Saint Malo, Saint Michel et Saint Joseph: Bro-ing Out

Salut!  I’m going to preface this post with a warning: my camera died this weekend so I don’t have many pictures…check facebook for photos.

This weekend our program was so kind as to plan a little trip for us (one of four for the semester).  At 7 a.m. we were herded onto a bus (Japanese on one bus, Chinese another, and everyone else in the other…such is my “French” life) where we began our adventure to Bretagne.

The word, meaning Brittany, is a region in northwest France which was once a fief and under British rule, thus there is a strong Celtic influence in the region.   In modern day, the area is known for several things:

1) The striped shirts they wear (which are also seen in J.Crew and Banana Republic when nautical themed clothing is in fashion).

2) The crepes/galette

3) Gateau Breton (Brittany butter cakes)

4) The strong cultural pride of its people—they insist they are separate from France and would probably secede if France would let them.  They try every few years to leave, but they’re kind of attached to France so it hasn’t worked out so far.

 Anyway, our first destination in Bretagne was Saint Malo.  More history: Saint Malo was a fortified city  during the Middle Ages.  Today, they are far more open to visitors, but the ramparts that surround the small island still remain.  You can walk around the entire city on top of these walls which shows you a beautiful view of what lies within and outside the city. 

Interesting about Saint Malo: in 1493 it seceded from Bretagne (so yes…Bretagne wants to leave France and Saint Malo wants to leave Bretagne.  And they say it’s just the Americans who don’t like the French..) and declared itself independent.  Though they returned, they still essentially ignore the French and Bretagne authorities.

Well we covered the galettes and a bottle of cider at a small café tucked away from the main streets.  It was run by an adorable little French couple who joked around with us and were so kind.  Then we bought one of the cakes—I’m so afraid to look how many calories was in one of those, but it was very good. 

And Nora bought a striped shirt—so we checked off our whole list!

Much to my dismay, we did not have time to visit the aquarium, so we walked along the beach and climbed some rocks until it was time to depart for Mont Saint Michel.

GEOGRAPHY: Mont Saint Michel is an island off the coast of Bretagne but you can access it by foot when the tide is low!  How cool is that?  We didn’t walk there…the bus drove us…so disappointing.  Then again, it is February and wading in the ocean for a mile would not be ideal right now.

So the draw to the island is that the Saint-Michel monastery is located at the top of this mountain/island.  Legend has it that at the top, the Archangel Michel appeared to a bishop in 708 and instructed him to build a church on that spot.  It is very literally located AT THE TOP…as in it was built with crypts under the large chapel so it could balance properly.  Anyway, you ascend half the mountain on stairs outside as you weave through the town which is build on these little stairways.  Then you enter the abbey and ascend through 29853 different rooms until you reach the top.  It’s beautiful and I can see how it used to be such a popular spot for religious pilgrimages. 

During the French Revolution, views on religion drastically shifted and as monks left the monastery, Mont Saint Michel became a prison (Victor Hugo was one of its VIPs (very important prisoners!).  Anyway, the island is really unique and really interesting but definitely has a tourist feel to it so it has lost some of its religious appeal in my mind.  Three hours later, we were back in Angers where we picked up some Asia Wok and returned home.

Sunday was very low-key.  I attended church in Saint Joseph with Micahlyn and Nora.  Mass is very interesting in France.  For the most part, I can understand what they’re saying, what part of mass we’re in, etc.  But some things are just very different.  They don’t respond to all the readings but they have an epicly-long homily.  In the past two weeks, I know the priest has discussed both facebook and politics so I think politics and religion are far more intertwined than in the US.  I like how simple the mass is though.  There isn’t a lot of pomp and circumstance.  It just is what it is meant to be: a quiet gathering with God. 

I apologize for the excessive amounts of history and religion…but such is France!  I will try to live a more exciting life and get back to you by the end of the week.  Bonne semaine mes chères!

La Vie Parisienne

I lied; I didn’t post about classes.  Instead, I had a picnic by the river as the sun set.  Sorry I’m not sorry.  I will write that post another day, because I’m going to post about my weekend excursion to Paris instead!

As my alarm rang at 5:15 a.m., my usual drowsiness was replaced by pure excitement.  I scurried to get ready and throw all my last minute necessities in my backpack.  For anyone who has ever seen me pack, this weekend was impressive: one sweatshirt, pajamas, one shirt, pair of pants, underwear, makeup, umbrella, map, wallet.  That is it!  Very pleased with my minimal packing, I strapped my backpack to my back and headed to the train station.  Little did I know that I would carry that bag for the next 15 hours.  Here is Maya approximately 10 hours in:

Once we left the train station, we began our trek through the streets of Paris!  We stopped at a café for a quick cup of coffee and plotted our day.  The first stop was le Jardin du Luxembourg, per my father’s request.  I tried to get him a picture to match the painting in our dining room but with the fountain turned off and without the flowers planted, it was kind of a fail.  The Jardin was still beautiful and we got great pictures of le Palais du Luxembourg, the seat of the French Senate.

Then we headed to l’Ile de Paris where Notre Dame is located.  The outside was remarkable….

….but the inside was emotionally stirring it was so beautiful.  You can just feel God filling your body as you walk around the cathedral.  It was so special and one of my favorite experiences of the trip.  Then we went to the crypt in the basement.  To our dismay, there were no dead people.  Only the old walls of Paris…wah wah.  So we left rather quickly and headed to the Concergierie.  Our group is rather divided on this excursion.  This was the prison where people (including Marie Antoinette) were held during the Revolution.  I thought it was less than impressive because they didn’t have that many actual remnants.  There were recreations of some cells, but I just didn’t find it as memorable.

We then left the island and went to the Louvre.  On the way, we found a bridge with locks tied all along it with the hope of everlasting love.  Couples come to this bridge and secure them as a proclamation of their love.  I thought this was really cute and added to the lovey-dovey feel of Paris this Valentine’s Day weekend (…it was not that romantic for our group of 10 females). 

After our moment of sentimentality we recommenced our photo shoot at the Louvre which is RIDICULOUSLY LARGE.  We only saw the outside on Saturday but I returned on Sunday (more later).

 

I also took a picture of children sailing boats in the fountain by the Louvre because my host father used to sail them there when he was small. 

We continued our never-ending walk down the Champs-Elysees.  I didn’t purchase anything but I did go into Louis Vuitton!  Wooooooow.  For one, it was intensely crowded and people were spending thousands of dollars in this frenzied flurry.  I felt so out of place with my backpack but I got to watch wealthy woman try on thousand dollar shoes and dresses and purses so it was a “cultural experience” I suppose.

At the end of the Champs Elysees we found l’Arc de Triomphe, which is extraordinary.  However, Napoleon built it for himself.  Who builds themselves a monument?  But we caught l’Arc just as the sun was setting and it was beautiful.

As the light in Paris began to fade, our enthusiasm did not!  Okay, it did a little because we had been walking for 10 hours…but we were really excited to get to the Eiffel Tower because we had been spotting it in the distance all day.  Alas, we pushed our way past 20897235 street vendors who all sell the same thing for the same price (the French need some new business models because they do not understand supply and demand or efficiency here), and finally were at the base of la Tour Eiffel!  Just as we walked up, the lights turned on and it began to sparkle.  Ah Paris! It was breathtaking.

Happy with our adventure, we went to dinner where I was adventurous and ordered a “coq au vin,” a French specialty.  It was delicious.  Then we began our metro adventure.  Not gonna lie, this is where our trip went downhill a bit.  We had a brief run in with a pick-pocketer (he failed and we had some choice American words for him).  Then we were oogled and catcalled at as we walked/ran to our hostel in Montmartre.  But we finally arrived and I could not have been happier to crawl into bed.

The next morning, Maya and I climbed 2897350287 stairs to Sacre Coeur which is the highest point in Paris.  Once my quads stopped throbbing we went inside the church which is really interesting, but they won’t let you take pictures inside it!  Maya was informed of this when they made her delete all the photos she sneakily took.  So rude.

We then headed to the Eiffel Tower again but decided upon arrival it was too foggy to ascend.  Instead, we headed to Les Invalides, which houses Napoleon’s tomb, wounded veterans, a WWII/Free France Museum, and an armory.  The WWII museum was remarkable.  There were so many drawings, clothes, maps, letters from concentration camps, soldiers, and General de Gaulle.  Definitely worth seeing.  Then we went to see Napoleon’s tomb…which is actually six tombs because he asked to be buried within six coffins.  I know this man did remarkable things for France, but after l’Arc de Triomphe and his tomb I think he needed his ego deflated a bit.  It was a beautiful tomb nonetheless.

Finally, I returned to the Louvre where I only had the time/energy to wander the Italian and Spanish paintings wing with Amanda.  We saw the Mona Lisa, which is small in person.  I thought some other paintings were incredibly impressive so I need a lesson or two in why the Mona Lisa is so much more famous.

After a beautiful weekend in Paris, we returned to Gare Montparnasse for our train.  Stephanie and I had tea and people watched for a few hours to heal our aching feet after 20+ miles of walking and then returned home to our beloved Angers to start another week in France.

I’m so fortunate for this experience and each day I am more and more astonished that this is my real life.  How blessed I am to have this opportunity and how humbled I am to share it with you.  My thoughts, my love, and my hugs with all of you this week!!

La premiere semaine et Nantes: The first week and Nantes

Bonjour tout le monde!  I have officially been in France for one week.  At this time last week we were beginning our first French meal with Alain and Chantal (mes parents ici).  Now, I am fully French-ified and am adjusting to la culture francaise.  Proof:

1) I am remembering not to smile at strangers on the streets.

2) I am speaking quieter and become offended when people are loud.

3) I wear a lot of black.

4) I have stopped shaving (jokes...maybe).

5) My diet is now 85% carbs, 10% ham and 5% other (2% is probably Nutella).

Anyway, with our lack of class, life has been rather glorious.  Some of the days have blurred together so let me summarize: 

Thursday: I went to see "the King's Speech."  Not my most French experience but it was an incredible film.  We all laughed really hard, but the French ladies around us did not...we don't know if they didn't understand the jokes or if we're just obnoxious.  But anyway, afterwards, we went to a Tapas Bar. 

This was fun because we didn't know what anything was so we ordered rather random things.  It turned out to be a pretty American meal with chicken fingers and tater-tot like items and salad and a casserole of sorts, and zucchini parmesean.  So we basically had a purely non-French day. 

On Friday, we had lunch at school with PMcD (the director from ND in Angers).  This experience was not fabulous but it manageable.  Today it was much worse in the cafeterial; our only options were plain noodles and a bacon wrapped hotdog.  Oh why did we ever complain about South Dining Hall??  Then we went to the train station to purchase our 12/25 cards which are student discount tickets.  After that extravaganza we went grocery shopping.  In the later half of this week, my three meals a week plan ran out...wahwah.  Alors, I bought 2 apples, 4 clementines, a baguette, yogurt, nutella, almonds and cookies.  I have since added a cucumber (which turned out to be a zucchini) and some jam to my groceries.  I'm pretty sure this will last me until Saturday when we leave for Paris (!!)...but I'm getting ahead of myself.  So train ticket: check.  Groceries: check. Then we had a girls' night at a pizza parlor...basically Jeff just didn't come.  Voila, instant girls' night.  But we had pretty decent pizza for being in France so that was a fun discovery.

Saturday, we went on our first trip!  We took a 9:20 train to Nantes (don't worry Nin, we adequately validated our tickets before boarding) and arrived expecting great things from the capital of "les Pays de la Loire."  After a quick walk down Rue President Kennedy (this is pretty common...we don't know why), we arrived at the Chateau des ducs de Bretagne (see below).

All I can say is WOW.  But I will say more.  The Chateau is even more stunning in person.  En plus, you can walk around the perimeter on top of the walls of the palace.  Even MORE, there is a 34 room museum within the castle explaining the history of Nantes.  We spent hours wandering through the rooms.  For a brief history lesson:

-Nantes is an important port city and has been since the Romans.  During the Roman empire it was invaded by everyone and their mother. 

-Because of its location on the river, Nantes was one of the biggest cities in the slave trade in France so they have a long and complicated history with slavery.

-Nantes had pirates. 

-Nantes was invaded by the Nazis and all of the Jews from Nantes were sent to Angers before they were sent to Auschwitz.

-Nantes now has a mechanical elephant (see below) that you can ride to get a tour of l'ile de Nantes.

 

After the chateau, we moved onto the Cathedrale des Saints Peter et Paul. 

Again, stunning.  But churches here are not heated so we could not stay too long.  We spent the rest of the day eating sandwiches (which ALWAYS have ham on them), drinking espresso, and being generally fabulous.  We made it home on the train and have now successfully completed our first trip. Hooray!

 

The only thing of note I did on Sunday was attend my first French mass which was interesting.  The first part of the mass moved very quickly, but then I heard the longest homily of all times.  I got lost somewhere after 10 minutes or so and had a hard time coming back in.  Remember when I mentioned churches aren’t heated??? I am un peu surprised that I still have functioning toes after that mass.  Most of the songs are in Latin in French mass and I don’t think the responses and such are the same as they are in America, but I need to do further research.  I will return because I like mass and will hopefully understand soon enough, but I do have somewhere around six cathedrals to choose from.

Alors, that was my weekend.  I will update you on the less exciting part of my life (aka class) before I depart for Paris this weekend!  Until then, a bientot mes cheres! Je vous aime.

Pas de douceur angevine et la musique americaine: no calm weather angers and American music

Let me paint you a picture of life in France:  As I emerged from the boulangerie (bakery) with my baguette this morning, I was greeted by a small French women leaning out her window to open the giant blue, wooden shutters that sealed her home for the evening--it was straight up Beauty and the Beast (see 0:38 here)
So I was going to begin this post with an explanation of how it is cold in France--not by my standards but the Angevins (people from Angers) are convinced that 30 degrees is absolutely absurd--but all my loved ones are currently burried under several feet of snow.  You all now have plenty of time to read my blog.

Since my post in the lovely JFK, I survived a seven hour plane ride, a four hour bus trip on the Angers soccer team's private bus (see below--Fern does this match up with the Gene Simmons van??), and a five minute drive in a mini car through the windy streets of Angers where I finally landed in my house! 

So upon arrival, we were escorted to our rooms.  Mine has a massive closet and Stephanie's has a couch so it's a decent trade.  Our bathroom is almost as large as my room..and it doesn't have a toilet because in France you have a salle de bains (bathroom--shower, sink, etc) and a toilette (toilet).  We have one of each of those for the two of us to share.  We cannot use the shower or flush the toilet after 10 which is the only relatively strange rule but it's pretty easy to follow so I have no complaints.



Our host mother, Chantal, is a wonderful cook and we've now eaten two unbelievable meals with her and Alain, our host father.  We've had soup, salad, an entree (quiche lorraine and a potato/onion casserole/loaf thing), wine, and dessert for each meal.  We also watched the French version of extreme makover home edition with them (D&Co).  They don't speak any English so all communications are done in French but they are pretty impressed by our comprehension so we must be doing pretty well.

Alas, there is life outside my wonderful house.  We had a rendez-vous with our class yesterday at noon so after two hours of wandering around the city with Stephanie, we joined them for lunch at a creperie.  There, we had des galettes (crepe-like things made with buckwheat flour and filled with things like cheese, vegetables, meats, etc.) and des crepes (filled with fruit, sugar, chocolate, etc).  Then we walked around the city, saw a beautiful cathedral (below, left), toured the old part of town, saw the chateau (below, right--yes we live near a castle--this is not real life) bought cell phones (in french), and bought adapters for our electronics (also in French).  Great success.  Today, I also bought koala yummies, instant coffee, a tea cup, and a bottle of wine--basically everything I need to survive in France.
 

We also took our exams today. wah wah.  We get our scores Monday and then we get a week to "try-out" classes.  Or at least I think that is what they told us.  Bottom line: I'm still not in class and probably won't be for at least another week.

So for the sake of space and the attention spans of my readers, here are some other experiences I should share:
1) They always play American music in stores/shops/tv shows.  I have no proof the French actually make their own music.  My most recent experience: my host mother was playing "Alejandro" by Lady Gaga while sewing.  Where am I?
2) Tap water is safe to drink--let's dispell that myth.  If I come down with some rare disease, then erase the previous sentence.
3) When dogs poop on the sidewalk here, their owners just leave it there.  So much poop on the way to school.
4) The French take a two-hour lunch break during the day which mean they work later than Americans.  This also translates into why they eat between 7:30-9:00 pm.  Also, full-time work is 35 hours/week.

Hopefully I have not bored you too much and will try to shorten the posts as the town becomes more familiar and I make less discoveries.  For now, a bientot.  Skype/email/comment when you can!  Les bisous!!