Sorry I’ve taken so long to write…France was quite a wild ride and I needed time to recuperate. So here I sit, in a café drinking a café bombon (condensed milk and espresso), looking out the window at the first rays of sun we have seen in a while. Today is SUCH a beautiful day here. The weather has been really nasty and the mountains have gotten a TON of snow, which is really good because apparently Granada is always in drought. Anyhow, today is pretty chilly but it’s the first day I haven’t been in a heavy peacoat and boots. Back to France: France started out as this mature trip with my closest girlfriends to the sophisticated city of Paris. To be perfectly honest the only thing I knew about France previous to my trip is political tendencies/structure and a bit about society from a Political Science class I took at UCLA. I figured I’d learn a lot more actually experiencing the city and people first hand. So to start the experience, I left class early. It was my political science class here in which I have the coolest professor who winked at me as I left class after only 30 minutes! I immediately pranced to Zara which is a clothing store equivalent more or less to Express in the states. [Sidenote: I just got an American guys number whose name is “fishy.” I didn’t really want it, but I couldn’t be mean and say no. The study abroad crowd is definitely a breed of its own! Haha!] Seriously I’m going to focus on Paris now. So I pranced out of class early to Zara and purchased a few turtlenecks to prepare for the bitter cold of Paris. Then I proceeded to the bus stop and met Kathleen who was my travel buddy, thank god! She and I bussed over to the airport which is even smaller than the Bakersfield airport…It has a whopping 4 terminals so as you could imagine, we ran into so many friends traveling for the weekend. As we were waiting for our flight we made conversation with this girl who was clearly from the south, and really seriously looked like a beautiful southern bell even without make up. She was on her way to Barcelona to meet up with a friend and said she’d decided to stay in the airport over night instead of getting a room, so obviously when she left I said “Be Careful.” Youd’ve thought I’d said drop dead, I’m psychic and I know you’re going to die. She nearly had a heart attack, her face was filled with fear as she practically begged me to elaborate on my, “be careful” comment. She then had the audacity to ask me why…now our entire conversation I’d thought this girl was pretty stupid, but I tried to tell myself it was the stress of traveling alone. I could do nothing but just stare at her. Literally, my other friends had to answer for me. I thought it was understood, you’re a female, American, you have your passport and a good amount of money on you in a foreign land where she very clearly does not know the language, and you’re staying in an airport in the least stable part of the country…AT YOUR OWN WILL! After she departed I was still dumbfounded and said nothing. My girlfriends however, who tend to be more accepting than I, couldn’t get over how dumb this girl was, so I don’t feel so bad for being shocked. If they noticed then I know it had to be bad. I mean this girls eyes were literally glazed over. After that encounter Kathleen and I checked in for our flight and they made us out our suitcases through. I was pretty near furious because I had a bad feeling about it. Spain is the epitome of inefficiency, ie getting your luggage to the right spot. Whatever, I’m learning to pick and chose my battles so I delve into my book until our flight to Madrid. The flight is delayed, as should always be expected when in Spain. They take the saying “la prisa mata” and “tranquilla” very seriously. They don’t believe in stress and are NEVER pressed for time. We arrive in Madrid and sprint right to the McDonalds with all the other loyal and malnourished Americans and grin while we waited for our connecting gate. Eventually we learned our flight was postponed until the next morning. It only took us 4 laps trips to the information desk and 10 rounds running though the airport to find our airline. The Madrid airport is all glass so you can’t figure out where the doors are or how to get anywhere, I felt like a friggin hamster, and quite frankly I was NOT happy. We spoke with Iberia (our Spanish airline company) and they told us they wouldn’t give us our luggage that evening because it was easier to keep it at the airport and put it on the plane the next day. Right….As if I didn’t need a fresh pair of panties or a toothbrush. “Oh well,” I thought, “they’re putting us up in a four star hotel and we’re in a big city, there’s a good chance it’ll be nice.” Kathleen and I just laughed it off as we were shuttled to our hotel in what was probably the equivalent to Inglewood, Los Angels. The entrance was stunning. I thought the rooms would be equally nice. After climbing the stairs, passing a family of Orthodox Jews and following the line of tread worn carpet to our room, my expectations had lessened a bit, but not enough to prepare me for this room. Tada! The bathroom had evergreen colored tiles, a rusted bode (I have googled this word so many times and CAN NOT figure out how to spell it – I’m referring to the nasty European alternative to toilet paper that washes you instead of wiping) and because it would make too much sense to leave a toothbrush and body wash in the bathrooms, the hotel had a shoe shine and shampoo…no conditioner. I really hope this does not come off as cynical, because it is not at all. Literally, everyday I have to laugh at the customs of people here in Spain. Really, a shoe shine? Haha. Oh well, Kathleen and I went for dinner number two as it was on the airline. We killed the worst bottle of red wine I’ve ever had and called it a night. 5 am rolled around pretty quickly considering we giggled ourselves to sleep at the hilarity of the situation. Kathleen and I are very similar eaters so we both we ecstatic for our free breakfast. We ran downstairs ready to give Paris a second go and find horrible horrible coffee, orange juice that tasted like Sunny Delight and packaged muffins. We should have known. Whatever, we get on our flight where I received a free newspaper that was 56 pages and had more articles on the US, especially Obama than any other topics. (This was pre election time too). All of Spain, Europe and seriously the world LOVE Obama. Being the asshole that I am I always ask why and nobody knows why though. Haha. So I’m pretty entertained with my paper, we land in France and I’m ready to role. Well…My luggage didn’t arrive and neither did Kathleen’s. Thank god our friend Parissa who is studying in Paris for the year knows French. We find out that our luggage was sent to Charles de Gaule airport in Paris even though we were at Orly airport. After the whole crock I was fed in Spain about keeping my luggage overnight, I was pretty pissed. Parissa had our luggage sent to her apartment and we were off. One 10 euro rail pass (one way only) and about 30 minutes we were climbing the stairs to her apartment.
Apparently there was some architect who went through and modernized the entire city of Paris except for one area, which is now the student/gay area of Paris and is ABSOLUTELY charming. We had to climb 5 flights of stairs to Parissa’s apartment, as there was no elevator and when we got to the top, it was the spitting image of the attic that “The Little Princess” was filmed in. Parissa’s room was up another flight of stairs and her ceiling was slanted into an a-frame as it was the roof. Right above her bed there is a skylight from which she can see the angel of the Bastille. Also upstairs is the only shower and laundry machine and rack to air dry the wash. Not only is air drying inconvenient and produces heavily wrinkled clothes, it takes forever in Europe because the weather is so cold! Therefore, I really admire the European’s for “going green” in this manner, as it would probably have been my last step to going green. The American idea of green laundry is a Laundromat that says they don’t use chemicals, or an energy efficient washer and dryer! You’ve got to love Americans. So anyhow, after a quick tour of the apartment, Parissa was off to class and Kathleen, Elise, and I set out for a café Parissa told us about called “American Breakfast” where we had breakfast burritos, scrambled eggs and chocolate chip pancakes! Not only were we ecstatic for food with flavor, my digestive system began to function immediately after. :) Then we set out to explore and wander the streets and wandered right past the Building of Justice, over the Seine River and onto the steps of Notre Dame. We then met up with Parissa, purchased Subway (another hallelujah) and picnicked in front of the Eiffel tower. After that we visited the Lourve where I saw the Mona Lisa, a Picasso exhibit and some Grecian statues that I studied in my art history class at UCLA! We then trekked home to an apartment full of Parisians dressed in costume for Halloween! Needless to say we partied all night. Kathleen and I, however, were the first to pass out from the exhausting travels we’d made so we hoped right in Parissa’s bed and listened to the rain hit the skylight that was so close I could reach out and touch it (remember the ceiling slanted down with the roof) and slept like babies. The next morning, my bed buddy (and room mate of two years in LA) and I hopped out of bed to go make purchases that we were positive would be charged to our airline. First on the list was clean undies. Kathleen gave in and bought a pack of 3 for 17 euro!!! I thought they were so ugly I’d rather wear my 3 day oldies than those, and boy was I right. Kathleen changed in the fitting room and made me come in there so we could laugh at how hyenas they were. They looked like the old fashioned bathing suits that make little sausages out of your upper thighs! We continued our shopping and after about 200 Euro each, which was literally one change of clothes, we ran back to the apartment to shower and change. It was here that we found out the airline still hadn’t gotten our luggage to us, which mind you was in the same city, and would only reimburse us 50 Euro for each 24 hours our luggage was missing because we made our lost luggage claims together. With that news we immediately showered, and returned everything but sweaters, shirts and undies because those were necessity and are still currently left with an unnecessarily expensive bill, but a story that is so worth the price! (I forgot to mention that the night before, during the Halloween party, another friend of ours, who is also in our sorority, and studying in Geneva, flew in, so there we were….5 Chi Omegas just tearing Paris a new one!) The day of hectic shopping and returns all 5 of us visited the Arc de Triumph, Champs Elysee (the equivalent to 5th avenue) had some lunch, saw the ways of Parissa as she showed us a few smaller things until it was time for the opera/violin concert held in a beautiful old Cathedral. The concert was in the upstairs portion so we climbed the most narrow, ancient feeling cement stairway that twisted on it’s way up until we reached this huge open room that has an entire wall of stained glass. At first I felt very cultured and really excited, but then I pulled a Steve Devers and started nodding off. A few times I’d close my eyes and try to imagine what the person singing very high soprano would look like and I always pictured a woman. I’d open my eyes and every time I’d be shocked to see the skinniest little man singing so high! As the show went on, my head fell forward for a quick doze and I was afraid the other 4 would see that my head wasn’t really in line with theirs (as we were all sitting in a row) and realize something was up. I tried chewing gum to stay awake and it did nothing so then I got strategic and slouched a little so no matter which way my head rolled they’d think it was from poor posture and not sleeping. Needless to say we were all relieved there was no encore and sprinted out of there to revisit the Eiffel Tower by night. Here we froze, had another photo shoot, as we now had Alissa (who is Chi O #5) and watched the tower light up. The tower normally lights up white but this time it lit up blue because the President of France is also the President of the European Union, so when you see my pictures and you see the circle of yellow/white stars and a blue tower you know why.
That night we slept tightly and the 3 American-Spaniards shoved off early in the morning to catch our flight home. You’d better believe I kept my luggage with my for my flight home, and was all too happy when I set foot on Spanish soil, in a land where I can ACTUALLY communicate. When I got back to Spain I got the same feeling I used to get when I’d leave Spanish class where you think, “thank god, now I can get my point across.” That’s how I felt, so hopefully that means my speaking is picking up. The true test will be when I get back home and speak with Mexican-Spanish speakers, because here there is an extremely heavy accent. I guess it would be the equivalent to a hard core southern twang, but they drop the ends of their words and speak with a list. Apparently the reason for the lisp is that hundreds of years ago there was a king with a lisp that the people adopted so as not to be offensive in his presence, and it’s stuck ever since. Anyhow, I’m headed to Brussels, Belgium this Wednesday with 3 other girls in my program and I have my first 2 exams, so I’ve got a big week. I’m really going to try to be better about blogging so hang in there with me, and I can not wait to see everyone at Christmas! P.S. My trip to Paris, thus far, has been the thing to make me most home sick. Had my flight mishaps happened in Spain, or better yet, the US, I would’ve reamed someone. French might be in my next lifetime, but after German. :)
Apparently there was some architect who went through and modernized the entire city of Paris except for one area, which is now the student/gay area of Paris and is ABSOLUTELY charming. We had to climb 5 flights of stairs to Parissa’s apartment, as there was no elevator and when we got to the top, it was the spitting image of the attic that “The Little Princess” was filmed in. Parissa’s room was up another flight of stairs and her ceiling was slanted into an a-frame as it was the roof. Right above her bed there is a skylight from which she can see the angel of the Bastille. Also upstairs is the only shower and laundry machine and rack to air dry the wash. Not only is air drying inconvenient and produces heavily wrinkled clothes, it takes forever in Europe because the weather is so cold! Therefore, I really admire the European’s for “going green” in this manner, as it would probably have been my last step to going green. The American idea of green laundry is a Laundromat that says they don’t use chemicals, or an energy efficient washer and dryer! You’ve got to love Americans. So anyhow, after a quick tour of the apartment, Parissa was off to class and Kathleen, Elise, and I set out for a café Parissa told us about called “American Breakfast” where we had breakfast burritos, scrambled eggs and chocolate chip pancakes! Not only were we ecstatic for food with flavor, my digestive system began to function immediately after. :) Then we set out to explore and wander the streets and wandered right past the Building of Justice, over the Seine River and onto the steps of Notre Dame. We then met up with Parissa, purchased Subway (another hallelujah) and picnicked in front of the Eiffel tower. After that we visited the Lourve where I saw the Mona Lisa, a Picasso exhibit and some Grecian statues that I studied in my art history class at UCLA! We then trekked home to an apartment full of Parisians dressed in costume for Halloween! Needless to say we partied all night. Kathleen and I, however, were the first to pass out from the exhausting travels we’d made so we hoped right in Parissa’s bed and listened to the rain hit the skylight that was so close I could reach out and touch it (remember the ceiling slanted down with the roof) and slept like babies. The next morning, my bed buddy (and room mate of two years in LA) and I hopped out of bed to go make purchases that we were positive would be charged to our airline. First on the list was clean undies. Kathleen gave in and bought a pack of 3 for 17 euro!!! I thought they were so ugly I’d rather wear my 3 day oldies than those, and boy was I right. Kathleen changed in the fitting room and made me come in there so we could laugh at how hyenas they were. They looked like the old fashioned bathing suits that make little sausages out of your upper thighs! We continued our shopping and after about 200 Euro each, which was literally one change of clothes, we ran back to the apartment to shower and change. It was here that we found out the airline still hadn’t gotten our luggage to us, which mind you was in the same city, and would only reimburse us 50 Euro for each 24 hours our luggage was missing because we made our lost luggage claims together. With that news we immediately showered, and returned everything but sweaters, shirts and undies because those were necessity and are still currently left with an unnecessarily expensive bill, but a story that is so worth the price! (I forgot to mention that the night before, during the Halloween party, another friend of ours, who is also in our sorority, and studying in Geneva, flew in, so there we were….5 Chi Omegas just tearing Paris a new one!) The day of hectic shopping and returns all 5 of us visited the Arc de Triumph, Champs Elysee (the equivalent to 5th avenue) had some lunch, saw the ways of Parissa as she showed us a few smaller things until it was time for the opera/violin concert held in a beautiful old Cathedral. The concert was in the upstairs portion so we climbed the most narrow, ancient feeling cement stairway that twisted on it’s way up until we reached this huge open room that has an entire wall of stained glass. At first I felt very cultured and really excited, but then I pulled a Steve Devers and started nodding off. A few times I’d close my eyes and try to imagine what the person singing very high soprano would look like and I always pictured a woman. I’d open my eyes and every time I’d be shocked to see the skinniest little man singing so high! As the show went on, my head fell forward for a quick doze and I was afraid the other 4 would see that my head wasn’t really in line with theirs (as we were all sitting in a row) and realize something was up. I tried chewing gum to stay awake and it did nothing so then I got strategic and slouched a little so no matter which way my head rolled they’d think it was from poor posture and not sleeping. Needless to say we were all relieved there was no encore and sprinted out of there to revisit the Eiffel Tower by night. Here we froze, had another photo shoot, as we now had Alissa (who is Chi O #5) and watched the tower light up. The tower normally lights up white but this time it lit up blue because the President of France is also the President of the European Union, so when you see my pictures and you see the circle of yellow/white stars and a blue tower you know why.
That night we slept tightly and the 3 American-Spaniards shoved off early in the morning to catch our flight home. You’d better believe I kept my luggage with my for my flight home, and was all too happy when I set foot on Spanish soil, in a land where I can ACTUALLY communicate. When I got back to Spain I got the same feeling I used to get when I’d leave Spanish class where you think, “thank god, now I can get my point across.” That’s how I felt, so hopefully that means my speaking is picking up. The true test will be when I get back home and speak with Mexican-Spanish speakers, because here there is an extremely heavy accent. I guess it would be the equivalent to a hard core southern twang, but they drop the ends of their words and speak with a list. Apparently the reason for the lisp is that hundreds of years ago there was a king with a lisp that the people adopted so as not to be offensive in his presence, and it’s stuck ever since. Anyhow, I’m headed to Brussels, Belgium this Wednesday with 3 other girls in my program and I have my first 2 exams, so I’ve got a big week. I’m really going to try to be better about blogging so hang in there with me, and I can not wait to see everyone at Christmas! P.S. My trip to Paris, thus far, has been the thing to make me most home sick. Had my flight mishaps happened in Spain, or better yet, the US, I would’ve reamed someone. French might be in my next lifetime, but after German. :)
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