Florence

Sorry for not writing.... I don't know why I haven't been bothered but I just haven't gotten the urge.  I owe it to myself to write as much as I can.  I am actually writing this from my friend's kitchen in Bordeaux, but I'm going to talk about my weekend in Florence.

I didn't leave Paris until 7PM.  I had choir all day so I was a little stressed on getting to the airport on time, but with the RER B going straight to Charles de Gualle I knew I only needed thirty five minutes to get there.  That was assuming the train was working.  Which it wasn't.  So naturally I had a panic attack and pretty much figured I was going to miss my flight.  I took my roommates advice and just took a cab.  Fifty-five euros later, I arrived at the Lufthansa terminal and checked in for my flight.  I had about thirty minutes before takeoff.  Whew!

When I landed in Frankfort I got a text from Katie, my friend from LCHS that I was going to visit in Florence.  She said that something happened and she was going to miss her connection getting her back to Florence around 11PM.  Now she wasn't arriving until 3AM.  Great... So I am going to a foreign country where I speak not one word of the language and my only friend isn't there.  Awesome!

Luckily for me, Katie had it under control.  She texted some of her friends and they met me at the train station.  I was able to put my suitcase at their apartment, and we kind of walked around the city at night.  A few things struck me as insanely cool about that night.  The first was the fact that three strangers were taking me around the city.  They had no idea who I was or what I was like but they let me put my suitcase in their apartment and stayed up with me until Katie arrived.  That night I promised myself that if anyone needs my help/hospitality they will get it.  The second thing that struck me about that night is how amazing European cities can be and how desensitized we can be to it.  I walked by the Duomo and I was shocked, but everyone I was with was just like, "Oh yeah... there it is..."  I guess I do the same thing with the Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame though...

So finally Katie gets there and we go to her apartment and we go to sleep.

The next morning (and by morning I really mean afternoon) we were going to meet Katie's brother who is in Chamber back at LCHS.  He was there on choir tour with the rest of Chamber and Concert Choir.  We picked him up and then headed back to Katie's where her friends made us an amazing lunch with pasta.  After that lunch, we walked around the town a lot.  It was nice seeing Katie and her brother.  I remember how much fun I had when Nick came and visited so it was cool seeing her brother and her having a good time.  We had to drop her brother off with the rest of the choir so they could get ready for their concert that we were going to that evening.

I cannot accurately describe what it was like to hear that choir sing.  It was the first time that I heard them since I was in the choir.  They sang some songs that I had sung when I was in it.  But the combined choirs sang Esto Les Digo, which was the first song that I ever sang in Chamber.  Maybe it was the fact that I had such fond memories of that song, or the fact that I was visiting a friend from LCHS or that I have seen more people from La Cañada in France than I have in the last two years, but it got me thinking about a lot of things and people that I hadn't in a while.  I got a little teary eyed thinking about how far removed I was from what I thought was my whole life back in high school.  It wasn't sadness though.  It was nostalgia.

Anyway, that evening we met up with some of Katie's friends and had one of the best pizzas I'd ever eaten.  Plus it was only four euros!  We ate our pizza on the steps of a church and had a lot of fun just kind of walking around and talking.  Everyone I met in Florence was incredibly nice to me.  It made it one of the most enjoyable trips I've had.

The next day was the day was Monday and Katie had class.  She said that I should come up to the villa and see her campus, so naturally I did.  She took me to one of her favorite Pannino places.  Ham, Tomatoes, Cheese and Pesto on fresh tuscan bread.  Wow.  Anyway, the only thing that was more impressive than that sandwich was her campus.  It was a villa that was donated to NYU back in the 1980's by some rich family.  It stretched across this valley and had gardens complete with statues of Roman gods.  I cannot believe they get to call that school for their time in Florence.  I fell asleep for an hour while Katie was in class.  There was this perfect bench next to a bubbling fountain for me to nap on.  It was pretty funny.  Katie's two roommates asked me that night if they saw me napping there.

That night we went out to a café where a lot of the people I had met were performing.  Katie is in the music business class and she told me that NYU Florence is one of two places that offer music courses.  So a lot of music students study abroad there.  Jordana, one of the two people who hung out with me when Katie was on her way back was performing, so we watched her.  Then Katie and I had a great dinner at a restaurant she had been to before and really liked.  Then we capped the night off by watching 500 Days of Summer and splitting a bottle of sparkling wine and some chips and chocolate at her apartment.

The next morning, Katie had more class and my plane left around 2PM.  I still hadn't seen any of the museums (except for going up the dome of the Duomo) so I needed to go see the David.  Oh my god.  I never thought of a statue as being attractive before, but there is something about the David that is just handsome.  I killed about two hours in the Academia seeing all there was to see there and then headed off to the airport.

That was my trip to Florence!

Je me sens bien

Never thought that I would be feeling this good while living abroad.  The leaves are back on the trees.  The sun is out more than it isn't.  I wear my mouth guard so my jaw isn't constantly hurting.  And to top it all off, not only did I not fail my courses last semester, but apparently I got straight A's.  I haven't even done that at UCSB.

Thinking ahead to the next six weeks, I know for a fact that May 17 will arrive and I will be wondering where the last nine months went.  I can still remember the first night Chez Michele, when she took me around and showed me how to get to SciencesPo.  It seems like a lifetime ago, but I'm sure I'll write a lot more on how I've changed closer to my departure.

Today all I want to do is just feel happy.  And that is what I am doing.  I'm sitting at my computer, listening to a great Pandora radio station looking at bright green leaves in the playground of the school that is across the street from house feeling good.  I had my normal lunch of ham sandwich, dessert and drink.  Later tonight I have choir.  And on Saturday I fly to Florence.  So far, I'm seeing nothing that can bring me down.

Since I haven't been keeping anywhere true to my New Years resolution of writing five times a week, I feel like I should recount some of the fun things that have happened since I last wrote.  The most notable one is that last Saturday, we successfully pulled off the surprise party for my roommate.  Not screwing up and telling her about was probably the hardest thing I've done this semester.  But luckily I didn't.

We had it set up.  I would go with Aliya over to Cam's house and just dial them to let them know we were downstairs.  Cam lives on the fifth (french) story so I raced up before Aliya to find everyone crouching down in the kitchen with the lights off.  Then she walks in and we all just shout "SURPRISE!"  She said she had NO idea.

That was probably one of the most fun nights I've had in Paris, though the next day and night were pretty fun.  The day after, Cam, Logan (Cam's bf), J.P. (Logan's friend who was visiting that I met the night before at the party), Sarah, Edmond Aliya and I all went over to Cam's to help him clean up.  It ended up being a second smaller party/brunch where we just ate the leftovers and watched youtube videos.  After we all went home and showered and got clean ourselves, I went out with Cam, Logan, and J.P.  It was J.P.'s last night in town, so we walked up around Montmartre and to the Moulin Rouge.  Then we had a great french dinner close to St. Michele.  We ended up back at my house, where unfortunately Cam had an asthma attack.  I told them that they needed to stay the night and that I could just go to J.P.'s hotel.  It wasn't too far from my house and none of us liked the idea of Cam climbing those five flights of stairs.

So that's basically been my life since Saturday.  Oh, I forgot to mention that I think I was pickpocketed.  I have to say though, I'm not even mad.  I'm impressed.  When we were at a supermarket picking up some drinks, I opened my wallet to find all of my smaller bills were gone.  I don't remember how much I had in my wallet, but it wasn't a lot.  I hid a fifty in the second fold of it though, which was still there.  But the weirdest thing was that none of my cards were missing, nor any of the other non-money things in my wallet.  And they did it all without me noticing.

Oh there was that and I almost got my iPod stolen.  It actually did happen to my roommate a few weeks ago.  Basically these three guys (who look like they are part of the Gypsies that plague france, more noticeably Paris) walk really close behind you.  If you have your iPod in your pocket, they will literally grab it and turn and walk away before you notice who did it.  Unfortunately for them when they did it to my roommate, she was listening to it so she felt them steal it.  Plus she had a broken wrist, so she basically had a plaster mace attached to her arm.  When she threatened to beat them, they gave it back.

My situation was a little different.  I saw these guys coming.  My metro stop is pretty crowded at night, luckily for me.  I first noticed these guys when one of them tried to cut between me and the wall on my right.  The weird thing is that there was only about a foot.  Then he turned around.  Some more people were coming through the exit going my direction, opposite from the three guys.  But they turned and started to follow me.  Right as one stuck his arm out to grab my iPod some stranger cut between us.  I finally realized what was going on, so I put my hand in my pocket and just booked it out of the metro.  I was a little jumpy until I got back to my apartment, but they weren't following me so all was good!

And despite all of that, I still feel this good! 

Printemps et les Anniversaires

Spring has sprung!

I have learned (and I'm pretty sure I've already written) that I hate winter.  I can find very few redeeming qualities about it.  I'm not one for winter sports, so that takes a majority of the fun out of the season.  I don't like always being cold.  Having to put on four layers just to walk two minutes to the bakery gets annoying and cumbersome.  The lack of sunlight is just depressing.  And the fact that all of the trees loose their leaves makes the surrounding environment look like war torn Europe.

But spring has come back.  There are buds on the trees.  Some plants already have blossoms on them.  I can open my window during the day and actually have a semi-warm breeze blow through my apartment.  Instead of being a ceiling of gray, I can actually see the sun, feel its warmth on my cheeks.

Yesterday was my roommates birthday.  I have some school projects I have to do, so I was going to meet my exposé partner yesterday afternoon, but before, Aliya, Cam and I decided we would go to a park and have a picnic.  Honestly, I couldn't think of a better way to spend the afternoon.  Yesterday was all around a wonderful day.

After we had our picnic in the park, Aliya and I went to SciPo to meet with our respective partners.  We stayed there for about an hour, then headed home.  Seeing as it was her birthday, we were having people over for a potluck.  That required that we make things.  We got back to our house around 5:00PM and then headed right back out to the store.  I was making bruschetta, and I wanted to pick up some drinks for the party.  I haven't yet developed the taste for wine, so I wanted to get a mixed drink.  (Side note, passion fruit liquor and Pineapple juice is delicious.)

Anyway, we didn't really get back to our house until around 6:00PM.  We told people to come over at 7:00PM.  We were a little rushed.  And to make matters worse, our gas was shut off because they are doing construction out side of our house.  The guardian of our building came over around 7:00PM with a construction worker who was supposed to turn our gas back on.  It didn't work.  That meant that not only did I not shower in the morning, which I HAVE to do, but I couldn't even shower before the people got here.  After they went around to the rest of the building, they returned with a different construction worker and he got it work.  I took the best three minute shower of my life.

After being all cleaned I got dressed and people started to arrive.  I would say we had between ten and fifteen people here.  It was a lot of fun.  We were hanging out in our kitchen, eating, drinking, talking.  Honestly nights like that and people like those help me get through the times when all I am thinking about is being back in SB.

And it also helped remind me how much amazing is going to happen between now and when I leave.  This weekend my friend Alyssa from SB is coming to visit.  Then I have tickets to go to Florence.  The weekend after, I'll most likely be spending a few days in Bordeaux visiting my friends down there.  Then its off to Ireland with my roommate (tentatively).  Then easter weekend in Paris, followed by the arrival of my mom and grandma.  Then after a few days of touring Paris, we are going off on our cruise to Greece, Croatia and Italy.  The day after I get back from that I'll be heading to Barcelona.  Then I leave France for good on May 17.

Time is going to fly by.

Le Banlieu

I had never really ventured out of Paris except to go to a specific city.  Today that changed.

Last Sunday, Jerome, my host brother, called to wish me a happy birthday.  He also invited me over to his house.  He asked me the when I could come, so I said a week would be fine, next Sunday.  That was today.

I remember writing about how I always dreaded going to dinner with Michele and the family, but once at the table it was always fun.  That's how I felt today.  My stomach wasn't feeling so hot this morning, so I almost used it as an excuse to tell Jerome I couldn't come.  But something inside of me told me I had to go. I literally would have done nothing else today, so there was no legitimate reason for me to not go.  And I am incredibly happy I did.

Georgiana, Jerome and Lucas live in an incredibly nice suburb of Paris, about twenty minutes away from the Arc de Triumph.  It was a pretty simple train ride to get there.  I had to change twice, but all was fine.  I made it there a little early, so I just sat in the sun at the train station for about ten minutes before I told Jerome I was ten minutes away.  He told me where he could meet me, so I waited there for about twenty more minutes, and then he, Lucas and I walked up to his apartment.

Their apartment isn't anything spectacular until you see their view.  It is smaller than where I live, with a kitchen about a third the size of mine.  Their bedroom is probably comparable to mine.  And they have a great living room, maybe a little bigger than mine.  But the view from their living room is amazing.  Imagine what you would expect to see looking out from a five story building over a sleepy little french town.  Church steeples, roundabouts, gardens, gabled roofs... Yeah, that is what they see.  I don't think it could have been any more French if they tried.

When I got there, Michele, my host mother, and two other people were there already.  From what I gathered, one of the two of the people there worked with Michele at some point.  Never did quite get the details.  All I know is the man, who was very friendly, was from Greece so it was difficult at times for me to understand his French.  His (presumably) wife was French, but she grew up in Algeria.  I liked her, mainly because we commiserated on how much we don't like winter.

After we stuffed ourselves with Georgiana's fantastic hors d'oeuvres, everyone decided to take a walk.  The greek said he knew of a great park that would be wonderful for Lucas.  He was not lying.

We headed out of Jerome's place, baby in his stroller, and walked through the neighborhood.  I'm not really sure why, but there was a canal we followed on our way to the park.  It was pretty neat.  There were some french kids, dressed in blue dockers and sweaters with their collars of their polo shirts popping out playing with a boat in the canal's water.  Again, I imagined that I would see that exact image in a movie.

We got to the park and we walked around some more.  It was so nice, just being able to walk outside and not hate life because of the bitter cold that made you forget what your nose felt like.  The most exciting part of the walk though, was seeing buds on the trees.  The Paris city center still doesn't quite have that yet, but we don't get as much sunshine as they get out in the burbs...

The park had an interesting layout.  There were some large fields on the edges, but the actual park park consisted of a moat and an island with a smaller strip of green rimming the moat.  We walked onto the island.  One thing that was a little shocking was how many families were out.  I guess since it was the first day that you really could go to the park, everyone had the same idea as us.  By far the funniest/saddest part was seeing a group of three little boys playing soccer.  Then one of them kind of sits down and starts crying.  No one seems to notice, mainly because his family thought he was crying because the other two boys wouldn't let him play with the ball.

In actuality, he had peed himself.  I'm not talking about a little wet spot.  It was like he had just fallen into a fountain.  Poor kid...

But walking around that park I realized how much I miss sunshine and warm weather.  It may be because I have a little less than two months left in France, but most things here are reminding me what I love about Santa Barbara, whether they are good things or bad.  For example, the rain makes me love SB for its sunshine.  The sunshine reminds me that I go to a school where for a vast majority of the time it is just like this.

I will be sad to leave France though.  I was riding with Michele on the RER back to Paris, and I realized how incredibly lucky I was to get a host family like them.  They invited me to their house, they fed me, and after I moved out they still stayed in contact with me.

It's people like that, that I will miss most.

Lycée

So tonight I had two friends from La Cañada come visit me.  It was probably one of the strangest things that has happened to me since leaving LCHS.

Remy and Lauryn were always good friends.  I've gone to school with them since 3rd grade.  When Lauryn posted on my wall on my birthday that she was going to be in Paris I was ecstatic.  Normally there is that feeling of dread when I am supposed to go meet people that I haven't seen in a long time, but I was just excited to see both of them.  I hadn't really talked to either since I had graduated, with the exception of a few instant message conversations over the last three years.

When they were here naturally we talked a lot about our experiences in high school.  We gossiped about secretes we didn't share because they were THE most important things in our lives, which now didn't mean anything (the secrets, not our lives).  We had a few drinks and just caught up.  It really got me thinking though, about how much I miss La Cañada.

When we were in Morocco, my dad and JoAnn closed the deal on our house.  For the first time I have no residence in California.  My mom moved to Boulder the summer after my senior year of high school and Dad did the same to Texas.  I always felt a connection to LC mainly becuase we were still renting out our house there.  But now that connection is gone.  Except it isn't.

It is kind of hard to explain.  I remeber when I was going off to UCSB, my brother tried to make me feel better about not going back to LC.  He told me that my social group moved on to college with me.  And that is very true.  I love the friends I've made at SB.  They are some of the best I have ever had.  But there is that little something that is missing.  The kids at SB only know college A.J.  Remy and Lauryn, and everyone else that I went from third grade to twelfth grade knew who I was, who I was becoming and all had ideas about who I was going to be.  It is really weird knowing that there are people I used to see every day for years that I haven't talked to in years.

I mean, these two lovely young women are a fine example.  I had classes with them throughout high school.  I would see them every day.  We all had the same group of friends.  We all were in the same AP classes.  We all kind of just knew each other.  And it is strange how simple it is for us to go years without talking to one another.  The even stranger part is how normal everything is when we got together.  It felt like we were right back in LC.  Instead of my kitchen in Paris, we could have been in Remy's living room or Lauryn's family room.  Nothing had changed, yet we are all incredibly different people.

I can't say that my experience is unique, in that I have changed a lot since going off to college.  I can say my experience is unique in that I am the only one who ever has or ever will experience it.  So I can appreciate those who empathize and sympathize with what I am feeling, but they will never one hundred percent understand what it is I am trying to portray.  They may come close, but this is an experience only I can ever really know.

The one thing that I have learned with all that I have gone through (granted in the grand scheme of things it isn't a lot) is that every decision, choice, everything I have ever done or said, has lead me to this moment.  If I could go back and relive any part of my life, I would do everything the same.  If I changed something, who knows where I would be now.  It is possible I could have an alternate reality that is much better than this one.  But I have learned to be content with what I have and love the ones I'm with. And I've also learned that there is an equally large chance that the alternate reality may not be nearly as wonderful as what I have.

I've always been one to take things for granted.  It is probably one of my biggest faults.  Instead of praising what is good, I denounce what is bad.  When I first got out of La Cañada High School all I could remember was how terrible the administration treated the students, how crappy some of the teachers were, some of the terrible decisions t hat were forced upon the student body.  Now that I have time, perspective and a little bit of wisdom I can remember the nights driving around with my friends, getting the 2:00AM Lucky Boy breakfast burrito, going to the high school dances and just having a great time.  I can remember the long conversations about our future and feeling how everything I was doing or saying was SO incredibly important.  I'm sure in ten, twenty or even thirty years I will look back on this blog and thing about how stupid I sound now for trying to sound all deep and wise, but c'est la vie.

That is the course that our lives take.  Every day brings more experiences that allow us to put what we go through in perspective.  I love my friends at UCSB, I love Paris and more and more I am remembering fondly my years at La Cañada.

Je serai comfotable bientot

I'll be home relatively soon.  I have some great trips planned, including Florence, Ireland, Bordeaux, Barcelona and Greece/Croatia/Venice.  But I am ready to get back to Santa Barbara.

I think the feeling that I have when I think about wanting to be back in SB isn't guilt.  It's more shame.  I feel a little ashamed that I don't like living abroad more than I do.  I've seen first hand how people I am close to think of those who refuse to travel, experience new cultures, see new things.  I would hate for them to think that I am as close minded as they think those others are.  But it is really hard living here.

Living here has taught me how much I really appreciate and am fascinated by the United States.  It also has taught me that the stereotype about Americans being very closed minded isn't fair.  I have always been open and interested in learning about where my friends come from.  And believe me, they love talking about their home countries and not only how great they are but how much better they are than the United States (especially the Canadians).  Honestly, I didn't know we were in a competition.  I mean, studying Globalization yeah I know about international rivalries and stuff, but that is for companies and governments, not for students.  My view is that we are supposed to come over here and not only learn about the culture we are trying to live in, but learn things from those around us.

I know a lot more about Australian politics than I ever thought I would because of the conversations I've had with my friends.  I know how the court systems of Canada work thanks to the conversations I've had with my roommate.  I've really learned a lot.  But I am so sick and tired of people always talking crap about the United States.  Even if that is how they feel, I don't think they realize how incredibly rude it is to insult something that someone may care strongly about.

I finally understand why my dad says my step mom can get so offended if I complain about the weather in Houston, and I am only mentioning the weather!  People here talk about Americans, as in the actual people.  They talk crap about our government, about the decisions our politicians have made, about our electoral process.  I can only say I disagree with Bush too many times before I start to get annoyed that they thought I agreed with him in the first place.

I do not think the United States is perfect.  But I don't think that it is fair for those who have never lived there or really even traveled there to judge it as harshly as a lot of people here do.  I am proud to be an American and I always will be.

Mon Anniversaire

It finally happened.  I am officially twenty-one.  And I have to say, Paris is a pretty cool place to turn twenty one. I'm not going to lie, it would have been incredibly fun to have all of my friends from SB surrounding me while I took my first sip of alcohol, but I am happy with how my night turned out for me.

On Thursday night, I had a friend from LCHS come and stay with me.  Katie Hale is studying in Florence, Italy this semester from NYU, so when I told her she should come over to Paris for my birthday she looked for flights and found a decent one.  Unfortunately, she couldn't get a good price home on Sunday so she had to leave Saturday.  But she still came, which meant a lot.

I had another friend come and visit.  I saw Amara in Spain, and she knew that she would be coming to Paris for my birthday since about November.  She got here on Friday morning and left Monday afternoon, so she was able to be here for my full day.

So now to the actual birthday part.  Weather.com said it would be raining all day on Sunday, so I had been praying to the powers that be for it not to.  Somehow I think they heard me.  Well, sort of.

I feel kind of unique in that I got to choose where I wanted to have my first drink.  I chose to have it at the Trocadero, which is the museum that is just across the river from the Eiffel Tower.  So the crew was me, my roommate, and some friends from SciencesPo, plus Amara and a guy that Aliya's friends introduced us to back in September who we have become friends with, named Xavier.  So the group all left my house to head down to the Eiffel Tower.

I also knew I wanted my first drink to be champagne.  Earlier that night Amara and I had gone to the store to buy stuff to make dinner.  On that same trip, I had bought my first alcohol.  We just let it chill in the fridge while we were waiting to go out.  Then we took the metro to the place.

The Eiffel Tower sparkles every hour on the hour for about five minutes.  I didn't trust my phone, so I decided I was going to let the sparkling lights tell me when it was 12:00AM on March, 13 2011.  As soon as that tower lit up I popped the cork and took my first sip.

It tasted terrible.

Luckily my friends knew it would taste terrible to me, so they bought be a palatable alcohol which I drank instead.  It was a fun night.  But I did say that the powers that be only sort of stopped the rain.  When we left the apartment it was barely drizzling.  When we got down to the tower it was more than a little drizzling.  But that didn't stop me.  I was going to have that experience so help me God, so we powered through.  What was a little strange is that the rain seemed to stop a few minutes after my birthday started.

After the tower, some of us headed to a bar.  The only thing that wasn't perfect about my birthday is that literally half the people we were with just left without saying goodbye.  No texts.  No calls.  Nothing.  I had already gone into the bar and they just bounced.  But c'est la vie.  I was feeling too good to really care.  Plus I really really loved the people that stuck around.  I almost think it was better that there wasn't a big number of us, because it meant that there were fewer people to take into account if we wanted to do anything.

Also, something really strange happened to me on the way to the Eiffel Tower.  I couldn't put any pressure on my right shin.  I was walking like a cripple.  Right before we started up the stairs at the Trocadero though, it stopped hurting. It was a birthday miracle!  I can't quite describe what it felt like.  It was like I had a bruise but it was on the bone itself.  It had happened before, but never for that long or that intense.

So that was the actual first drink story.  Champagne under a sparkling Eiffel Tower with some pretty amazing people.

Then there was the next day.  I didn't really know what I wanted to do during the day, so I took Amara around and we saw some stuff.  We went to a really good restaurant close to the Louvre, then into the Louvre.  I saw the Egyptian stuff (I go there every time I go to the Louvre) and we also saw the required sites (Winged Victory, Liberty Leading the People, The Mona Lisa, that kind of stuff).  Then we headed over to the Eiffel Tower so Amara could see it during the day.  Unfortunately the clouds didn't make for a pretty sky, but the cherry trees were blooming so we still got some good pictures.  Then we headed home.

I had made a reservation at a restaurant called Refuge de Fondue.  It is pretty famous for serving wine in baby bottles.  Yes, actual baby bottles, nipple and all.  I still don't have a refined pallete so the red wine I got tasted gross, and I couldn't finish it.  Thankfully my friend Owen was there to do that for me.  Again, I had a great time, except for the fact that so many people canceled last minute.  But those that did come I really appreciated.  I had five different nationalities eating with me, including French.  The fondue was delicious too!

Looking back, this may not be the best birthday I have ever had, but it will be one of the most memorable in my life.  I don't think I would change anything about either of my birthday nights.