Springtime in Paris

The Weather is Great!!!!!

Monday
After class, I took a nap because I was exhausted from the weekend and did my homework. A little later, I went to the Arc de Triomphe for the first time. It was pretty cool, very touristy. Then my friend Caitlin, her friend from home, and I walked to the Trocadero for an amazing view of the Eiffel Tower. The weather was amazing, about 60 degrees F, and walking through Paris on a day like that is so awe-inspiring. That night, we had dinner with my roommate Justin and our other friend Mary. Shrimp with Pinapple and coconut milk, rice, and veggies. It was great. Our dinners are so fun because we start cooking around 7, eat, clean, and just hang out drinking wine until around 11/11:30 when everyone leaves (they're basically always at my apartment). The weather is so nice now and I think it's only going to get better! It brings the city and the people to life.
Tuesday
Happy St. Patrick's Day! I had class this morning - we talked about Affirmative Action in France and in our countries. It was interesting because a lot of countries don't have to deal with that issue (Georgia, Iran, Poland) - they don't have to deal with as many racial and immigrant issues. So it was mostly the Americans, Germans and English that talked. I went out to lunch with 2 people from class today...a girl from the States and a guy from England. It's nice to have friends in the class and I hope we'll do more stuff after class - going to museums or parks or whatever. I came home after doing some grocery shopping and I'm took an hour or so to study the NCAA brackets so I could make my picks. I haven't been able to follow the whole league that well but we'll see how it goes! And now I'm updating my blog! I know we'll do something fun tonight for St. Patrick's Day. That's it for now. Miss you all.

Wednesday
Class from 8:30 to 2. Makes for a really long morning. After class, I went for a run in Jardin des Plantes. It was gorgeous out and I found a really good route. I feel a little strange running outside here. I definitely look very American in my Michigan shorts and white t-shirt. People in France run in funny things...like khakis and converse shoes. I put my facebook status as "Running in Jardin des Plantes" and I got a message when I came back from someone I worked with at Thunderbird saying that he is living in Paris and lives right by the Jardin des Plantes! It is so funny how these random connections keep popping up. So I will go have drinks with him sometime in the next few weeks. After my run, I went to my friend's dorm at Cité U (which is an international student dorm in the 14th) and we went to Sacre Coeur. We tried to make it by sunset but our timing didn't work out quite right. We got there around 7 pm so it was dark but not too dark yet. The city was all lit up and the church was beautiful. Everyone was just hanging out on the steps of the church listening to these guys who play guitar. It's basically a non-stop concert that is free (but you're supposed to tip them a little). Hanging out at Sacre Coeur was another one of those "ahh, I love Paris" moments.

After Sacre Coeur, I went to this restaurant called Le Refuge des Fondues. I went with my friend Caitlin and her friend Eliza who was visiting from the states. It's this really fun place where you sit at a long table (next to strangers) and you have meat and cheese fondue and drink wine out of baby bottles. It's a little strange at first but actually really fun. The food was great and the atmosphere was really exciting. Everyone brings their visitors to Refuge. We saw two other groups of people we knew that night, and it wasn't that cheap for fondue and wine..20 euro per person.

Thursday
After class, I got a bunch of things done on my computer: finalized my Eurail pass, booked my trip to Munich, booked a flight from Munich to Barcelona, updated my resumé. Sometimes it's hard to remember that you have to do the mundane things even when you're in Paris and just want to be exploring all the time. For dinner, my friend Michael came over (he's on a different program in Paris) and Mike, Justin and I cooked burgers. We bought the meat at a meat shop down the street and it was really delicious. After that, some of our girl friends came over and we went to a bar called LongHop to watch some of the NCAA tournament. They had the games!...but not the Michigan game. I was bummed but I had dragged all these people to the bar so I couldn't leave. I could see the constant score updates too. At the bar, I ran into Emily Scott, a girl from my neighborhood in Highland Park that I went to middle school with! We did Problem Solvers together! It was so funny seeing her in a random bar in Paris. She was visiting for spring break. I left the bar a little early and was able to watch the end of the game on my computer (cbssportsline.com has on demand for free). Michigan won! So that was a great end to a great night.

Friday
I had a quiz in phonetics...wasn't too bad. In my French class, this girl did a presentation and brought food from all these different regions of France. She kept pulling out baguettes and cheeses and madelines, etc. It was really funny and everyone loved it. I have a presentation about Foie Gras coming up this week. After French, I went to get a crepe with a girl from my class. Nutella banane, so good. I walked home after that, hung out with the girls from upstairs for a while, tried to watch some basketball (the internet wasn't really cooperating) . I went to my friend's house for dinner and then a bunch of people, probably 25 (he has a huge apartment) came over. We all went to this club called Duplex that was really fun. I had brought stuff over and slept at my friends house because we had to catch the train to Dijon the next day. He lives next to the train station where we had to meet at 8:00 am

Saturday
Alarms did not go off! 4 of us in the apartment all set alarms to wake up at 7:30 for Dijon and at 9:00, the first one of us woke up. It was pretty disappointing that we missed the trip. We had all tried to plan it so we would not miss it and it just did not work. But, it was a gorgeous day in Paris, and we had to make the most of it. We made a great breakfast: eggs, crepes and fruit. Then Johnny and John from Colgate (I was at their apartment), Holly (from Alabama) and Emily Haymer (michigan) and I went to Parc Monceau. It's supposed to be the best park in Paris. It was an unbelievable day out and the park was packed with people just lounging on the grass, having picnics, playing with their kids, etc. We just layed out in the sun for hours, walking around the park, talking, reading. It was so relaxing. I started to get a headache so we were going to get food but ended up going back home. I took a shower, made some pasta, and took a nap. I woke up feeling so much better. My roommate came back and he has two friends in town who are staying with us. We went to dinner and went to this concert for some DJ named Proxy. It was pretty fun but I ended up going home a little early because I was just really tired.

Sunday
I'm writing this from bed, everyone else in the apartment is sleeping but I think I'm gonna wake them up soon. Things to do in Paris!