La vie est belle!

Mardi le 13 février

Tuesday was my first day of classes at the Sorbonne. In the morning I had my TD, which is the French equivalent of a conference/section component of a lecture class in the US. I ran into another girl from Sweet Briar in the park by the Centre Michelet (the Art/Archeology Center for Paris I and Paris IV), so we walked in together. The classroom was huge, but there were only 15 people in the class. The class was actually pretty boring. The prof talked extremely fast (even the French students got lost and missed dates and names), but she was nice. Still, it was a 2 hour-long class (and you’re not even allowed to have water, so you get really thirsty), and she just talked about one painting, Courbet’s Burial at Ornans. The set-up of the class is also really strange, because this is the TD for 5 lecture classes – Renaissance Art, Impressionism to Expressionism, Indian Art, Modern Iconography, and Chinese Art – and yet in our weekly TD we focus on only one work of art, and they are all either Impressionist or Renaissance. That’s fine for me, since I’m taking the Renaissance & Impressionism classes, but it seems pretty pointless for the people taking Indian Art…

After TD, I went back to Sweet Briar for my Atelier d’Ecriture class, where we learned about “de” for forme negative, rendre vs. faire (“je pars, tu ne peux même pas me rendre heureuse”), discuter de qch/qqn, and “avoir lieu.”

I rushed home from TD, grabbed my viola, and headed over to the Ecole Normale for my viola lesson. I was afraid I was going to be late, but that didn’t matter, since my teacher was running 2 lessons behind. I sat and listened to the two lessons--the first was with a prospective student from Argentina, the second was with his friend who has been here for the year. From a “musical” standpoint, the lessons weren’t too interesting, since the students weren’t very advanced, and my teacher just talked a lot about adjusting the chin rest. From a…linguistics perspective…it was fascinating to observe the lessons, and see how he used a mix of English and French to talk to native-Spanish speakers who spoke some English and French…Then I had my lesson, which went really well, and he told me lots of crazy stories about his career, and about going to Paul Hindemith’s house and finding a recording of him playing with a famous pianist, and realizing how awful it was…hah apparently Hindemith didn’t practice much.

Came home, dinner w/host fam plus Constance (after the kids went to bed), bed.

Mercredi le 14 février

Woke up and went running in the rain, then headed over to Sweet Briar for my Monuments class. In the morning we learned about the Marais, and then we had an hour long lunch break, before meeting in the Marais. I went to L’As du Falafel (famous and amazing falafel place) with some other Sweet Briar people before going to Pont Marie to begin the walking tour. It was freezing, and pouring rain, so the visit was not too fun. We saw lots of old Hôtels, the remnants of the first enceinte (wall) around Paris, the Church St-Paul St-Louis, and a medieval street…but after walking around outside for 45 minutes, Monsieur realized that everyone was too busy being miserable to pay any attention, so we went to the Musée Carnavalet, a museum of Paris’ history. The museum was actually pretty cool—we only had time to go to a few rooms, but I definitely plan to go back. We saw models of ancient Paris, and a girl gave an éxposé on the Bastille in front of a model of the Bastille, built from stones taken from it during the Revolution.

I went back to Sweet Briar with some of the girls in the class, because there was supposed to be a Valentine’s Day party…which turned out to not exist. So I went back to the 15^th with a girl who lives two blocks away, and we went to a café/boulangerie to meet her friend who teaches English in Paris through the French Consulate.

Came home, had dinner with the fam, and then went out to Aussie Bar with Claire, Kate, Jen, Sam, and Sara. They were having this ridiculous Valentine’s Day party where they give you stickers with numbers on them, and then these cards where you could send messages to other people in the bar ("accepteriez-vous un verre?" "voulez-vous danser?" "une discussion s'impose" "j'ai croisé votre regard" "je suis prêt(e) pour l'aventure" "je brûle de désir...répondez moi" "rejoignez moi", and my personal favorite, "je vous écris...")…so yea we had a lot of fun sending ridiculous messages to the tables around us, or to just random numbers.

Jeudi le 15 février

Had Atelier d’Ecriture in the morning, where we learned about rapide vs. vite, the construction “comme + le” – “Comme tu peux le supposer, je suis très fâchée,” and “Comme le disait mon grand-père, la vie est belle,” and tellement/tant/si.

After Atelier I went home planning to go for a quick run before class at 4, but the quartier had a water problem, so the water was off until 4…I decided that I didn’t want to stink up the Sorbonne, and instead grabbed a sandwich and met Sammy, Darcy, and Sara in this really quiet and beautiful park by Darcy’s apartment. It was about 55 degrees and sunny, so we just sat around and talked in the park until about 3:30, when I left for class.

Class was my first lecture at the Sorbonne – Impressionism through Expressionism. It was also pretty boring…It was a two-hour lecture, but the prof couldn’t get the slide projector to work for the first 30 minutes. Then for the next hour and a half he talked (painfully slowly) about salons and World Expositions…needless to say, it was hard to stay awake. The French students also seemed to have problems concentrating…after the first 15 minutes of lecture, there was a dull murmur, as the students carried on their own conversations. After class, this French girl asked me if I had passed my exams to get into the course, because she had had a hard time with it. I explained that I was an exchange student, so I didn’t need to pass the exams, and she said “oh, PHEW.” I really wanted to say something like “well, I’m sure that if you paid attention in class it wouldn’t be too hard to pass the test,” but I restrained myself…

Came home from class, had dinner, then met up with Jen and Sara at le Cristal. After there, we went to Le Mix, a club where every Thursday they have this huge party for International students. It’s technically associated with Erasmus, an exchange program for all countries except the US (I think) – it’s the program that the people in L’Auberge Espagnol are on – but it was free for all International students. It was a lot of fun, and really cool to meet not just French people, but people from lots of other countries – Germany, Italy, Switzerland, England, Morocco, Tunisia, Argentina, etc.

Vendredi, le 16 février

Woke up at 8am, very tired from the discotheque, and got to the Sorbonne at 9:45 for my 10am lecture class. A class was going on in the amphitheatre I waited with 2 other Sweet Briar students, and about 20 other French students until 10:20…when we realized that this class was not going to end any time soon. We went up to the office of the Sorbonne, and found out that they had changed the time of the class from 10-12 to 9-11 without telling anyone…so that was cool. We figured it was pointless to go to the lecture after missing the first 45 minutes, so everyone left.

I went home and napped until 1, went running, and then went to the Louvre to meet Jen and Darcy. We saw the Napoleon Apartments, and then went to the French Sculpture garden. We ended up just sitting and talking there. There were 3 French guards standing and talking to each other, and we got really annoyed at them, because there was a group of 7 or 8 French guys who were literally caressing the sculptures, and the guards were too busy talking to each other to notice...so yea apparently it’s OK to touch the sculpture at the Louvre. We left the Louvre around 7:30 (it’s open until 9:30 on Fridays), and went home.

Had dinner, then went to Sara’s house for our traditional Friday night Grey’s Anatomy, which was nice & relaxing as always. Came home around 12:30, and went to bed.

Samedi, le 17 février

Woke up late, went running, and then went to the Marais to meet Darcy, Jen, and Sara. Darcy has this book of “Calm Places” in Paris, so we have been trying out different places listed in it for lunch, and today was Square Georges Cain. It’s this small, quiet, and beautiful garden/square, with faux-ancient stone sculptures and friezes, and lots of benches. Lots of families were there with their children, there was also a group of French girls who were sketching the sculptures in the garden, and there were two guys playing guitar. It was 60 degrees and sunny, so we just sat there and talked, read, and drew sculptures for the afternoon.

I started to feel really sick, so I left early and came home. When I got there, half the family was over, and FaFou started talking to me about life in the States, so I came in and explained about Ivy League colleges and about Princeton (where he lives). After that, I went to my room and napped a little.

Woke up, and got ready to go to a Franco-American “pot” (party) at Mme Hervier’s house (basically a mixer between Sweet Briar people and her son Peter and his friends). I got there late because the metro was running very slowly, but that didn’t really matter since I already know Peter and his friends (he’s friends with Sammy from Williams, so we’ve been to dinner and a few bars with them).

After the party Darcy and I met up with Sammy and Lisa at an Italian restaurant nearby, La Comédia, which is my new favorite restaurant – cheap and delicious, and if you come visit me, I’ll take you there :o). We walked around Rue Mouffetard after dinner, then went to the Pont des Arts and wandered around. Ended up back in St. Germain, and then just decided to go home…a pretty uneventful evening.

Dimanche, le 18 février

Another late morning, and another run in the Champ de Mars. Then I went to the Jardin des Plantes in the 5^th to meet Sara and Darcy (another 60 degree & sunny day!). It’s a little like a botanical garden – it’s huge, has a zoo, a museum of natural history, a museum of evolution, and is next to the Paris Mosque (another “calm spot”). Like most other gardens in Paris, it was filled with families “promenading.” We were planning to work, but ended up just talking, and reading through Paris guidebooks for the afternoon. Around 4 we left, and went to the Arènes de Lutèce, an old Roman amphitheatre where people come to play soccer and pétanque, and picnic. We met up with Kate & Claire, and talked while watching a group of old guys playing pétanque next to a group of elementary-school boys playing soccer.

Walked around the 5^th a little, went up to the Pantheon, and then walked to the Metro. Came home, practiced, had dinner with the fam, and went to bed early.

Lundi, le 19 février

Woke up at 9, went running in the Champ de Mars, cleaned my room, and headed over to the Marais. Grabbed lunch at l’As du Falafel, waited in line for an hour at the Centre Pompidou library, where I spent the afternoon researching my exposé on Église Saint-Sulpice. After spending 5 hours in the library, I decided it was time for an epic walk…so I walked from Centre Pompidou to my house (which took a good hour and a half). It was dark, so all the buildings were lit up, but still pretty warm. I went a way I had never gone before, which was nice – it was through the 7^th, on Rue du Four/Rue de Sèvres/Rue de Babylone. I discovered what might be the world’s most “chi-chi” grocery store, La Grande Epicerie de Paris (part of Le Bon Marché Rive Gauche). They organize food by countries, and I think I stumbled upon every ex-pat in Paris in the “Tex-Mex” (aka pretzels and guacamole) aisle.

Now I’m back home, about to watch the news with my host dad, have dinner, and either meet up with a few friends at a bar, or go to bed (10:30am TD tomorrow!).

Au Revoir!