La Maison Blanche

Wednesday, May 8th

So on Wednesday we traveled back from Normandy to Paris which was about a five hour bus ride. We stopped twice. Once in this tiny town, that was supposed to give us more of an idea of what the Normandy region was, and once to give the driver a break. In France almost everything is unionized and obviously they are very big on protest, so their unions are a pretty big deal. So everyday workers have regulations that are put there for protection and are strictly followed. For example, our bus driver couldn't drive like more than 3 hours without taking a 15 minute break. Also, our professors kept telling us that they have like a maximum amount of hours or meters that they can drive and then once they've done them all, they will just stop. They will pull over to the side of the road and be like "ok, that's it for today". Kinda crazy? Anyway that didn't happen to us.

We stopped for only about 15 minutes in the small town and - I know I keep saying this - but this town was honestly one of the most picturesque we had been to. You'll see what I mean. I mean, everywhere is beautiful in France, but this town every view, every street, every house: gorgeous.


Then after a long day of travel we finally arrived outside of Paris where we were meeting our host families. I was soo nervous. I mean this is essentially our family for the next 2 months! What would they think of us? What would the interactions with them be like? We had received a paper beforehand which told us the basics about our family. They lived in a banlieu outside of Paris. There was a mother, father, and 4 kids. 3 boys and 1 girl with respective ages of 22, 20, 16, and 14. When we got off the bus, we waited for our families. Watching girls getting picked up two by two while we waited must be similar to how dogs feel getting chosen at the pound.  Then we were told that no one could come pick us up. That news kinda deflated my excitement completely. No one was coming to pick us up? We weren't going to have a real family? Were we those dogs at the pound that no one wanted? But then a boy around our age and a young looking girl popped up and introduced themselves. They were our oldest host frère and youngest host soeur, Quentin and Joanne (I'm still not sure if that's spelled right) - and Quentin brought along his girlfriend Sophie. And they came to get us! They quickly excused their parents because they were out of town for a funeral. We crammed into a little French car (Puegot peut-être?) with all our luggage and were off. It was about a ten minute drive and then we saw our new house. It is seriously lovely. It has this beautiful jardin in the front yard and is probably three stories high. They gave us a quick tour of the house and then told us we'd eat around 8 or so. We have a whole basement to ourselves with two separate rooms, a shower, bathroom, and even mini-kitchen/bar complete with microwave, fridge, and sink! It is awesome! My room is pretty large and I even have a double-bed all too myself. I feel so spoiled! I found out that since the parents wouldn't be getting home until Sunday, we would just be eating with Quentin, the college boy, and his friends. He probably invited nearly 15 friends over, some girls some boys, probably close to half and half maybe leaning in favor towards boys. All of them were going or went to university. It was une grande soirée (big party). He and the boys and some of the girls helped cook. They made a salad, Ratatouille(! Just like the movie! Except it looked different) and then barbecued meat. True to French form we had an apéritif before the main meal - some hummus and bread. Then a salad. Then Ratatouille. And then the barbecue. It was good. Neither the salad nor Ratatouille were something that I loved but they tasted good. The Ratatouille was made in the traditional style, in a big pot with lots of vegetable dumped in and stewed for a while. The salad was spinach leaf with tuna and tomatoes and other salad-y things, so it was alright. Mostly I was glad that I made it through my first super French at-home-meal! I ate everything which was a success for me. That day and the next were holidays for the French so there was a lot of drinking going on. They had whiskey, vodka, wine, champagne and beer. But don't worry, the French don't drink in excess like Americans so they never really got drunk - plus they were splitting all that alcohol between nearly 15 people, even if it was a lot. I thought that there was some good conversation and I even got a chance to really practice my skills. Unfortunately, it kind of overwhelmed my French abilities since I can't understand people who don't talk right to me, so typically I couldn't understand most of the conversations going on between other people. But that was alright for me, just try to fly under the radar, hopefully improve by listening. It was fun. By about midnight I was ready for bed and so I a fait des bisous (gave the cheek kiss) like I had learned earlier that day when meeting everyone, to whoever was left. Overall, a long day but a very fun one. I love the new house and the family is incredibly nice - it's more than I could have hoped for!

And At Last I See The Light

May 8th

So we went to a couple of cities today, the first being Mount St. Michel. Which in case you haven't seen all the other pictures/posts I've made is the "castle" that TANGLED is based off of. Yeah. You know that Disney movie about Rapunzel that just came out? And that big castle/city that is her real home? THAT ONE. And no - before the jokes begin, they did not do the floating lanterns. I know. Sad :(. But it was pretty magical without it. Ok, so Mt. St. Michel is actually a small city built on a hilltop surrounding an old old old abbey - hence the reason I put the word castle in quotes up there - it's actually an abbey. It is built almost on like an island because it is completely surrounded by water and you have to cross a bridge to get to it. But when its low tide the water recedes and you can walk on the beach outside the city walls. It's pretty cool to say the least.
          So our main sight to see at the city was obviously the huge medieval abbey which is built on the very top of the mountain. And ok maybe it's not exactly large enough to be a "mountain" but I'm not calling that sucker a hill, not after walking up its 90 degree slopes and thousand stairs. I thought I was going to tear the muscle above my kneecap - what muscle you ask? No, not your thigh, the one that is right above your knee joint. Don't know what I'm talking about? Go walk up 20 flights of stairs and then you'll start to feel it. The abbey was really cool...but to be honest...it was also really boring. Is that awful of me to not appreciate this old building rich with history and experience? We got the little audio guides that are supposed to tell you about each room as you move along but of course we got them in French and they were difficult to understand and nearly impossible if you weren't paying 100% to them. So basically I didn't get a single word out of them. It was really cool seeing the building and looking at  some of the rooms - I mean one of them was a knights hall! And it had a beautiful courtyard, even though it was pretty small I suppose in comparaison to the large jardins (gardens) of the Paris palaces, but I loved the classic structure of it.

But after a while, it is just an old old building. If you don't know history and background, things tend not to seem as interesting. And it was a long audio tour/walk through the abbey, we were in there for an hour to an hour and a half.
     After wards we were free to explore the small city. I felt like this city was pretty unique even among the other villes (cities) of France. I mean its built into a mountain for heaven's sake. Which means that a) it's isolated and there are no suburbs or city sprawl b) it was built in the Middle Ages, like literally, and the structure/layout hasn't changed much and c) the streets are the tiniest I have ever seen. Even in Paris. The streets of France are generally pretty small anyway, they just don't make big streets. Maybe that's really why everyone drives small cars. But I kinda loved the small streets just because they were so fitting. They fit in with the town. They hadn't been expanded in an attempt to modernize and profitize and effecticize (those last two aren't real words), they had just been left as is, as they were meant to be, and all the souvenir shops and cafés found space within them. I feel like that's a lesson we can learn from the French. Too often I think in America we destroy things because they're not new enough or practical and then instead we build something new to be more efficient. Just a thought. And the streets really were so cool. Besides being small they were crammed with shops and so steep. But also there were a couple of alleys that led to backstreets - and you thought you were just going to some boring alley behind a house/shop but instead it led to a whole new section behind the main road. They were so cool.
And of course, like everything else in France, so picturesque. I found this little hotel on one of these backstreets and to get to it I took these little steps that were shoved between two houses. The corridor for the steps was honestly the width of my body, I turned sideways a little as I walked in order not to scrap my shoulders...or get stuck. I kept worrying that the walls would get nearer at the top of the stairs like in that scene in Inception when Cobb is running away in South Africa -- or like a cow stuck in one of those herding mechanisms (you know so they can't turn around and have to keep going forward?) Anyway I digress. Point being, the whole place was so cute and fun and adventurous, if you ever go to France put this one at the top of the list. It's worth it. We ate lunch at a little café and bought un crêpe du burre sucre, which is a buttered sugar crêpe. It's one of the region's specialty, and our professors kept telling us we had to get one. It was pretty good, although I might still prefer fresh fruit crêpes. And then I bought glace (ice cream) to eat on the warm afternoon. I love French glace, it's so delicious. So far I've always gotten the framboise (raspberry) flavor because it's so good. It tastes like sherbet, but is lighter. I'm not really sure what makes it so good or different from American sherbet - maybe it's just that I'm in France and now I have rose-colored tastebuds :)

So the second place we went to was a small town called St. Malo, and so far it has been my favorite place - which is saying a lot. It is this little seaside town that was built back in medieval times and it still has its original ramparts! The old brick wall surrounds the whole town and you can walk it in probably an hour or so. The streets are all cobblestone and most of the buildings are the original old brick. The town itself can be crossed in about twenty minutes by foot which made it perfect to explore. We could walk all around town and it was small enough to not get lost. I'm practically obsessed with this town to be honest. Everything was SO picturesque. I mean each street could be the cover for a different calendar. You see pictures online or in books and you think that just some especially pretty parts of Europe look like that, but honestly all of it does. At least as far as the places that I've been - and this town was the epitome of that. Don't worry, I'll put up enough pictures you'll see - but even then, the pictures don't do it justice. If a picture is worth a thousand words, then clearly this town needed millions of words written about it because seeing it in real life...no picture can truly capture that. So basically we all just explored this town for the rest of the evening. We had dinner together as a group, and I got a salmon crêpe (I know, two crêpes in one day, so French haha) and it was actually quite good. I also had an Origina, which is this soda they have out in France. It's essentially like carbonated orange juice...which may not sound great but it's actually incredible. I love it and wish we had it over in America more. (You can find them at grocery stores but they're more expensive and in a special section). I just really enjoyed walking the town, it's what I always dreamed of I suppose. Roaming the streets in France. We walked out on the beach too which was fun. It is amazing that I am here. That this is my life now. It is quite literally fulfilling a dream of mine, and its amazing to see a lifelong dream like that to come true. 

Beautiful beach and beautiful girls

When in France, do as the French do - don't worry we kept it sober!

Normandy et Liberté

May 7, 2013
The weather was beautiful at Normandy today which is not always the case. In fact, it rains so much - like parts of Washington state - that there is a running joke that the four seasons of Normandy are pluie, pluie, pluie, et pluie (rain, rain, rain and more rain). But today the sun was shining and a gentle breeze was blowing. Barely a cloud in sight. Beautiful.

We visited about four different sights but the one that impacted me the most was the American Memorial Museum and Cemetery at Omaha Beach. This beach was the site of one of the toughest battles of D-Day and resulted in some of the highest casualty numbers. The museum was very touching. It pulled out specific examples of heroism and bravery among the individuals who fought that day. It also had several short clips to watch of real video footage of soldiers preparing for the war and General Dwight D. Eisenhower discussing the events surrounding D-Day. As I sat in the theater, I was moved with gratitude for the many sacrifices made by the men and women involved in the war efforts. These young men - some of them only my age or barely older - plunged into battle, to fight on soil that wasn't their own, knowing the dangers of war. In many ways I can't even imagine that type of courage. I think it's a bit scary to leave my family and travel to France with a large group. Heck, I think its a little scary to try the different food! And yet, these boys were willing to give it all, for people they had not even met. Of course they were fighting to protect liberty and friends and family back home but they were fighting in France! But firstly, they were fighting for the French people. What amazing courage. What amazing strength and determination - and character. It truly is inspiring. And they live on in our hearts as we remember them and recognize all that they've done.

Family members were given the choice of having their soldier's bodies shipped back home or having them buried in France. Some opted to have their loved ones buried under the ground they died fighting to protect and win back. Thus the large American Cemetery. The white marble crosses dotting the bright green grass in front of the shining blue ocean was actually a very pretty image. Of course it was sad, tragic even, to think of all of those young lives that ended so soon. Yet, it was a beautiful commemoration to those soldiers. Their rest is forever peaceful. And it's in a beautiful place by the sea.

The other place we went was a place called Point du Hoc, it's a monument out on a cliff that was especially treacherous during the fighting. The whole scenery was, quite frankly, breathtaking. However, scattered around the area nearly every four feet were large holes that were created by bombs during World War II and were now overrun with grass. In addition there were the remnants of old shelters used during the combat. It struck me as amazing that such a beautiful place was once the location of so much violence - and even more astounding was the fact that the place had not lost any of its beauty despite the physical scars. The cavities made by the bombs were still present and very frequent - yet in due time, the grass had regrown and the landscape was healed. Perhaps I was feeling a little sentimental because of the circumstances and subject of the day but that landscape to me seemed as though a metaphor for our lives as well.

We all will have scars in our lives - by this I mean emotional, internal, personal, not necessarily physical scars - from things that we experience. Each of us will go through rough and difficult times. Each of us will have particularly dark days that seem an intense struggle. Yet. After these struggles and difficulties and scars, there is beauty. Our lives can find peace and whole-ness and purpose and meaning. And in that there is beauty. I mean to say that we should never look at ourselves or our circumstances and think, I am too broken, I have too many scars, too many past problems, too many old hardships, to truly be normal and accepted, valued and appreciated, whole and beautiful again. I have my scars and they mar me. There is one to whom we need only look, and he will heal us again. The Lord Jesus Christ has promised us, "Come all ye that are heavy laden, and I will give you rest". He has the power to not just make us equal to our old selves but better than before. Through our mistakes and imperfections, he can strengthen and complete us. There is never a sheep too far gone for the loving Shepherd. Come unto Him, for He is the Way, the Truth, and The Light. Amen.

Paris: Love, Lights and Dreams

There are some obvious stereotypes about the French - and some were confirmed and others disproven to me today. Some things I learned about the French:
Real:
-- They love their baguettes. Honestly. I saw at least a dozen people carrying around bags with baguettes in them - and sometimes just baguettes, no other food. Their love of pain (bread) is no joke.

-- Secondly, these are the best baguettes you will ever have. Trust me I tried a baguette sandwich for lunch today and I just about thought the heavens were going to open. And for those of you familiar with Ratatouille - yes the bread did have the crunch, mmmm.

-- They love to smoke. I mean when you see those pictures/videos of the classy women sitting at a sidewalk cafe or the men lounging on the park bench enjoying a cigarette - yeah that's real, saw both of those today. And I hate to say this, I do, but they look so cool while doing it! Now disclaimer for all you kids out there: I am by no means advocating drug use. It is bad. Cigarettes are bad. Pipes are bad. Cigars are bad. They destroy your lungs and kill you. Plus they make you smell super gross all the time. And don't even get me started on the nasty things they can do to your mouth. I once saw a picture of a hairy tongue as a result from smoking...yeah that was enough to make me swear never to smoke - or kiss a smoker. But if anything is going to counteract that picture and make me think smoking is actually cool and not super gross, it's the image of the Parisian women smoking their cigarettes while they drink their coffe (also something I highly discourage. I'm not doing that great at dissuading drug use right now - but I participated in the D.A.R.E. program. I was part of the "Just Say No Campaign". We even had a little graduation ceremony! But I digress...

Not Real:
--Not all French men have mustaches
--I have not seen a single beret since I got here (which makes me a little sad b/c I was planning on buying one to wear for myself...oh well I'll probably get one anyway! The Americans won't know :)
--NO ONE says "Haw haw haw" EVER. Though I have heard quite a bit of "Oh la la" - that is real.

Let me just say that today was one L O N G day. And I'm not going to bore you with all the details (I'm sure you're relieved by that) - I have few enough viewers as it is, no need to go running the rest off with long detailed explanations of the plane and its flight and what I was thinking and how I was feeling about what I was thinking...
However, I will make note of some of the highlights. I took two flights to get to Paris. One was from Sacramento to Dallas and the next was Dallis to Paris. The first flight was 3 hours and the second was close to 10. I did NOT get pat down when I went through security!! For those of you who are familiar with my track record, you'll realize what an accomplishment this is. The first flight was great I slept through all of it. Then I met up with 4 other kids from my study abroad in the Dallas airport and we all took the same flight over. I sat next to a French girl. We chatted a little (yes, in French) but didn't really talk much. I tried to sleep on this super long flight. Tried. Mostly failed. And we didn't even have our own TV screen - just one fairly small one per cabin - I was disappointed by that. I didn't watch any movies and the dinner was cheese ravioli that was essentially a microwave dinner. But I'm a college kid so I'm fairly used to that right? The flight wasn't that long but essentially I was just uncomfortable THE WHOLE TIME. Which made me realize, yeah it probably is worth it to pay $200 more for first class where they can lie ALL the way down (seriously?! The seat extends to a bed - like a Bark-a-lounger!!) and one day when I'm rich and not a college kid who is familiar with eating TV dinners and beans out of a can, that will be my first order of business. I must have slept some though b/c I don't remember either of the two movies - though I do remember having to flip my pillow over b/c my drool had made my pillow so wet it was uncomfortable...ewww. Oh and I slept by huddling over and resting my head on my tray - and yeah my body was too big for that - and yes, everytime the lady in front of my decided she was going to try and pretend she was a first class customer and extend her seat as far back as possible, my head literally got crunched and I had to move it quick for fear of squishing my brains. Like I said, uncomfortable. But it was all worth it!!! Because I arrived in Paris for the first time of my life. Somehow us crazy kids managed to find our bags and get a taxi and make it to our hôtel.
Then we started seeing cool sites like

And here's the thing. The streets of Paris really are as great as they are in the movies! They really are cute and lined by beautiful buildings.

They have sidewalk cafes and petit parcs everywhere. I swear there's something special in the air. It is like walking in a dream. I better not be Incepted. I absolutely love it, love it, love it here - big surprise. La ville de lumières, la ville d'amour, la ville de mes rêves