The Time I said "Merci"

My heart aches whenever I look at my photos. I miss the Eiffel Tower, I miss the croissants, I miss the city and I miss the history. I miss the accordion music and the surreal, idealized image of Paris from the 1920s. I cannot believe I was there just over a week ago.

I didn't think I would enjoy it as much as I did, but I learned a lot not only about the city but about cheesy life stuff.

Like the best adventures happen when you least expect them. Whenever we planned out what to do on any given day with an agenda, sure we got it done and had fun, but that was it. Yes, we did this, check. But when things went wrong? That's when we had adventures. When it rained so we had to sit in a café all afternoon. When we got lost at night walking back from the Eiffel Tower. When we couldn't find a restaurant using Google maps, so we stopped at a random one and it was amazing. When we almost died from the heat at Versailles. When we walked for hours and our feet hurt in sultry summer weather wandering the streets of Paris at dusk.

But those were the times we learned how to be on our own, how to appreciate the small beauties of the city and what it means to be Parisian.

I love the French lifestyle of being relaxed and serene. It's not bustling, there is no hurry. They sit in cafés for hours. Dinner doesn't start until 8 and doesn't end until 11. They do ride bikes with baguettes in baskets.

There were also some misconceptions that I'd like to clear up. Namely, that French people aren't rude or mean. No one was rude to me the entire time I was there. Now, I'm not saying the Parisians can't get snippy - but only if you're being an annoying tourist who's blunt and loud. I'm convinced it's not that the French are rude, but the opposite - they are so polite that everything we boisterous Americans do is offensive to them, and then they get short. My tip: say bonjour, merci, au revoir and pardon, and you will be fine. They were always so friendly and funny to me, even though I only speak basic French. "Pardon" will become your best friend.

Nine days ago I was eating ice cream along the Seine. I don't like exaggerating, so I don't often act excited, and I'm probably downplaying how much I liked this trip so as not to seem dramatic. It was truly great and quite literally unbelievable now that I am back home. Part of me wishes I could've done more - oh, if only I could've done this one more time, or gotten a picture here, or spent more time here. But in the moment, I was happy and satisfied with my trip and somewhat ready to return. Now of course I feel like I want to go back and do more things, but I saw some beautiful sights, tried some amazing food and learned about a culture that is completely different than my own.

I still feel like there are many personas of "Paris," when I think of the word in my head. I can think of the fancy Paris tea party with designer handbags and macarons. I can think of the touristy Paris with Eiffel Towers and the Louvre. I can think of the accordion Paris with rainy streets and cafés. That's my favorite, because I think it's the most Parisian. That's the one I will try to keep with me.

I miss it. It's a magical city. I can't wait to go back. But I'm glad, as Teo has reminded us, that Hemingway said Paris is a moveable feast because you always carry a part of it with you. And beyond that, some of us developed our own motto for the trip: pourquois pas. Why not? Because, as I said, those misadventures were and are the best adventures. Go with the flow and try new things, always. Pourquois pas?

Merci Paris, for everything.

The Time Fireworks Illuminated the Tour Eiffel

It's time to update you all on Bastille Day on July 14th!

We spent the morning packing, though at noon my class walked to the nearby park with a gazebo down Rue de Commerce, the location of our first lecture, to have a picnic lunch. As we've been doing all month, we carried baguettes and fruits and cheeses and cold meats (like a small round sausage with spots of white fat inside).

It was a kind of sad goodbye because this was our last official event as a class. I can't believe it's been a month because it feels like we just got here. On the other side, however, I do feel like I got a full taste of Paris and I'm feeling alright to come back.

In the afternoon, I went with one girl to Berthillon one more time to get ice cream by the Seine near Notre Dame. This might be one of my favorite areas of Paris because it's just so quintessentially iconic with the towers of the cathedral and people painting by the river and those hideous love locks and street performers playing accordion music.

We waited in line at Berthillon on the Ile de St. Louis. I got chocolate and pistachio; this time the chocolate seemed darker and more bitter than before, but the textures were just so good.  I spoke French to an employee to order my cone, but I overheard the tourists after me in line trying to talk to her and the other employee told them she doesn't speak English. The annoying tourists then said, "Oh, sorry. Can we have blackberry?" to the girl they just found out speaks no English. So stupid. However, I was pleased that I managed to communicate with someone who doesn't speak English and only French.

Sitting by the river, we licked our last best ice creams and said bye to the wonderful Seine. The ride back was our last time on the metro, so we said bye to that too. The metro had been so convenient, as we finally got the hang of it and knew which lines to take in which directions to get to most common places, often without looking at the maps.

Before we returned to the hotel, we stopped at Monoprix to get food for Bastille Day like baguettes and pasta salad and peaches and soda. Some of the people on our program (including me) met with Teo and Ryan at about 5:30 for us to go to the Champs de Mars to claim a spot for the firework show tonight.

I didn't really see any celebrating in Paris at all before the firework show. There were no streets lined with French flags, no shouting, no music. I'd heard about a parade on the Champs Elysées, but it looked like a completely regular day in Paris everywhere.  Except at the Champs de Mars.

We arrived and the entire lawn was already covered with people - every inch. This picture was taken at 5:30...for a show that begins at 10:30. It became infinitely more packed as the night progressed - the walkways were covered and you literally could not move from your spot.

We went to the righthand side and sat in the grass in a huge circle, with a view of the tower over the trees. The waiting game began, as we dug into the leftovers from our picnic lunch and the other items we brought. It was sunny, so we were sweaty and hot laying in the grass. Naturally, it reminded me of Fourth of July with happy people and summertime and celebrations, though there weren't any French flags or French clothing as there would be in America.

I spent an hour in line for the bathrooms at 8 pm and when I got back we played games with the group. Like "Most likely to..." and then we all point to that person. A lot of them were Paris-themed like "Most Likely to Get Lost in Paris" or "Most Likely to Offend a French Person" or "Most Likely to Buy the Most Souvenirs" or "Most Likely to Be Recognized as American on the Metro."

At about 10 p.m. it started getting a little dark so the tower lit up and sparkled every few minutes, taunting us before the show.

Finally, around 11 p.m. the show started. I went in with wrong expectations - I'd been told it was a 45 minute firework show by the Eiffel Tower. I was thinking, how can we watch fireworks explode for 45 minutes? No, no. This is a 45-minute synchronized light show and concert with fireworks shooting OFF OF the Eiffel Tower. There were like canons that shot the fireworks off in patterns and designs, with different songs featuring a theme and colors and new rhythms. Some of them were Mexican themed because the President was visiting, but they also played Skyfall from James Bond and the last song was the ET theme song.

 (Yay I got to see the Eiffel Tower lit up like the French flag. Goals.)

 It was just so much better than any other firework show I'd seen. Not even because it was by the Eiffel Tower, but literally just the fireworks were better - controlled. It seemed like they were painted into the sky, purposefully placed and designed, instead of just shot off in an uncontrolled circle pattern. They were like little fairies moving where you want them to go.

It was a firework concert. I loved it. I think it was the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.

However, getting out was a nightmare. Someone said (aptly) that it reminds them of the stampede in "The Lion King." Imagine thousands of people packed like sardines, body to body, trying to get out of a park via only a couple entrances. In the dark. It was a flood of people trying to get to the metro. Our hotel is a 10 minute walk away, but the metro station is in front of our hotel so everyone was swarming down the Motte Piquet, with us in the crowd.

There were cars just stopped in the middle of the streets, some abandoned, because people covered every inch of the roads and sidewalks. It took us so long to get back, navigating the crowds and trying to stick together with five others.

At one point, an ambulance had to get through the road, and we all had to cram together super tight to make a path on the sidewalks. I was completely jammed up against a parked car, smashed.

From the hotel room, I looked out at the metro stop to see the hoards of people.

It was amazing to see how Bastille Day is celebrated in France. A perfect last night to watch the Eiffel Tower for six hours one last time, with a great show and two picnics in one day.

It feels weird to be done now, because I feel like I've been here for a while but at the same time, no time at all has passed. I can't comprehend what I was thinking or how I was before I came to Europe, because now it feels like something I can't imagine myself without. What would I have done if I wasn't here? I've been packing periodically yesterday and today, and I leave tomorrow at 10 a.m from the hotel. It's been an adventurous month - I will post my concluding thoughts later once I've had time to digest my experience. For now, I leave you with "Bonne Fête!"

The Time We Danced in a Fire Station

I started this morning off right with a croissant and pear juice that tasted thick like liquefied pieces of fruit.

In the morning, our long walk took us to the outskirts of Paris - much different from the rest of the city in that it is more diverse, has higher buildings and frankly is not as nice. It looks like the outskirts of any other city with little hints of Paris. However, we stopped at a park with mural art and Teo said this is the best view of Paris because you can see all the monuments - though it seemed too far away to me.

It was a strange neighborhood and smelled pretty bad. The buildings were also higher than the six-story limit in central Paris, so it didn't have the same quaint appeal. Eventually we strolled down a few residential alleys that were very small and charming with flowers all around.

(An aristocat... kidding)

For lunch, we had brought sandwiches (rustic ham and cheese for me) to eat in a huge park with tall trees and a stone structure in the center. However, The Butte Chaumont Park was hilly and muddy, so I actually slipped and got mud all over my leggings and some on my skirt. It was kind of miserable sitting in the wet grass on a hill, but I guess it's a good thing that one of my worst moments in Paris was just getting a little dirty.

At the end of our walk, I went back to the hotel to change and got dessert at a bakery across from our hotel with a lime green storefront. The tricolore is a tiered chocolate cream dessert (with white, milk and dark chocolate) with a single raspberry on top that gave it so much flavor (I wish there were more framboises).

I had an early dinner at the café in the movie Amelie, which we'd passed by in a previous walk. Two girls came along to Cafe des Deux Moulins - it was really cool because the inside looks exactly like the set of the film, except now there are Amelie posters inside and pesky film fanatics eating.

Eventually we felt awkward because we could tell it was a touristy place - what do you call it, like a cliche faux café like we were on a movie set. The menus were in English, no customers were really French,and we could just tell it wasn't a real French café. On the plus side, they did have frog legs on the menu, which is something I've wanted to try here! With so little time left in the program, I thought I wouldn't get a chance to try them, so I was overjoyed. I ordered them with French onion soup for my dinner - can you tell it's a tourist spot yet?

One person was wearing an LA baseball hat, one person was holding a selfie stick... it was bad for us Parisians. I did enjoy the frog legs - they did indeed taste like chicken as I'd been told. It was super difficult for me to get the meat off them, though, because they were like 70% tiny bones. The onion soup tasted alright, but I could tell it wasn't authentic French because the cheese wasn't as messy and over-the-top as it's supposed to be. The bread was somehow simultaneously chewy and soggy and impossible to cut with a spoon.
Like I said, kind of a fake French café but still decent. Bucket list: check.

Since tonight is the day before Bastille Day, there are "balls" at the fire stations, where the firemen and other public officers raise money for charity apparently by throwing a dance in their station down our street. Literally everyone in the entire neighborhood went from grandparents to kids, from 9 pm to 4 am. We went from like 11 pm to about 2 am and I was exhausted, but it was really fun to see all the French people celebrating their national holiday like our 4th of July.

The line was so long for people to get inside to the courtyard. There were booths for food and drinks, and a concert-like stage with a DJ and colored lights. Almost everyone was speaking French, so we knew it was actually something that local people did. The firemen and officers were working by collecting money and checking bags - it was a really cool cultural experience to see this community dance party with people of all ages.