Heading Home

Thursday, I got to the airport pretty early. I had a jar of lavender honey from Aix, and I had to throw it out because it was a glass jar and I usually never carry glass jars so I forgot that was even a thing :( I was planning on eating it before my flight, so I was very, very sad when I had to throw it out. I took one final swipe of it with my finger, but I was still so sad. I mean I had already eaten more than half of it, but still… lavender honey from Aix…

Anyway, I’m pretty excited to be home! I know there are a lot of little stories and cultural differences that I haven’t had time to explain, so hopefully I’ll continue posting about France for a while after I return.

So after I got to the airport, I called Marie-Claude, and it was nice to talk to her before my flight. It was really hot in Aix, like 37 degrees Celsius! In Paris, it was only 28 or so, and that still felt pretty warm. 

While I was waiting, I found a piano right by my gate! Also a cool French drinking fountain. Remember when I first got to Paris at the beginning, and I was saying how there were no drinking fountains? Turns out, everything is on the port side. All the lounge chairs and eateries and nice bathrooms and drinking fountains. Voilà. 

My flight kind of sucked. I was supposed to sit next to this person, but he told me that he was an assistant for someone and asked if I'd be willing to switch, so I was like Yeah of course! I ended up getting a window seat, which was pretty neat. I got the best view of Toronto, with the CN Tower plain in sight! Although this picture is really hard to tell. 

Okay my flight was really bad because the new seat I got was first of all, pretty dirty. We left like a full hour after we were supposed to board the plane, so we were supposed to get to Toronto around 4:33 (it was originally supposed to arrive at 4:10). And also, this 8 hour and 15 minute flight, we had nothing to do! We were supposed to have interactive screens to watch personal movies and stuff, but for some reason the system broke down so only like, 2 people on the entire plane could watch movies. So literally I had an 8h15 minute plane ride with NOTHING TO DO. It was so terrible. I was planning on watching so many movies. 

And then once we got to Toronto YYZ airport, someone on the plane had a seizure! Which is so terrible. But then we waited another hour for the paramedics to finally take the kid away and then we were finally allowed to descend the plane. It was so horrible and then the baggage pick up took forever and it was just a mess. I almost cried of happiness after getting off that plane because I had honestly had enough.  

Anyway, I'm back safe and sound now in the US! It is still very strange to me. Everything is bigger than I remembered. Like I walked into a bunch of rooms and was thrown off because it seemed like everything had gotten bigger. 

Alright, I'm going to go now. There's so much work I have to do now that I'm back in this country. I will miss walking more than 10 miles a day because of course we drive everywhere here. Ciao for now!

-Cindy

Wednesday in Paris

While waiting in line for Musée d'Orsay, I saw this man with a bag that had the exact same design as one of my purses! It is a really dark picture, so it is a little difficult to see. 

Wednesday was my big museum day. I had originally planned on going to Musée d’Orsay, Musée Rodin, and then go back to the Louvre, but when I walked into Musée d’Orsay, I wasn’t going to leave. First of all, it was beautiful. You walk in and it’s this giant atrium with sculptures and natural skylighting and WOW. Also, there were so many painters that I knew! As much as I complained about my art history class, I knew it was a good class to take because now I appreciate art so much more! I was soo excited to see all the paintings that we studied during class. Looks like France has made me into an art history nerd!

The Gleaners, by Jean-Francois Millet! I studied this in my Written French I class AND my art history class. Talk about being important!

I don't understand sculpture at all, but can you imagine this being a slab of rock and the artist just slowly revealing this being underneath it?

THE MUSEE D'ORSAY IS SO PRETTY

I was so happy!!!

So this painting is of Jason and Medea by Gustave Moreau. I used this painting in my art history paper! So I was so excited to recognize it because I was like THAT IS MY PAINTING.

:D

Olympia, by Edouard Manet. It's very bold because it was the first time someone drew a naked woman who is clearly a prostitute, and didn't try to hide it as another depiction of Venus/Aphrodite (before, the only naked woman you were allowed to draw was a goddess).

Also Manet, also very bold, because again he is highlighting the French middle-class tendency to hire a prostitute who is so candidly sitting naked with some bourgeois men.

I didn't realize that I never got a good picture of myself with this painting... dang it

This painting is actually on the cover of one of my piano books!

This is one of Paul Cézanne's depictions of Mont Sainte-Victoire. I probably mentioned that he is a hero in Aix, so finding him in Paris was awesome!

More Cézanne. This one is called "A Modern Olympia" and at the time, it was pretty shocking (every art piece ever is shocking, haha) because Cézanne was comparing himself to "The Great Manet"

One of my favorite pointillist painters, Paul Signac! We studied this painting in class, too. 

Some Van Gogh for ya

Isn't the museum beautiful?? 

Also, I liked Orsay better that the Louvre simply because it was less crowded. And they had their walls painted all different colors. It was so pretty! I ended up staying there almost just as long, if not longer than I had stayed at the Louvre. Oh I loved it. I didn’t even want to leave.

Then I went back to Jardin de Luxembourg to have a picnic lunch. That was nice. After I went to Musée Rodin, this museum for Augustus Rodin, a French sculpture. I originally thought I wasn’t going to like it that much because I never studied sculpture art history and I wasn’t super interested in any of the sculptures at the Louvre or Orsay. But I FOUND “THE THINKER.” I mean I didn’t really find it because it was there in plain sight for all to see, but anyway… the museum (got in for free because they asked me if I was a fine arts student and I was like UH YES) was part of this large, very pretty garden. I almost cried when I finally saw The Thinker. I was wondering why the Louvre and Orsay didn’t have it and then I realized Rodin must have built it, so obviously it was probably in the Rodin museum… and then when I saw it in the Rodin garden, I didn’t know what to do! It was just like, Wow he’s so famous, I don’t even know what to do with myself. I wanted to take like 50 million pictures. It was wonderful.

The garden

In front of, The Gates of Hell

THE THINKER

MORE THINKER PICTURES

Omg he's so famous

Then, because I could, I visited the place where they filmed Inception by the Bir-Hakeim bridge! It was pretty underwhelming and there was a lot of construction. 

Got back to the hostel pretty early and packed everything! And that was my last full day in Paris.

-Cindy

Tuesday in Paris

Tuesday—went to the Catacombs. I waited for like two hours to get in! And they weren’t free, but that’s okay. I had sort of a “death” day on Tuesday; I went to the Catacombs, which obviously there are a lot of dead people there, and then I went to Victor Hugo’s house, who is also obviously dead, and then I decided to finish it off by going to the Père Lachaise cemetery where Oscar Wilde and lots of other famous people are buried.

SO MANY DEAD PEOPLE. 

My picnic lunch! I love taboulé :D It's kind of like couscous, but you eat it cold. 

Victor Hugo

Victor Hugo's Chinese room

The Catacombs were really cool! Literally. By the end of the tunnel, I was freezing. And I saw Honoré de Balzac’s grave, and Edith Piaf’s grave, and Frédéric Chopin’s grave (his Nocturne in C# minor is my favorite piano piece ever), and Eugène Delacroix, Jean-August Dominique Ingrès, and of course Oscar Wilde’s grave. Some of them were really hard to find! And then some of them people really crowded around. I guess if you’re famous, people like to see where you’re buried.

Frédéric Chopin

I saw this man taking care of this person's grave. I thought that was really sweet. In a place where there were so many famous people buried, it was hard to remember that regular people were buried there too, to take care of the graves of their loved ones. 

Edith Piaf's family, with Théo Sarapo

Honoré de Balzac!

Oscar Wilde. His grave was surrounded by this plastic cage/fence thing, so people could write on it and leave messages and thank you notes. 

EUGENE DELACROIX

That night, I really wanted to see the Eiffel Tower. I already went, but I wanted to see it lit up at night! So Kinki and I went to the Eiffel Tower. The terrace was closed because it was so late, but we went up to the 2nd floor (the halfway point pictured below). The view was still gorgeous though, and every hour the Eiffel Tower would light up and sparkle!

They don't call Paris, "The City of Lights," for nothing.

Is it better than Pitt's Cathedral of Learning? We may never know.

-Cindy

Weekend in Paris!

Early Saturday morning, I went to Paris to meet my cousin who is working in Germany. Iku and Marie-Claude woke up super early to say goodbye to me, which was so sweet of them! Iku actually held the door open when I entered the elevator, which meant the elevator couldn’t work, but she was like, Noo once I close it, you’ll be gone! And Marie-Claude was like, you’re gonna make her miss her train!

The trip to Marseille and then to Paris was pretty uneventful. I somehow managed to snag a first-class seat because it was cheaper than a second-class seat. So I had a pretty comfortable ride to Paris! My cousin was caught in a traffic jam, but we eventually found each other, so then let the adventures begin!

Departing from Marseille, so I was the only one on the car!

My hostel ended up being ridiculously nice this time. I think it’s a pretty new hostel, but it was so clean. It was probably even nicer than most hotels I’ve stayed at, and it was in a pretty good location! Accessible everywhere by metro.

The first day in Paris, we went to see the Arc de Triomphe and Eiffel Tower. Paris in July is terrible. It is full of tourists, and everywhere you go, you have to wait in line for at least an hour. Then, we went to Sacre-Coeur to see the sunset, but the dome was closed by the time we got there, so the sun wasn’t even setting in the right direction! I mean, of course the sun was in the right direction, but we weren’t high enough to be able to actually see it. It was a great view though, so I’m not too broken-hearted, and the cathedral itself was very beautiful.

Arc de Triomphe!

Feeling so French in this gallant moment

A panoramic view from the Arc de Triomphe

There were so many stairs in Paris! I walked an average of over 10 miles every single day I was there.

Me and Eiffel :)

On the River Seine

On Sunday, we decided to visit the Palace of Versailles (or actually the French call it the Castle of Versailles). This was great because Versailles is actually pretty far from Paris, so I got to ride in a car there since my cousin rented one! I somehow managed to get in for free because I had a European student ID, which was awesome! And Versailles was beautiful, of course.

After Versailles, we wanted to get into the Louvre, but it was so crowded and the line was just getting longer. So we ended up going to Notre Dame, which was also very pretty. My cousin and his colleagues left after that, but I went back to the Louvre and I couldn’t decide if I should try to go in or not. By that time, there wasn’t a line anymore because it was about to close in an hour. But I went in, and turns out since I’m technically a “student,” I got to go in for free! I didn’t even have to wait in line to buy tickets. So I spent like 20 minutes in the Louvre haha! I saw Mona Lisa and Liberty Guiding the People and Winged Victory, so I was pretty happy.

Moi et le château

Le Château

J'étais une princesse

Et après, nous avons visité la cathédrale de Notre Dame!

And then I went to the Louvre! 

I wasn't super impressed with the size of Mona Lisa.

Winged Victory! It was very uncrowded since the museum was almost closing.

Liberty Guiding the People by Eugène Delacroix! I studied this in my art history class. This painting inspired a lot of Victor Hugo's novel, Les Misérables

Another one of Eugène Delacroix's paintings - Massacre at Chios!

Louvre

I think that’s so awesome that the really big museums in Paris are all free for students and youth. I’m not sure if it’s because they figure that youth wouldn’t really care that much, or if it’s because they’re making an effort to promote art and cultural appreciation among European youth. But I’m so happy because I basically cut down my spending in Paris by at least 75%, and I got to visit all these really famous, awesome, cultural places for free!

But speaking of museums, on Monday nearly everything is closed, except for the Louvre and Centre Pompidou. Which was totally fine because I was going to go visit those places anyway, so it was perfect! I got to the Louvre again and got in at around 9:30, and it was still pretty empty at that time so I went to see Napoleon’s apartments. And then I spent like four more hours just looking at everything. I found a bunch of paintings that I studied in art history class, so I got pretty excited! But by the time I was done, I was exhausted.

Look at this line!

Lonely in Napoleon's apartments

African art

I then had a sort of picnic lunch in the Jardin de Tuileries, and then I visited the Jardins de Luxembourg, or Luxembourg gardens! Oh, it’s so beautiful there. I know I’ve been saying that everything is beautiful, but it really was! I love parks because they are free and very pretty and nature-y and green. 

Jardin de Luxembourg

Ah, the building/senate there

Then, I actually went to a museum of Medical History. It was honestly the most terrifying thing I've ever seen. There were so many knives and images of people cutting the body open for surgery, and the medicine history of genitals was SO SCARY. Also all of the writing was in French, so anything I didn't understand was left to the imagination. It was disturbing. I mean, just look at these chainsaws!

Phew. Well afterwards, I went to the Hôtel de Ville (city hall) because the French always have really interesting buildings for their city halls! I didn't go in because there was construction outside, and I don't think it was open, but here it is in all of its glory!

Afterwards, I went to the Centre Pompidou, which is this modern art museum. I saw some more paintings that I studied in art history class, and then I saw some pretty interesting things (it was pretty similar to the Andy Warhol museum, actually).

Georges Braque :) I was actually tested on this exact painting on my art history final exam, and I got the title only partway correct. Oh well. 

The view from Centre Pompidou :)

Then, my handy Parisian guidebook told me to go to this falafel place, so I went there and got a falafel sandwich for dinner. I ate it in a nearby park. It was very messy and very delicious, but I was so hungry that I kind of wolfed it down and couldn’t really appreciate the taste. Anyhow, then I went back to the hostel.

This vegetarian falafel had so much in it!

I got home pretty early actually (it's funny that I thought of the hostel as home), and they have this 9th floor terrasse, so I went up there with one of my roommates to enjoy the view. This is completely unedited! The little building in the distance is Sacre-Coeur. 

Me and Kinki, who is from Hong Kong!

[End Sat-Mon in Paris]

-Cindy