Senioritious or Spring Break Blues

I don't know what it is, but this week has not been a good week. I've been in a bad mood, stressed out, and pooped out. I missed both of my classes on Monday, because I couldn't get up on time. Yesterday, I missed my phonetics class, because again I was unmotivated to actually walk ten minutes to class. I'm getting a little complacent with life right now and I think it might be because I only have a month and a half left in Paris. I'm sad about leaving Paris, but also I'm freaked out by the huge final I will have to take. I haven't exactly been acing my tests and the final is going to be on everything I should have learned. If I pass this class, it will be a gosh darn miracle. In other wonderful news, Christy and I are going to see Blonde Redhead tonight at the Bataclan (click on la salle.) I think the venue is really small and intimate which will be a perfect place to see the trio. Then on Friday, we are going to have some people over and I'm going to cook some Mexican food. Hopefully everything will go well. On Saturday, we leave for Barcelona!!! Our flight is at night, but the airport is really far away so we'll be using the extra time to get to the airport. The following is my itinerary:
April 19th-23rd (Barcelona avec Genoveva)
April 23rd-28th (Rome)
April 28th (Pisa to Florence)
April 29th-May 2nd (Florence to Venice)
May 2nd return to Paris (where I believe my Mom will be waiting for me.)

Aix-en-Provence et Cassis

This weekend was our last excursion in Aix-en-Provence and Cassis. This last excursion was absolutely amazing!!! Aix-en-Provence is a small town in the South of France and was also the hometown of painter Paul Cezanne. We took a walking tour of the city and our guide said that although Cezanne never painted Provence directly, he did paint in city's color palette. For lunch, Christy and I had some delicious pizza with some chili oil... mmm so good! The only problem with this day was that the night before I didn't get to sleep until 3 am and we had to leave by 5:30 am. The next day we traveled to Cassis, France by bus, but the bus was too large to get close to the coast so we had to take one of those little trains (you know those trains that are at the zoo.) Nothing could have prepared me for how gorgeous this coast was. OMG. Beautiful. When we arrived, we took a boat ride out on the Mediterranean and viewed creeks along the coast. I felt so special and so decadent. The only bad thing about the boat ride, besides getting blasted by waves, was that I sat on a bench that still had wet white paint. GRRRR. Luckily, the paint was on the part of my tights that was covered by my dress. After the boat ride, we were free to have lunch and walk around. Christy and I ended up eating at a lovely restaurant with two girls from the program. I had a delicious tomato salad, chicken with potatoes, and two sorbet scoops. So good. We ended-up staying there for 2 and half hours and I believe thats where my face got sunburned. After lunch, Christy and I walked around for about 5 minutes when we decided to get a coffee. All our free time in Cassis was spent eating or drinking and just being lazy. At around 3:30 we meet again to take the little train back up to the bus and from there we went towards the train station. We ended up arriving to the train station too early so the bus driver, who was so nice, decided to drive us around the city of Cassis. Our train left at around 7, we got back to Paris at 9:30, and we were back at the apartment by 10:30. I was so tired and so happy. Don't forget to check out my pictures. Until next time...

London Baby!

I love London!!! I had a wonderful time in London over this past weekend. So much, that I slept in yesterday and missed my first class. Rhoopsy! It was just so nice to be in a country where everyone speaks English. I knew I was stressed about not knowing French, but I didn't really appreciate it until I was removed from there. We arrived fairly early in London on Friday and checked into our hotel which had a view of Hyde Park. After we dropped off our stuff we walked the entire city, eventually passing: Buckingham Palace, Big Ben, Parliament, the London Eye, Westminster Abby. We started out with a nice stroll through the gorgeous Hyde Park which lead us to the major monuments of London and the weather was amazing. During the weekend, there was a small drizzle that came and went, but it never ruined our plans. When we came across Buckingham Palace, we were fortunate enough to see the changing of the guards (which only happens once a day.) After viewing the major scenes of London, we found a very cute pub that had 15 different types of sausages. I had bangers and mash and Christy had fish and chips. After our lovely meal, we decided to take on the London Eye (the huge ferris wheel off the Thames River.) The view was spectacular, but the experience was very nerve wrecking as the height was quite daunting. I got over my fear quickly when I realized that the children that were also there were just fine. Later on that night, we took the tube to Piccadilly Circus and tried to find a bar. We finally ended up at Fudge where every person got a free shot. I ordered a gin and tonic and the shot and the bartender came back with two glasses of tonic water and one shot??? How is it that I can order this drink in Paris, in a different language, and get the right drink? But in London, in English, I got tonic water! On Saturday, Christy and I went to Topshop. It was supposed to be the start of our shopping day in London, but it quickly turned into the entire day. We stayed there for 4 hours simply because they're so many clothes. Every room we went into lead into another room full of latest fashions. I really wish the concept of Topshop is brought over to the US which besides clothing had a: nail salon, hair drying salon, a cafe, personal style consultant, and a sweets area. Later that night, we went to a very cool bar that played a mixture of great music where Christy and I had a great time drinking and dancing. Sunday morning, we had to wake-up pretty early for check out and went to the Tate Modern Museum. We were able to see an incredible show which housed works from: Duchamp, Man Ray, and Picabia. Finally, at 5 or so we headed to the airport and we got back to Paris by 9pm. All and all my trip to London was amazing and I would really really like to go back.

Care Package!

Yesterday I finally received my first care package. It was so fun to finally receive some sort of mail and now I have a ton of food which will help with money. Pasta, rice, sauce and all of that stuff is theoretically cheap, but since I use my credit card on such transactions it really isn't cheap. A package of pasta is €1.80 = $3.50 and it only lasts two dinners. Christy and I spend €30 each on groceries every week or so, but this is cheaper than eating out for each meal. Any who, I just want to thank Liz and Becky for gathering up the supplies and getting the funds together to ship it. Thank you so much! There will be tons of pictures to come as we enjoy each meal.

London is Calling

So in celebration of my upcoming birthday, on Friday btw, Christy and I have decided to go to London! We leave Paris very early in the morning and will arrive in London an hour and 20 minutes later. We are going to stay until Sunday and return to Paris in the evening. Our hotel is Royal Bayswater Hostel which is very close to Hyde Park. I will, of course, update you all on what transpires while I'm away, but it probably won't be until Monday. Any who, please keep me in your thoughts and prayers. I'm sick again, so I could really use some voodoo to finally get rid of whatever keeps coming back :)

My Paris Album

Paris 2008

I've updated my album with a lot more pictures of Paris and I hope to update it continuously.

I had mexican food?

Christy and I strolled down to the Latin Quarter today where they have good greek food and cheap postcards.  We turned on a tiny street where we were inundated by all these people trying to get us to eat in their restaurant.  We decided to get an appetizer at a Mexican food restaurant.  I had a Tecate and Christy ordered a Dos Equis.  I asked for some extra lime and salt for my beer, but what came out was a minuscule lime and some salt.  Then came the delicious appetizer "Super Nachos," which was a platter of 5-7 chips and on top of them were: an almost liquid guacamole, sour cream, not spicy chorizo, huge kidney beans, chicken, and ceviche that didn't taste like fish.  I forgot to mention that the chips had to have been from the Doritos family.  We then ordered another plate of chips which brought the grand total of chips to 15.  After we finished the chips, we used our utensils to finish the rest of the food (not that there was much to finish.)  Needless to say, they were not "super nachos" and I will probably stick to the good greek food.