DONE!!!!!!

having finished A WHOLE lot of writing, i don't feel like posting anything now though i have many things i'm thinking of. yup. i'm done. wow. this was all so unreal.

A Dedication

So I don’t think people dedicate blogs in the same way that they dedicate books, but if that were the case, here is my dedication:

“To Mrs. Greenberg, the first person who tried (and failed) to make me less loquacious, and also the person who taught me that word.”

What made me think of this? And some of my constant readers (hi Grandma, mom, dad, Marianne, Alyssa & Sarah--hi!) may be asking, who is this Mrs. Greenberg anyway?

To answer the second question first, Mrs. Greenberg was my fourth grade teacher. You know how some people have those stupid posters that say “Everything I need to know I learned in kindergarten”? (I’ve noticed these posters are especially popular with kindergarten teachers.) Well in all seriousness, for the second summer in a row, it has occurred to me that everything I need to know I learned in fourth grade. In Mrs. Greenberg’s class we had a loooot of homework. I hated it at the time, but I am convinced that I must have developed some sort of work ethic there. (I procrastinated a lot, and things haven’t really changed.) We had a list of spelling words each week. Monday night we had to alphabetize them, Tuesday night we had to write a sentence using each word, Wednesday night we had to write a short story using all of them, and Thursday night we had to study for our spelling quiz on Friday. Thursday night was easy since I was a super-duper-speller. (As several of my readers have pointed out (Amy/Dad) my spelling/general homonym use in this blog has taken a serious turn for the worse. The same thing happened when I was in Paris last summer; French immersion renders me unable to spell English words correctly.) So anyway, I got really really good at alphabetizing. When I spent all of last summer filing alphabetically endless documents/manuscripts/contracts at my two lit agency internships, I remember thinking that I could have completed these jobs--that I needed a personal recommendation and the Harvard name to get—just as well upon my completion of 4^th grade. But such is the stupid life of an unpaid/minimally paid intern, and that is a separate rant for a separate time.

So as any reader of this blog can tell, I am more than a little wordy. Part of the reason I hold Hemingway in such esteem is because he can do something with words I’ll never be able to do, that is, mainly, use less of them. My work this summer, however, for Let’s Go has been a constant exercise in conciseness. I must summarize every meal I eat, every museum I visit, every post office I encounter in 30 words or less.

“30 words or less” is the phrase that popped into my head today as I was walking through this gorgeous park in Amiens on one of the most gorgeous days I’ve had all trip. I found myself actually trying to take in the park in a 2 sentence summary (which I can’t include here for copyright reasons…haha, I feel slightly badass being able to say that). But it was very strange and I was reflecting on how I had come to perceive many things through this lens of “how can I best summarize this for readers in 30 words or less.” It is a very weird and difficult to explain phenomenon that you probably wouldn’t be able to fully understand not having viewed and experienced a 5^th of France in little 30 words or less segments. I suppose my editors would be happy about this state of mind.

Anyway, the phrase “30 words or less” was ringing in my head, and it seemed really familiar. Then I remembered these terrible book reports we had to do in fourth grade, which were the bane of my existence at the time, and sort of the equivalent of the 25 page papers I have to write now in their relative difficulty level. And the absolute hardest part was that we were required to start the book reports by summarizing the plot in “30 words or less.” This was always so difficult for me to do, but by the end of the year, I was awesome at describing how “Everyone in the dystopian town takes pills so they can’t see in color and except for one boy who can secretly experience all the sensations of the world.” (29 words, I think actually did read The Giver for the first time in 4^th grade, but definitely didn’t know the word dystopian).

And once again, this was a skill I learned in 4^th grade that would have allowed me to do this job when I was 10. Well okay, maybe I learned a few other skills between then and now that allowed me to travel through France by myself for the last 2 months (a blog entry on “skills” which I have been thinking about for awhile to come later…and I do maintain that a 10 year old could intern just as well as a 20 year old college student at a literary agency). But the ability to summarize succinctly, cleverly and comprehensively was the real basis and product of this job.

So yea, this is what made me think of Mrs. Greenberg. This has actually been the millionth time I have wanted to thank her for various things (4^th grade=major year), like when I played a strict teacher in a play in high school and based the character on her, or while doing homework late into the night and knowing I’ll actually get it done, or alphabetizing paperwork dating back to 1995 at the lit agency. Unlike most teachers who would give me work that I found really easy, and upon finishing it in like 2 minutes would let me have free time while the rest of my classmates kept working (or in the case of 3^rd grade, when I got a 100 on a test, didn’t have to take any more tests for the rest of the year—sorry to brag about these successes of 10 years ago, but hey, I was a smart kid!), she always had more work for me to do. As a 10 year old kid who just wanted to play on the playground, this was very frustrating. But I have realized retrospectively what an enormous impact she had on me, and I can’t think of any teachers from the Hendrick Hudson School District days who have pushed me as hard. Very sadly, she died (I think in 2004), along with several members of her family in a terribly tragic car accident in Mexico. I wish I could contact her to thank her for all these various things, and I think I actually might write her husband a letter about this.

Anyway, this ended up being a slightly less light-hearted entry than most, but it was what I was thinking about today. Off to din din, in this fabulous weather. And holy crapoli, tomorrow is my last day of this job. Just when I started to get good at it…

Belated Bastille Day Post

I have just arrived in Amiens, the LAST TOWN on my itinerary. The sun is shining. woohoo. but here is a post i wrote the night of Bastille Day (Bastille Night?) when I didn't have internet at my hotel, copied and pasted for your delight:

July 14, 2007

(I think I will put this on the blog). ((haha that i wrote that in the word document))

It occurred to me today, on Bastille Day, that I have known the Marseillaise for way longer than I knew it was the Marseillaise. I grew up listening to Alan Sherman (the original weird Al), and he has a song about Louis XVI called “You went the wrong way old King Louis,” and it begins to the tune of the Marseillaise. “Louis the XVI was the kiiiing of France in 1789…he was worse than Louis the XV, he was worse than Louis the XIV, he was worse than Louis the XIII…he was the worst, since Louis the first. King Louis was living like a king, and the people were living rotten, but then there was this whole thing called the French revolution that will never be for-gotttt-en….”

In any event, that is to the tune of the Marseillaise if you feel like singing along. This is also probably the reason I’m a nerd, since I grew up listening to things like this. (hi mom and dad! Thanks for making me a nerd, seriously!) I didn’t actually hear the Marseillaise today, though. While the general celebrations I attended (fireworks, carnival, etc) were like the U.S. (except for a few differences to come), they were must less cornily patriotic. I think I saw about one French flag hanging from somebody’s apartment window. Nobody was wearing blue, white and red, flag t-shirts, J’aime la France t-shirts, etc. And no Marseillaise. I kind of wanted to hear it, especially after falling in love with that amazing scene in La Grande Illusion where they sing it. (Conversation in Paris a week ago when the Star Spangled Banner came on in a bar we were in: Rich: I actually really like the Marseillaise. Me: Me too, have you ever seen La Grande Illusion? Rich: That’s my favorite movie.)

Calais actually proved to be an awesome town in which to celebrate 14 juillet, as everyone calls it. This is a serious beach town, so the night time festivities were all on the huge beach. There was a goofy polka band, and all the glace stands were still around serving big cones of deliciousness. The sun doesn’t actually fully set here till about 10:45pm, so the fireworks didn’t start till 11. At 10pm I saw a large crowd of people forming somewhere so I decided to investigate. Turns out the Calais festival committee was giving out glow sticks to the crowd, but then it turned out only to children. Confession: I lied and said I had a small child because they didn’t want to give me one. Oh well. I got my hot pink glow stick! I didn’t really think about the fact that after I swindled it I would look like a huge dork walking around with it because all the other people holding them were indeed small children. But I am a huge dork. So it is ok.

So I got a good seat on one of the walls by the beach, and settled in around 10:15. It was actually ridiculously cold, and the thousands of Calaisois were in winter coats and scarves. I luckily had put on a long sleeved t-shirt so I wasn’t utterly freezing. I was just generally crowd watching, taking pictures of the pretty sunset, and after watching like 20 wheelchairs go by I thought, “wow there are a lot of handicapped people in Calais.” Then I realized I was sitting on the wall of the handicap ramp down to the beach.

At around 10:30 it actually started to get slightly terrifying. There were thousands of people on the beach and dozens of kids who decided to start “les feus d’artifice” (fireworks) early, lighting off fire crackers, sketchy fireworks, loud noises, etc all over the beach. This was actually what I found to be the biggest difference from the U.S. I seemed to be the only person who was freaked out that 7 year old kids were lighting fireworks really haphazardly directly over my head. In the U.S., parents wouldn’t bring their darling children near such a spectacle, would warn them about firework safety, never to play with matches, if you see a person smoking a cigarette run away, etc.. Here, the parents were giving the kids more fireworks and cheering them on, laughing when the fireworks would fire horizontally across the beach landing inches from people. Taking the cue from the rest of the crowd of thousands that was completely okay with this rather dangerous (in my minority opinion) behavior, I chilled out and played with my pink glow stick. I actually could see the fireworks really far in the distance in Dover, and that was cool. (I know it is Dover because dozens of ferries go back and forth there and leave from right next to the Calais beach.) Why there were fireworks in Dover is more of a mystery.

When the fireworks actually began, at 11 on the dot, they were really impressive, and were shot off the pier near the Friterie stand where I had my first lunch of French fries earlier today at the beach. It was actually a complex music and light (the French love their son-et-lumiere) show, and the voiceovers in between the music were hilarious. The theme of the show was “travels around the world” (fitting for me!), and so the fireworks were divided into different “geographical segments.” As a crowd we traveled through the jungles of Africa, the wild west of the United States (to what sounded a lot like Holst’s Mars), South America (to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s Carol of the Bells, which I truly found hilarious. Maybe French people don’t know that this is usually a Christmas song/not related to South America in any significant way that I’m aware of…at least they could have used it for the Russia segment?), each firework segment went along with the funny music. But the final “grand finale” segment was the best. The voiceover was essentially like, “And now that we have traveled all around the world, we must remember that all the people are brothers. And we must protect our brothers. And most of all, we must protect our brother, the planet, and conserve the environment.”

I thought about this while walking back to my hotel (in a HUGE crowd that reminded me of the time when we had to flee some island in Memphis because of the pouring rain, or something…I was young, but I remember a really big crowd leaving fireworks) enshrouded in a gigantic cloud of smoke left over from the fireworks that was just floating through and polluting the air, and then walking past a line of about 100 people in the street, lined up to buy cigarettes from the only Tabac that was open today. Sorry brother planet.

All in all, a really fun relaxing day. I’m happy I decided to take part in the 14 Juillet festivities. Only four more days of Let’s Go left to go. That is really wild. I have definitely really gotten into the groove of this. It is just what I do. I wake up, visit a museum or tourist office or two, eat lunch, visit more museums/internet cafes/Laundromats, pass out on my bed for about an hour, have dinner, briefly check nightlife, write, pass out. But I really realized that I was so used to this job today when I was sitting in a restaurant tonight with really slow service (but really delicious…and I had my first escargot of the trip, and it was actually fantastic, wish I started eating that earlier), and realized I had been sitting alone at my table for nearly 2 hours and was completely non-phased by this at all. Eating alone is actually really relaxing (once you get over the loneliness or awkwardness of it, which I forgot about after a week or two and now don’t even consider.) It is fun to wonder what that couple who has been staring at you for an hour thinks you are doing. Do they think I am a loser who can’t get a date? A liberated feminist who doesn’t need a man to take her to dinner? A reviewer? (d. all of the above? Haha). The past week or so I have been eating pretty expensive multi course dinners (though I’m still keeping under budget.) Once I didn’t have to take day trips anymore, which were the bane of my existence for awhile, that cleared up 10-20 euro a day to spend on making this “toute seule” life a little more luxurious.

Despite the fact that I still have an ocean full of sand covering my scalp after laying on the windy beach today (and this is after a shower, mind you), I am in a fabulous mood. The sun really makes life a lot easier, and fireworks are so pretty!

((note from actual day of posting...i still have some freaking sand in my scalp. several showers later i cannot get rid of it.))

the sun

came out. finally. i am in the beach town of calais and today is my day off since it is bastille day. i went to the beach and hung out for a few hours this morning and am now totally covered in sand.

yes. it may actually be summer.

On the SNCF lean

So, I have been thinking about this for a really long time. There has been nothing on this trip that has irked me more than what I have so lovingly named "the SNCF lean." For those who haven't had the pleasure of travelling by train throughout France, a really fun and relaxing way to travel, you may not know that SNCF is France's train company. I've actually had good experiences with the trains so far (excepting that one time that the train just didn't stop), but the absolute worst part is waiting in line for sometimes up to hour just to get a ticket. They have installed electronic machines to alleviate this wait, but unfortunately American credit cards don't have the chip you need to use them. Grrrr...

So while waiting in line to buy tickets, which is usually every day or two, the absolute most frustrating thing is the "SNCF lean". here is the situation. joe shmoe, or we'll call him jacques shmacques, goes up to the window. first of all, it is important to know that there are usually about 10 guichets (or ticket windows). without fail, only 4 are open at any time. workers can put on the "guichet ferme" sign whenever the hell they want. it is so weird. so anyway, jacques wants a ticket to Australia. simple thing. goes up to the window, and about 10 people are in line behind him. suddenly, it seems like he is going to be there for awhile. the girl at the window wearing too much make up and the hideous SNCF purple button down shirt is starting to look confused. she stares at her computer. does that french sigh thing that sort of resembles spitting (anyone know what i'm talking about?). she clarifies jacques' request. looks at the computer. another SNCF worker, who is sitting in a chair doing nothing (seriously, there are always at least two of these people sitting about 5 feet behind the ticket window, doing nothing at all.) notices that her colleague is looking confused. she comes over and worker one starts explaining the situation, slowly, and with more spitting/sighing.

two things can happen now. if the gods are smiling, the rescue worker can easily solve the problem. often, the gods are angry.

the second SNCF worker will lean over the computer screen, and start to look at it closely. they will start moving their head back and forth as if their eyes don't have the ability to move left and right. sometimes they will take the mouse from the original workers hand and start clicking. all of these things are done with the back at about a 75 degree angle to the legs. spitting/sighing noises are now made by both while the customer just stands there, not actually pissed off because at least he isn't waiting in line anymore.

unfortunately, this rarely helps. most of the time, the leaner will improve posture and walk away. those waiting in line might falsely take this as a sign that Jacques is almost done buying his impossible train ticket to Australia. but no. leaner 1 returns with a more senior member of the team. either an older man, or a woman in her 40s whose make up is much better than the original girl. as original girl sits there, leaner one will resume leaning position, and senior member will now also lean over the two others, at more of a 60 degree angle. the three workers will now chat, sigh/spit, ask clarifying questions to jacques, who still just simply wants his train ticket to Australia. Jacques may ask a question, and all three will chime in together, speaking over eachother.

Eventually, he will give up and go to the airport. The first person in line with start to make his way over to the now empty guichet, only to find that it is now ferme.


To people who have never waited in an SNCF line, you probably think I've lost it. But seriously, if you ever find yourself in a train station in France (I recommend the one in Metz btw...it is absolutely amazing. you could live in it, it has so many modern stores, and there is wifi. also the line you wait in is really high tech, with these funky chairs you can sit in while you wait forever), you might think back to this post and know exactly what I mean.






unrelatedly, i am currently in Lille, which has been my least favorite town yet, actually. I leave tomorrow morning for beachy Calais. Yay beach towns in 60 degree weather in july. But Lille. There is just absolutely no reason to come here. There is nothing here that you can't find in Paris, and obviously you can also find much more in Paris. While chatting with my editor, i likened it to the relationship between Boston and New York. New York=Paris, Boston=Lille. Sure boston has some "cultural character," as does Lille, but it is just generally further north, colder, smaller and less exciting, with a sub par public transit system. (It was on the metro here that I actually talked my way out of a 25 euro fine. yay/sort of. it was one of those situation where it is seriously the ONE TIME you forget and then get caught. i forgot to validate my ticket (i really did) and it was the only time the entire trip when the transit officers stopped me to check. to my prague buddies, it was like that, and i actually thought he was trying to sell me something at first too. so immediately dropped into poor innocent American tourist who is totally ignorant of this validation system but happens to speak good French. this worked, and i talked my way out of the fee. it was a minor annoyance, and i'm happy i didn't have to pay.

but lille. ugh. to demonstrate why people shouldn't come here, here is an anecdote to show that Americans don't come here. I was in a restaurant tonight and I was chatting with the waiter (sort of cute, sorry J). eventually he asked (as they all do because my accent sucks), where are you from? (this question is actually much preferable to people just speaking to me in English). I was like les etats-unis, and he was shocked. he was like, "vraiment? (this is in french, but i'll continue in English). Wow. that is so strange. we have tourists from Belgium and sometimes England here, but never anybody from the U.S. Quite a trip, eh?. So apparently people know not to come here. it really isn't a bad place, but there is just nothing here you can't get in Paris.

except, apparently, cheap appartments, which is why lots of students come here to study. (i was chatting with some people in my hostel looking for appartments).

this has been a long post, but i have been typing on an off while i watch the tour de france on the hostel TV.

also, harry potter in French was awesome. I realized there really is very little dialogue in the movie. it was much easier for me to understand than this movie i saw about a month ago called "conversations avec mon jardinier" which granted, as i should have known from the title, is just a long conversation between a man and his gardener. also, Hogwarts is called Poudlard in French, which is really badass/hilarious.



Ah, so something good about Lille. They had two really cool museums, one of which is in an old municipal pool and now has really funky modern art and statues. it was going that there i nearly had to part with 25 euro.


this has been random, and if you made it this far i commend you. woah, some guy just changed the channel on the TV to some really weird arabic music video.

one more week of Let's Go, and then I go to Berlin. Fun!

so i was going to post

on a whole variety of thoughts i had today, but i made a facebook album instead. go look at my pictures!

also i saw the new Harry Potter movie in french today. more on that in this ambiguous longer post that will exist at some point.

hi!

i am in lille, finishing up my 5th copy batch tonight. i'll probably do a longer post tomorrow on all the fun i've had in the past week or so. i didn't have wifi for 3 days (gasp!). ok, till soon.

Paris is wonderful. Having been here for the past two days, I realized that I have just been sort of rationalizing to myself that these other places are as good. They are interesting and I am more than happy that I've had the opportunity to visit them. But they aren't Paris.

Gothic Cathedrals, and my love/hate relationship with them

I go to, on average, 1-3 cathedrals/large churches a day, most of them gothic. I am frankly very very burnt out on them. If I see another freaking piece of stained glass (from the 13th century! glass that survived WWI! by Marc Chagall!--i am so sick of it all...well actually, the Marc Chagall glass in Metz and Riems is pretty cool).......I probably won't do anything about it. But yea, making empty threats on the stained glass makes me feel better. I am really just tired of looking at them though. Besides the interesting architecture (which is only interesting for so long), they are spiritually void for me. I can't really fathom how people can focus on praying with so many distracting things to look at (though i know, i know, the decorations are intended to enhance the experience.) I really don't mean this to offend anybody, but as somebody who is very much not Catholic, I just find the whole thing puzzling.

So that was the negative part of my relationship with les cathedrals. But indeed, there is some sunlight behind that stained glass! First of all, awesome thing to keep in mind if you are travelling in an old european city: a cathedral can save you from any weather. it is really the only indoor place besides your hotel room where you can sit down for free, and you can sit for as long as you want. Think about it...if it is raining and you need to get inside, you'd have to pay for something in a restaurant, cafe, bar, museum, etc. the cathedral will be nice and dry. if it is beastly hot outside, a cathedral is always at least 10 degrees cooler (figure made up by me, but there is a huge difference in temperature...not that i've seen the sun in two weeks, but once upon a time it was really hot here). Second, most cathedrals are really really really tall and always near the center of town. Generally taller than any other buildings in older cities. This means that if you find yourself lost, you can just look to the skies and find yourself again. (I have a feeling that the builders might have designed them so people could look to the skies and spiritually find themselves again, and less so physically when they are looking for an ATM--always near Cathedrals! I am uninterested in finding Jesus or any of his affiliates, but I often have a great interest in finding the center of town/tourist office, also usually near the cathedral.)

What sparked this rant? Well mainly just a lot of cathedrals, but more specifically today I had to walk about a mile out of town to visit some champagne maisons, and walking back (in generally the correct direction, but more generally confused), I found myself sort of lost. Then I looked up and saw Reims' cathedral and realized I was quite close to target. And then on the rest of my long walk I was just generally thinking about my pro/con feelings on the huge amount of them that i've seen.

I am pretty tired, but am going to head out to dinner/visit a few bars. Today just involved tons of walking because I had to get to the Champagne houses and then once there, take an hour long tour on foot of the caves. After visiting 5 champagne maisons in the last 3 days, I am truly an expert on every step of the process. Quiz me, grill me, I will not fail. Interested in degorgement? I'm your gal. At the last place I was slated to take a tour, they messed up and printed the wrong time on my ticket, and when I was perplexed about why no friendly, well dressed woman with a scarf (the caves are cold!) had appeared to lead me into the -30m abyss, I went to the desk and they were like, "oh no! you missed the last tour of the day." when i explained that it was very much their fault, they did feel bad and asked if i wanted 2 or 3 glasses of champagne instead of a tour. i thought about this long and hard. Pommery is a really fancy champagne company and you will never find 3 glasses for 10 euro. then i remembered that a) i was ridiculously tired, b) i had over a mile to walk back to the town, and c) this was probably a pour idea considering the only thing i have eaten so far today was a little quiche lorraine for lunch. so i just asked for my money back, which they begrudgingly gave me. but then they had a change of heart, and gave me a free glass of champagne anyway. score!!! (and besides, i really didn't want to take the tour anyway...they all say the same thing and i didn't feel like walking through another set of icy caves). so generally, win win all around.

Okay, so off to dinner/bars/sleep, not necessarily in that order. it's been a long day, but i am surprisingly in a very good mood for the first time in a few days. those 3 glasses i champagne i had today probably didn't hurt.

so close

only a few more finishing touches on my 4th copy batch, and then i get to go visit some more champagne houses. i can't wait to finish and indulge! (also, don't worry, i'm not becoming a drunkard...in order to do the champagne tasting you have to go through a one hour tour, which gives you enough time to my liver to properly deal with the glass from the previous tour)....that is, if i don't opt for the tri-tasting option they usually offer. (unfortunately, or not, i definitely cannot afford that.)

ALMOST DONE. i'll post more later, since i have super fast wifi in my hotel

Be Fabulous

So says Moet & Chandon, where I toured today. They are the makers of Dom Perignon Champagne. Sweeet. I am in Epernay, home to avenue de Champagne, where there are just tons of old filthy rich champagne houses on one long street. This town is a serious improvement over Verdun. Though I suppose lavish champagne drinking is generally more "fun" than visiting WWI memorials. Definitely towns for two different audiences. I am ridiculously exhausted because I had to catch a 6:41am train out of Verdun this morning, because otherwise I'd have to wait until 6:45pm to get out of that town, and I had no desire to spend another 12 hours there. I am taking a bit of a rest (on my hotel's wifi! yes!!!) before I head out to two more champagne houses. One would think that a visit to two champagne houses with included tastings might get one off of the computer quickly, but I am sooo tired. After the Champagne visits, I think I'm going to take a serious nap because I have a serious amount of Let's Go writing to do tonight.

In Verdun

which might as well be called Verplanck. For those of you who don't understand that, you are lucky. For those who do, yea this town is basically what Verplanck would be if it were an old town in Europe. It is sort of on the waterfront, like Verplanck, with lots of generally sketchy people wandering around and sitting outside all day. No nuclear power plant in sight though. It is, unlike Verplanck, the site of a major WWI battle, and I am about to go visit 4 memorials on a 4 hour tour. Yesterday I visited the citadel (it is not a coincidence that citadel rhymes, loosely, with on-a-hill) where French soldiers lived underground during a nearly year long battle with the Germans. It was pretty intense, but somewhat cheapened by the way in which one must visit it: you take a little train ride through the tunnels, and stop frequently to see holographic images of soldiers talking about life on the Front. It was sort of like a Disney World ride from hell.

I head into the Champagne region tomorrow which should be some bubbly fun.

Also, I am much recovered since my last post, which is good, since I spend my days walking around and need the energy. I was in Metz two days ago, and when the phrase "Let's Go Metz" popped into my head, I laughed to myself for like 10 minutes about how it was funny on so many different levels. I may be becoming delirious, but little things like that crack me up.

I've surprisingly gotten a little ahead on my itinerary, so hopefully I'll be visiting David in Paris next week, so that is something to look forward to post bubbly.

Anyway, off to eat in a sketchy Verplanck like cafe.

Pain, and not the baguette type

So i am in nancy...unfortunately for an extra day because i'm a bit sick (to Grandma, who i know reads this as regularly as the NYTimes, don't worry!!! ive drank lots of tea and soup) and decided a day of rest would help. i am feeling better today and hopefully will be back on track on a train (pun totally not intended...the french train culture has penetrated the pun part of my brain) early tomorrow morning to Metz. Nancy is a surprisingely large city with really wonderful restaurants and (to the joy of my nerdyness) home to the Hemingway cafe. I'm not sure if Hemingway would have enjoyed the enormous flat screen TVs playing loud popular music videos while he was penning his masterpieces. Just imagine how The Sun Also Rises would have turned out if it was written to the tunes of EuroPop. I, for one, don't like to imagine things like this.

also

it is supposed to rain every day for the next 10 days according to various weather sites. wonderful. mr. sun, please shine down on me. (i know you are shining down now, when i can't go out, so maybe you should go away now, and come back tomorrow. please?)

The Writing half of this job

Strasbourg has been a lot of fun, but I think I'm ready to leave. It was a great city with so many neat areas, but it was also the first city where I encountered tons of tourists, and the annoying vendors/people on the street hawking useless things/huge crowds at places. I didn't like that as much, and I wonder if it is because this is the biggest city I've been to, or it is just because it is now later in the summer and more of a vacation time. So far, Besancon has absolutely been my favorite place.

I finally met people at my hostel, actually went out and stayed at a bar for more than the 5-10 minutes I usually spend there to check it out (before people start checking me out), actually went out to dinner with somebody besides myself. however, this means that i didn't get nearly enough writing done every night while I've been here, so i am currently writing writing writing on my day off. blah. but it was worth it because i had fun, and what would i be doing with my day off anyway besides wandering around and sitting in a coffee shop. the lonely life is more conducive to getting work done, but certainly less enjoyable. I am currently reading Wuthering Heights because I needed to read something slower than the mystery novel I read last week. The mystery novel was fun, but it was very hard to make myself put it down and write, since I wanted to know what happened. Wuthering Heights doesn't seem to mind if I put it down for a few days.

anyway, i should be on my computer all day, so say hi if you get this. not sure when i'll have Wifi chez moi again. tomorrow I head to Nancy, then Metz and Verdun.

Also, I am officially half way done as of yesterday. very strange. it is crazy how much i've done, but still intimidating to look forward to what I have to do (though I guess less intimidating than it was at the beginning.) I am much better rested in general than I was last week, though I think that my wonderful long nights of sleep also might have added to the amount of writing I have to do today.
well, yea, time to do more writing.

I have officially conquered yogurt

I generally know that I have conquered a food when I not only will suffer through eating it without too much pain, but actually find myself wanting to eat it, and choosing it over other foods.

Laying in bed this morning at 745 after an awesome fete de la musique last night, I forced myself to get out of bed and head down to the hostel's free breakfast because i knew they had yogurt. Yes!

(I will never get out of bed for boudin...ever. I will hide under my blankets).

Direct any yogurt food conquering questions to jeanyang at fas dot harvard dot edu or kaletzky at fas dot harvard dot edu. They helped me start the process of the yogurt conquest.

sigh, back to work.

Strasbourg

is a fantastic city so far. It is the first actually large city I've been in , and also the first city with a normal hostel that is not like 5 km out of town by bus. So I have finally met some people at the hostel to hang out with which is fun (as opposed to the other hostels where they were just school dorms with single rooms with generally cliquish people). There was a bit of problem with a reservation on their part, and it was looking like i'd have to go somewhere else tonight, but luckily there was a cancellation so I can stay. The other place was one of those 2km out of town hostels which generally are logistically annoying.

Tonight is fete de la musique and i am excited. I cant believe it's been a year since I celebrated it in Paris.

Random things (as there always seem to be in these entries)
-Le Routard, the big French travel book company, sells its own brand of shoes for travellers. This is sort of awesome. Maybe Let's Go should do this too.
-I have seen so much religious art. I see representations of the Passion from every era at least 2 or 3 times a day in museums or cathedrals. I went to the modern art museum in Strasbourg today and thought I might have gained a bit of relief from religious art, but no, in the back room they had a 5 story tall enormous painting of the passion. seems a museum just can't stay away from this. Sorry if this is offensive to anyone, but it is a lot to take all the time. The Strasbourg cathedral is absolutely breathtaking though.
-not sure if this song is big anywhere else, but the ONLY song that plays here EVERYWHERE is this song that goes "relax, take it eeee eeee asy" maybe i am unaware of current music trends, but this song is seriously the only song that plays. It has been played 3 times at this internet cafe since i sat down half an hour ago
-i think i will try to continue to keep a list of what i spend when i get home, as i have been doing here. it is amazing how it helps to keep you from buying random useless things...though i also cant fit random useless things in my pack. for anyone who has witnessed any of my moveouts from college, you will know how many random useless things i have. eeks



anyway off to the fete

You know your frame of reference has shifted...

...when you consider taking a 2km hike in the pouring rain to actually be a really relaxing day off. And by you, I obviously mean me. Okay, so I wasn't just taking that hike for the hell of it, but it was to go see this absolutely amazing chapel designed by Le Corbusier in the tiny town (with a big hill) of Ronchamp. Google image search Le Corbusier and Ronchamp, and you'll see this funky chapel that is made all out of concrete (Mather wishes it used concrete like this). Anyway, that is where I was yesterday. A few days ago I began to get really really exhausted, but I delayed coming to the current town of Mulhouse for a day (actually, not really out of choice, but because of annoying train schedules) and now I'm feeling much more with it and well rested. Also, it is cool I ended up coming here today because they are having a dance festival in the streets today. Sort of fun. I went to 4 museums today..pretty crazy. Even though I am not intrigued by cars, the car museum here was amazing.

I didn't really like Belfort, the last town I was in, as it didn't really seem to have anything special except for this enormous lion carved by the same guy who did the statue of liberty. BUT the hotel I stayed at had the absolute sweetest kindest AMAZINGest owner i've ever met. Funny story to get a sense of how personable she is:

So I had called to make reservations, but it ended up that I would arrive a day later than I thought I would. So I called back the next day to change the reservation, and when she heard my voice (and more likely my terrible accent) she was like, "Is this Alizia?--she kept calling me Alizia. But anyway, Ic hanged the reservation;all was well. So when I arrived the next day it was painfully humid, and thus rained the following day when going to the chapel, but I was totally sweaty and hot and the tourist office gave me ridiculously outo f the way directions to get to the hotel. So I am shlepping along with my backpack and side pack, and according to my map I should be getting close to the hotel, when a car slows down as it comes from behind. The sound of the braking car alarmed me and I looked and saw a woman roll down her window and then said, "Alizia?" I was totally confused and shocked and then realized it was the hotel owner. I guess she wasnt expecting any other sweaty backpackers that day and assumed it had to be that girl with the bad french accent coming from the direction that the tourist office poorly gives. She identified herself as indeed the hotel owner, and offered to give me a lift the rest of the way. Unfortunatly I didnùt fit into the car with my backpack (such cruel fate) but I walked the rest of the way and she was waiting at the door for me. We had many conversations, and it is because of her kindness that I made it back from the Le Corbusier church without having to wait at a trainstation (read: hut on the side of the train tracks) for 5 hours. Before I left to go there she insisted on giving me the number of her friend who was going to be in Ronchamp that day and maybe he could give me a ride back. I took it, assuming that I would just take the train, but when the train arrived at the schedule time, AND DIDN'T STOP, I called Kim (the owner's friend) and he arrived within 45 minutes to drive me to the hotel. All in all, I would return to this crappy town only to stay at this hotel.

She told me I should come back and visit her with my 'mari et enfants.' so i guess i wont be going back for awhile.

Also, in the vain of my cow entry, something else occured to me. So my biggest communication problem in french is actually taking down numbers because it takes me a second to figure out what the number is. This made me think about the English names for numbers, and it occured to me that 'fifteen' 'sixteen' 'seventeen' etc. are just six-ten, with ten being spelled weird. When I had this thought, I got mad at myself that I had never thought about that before.

Anyway, off to do actual Let's Go writing. If you are still reading this blog, drop me a line...i love getting emails.

ah sweet weefee

i am currently sitting in the Besancon University cafe (pretty chill place) where they have free wifi and cheap coffee. score. I really really really like Besancon (I am on my computer now so I don't have the little cedille key anymore...interesting fact about the word cedille--it comes from spanish, meaning "little z," since the squiggly thing under the c is supposed to look like a mini z. but anyway, i can't remember where i learned that, but i know it was recently). It is a town with a ton of personality, filled with students and funky shops and unique restaurants and general coolness. It is the first place I've been so far on my itinerary where I have felt that I would like to come back here and spend a longer period of time in the city. Last night in my hostel, there was a strange world music a cappella concert. 40% kind of cool, 30% clearwater 30% weird. ah clearwater must be soon. this is the second year i am missing it because i'm in france :(. i have been eating at very clearwatery/natural places though.

i just went to this vegetarian restaurant where they only have one option of meal for each meal, but luckily it was really delicious. i went to the most heavenly tea room/restaurant yesterday (heavenly as in it was decorated as if it was actually heaven, and also because it was very tasty)...look for its write up in Let's Go France 2008!

i have basically finished my work in this city but now have to write it all up before I head to Belfort tomorrow, so I think I'm going to write and bask in the zone of free wifi here at this cool cafe. tonight i hit up the gay clubs...fun!

La Fée Verte and a question about cows

1. I took a daytrip to Pontarlier today, which is an utterly unexceptional town except for the fact that it was the home to Absinthe back when it packed a punch and also there are a lot of cool hiking trails that depart from it. I tried some absinthe sans wormwood at a local distillerie and wasn't very impressed, and liked the alcool sapin much better. It was pretty rainy all day so it was just kind of a gross day, but not too bad. I got a lot of writing done when I got back so now I have time to update on the hostel common computer.
2. Maybe somebody who reads this knows something about cows and general cow habits. As I have been in the countryside for two weeks now, I have seen many many cows during my travels along the sides of roads and have noticed a thing or two about them. But one thing really is bugging me: why are herds of cows who are just grazing in the fields always facing in the same direction and doing the same thing. They are either all standing and facing one direction or lazing on the ground facing in one direction. What is the deal? Are they drawn to the sun like flowers? That can't be it because often there are several groups of cows on one big field and each separate group is facing a separate direction! Are they keeping guard? Is there a leader cow in each group who decides? Maybe I have developed mad cow from all this scenic travel, but I keep noticing this and each time I am only further intrigued.
3. Madame Bovary=really really good. I know I discussed this in a previous entry, but it has continued to give me food for thought. Speaking of food, I had another wonderful (no sarcasm) baguette and camembert dinner tonight. Maybe this will be a once a week thing. J'adore la France.

Home of my french textbook

Besançon! This is where I am now. My beginning French textbook was set in this town, but I suspect that people no longer wear the hip circa 1994 fashions of Besançon that were in the book. It ended up pouring today so I didn't leave my new hostel. Yay days off! I was in Dijon sans cheap internet for 4 nights, and now I am on the move again. Dijon was a really cool city with great restaurants, and a wonderful proximity to delicious wineries and chateaux. anyway, today is my day off and I finished reading Madame Bovary, which I had begun the day my luggage was terribly lost at the airport. It is a good book to read here because even though Im reading it in translation, the cover makes it appear i'm reading a french book. yes, I'm a big dork like that. Anyway it was a great read and gave me many things to ponder (since I have much pondering time these days). I took a ridiculous nap today for like 5 hours after I arrived in Besançon, and it was definitely much needed. I hope I can get to sleep on the early side though tonight because I take a day trip to the town of Pontarlier tomorrow. i need to find a new book to read...good thing we list an english bookstore in this town so I can use my trusty Lets Go guide to find one.

c'est beaune

hi all

quick greetings from this random youth center in beaune where there is free internet. autun had a lot of roman ruins and Beaune is filled with american retirees; i met some from boston on an awesome tour of a mustard factory where I made my own mustard. longer entry when some place im staying has weefee

love
aliza

Medieval Times

Nice relaxing trip to Semur-en-Auxois today. The town could be seen and "done" in maybe 1.5 hrs, but because I bus schedules, and inability to return sooner, I spent a very relaxing 7 hrs there. When I finished checking everything within the first 1.5 hrs, I wandered around for awhile, checking out various "romantic" sites. (the romantic one we list was a bit *too* romantic, with condom wrappers and various alcohol bottles rather disgustingly strewn about.) i took a very long walk to the campsite that was 3km away, and that was the one part of the day when it was beastly sunny. it was by a pretty lake though. then i walked back. i visited a museum that i plan to add to the town write up, and it had these funky contemporary art pieces interspersed with old classic stuff.

..ah i forgot i was writing this.

not that you knew there was time lapse of about 2 hours in between the last two sentences. but anyway. just got an email from one of the readers of my junior essay, who was also my tutorial prof sophomore year. he really liked the paper. this makes me exciting because he always used to critique me for not dwelling on things enough. i guess i've improved in dwelling.

i am just sort of dwelling here now, at 10pm saturday night. there isn't really anywhere to go in this town, and i don't really want to go to a bar alone. i'm also tired. i hope i meet some people eventually--i guess that will happen when there are actually hostel options in the town i'm staying in.

ah yes, the subject line, medieval times. so when i ended up having to stay in this town until 8, it turns out there was a medieval festival beginning at six, where people were dressed up as vikings and such and there were also crazy running races around the old streets of the town. from jean's suggestion, i will try and upload some pics to this, but not now.

tomorrow is my first day off, but i have to just hang around this town till my train leaves at 6:45, since it is the only train of the day. i plan to sleep in. yay. i wonder when i have to check out?

Thinking of Robert Levin/Every horror movie I've ever seen

Re: Robert Levin
He was my professor for the Swing Era class I took. He used to get really awkwardly emotional sometimes in lecture, like going down memory lane to explain how some song reminded him of some failed romance, and then get sad...but anyway, in one of these awks emotional moments, he said something to the extent, "Jazz is powerful. Jazz will be with you through thick and thin. when things are tough, and things get really really hard sometimes......(students feeling really awkward)....you'll always have jazz. you can always put on louis, or benny..."

anyway, where am i going with this? right. so i was in this pretty good lunch place in vezelay (a tiny town centered around a basilica on a hill...there are like 4 roads. see for you self on the map from this site:
http://www.vezelaytourisme.com/ )
and suddenly stardust comes on. freshman year i had to memorize a solo from it and i started humming along to it. and suddenly i felt really good (not that i felt all so bad in a town where all you can do is drink wine and see pretty vistas). then i thought about what robert levin said and i was happy about jazz.

anyway, that was sort of random. i had some good chats in french with both of my taxi drivers to and from the town. yay speaking french. i still haven't really had any exciting conversations with people because I am mainly just asking for information. i can really understand people now, though i have trouble processing numbers quickly (which i am getting better at too, since people tell me a lot of numbers: "what time is this train?" "what is your phone number?" what are your hours?"

i went to an absolutely breathtaking costume museum today. it was in an old mansion that used to belong to the governor of burgundy in the 17th century. a cute little old lady showed me around. manequins in haute couture dresses from the 18th century on stood in the rooms that were still decorated in their original manner with hundreds upon hundreds of paintings and maps and decorations. It seriously reminded me of a horror movie, in which these dolls would come alive and complain that their corsets were too tight. it was creepy but amazing. it is hard to explain how decorated it was, but it was ridiculous.

anyway, i am getting a bit faster at the let's go writing, which is good, since that means more sleep for me! i'm not sure whether i will become very skinny from all the walking i do all day, or very fat from the delicious food i eat (even if is just a lot of bread sometimes). hopefully, at the very least, these two things will balance each other out.

technology is so neat

i was just chatting with my dad on skype through my computer. i've used it several times before, and i'm not one of those people who is like "wow internet," but it is very strange to be sitting in this random town in france surrounded by fields and cows chatting with my dad on my computer. ok, maybe i am one of those people who is like, "wow internet!" it has been nice to have a hotel room to myself the past few days, but i want to actually talk to people, so i am looking forward to a more social living experience.

I have found a food that I don't want to "conquer"...

...and its name is Boudin. Blood sausage in English. Unfortunately, I thought it was just regular sausage and was sorely sorely mistaken. For those of you who don't know what this is, gag with me:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_sausage
Yea, so I was starving, but ate like two bites of it because even looking at it made me want to gag. For those of you who know how enthusiastic I am about conquering new foods and old ones, you'll know how bad this must have been. I ate a lot of bread, and just sort of sat there, and the woman came over and asked if things were ok, and I just politely said I was finished, and she was like, "did you know what this was? (in French...actually, for all future quotations, they probably were in French unless otherwise noted)" I shook my head no. She sighed, felt bad, and brought me a free piece of chocolate cake. score, sort of.

this occured in the town of Auxerre, where I took a day trip today, but I am currently based out of Avallon. I had an amazing meal tonight in Avallon, though I was only 5 times as hungry as at lunch, so anything probably would have been good. But it was this fancy buffet, and also a salmon sopping in butter sauce. They serve salmon upside down here from how they do in the u.s. or maybe it is rightside up here. deep philosophical thoughts i'm having here over salmon.

auxerre was cute, but not particularly exciting. i head to vezelay tomorrow. it is supposed to be rainy for the next few days...i hope the weather report is wrong :(

anyway, i should probably finish up my writing early tonight so i can get a good night's sleep finally

un, deux, troyes!

i am writing from a funky cyber cafe/bar in troyes covered in film stills of american movies and strange decorations like a pinball machine, a lamp made out of a tree tunk, and 5 foot tall fake flower. i left paris this morning, and reached the city with ease (though I didn't know I had to stamp my ticket on the train, but when the conductor realized i wasn't french, he nodded and wrote "estrangere" on the back of my ticket, and then punched it. ah. ) i'm figuring stuff out, and actually conversing in french. unlike paris, even when people realize that my french is not amazing, there english is worse, so we continue to talk in french. this is exciting.
amongst many other things, i went to a museum of tools, and got a phone. if you want to call me, email me and i'll send you my number. sorry, but i probably won't call you because the minutes are painfully expensive when you don't have a real phone plan and have to buy them a la carte. anyway, i'm off to go check out some bars (rather early) because i'm still a bit jet lagged and have my first night of writing ahead of me!

CDG Airport--The Journey Stalled for a bit

So British Airways lost my darling backpack, and I sat in Charles de Gaulle airport from 10am to 8pm when my backpack finally arrived. It would have been really really terrible except that wonderful Amy, who is in Paris, and who is currently folding shirts next to me, spent all day with me at the airport. Highlights included sitting, groaning, taking walks through the different terminals, eating McDonalds, and watching a French romance novel circle round and round on the baggage picker upper thingy. Anyway, I am exhausted, and all in all the journey took 24 hours from leaving my house to leaving CDG. I leave for Troyes early tomorrow morning and am currently staying with Sarah Fishman's really nice cousins!!!

Anyway, ugh, don't fly British Airways if you have a half hour connection. You may make the flight (huffing and puffing), but your baggage won't.

JFK Airport-The Journey Begins

Hi all. Hopefully I'll keep up with this. I was not so good about it last year on the not so famous or infamous alizainparis.blogspot.com blog, but maybe I'll be better about this one. I am currently in JFK airport on their 7.95 wireless, but probably will be boarding soon. Anyway, hope everyone has a great summer and check up on this blog from time to time

Love,
Aliza