J'adore Paris

My Italian has been irreversibly corrupted.

These past day two days, I have been oui-ing when I should have been si-ing, and I have "merci-ed" at least three Italians already on accident, and I even forgot the word for "one" yesterday at the market. It was bad. It was the result of eight days in France.

A small part of me, one that has become a large part, has always regretted dropping French in the eleventh grade. At the time, it seemed like a good idea. I was too busy being a member of the Cult Of Crew (ie, the rowing team), being in the operetta, and epically failing Chemistry to continue with language. However, the next year I left crew, ditched the operetta, the vowed to never take Chemistry again. So needless to say, there would have been plenty of time to take French, and I realized this as soon as it was too late to change my mind.

The opportunity arose for me to return to French in the months before I went to UB (English majours at the school need two years of foreign language), but my adviser (who I quickly learned was a idiot, but not before it was too late) told me Latin would be more "useful". If useful means composing sentences like "rex urbem vincet" and reading the rubble at the Roman forum. And the most terrible irony of all? My favourite writer is French.

So I knew, even before I was accepted into my study abroad program, that I would head to France on spring break. Maybe it was a way to atone for dropping French.

"If you love French so much, why didn't you go to France then?" you ask.

Well, basically, everyone else I knew who had gone abroad had gone to France, and I wanted something different. Different pictures, different stories. And after having been to France and back, I can say that I don't regret studying in Italy. France and Italy are both beautiful, but in different ways. I can't help but compare Florence and Paris to people. Florence is everyone's friend, but Paris is more reserved, and if you approach her the wrong way... watch yourself.

Strangely enough, I escaped all the of snobbish French attitude I had expected to find. I would like to think this was due to my amazingly well preserved French skills, but I probably just got lucky.

I went to two cities on my trip. Paris, and lovely French/German city of Strasbourg. I set off for Paris with, with my favourite travel companion.


Oh yes, this was a solo trip. Considering less than six months ago I could barely even spend an hour alone, I wasn't quite sure how this would work out for me. But it was beyond amazing. If you ever get the chance, not only travel to, but try to experience a place by yourself. You'll notice things you never knew were there.

Once I arrived at France, I spent a night in a crappy hostel with unpleasant American roommates before heading to Marie-Jeanne's. Marie-Jeanne (and her two tiny dogs and roommate) was my couch surfing host. For those of you who have never heard of couch surfing, it's a global grassroots movement where people agree to let travelers crash on their couches free of charge. It lets people go to places they normally wouldn't be able to afford to go, and offers them an insight into the culture that they wouldn't have gained at a hotel or hostel. In a nuthsell, couch surfing was an awesome experience. Marie-Jeanne let me stay three more nights than I had intended to, and us and her roommate were able to discuss feminism and international politics over our morning caffeine fix. Plus, her two tiny dogs almost filled the medium sized dog shape missing from my heart (Maggie is afraid of Skype, and Skype doesn't have a petting application yet anyway).

The couch.

Once I was situated at Marie-Jeanne's, I was set to take France by storm. Which I did. the beauty of traveling alone is that I got to do what I wanted, exactly when I wanted to do it. I saw an inordinate among of things, including every single garden the city had to offer within range of the metro system.


This seems to speak for itself, really.


Sacre Coeur, the church on the hill. I actually went here after Notre Dame, and after the touristy madness that was Notre Dame, I had braced myself for the worst. I went into the church during mass. Nuns were singing, their voices echoing off the vaulted ceilings, and it was absolutely enchanting.


Fountain near the Tulleries.


My transportation mode of choice.


The Arc de Triomph, built by Napoleon (happy now George? :P) to celebrate his military prowness. Except he stole the entire idea from the ancient Romans, but Napoleon does what he wants.


Notre Dame. pretty on the outside, a touristy hell on the inside.


At least I was able to eat lunch with a view of the cathedral.


I spent WAY too much time near the tower, but it's so pretty! I like pretty things. Like the caramel leather over the knee boots I bought in Primtemps earlier that day. Europe is the worst/best place ever for a shoe person.



As I was walking along the Seine, I saw a real live action dress up day in progress! But ours are better.



A few days in, I met up with with friends from LDM to go to Versailles and we found a Buffalo Grill. Absolute destiny.


Halls of Mirrors, in Versailles.



After spending about four days in Paris, I took the train to Strasbourg to see Megan, a friend from high school. It broke my heart to leave Paris (it rained the day I left, I took that as an omen) but Strasbourg did not disappoint. The city sounds German, because it is. It's in the Alsace region of France, which had been passed back and forth between France and Germany for a few centuries at least. Half the buildings were built by the Germans, half by France. They even have their own special French/German dialect: Strasbourgeoise.

I stayed with Megan and her host parents while I was there, and her host parents were the most awesome people ever. Breakfast was left for us on a cart outside our door each morning, and dinner was delicious (considering the food prices were so outrageously high in Pairs that I pretty much hadn't eaten for four days, this was a godsend). She even did my laundry for me, which by this point was turning into a rather desperate situation. Here are some pictures for you.




The church only has one spire. I had fun inventing stories for why that was.


The clock inside the church.

The only dark spot of my adventure was the part where I ended up missing my flight back to Italy because the line I needed to take on the metro was closed. This led to a whole bunch of fun shennaigins. I had to backtrack on the metro to take the line that dropped me next closest to the airport bus (next closest was a half mile away, mind you) where I got to walk with my luggage and new over the knee boots said distance to the bus in the dark at 6am. I got the airport just as my flight was leaving, paid an astronomical sum to change my ticket to the next flight going anywhere in Italy. I ended up in Rome, where I took the four hour train ride back to Florence.

Oh yes, it was fun.

France was amazing, but I still think in the end I made the right choice in deciding to stay in Italy. This may be entirely due to the fact food is cheap and the weather is warmer here, but I can say with absolute certainty that I will be back to France, especially Paris. When I am rich and famous and aged, I will pay eighty euro to eat in that five star restaurant on the second level of the Eiffel Tower.

And even if I'm sixty, I'll still be taking the stairs.


As usual, here are the additional pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/album.php?aid=165169&id=561287236
http://www.facebook.com/#!/album.php?aid=165232&id=561287236

Nutella should be its own food group

So what did the almost-classics minor do when she went to Italy?

Went to Rome, obviously.

But seriously. You don't study abroad in Italy and not go to Rome. That's like going to Anchor Bar and not eating wings. Unthinkable. But, because everyone who studies abroad in Florence goes to Rome, you run into the problem of finding someone who actually wants to do the same things as you in Rome and who has the same weekend open for it that you do. Because Rome is not a hop, skip, and a jump away. It's a tedious four hour train ride away, and it's so sprawling you can't expect to take it all in during a day-trip.

So what did I do? I found a like-minded person with the same weekend free and we went for it!



The she-wolf who nursed Romulus and Remus etched on a wall by the Tiber river.

Now, my school over here (Lorenzo de Medici) actually has a campus in Rome, meaning I could've studied there instead of Florence. So while there, I couldn't help but compare everything to Florence to see if I had made the right decision. The answer was a resounding yes, yes indeed Florence was the better option. Everything you want to see in Florence (which the exception of obvious, non-city related attractions like the Chianti wine region) and located in a helpful one mile radius spiraling out from the duomo. Rome, on the other hand, is not so helpfully arranged. Even a trek to the Trevi Fountain from the nearest subway spot to the Trevi fountain took us a good ten minutes. I'm already commuting next fall, I didn't need it in the spring. So overall, though Rome was beautiful and rich in its own right, I'm glad Florence is my home base.

Staying in Rome also merited my first hostel experience. I booked the cheapest one possible, and fully expected to wake up with rats in my bed. But the Peter Pan Hostel (yes, I know) was surprisingly nice, despite the fact that it was a twenty minute commute by bus and train to the city center. But really sealed the deal for me was the hostel's pet pig and puppy! They would play together in the morning, and it was adorable.




I miss my puppy.


The grounds of the hostel.


The Ethiopian restaurant we ate at. I know, this pictures are way out of order.


Ethiopian food. Don't worry, we ate pizza the next night to make sure that we were being appropriately Italian.


Friday, Randi and I hopped on the train, went to our hostel, dropped out stuff off, and headed right back into the city to see the Gallery Borghese. It was definitely the most beautiful art gallery I've seen so far, and I've seen quite a few art galleries at this point. Cameras were strictly prohibited, so you'll have to take my word that Bernini's sculptures are breath-takeingly beautiful, especially his Apollo and Daphne sculpture. He sculpts her hair transforming into leaves. I don't think Michelangelo could even top that.








Saint Peter's Basilica, which I did not go into because I am a moron. But also because we had just spent 3+ hours in the Vatican museums.


This is what my brother looks like when we wakes up in the morning.

Bengal's portrait.

Ancient Greek in the Vatican musuems. They liked to steal stuff from other cultures.

I got excited when I saw this picture because I thought there was a unicorn in the background, but there wasn't.


Anubis. Again, the Vatican stealing stuff that isn't theirs In this case they had a whole musuem of Egyptian arifacts.


My highly illegal picture of the Sistine Chapel ceiling! Remember when we mined that out George?!


Spiral staircase while leaving the Vatican musuems.


Okay, so this is a good story. After Randi and I left the Vatican, we tried to get into this park for forty five minutes and failed. So, we walked back to the main city center, but what did we find on the way?! Another park! So we climbed to the top of the hill and took pictures until the cabarineri (Italian police) told us to get down. So we did. But, what they failed to tell us was that the pack was closing. Five minutes later when we tried to leave, the gates were literally padlocked shut. After not being able to get into the other park, we were locked in this one. Awesome. Some italian men saw us stuck behind the bars, and taking pity on the due ragazze americane, they called the police for us and stood vigil as we waited ti be set free. We caused quite a sensation amoung the passerbys, even earning applaus from the crowd when we finally escaped! It was like when a cat gets stuck in a tree and everyone watches even though its not that exciting.


The one good thing about being locked in the park is that it let me get this picture.


Rumour has it that is your throw a penny into the Trevi Fountain, you'll come back to Rome. But all I had were five cent pieces, and I don't toss five cent pieces away.


The ruins were my favourite part of Rome, hands down. You don't study Latin everyday for two years of your life and not appreciate the ruins. But I never actually thought I would SEE them.

We had to check out of our hostel the morning we saw the ruins, so Bengal came along as well.



Looks kind of like the Arc de Triomph? That's because orginally, a Triumph was a giant parade/celebration held in ancient Rome for a successful war general. Having a Triumph was amoung the highest honours a Roman citizen could recieve, and was one of Cicero's favourite things to whine about since he didn't have one. Nepolian, being Nepolian, couldn't resist building one in France to symbolize his own military conquests. Oh Nepolian, you are something.



Let me tell you, I was having a field day reading all the Latin on these ruins!

After a day of seeing the ruins in the sun while carrying all of our stuff with us, by about two Randi and I were ready to head bak to Firenze. So, after epically runnung through the train station and making our train with only minute to spare, I passed out listening to the Smiths and was reunited with Kara and Arielle in our apartment at last.

Things I learned? Rome is awesome, but not as awesome as Florence. But for my first weekend away, it was a good one!

For the record, these are not even a quarter of the pictures I took in Rome, the rest of them are here (http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?ref=profile&id=561287236#!/album.php?aid=160897&id=561287236).