Updates

I’m sorry I keep doing little updates and not one long entry about one adventure I’ve had in Paris.  The thing is that I’m not very adventuresome on my own and prefer to sit in my apartment and write rather than traipse out to Montmartre by myself.  So, sorry!  I’ve promised myself to jumpstart my adventures after Fall Break.

 

In regards to Fall Break, I am 100% going to London.  I got my train tickets ($200–GULP!), confirmed my lodging, and now I’m starting to formulate a small list of places I’d like to see.  As a geek or honorary geek (depends on how you spin it), I already have a visit to Platform 9 3/4 in King’s Cross Station on my list, haha.

 

As if I don’t have enough problems in my life (haha, again), I have now become quite intrigued by the show “Gossip Girl”.  I got the first season before the beginning of the summer but never got around to watching it until last night when my friend Kate came over for dinner (Mac ‘n Cheese) and we watched a couple of episodes.  I wasn’t expecting much but I think I may end up watching the first season.  Mostly because I REALLY like Serena and Blair’s fashion choices.

 

On Monday, Konstantin came back to Paris and spent the night on my trundle bed while en route to North America (if I have this correct, he’s making a stop in NYC on his way to Toronto).  I had this really great evening planned out culminating in seeing the Eiffel Tower all lit up.  Well, we made it to Pere Lachaise but it was closing time so we walked around trying to find Oscar Wilde’s grave until a security guard told us to leave.  We didn’t go to Montmartre either and instead walked around the 20th arrondissement (the quartier of Pere Lachaise), then headed back to the fourteenth where I live to pick up ingredients for chicken Marsala at Carrefour.  We ran into Dylan and Emily there and we talked for a bit before Konstantin and I went back to my apartment to cook.  I totally was intending to make dinner or at least do the majority of the cooking, but my . . . not “fear” . . . maybe “loathing”, of touching raw meat kind of hindered my cooking abilities so Konstantin took over and made a splendid meal.  And I must say I did a really great job making dessert afterwards:  I reached into that little fridge of mine and I took out those chocolate mousse packs like a pro.

 

(By the way, Konstantin, if you’re reading this, I swear I can cook!  But I’m better at things like soups and stews and–for some reason–Japanese cuisine.  Once I cook Japanese for my friend Nick next semester he’ll be able to vouch for me.  For now you’ll have to talk to my mom about my cooking prowess.)

 

Back to Monday:  Konstantin and I ended up sitting at my little dinner table talking instead of chowing down, doing dishes, and high-tailing it out to the Eiffel Tower.  It’s OK that we didn’t make it because I had a lovely time drinking wine and talking about this and that.  After doing the dishes and taking out the trash our evening was pretty boring because I had to do a report for Grammaire about a TV show, which was interesting because I don’t have a TV so I had to watch it on the Internet, while Konstantin played on his epically-OLD laptop that still has a heartbeat–much to my surprise after learning its age.  Then, while I wrote the report, he used my Ethernet cable to get on the Internet and check his own e-mail.  I started watching the TV show about 11 PM, didn’t finish the report until 1 AM, and had to be up at 7:30 AM to get ready for school and make sure Konstantin didn’t trip on anymore stairs on his way to the Metro/RER that would take him to Charles-de-Gaulle (one of those “you had to be there to understand” statement ).  So, I got about 6 hours of sleep, which is quite a bit less sleep than I am used to . . . I won’t tell you how much I sleep because you’ll definitely give me a hard time whether it’s teasing or scolding.

 

OH!  Nearly forgot!  On our way back from Pere Lachaise with Konstantin, I finally had my first “almost miss the train and get stuck in the doors” experiences on the Metro at Chatelet!  I managed to make it through the doors as they were closing, but my purse wasn’t as lucky.  Thank God for people like Konstantin and the guy in the orange t-shirt who had enough upper-body strength to pull the doors apart enough that I could pull my purse free!  I’m pretty sure that’s what happened because I kind of blanked-out a little bit when my purse got caught and started wondering if the train would just leave the platform with it hanging out the door . . . and I was also wondering if my iPod had gotten crushed (answer:  NOPE!).

 

So, even though my evening didn’t go according to how I’d played it in my head, it was still a great evening and I am honored to be a good enough friend to Konstantin that he wanted to see me a second time (even if it might have been to crash at my place instead of a hostel, haha).

 

It’s the weekend now for me (I don’t have classes on Fridays!), and I think that I’m going to go out to Carrefour and get myself a sewing kit to mend my favorite black military jacket that is missing two buttons (I found the buttons–they just need to be sewn on) and maybe scope out a (faux) leather jacket at a decent price so I can complete my “sexy” French ensemble of clothing.  And maybe stop by Zara and get some cardigans to layer over all the t-shirts I brought with me.

 

Until next time, I remain,

-CAROLINE

Les Nouvelles

Happy Halloween!

 

I got my winter coat business taken care of a couple weeks ago and now am the proud owner of a GORGEOUS Zara wool coat that ended up being on sale when I exchanged the first coat, saving me about 10 euro!  Also, much to my surprise, one of the sweaters I bought magically fits me so I decided to keep one and return the other.

 

I am definitely going to London for my Fall Break, it’s just a matter of navigating the SNCF website to get my TGV train tickets.  Thanks a heap to Laura for agreeing to lodge me!  I hope I make for a good guest!

 

Well, mid-terms at IES were this week and my last two are next week, which kinda sucks because the last two are Monday and Tuesday, meaning that I’ve been studying quite a bit (for instance, I studied until midnight last night!).

 

As follow-up to my mentioning a presentation I had coming up for Histoire de la Photographie, it ended up going really well.  My professor was very complimentary of my speech afterwards.  Honestly?  I didn’t even know I was spouting off wonderful French prose!  I can tell you that my voice was shaking and eye-contact was pretty much zero.  Oh well, if my prof wants to give me an A on that presentation, I’m not going to object, haha.

 

I should probably get back to studying for Histoire de l’art (Art History) because seriously I don’t know what to study . . . so I’m studying EVERYTHING!

 

Hope everyone is doing great.

 

Bisous, CAROLINE

Quick Update

Bonjour, tout le monde!

Just wanted to leave a quick post to say that I am alive and well in Paris.  Today has been spent cleaning and working on homework–two things I have regrettably allowed to get out of hand.  I made an attempt to buy a winter coat at Zara yesterday but I grabbed a coat that was the same color as the one I tried on earlier this past week, but wasn’t the same style.  And apparently even though I wear a size M in knit shirts at Zara, I must be an L or XL in sweaters.  So, going to Zara was a mostly-fail except for my 9-euro SILVER umbrella!

I might be going to London for Fall Break to visit one of the first people to reach out to me as a friend when I moved to Michigan in fifth grade, who is studying abroad!  I’m waiting to hear back from her on if the dates of my Break work with her schedule or not.

In academic news, Purdue’s Spring 2010 class schedule is being posted tomorrow so that means that I have to start thinking about what classes I am taking next semester already!  Tentatively, depending on if I can fit these classes in without killing my spirit like last semester, I would like to take (actually, I NEED to take):

English 205 (Introduction to Creative Writing),

English 257 (Literature of Black America),

English 409 (Introduction to Fiction Writing),

Hebrew 385 (The Holocaust in Modern Hebrew Literature), and

French 402 (French Level 8).

Originally, this current semester was supposed to be The End of my French-speaking career as an undergraduate.  However, after being in Paris for over a month, I really can’t bear the idea of this being it.  So, I’m going to fit in a French class for each of my remaining semesters at Purdue, even though French 402 is the highest it goes as far as just Grammar.  So I want to take some 500-level conversation classes after next semester.  Playing it by ear, but that’s what I’m hoping for!

I have my first BIG assignment due of the semester on Tuesday:  a 10-15 minute presentation for my Histoire de la Photographie class on a book I was assigned two and a half weeks ago.  Luckily, our prof is letting the class just read from papers we wrote.  It’s going to be really informal, he just wants to evaluate our proficiency (I can tell you that mine is close to ZERO).  So far, I have one single-spaced page written of my speech . . . in English.  It’s almost 5 PM right now so I think I ought to finish writing the speech in English and then translate it into French tomorrow during my break and after classes.  And probably proofread it during my four-hour break on Tuesday (while at Starbucks with the fabulous Margaret of Northwesten–her blog is “From Chicago to Paris” if you haven’t checked out my Blogroll yet).

Well, this turned out to be a lot longer than I had anticipated.  I’ll write up something else later this week.

Hope you all are well.

-CAROLINE

Some Adventures

October 2:  I got my hair cut!  I REALLY like it, even though it’s not as short as I was picturing in my mind but it’s more flattering, I believe.  I still cannot get over how smoothly it all went.  I walked into the salon, requested “une coupe” and “un brushing”, waited about 10 minutes, and they got to me right away.  One lady (she might have been a few years older than me) washed and conditioned my hair and another woman (maybe in her mid-30s to early-40s) cut my hair.  I remembered to show the picture I had in mind and she went to work.  I am pretty sure I should have been engaging in small-talk with my stylist, but I am afraid I am a little hopeless at that at the moment.  She spoke some English but I used French with her.  My biggest problem has been that I just CANNOT hear anything in this loud city!  Stupid conductive hearing loss . . . so, when they say something, I say “Pardon?” and they switch to English.  It’s really frustrating.  I suppose I should say something like “Je peux parler francais, mais je peux pas vous entendre.”  (I can speak French, but I cannot hear you.)  I should probably try that phrase out and see what kind of response I get from the Parisians.  Hopefully a French response.

Oh, and October 7 was exactly one month after I arrived in Paris from Chicago.  WOW.

To celebrate, of sorts, I went to an American diner in the Marais with some classmates of mine called Breakfast in America.  Like the Supertramp song.  I dropped about $15 for the cheeseburger (which I didn’t finish.  Then again, when do I EVER finish a meal??) which was just OK.  The fries were good.  Afterwards I was really craving a burger from Triple XXX at Purdue.  J’etais triste (I was sad).

Today’s Literary Purchases

-The Picture of Dorian Gray, by Oscar Wilde

-Complete Works (Including A Season in Hell and Illuminations), by Arthur Rimbaud

-Écrits (Writings) 1926-1971, by Jean Renoir

-Allemand:  Méthode Express (German:  Express Method)

-Dictionary of French Slang and Colloquial Expressions, by Henry Strutz

-Histoire de France (History of France), by Jean Carpentier & François Lebrun

-Complete Poems, by Charles Baudelaire

-The Collected Poems, by Sylvia Plath

I thought reading The Picture of Dorian Gray again would be a good idea before I go a-looking for l’Hôtel, where Oscar Wilde died.  I wanted to get in a “Wilde” mood.  Haha, see what I did there?

Ahem.

Arthur Rimbaud was recommended to me by a friend.  I’m not a big poetry fan but that’s mostly because I can’t write it myself worth anything and I just get jealous when I read great poetry.  I found a free copy of Rimbaud’s poems online, so I’ll be doing some comparisons.

Yes, I am going to try and learn a little bit of German.  I’m referring to the book I got to help me with that the “mind f— book” because I couldn’t find a really cheap one that goes from English to German, so I’m going to be learning some German with French as my point of reference.  Oy.

The slang book I thought would help me sound informal when I finally meet some real French people.

Histoire de France is for my History of Paris class.

Sylvia Plath:  because I love her writing.  I loved The Bell Jar, her journals are amazing.

Charles Baudelaire looks exciting, mostly because the cover is epic.  AND because the book has the poems in French and English side-by-side.  So that’s nice.

Guten Tag!

OK, you’re probably a little befuddled as to WHY this post’s title is in German, of all languages.  If you know me well enough, you know that for one year I attempted to learn German–emphasis on “attempted”.  I know some polite, information-please phrases, but other than that I’m totally clueless!  I don’t think I even know how to say “You’re welcome.”  How rude is that??

Anyways, here is why the title is the phrase for “Hello!” in German:

When I was sixteen and seventeen, I was pretty good friends with one of the two German foreign exchange students at my high school.  His name was Konstantin.  He and I made some “photo stories” with some of our mutual friends while working on the fall play, “Arsenic and Old Lace” (if you’re friends with me on Facebook, you can check them out among my massive list of photo albums.  They are titled “Konstantin’s Photo Stories”.).  Konstantin even assisted Ms. G in directing me and about 70 other classmates of mine in three performances of “Beauty and the Beast” for the spring musical.  When Konstantin “graduated” from SJHS, I was in the stands of Dickinson Stadium, cheering him and the other graduating seniors on.  Halfway through the summer, our friend threw a going-away party for him before Konstantin went back to Germany (this friend, by the way, is not friends with either of us anymore, haha).  I didn’t see him again for an extended period of time (I did see him briefly–for like 10 minutes–when I was 18) until this past Wednesday.

Back in April, when I knew I was definitely going to be in Paris the next semester, I sent Konstantin a message on Facebook explaining my travel plans and asking if he would like to meet halfway between our locations and get food and catch up on life.  Much to my surprise, he wrote back and said no way were we going to meet halfway . . . he wanted to come see me!

Turns out he is as madly in love with Paris as I am.  Of course, I was overjoyed to read that he wanted to come see me and crash on my couch in Paris (I don’t have one, but it works out, you’ll see).  We exchanged some e-mails over the last month and a half and finally made definite plans to hang out last Wednesday, while he killed some time between his train arriving at Gare de Lyon (from Lyon) and his flight from Orly taking off for Berlin the next morning.  On Monday or Tuesday, he told me when his train was arriving and which car he was in.  After class on Wednesday, I took the Metro from Denfert-Rochereau to Châtelet and then I got on Line 1 from Châtelet to Gare de Lyon.  I was maybe 30 to 40 minutes early for the train . . . I’d wanted to leave extra early because I’d never been to any of the train stations in Paris and I didn’t know where things were or how to find him.  The Metro took me to platform Blue but I (correctly) guessed that I needed to be at platform Yellow so I went and found it.  I had some more time to kill so I went down in the “Meeting Point” where there were benches and chairs to sit on and wait for arrivals.  I stayed within sight of the arrivals board (it was more like a TV) and watched as Konstantin’s 17:00 train arrival drew closer.  It was a pretty calm time while waiting except when this weird guy in glasses and carrying a backpack came up to me and explained to me (in French) that he gave people waiting in train stations free foot massages.  Obviously this guy had a foot fetish and I freaked out on the inside and outwardly I repeated “Non merci” until he went away.  When the arrivals TV started displaying which platform Konstantin’s train would be arriving on, I made a be-line for it.  Unfortunately, the guards weren’t letting anyone without a ticket for the next train beyond a certain point on the platform, so I waited for the train as close to the platform as they would permit.  Once the arrivals flooded the platform, I noticed other people waiting near me had gone onto the platform so I followed suit.  I stood on tip-toes looking around for Konstantin (I knew he’d be towards the back of the crowd because he told me he was going to be in Car 18, which turned out to be the last car) and also wondering if he’d recognize me (last time we saw each other, I was a brunette.  I have blonde hair now).  And I worried about recognizing him.

Finding each other went extremely well:  I didn’t need the little sign I’d made with his first initial and last name on it in case we didn’t recognize each other.  We managed to pick each other out from the crowd (he was kind of conspicuous with his giant backpacker’s backpack) and I saw this huge grin on his face.  As we hugged for the first time in a bazillion years, he said something along the lines of “It’s really you!”  (I’m retelling this three days later and so much had happened since we found each other at Gare de Lyon that my memory’s a little fuzzy) and then we greeted each other like the French do and kissed each other on the cheek (first time I’ve gotten to do that in Paris).

I took him to the Metro and suggested we make a stop at my apartment so he could drop off his backpack and messenger bag (I still can’t get over how HUGE that backpack was!) and not have to tote them around with him all evening.  We got to my Metro stop (I won’t share what it is for the sake of my own privacy) and walked back to my apartment, yacking and getting caught-up on life.

Thought:  Basically, I think that since between 2 and 3 years have passed since seeing each other, we’re not kids anymore and we’ve started developing a more adult, more intellectual platonic relationship.

Anyways, we got to my apartment and I gave him some (extremely delicious) yogurt with raspberries because I felt horrible that he had not eaten at all that day, or at least not on the train from Lyon.

We walked from my apartment to the building where I go to school but didn’t go in because it was after-hours, down Avenue du Maine.  We stopped and sat down for sodas at a cafe and wanted to eat too, but they weren’t serving the full menu that evening, so we just had the Coke and Orangina (I hate brown sodas so go ahead and guess which I had) and continued getting caught up (personally, five hours is not enough time to get old friends caught up on 2 to 3 years of life).

After paying for our drinks, we wandered from the 14th arrondissement to St-Michel in the 6th (not that bad of a walk if you cut through Jardins du Luxembourg, by the way), making a stop at the Sorbonne to try and find the hotel where Oscar Wilde died without any luck.  I looked up Oscar Wilde in my Paris guidebook the next day and it turns out he died next door in St-Germain-des-Pres (5th arrondissement) instead.  I’m going to get up there next weekend.  I didn’t do any navigating AT ALL, we got from the 14th to the 6th all thanks to Konstantin’s excellent sense of direction.

We ate at this Italian restaurant within view of the Notre-Dame and we had a really rude waiter who only spoke English to us (though we both speak pretty decent French), but we only used French with him so he shouldn’t hate us too much.  We had wine with dinner like we originally planned back in April and took a picture together on Ile-de-la-Cité with the Notre-Dame in the background so we could prove to our friends from SJ that we didn’t Photoshop a picture of us together:  we really DID hang out in the most wonderful city I know.  We walked along the Seine between two bridges (le Petit Pont and I forget the other one) and took the Metro back to Montparnasse since it was getting closer to the time Konstantin had wanted to leave to catch the Orlyval to the airport.  We got his stuff, said good-bye, and expressed desire to see each other again in LESS than 2-3 years.  We might see each other while I am on Fall Break (which would be AWESOME because that’s the weekend of my birthday) or/and we might see each other next time he’s in Michigan.

Seeing Konstantin was great and so far he’s definitely been the highlight of my stay in Paris as he is going to be my only visitor while I am in France.  I’ve kinda had my eyes opened as to how much high school DIDN’T suck for me in reality.  I made some really good friends those four years, and the really special ones are the people I want to keep in touch with my entire life and never lose track of them.  I know who my true and wise friends really are from HS and I am glad I have kept in touch with these people.

OK, I was going to continue on with a recounting of my day trip to Giverny yesterday, but the middle of my shoulder is really killing me from all this typing and so I think I will talk about Giverny tomorrow or Monday.

Bonne journée!

-CAROLINE

“Faire la cuisine”

One thing FOR SURE that I have been enjoying thoroughly about Paris is cooking in my apartment and grocery shopping.  It’s so much different than when in the States.  Where I come from, you do the bulk of your grocery shopping in one go every week.  This is not so in France, or at least Paris.  In Paris you buy what you need for the night’s meal on your way home from work or school.

Another shocking, revolutionary thing about grocery shopping in Paris is that you bag your own groceries, usually in bags you brought along! I love this, it’s brilliant.  Although I don’t think America should do away with the baggers at grocery stores (they’re the grocery store employees I enjoy talking to the most because 8 times out of 10 they’re my age), it’s been refreshing to keep on my toes when I’m paying.  Start bagging your groceries, pay, finish bagging, get the heck out of line, and leave.  The first time I didn’t have it down but now I think I do.

As for cooking, let me share with you some meals I have prepared:

-White meat from a rotisserie chicken (the Frenchmen running the boucherie where I got my chicken not only picked up on the fact that I’m foreign–I think it was my accent –but they were nice to me.  When I started to pay the man who got my chicken out of the rotisserie, he kindly said “Mademoiselle, this boy here will take your money at the cash register” and the other, younger, man went over to the cash register and we made our transaction.  AND, in addition to verbally telling me how much the chicken was going to cost me, which was about 5 E, he showed me the receipt so I could see the numbers.  As I left, the older employee asked me to come again . . . and I most certainly will!) sauteed in butter with scallions and tarragon.  It was an improvisation of Julia Child’s “Chicken Dinner in Half an Hour” from her “French Chef Cookbook” that I brought with me.

-Haricots verts (or, green beans) steamed and tossed with melted butter, half a lemon, scallions, and salt and pepper.

-French Onion Soup, which I made last (Sunday) night with a friend from one (two!) of my classes named Emily.  We had great fun cooking, drinking the rest of the bottle of Bordeaux I’d bought for the soup, listening to music on my computer, yakking it up, bonding over the TV show “How I Met Your Mother”, and of course eating the soup.