Sorry I haven’t posted since last week everyone. My life has been the epitome of hectic since last Wednesday! It’s been an incredible past couple of days and there’s no way I can go into enough detail about everything I’ve seen and done. You had to be there to experience it for yourselves!
Let’s start with last Wednesday - my last day in Paris! We woke up early to meet Dr. Hudson and the BYU Art History students in front of the study abroad apartment at 8:00am. Again, I wasn’t able to get tickets for the RER or Metro...so I had to hop trains the whole way there. I’m lucky they weren’t controlling or else I’d have a hefty 20-30 Euro fee! Non-merci. We made it in time to meet everyone and hopped back on the hot pink Mercedes-Benz bus (which I got a picture of this time!). We headed for Auvers-Sur-Oise about an hour and a half away to see where Van Gogh painted lots of his works, where he died, and a cool museum at the chateau in town. I’m going to have to illustrate with pictures again because words just can’t express how beautiful and exciting everything was!
After Auvers-Sur-Oise, we headed about 45 minutes away to Giverny where Claude Monet lived and painted his water lilies. It was BEAUTIFUL! Apparently he got obsessed with gardening and took it up as a hobby. Holy moly did he do an impressive job! The water garden and the house were definitely my favorite parts. Unfortunately, we weren’t allowed to take pictures inside of the house but just trust me...if you’re ever in France and have nothing to do, go visit it! You won’t regret it. The kitchen was this gorgeous yellow color and it was just charming.
We decided that because so many people wanted to go so many places on the last night in Paris, we had to split up. We were to meet at Notre Dame at 6:30pm and then plan the rest of our night from there. I had to get one last souvenir (the only thing I’ve been dying to get for myself since being here...) at the Nike store by the institute building. It’s a France soccer team track jacket and I LOVE it! I wanted blue, but they didn’t have my size. I actually like the white one a lot better! After Nike, Mckenna, Amy, and I ran to Notre Dame to meet everyone else. They were all late, so there was one final place we wanted to go - Shakespeare and Company. It’s an old bookstore near Notre Dame and it’s seriously like Flourish and Blotts from Harry Potter. There were books EVERYWHERE! Ali, you would have loved it! The best part? Everyone that works there was American! I was so overwhelmed by the coolness of the place that I got separated from Erin and Mckenna. Thinking they’d left, I ran to the Latin Quarter and got a crepe from my favorite creperie one last time. I was in a rush and on a budget (I had like...4 Euros to last until our excursions), so I tried an applesauce and cinnamon crepe. It wasn’t my favorite, but it was satisfying enough to hold me over for the night.
I ran back to the statue by Notre Dame and everyone was there waiting to make plans for the evening. Caleb, Amy, Toni, Kenny and I decided that we wanted to climb to the top of the Eiffel Tower to celebrate our last night in Paris. We took the RER C (which, again, I had to jump...) and got our right by the tower. Unfortunately the stairs were closed (they’re cheaper to climb, so we wanted to do that instead of the elevator), so Kenny decided not to do it with us. Everyone else paid to take the elevator. Let me just start by saying that this whole night was epic. I had a total blast! We all talked and laughed and took random videos of waiting in the elevators and at the top. I also found out that when I went to visit a friend in Rexburg in February, I was in Toni’s apartment...he was my friend’s roommate! So ridiculous, I know!!!! We were freaking out when we found out and people were staring at us like we were crazy. The top of the tower was STUNNING because we were there right at sunset. I got some beautiful photos! It was fun to take pictures and know where things were in the city from the top. Definitely a night to remember.
Thursday was probably the most stressful/long/exhausting day since the Brussels fiasco. I set my alarm for 8:00am but my brain woke me up at 7:30am. I wasn’t very happy and I couldn’t get back to sleep, so I just decided to finalize all of my packing. Three suitcases and a backpack later, I was set! I made sure to clean my room and leave it better than I found it. Madame said a few weeks ago that Amy and I are the cleanest students she’s ever had, so I had to keep it up until the end! I mean...I’m a pretty tidy person in general but I made sure to be EXTRA tidy as a guest in their home. 11:00am came fast and it was time to load the suitcases in the car. Madame insisted on driving us to the gare (station) so we didn’t have to drag our suitcases all the way into town. It was really sweet of her! We said our goodbyes to Monsieur with bisous and a hug (he’s one of my favorite people of all time...seriously, he was extraordinarily nice to me and Amy!) and he watched us pull away. Madame helped me with my suitcases and walked us all the way to the platform to say goodbye. She was having a hard time with us leaving. The RER A pulled up and we waved goodbye through the window to her as the train pulled away. I was so lucky to have Monsieur et Madame de Grandmaison as my temporary parents here in France. They were so kind and wanted us to have the most amazing experience that we could!
We took the RER A straight to Gare de Lyon to meet the group at the platform. It took some major effort to board the TGV (really fast train) because we were on the second floor AND I had my huge blue suitcase (full of presents for the fam), my little blue carry on, my black duffel, and an insanely heavy backpack. I’m pretty sure I looked like a fool dragging everything around! Anyways, the train ride was only 2 hours long and it was nice to see some more French countryside. I seriously can’t get enough of it!
After dinner, a few of us came back to the hotel. On our way, we saw some white vans parked along the road. Guess what they are? Prostitute vans. It’s pretty much the most disgusting thing ever and I hate walking home past them! I mean, they can’t do anything to us and they usually aren’t visible but I get this nasty nast feeling every time we have to walk by. No me gusta. Once at the hotel, we watched Les Miserables in our hotel room. Love that movie! Everyone was dead though, so some people fell asleep before it finished.
Yesterday was another amazing day. I’m in LOVE with Lyon! Definitely recommend to anyone that visits France. Its smaller than Paris, but it’s 1349587 times cleaner, the people have been absolutely charming, and its FULL of amazing architecture and history. We had to meet outside at 9:00am to make our museum reservation by 11:00am. Before the museum, Dr. Hudson showed us some secret tunnels and hidden Renaissance courtyards all over Vieux Lyon (Old Lyon). Everything was stunning! At 11:00am, we headed to the Museum of History of Lyon. It was interesting and everything but I was so hungry that I couldn’t concentrate on much. Toni, Sarah, and I finished the museum before everyone else so we took off to find food. We found this pasta place and I got 4 cheese stuffed noodles with pesto. It was so fresh! I downed the thing. I also got an Orangina (which is crazy because I hate soda) and it was actually good! I won’t get it in the states, so I might as well enjoy it for the next few days, right? I also saw a raspberry macaron for 1 euro (they’re 3.50 in Paris!!!!) and had to get it. It wasn’t as good as the ones in Paris, but it was good enough.
The group reconvened at a cathedral in Vieux Lyon and got ready to head to the Museum of Printing. The printing trade was a huge part of Lyon in the Renaissance, so we were all really excited to see the museum. When I got to the group, everyone pointed at me and said my name. I was really confused but there was a girl that wasn’t in our group sitting and talking to people. She said she was from St. Louis (that’s why people were pointing at me) and I said she looked really familiar. She asked me what high school I went to and I said, “Lafayette.” She said, “Me too!” and I asked her what year she graduated in. 2009. Holy cow I felt like an idiot. I run into someone IN LYON, FRANCE who was in my graduating class and I didn’t even know her name! I asked her and she said Danielle French. I TOTALLY graded her papers when I was a student teacher for Madame T! I remembered thinking about how she had a great last name to be a French student and when I started to remember, I felt a little bit less awful about the whole thing. She’s doing a gastronomy study abroad from Mizzou and gets to basically travel around France and eat food. I was a little bit jealous!
The museum of printing was the COOLEST museum I’ve been to in France. We had a guided tour and the whole thing was in French. I understood everything! Our guides were amazing and we even got a demonstration of how both 16th and 18th century printing presses work. Again, if you’re in Lyon, you have to see it! I learned a ton. You know the saying, "Mind your p's and q's"? Well that originated from the printing press! The little letters were really small and if they were upside down or flipped, you could easily confused "p" for "q" or even for "b" and "d". Interesting, right??? I thought so.
We finished the museum around 4:00pm and everyone was dead tired after walking all day. We opted to come back to the hotel and take naps before heading back into the city for a hike to the top of Lyon’s version of Sacre Coeur. I was out cold until 7:15pm! It was great. After napping, Toni, Caleb, Paul, Sarah, Lacey, Mckenna, Amy, Erin, and I went next door to what Dr. Hudson called, “The Denny’s of France.” I was disappointed that there weren’t any breakfast foods, but the food wasn’t horrible. My only problem was that I’d eaten a TON of bread and sweets and my stomach was killing me. I felt like I was going to vomit and had NO appetite by the time my food was there. Not good! I ate what I could stomach (which wasn’t much) and then gave the rest to Caleb. Better someone else eat it than let it go to waste, right? The only thing that I could finish was my dessert - compote de pommes (applesauce). It was easy to swallow, so I think that helped.
We were supposed to meet the group at 9:00pm for the hike, but were WAY late. The trains were all late, drunk gypsies kept blocking the doors, and we thought we lost Lacey for a few minutes. We got into town at 9:40pm...we were pretty sure that they didn’t wait for us. So, we took the funicular. Thank goodness we did because the whole group was at the top when we got there! The view was incredible and we had a ton of fun talking and taking pictures. After sitting on the huge wall overlooking the city for a while, the group migrated to the front of the basilica. Some people started dancing around and that eventually led to playing the animal game. It was pretty much the most hilarious thing EVER. Our program director even played! He’s the coolest! In fact, I took a video of it. Enjoy!
It was getting late (11:30pm), so we headed back to the metro after our game. The hill we walked down was really dark, so the boys kept hiding in bushes and scaring the pants off of people (me included). Fun but scary! Once we got into the metro, Dr. Hudson suggested that we do something really bizarre and see people’s reactions. We walked through the station in a single file line and (with completely straight faces) followed his lead. He waved his arms, jumped in the air, made faces, and a bunch of other things. People were laughing and it was HILARIOUS! Not many of us were able to keep straight faces.
Once we got home, we really started feeling the exhaustion of the day. We were so tired! Mckenna and I tried to blog but we were just too exhausted. At least I’m all caught up now, though! Lyon has been amazing and I’m excited to see what new things will happen in Geneva tomorrow. Thankfully, Dr. Hudson is ordering taxis for us to take to the train station so I don’t have to die carrying all of my suitcases again. Woo!!!! If I can, I’ll write about today later tonight but if not, I’ll write again tomorrow on my way to Geneva. I can’t believe I’ll be home in 5 days! Time is going way too fast.
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