This weekend has been another whirlwind. Friday was a glorious day – after class we bough sandwiches and ate by the fountain in Place Grenette. Then, we went to Hagen Daïs and I got a scoop of Crème Brulee, which had delicious chunks of crunchy brulee in it. It was heavenly. Once again, we took advantage of the relaxed atmosphere and just hung out at the ice cream shop for a couple hours talking. Gotta love the French lifestyle. After, Molly, Elita, and I went purse shopping and I got a beautiful leather bag. After, we found this amazing and cheap boutique with a magical fitting room attendant. Then I went home for supper and ate with Nicole all by myself – my first time since being here. It was cool to have to keep the conversation the whole time and not depend on Elliot when I got tired and frustrated speaking French. It was a really nice, relaxing evening. Not the most eventful Friday night but to me it was perfect.
The next morning I woke up early to be at the train station for 8:15. After buying tickets, Adam, Travis, Molly, Elita, Greg, Hannah, and I traveled to Lyon for the day. It was my first train ride and it was gorgeous – weirdly enough we were weaving in and out of the clouds the entire time even though we didn’t change elevation. I’ve decided I like trains much better than flying! It’s very relaxing and you can look out the window and see land the entire time.
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| Inside Notre Dame |
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| Basilique Notre-Dame de Fourviere |
We got to Lyon and were all ridiculously excited. We walked from the train to Place Bellecour where there was a rally for Handicap International going on. Then we walked around Vieux Lyon, which had beautiful, antique buildings and the coolest stores. We stopped at a cute café for lunch, where there was a man making crepes right on the side of the street. I tried a bite of liver for the first time. It wasn’t very good. We checked out the Cathédrale Saint-Jean Baptiste, walked to the Basilique Notre-Dame de Fourvière, took the télépherique down back to Vieux Lyon (which was a letdown because it was in a tunnel), and checked out the Traboules – secret shortcuts throughout the city. We also came across two random bands in the streets. I love music; it just makes everyone so happy. Seeing the bands made me miss playing the flute, perhaps I’ll pick it back up when I get back to school!
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| More Crepes! |
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| Telepherique |
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| LYON |
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| Molly in the Traboules |
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| Random Street Band |
We decided to have a drink alongside the Rhône and then rushed back to make the 6:45 train back to Grenoble. Molly and I almost missed the train because we forgot to buy a return ticket! When we got back to Grenoble, we stopped at Monoprix and got some cheap food for a nighttime picnic and the hike tomorrow. Nutella sandwiches = yummy. We ended up chilling on the ramp of the Victor Hugo church.
Sunday, aka today, Molly and I decided to go hiking with the club from school. My morning was a complete fail, which luckily ended up turning out perfectly. First of all I didn’t set my alarm early enough for some strange reason, but fortunately woke up exactly the time I needed to. Avoiding that close call, I went to the bus station and arrived 8 minutes early for the bus. The bus never came. So I walked 10 minutes to the next stop just in time for the next bus I needed. When the bus came, it was not the right number. After relooking at the schedule, I realized another bus came at 8:20 and I needed to actually be there at 8:12 for the correct one. So, bus number 1 never showed up and I missed bus number 2. Fail. Then, I waited for almost an hour for the next bus – getting super antsy to make the 8:30 departure time (although I was somewhat productive and read a bunch in my new French novel: The Diary of Anne Frank)! Once I got on the bus, it took 20 minutes to get to campus rather than the normal 45 – since no one goes out on Sundays and we did not have to pick anyone up. So, I made it exactly on time!
The group decided to go to the Chartreuse Mountains rather than the Ecrins because the weather was supposed to be better. So, we took an hour drive to Chartreuse on the most twisty and small roads I’ve ever been in. The whole ride Molly and I just kept making exclamations about how beautiful everything was. The villages are part of the mountain and were just incredible – look at the photos!
I chatted with Anna and Julian the whole ride – two native French students. They wanted to practice their English and I wanted to practice my French, so they would talk English to me and I would talk French to them. We all corrected each other and helped one another out with the vocab words. It was so cool! My favorite part of the conversation was when Julian exclaimed that he couldn’t believe people in America ate the yellow, plastic cheese.
When we got to the trailhead, the van got stuck in a ditch. We spent a solid hour trying to get the van out, which I am still surprised we did successfully. The hike was AMAZING. The people were great and the scenery was incredible. The only scary part was that the whole hike was super slippery! Through my many interesting conversations (all in French) I came to realize a lot of the students were international on the ERASMIS program. Molly and I were the only Americans, which was great! There were two people from Quebec, one from Italy, another from the Czech Republic, another from Germany, and a bunch of people from different areas in France. I was having casual and pretty fast paced conversations in French and it felt so great! I even started thinking in French. Some of my favorite discussions included comparing the Italian/American university systems, talking about my Acadian heritage with the Quebec guys, chatting about Fort Kent with the director of the program, talking about the exciting challenge of living completely on your own in a new city with a new language with the German guy, teaching each other the word ditch in all the different languages (after getting the van stuck), and trying to explain the word throat lozenge and skidding. Julian also pointed out that French people have a difficult time pronouncing rice versus race, which I found super interesting. Then he helped us with pronouncing dessous/dessus and crier/ créer.
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| Chartreuse |
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| Chartreuse |
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| The Crew |
One of my favorite parts of the day was talking with the guy from the Czech Republic on the tram ride home. I’ve been feeling a little bit guilty the last couple days for having the ability to travel around Europe and visit all these amazing places when there are so many others who cannot. I am torn because it is so much fun and teaches me so many things, yet that money could be used to benefit others who need it. My friend, however, chatted with me about how he was staying here for a year and was disappointed that I am only staying for a semester. He thinks it is so important to really get a feel for a place –which he thinks takes a year. In his words, to learn a culture completely different from your own makes you understand the world as well as your own country much better. He put it more elegantly, but basically he helped me see the worth in traveling. He also talked about the “American Dream”. It was neat to see the perception of how an outsider views America. He truly believes America is the place where you can do anything and do not have to worry about bureaucratic problems. I quickly refuted that statement, but he helped me see the positives of America. It is amazing how if you work hard and set your mind to becoming successful, no matter what your background is, you can move up in the world. It truly is remarkable. I’ve seen it happen. The American Dream exists!
When we got to the trailhead, the van got stuck in a ditch. We spent a solid hour trying to get the van out, which I am still surprised we did successfully. The hike was AMAZING. The people were great and the scenery was incredible. The only scary part was that the whole hike was super slippery! Through my many interesting conversations (all in French) I came to realize a lot of the students were international on the ERASMIS program. Molly and I were the only Americans, which was great! There were two people from Quebec, one from Italy, another from the Czech Republic, another from Germany, and a bunch of people from different areas in France. I was having casual and pretty fast paced conversations in French and it felt so great! I even started thinking in French. Some of my favorite discussions included comparing the Italian/American university systems, talking about my Acadian heritage with the Quebec guys, chatting about Fort Kent with the director of the program, talking about the exciting challenge of living completely on your own in a new city with a new language with the German guy, teaching each other the word ditch in all the different languages (after getting the van stuck), and trying to explain the word throat lozenge and skidding. Julian also pointed out that French people have a difficult time pronouncing rice versus race, which I found super interesting. Then he helped us with pronouncing dessous/dessus and crier/ créer.
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