Happy Thanksgiving

Well, I just wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving to everyone – and also give you a little update, since I haven’t done that in a while.

So last night I cooked some turkey and mashed potatoes (thanks to the kitchen utensils of Hollie, actually) – and Hollie, who is British, Esther, who is Swiss, and Gabriella, who is Swedish all came to have dinner. Hollie also made a beautiful trifle for dessert, and I made everyone say what she is thankful for. It was a really good night – I really enjoyed it, and it was sort of like having my own mini Thanksgiving celebration. Also yesterday I received a package full of Christmas presents (food) from my parents… so that was a pretty wonderful surprise. 

Tomorrow I am going to Colmar to have a Thanksgiving meal with the family of a girl I know from a class. Her father is American and is actually from Indiana – so she invited me to their Thanksgiving celebration, which is really cool. I’m definitely excited to see a French/American Thanksgiving!

The Christmas markets start today in Strasbourg – apparently this is a very big deal, and people come from all over France and Europe to see Strasbourg’s Christmas markets. So I think I will go into the center of the city this afternoon to see everything that is going on today. I’ve heard that there are chandeliers in the streets and little vendors basically everywhere – so I’m definitely looking forward to seeing it.

There have been many talks about having a student strike and blocking the university to send a message to the French government. Apparently they are trying to pass a law right now that will make the universities in France no longer financed by the French government, but rather by large companies. The problem is, companies which can afford to finiance the universities will probably be medical/scientific/pharmaceutical companies who will therefore give money to the natural sciences, pharmacy schools etc. and there will be no support for the humanities. Also, they are trying to eliminate certain master programs (in the humanities) in order to save money, because the government feels that these masters are rather useless in the long run. As you can imagine, there has been quite a large response by the students, but they haven’t actually started to block the university here in Strasbourg yet. We shall see what happens…   

I found out that I will be in Rouen for Christmas, so I’m pretty excited to see Normandy – I haven’t been there yet.

Tag thing

So, my friend Ashley tagged me in this blog game thing, and apparently now I have to write 5 interesting things about myself and then tag 3 more people. Soooooo, let’s see if I can come up with 5 interesting things about myself….

1. I have a pretty close relationship with sleep. When I was born I had to have surgery and stay in the hospital for several weeks, and consequently my parents were told that I would probably cry and cause problems when they took me home because I was only used to living beneath neon lights… Well, the first night they put me down and I slept all the way until morning, no interruptions. And thus the tradition was established. I am a total grump without sleep, and I can usually manage to take naps no matter where I am.

2. I have a very active dream life. (hmmmmm…. I’m starting to see a pattern here) My most vivid dreams are usually one extreme or the other, happy or scary, but I tend to remember my dreams quite often even if they aren’t terribly significant. Sometimes I have dreams in which characters from different stages or areas of my life will all appear at once… for  example, there might be a family member of mine (early stage, or Ohio) and someone from high school (that stage in the middle, Newburgh) and a friend from Purdue all in the same dream. This sort of dream usually perplexes me for several days. So, that’s just one example of the many sorts of dreams I have. I am really fascinated by dreams, and I feel that my dreams are really important… So if you ever want to make my day, start a conversation with me about dreams.  

3. I tried to learn how to play the guitar last summer, but I wasn’t terribly successful. And now I think I’ve forgotten all that I had learned. But I really enjoy it, so I think I will try to pick it up again when I come back to the States.

4. I have issues with the American education system as it is right now… I think that we need to have much better teacher preparation courses in Universities and make this path of study more difficult. As it is, I know a lot of people who really have no desire to be a teacher and who really don’t have a passion for working with kids, but they just fall into the education program because they can’t succeed in the programs they started in. Anyway, I want to be a teacher and help kids become culturally aware of the world around them, help them to start thinking a little more critically in general… and teach them French of course.

5. Well, I’m not sure what else to say… I’m having a pretty cool adventure here in France. I learn so much every day, and I’m so glad I decided to do this, even if it is very hard sometimes.

 Now I’m supposed to tag three people, but I can only think of two people to tag…

so I tag Dave (banannery.wordpress.com) and Amanda (amandajean.wordpress.com)

Winter

It got dark at 4 pm today. There are busy Strasbourg electricity workers all around the city putting up lights and Christmas trees. I only have about 5 and a half more weeks until the semester is over… oh la la

Paris photos

Well, I think you all know what this is.

Notre Dame de Paris… you just can’t get tired of taking pictures of this church.

Yes, I just had to go to Starbucks.

The postcard man

So, I’m learning more and more about this nifty blog of mine… I found out that I can view my “blog stats” – and my blog has been viewed (more hopefully, read) 888 times! That’s crazy! I was just thinking… my mom and dad, my family every now and then, and maybe some friends would look at my blog… but wow, it’s cool to know that I am not spending time writing these entries for no reason.

Surrounding the cathedral in the center of Strasbourg are some typical tourist shops which sell typical tourist things… postcards, little stuffed storks (well, in Alsace), Le Petit Prince notebooks and calendars, umbrellas with the European Union’s flag printed on them, etc. And it just so happens that the first shop I ever went into on my first day in Strasbourg is run by the most flattering little old Catholic French man you’ll ever meet. On my first day in Strasbourg, he told me that my French is so good already, etc, etc. It made my day. When I returned to buy some more postcards and stamps, he told me the exact same thing. And then when I returned today, he finally remembered me “oh, I remember you – from Indianapolis” (I just nod and smile because this is the only city in Indiana that French people know) because I buy lots of U.S. stamps every time I’m in his store. But it was funny today, two Russian girls in front of me were paying, and he chatted with them… “oh, but your French is so good already… by the way, will you need some of these special Strasbourg envelopes which have pictures of the cathedral??” Even though I know he compliments every foreigner who comes in his store, I’m sure that I will continue to buy my postcards and stamps from this monsieur – and I’m sure that I will never be able to say no when he asks if I need Strasbourg envelopes. haha

How is it already November?

Paris

Well, I went to Paris this week and stayed with Marianne. There is quite a lot to write about, so I’ll start from the beginning.

Monday afternoon Hollie and I arrived at the Strasbourg train station quite early so we decided to get some maltesers and go outside the train station to wait for our train. I opened the bag of maltesers and they went flying – everywhere! So, I’m sitting there laughing so hard that there are tears in my eyes and Hollie is laughing at me… and I start to wonder what to do with all this candy that is spread all over the sidewalk. “Should I try to pick them all up?” Hollie’s response… “ummm, I really don’t know, this has never really happened to me before…” A few seconds pass, and a couple of dogs come over and start eating the maltesers… and then a homeless man came and started picking them up as well…. and all of a sudden, the sidewalk was completely cleared of maltesers. This all happened so quickly that Hollie and I had no time to really understand what was going on and/or stop laughing from just having burst open a bag of maltesers in public. So afterward we just sat there wondering what the heck had just happened and whether this was a sign of what was to come during our trip to Paris. It was truly one of the strangest experiences of my life.

After wearing our Halloween witches’ hats on the TGV to Paris (and getting very little reaction from other passengers, actually), we arrived in Paris and found our way to Marianne’s apartment. A friend of hers was leaving for Quebec the next day, so we all went out to go to a bar and see this Canadian. Strangely enough, we never got to a bar but instead walked around Paris with this Canadian and several Parisians who he seemed to sort of know. There was some skipping and laughter involved and then all of a sudden, they went on their jolly way and we decided to go back to Marianne’s apartment. It was a really strange night, especially considering how exhausted Hollie and I were already.

So the next day we went to the market with Marianne, and we got to see a very public and very French dispute over something that probably didn’t matter at all. Marianne took us to see the Place de la Bastille and the Place des Vosges.  Hollie and I then decided to go our separate way to see some touristy things. We first went to the Pere laChaise cemetary and there we saw the graves of Oscar Wilde, Marcel Proust, Chopin, Moliere, La Fontaine, and Jim Morrison. Then we walked around the Hotel de Ville / Notre Dame area and looked through some tourist shops there. We went back to Marianne’s apartment and had dinner and played a funny guessing game with her and her roommate… it was sort of like taboo which turns into charades. 

On Halloween we woke up early and made our way to the Eiffel Tower to stand in line for about an hour in order to get into an elevator. After we made it to the second level, we waited about half an hour to get the next elevator up to the top. the view was absolutely amazing – it’s hard to bear all the crowds and waiting, etc. but I think it was worth it once we finally made it to the top. Actually, we wore our witches’ hats while waiting in line for an hour on the ground and we amused many, many small children. So at least we were able to provide a sort of service to impatient children, haha. After the Eiffel Tower, we went to the Centre Pompidou and did some more touristy shopping around there. I then tried to convince Hollie that it would be a good idea to walk from there to Sacre Coeur - and somehow I managed to succeed. So we walked all the way to Sacre Coeur (passing through a rather interesting area on our way), and then got caught by Africans who tied bracelets to our wrists and then asked for money. We gave them some on went on our merry way. (haha) And as it was starting to get dark on Halloween night, we put on our witches’ hats and once again provided entertainment for small children. After we finished taking photos and touring the Sacre Coeur, we found a metro station to return to Marianne’s place. However, there had been an accident and that line was completely shut down… so we had to walk to another station (which seemed like a big deal at the time, but we found our way and everything was fine).

The next day we visited the Pantheon, les Arenes de Lutece, Ile Saint-Louis (which has the best ice cream in the world, Berthillon’s), and the Canal Saint-Martin. After this, we ate with Marianne… and it was time for us to head back to the train station to catch the TGV back to Strasbourg. 

I’m sure I’ve probably left out a lot, but that is my Paris adventure in a nutshell.