Paris, France-- The more we get accustomed to Paris, the faster the time goes, but I guess that's to be expected. We had a great weekend here, with what I think was a really good balance of seeing the sights, catching up on sleep, and just living in general. Friday we returned to the kosher markets in Montmartre to stock up for Shabbat, and it's becoming clear that we are forming relationships with the shop owners, particularly the butcher, to whom we now proudly refer as "our butcher." The French is coming a little more easily to me now, although it could just be that I don't care as much about making mistakes.
Saturday, we slept in before taking a long walk through one of the main drags of the city--les Halles, the gardens of the Palais Royal, the Louvre courtyard, the Tuileries, and Rue de Rivoli. It's good to see the more well-known sights (they really are beautiful), and because of the cold and rainy weather, they weren't mobbed by tourists. One of the reasons we wanted to stay in Paris for a whole month, though, is to be able to get to know the city beyond the beaten path. The last few days we have been exploring the farther reaches of the city limits, usually with an interesting architectural site to boot. As per Dom's suggestion, we journeyed northwest on Sunday evening all the way to La Defense to see the Grande Arche, so big that actually houses offices and multiple museums inside. It was a great contrast to the Arc de Triomphe, which stands on the same boulevard about 3.5 miles away. Monday we headed southwest to the 16th arrondissement (kind of like a district) and saw a slew of Art Nouveau buildings by Hector Guimard and some modernist Le Corbusier. We also wandered in Bois de Bologne, a former royal hunting ground twice the size of Central Park. Today after seeing the breathtaking Ste. Chapelle we ventured southeast to Bercy, where we ate a lovely picnic lunch before passing Frank Gehry's Cinematique Francaise.
Perhaps the most "authentic" experience we've had, though, was on Saturday night, or rather, Sunday morning. The Pittsburgh Penguins (hockey) were playing their fifth playoff game against the Montreal Canadiens, a match that aired at 7:00 pm EST. Looking for something to do after Shabbat, Ben and I decided to go to a sports bar in the Latin Quarter called The Great Canadian Pub, where the game would be aired live, beginning at 1:00 in the morning! The bar was crowded when we got there at 12:30, but in the next twenty minutes more people than I thought humanly possible squeezed into the room--all of them raging Canadiens fans. Ben had a Pittsburgh hockey tee shirt on and was told multiple times, "This is Paris!" so we assume there are some pretty strong allegiances to French Canada, and/or many Canadian ex-pats in Paris. The funniest part for me was when the French fans cheered for the team, nicknamed the Habs (don't ask me why...). "Go 'Abs, go! Go 'Abs go!" they yelled--because in French the "h" is silent--and it took me a while before I realized they weren't chanting about a muscle group. It was a very late night but a great experience, all the better because we won the game.
New pictures will be added on the same link as last post.
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Thursday, May 6, 2010
Paris State of Mind
Paris, France-- The five days that we have had here in Paris have really taken their toll on us. We are pooped. We've managed to carve out a good chunk of the city and get acquainted with its inner workings-- mainly the Arrondisments and the Metro lines. It's only Thursday, but we have seen the Seine, Eiffel Tower, Place de la Concorde, Grand Palais, Place de la Victoire, the Arab World Institute , the Latin Quarter, Notre-Dame (from across the Siene), Place Vendome , Montmartre, the Champs Elysee, the Arc de Triomphe, Pont Neuf , Boulevard St. Germain, and the Musee d'Orsay...Oh yeah, and we took a day trip to Chartres . We've already probably seen as much as most tourists get to see in their entire vacation here and we've had to cook and clean our apartment as well. I've been drawing voraciously in my sketchbook to boot. We're pleased with our visit here thus far, but it seems that we are running on fumes; I'm not sure how long we can keep up this pace.
Today, we may finally have hit our breaking point. We headed out for a full day at the Musee d'Orsay, which commands far more attention than we had originally estimated. We were there for over four hours which wouldn't have been so bad, but we skipped lunch and my contact lenses were giving me a lot of trouble. I struggled through the headache my poor vision gave me to enjoy countless (several hundred) famous Degas, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Manet etc. masterpieces. It was really incredible. Blind and hungry, we trudged our way home via a crowded metro, which required us to navigate new, confusing stations. After we climbed the hundred and twenty stairs up to our apartment I crashed for a two hour nap as Betsy read.
Perhaps it is just the difference between urban and rural places, but so far, Paris feels more like New York or Washington D.C. than the other places we've been in France--including bigger cities like Marseilles, Toulouse, and Bordeaux. The diversity, the density, the pace of life--the thing that make Paris a world city-- all separate it from our other experiences in France. That's not to say that there isn't a distinct French flavor. It's also been cold here (in the 50s), all the colder because we mailed home our heavy coats from Israel.
Overall, the past few days have been an exciting whirl, and every day we learn a little bit more about the city. It's amazing that one day we see the purest example of Gothic architecture ever built and the next say we see the most famous impressionist paintings ever painted. It brings me back to my Rome summer semester, where we'd have to crash in the middle of the day just to recharge our batteries for the evening ahead. Looking back, we've done a ton and it's good to realize how much we've accomplished.
New album:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2540454&id=5726231&l=bc4b67e5b2
Today, we may finally have hit our breaking point. We headed out for a full day at the Musee d'Orsay, which commands far more attention than we had originally estimated. We were there for over four hours which wouldn't have been so bad, but we skipped lunch and my contact lenses were giving me a lot of trouble. I struggled through the headache my poor vision gave me to enjoy countless (several hundred) famous Degas, Cezanne, Van Gogh, Manet etc. masterpieces. It was really incredible. Blind and hungry, we trudged our way home via a crowded metro, which required us to navigate new, confusing stations. After we climbed the hundred and twenty stairs up to our apartment I crashed for a two hour nap as Betsy read.
Perhaps it is just the difference between urban and rural places, but so far, Paris feels more like New York or Washington D.C. than the other places we've been in France--including bigger cities like Marseilles, Toulouse, and Bordeaux. The diversity, the density, the pace of life--the thing that make Paris a world city-- all separate it from our other experiences in France. That's not to say that there isn't a distinct French flavor. It's also been cold here (in the 50s), all the colder because we mailed home our heavy coats from Israel.
Overall, the past few days have been an exciting whirl, and every day we learn a little bit more about the city. It's amazing that one day we see the purest example of Gothic architecture ever built and the next say we see the most famous impressionist paintings ever painted. It brings me back to my Rome summer semester, where we'd have to crash in the middle of the day just to recharge our batteries for the evening ahead. Looking back, we've done a ton and it's good to realize how much we've accomplished.
New album:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2540454&id=5726231&l=bc4b67e5b2
Sunday, May 2, 2010
Midnight Train to Paris
Paris, France-- Wow, it is thrilling but a little strange to write that we are in Paris, the halfway point of our trip. But before I go into that, we got some very exciting news today! After weeks of waiting, Ben finally heard that he was accepted to Virginia Tech, one of the top-ranking architecture schools in the country and one of his top choices as well! Needless to say, I am very proud of him and we are very excited to start planning our life in Alexandria, Virginia (on the D.C. metro line).
Although the good news would have been welcome at any time, it was especially appreciated after the past few days. Beginning last Thursday, our relationship with Hans and Angela started feeling a little stale. It was their first time hosting WWOOFers, and it seemed like they might have been a bit anxious to get back to their normal routine. Ben and I are finding that the host-helper relationship is a very finely nuanced thing; it is difficult for both parties to know exactly what to expect and what is expected of them. Anyway, we have decided that a week and a half is good amount of time for a stay. It is long enough that we all get a chance to learn the ropes and get to know each other, but not long enough for everyone to tire of the situation.
We ended up cutting our stay in Puylaurens a night short, but only because of the horrific time we had trying to find a train to Paris. The original plan was to leave sometime this morning (Sunday, May 2), giving Marianne, our landlady, the chance to have the apartment ready for us by the time we arrived in the early evening. To make a long story short, the only train that had space for Eurail passengers (a budget pass) and did not interfere with Shabbat was the 12:49 overnight train. So that's what we took. Angela made it sound sort of glamourous, but after a two hour wait in the Toulouse train station, we boarded a crammed train full of coughing and sneezing, grumpy travelers with no respect for personal space. We "slept" in reclining chairs that you couldn't fully recline unless you wanted your head in the lap of the person behind you.
We arrived in Paris at 7:30 in the morning and because it is the Sunday of a holiday weekend (May 1st is Labor Day here), the city was eerily quiet. We found our apartment building with no trouble only to realize that we didn't have the access code. This meant a lot of frustrated waiting and phone calls and shlepping of heavy, broken luggage, wah wah. By 1:00, however, everything was going smoothly again. Our apartment is small, but beautiful, fully equipped, and in a wonderful central location. We already have a load of laundry in and are making it our home for the next four weeks.
Although the good news would have been welcome at any time, it was especially appreciated after the past few days. Beginning last Thursday, our relationship with Hans and Angela started feeling a little stale. It was their first time hosting WWOOFers, and it seemed like they might have been a bit anxious to get back to their normal routine. Ben and I are finding that the host-helper relationship is a very finely nuanced thing; it is difficult for both parties to know exactly what to expect and what is expected of them. Anyway, we have decided that a week and a half is good amount of time for a stay. It is long enough that we all get a chance to learn the ropes and get to know each other, but not long enough for everyone to tire of the situation.
We ended up cutting our stay in Puylaurens a night short, but only because of the horrific time we had trying to find a train to Paris. The original plan was to leave sometime this morning (Sunday, May 2), giving Marianne, our landlady, the chance to have the apartment ready for us by the time we arrived in the early evening. To make a long story short, the only train that had space for Eurail passengers (a budget pass) and did not interfere with Shabbat was the 12:49 overnight train. So that's what we took. Angela made it sound sort of glamourous, but after a two hour wait in the Toulouse train station, we boarded a crammed train full of coughing and sneezing, grumpy travelers with no respect for personal space. We "slept" in reclining chairs that you couldn't fully recline unless you wanted your head in the lap of the person behind you.
We arrived in Paris at 7:30 in the morning and because it is the Sunday of a holiday weekend (May 1st is Labor Day here), the city was eerily quiet. We found our apartment building with no trouble only to realize that we didn't have the access code. This meant a lot of frustrated waiting and phone calls and shlepping of heavy, broken luggage, wah wah. By 1:00, however, everything was going smoothly again. Our apartment is small, but beautiful, fully equipped, and in a wonderful central location. We already have a load of laundry in and are making it our home for the next four weeks.
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