J'adore l'automne à paris!

Salut! Well it is officially Fall in Paris and I must say I love it! Actually the weather has gotten much better the past 2 weeks and I have been very comfortable in short sleeves! The leaves are changing colors here and it really is beautiful. I can't even express how lucky I am! This weekend we took a group excursion to the Loire Valley to visit 4 chateaus. C'était incroyable! Don't get me wrong, I love Paris and it is the first big city that I could see myself living in, but it was quite a treat to get to explore other parts of France outside of the city. It reminded me why I do love the more quiet countryside areas. (perhaps why I'm dating a farm boy :)) We could not have asked for better weather and the landscape was breathtaking. Nous avons visité le Château Chambord, le Château royal d'Amboise, le Château Chenonceau et le Château royal de Blois. Mon château préféré était le Château royal d'Amboise bien sûr! The picture on the left was the view from the top of the Château royal d'Amboise. On the other side it looked out over the ridiculously cute little town of Amboise and then this is the water and homes side! I was like ready to move in tout de suite! Chenonceau was also situated on a gorgeous lake and the wake through the forest to get to there was incredibly romantic and amazing! There was even a beautiful chestnut horse grazing on some grass which we passed on our walk to the castle. The architecture of all the château's was really wonderful as well because of how ornate and gorgeously different they all were. The last one we visited, Blois, had parts from 4 different architecture styles as each King who lived there changed it according with the style of his time. It had gothique, flamboyant, renaissance and classique architecture all in one château. Pretty cool if you ask me! We learned the history of each of the château's as well and most of it was fascinating (with a tad bit of boring thrown in there as well. After all we did visit 4 in 2 days!) All in all it was a great way to spend a weekend!

Sorry this entry is so short but it is dinner time and I just wanted to quickly update about the amazing weekend! Love you all!!!

je suis désolée pour ma absence

(The president's house- le palais d'elysees- waited in line for 5 hours to see it!)
Salut mes amis! Vous me manquez beaucoup! Paris est encore très maqnifique et je suis très contente. J'avais beaucoup d'amis qui j'adore. Depuis mon blog dernier, je suis allée Barcelone en Espagne, et Londres! J'adore les deux!! Ok enough torturing you now with my French :). But like I said everything is going very well. I am still in love with Paris and having the time of my life. I am making some great friendships that will be very hard to leave behind come December. But luckily I still have 2 glorious months here before I have to think about that. I am so so so glad that my friends and family encouraged me to have this experience. When I think about how close I was to backing out I can't believe that I almost missed this. I am definitely blessed. Not many college students have these experiences and I am thankful that I have!

Well my classes are going pretty well. I am getting A's and B's in my grammar class which is exciting and I got all A's in phonetics which is shocking lol. My host mom said she could hear improvement though which made me feel good. Speaking of the fam, things are going great! I feel like I'm fitting in more rather than just feeling like an awkward guest. It has been a lot of fun to get to be a part of a big family for once since I don't have that. It makes me miss Matt though when I see them fighting (which they do a lot) bc I realize how lucky I am. I wish he was coming with my mom in a few weeks. :( But, I am pretty much able to hold a semi-decent conversation now. It occasionally takes me a few tries to express myself correctly but I can understand 90% of what they are saying and I can respond which is a good start. I am definitely not fluent, and I probably won't be when I leave but I will be much closer. I notice that I think in French a lot which is cool. I also make a point of sending my texts in french and talking to my friends in french when we are online. we are all still bad about talking in french when we are together tho bc we slip into English very easily. I got very excited thought he other day because I had to go to a tabac to recharge my cellphone minutes and I had a full conversation with the guy in French without any hitches and when I gave him my 'American' credit card he was surprised because he said he couldn't tell that I was American! I don't know if he was lying or not but I was like sweet!!!

Well two weekends ago I took my first trip outside Paris to Barcelona Spain and I loved it!! It was an AMAZING city. I went with 7 of my friends here and we were all able to stay in a hostel room together! It was kind of like the camp experience that i never had. There were some disagreements in the morning time regarding when we should get up lol but we all worked it out. We got in very late Friday night after a looong day of traveling so after we struggled to find our way to the hostel (not speaking the language and having phones that wouldn't work didn't help the situation) we got some quick fries and went to bed. Saturday we walked ALL day and saw a lot of the touristy stuff: the gaudi buildings, La Sagrada Familia, the gothic area, l'arc de triomf (i like ours better) and some more stuff. Then we did some shopping and I did a lot of trying on but no buying. Thank goodness because my bank account appreciated it. :) We ended up watching the sunset at the port which was beautiful and then eating an amazing dinner! We had so much fun together and then we went home and got ready for the magic water fall thing which was soooo cool. And then we went out for a fun night on the town! Then on Sunday we found the BEACH and basically stayed there alllll day! Then we had another amazing dinner and went to an Irish pub and played cards until 2:30 in the morning when we started making our way to the bus station that would begin our hellish day of traveling. We did not get home to Paris until 2 pm Monday and we left Barcelona at 3 am Monday morning. Ya not so much fun, but still totally worth it!

So then this weekend I went to London to visit my ROOMIE!!! It was sooo needed and a wonderful reunion weekend. Now I am just waiting for her to come visit me. Friday night again it was late so we went back to her adorable flat and she cooked me spaghetti and made me typhoo tea. She knows me well :) and then we just spent hours talking and later that night I met her awesome roommates who I liked very much. Saturday we got up nice and early (for me at least) and bought chocolate chips so that David could make us chocolate chip pancakes! They were sooo yummy. I missed my crepes though for the weekend, but having real pancakes was great! Eventually we got our butts in gear and went 'sploring! We finally experienced the greatness of Camden market and i bought a skirt that I am absolutely in love with. I hope I can find a great shirt to go with it soon so I can wear it. Ash and I match now :). We also went to top shot and another dept. store that I can't remember that starts with a P. We were on a mission for cute bangles and boots, but alas we found neither. Then we had some yummy pizza hut and went home for a little bit. Later that night we went to dinner at... BISTRO BENITO'S!! It was so wonderful to be back and it hadn't changed a bit! The little old man was there and called us beautiful girls again and the son of the other old Italian man was still there and his son who was a newborn last time is now 2 and he has a 7 month old beautiful girl! He gave us a free drink again. C'est la bonne vie! We both ordered the exact same thing as always right down to our bottle of wine! We are creatures of habit. After dinner we walked down earls court and visited all our old favs. Then we walked along embankment and took some pics of parliament and Big Ben and the Thames River. All in all it was a great day! On sunday we had some yummy tea at the place where the Queen loves to have her tea! Then we walked around Trafalgar Square and took all the quintessential London pics including me climbing on the Lion. Then we attempted to go to Hydes Park but it was dark and we were weenies so we checked out London's arc and this cool war memorial instead. I think every european country must have an arc. Paris' is the best though. :) So sunday night I actually got my roomie to come to the Ice Bar with me!! We had a blast. It was so cold and not exactly what we expected, but as always, we had so much fun together. I was sooo sad to say goodbye to her. I love having our awesome deep talks followed by our random crazy moments. She is definitely one of the best people I have ever met in my whole life and the only thing that could make Paris better is if she was here with me. :) There is no one I would rather be homeless with next semester ash!!

So in just 2 weeks I get to see my mommy!!! Yay!!! I am tres excited! But for now I am going to go to bed. I promise I will try and update more often. Love you all very much and miss you bunches.

Bisous a vous!
xoxo
Laura

My Trip so far...

Bonjour mes amis! Ca va? Je suis très bien, mais vous me manquez!! Haha ok well enough French now. So I've been in Paris for almost three weeks and still can't believe how lucky I am to be having this experience. It is incredible. Sometimes I am just walking around and I realize, wow I'm in Paris! I'm so thankful to be having this experience, although I wish all of you could be here with me experiencing it. So I have started all my classes now and they are going well. The french class started off a little slow and I was nervous that I wouldn't learn anything because of how basic the stuff was (umm learning our numbers???) but it has picked up now and I feel that I was put in the right level. I need some review anyways since I haven't taken french in 2 years and am pretty rusty.It is still a little weird that we are trying to learn a language that we don't know that well in that language but I guess that is the quickest way to do it, total immersion. The phonetics lab is definitely helping because it is an hour of learning how to pronounce words. If anyone is reading this that has been in French with me, you know how bad I need that :) Both of the professors are young women and seem to be great! I am happy to say that I understand what they are saying pretty much all the time now, which is a good feeling! The conversation class is ok, we have a lot of work for that class for sure but I think it will help a lot as well. It gives me good things to talk about with my family though because the topics of the class are pretty cool. This week we were debating whether or not an idea Great Britain had was a good thing or not. A few years ago they were considering placing a new tax on junk food, to help with their increasing problem of obesity. My group had to argue why it was a good thing, which was pretty interesting considering we were doing it in French. My poly sci class is good too. It is in English so easy lol. It is loooooong though. Three hours. But its only once a week so i guess I shouldn't complain. The professor works in the government too so its pretty cool because he has had hands on experience with the stuff he is teaching us. It is always better that way, as opposed to teaching in theory. I have already learned a lot about the French system of government that I never knew. Still think ours is a thousand times better, but its very interesting to learn about. For example, there are 2 heads of the executive branch: the president and the prime minister and they share that office. Also, the president can send the legislative branch home and call for new elections earlier than scheduled (elections are every 5 years), which was very odd to me. Well anyways, enough about classes. :) So as of right now I have weekend trips scheduled to Barcelona with some friends and then I am flying solo to London to visit my beautiful roomie, Ashley, who is studying abroad there for the semester!! Excited to go back to London since I loved it so much last time. I am also going to Italy for our 4 day weekend with my friend Samantha. We are definitely going to Rome, and then we haven't decided on Venice or Florence. I am voting for Florence lol. I might also possibly see Ireland or Switzerland, but I don't know. I am already getting to do so much o that might have to wait until I am rich and come back again some day :). My mom is coming to visit in October with her best friend and I am SO EXCITED to see her. Wish my brother and dad could come too but at least I get to see my mom!! We are going to go to Normandy for the weekend that she is here and I think my friend Samantha is going to come with us. Apparently we are staying in a castle or something?? lol. It should be awesome. My host family is excited to meet her and we are all going to do dinner one of the nights that she is here. I'm excited to introduce them to each other. "Hey real mom, this is my fake mom for the semester". That will be fun! lol. Speaking of my family, things are still going really well in that area. Actually I think they are getting even better! I am starting to feel more comfortable around them and the conversations are flowing better. They are so nice and welcoming and I am trying to make a good impression. I am so glad that we had to stay with families because it definitely helps my French. Plus, I get to experience being part of a big family, which I never had. Dinners can be pretty funny. The 12 year old eats like he is an 18 yr old boy!! He is so funny. I have watched many episodes of Winnie the Pooh (in French of course) and some other Disney movies with Tiphaine and Gautier. I'm an expert now! I also read a little mini newspaper that is free on the metros everyday and it is getting easier and easier to understand! Ok, places I have visited so far. I have seen Notre Dame, Sacre-Coeur, the Louvre, the Pantheon, the eiffel tower of course, Moulin Rouge (well just the outside), some palaces in Marais, Place des Vosges (one of the nicest parts of Paris and where the most expensive restaurant in all of Paris is- you need to get reservations 6 months in advance), I've frequented the French Wal-Mart (Monoprix) about a hundred times lol because you can get food dirt cheap there, OHHH i almost forgot Versailles!!! We spent all of our first Saturday there and literally walked for 7 HOURS lol. But it is phenomenal! Pont d'Alexander III (the most famous bridge in Paris near the Eiffel Tower, les Champs- Elysees, and Pere-lachaise (tons of famous people are buried here). I've also done a little French shopping :) Mostly just poking in the cute boutiques though because its very pricey here. But they have some amazing fashion here! Paris Fashion Week starts the last weekend in September which will be really fun to see! I mean not that I can go in and see it, but maybe I can hang around the area lol, see some celebs. :) I think this weekend we are going to go to some vintage stores that my friend Caitlin found in Le Marais- should be fun. Also I'm going to try and hit up a French movie and hopefully Musee d'Orsay again. I love that place! Tomorrow the Pope is coming!!! He is speaking at Notre Dame so I am going to go after class tomorrow. I will probably be so far away that he will be a tiny little dot, but oh well! It will be awesome to say I heard the pope speak in person :) Other than that, I don't have much else to update on. J'adore Paris!! Miss you all tons and tons and tons!! And now, picture time!
Bissous à vous!!
xoxo,
moi

Back Side of Notre Dame













Louvre and the famous Pyramid













The group at Versailles

















The Gardens of Versailles













The Girls at the Eiffel Tower





















Group at Montmartre
















Moulin Rouge!!!













Sacre- Coeur





















Beautiful Gardens at Versailles again













Notre Dame





















The Seine













Hall of Mirrors at Versailles

First 2 weeks!

Bonjour mes amis!! Well I have never done one of these before so sorry if it is not that good. I decided it would be a great way to keep
everyone updated on my time in Paris, France. I have only been here for 2 weeks but I am in love. I may never come home :) For the first week, all of the students from the program I am here with stayed together in a student hostel called Le Foyer des etudiants. We spent the first week really just getting to know each other and the city. We had some orientation classes, and they were taught in French. My french is really rusty so it was a little overwhelming. Actually, it still is but I am just trying not to freak out about it because I know it will get easier. We took a few walking tours of some of the arrondissments of Paris including Le Marais and Montmartre. We also went to the Louvre and learned so much about the history of that I never knew. Did you know it was originally built as a fortress for the people of Paris during the crusades? It wasn't turned into an art museum until thousands of years later, and parts of the medieval Louvre are still intact and part of an exhibit in the Louvre. Pretty cool. Most of the evenings were spent up on our INCREDIBLE terrace overlooking the city, hanging out getting to know each other and sipping french wine. C'est la bonne vie! (which means It's the good life by the way). The picture of the tour d'eiffel is our view from the terrace. At night it lit up blue and at 23:00 it would sparkle!! So gorgeous. A week after we got there we were moved into our host families!! I was so nervous when Monsieur Henri Moulins came to pick me up, but the family is wonderful. My mom, Diane, is very welcoming and talks to me a lot. They don't speak any english of course so communication is difficult at times. I now have 5 new brothers and sister. Ines is the oldest. She is 19 and goes to business school. Hugues is 18 and he lives at his college, which is a military college. Hermine is the middle child, 14 and very shy. She is such a sweetheart though. Gautier is a wild little 12 year old but sooo funny! And of course there is little Tiphaine, the baby of the family. She is only 3, but I'm sure you guys can already guess that I adore her and think she is the cutest thing ever! She loves to ride bikes, swing, and play in her "petite maison" (little house) as you can see in the picture. I eat dinner with the family on tuesday and thursday nights and so far I have loved everything she has cooked! Dad you would be very proud because I eat whatever is on my plate. I am determined to not be picky or come across as rude so I just eat it, and to my surprise I have loved everything so far. They do not drink wine with every meal like we imagine them to and bread is not put on the plate. It is sat on the table, which was a little odd to me at first. They are also big into salad, although that does not always mean what we think of as salad. At my first lunch with them we had carrot shavings with vinegar dressing and that was salad. It was quite tasty. Dessert is typically had every night and a big favorite is this yogurt with fruit, but the yogurt tastes like cottage cheese. It was not my favorite thing ever. :) We did have an amazing tarte du pomme (apple pie) the other night. My family is big into learning what the english word is for things and when I told them that their tarte was like our pie, they found that absurd. They wanted to know why on earth we called it a pie! I had no good answer for them, but it made for a very interesting conversation. We also talked a little about thanksgiving and they wanted to know why we ate a lot for the holiday. I attempted to explain about the Pilgrims and Indians, but was met with blank stares so I simply said "C'est un tradition!" and they were pleased with that answer. So far my experience has been wonderful and I am loving every minute of it! Missing you guys like crazy though! I started all my classes last week and so far they are going well. Learning french in french is an interesting experience but I think it is going to really push me to speak better french which is why I am here after all. I start my phonetics lab on Monday which I think is going to be the best thing for me because it is all about learning how to pronounce things and that is not my strength. Oh and this weekend I experience my first stay out all night! Don't worry mom and dad its not as crazy as it sounds and it was so not me! We went out as a group and hung out on one of the hundreds of bridges in Paris (there are so many of them on the seine because they built monuments directly across from each other to keep the symmetry and then built bridges connecting them) and just chilled with some french people. Then we went to a fun Irish pub to dance, but it turns out the last train home to the suburbs (where I live in Colombes) was at 11:30. So I had to wait until 5 am when the metro started running again. Luckily, the pub we were at stayed open until 4:30 so we just danced all night. It was actually a blast and I didn't even feel tired until after we left the pub and had to wait for the metro to open and then had a 40 minute commute home. That part was not fun. But I guess you have to do it once in your life right! I am going to Barcelona the last weekend in September and I'm excited!! Basically, the trip is rocking so far and I am so glad that my family and friends encouraged me to do this. Thanks you guys for supporting me!! Well signing out for now. I will do more pictures later since I have some good ones!! Love you bunches!!

xoxo
Laura