic Invasion

So we left Madrid at 1 in the morning... and I didn't sleep til the next day as it was possibly the most uncomfortable bus ride of my whole entire life (worse than even Pennbrook Softball team busrides) We were smushed together with a smelly and old Spanish man sitting behind us. Every time I started to drift to sleep I was sadly awakened by a swift kick in my butt. Angie and I had to huddle together because of the cold and my tiny delta airlines blanket was NOT enough for two people. After 9 hours in a bus, we were in Barcelona.

We went and dropped off our bags at the lovely Kabul hostel which is situated in what I am assuming was the former Plaza Reial (Royal Plaza) Though not so royal now, it's a hot spot for local bars and has a beautiful courtyard decked with palm trees.

We couldn't check in for another 2 hours, so we left our luggage there and went wandering around Port Vell, which is basically a yacht resting place. It's a lovely walk down Las Ramblas to what I can only say is a gorgeous walk along the marina. The architecture in Barcelona is a blend of very very old with modern. Alongside the 200 year old statue of Christopher Columbus pointing towards the New World is a metal wave design bridge. The Barcelonians like to blend things together.

During our lovely walk, we saw a big red bullseye... like Target. I don't think I have ever been that excited in my life. Sadly it was NOT Target. A note to all Target Marketing Teams, I would consider building up in other international cities as Target is one of the bets things in the entire USA.

Not TARGET!

After a quick walk around and a bunch of photo taking (only 3 photos were we in because we looked like crap), we returned to the hostel. On the way back up Las Ramblas, what do we see but 2 men in kilts and green shirts. Of course, Angie and I demand a picture with them and as our picture is being taken a Spanish cameraman arrives and starts filming us. Next thing we know, the Scottish guys bare ass under the kilt is out. Needless to say I never need to see a Scottish ass again. That was just the start of the Celtic Invasion of Barcelona (the Glasgow Celtic was playing the Barcelona team).

One of the first things we learned is that Barcelona is in fact pronounced like you have a lisp on the "S". Apparently one of their old kins had a lisp and pronounced it that way, so they decided to just go with it. The other awesome thing was that in Barcelona they speak Catalan, which is a mixture of Spanish and French, so I understood them a bit more than in Madrid.

Our room was nice for a hostel... clean bedding, lockers that locked, friendly staff. Only part that sucked was that the common area was a Smoking Zone and smelled AWFUL!

We showered and prettied ourself up for our first night out. And also did 2 loads of laundry as we'd already cycled through all of Angie's socks and underwear.

We wandered a bit outside, discovered the Petit Palau and the Passeig de Gracia, which is famous for its two Gaudi Buildings. Before we got to either of the buildings we did some shopping in a cute little Spanish shop where we both bought us some cute clothes (me a summer dress, Angie a t shirt).

At this point we were cranky and hungry. Walking back to the hostel we discovered the Mercat de la Boqueria, where we had the strangest fruit I've ever seen in my life, pirana fruit.

We returned to the hostel met some nice folks in the waiting area, and then went and got some "traditional" Spanish Paella on a lovely terrace, or what I though was so....

Of course, the paella is from the Ristorante Oriente, which if you can guess is not a Spanish restaurant. It ended up being good even if my platter came out 20 minutes later than Angie's.

After we finished the food we went on to Sangria, and under the influence of Sangria, things get interesting.

First, while Angie was in the bathroom, a Scottish man sitting directly across from me waved at me and then said "Hola". So I gave him a little creepy wave back and said "Hola". The funnier part is that he then started speaking in English loudly about how I was cute and how he'd been checking me out all night. When Angie came back, I was like Angie that dude thinks I am Spanish... then I say to the dude, "I'm not Spanish!" That was possibly the reddest Scottish person I've ever seen in my life and here's a picture of him.

At this point, we've become a bit intoxicated and decide that this night we should have a S.S.H.I.B (a Scotsmen Scavenger Hunt in Barcelona). We made up the rules and assigned different Scottish men different point totals.... Obviously we put out game faces on.

Here are some of the pictures I have from our S.S.H.I.B.....

Let's just say it was a ridiculous night of my life full of Irish, Scottish men.....

Our Last day in Madrid

2008-03-29T23:07:00.000+01:00

Look at THE LAST DAY'S PICS!

After another long day, we were up and ready by 11 am to spend our last day in Madrid.

Despite our best efforts we weren't ready in time to head to the Mercado on Calle de Los Estudios with Hong and Kao (the other Americans).

We spent some time searching through the market, and I ended up purchasing two really cool prints of Madrid, one for me and the other for my mom from a nice Madridian man Antonio Rios Martin. I also found a really cheap but cute pair of earrings. From there, Angie let my awesome sense of direction give us a tour of Madrid.

Me and the artist of my print

I managed to take us pass the Plaza de la Villa (City Hall) with a hot Spanish statue right in front. Supposedly right here was the Ayuntamiento (town hall) where during elections we could find some protestors against everybody's favorite Spanish King, Juan Carlos the II.

Of course while walking past the Placa Real, we saw a Angel Human Statue in the process of her siesta (apparently even the supposedly non-moving statues take breaks)
After a brief photo shoot at the what I consider the coolest statue ever, Don Quixote with Sancho headed off to fight some windmills at the Plaza de Espana, the two of us headed over to the Cabines to see Madrid from the air.

We were delayed a bit by the sweet smell of Spanish tapas. We had a lovely lunch which included the waiter putting Angie's eye drops in for her.

After a 15 minute ride, where Angie and I attempted to strategically balance ourselves and our cameras, we landed in Casa de Campos an outdoor park.

If there is one thing the Spanish have mastered other than the siesta it would have to be the art of the park. This was seriously 50 acres of landscaping for the Spanish people to just enjoy.

Over the other side of the hill was an amusement park and swimming area. Once you reached the other side of the Cabines back towards the heart of Madrid, you were in the La Rosalida, where Angie and I decided that it would be a nice place to take a nap.

After about 30 mins of siesta time we went to the Templo de Debod, a supposed gift to the Spanish people form the Egyptian government for helping to build a dam that saved a bunch of historic structures. In reality I think the Spanish stole it during the Crusades but I guess to each their own.

Templo de Debod, stolen from Egypt. Picture stolen from cousin.

Luckily we once again made the acquaintance of Americans by ignorantly trying to get someone to take a picture of the two of us by handing a camera and saying "Por Favor", obviously Angie and I are fluent in Spanish.
por favor picture

Our new friend Ian was from Philly also and was actually fluent in Spanish. He took us to get falafel which of course turned into a whole ordeal bc of my vegetarian cousin. Not only did the guy originally try to give her a meat pita but then he just removed the meat and put veggies in it thinking that would be alright.

After a brief Turkish American war, we went back to the Plaza Real and hung out by the fountain until we could go back to Matias and pack.

While walking back to pack at Matias, there just happened to be a good old fashioned Spanish bidet, of course we had to use it.

Sadly, we had to take a 9 hour bus to Barcelona. During the bus, I wanted to vomit because of the gross smelling Spanish man who sat behind me. So let's just say I spent the 9 hours trying to breathe through my mouth....

Luckily we eventually arrived in Barcelona!

Are you saying Mr. Bean is an Elephant??? Madrid Continues

2008-03-29T22:22:00.000+01:00

After let's just say a rough night partaking of the Czech specialty, Angie and I didn't wake up til late.... Well I woke up at 10:30 and spent some time with Pablo and Rasta before Pablo left. Let's just say, I think Pablo may have had a crush on me, but he was supremely disappointed that I had a Vince in Germany and wanted me to have a Pablo in Madrid. Lucky for Vince, I decided to control my self and play with Rasta instead.

Once we got going, we spent the day exploring Madrid's lovely streets.

Once Angie was up and we were both ready, we headed to Museo Thyssen Bornemisya, a private art collection owned by a wealthy Spanish woman who was married to a Swiss Baron. Included in the amazing collection was works by Kadinsky, Ernst, Degas, Dali, O'Keefe, Renoir, Money, Manet, Picasso, and Van Gogh. We also bought a ticket to the Modigliani exhibit and some of his incredible art work which was inspired by Masters like Cezanne and Juan Gris. All in all, a pretty incredible exhibit.

Afterwards, Angie and I just walked for a bit and explored the city, nothing too exciting.

Pretty awesome place we should've eaten at...

Grabbed some food at the Spanish version of McDonald's which included nachos with mayonaise (gross), who could've thought the Spanish could ruin something so incredibly?

When we got back to Matias' apartment, everyone was heading out for a carne asada at Johnny and Lily's apartment. We trekked out to God knows where, and discovered that Lily and Johnny had a beautiful apartment.

After the manly Argentinean men handled the meat (which turned out to be diaphragm), the barbecue was started!

Lucky for me my new friend Fernando is from Mexico and he happens to have the super secret recipe known only by Mexicans for delicious guacamole and salsa....

mmm I miss American mexican food, almost more than Mexican mexican food.

After fun and revelry, they broke out the absinthe and I became a drunk mess. Let's just say me and real absinthe are a party in a gulp. Don't worry I tried both red and GREEN absinthe, red is less licoricey. Angie was only brave enough to sip the green gracefully out of a wine glass.

Then we partied like an Argentinean...

Crazy Argentinean Women (and a Spaniard)

Johnny was kind enough to DJ the party and we partied it up again til 5 in the morning...

Let's just say I can never live in Spain as I can't handle the fun!

OH NOOOO Pablooo PLease don't go!

2008-03-20T17:42:00.000+01:00

So, of course, after a night snuggled on the couch with Smiegel the snoring monster (Angie), I woke up late. Angie claims her excuse is "jet lag". As we get ready in the morning, Angie loses her shoe after 20 minutes of searching we say something to Matias and Leo from the other end of the apartment goes "Is it purple?". Of course, Rasta, the cutest puppy in the world has stolen it and placed it under Pablo's desk.

So now we are finally off into the beautiful city of Madrid. We head to the Museo Nacioanl Centro de Arte Reina Sofia for a Pablo Picasso Exhibit, which includes Guernica. The Picasso exhibit was absolutely ridiculous.... 4 huge rooms full of everything from his blue period, his works of Pierrot, Guernica, Cubism, Self Portraits, and works inspired by others (including Manet's Dejeuner Sur l'Herbe)

Afterwards we met up with our Spanish friend, Cristina to take some photos. She gave us a mini-tour and we saw the Palacio Real and the Royal Cathedral (Iglesia de le Almudena). Walked pass the Jardines de Sabatina, Spain's version of the Royal Gardens... we really hoped we'd see King Juan Carlos II.

Around 5 pm, Angie and I realized we were absolutely starving. The only thing we didn't know was that between 5 pm to 8 pm, ALL OF SPAIN SIESTAS (including the restaurants).

The only place opened was Haagen Daas, so Angie and we ordered two sundaes to share. Possibly the most ice cream I've ever seen and our most expensive meal in Spain.

We returned back to Matias' house, and passed the Plaza de Espana and the Don Quixote Monument!

Once back, we met up with some more Americans and started to celebrate Pablo's departure for Germany. Sadly, this celebration included REAL absinthe made from wormwood in the woods of the Czech Republic. Of course, Lukas devilishly offered the two of us some. Possibly the worst tasting alcohol in the world, but the rest of the night was extraordinary.

We went dancing at this club called 80's, which I can only assume was a gay club as there were at least 5 male couples making out. After some dancing, Pablo's absinthe started to take effect on him (he had 3 shots) and he gave going away kisses to everyone.... This means he kissed everyone (including men) at least once on the lips. The bar closed around 3 and Matias asked if we wanted to go to another club, Angie and I were of course up for ANYTHING.

We head to the next bar, more traditional, and the two of us begin to feel the Absinthe. Let's just say Absinthe makes me a crazy Spanish dancer (like almost professional) and it makes Angie very "tempting". We danced the rest of the night away!

We finished the night, or I guess, morning and arrived back at Matias' around 7am in the morning... To the say the least we didn't wake up til noon the next day.

Check out pictures from my second day!

And here's some more!

A la Molestas de de pecho a qui?

2008-03-12T09:54:00.000+01:00

View the pictures from my First day in Madrid!

Madrid rests in the center of Spain. Situated on top of a hill, it is the Spanish powerhouse of politics, culture and sports. You can find anything and everything you ever thought was close to Spanish there. The city was built like a giant bulls-eye.

Want to go to a bullfight, visit the Placa del Torreaus... but make sure you grab the bullfighter's balls for good luck (at least that's what some Argentinean dude told us). Like tapas? Enter any of the estimated 30,000 cervecerias and stand by the bar and have some delicious pimentos vertes or croquettes. Enjoy staring at really old buildings? Well Madrid has plenty of them. The prettiest include the Palacio Real (Royal Palace) and the Cathedrale de le Almunda.

After touchdown in Madrid, Angie and I were exhausted from all of the rushed shopping and packing the previous night. After Cristina was kind enough to take us to Lavapies, we met our host. The two of them took us out for a traditional tapas celebration at a local cerveceria close to our Madrid "home".

Afterwards Matias had some errands to do, so he gave us a couple of options of things to do.

Luckily our host recommended a nice breezy walk to the Parque del Buen Retiro, where I discovered the joy of what the Spansih term a "siesta". I enjoyed it so much I am considering adding it to my repertoire of cultural influences. French bread in the morning, a siesta around 1 and a french goute at 4:30.

Angie and I walked around for about an hour attempting to photograph what I think is a magpie or the Spanish equivalent of. At one point we found a lovely little pond with a bridge going over it. Obviously the best way to view this spot was laying on the bench. Eventually I fell asleep for what I will guess was half an hour. That was the best 30 minutes of my life.

Palacio de Cristal

Once I woke up, I was pumped to see what was actually in this parque.

Just by happenstance, we came along the Palacio de Cristal. A beautiful Metal framed glass palace, that the Spanish were smart enough to situate on another lovely pond filled with swans and ducks. I felt like I just stepped out of my own Hans Christian Anderson fairy tale (except I wasn't wearing my ball gown). After taking probably what was 100 pictures, the cousin and I continued on, to what can only be termed the most beautiful place to watch the sunset.

It was a gorgeous manmade lake called Estanque where on one side there was the Monumento al Alfonso XII, which was like a columned promenade of sorts with Alfonso XII looking down on Madrid from atop his faithful steed. And the other side had a large pathway lined with flowers and lampposts where local musicians played Spanish music.

We followed the Paseo de la Argentina, in honor of our Argentinean host, to the Plaza de la Lealtad, where they had erected (snicker) a obelisk to the fallen Spanish war heroes. As we continued back towards

our Madrid home, we passed the Plaza de Neptuno where a huge fountain commemorates the sea god. After a quick stop at the Plaza de Jacinto Benavente where Angie munched on some not good tasting "Happy Mix" and we both played on the Spanish playground, we made it back to Calle de San Carlos.

At the house, we were able to finally meet all of Matias' roommates and discover their lovely nicknames. There was Leo (who didn't actually live there, but was there all the time) who they called the Rock. And Matias was Mr. Elastic, as he could climb up anything or jump on anything and stretch around it. Then there was Pablo (who actually moved out the Saturday we were there to pursue his career in Germany) who was Hombre Gasman, because his special talent was that of flatulence. And finally, after much prodding, we discovered that Matias' brother, Lucas, was "the Porn Ghost". After they said this, they snickered and refused to tell us what that meant. Obviously we were intrigued, if not scared of this "porn ghost". So many possibilities exist as the meaning behind the name. Eventually we discovered it was because he occasionally walks around naked at night, and once one of the other roomie's girlfriends discovered him in this state. And instead of covering himself, he asked her if she had a light for a cigarette.

Eventually Angie passed out and joined their nickname club, as she became Smiegel (Golem from LOTR) as apparently her snores are the equivalent to his longing for his precious. Also Pablo told her that she sort of looks like Smiegel too, which I of course found to be hysterical!

That's the end of our first day in Madrid!

Please note: the only phrase Angie and I know fully in Spanish, thanks to Lonely planet, is the one listed as the title of the post. I suggest you translate it because it is possibly the least used phrase in ANY language!

A Short Explanation of my Whereabouts...

2008-03-12T09:45:00.000+01:00

PREPARE FOR POST OVERLOAD!

If you haven't realized by now, I haven't posted in over 2 weeks. While you dudes were trying to read about my exciting adventures, I was off having them.

The last 2 weeks I have spent traveling. Madrid, Barcelona and Amsterdam plus a fun little layover in Belgium for about 2 hours. Never-less, I will try, in the next couple of posts, to up date you on the wonder that was my vacation.

From the previous post, you've already heard that my dear OLD cousin Angie arrived in Paris but alas her luggage did not. SO the whole vacation was spent in MY clothes. After about 30 minutes of sleep, Angie and I woke up Feb 28 to fly down to Madrid. Our flight left ridiculously early in the morning and we had to catch a bus to the airport at 5 am, lucky us....

After sleeping through the 2 hour flight, we finally arrived in Madrid. Through Couchsurfing, we had met a nice girl who would let us store our things in her apartment while we waited for our actual Couchsurfing host to come home from work.

ON A SIDE NOTE: Couchsurfing.com is a website where you can find people to meet up with in different countries. You can either just have coffee or stay on their couch while you visit that place. Since Angie and I were traveling together we decided to save a bunch of money and try out the old couchsurfing.

So I am sorry about the lack of posts, but I promise that in the next couple of days I will bombard you with stories of my lovely vacation!

Guest Blog from Visiting Cousin

2008-02-28T02:26:00.000+01:00

Hello

I am in Paris with Jess. This is what happened in 24 hours... I have been in 4 countries (US, Canada, Germany and France) and on probably 12 different airplanes. I missed connection #1 because plane #1 (Philly to Toronto) had a broken Jump Seat and we sat on the runway for 3 hours, arriving in Toronto at 7:15 and my flight to France was at 6:45...

The first person I talked to told me they would send my bags to baggage, where I could collect them and go to ticketing for a new flight... my bags were NOT at baggage. The baggage help-guy said that 2 bags did, in fact make the flight and would be waiting in France for me. Ooh la la. Ticketing put me on a flight to France via Frankfurt, Germany.

When we were supposed to depart Toronto, everything was a go except... no pilots. Two hours later... pilots. Guess who missed her connection in Frankfurt? I got a NEW flight to Paris. We made it to Paris (ooh la la)... but the bags were nowhere to be seen. And no one knew where they were. So I filled out a form.

By the way, if you miss your connection, your vegetarian meal just gets discarded. My fault for not pre-booking veg meals on every flight every possible way to get to Paris. Thankfully, a crafty flight attendant scored me a fruit cup.

Jess was waiting (the only thing that worked out). We took a painfully slow train into Paris, and did what MUST be done (and seems to be Jess's calling) as we are leaving for MaDRID AT 4:30 am (WAIT did I agree to this?) Ducking under closing door-gates as the shops were closing Jess screamed (in french) "Do you sell women's underwear??!?!? This is an underwear emergency!"... Shop after shop for an hour denied us. No panties at the Gap??? None at the grocery store? What is wrong with Paris?

Finally a Target-like shop (Monoprix) proved to be the one and only saviour (as Jess just said, the panty haven)... I now have 6 pairs of underwear, 3 pairs of socks, 1 pair of jeans, 1 bra and contact lens solution.... Let's hope my luggage turns up!

written by Angie (my cousin)

Germany or Bust

2008-02-27T09:51:00.000+01:00

Let's see, how much do I love my boyfriend?

So much that I spent over 12 hours traveling across Germany to see him with 25 members of his family.

Vince invited me to come visit him in Germany for the weekend for his father's 50th birthday. Only days before did I find out that this would be a test of sorts to see if his family approved of me. Most of this approval came in the form of a test of my alcohol tolerance.

I spent over 10 hours riding the ICE (InterCity Express) from Paris to Frankfurt to Dresden. In Frankfurt, I discovered that my limited knowledge of German is well, very limited. Little did I know, the words I know in German (including gift, Christmas, love, like, lame, bossy, and all the curse words) is not practical...AT ALL. So there I am, about 7 minutes to switch trains, and I don't know how to say train in German! So I keep saying Vo ist mein TRAIN (Note: in German train is not train) to this man and he's looking at me like I am crazy. Finally I say I speak english and french and he speaks in French to me. And he's like you better run it's 14 tracks away. I finally get there and as soon as I am on the train pulls off the tracks and I'm on the way to Dresden.

About 7 hours pass and it's 4:00 and I am in Dresden. Vince and his sister, Josie, pick me up from the train station and we take an hour drive into the countryside of Germany to a little village called Sayda, where his family has rented a King's old hunting lodge to house the party.

I absolutely loved the party, the food was wonderful.

I tried a couple of different German foods (including schnitzel and weiners) and everything was wonderful. And they made me a barmaid... well not made, but all the children (Vince and me included) were responsible for tending bar. The only problem was that every time I tried to get some dunkel out, in came out all foam, what we call the head and Germans call the blumen (flower). There was like a whole little comedy performance in honor of Wolfgang (Vince's dad) then he also did a bit of a speech. For the most part, the party was just being in each other's presence and drinking a lot. It was really fun and his family and I really got along. Around 2 or 3, I think we eventually called it a night, we were the last ones up with Vince's cousin Pierre.

The next day we went for a lovely hike for about an hour and a half with 10 people. It was nice to view the countryside. Breathtakingly beautiful and it felt very untouched almost like the woods of Little Red Riding Hood.

We left the Forsthaus around 3 and by then of my less than 24 hours with the Buerger family, I had been invited to Leipzig to stay with Vince's grandparents, to Munich for Oktoberfest to stay with Vince's family friends (Susan and Ralf), to Hamburg to visit his cousin Romy, and to somewhere where his cousin Pierre lives. His family was very kind to me and I really appreciate it.

Sunday was spent either asleep in the car or wandering around the lovely village of Erlangen, where Vince is currently in Grad School (an Elite Program). After almost 2 years of dating, I consider Vince and I quite lucky to have found eachother. We both really know the other person and despite our distance neither of us wants to be with anyone else. For the most part, I think an understanding exists between the two of us that we should do what's best for ourselves and then the relationship. Luckily, nothing we've done has really effected the relationship.

Eventually I left Erlangen and my weekend with Vince. Stupidly, I thought my plane left at 9:30 and discovered at 8:30 when I arrived at the airport that it was leaving at 9:05. Dumb luck, I made it on the plane and home to Paris....

MOre pictures to come...

A Miraculous Chocolatey Event

2008-02-27T09:35:00.000+01:00

As previously mentioned in the Pere LaChaise post, there exists a chocolate cake that will make your life prior to having it seem meaningless.

It's at the Metro Cafe at Metro St. Suplice. It's called le gateau mi cuit au chocolat. It is better than anything you will ever do in life. For most of you who know me, I am not ever very quiet or calm, but when eating this cake it's like an air of utter calm (the french call this sang-froid) descends upon me. I move as if every movement were a part of a choreographed ballet. Each bite signifies heaven.

Trust me, I now have 4 sources who can state for the record that this chocolate cake is in fact the best that ever existed (Mom, Autumn, Ellen and Jon).... Come to Paris and I will definitely partake of this marvel of cuisine created by the French.

A Chronology of the Miracle that that took place in St. Suplice

Autumn and I pause a moment before we start....

Jon and Ellen before they commence...

Mid-bite Sang-froid

After the Miracle of Chocolate

The Chicken or the Egg....and their Belly Buttons

2008-02-27T09:32:00.001+01:00

Yesterday Raphy posed the question of where do belly buttons come from and why exactly do men have them too? Her reasoning behind this is that the belly button is used to feed the baby, thus it's a thing mothers should have. And as we all know, mothers are women. So why do men have them?

Interesting right. First time I had to carefully think through what I say. So I told her that all humans have belly buttons because it's where a tube connected them to their mother so that they could get food. Since men were once babies they had to get food in their mommy's tummies too.

The follow-up to this question was why do mommy's have belly buttons? Took about 15 minutes but I think the idea that we all are once babies was thoroughly explained.

Walking with the Dead....

2008-02-25T22:52:00.000+01:00

What can I say, when in Paris, go visit dead people's burial sites. Super cool, right? No. You'd think that seeing a tombstone would be thrilling, right? Well it's not. The only thing thrilling at the end of our adventure to Pere LaChaise was that we were going to get Mi Cuit Chocolate Cake.

For your own benefit, I will give you a photo tour of the graves we visited so you don't have to waste 3 hours of your life wandering around a big hill filled with bones (there are no direction although they were nice enough to number the "famous" graves, not that that really helps you much), it's really not that exciting and it's sorta creepy when you actually think about it.

I really don't understand the touristic draw. NOW if there was a trip that played laser tag or paint-ball in the cemetery I totally could get THAT! The only grave that was at most passably enjoyable was that of Oscar Wilde as at least his was interactive (you're supposed to kiss it) I don't know why, maybe he wanted to infect the world with herpes. But nonetheless, I kissed Oscar Wilde's tomb woo freaking hoo.

NOTE: Blogspot is being lame so I can't load the other 4 photos, that's right we spent 3 hours in a cemetary and only saw 4 famous gravesights. We saw tons of graves but really it doesn't impress me much. The best thing for me was that one grave said and I quote "fantasmagorie" I really don't know what it is BUT I know I want that word on wherever I am put when I die.

I am preparing Autumn for her big kiss with a big stone....

Finally Autumn decided to give Oscar a big KISS...

Edith Piaf's Grave which you can barely see do to all the flowers and people crowding around.

The Door's Frontman Jim Morrison's Grave...shoved between about 6 other tombs and you have to do yoga to even see all of it

That's what you can spend 2 hours looking for in Pere LaChaise...a big stone to kiss, some graves you can barely see either covered by flowers or hidden behind other graves,

The Falafel to Rule the World

2008-02-22T14:50:00.000+01:00

You haven't had falafel til you've been in Paris to L'As de Falafel, otherwise known as the gods of Falafel. I thought Pita Pit was delicious, BOY, was I wrong!

Not only are you given a delicious warm and round pita whose light brown exterior smells of the pita made in heaven by God himself, but inside they combine the most wonderful varieties of Middle Eastern food to make your mouth water, seriously, bring a tissue to wipe it.

*First, let me tell you, DO NOT GO THERE HUNGRY! Go there 20 mins before you will be hungry as you will have to get a ticket to then wait in line to eat inside. There's a nice man who points at you and says Are you American? and then proceeds to hand you a ticket that says come back in 35 mins. See all the people in the picture to the left? They are waiting for the delicious falafel... Toujours Imite jamais egale (Always imitated, Never Equal) That's their motto, and it's true DO NOT be tempted by other Falafel vendors.

*Second, EAT INSIDE! I mean it's cool to take it out (Emporter) but it's not the same joyous experience. The atmosphere is similar to a chic citrus diner filled with bustled movements and fast talking Middle Easterners. And the smell is out of this world....

*Don't get the lemonade, it's too expensive (4.50 euros) RIP OFF.

*Savor each delicious bit of falafel ball goodness.

Unlike any crappy thing you get in the States, these pitas are LOADED. Enjoy at least 6 falafel balls, all lovingly cooked by the creepy guys behind the counter. Devour the freshly grilled eggplant. Let your mouth water with the delightfulness of the Baba Ghanoush. Sensory overload, as you delight in the creamy hoummus texture juxtaposed against the crunchy fresh cucumber slices jumbled with red cabbage slaw. The final topper on this Middle Eastern Ambrosia is the addition of what I can only call Tzatiki of the Gods, a Hebrew Ambrosia of sorts. Every single bite of that delicious godly creation I can remember..... oh how I wish I were back in the Marais. This is how you will look if you eat there...ravenous, like a wolf. I would kill anyone who came near my pita...seriously touch my pita and die.

Seine Walking and Statue Seduction

2008-02-20T21:52:00.000+01:00

After our lovely picnic, we decided for a photo op on the Seine and in the Tuileries...

What a beautiful day....

Squinting in the sunlight with an extremely pretty Autumn and Ellen

I like to ruin pictures...

It took me awhile to get on this pole..

Now comes the seduction of a statue in the Tuilleries previously assaulted by me in 2005...

First Autumn teases her with a good old fashioned tittie twist thanks to Christophe and 18th century French Art

Next Jon gets frisky and just goes for the general booby grab

Ellen eventually makes the lady lay down with her

And I of course conquer her (notice the placement of my foot)

Ellen couldn't resist this statue, even when a bunch of little children walked by staring at her she remained in her pose. She's an excellent model.

Jon and Ellen being cute again in Paris

Stopping for a Picnic in Paris

2008-02-20T21:14:00.000+01:00

When in Paris, do as the French, right? Non! Do as the Parisians. So during the most wonderful weekend of my life, Jon, Autumn, Ellen and I had a delicious cheese and bread picnic in a lovely little park (which thankfully no dogs were allowed in)

If you, my readers, come to visit me ever, I will make sure to do just that, by hitting up the local market, buying some delicious fresh bread and even more delicious than the bread chevre (goat cheese)

Here is a photo chronical of all that happened...

Autumn and I are "penseurs" outside of Place de la Sorbonne, obviously DEEP in thought

Ravenous Wolves when it comes to bread and cheese...I appologize for my ugglies but they are warm and comfy

Three pretty girls posing mid-bite

All of us posing on the cool "open book" benches

Jon and Ellen being all types of cute in the city of LOVEEEE

Romantic Autumn and Jessie Picture (You wouldn't believe how hard it was to get Autumn to kiss me)

Today I have become a French Person

2008-02-19T23:34:00.000+01:00

I have a bank account in France with BNP, and I deposited my first check into it. Crazy right? All I know is that the French are weird with their banking system and I dont understand it, pas de tout! There is some crazy time stamping machine that I have to use when I deposit the check, I didn't know what to do so I went and asked a man to help me and he just took the check from me, and said it would be available tomorrow... I guess we will see.

Also to officially make myself even more of a French resident, I bought a cell phone plan (forfaits bloquee) I have 1 hour worth of phone calls that I could make for 17 euros a month. I also got a free chocolate cell phone for no reason, which was pretty cool, and 720 free texts for the next 12 months... we'll see how fast that goes.

So anywho, I feel as if I actually belong here now with my cell phone and checkbook in hand!

It's Called Having FUN!

2008-02-19T13:57:00.000+01:00

I just had the best weekend ever! And this is only the first night of the weekend!

I am so lucky as to have TWO friends who happen to live in France with me! Both Jon and Autumn studied in Paris with me and now both of them are working as assistants in France. Jon lives in St. Etienne which is close to Lyon and Autumn lives in the north near Stausbourg in a place called Nancy.

Both of them decided to spend this past weekend in Paris. Luckily for Autumn and me, Jon brought his truly wonderful girlfriend Ellen with him. Everyone didn't get in til late, but we managed to make up for our late start by hitting up the 10 bar (le dice) and drinking some very delicious sangria with my buddy John. Though the bar was fun, we had some annoying french people next to us who actually tried to SHUSH us in the middle of a bar. I mean there are places you are supposed to be quiet (libraries, churches, museums) and then there are places you are supposed to be loud in (raves, nightclubs, strikes, and BARS) so of course, our own Captain Obvious (with a british accent) screams at said French man "IT'S CALLED HAVING FUN!" Thus the theme for the rest of Friday night...

Things that were attempted Friday night to "HAVE FUN" include Ellen riding a motorcycle.....

Me "riding" a scooter......

then continuing to walk away while the scooter lays on the ground knocked over by the crazy American. It's alright Jon fixed everything!

Superman Faces.......

The "Fun"High Five.....

Tequila Shots?....

Beer pong.......

Pictures around a Fountain....

Pictures in a Fountain.....

Clueless French Man.....

Me yelling at a Clueless Frenchman.....

Playgrounds Cost 4 euros in Paris

2008-02-18T22:03:00.000+01:00

As commented before, playgrounds should NOT cost money... Paris is basically stealing from tiny children. I guess in Paris poor kids aren't allowed to play, they must work so that they can earn 2 euros to go on a slide...

I mean the playground was cool, but I have personally seen way better, FREE American playgrounds.

Raphy and I also agree that red heart lollipops are deceptively tasty....

Why France is Dumb?

2008-02-13T23:11:00.000+01:00

Ok, so I know you are thinking to yourself, "Is Jessie really saying that France is dumb, when she obviously loves it soo much that she wanted to move there and babysit children after her dad paid several thousand dollars for her college education?" (I included that for you Dad) In fact, France does have some minor problems, and I speak the truth when I say France can be dumb. France, although very awesome (I will write of this awesomeness some other time), is also very stupid about some things.

1. If you have a passport for something, you should not need a birth certificate also (the birth certificate was necessary to get the passport in the first place).

2. When your dog poops, pick it up. Do NOT leave piles of poop on the sidewalks lying in await for my beautiful shoe to step on.

3. Playgrounds should NOT cost 4 euros. I paid 4 euros to go to a playground today with Raphy. 4 EUROS!

4. I went to the pharmacy yesterday to buy things for my cold. I bought medicine but I also asked for some sort of intensive moisturizer for my nose mouth area (you know how dry it gets)...I swear to someone holy, that they pharmacist gave me diaper cream to rub on my face...NOT COOL (Although it makes it better I look like I rubbed my face in clown make up)

5. You cannot watch American TV shows online because you are not in the US...that's dumb.

That's all my complaints so far I'll try and keep you up to date on any other reasons I find to be mad at France but helas it's hard.

PS Today I had the grocer propose to me...if Vince doesn't work out I always have him to fall back on

I guess for every bad thing I say I should say something nice about France.

1. I love how at the produce grocer you will ask for something and they will ask you when you are going to use it. When you say Sunday, they will look through all the fruit and pick the most perfect 3 pears for Sunday. So they will be perfectly ripe for Sunday. NEVER try and pick your own stuff.

2. Velib... this bike system is possibly the smartest thing in the whole entire world... and so good for the environment too. I am lucky because there is a stand right outside of my house :)

3. I love how Paris "flushes" the streets clean. Almost every day I see flowing water go down the side of the streets to keep everything clean, and a water man comes around with a big hose attached to a truck and rinses the dirt away.

4. Health Care. Since I am not paying taxes as an au pair, I get awesome benefits with none of the awful taxes. France really takes care of her people.

5. Any food you can think of. It's most likely 10x better in Paris. Bread, cheese, wine, fruit, veggies, even candy. Food here rocks.

That's all my thoughts for the night.

Love,

Tiny Dancer

2008-02-13T14:54:00.000+01:00

Today I went to la Porte Ouverte for Raphy's classique dance class (Open House). It was ridiculously cute. Not only are little French kids the cutest dressed kids in the world but they are also little ballerinas in the making. They were accompanied by both a percussion player and a pianist which cracked me up. Who would have thought that nine 8 year old girls would get accompaniments for ballet. The whole time that I was there, two of the little ballerinas little sisters were there, trying to imitate their big sisters, it was possibly the cutest thing that ever happened.

Practicing graceful arms and confident eyes , as they say in French

I have decided that if and when I do have children, they should be adorable little french ballerinas. (Note: there

was one boy in the class and the instructor called him the chef (chief) of the class, being the chef makes it a bit more manly, I suppose) But if you are French, I don't necessarily think manhood is really an aspiration. You don't know how many men I have seen in jeans tighter than mine.

Raphy doing a "pose" for classique

Most of the class, the girls learn basics of ballet, combined with a bit of barroque. Unlike the regimen of ballet, Baroque style dancing basically let's the girls do whatever they want, specifically run in circles. So as I watched them react to different percussion instruments in the Baroque style I couldn't help but chuckle. All of the girls are very very into the dance, they not only listen well to the teacher but they don't really complain.

Dancing le serpentin (serpent) as per Madame's orders

The other funny part was after the girl's were done the Baroque response dance, the instructor made all of the audience members try it out.

So let's just say that for an hour today I ran around like a crazy person with no shoes on.

Cute little ballerinas (One's picking her butt)

The Monet, Degas and Pissaro of the 21st Century

2008-02-11T20:06:00.000+01:00

Today, the girls and I painted Jazzy's bookshelf....it was pretty fun as it took them off Webkinz and involved messing around with paint!

Raphy and Jazzy painting the top parts of the bookshelp

Jazzy and I doing the bottom half.

Jardin du Luxembourg

2008-02-11T15:32:00.000+01:00

I took some pictures for everyone to enjoy of the Jardin du Luxembourg...it was a beautiful day probably 50 degrees outside without a cloud in sight....ahhh

Le Senat (this is the building where the French Senate is housed)

This was a cute couple, casually affectionate not disgusting

The cute little boy next to me was sailing that boat...

The big building is the Senat again

First Day of School

2008-02-11T15:21:00.000+01:00

Today, I had my first class with Sylvia. She seems to be pretty cool and the course is rudimentary grammar but helas it is quite helpful. I am basically the only American and there are no other english speakers. Everyone else is either japanese, german or spanish... It's very interesting to be taught french without relying on your basic english knowledge. We are not allowed to use dictionaries when we don't know a word but instead we have to try and describe the word in french. It is actually quite helpful, I think. I have to admit I have trouble understanding when some of the foreigners speak french as their accents are difficult. But overall it was a good experience...and I hope I can learn a lot!

The City of Too Much Love

2008-02-11T15:16:00.000+01:00

Ok I know this is the city of Romance and Love and all of that stuff BUT making out while you are right next to me in a restaurant is just too much. Seriously I do not want to see your tonsils while I am enjoying my fondue...

In the coming weeks I plan on documenting all the "loving" that is going on in Paris so people can understand. I walked around the Jardin du Luxembourg the other day and seriously everywhere you looked people were playing tonsil hockey, and not just young people, but people in their 70's too. I mean I am all for a good kiss in Paris, but come on, at some point you have to draw a line and that line is the point where you should just get a room.

French men* give me the creeps

2008-02-08T15:36:00.001+01:00

For the record, french men are some of the creepiest men I have experienced in all my stay in Paris. This is a record of about 4 hours in Paris...

Last night as I was going out (around 9pm), I walked down the street and there was a crazy old homeless person yelling, that's fine by me. So I put my headphones of my ipod on and begin to "listen" to the music. Of course this angers the crazy french man and begins to shout at the top of his lungs at me, "POUTAIN!!!" and follow me down the street (Note: Poutain is a very not nice word to say to a lady). There are about 60 people on this road at the time, including a tour group. I keep the headphones on and assume the "I can't hear you" position and just walk away.

About 1 train layover later, I am waiting for the train to arrive. My headphones are on now and I am actually listening to music. As I wait I look around the train station to entertain myself. For some reason creepy french guy #2 (dresses like a normal person and NOT homeless), thinks this means that I am attracted to him. First, he tries smiling at me, and I resist the American urge to smile back, as I know that this is basically considered an open invitation to French men. As I ignore him, he attempts to get in my line of vision. This is the part where I begin to "dance" with my head to the music and use the "blank stare" look. After about 2 minutes of him awkwardly trying to get in my line of vision he tries to talk to me, I again "jam" to my music and do a complete 360 degree turn. At this point the train arrives and he luckily gets the idea that I am not interested.

On the next train I have to take, I am of course sitting directly across from a disheveled french man, who starts off our journey serenading me. When I deny him eye contact. He does jazz hands in my line of sight to try and break my stare. Luckily I keep my focus and keep looking blankly at a cute french baby 2 rows behind him. After his last attempt at breaking my focus he finally gets off the train and tells me how much I will regret this.

Finally while I am walking home by myself, I walk past a homeless man on the ground who again screams POUTAIN at me.

I really don't appreciate the French version of chivalry.

*Please note, not all French men are creepy. I would say about 96.8% are creepy, and the other 3.2% are probably nice

Fondue Fun in France

2008-02-08T09:37:00.000+01:00

I have a friend in Paris!

That's pretty exciting. A guy I knew from DE (John) actually lives in Paris at the moment. So I officially know someone in my age range who lives in Paris! Woo hoo!

Anywho last night John and I went to le Refuge des Fondues, an extraordinarily funny restaurant that also has delicious food! Obviously it's a fondue restaurant but it's a fondue restaurant with a bit of fun.

First of all the place is always packed. We had to wait outside until 2 spots opened up. It's funny, the waiter comes and out of the restaurant and he basically screams COMBIEN (how many). My guess is if you don't respond quick enough he won't let you in. The girls in front of me (Americans) had said they made a reservation before and he wouldn't let them in, so they were going to try again. It's a bit of a Seinfeldian Soup Nazi right in the heart of Montmartre. When you finally are allowed to enter, you go through a door whose handle is a golden baby bottle...perplexing, yes, but this has a lot to do with the prior mentioned "fun" of the restaurant. You are ordered to the back of the restaurant by the Fondue Nazi, as I will now call him. The restaurant is about the size of a small class room, maybe 12 ft x 20 ft (maybe). Two long tables are along each wall with barely enough space for one small person to fit down the aisle between them. Everyone in the restaurant huddles together at the table as they hope to avoid the one man who seems to always be walking back and forth down the aisle yelling Chaud! (Hot!). The walls are made of wood, but graffitti commemorating the people who have been there before covers the walls to the point where it no longer appears to be made of anything other than scribbled letters. It's so loud you can barely hear yourself think. As I go to the back of the restaurant, cleverly avoiding being burnt by the Chaud man, I meet the cross eyed bartender, who begins to mumble to me in what I believe is French. I respond with the affirmative "ouais" and begin to understand him a bit more clearly. Although I am still not quite sure I believe he has told me that I was A)pretty B)this was my first time there and C)I should be careful not to drink too much wine or he might have said I should drink a lot of wine...I'm still not quite sure. Next thing I know, the Fondue Nazi winks at me and beckons me with a slightly creepy come hither look that only old French men have perfected.

So I shyly approach and all of a sudden I am climbing over the table, stepping on it and posing for a picture taken by the nice Texan man next to me. Once I sit the table is quickly pushed towards me and Voila I am in my spot.

Like all French waiters he comes to the table and asks us what we want. But unlike most restaurants there is NO menu. I begin to panic thinking "Oh lord, we made it in, but can we stay, the Fondue Nazi will definitely kick us out for such impertinence" but luckily John saves the day and orders the savoyarde (cheese fondue) as he had been here before and knew the expectations.

As we sit there, we are given a lovely kir as a welcome (my first kir in Paris!) and some lovely hors d'oeuvres (sausages, cheese cubes,

pickles, olives). The kir fills my mouth with delicious merriment... although they did add an orange which I felt brought down it's usual impeccable flavor.

The Fondue Nazi asks if we would prefer le vin rouge ou blanc, and I order a rouge. Next thing you know he brings us two baby's bottles

filled to the top with wine. Possibly the best way to drink ever, I may have to start up a new fad in the USA. After two sucks of my baby's bottle, the Chaud Man comes by and plops some delicious crusty french bread down on the table and the wonderful savoyarde. The fondue pot steams the general area and my stomach delights at the wonderful aroma of delicious french cheese (not the stinky variety). Of course, my fondue fork and I puncture a piece of crusty bread and dip it in the soupy fondue. MMMM Parfait! This is the perfect way to begin my time in Paris. John and I stopped all conversation at this moment and focused on what's important, the fondue. So as I am dipping my bread, John loses a piece in the fondue and I look over and he's kissing the girl next to him. Apparently it is tradition that when you lose something in the fondue you must bestow a kiss on the person to your left or right. Lucky for the girl next to me (or perhaps unlucky for her)

I only lost my bread once.

At some point, perhaps 30 mins into the fondue, I get that feeling in my stomach that says if you eat one more bite I will explode. This is also the point where my whole entire face begins to leak. Of course, at this moment, my body has chosen to express that it has a cold. Luckily we are done, but I turn into gross disgusting monster who cannot control her leaky nose or her sneezing. I not only use my napkin but I also use up John's napkin. Then I attempt to escape to the bathroom without mounting the table, but Fondue Nazi gives me the evil eye and I awkwardly climb over the table with his help. Once in the bathroom (relatively clean by Paris standards) I steal about 25 squares of toilet paper, in hopes that it will help me survive the rest of the night. Boy was I wrong. Not only have I used up all the toilet paper I have to go back to the bathroom twice and take at least 15 sheets of napkins as the toilet paper was just not strong enough to hold up to my blossoming cold. At the end of the night it's just the American girls next to us, the Fondue Nazi, Chaud Man and John and me. We leave the restaurant with rather full bellies and grab the metro to Odeon with the American girls to enjoy a drink at the 10 bar.

Rather uneventful at the 10 bar, other than the fact that I stayed out past the metro and had to walk home. Lucky for me, the walk took me about 10 mins.

I love my location.

That's about all for my adventures so far, I will try and put up some pictures from the experience with the trottinette or get Raphy to help me reenact.

Me and the Trottinette of Death

2008-02-06T17:16:00.000+01:00

Today Raphy asked me to ride a scooter (trottinette) with her to school. This is possibly the worst experience in my whole entire life. Not only was I trying to protect Raphy from on going traffic I was also trying to maintain my precarious balance on the stupid scooter. Several times I actually stumbled into pedestrians who thought I was clumsy and too old for a scooter. The lesson learned from this is that sometimes you are in fact too old for some things, and those things are mainly trottinettes.

Baby Bird Flies the Coop...in First Class

2008-02-06T08:32:00.000+01:00

This post was written for Feb 4, my first day in Paris, but I just got connected to the internet so it's a bit late!

My life is pretty wonderful. What can I say? For some reason I am lucky enough to have Dave Hulshouser in it. A pilot with Delta, Dave reallly hooked me up. Not only did I get a ridiculously cheap round trip ticket to Paris BUT I also managed to sit in first class and be treated like a princess. It was absolutely incroyable! I think the saddest part for me was watching my mom and dad walk away from the van that left with me in it. I cried a bit but hten got myself back together so I didn't make the driver too uncomfortable. I left Fort Washing ton at 12:30 and made it to JFK by 2:00, which is an hour and a half to get to NYC...that's just plain old ridiculous. I guess t's because it was the Super Bowl, and all Americans were watching the TV and not flying, which was wonderful for me.

I get to the check-in counter and discover that my baggageweighs 64 lbs and 72 lbs respectively (the limit is 50 lbs) Thanks again to my luck, the very nice Deta check-in lady only charges me $50 (thanks to Mimi and JimJim's gift card, you got my clothing to Paris, the greatest gift I could ask for). Now, on to security. Please note that even though I checked on 146 lbs of luggage I STILL have a carryon (a mini rolling bag) and my "personal item" which is probably bigger than my carry on and contains my laptop. Stupidly I forget to remove my laptop from my one bag before going through security, and of course the angry latino TSA man responds with what I assume are a series of curses in Spanish. He then yells at me and tells me that I should have told him and now he has to hand search my one bag and swipe every possible area for dangerous materials. So I am delayed about 20 minutes while the angry mn searches my bag. BUT this doesn't upset me I am over 4 hours early for my plane and really have nothing to do. I think the fact that I wasn't bothered at all made teh angry TSA man angrier. He wouldn't even respond when I appologized.

Now I am at JFK, and I spend the next 4 and a half hours talking on the phone or reading my book, "The Other Boelyn Girl".

Finally it's time for the standby passengers to be given their seat assignments. I walk up to the Delta lady with a huge smile, and since we are at JFK she responds back to me with a sneer. I hand her my standby ticket and she hands me back my boarding pass. I look down at it and I realize I am in seat 4F! First class BABY! I board the plane first, to my delight, and get to to set myself up in the deliciously comfortable seat, as I watch 12 little children head back to economy class.....ahhhhh WONDERFUL!. By the time everyone is boarded, there is no one sitting next to me in first class. So not only am I in first class but I am also completely by myself in my row. First things first, I order myself a mimosa and proceed to have the glass refilled 3 times.

The rest of the flight was absolutely perfect. By now the Xanax has kicked in, but I only slept for maybe 2 hours on the flight. I did however get to watch Jane Austen Book Club, a clever comedy based around her romances. Pretty easy to watch as long as you are familiar with her writing. Food was delicious for a flight. Macademia encrusted mahi mahi served with a pineapple coulis and jasmine rice. Mediterranean crab salad with an apple slaw (my favorite) and then a dessert of French cheeses (parfait!)

After 8 hous, I finally arrived in CDG and I have to admit the worst part of the whole flight was getting off the plane with my carry ons. Because between me and the ground there was apprximately 20 stair that I needed to walk down to then get on a bus. Of course the carry on luggage was not in the mood to participate so instead of looking like a chic Parisian disembarking the plane, I look like a clumsy American struggling to remain control of her luggage.

Jean-Paul was waiting to pick me up at the gate once I got though customs (which is a breeze in comparison to America). He's quite nice and a bit sarcastic, which is typical of the French. His family is from Northern France but I am pretty sure he considers himself Parisian. It's fun to hear the French speak of arrondisements (neighborhood/districts)...I am pretty sure in Paris your arrondisement makes who you are. I mentioned that my school was in the 6ieme arrondisement and J-P basically did a comical sneer for me, and said well now you live in the 5ieme. I discovered that both J-P and Suzanne work for Nestle Tollhouse at the Paris Headquarters. He is a Director of Innovation, so he is paid to think of new things and Suzanne is a Marketing Director for Herta, a chilled foods subsidiary of Nestle.

Once we arrived at the maison, J-P did a quick walking tour of the area. I seriously can walk to the front of the Pantheon in under 5 minutes and to the jardin du Luxembourg in maybe 7 minutes. He showed me Raphy's school which is blocks away from teh house adn he showed me Jassy's school which is also also quite close. I came back to the apartment (which is deliciously above a boulangerie (bakery) which happens to always smell delicious) and waited until Jassy showed up for lunch and then she gave me the grand tour. My room is quite small but the family is really quite kind and they have basically said that the downstairs is also to be like my home. Therefore I have access to everything I could want. I am really quite happy, even though my room is a boite (box).

Jassy and I had lunch and I really enjoy her. She's sweet and innocent but still mature at the same time. She's just entered a new school and is allowed quite a bit of independence by her parents, but she still is quite fun and not at all upset that she has an au pair, which I was worried about. We had a lovely lunch together, we both helped to heat up some soup and we both helped to clean up...so it wasn't as if I was a maid of any sort. After she went back to school I proceeded to unpack my luggage by crrying bits of it up and down the 4 flights of stairs.

At 4:30Raphy arrives, and boy, is she a whirlwind. She was super excited to see me and the two of us had her goute together. I have to admit even though she is high energy, she is cute and smart that you can't not be charmed by her. Until about 6:3 the girls and I played together, I then tried to make Raphy do her homework by sitting with her and helping her. In France they do subtraction in a ridiculous fashion compared to how I learned it....so I had a bit of trouble figuring out how to help her in the "correct" way because I didnt want to get her in trouble with her teacher for doing it incorrectly. Apparently I am going to have to learn a couple of things about being 8 years old again. After about an hour we finished and Raphy proceeded to do my hair and make-up for dinner...I surprisingly did NOT look like a clown but more like a fairy with silver glitter all over my cheeks, which Raphy told me was tres a la mode.

Dinner was delicious, J-P made a raclette, which is steamed potatoes which you pour melted hot cheese over (usually a comte or a gruyere). As I am a fromageophile (cheese lover), dinner was absolutely incredible.

The girls went to bed, and Suzanne and I stayed up and chatted a bit. I really like the family. Although I am sure at times the girls will be a handful, they are generally very sweet and good natured. Both Suzanne and Jean-Paul seem to want to make my stay here as easy and fun as possible. I have my own separate where I can do what I wish and my schedule doesn't seem to be overwhelming at all.

I am super excited to be here and it seems to all be working out in my favor which is wonderful! Thanks to everyone who showed up at my going away party, I really appreciate it. I think that will probably be the toughest thing, not seeing the people I love for 6 months. Tomorrow hopefully will be just as exciting as my first day!....hopefully I will be able to up date you soon...by the way it's 6 am in Paris right now and I cannot sleep!

Psychic Cousins, NOT Psycho Broads

2008-02-01T02:45:00.000+01:00

My cousin Angie and I just spent a whirlwind 24 hours driving down to DC and back. On the way we stopped and visited my other cousin (Angie's sister) who lives in Baltimore. We had some lovely cousin bonding time which consisted of huge Mexican platters, Jeopardy, American Idol and House.... apparently we are lame home bodies who only like watching TV.

After Angie and I left Stephy's house at 7 am, we made our way down to the Nation's capital to the French Embassy to get a visa. Luckily we found it in plenty of time (we were 3 hours early). With all the additional time we decided to wander a bit through Georgetown. Out of the 4 hours we were in Washington; 2 hours was spent walking to M Street, 1 hour was spent walking through shops like the Gap and J. Crew, 30 minutes was spent trying to take a picture on a HUGE Adirondack mint green chair in front of the Duke Ellington School of the Arts, and about 15 minutes was spent actually obtaining the visa from the very mean frenchies.

The last 15 minutes was dedicated to the extraordinary intellect of Angie and me. In the car driving through Washington, I noticed American's campus and I said to myself and later outloud, "I think Rachel (my cousin Danny's girlfriend) lives around here, we should call Danny and get him to call Rachel". About 10 minutes later Angie is screaming, "I just saw Rachel walking down the street! In a blue Coat! Walking down the street!" So I stop, incredulous in my disbelief that we could run into the ONE person we know who lives anywhere near Washington DC at quarter til 9 in the morning. So I turn the car around and there she is Rachel Wise! It was possibly the most incredible thing that's ever happened to me before. Notice the psychic power caused by the cousins right there.

So we depart Washington and get ready for the 3 hour ride back to good ole Lansdale, PA. As we are driving back I turn to my cousin and say, "I need to go to the outlets this week and get some stuff for my host mom from Osh Gosh" and Angie replies in about 20 seconds, "Did you say that because we are passing an outlet mall right now?" As you can tell there is some evidence of psychic power generated by us two cousins.

On a side note: despite what any comedian or crazy blond woman said in Atlantic City, Angie and I are not psycho broads, for the record. Our laugh is cute and does not sound like the last sound you here before being murdered by someone in the backseat of your car.

Battle of the Sexes

2008-01-29T04:52:00.000+01:00

I saw one of my favorite men in the world today, and he bought me lunch. If he wasn't gay and in a relationship (with someone I approve of) I would totally try and steal him. Lucky for me, he loves me just as much as I love him.

Why can't guys just do what we want them to do without us having to tell them. I sometimes feel like it's our society's sadistic version of an ongoing world war, men v. women the final final frontier. On the guy's side, they are just trying to hook up with relatively attractive women and put themselves in a position to continue doing this. The women on the other hand want to develop this perfect "boyfriend" and to find out if the guy you are seeing is the right one, we put him through a variety of little tests made up in our own mind. If he loves me, he'll ask me to marry him by December. If he starts to put the toilet seat down, he truly wants to be with me. I know he's in love if he'll fix my carburetor. To tell you the truth, I don't think men understand just how many tests women put them through without their knowledge.

Tiffy and I were discussing how we are each secretly testing our boyfriends at the moment. She is waiting to see who will hang a picture in her apartment first. She asked him to do it about a week ago, but he hasn't yet (neither has she). Hopefully he will get his butt in gear or he will "fail" one of our crazy tests invented to see if a boyfriend is "good enough". Truthfully, I really don't think anyone is quite "good enough" for her, but if he hangs the picture he will be one step closer. I am abstaining from mentioning my boyfriend's test as he does check the blog, luckily we live 3,000 miles apart and over an ocean from each other so he can't browbeat me. But I will tell you that the BF has struck out a couple of times (he's compared my hair to a possum and my legs to ham), but he's also hit quite a bit of homeruns (pretty ring and London)....

I guess it all equals out in the end, but testing them is just too much fun.

Sorry for the Delay, your LIFE is approaching

2008-01-26T06:13:00.001+01:00

As you can tell I've been away from the blog for a bit. Many reasons have stopped me from entering lovely tidbits about my life, the biggest being that I am in fact MOVING TO FRANCE! It's finally been confirmed! Other notable mentions of wasted time this week include: movies, crying over said movies a bit (bleeding heart romantic film), Atlantic City misadventures with the cousin, the black plague, and also peeing myself with excitement over leaving for Paris.

I leave February 3, arrive the 4th and stay until probably forever...ahh it's actually real now. I am a bit stressed but super excited. I have to say my biggest fear is having good friends to hang out with, as I have basically no one there and I am used to being surrounded by people I love and who love me back. I'm really going to miss watching movies with my parents and Granny, going to lunch in the city with Tiffy, being able to pick up the phone and call any of my friends, having game nights with the DiLanzos, just chilling with my cousins, going over the Zanonis and having a huge Italian lollapalooza, and so many other things.

But who really cares, "live life with no regrets", I'M MOVING TO PARIS!

So now it's all about getting everything done and saying my good byes. I guess in the end it's all bittersweet...I am so thrilled to be moving to Paris but sad I won't get to see the people I love everyday. It's weird how even though you can be ecstatic to do one thing, there's always a little tinge of the what-if 's. I mean not that I'd ever not go to Paris but there are definitely people I will miss and I know that will be hard for me, as I consider myself a family person and to me my family is huge. Family isn't just blood, it's my best friends and their families, my parents friends, even some of my neighbors...it's all those people who make me smile...those people I enjoy taking a second out of my day to talk to...the people that fill my heart. So to all my family, even though I am far away I will always have a little piece of you with me. I really loved this poem for some reason the first time I read it. Every single time I pick it up I think of the people I love most and how they affected me. Truthfully, wherever I go and whatever I do, the people who have been in my life shaped who I am and are always with me, I truly carry them with me no matter where I am.

i carry your heart with me by ee cummings

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear; and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than the soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

I know this was a corny post so I am truly sorry.

PS Mom and Dad I love you

New Found Insomnia and a Case of the Fashion Blues

2008-01-20T06:35:00.000+01:00

Today I woke up at 3 am. I don't think I have ever just woken up at 3 am. Usually I am STILL awake and wasting time on something dumb.

The conclusion drawn on this new found insomnia is that I am in fact suffering from the flu. My dad and Granny just had it so I guess I caught it. My body's reaction is inability to sleep and fever. Which is really the best you could ask for in a flu situation.

Now with this glorious lack of sleep, I have taken to attempting to pack for France. So far I have conquered toiletries and electronics, packed in the smaller of the 2 check in luggage (as recommended by my totally awesome cousin). I have no clue how I will overcome the hurdle of clothing. I am one of those girls who has A clothing (the good stuff), B clothing (stuff you occasionally wear) and C Clothing (the stuff you'd like to wear but really don't think is "you" or actually doesn't even fit you anymore but you hang on to it just because you loved it once)

Now what it comes down to is what do I want to look like in Paris. As it is the Fashion epicenter of the whole universe, this is a world altering decision. Do I want to come off Audrey Hepburn in Funny Face? Definitely, but I also want to throw a bit of Katie Holmes a la recently. Very classy and sophisticated but with a little modern day edge. Should I include Brigitte Bardot in the items that enter my bag? Duh, which is why I plan on taking plenty of eyeliner.
Leslie Carron, tops my list of favorite actresses from the 50's... very Parisian and glamorous. Always had a nice floppy hat on her head and a scarf around her neck. I'd like to have the confidence to do that. Or red lipstick in the daytime. I think every girl should become a woman with the discovery of the perfect shade of red lipstick. Back to the actualy point though, what do I wear in the fashion capital of the world. Perhaps one of the most difficult decisions is comfort vs. style. Some people claim they can be achieved simultaneously, but I doubt that. I mean you can look "cute" or "nice" but people will not admire you for your style.

I am a babysitter, so I should wear flats. BUT my Michael Kohrs boots are absolutely adorable and comfy enough to wander around the Musee D'Orsay or Marmmotan. People have seen said boots on me, and liked them so much they went out and bought them themselves. To me, that is STYLE. When someone looks at you and goes oh hot damn, I want to look like you. But woe is me, I am an au pair and required to walk from place to place not chauffeured around the town. But all I do is pick the kiddies up from school and wander back to the apartment, and you never know the girls could have a breathtakingly gorgeous teacher or tutor or something and I don't think a pair of sneakers would be my best option to impress him (Sorry Vince, if I meet Oliver Martinez and he falls in love with me because of my Michael Kohrs boots, we had a good time these past years but we are most likely over)

Tonight I promise that I shall pack some basics clothing essentials tomorrow with my best friend Tiffy and if I fail to do so, my punishment shall be not watching the show Las Vegas on TV. She hails from Philly and will most likely knock some sense into me if I try and add a vintage but very ugly pink poncho that fashionistas argue is in style. Tiffy is definitely my Michael Kohrs boots as I wouldn't trade for anything.

Barefoot in the Snow

2008-01-18T05:47:00.000+01:00

Every year since we've been up north, at the first snowfall my mother and I would hold an annual foot race. Rules were the ground must be covered in snow (no grass peaking through to reveal itself), your feet must be bare, you must run from the front door to the street as fast as humanly possible without breaking any bones or having to be rushed to the hospital.

This race for me was really the arrival of winter and a sort of remembrance to childhood and a special bond that my family has between us. Even though it's my mom and me who do the running it wouldn't be the same without dad saying that we're crazy and shaking his head at us and telling us we'll wake up with a cold the next morning. It's one of my favorite traditions and I plan on doing it at the first snow of every year as long as I possibly can.

I feel like every second of your youth you spend hoping to be older, classier, more sophisticated and you forget about that time when you just do things because.... because they are fun , because they are ridiculous, really just because you can. Running barefoot every year helps me to remember to do that, to be just because and do things just because.

There's nothing quite as wonderful as running full speed on slippery snow. Even though your toes tingle, you never actually feel cold. You're running on all this pent up child-like adrenaline. You run in the door and suddenly you look up and you are like did I really just do that? Usually my mom would try and knock me down or I'd throw a snowball at her, while my dad laughed and took pictures of us from the warmth of the house. This year despite my mother's surgery and all her pain she still did it.... I guess for me, which is pretty cool. Despite the earlier spinal tap post, my mom is pretty cool and I am lucky to have her (I would like to note that I put this in here because I know she reads it and I would like her to discontinue the use of sad pouty face (I've patented it and I am considering suing her for illegal use.)

So I guess what I will say is thanks Mom and Dad for making this 6 months I've been home with you less like a spinal tap or an anal cavity search and more like a carnival's freak show, a little creepy and definitely weird, but in the end pretty great and all together very memorable.

Crazy Game of Poker

2008-01-17T09:38:00.000+01:00

Sorry for the lame post title but I am attempting at the moment to come off as witty as it is my first blog and it is also 3:45 am.

Tonight was what may be one of my last poker games with my boys for awhile. It was fun as always until I had to take on the chip stack empire of Darth Tim. Let's just say towards the end of the game (it ended at 3) I went a bit crazy. Which is probably evident by the state of this post. To give you one example of my actions, I told Tim that this was in fact a Return of the Jess-I... I admit not one of my finer moments in life but hey you win some and you lose some. In the end I was up 5 bucks and a happy camper, but sadly Duke Duke Duke and Earl is still stuck in my head (Damn you Alex Trebek)

I would just like to say that my friend Chris does in fact know what urine therapy is, and has practiced it. the end.

On a side note; My boyfriend (the German) named his bike after me. Not a motorcycle, a bicycle. He told me that owning a bike was like being the Captain of a ship. The first thing that popped into my head was The Looking Glass and Brandy... Maybe my boyfriend's true love is the pavement of Germany and this is his secret way of telling me...

Blog posting is very fun and I think this was a wise decision for me to make. Now I can be slightly more productive when being bored on the computer and keep people well informed of my life via internet, just what everyone wanted right?

The Wait

2008-01-16T23:06:00.000+01:00

January 6. That's when I was supposed to leave this god forsaken place and be in my dream town, well I guess city of Paris...but alas I have been thwarted by the French government. Really no surprise. So now it's January 16 and I am dilly dallying around North Wales, PA. I don't really feel like doing much of anything to tell you the truth. I am about an eighth of the way packed with really no hope of finishing.

How can you put your life in 3 bags and then fly off to Paris? Who does that? Well obviously I do...or will. But still making a decision between my 2 favorite cardigans is like Sophie's choice. Do I take navy or black... usually what happens is I decide to take both and then my luggage is 20 lbs overweight and I am paying $300 to get my luggage over to France a la the incident of Study Abroad 2005. Nonetheless, I will overcome this and be in Paris hopefully in no less than a week. Once there the first order of business is 1) bottle of cheap French red wine 2) baguette 3) chevre 4) Notre Dame and La Seine and I will stay there until I have to do something...

Whilst in Paris I plan on living the life of Gigi, the best Musical to rock the Academy Awards... at least in my opinion. If you happen to be in Paris when I am, if you see a girl walking down the streets singing "The Night they Invented Champagne" or "Thank Heaven for Little Girls" it most likely is me. Sadly, I think this is the movie that started my love affair with all things French. If I remember correctly my mother let me watch it when I was 5 or 6. Let me just give you a quick update on the plot: poor young beautiful girl is trained by her mother and aunt to be a courtesan to some of France's and the world's most powerful men. I find that funny that 2 of my childhood favorite movies had me idolizing prostitutes (the other Pretty Woman) What do you think Freud would say about that?

Well enough with my Paris daydreams... back to the States.

My mom just had some surgery and we've been hanging out. Which can be fun but can also be similar to a spinal tap. She's recovering pretty well, but she has developed what I like to term "Displaced Princess Syndrome", where she thinks she is a Princess and everyone should wait on her.

This is all I feel like writing for my first post ever, maybe I will continue later.

Much love.