Second week in Paris

Rosemary lamb

Monday - 9/16

Monday was fairly uneventful. I was still tired from the weekend so I decided not to visit Paris IV - La Sorbonne this morning at 9h30. Dinner was oven roasted lamb ribs with carrots and peas. While some people are not so fond of the gamey flavour and aroma of lamb, I absolutely adore it. There were also large cloves of roasted garlic all around the lamb as well with were delicious smoothed on a toasted piece of bread. As a little after dinner goûter, we sampled some of the different kinds of chocolates that my host parents had lying around in the cupboard with only one or two pieces left. My favorite was a dark chocolate with pistachios covered in caramel. 

Tuesday - 9/17

Moving walkway in the metro

Tuesday morning was the university visit to Paris VIII - St. Denis. I am planning on taking most of my classes here, including a literature, cinema, and maybe an art class so this visit was fairly obligatory for me. The school is actually located outside of Paris in the city St.Denis just to the north. It is all the way at the end of line 13, which is a 35 minute ride from the Vavin station near CUPA. There was a group of about 20 of us who all went together and it was quite a feat to fit us all onto the very crowded train at métro Montparnasse-Bienvenue where 4 lines come together. In the end, we didn't succeed and a good portion of us who weren't able to squeeze onto the first train, me included, ended up having to take a second train 6 minutes behind. However, we were all going to the same place and there were no line changes, so it was just a matter of waiting for everyone to arrive at the destination. Thankfully there was a nice violinist in the subway keeping us company.

When we arrived at St. Denis, I immediately liked the ambiance of the university. Paris VIII St. Denis does not have the traditional gothic architecture shared by the older Paris universities. Instead, it is made out of modern materials with lots of floor to ceiling windows and buildings erected in odd shapes and colors with exterior stairwells and lots of hustling and bustling. In many ways, St. Denis is much closer to the idea of an American campus/university.  

A little glimpse into the library

View from a sky bride in building B

The buildings are lettered A-E, which makes navigating them very easy. The art and cinema departments are located in building A and the literature classes I'm interested in are in building B. While it is annoying to have to find all of the bureaus and bulletin boards for the departments just to look up the class locations (and because classes start the following week, most of them are not yet posted...), it is also a good opportunity to familiarize myself with the school. Not to mention I won't have to look like a fool tourist lost international student the next time I actually come for class.

Wednesday - 9/18

This morning, I had my first thermodynamics lecture. All I can say is that is was a lot harder than my TD section. By no fault of the professor, I had a very difficult time following the lecture and taking notes from the board. She often spoke very quickly and wrote with a scripted handwriting and in french abbreviations on the board. I often had to reflect on the sentence I just heard several times before I could fully comprehend what was said, and by this time, she had already finished writing an entire board of notes, which I then had to double check with my incomplete list of abbreviations used by French professors to decode what it was that I was copying down. Overall, it was an overwhelming and unhappy experience. 


Speaking with the professor after the end of classes posed to be a huge difficulty as well. I tried to explain to her how I was a student in the CUPA program, I missed the first lecture class, and I wanted a copy of the programme. However, all she did was point me towards the board where she had written down her email and told me to send her an email. To make a bad situation worse, because I had to wait for other students to ask their questions first, by the time I was done talking to the professor, all of the other students had already left and there was no one for me to ask to photocopy first day notes from. That night, I sent her an email about my situation and to ask about an American version of the book I could follow (she mentioned during our brief conversation that one of her colleagues , but she never responded. (UPDATE: She emailed me back 5 days later...)

After CUPA classes in the afternoon, a few of us went to Julien's boulangerie for some rustic baguette and pain au chocolat. The amazing aromas of baked bread gives you a special kind of hunger that only a flakey, warm pastry can satiate. 

Dinner was also something quite special. There was a fancy looking carrot salad, roasted fish with tomatoes and thyme, as well as another tart. This time, a juicy mix of pears and apricots, which more than made up for my lousy morning at thermodynamics! 

Carrot salad with mustard dressing

Apricot and pear tart

Roasted whole fish

Thursday - 9/19

Today after classes, I went to an orchestra concert at the Marie du 13ème, the the official building of the 13ème arrondissement in Paris. This concert was performed by Shaan Xi orchestra of China with lots of traditional music for the Fête de la Lune (harvest moon festival) marking 8/15, the first day of autumn  The ancient Chinese did not use the solar (Roman) calendar, but instead the lunar calendar, which marked months according to each cycle of the moon. It is also a tradition to eat moon cake with is a Chinese confection made with a pasty crust enclosing different fillings ranging from the traditional red bean paste to other nuts and fruits. There are also slightly more savory varieties that have an egg yolk in the middle to represent the full, glowing harvest moon.

Line behind me

Line in front of me

 Since I was in France and these things were hard to come by, I decided to go celebrate by listening to some chinese music instead. The Clair de la Lune concert was not supposed to start until 19h but I got to the Marie de 13ème an hour early to look at some of the art exhibits. Little did I know that there was already a huge line waiting to get into the concert. 

Unhappy me in the cold

Happy me in my seat

It was super cold outside, especially with the wind, and the lady behind me was right on my heels always trying to sneak in front of me as the line shifted forward. I was not a happy camper. Around 20 minutes before the concert was due to start at 19h, the front of the line began to move, and we slowly filed our way into the concert hall. The concert ended up starting a little late, but it was well worth the wait. There were even speeches by the Chinese Ambassador and the Mayor of the 13ème arrondissement. I've included videos I recorded of 茉莉花 and 在那遥远的地方 for your listening pleasure. 

Friday 9/20

Outfit of the day :)

Today was the day I had to hand in my final selections for courses. I spent quite some time making myself a mini weekly calendar with all my course information on it for shopping week. It was the last day of CUPA orientation as well. Next week it's finally time to dive into French universities! (Apart form UPMC)

Dinner was steak with spinach and sautéed zucchini. Frédéric asked me how I wanted it and I said medium well. He laughed at both Missaratou and I for wanting to eat shoe leather. The end result was a bit more rare than I would like (because he didn't want to ruin the meat and refused to cook it any more than that). However, it was still delicious, especially with the accompaniments.  

Tours of 4 districts of Paris (Part 2: Montmartre and Marais)

Wall of "I Love You"

Sunday - 9/15

The weather today was absolutely gorgeous, probably Paris trying to apologize for the ickiness yesterday. The noon tour today with Sabrina was in Montmartre and afterwards we met Michel at Place l'Hôtel de Ville to explore Le Marais. While to begin the tour, we took a pit stop to look at the multi-lingual wall of "I love you" and other inspirational quotes. 

Very hilly

Jardin des Abbesses

Montmartre is one of the two collines (hills) in Paris. The root of the word "mont-" means a raised piece of land or the highest point, as found in montagne (mountain). Situated on top of the hill is the Sacre Coeur, one of the most famous churches in Paris. Our uphill walk had us pass a couple of little treasures, the Jardin des Abbesses, a grocerie that was in the movie Amélie, a winery, a cool statue, windmill, and lots of beautiful weather. Because my last post had too many words, and a picture is worth a thousand words, I will substitute pictures for my rambling. Please enjoy :)

I didn't even recognize it at first

Great movie about Montmartre

Statue based on a famous French book

Beautiful day!

Le lapin agile (French restaurant
originally named after a dish that
chef Gille created. To say made by
Gille it is à Gille, which later became
agile - a play on words)

Passed by a rose garden

Montmartre Winery

Behind the Sacre Coeur

Limestone keeps it looking white

The art market next door

Artist on the street

Everyone's at the Sacre Coeur!!!

 

View from the front steps 

The cafe where Amélie worked

Moulin Rouge - a little smaller in person

If you have ever seen the movie Amélie, you will recognize this little café straight away. This is the cafe that Amélie worked in. We also casually passed by the Moulin Rouge on our way to the metro station. 

Hôtel de Ville

For the afternoon visit, we met Michel at the Hôtel de Ville. As per usual, Michel did not hesitate to start his lesson on the history of the Marais district along with the different stages of architecture and social implications of the changes to the district over time. This hotel does not have the same connotation as it does in English. Instead, these hotels were the houses of aristocrats and the bourgeois. As a result of the extravagant living of the upper class, this meant that the palaces of French kings had to be mindblowing- Versailles being a prime example.   

In stark contrast to the enormous hôtels are these little medieval houses, which have been preserved through the renovations. The word marais means marshland or swamp in French, which is exactly what the environment was like during the moyen age (middle ages) when people first began to inhabit the area. Originally only the poorest of people lived here.These houses have the same style as the ones we saw yesterday: wide at the bottom, narrow at the top, and adjacent houses leaning against each other for structure and stability. The width of the house is so small because each floor is only one room. The kitchen was on the first floor so the fire could heat up the whole house, the living room / welcoming room was on the second floor so guests wouldn't have to go far, and the bedroom was on the top for the most warmth. At the time, there wasn't really a sense of privacy in the home like we are used to today. Everyone shared each room, including the bedrooms!

My life every time I try to
go out with friends...

My sentiments on tours

Fashion shoot?

Old Paris wall

Along the way, we passed by a poster exhibit with vignettes of Parisian life. There are 42 drawings in total in the collaboration between illustrator Kanako and the creator Amandine. The two drawings on the left I found especially funny and relevant to my current life in Paris. Other random thing we passed by was a photo shoot for some French brand of clothing. Talk about being a fashion city. Geez.

Fun fact: Paris used to be a really small city. The original city of Paris was enclosed by stone walls, whose remnants can still be seen around the city. Also, land elevation has rise around 20 meters over the course of several hundred year as the swamps were gradually filled in and became solid ground. 

The front facade standing in the square

First garage: for horses

One of the hôtels we saw in detail was the Hôtel de Sully. There are a couple of distinguishing features of the hôtel.  The first is the square in front of the house, which provides a separation between the front door and the road. Welcomed guests are brought in through the front door to the main part of the house while unwanted guests are kept out front. The square is paved with cobble stone so that when important guests enter the square on horses, the sounds of the horseshoes echoing in the square alerts the servants of their arrival. Most of the servants live in rooms on either side of the square. There was even a covered garage like area for guests to store their horses while they visited.

Back facade

Secondly are the four statues on either side of the door in the front and rear facade pictures. I don't know if you can see them clearly enough, but they represent the four seasons: in front - winter and spring, in back - summer and autumn. The architecture during the time that this hôtel was built focused heavily on nature allegories as well as geometric shaped. Many of the awning above the windows are semicircles or triangles and decorated with twisting vines and leaves.

Notice the modest garden behind me?

Thirdly is the introduction of private gardens. Unlike the haphazard melange that is American gardens, French gardens are much more defined and precise. Everything must be symmetrical and perfectly pruned in order to demonstrate man's control over nature. Flowers are planted in specific patters, bushes are cut into shapes, and the ever poplar labyrinths are perfectly groomed as well. The garden in Sully was considered very modest in comparison to (yet again) Versailles.

Right next door was the Place des Vosges where many Parisians like to come and hang out when the weather is nice. Right smack dab in the middle is a statue of Louis XIII. 

Louis XIII

Parisians soaking in some sun

Hip band

Most famous falafel place in Paris

The Marais is a major tourist destination. There are even live bands and a falafel shop with a line that stretches over 200 meters.

Jams and butters

Baked goods galore

After the tour, I walked around with a group of girls and we stumbled upon this super cute little market/festival. There was everything from a live band to face painting, and of course lots of little stands selling artisan goods. There was even a honey stand that was attracting not only a lot of human customers, but also every bee in the area. Although I didn't buy anything, I did sample quite a few of the breads and cookies from the baked goods stand. 

Dinner on Saturday was chou fleur au gratin (cauliflower baked in a cheesy cream sauce). It was super rich, but oh so delicious when sopping up the extra sauce with a good piece of toasted bread. Sunday was simple with steamed broccoli and potatoes.