*flop*

This past week, my mom and sister were here visiting. It was really nice, and we did SO much. Museums up the wazoo. Mum gets like that - when she has a plan to do stuff, she does it. I'm very proud of them. It was really intense for me especially, though, because I was being a tourist with them, as well as their tour guide and translator, plus continuing to be a student, and hopefully enjoy it all too. Hence the title of this post - I was ready to fall into bed at every moment.

My favorite part of their trip , stuff-wise (as in, having them here was the best part) was Tuesday, when we went to Versailles for the day. It also just happened to be the only day I have seen in Paris yet that didn't have a cloud in the sky. Not. One. Single. Cloud. Not even a wisp. Just a clear blue as far as the eye can see.

The chateau of Versailles is ridiculous. Absolutely nuts. Each room was worth approximately four hundred gajillion dollars (you don't even want to know what that is in Euros). Even the simplest room that we walked through had a mural on the ceiling. There was one room with velvet walls!! All the beds that we saw (and there were WAY more fancy beds than there had been fancy people living there) were ostentatiously ornate, three or four feet high mattresses with huge canopies and feathery plumes at the corners. Also, gold was everywhere. Everything was gilded. No wonder the people hated them - they were starving while Marie Antoinette and her elite posse decided to have yet another portrait taken of them to put in the new room that they had just built. Who doesn't need a seventh study in the East Wing of a chateau?

Other than that, Sainte Chapelle was unnecessarily closed every day, Mom's French started coming back, and Bertillon's (ice cream) was as heavenly as ever.

I'm legal!

Sorry it's been a while - my life was picked up and spun around by a cyclone of awesomeness starting about two weeks ago or so.

So, as the title suggests, I have since had my 21st birthday! (Shoutout thanks to ADP for the fantastic surprise birthday skype) It was great. Thursday, a bunch of friends took me out to an Indian place, and we all shared 5 curries/saags/yumminesses and a ton of rice. Then we got crepes for dessert (Rhiannon and Becky got seconds, hehe), when I remembered that the best crepe is nutella and banana slices. I think I already mentioned this in another post, but it merits being mentioned multiple times.

Friday, Andy and I saw Mr. Nobody, which I highly recommend, as long as you don't mind needing to watch it about 7 times before you understand it. It's kind of a mix of The Matrix and Sliding Doors. After that, we went to a party of some American girls who are in the same program as Kirill, who is Aaron's Russian friend from the high school era (remember that time?). We're big on having random, far-reaching connections here. It was great, their apartment was 3 stories for 3 people, with incredibly high ceilings and a bubble staircase (the railing was metal circles of different sizes attached together). SO cool. We met new people (the first ones I met were a British girl and a Finnish dude), and chatted about being in France. Yael and I barely caught the last metro, and got home around 2am.

Saturday (yeah, I decided to have an entire birthday weekend, to compensate for the fact that turning 21 is not nearly as big of a deal in France as in the United States), Andy and Kirill and I watched The Princess and The Frog (fun french word of the day: frog = grenouille. Another fun french fact: "to have a frog in your throat" is "avoir un chat dans la gorge"; literally "to have a cat in the throat") (and yes, this is the new Disney movie...), then met up with people and went to have dinner in the latin quarter. The rue that Kirill knew of was stuffed with restaurants, with people enticing customers in with deals and freebies. The place we ended up going to was an Italian place, with an appetizer (calamari for me), main course ("individual" pizza that I could only eat half of) and a dessert (apple tart) for 9 euros. REALLY good deal, and decent food - I liked the pizza, and the veggie soup that Andy got for an appetizer was really yummy with the bread dipped in. To get us in, though, the guy outside ended up promising each person in the group (there were 8 of us) three free cocktails, which was similar to sangria.After this dinner, we went to a bar/club to meet up with some of Kirill's friends. This place was set up with a normal bar on the main floor, and then a dance cavern below. There's no other way to describe this place. It was craggy stone cavern with uneven walls, a low ceiling, and minimal lighting (except for the neon clubbing lights). It was epic. We had gotten there around 10:45 (and therefore gotten downstairs for free, because it was before 11), and danced like maniacs, with Lady Gaga songs followed by Michael Jackson, followed by one that was DEFINITELY on my parents' mix tape for their wedding. CULTURE SHOCK (thank you Allie Benson). In any case, most people decided to leave around 1, so as to catch the metro, but Kirill and I decided to stay for a bit and dance some more (during which time, a French guy made a passing comment to Kirill and I of "chaud comme lapin". If you don't understand French, find someone who does to translate). Around 3, we found a 24-hour cafe to rehydrate, and then kept dancing until 6, when we took one of the first metros back to our respective homes, and (for me, at least) collapsed into sweet oblivion for several hours.

As if that weren't wonderful enough, we all went bowling the next day (I like bowling. Hush up), and then Kirill made me dinner and we watched a movie and I happened to fall asleep at his place.

And then I was happy.

And 21.

But mostly happy.

A few delicious things I have eaten, and other stories.

My host mother this time around seems just as intent on feeding me constant deliciousness as the last. I am by no means complaining. I have had whole fish, fried, of which only the spine and parts of the ribs were inedible, and okonomiyaki:

(I.E. this pile of deliciousness. Note: not my picture, source is google images)

I've been fed Curried Tonkatsu (Japanese curry isn't really spic at all, it more resembles Tommy's Chili, though I don't know if East Coasters will get that reference), every kind of Miso Soup ever, salmon filets, tako-yaki (doughy fried balls with octopus meat), horse sushi (raw, and actually very tasty), udon with a whole fish in it, tuna tarre tarre (Japanese style, of course), and a whole lot more. I love this country.
In other news, if you ever get the chance to go to Osaka, check out a club named Joule. they have a discount for foreigners and will give you two free drink tickets. and they play awesome remixes (such at Bon Jovi, whoever the hell did You Spin Me Right Round, Michael Jackson, lots of rap, rock pop, etc.), house, tehno, and more. Oh, it's also populated by massive crowds of attractive Japanese people who dance until they can catch the first train at 5:30 in the morning.
P.S. Osaka is just generally an awesome city. Food, Shopping, Partying and sight seeing is all definitely possible. And you can stay in a capsule hotel.

I like to think this guy is saying "WOOOO PARTY WOOO"
Though really it would be more like ヤアアアアパティーヤアヤアアア

Pictures of Pictures

Well, this week I'm actually starting classes (which, by the way, are all in French. We'll see how that works out), which means that for the past few weeks, everyone in the program has been running around like chickens with their heads cut off, trying to do all those wonderful touristy things that we probably won't be able to do once we have to do homework (also in French. Grr). What all THAT means, is that I've been to a whole bunch of museums (most of which are free to us, as VWPP [Vassar-Wesleyan Program in Paris] decided to make us all art history students, because we get in free to said museums. Pretty sweet). My favorite so far was probably the Louvre, though we were only in there for a total of 15 minutes before they kicked us out. Because it is my first time in Paris, and therefore at the Louvre, my friends rushed me up to see the Mona Lisa, as it is a necessity for first-timers.


Something to know about this most famous work of art - it's small. Made smaller by the fact that there is a counter around it, making you stand about ten feet away. Rather a pain. In any case, I looked at it, I took a few pictures, I noticed some interesting details about the left and right sides, and then I turned my attention to the painting on the other wall.

It was really pretty, and the railing was only a foot away from it, so I could get much closer, and look at the detailing better. It was also huge. (Apparently size does matter to me?) It grabbed my attention a lot better than the Mona Lisa, even though there were a few guards surrounding it.

We also went to the Musee d'Orsay, which I really enjoyed. They had a Van Gogh exhibit, which was fantastic. You know how everyone says that you can see the brushstrokes in his paintings? It's completely true. It was a bit unreal to me.

(original)
(close-up)

And there was NO fencing around these. This one didn't even have glass - I could have touched it if I wanted to (and if they wouldn't have gotten really angry at me). Of course, I didn't, but STILL! I could have!

The Epitome of France

Today, I'm going to teach you about chocolate.

(And before I begin - yes, this is entirely meant to make you jealous. In case you had any doubts about that.)

We had a degustation de chocolat a few days ago, which is essentially a chocolate tasting, and we also had a bit of history and a talk of the process of making chocolate thrown in. For those of you in my dear hometown of SK and know about the Sweenor's Open House in December, this was essentially that, but more elaborate and expansive, and had more eating involved.

The first thing that happened was that I was late (I'm in France. It happens). We were greeted by the intoxicating smell of chocolate, as well as the warmth that comes from not being outside. Someone who worked there was handing out little cups of homemade hot chocolate. Even better than that, though (yeah, I know, it KEEPS GETTING BETTER) was that there were two platters of little chocolates sitting on the counter for us to munch on before the tour actually started. We had hors d'oeuvres of chocolates before a chocolate tasting. Absolutely phenomenal.

Then the actual tour started. Our guide talked about the cacao bean, and where it came from, and passed around a tray of shaved 100% chocolate to taste. I knew what was coming, but apparently I was one of the few, given the faces. It was really amusing, actually. He then showed us the machines for getting the small shaped bits of yumminess, and how to cover them in chocolate (like at Sweenor's), and how to decorate the tops with nuts or music notes or whatever you fancy. He also showed us how they make the hollow chocolates that they can then fill with liquids, like caramel or some such thing. Then he took us into the storage room, where the chocolates all wait patiently to be nommed, and left us alone with another few platters of chocolates, after telling us what types they were.

All in all, very delicious.

Also on the list of wonderful things that are not necessarily healthy is a crepe with nutella and banana slices (sorry Mom). Ridiculously good. Also also on the list is passion fruit sorbet. Oh mon Dieu.

*see moral of previous post*

ひさしぶりだね！

Hi everybody, it's been a while! For those of you who don't know, I'm spending spring of 2010 in Kyoto in the Kyoto Consortium for Japanese Studies. The city is beautiful and historic, but still crazy and Japanese if you know where to look. I'm studying at a genuine Japanese University... just not with any Japanese students. All my courses, aside from language, are in English. I'm in a Post-War Fiction and Film class, and a survey course on contemporary and historical Japanese religion. It's been an interesting couple of weeks so far, from orientation, and getting to know my classmates through sushi

(I did not in fact eat the Japanese plum and labiate roll)

and drunken Karaoke,

Hold me Jack!

to actually having to remember to be a college student and do my homework.

I live in a rural area five minutes from a shrine dedicated to sake in one direction and a monkey park in the other. My host dad trims his lawn with a flame thrower and I migh start spinning fire with a group called 遊火 pronounced Asobi, the kanji of which literally translate to "play" and "fire." The semester is looking bright. This past sunday, I witnessed the largest Kyudo archery contest in Kyoto, in which massive numbers of archers of all ages and genders try their hand at shooting targets lined up at one end of a temple, fom the other end of the temple.

No seriously, lots of archers.

The temple in question must be about a hundred feet long or more, so it's not an easy task. Tomorrow i'll be going on a field trip to a number of temples and shrines, as the classes I am taking are strongly tied in to Kyoto's history.
Whew! So that's the rundown so far, I'll keep you guys updated as cool stuff comes my way!

A short tale of noms and happiness

Tonight, dinner was a crepe with nutella, and red wine.

Moral of this tale: I love being in Paris.