We got our placement results - I landed in "B2"/38.. which translates to high-advanced, I believe. I don't really know what this means for me at this point. Most people in the class were put into B11 or B12 (intermediate). I'm a little worried that perhaps it will be too advanced for me, but I'm very confident in my grammar. It's the oral comprehension that I have an issue with...
Similar to the way we say "gonna" (going to) - they mesh their words together and speak so quickly that its difficult to catch what people are saying on the streets. Its far easier in classes, where you have a general idea of the topic and oftentimes have a written reference to go from as well.
On Thursday, I have my oral test. I think I will place low for that.. I actually am hoping I do, because drowning in a lack of comprehension has not helped me thus far in my experience. I'd like to work from the bottom up, and really gain an understanding of spoken french.
Things have been going well lately, and we only have one night left of sleeping at Delph's (after tonight), so soon enough we will have our own personal space! We explored the 10th arrondissement a bit today as well, which isn't too far off from our apartment, and ate at a little place called Miam Miam - what they would consider to be the same as "Yum Yum" for us, where you can get a panini, drink, and dessert for 6€20 - only about seventy cents more than our usual lunch spot, with better desserts and warm sandwiches instead! The man working there was extremely nice as well, and it's not a tourist hot spot so they're much more patient in this area.
Tomorrow we meet for class in the Marais, and Wednesday we have off. Thursday our official classes begin.
À demain! Bisous!
Showing posts with label paris. Show all posts
Showing posts with label paris. Show all posts
Monday, October 7, 2013
Sunday, October 6, 2013
Our quest for an American grocery store
We've been meaning to find one since we came, and though it's probably frowned upon, we decided to go on a quest for American food in Paris. What can I say, sometimes a girl just need a nice package of Oreos to come home to at the end of the day. So I started out with a google search, and this is my list of stores to visit:
The Real McCoy - 194 Rue de Grenelle, 75007 Paris (close to the Eiffel tower)
Epicerie Anglaise et Américaine de Paris - 5 Cité du Wauxhall, 75010 Paris
Thanksgiving - 20 Rue Saint-Paul, 75004 Paris
Today we went for The Real McCoy - which turned out to be an exceptional idea. The store itself on Rue de Grenelle was closed, but it had a sign on the door which lead us around the corner (to 49 Avenue Bosquet, 75007 Paris) to it's counterpart café, where they sell the same products AND prepared food. We walked out of Paris and into our own little slice of America. They have a plethora of foods we're missing... cereals, pop tarts, gushers, candy, oreos, popcorn, sauces. So luckily, we know we have access in a case of extreme deprivation, but it is very very expensive. A box of Kraft mac n' cheese is 4€50. The best part was that the two girls working there were American too! No language barrier!!! I ordered an "Extreme Burrito" and Audrey ordered a philly cheese steak sub, both with Dr. Pepper, and we were probably the happiest we've been since leaving. Comfort food takes on a whole new meaning when you're far from home.
We left The Real McCoy and traveled on up to Thanksgiving - another great store, and a bit closer to our new apartment. It mostly sold the same foods, but was a little bit cheaper. It carried Duff beer too, which was a funny edition. And vegemite! I've always wanted to try vegemite, but I don't think I would like it so I probably won't spend the 10€ on it. That's all for today!
The Real McCoy - 194 Rue de Grenelle, 75007 Paris (close to the Eiffel tower)
Epicerie Anglaise et Américaine de Paris - 5 Cité du Wauxhall, 75010 Paris
Thanksgiving - 20 Rue Saint-Paul, 75004 Paris
Today we went for The Real McCoy - which turned out to be an exceptional idea. The store itself on Rue de Grenelle was closed, but it had a sign on the door which lead us around the corner (to 49 Avenue Bosquet, 75007 Paris) to it's counterpart café, where they sell the same products AND prepared food. We walked out of Paris and into our own little slice of America. They have a plethora of foods we're missing... cereals, pop tarts, gushers, candy, oreos, popcorn, sauces. So luckily, we know we have access in a case of extreme deprivation, but it is very very expensive. A box of Kraft mac n' cheese is 4€50. The best part was that the two girls working there were American too! No language barrier!!! I ordered an "Extreme Burrito" and Audrey ordered a philly cheese steak sub, both with Dr. Pepper, and we were probably the happiest we've been since leaving. Comfort food takes on a whole new meaning when you're far from home.
We left The Real McCoy and traveled on up to Thanksgiving - another great store, and a bit closer to our new apartment. It mostly sold the same foods, but was a little bit cheaper. It carried Duff beer too, which was a funny edition. And vegemite! I've always wanted to try vegemite, but I don't think I would like it so I probably won't spend the 10€ on it. That's all for today!
Nuit Blanche, 5 Octobre 2013
Nuit Blanche directly translates to "White Night". Indirectly, it means the same thing as what we'd call an all-nighter. Nuit Blanche happens once a year in Paris (beginning in 2001) and it is a big all night long event of art, music, and food all throughout Paris. The metro runs later than usual, and everyone comes out to see the different projects in each neighborhood.
We started out by heading to Pont-Neuf to see the most interesting-sounding event around 6 - four violinists inside four helicopters. I don't know much more about it than that, but we didn't know what to expect so we wanted to check it out. It turned out to be pretty anticlimactic, as the violinists were shown on a large screen (which I couldn't see) and then we just got to see the four helicopters fly by us one time, after about an hour of waiting.
At 7, all the bells in the city ring, and people join in with bicycle bells, hand bells, there was even an app you could download in advance that would ring for you.
Around 7:30 we met up with Delph and headed to Centre Pompidou, where we saw a strange German artist wearing a skirt and blush drawing on a large piece of paper while mixing things strangers were saying into a microphone. Very abstract, to say the least.
We then went on the search for falafel on our way to Place de la République for a Fog Installation. The wait for falafel was about 25 minutes, so we decided to go on our way and just eat something that we found. We ended up stopping at a little street café/restaurant, where we all got croque-monsieur and I ordered my first beer while here (1664). Both the food and beer were delicious.
We made it to the Fog installation, which was exceptionally less cool in person considering the mobs of people present, took some pictures, and left to come home (by this point we had been walking around for easily 5 or 6 hours). I'm glad I was here for it, and I'm glad we had Delph with us to guide us to the better places, but I do think Nuit Blanche may be more exciting as a native-french speaker with a group of friends. Regardless, we still had a great time.
We started out by heading to Pont-Neuf to see the most interesting-sounding event around 6 - four violinists inside four helicopters. I don't know much more about it than that, but we didn't know what to expect so we wanted to check it out. It turned out to be pretty anticlimactic, as the violinists were shown on a large screen (which I couldn't see) and then we just got to see the four helicopters fly by us one time, after about an hour of waiting.
At 7, all the bells in the city ring, and people join in with bicycle bells, hand bells, there was even an app you could download in advance that would ring for you.
Around 7:30 we met up with Delph and headed to Centre Pompidou, where we saw a strange German artist wearing a skirt and blush drawing on a large piece of paper while mixing things strangers were saying into a microphone. Very abstract, to say the least.
We then went on the search for falafel on our way to Place de la République for a Fog Installation. The wait for falafel was about 25 minutes, so we decided to go on our way and just eat something that we found. We ended up stopping at a little street café/restaurant, where we all got croque-monsieur and I ordered my first beer while here (1664). Both the food and beer were delicious.
We made it to the Fog installation, which was exceptionally less cool in person considering the mobs of people present, took some pictures, and left to come home (by this point we had been walking around for easily 5 or 6 hours). I'm glad I was here for it, and I'm glad we had Delph with us to guide us to the better places, but I do think Nuit Blanche may be more exciting as a native-french speaker with a group of friends. Regardless, we still had a great time.
Friday, October 4, 2013
McDonalds
Haven't been up to much lately - mostly just school things. We saw where our classes will be taking place for the first time (Raspail) and had our placement exam, as I alluded in my last post. It consisted of a fill-in-the-blank section of 50 questions or so, a comprehension section, an oral comprehension section, and a written section. Then after that was complete, we sat down with someone and had a brief conversation for our oral exam. I will actually find out which level I'm in on Monday... not the 9th.
We didn't get much sleep last night. There was an absolutely insane thunderstorm here - without a doubt the absolute loudest thunder I've ever heard... And Delph's upstairs neighbors never sleep. Unfortunately the floors in 18th century buildings aren't quite as silent as the one's we're used to at home, so we can hear every single move they make. However, the fact that I got to take a half-hot shower this morning made up for any lack of sleep. We went to class, and afterwords Audrey and I decided to check out the metro station that we think we want to take during our move from Delph's to the apartment. We walked around our new neighborhood for a bit (there's a pizza hut nearby!!) and then just wandered down Rue de Rivoli. We decided we wanted to check out the macarons from McDonald's (they may be a franchise food, but they certainly look just as good as any other macarons I've seen). So we wandered in there and found something much more interesting. They have ordering machines.
We didn't get much sleep last night. There was an absolutely insane thunderstorm here - without a doubt the absolute loudest thunder I've ever heard... And Delph's upstairs neighbors never sleep. Unfortunately the floors in 18th century buildings aren't quite as silent as the one's we're used to at home, so we can hear every single move they make. However, the fact that I got to take a half-hot shower this morning made up for any lack of sleep. We went to class, and afterwords Audrey and I decided to check out the metro station that we think we want to take during our move from Delph's to the apartment. We walked around our new neighborhood for a bit (there's a pizza hut nearby!!) and then just wandered down Rue de Rivoli. We decided we wanted to check out the macarons from McDonald's (they may be a franchise food, but they certainly look just as good as any other macarons I've seen). So we wandered in there and found something much more interesting. They have ordering machines.
Yes, that is ALL McDonald's. It all tastes much less greasy as well. Overall, we have had a pleasing experience there (though in the future I would prefer to avoid it - there are cheaper, healthier, fresher options by just picking things up from a local boulangerie, marché, brioche dorée, etc).
After McDonald's we came home to rest and contact people from home, since we hadn't been able to since before the thunderstorm took out the wifi. I started my two hour venture to compile a list of Paris free wifi spots, arranged by arrondissement, into an excel file. Delph came home and talked to us for about two hours about various things, and then went out to meet some friends for dinner. We ate chicken nuggets for dinner with barbecue sauce/Frank's combo, and now I am blogging while Audrey watches the finale of breaking bad. Like I said, our life hasn't been that interesting these past few days, but it will certainly begin to pick up this weekend and the following week with some unusual activities coming up (nuit blanche, free horse races for girls wearing hats, our big move, the beginning of classes). We're also looking into going to Disneyland Paris for our long weekend - it's about 55€/$75 per ticket and we can get there for free with our metro pass on weekends! Anywho, I'll write again tomorrow or the next day.
À bientôt!
Wednesday, October 2, 2013
Brief day
We only had class from 9H30 to 11H30 today, and Delph wasn't at the apartment when we got home so we're staying here for a bit, and reheating our pasta with Bolognese sauce for lunch. I talked to my dad on the phone for about half an hour, and will now take this opportunity to upload some photos from my good camera! (The first three are Centre Pompidou, last two l'Hotel de Ville)
Tuesday, October 1, 2013
Il y a deux jours depuis j'avais posté
It's been a busy two days...
Yesterday
I had class from 9H30 to 11H30, and then had our entrevues with Céline (where we tell her which classes we're interested in taking once the lectures begin on October 21st). I will be taking l'Histoire d'art and some sort of Cinéma class. I'm sure both of these classes will be extremely difficult, but everything is difficult when you're studying abroad! Why not make it interesting.
After class we had about 4 hours to kill before we met again for a guided tour of l'Hotel de Ville ("city hall"). In the mean time, we found our new favorite restaurant - Brioche Dorée. It's 5€50 for a bottle of pop, a sandwich, and your choice of dessert. We took our cheap lunch on over to the Luxembourg gardens and ate there before walking north to Notre Dame in search of an Orange store. We didn't find one right away - however, we did see a scam in action... I'm not sure if I've blogged about it before, but it truly makes me angry that it exists so I will now culture everyone who reads this blog on the lowliest of crimes:
Near tourist hot spots, it's really common to see groups of younger, foreign girls (oftentimes arab-looking, I'm not great with ethnicities, I apologize) holding clipboards. There are two approaches that I've seen for this scam: 1) they approach you, ask you if you speak english, and then ask you to sign their petition. They're pretty insistent. When this happened to me, I repeatedly said "no, thank you" at least 10 times before she finally went away. If they manage to finagle you into signing something (which is pretty much a no-no whenever you're in a foreign country, not just Paris), the other girls will steal your things while you're hands and eyes are distracted! The other approach - 2) a group of young girls holding clip boards come up to you, motioning for you to sign. They also motion to their ears and their mouth to show you that they are deaf and mute. You sign their clip board after they follow you around shoving it in your face, and then suddenly they surround you, walking in circles and asking for donation. You pull your wallet out, and they all begin to grab from it right in front of you. It's so fast that you don't really have an option, and they're not about to give it back. It's a "donation", after all. I saw this one happen to someone near Notre Dame. The point is, never sign anything. Always say no to petitions in tourist locations. Maybe even just in general.
Anyways, back to my day recap... We did some shopping on Rue de Rivoli and found our first Lush store. We found an H&M and both invested in new, bigger purses - pretty much an essential. We found multiple french thrift shops and visited the outside of Centre Pompidou. We saw a real french bulldog. We bought our monthly métro pass - Navigo Découverte, which will allow us to take the subway and the bus freely throughout Paris any time. We then went on a tour of l'Hotel de Ville - which was beautiful and grandiose but ultimately not the most interesting way to spend a day. And we retourned.
Today
We had class 9H30 - 11H30, ate free bread from the building our classes our in, Audrey got more Brioche Dorée, and we ate again in the Luxembourg gardens. Then we went to a mandatory slideshow about Paris which put us all to sleep, and took a quick stroll through Galeries Lafayette - one of the "grand magasins" of Paris, where you'll find Chanel, Dior, Louis Vuitton, etc. We kept wandering up Rue Lafayette and found a grocery store called Carrefour, which we quickly discovered carries Oreos, Reese's, Ben & Jerry's, along with 2€50 sandwiches and plenty of other good prices on good items. Luckily, it's not even a 5 minute walk from our new apartment! We took the subway back to Delph's place and made ourselves some quick pasta before heading out again for the night... we primarily left because we thought Delph was mad at us again, but I'm very glad we did leave!
We took a trip to the Eiffel tower and walked around it's gardens and parks. Audrey wanted to see it sparkle - which it only does for 5 minutes on the hour every hour past 8... so we hung around for a while. A man came by offering wine and champagne. At first we said no, but then on his way back we politely asked how much ("combien coûte le vin?"). 20€! We said no, and he continued to talk himself down all the way to 5€ at which point we felt we had achieved a great feat and deserved the wine. He even asked if we were French.. I guess speaking french does help in tourist situations. We drank our wine and watched the Eiffel tower sparkle, and then slowly made our way back to the RER station. On the way, we grabbed a crêpe au nutella banane avec crème - and it was to die for.
Now we are back at Delph's. While it doesn't seem like much (or maybe it does), I would say today was one of our best days yet!
Friday, September 27, 2013
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Our arrival
I left the United States feeling nervous and excited and sad. I knew there was a ton to look forward to, which turned out to be very important. If we didn't have high spirits and the ability to laugh at ourselves, we would've been much worse off than we were!
We arrived at Charles de Gaulle around 9 or 9:30 am, after a relatively smooth 8 hour flight. We got our bags, took some cash out at an ATM, and walked for what felt like forever to the RER station, with plenty of stops in between. For inexplicable reasons, it felt like it was scorching hot inside the airport and we were dying of thirst and sooo tired from carrying our 100 lbs worth of luggage. Eventually, we made it to the automated ticket booths, and we couldn't find the specific ticket we needed (one stopping at Laplace). We spoke to a very nice man at the desk, who provided us two maps and told us which platform we need, and invited himself out to dinner with us later.
We got on the train, and were thankful to finally rest after our hour long airport fiasco. About 30 minutes into the ride, it started to fill up quite a bit in there, which only made it that much more difficult to get off with our luggage. The doors started to close before I was out of the subway with mine, so I just sort of jumped out and dragged them with me (with some help from a boy who quickly became my only french, long lost friend). We then were leaving the train station, and once again, my luggage got stuck in the exit doors, leaving me at the mercy of the people behind me (who were not thrilled nor amused). Finally, we made it out, and proceeded to be very, very lost and confused for approximately 1 1/2 hours. Even asking directions didn't help, since people were not very warm to english speakers. It was hot. Our luggage was heavy. And we were wheeling it behind us for a LONG time, over cobblestone sidewalks, following iffy directions by google maps.
We caved and got a taxi once we reached Paris' Port d'Orleans with no luck. Once our luggage was in the trunk, our driver began to search for our address. According to the previous people I had asked, Avenue Henri Ginoux was in Paris - which we then relayed to our taxi driver. He, however, informed us it was actually in Montrouge, a Parisian suburb, and proceeded to yell and scream at us in French during our entire 5 minute ride. We were terrified, tired, physically exhausted, and very disheartened to have met so many mean people in just one day. He did bring us to our housing though, so we were happy to finally be somewhere that we could relax.
Delph paged us in, and we then had to walk up 5 flights of stairs with all of our luggage (technically the 4th étage here). She shared her lunch with us - the best quiche au jambon that I have ever been blessed with eating in my entire life, and gave us water, and showed us our room. We called home, and ended up passing out for much of afternoon/evening.
We woke up in the evening for a few hours, and embarked on our internet apartment search. We are able to find apartments, however, after our short amount of time in Paris we learned quickly that it's really important for us to have an english speaking landlord. After doing some research, it seems as though our only real option is to go through a rental agency and just suck up the agency fees. We found one we love in the 17th arrondissement, and are waiting to hear back right now.
In the mean time, we went to the mall for some much needed retail therapy at H&M. It is oddly comforting to know that the prices are nearly the same and the clothing items are international. We also gave directions to a man in french, which is ironic considering we were lost on the exact same street the day before. We returned to our temporary home and made a shopping list, and completed our grocery shopping for the week (about 45€). Now we are just vegging out until we can think of something else to do. Tomorrow we will venture into Paris!
À bientôt!
We arrived at Charles de Gaulle around 9 or 9:30 am, after a relatively smooth 8 hour flight. We got our bags, took some cash out at an ATM, and walked for what felt like forever to the RER station, with plenty of stops in between. For inexplicable reasons, it felt like it was scorching hot inside the airport and we were dying of thirst and sooo tired from carrying our 100 lbs worth of luggage. Eventually, we made it to the automated ticket booths, and we couldn't find the specific ticket we needed (one stopping at Laplace). We spoke to a very nice man at the desk, who provided us two maps and told us which platform we need, and invited himself out to dinner with us later.
We got on the train, and were thankful to finally rest after our hour long airport fiasco. About 30 minutes into the ride, it started to fill up quite a bit in there, which only made it that much more difficult to get off with our luggage. The doors started to close before I was out of the subway with mine, so I just sort of jumped out and dragged them with me (with some help from a boy who quickly became my only french, long lost friend). We then were leaving the train station, and once again, my luggage got stuck in the exit doors, leaving me at the mercy of the people behind me (who were not thrilled nor amused). Finally, we made it out, and proceeded to be very, very lost and confused for approximately 1 1/2 hours. Even asking directions didn't help, since people were not very warm to english speakers. It was hot. Our luggage was heavy. And we were wheeling it behind us for a LONG time, over cobblestone sidewalks, following iffy directions by google maps.
We caved and got a taxi once we reached Paris' Port d'Orleans with no luck. Once our luggage was in the trunk, our driver began to search for our address. According to the previous people I had asked, Avenue Henri Ginoux was in Paris - which we then relayed to our taxi driver. He, however, informed us it was actually in Montrouge, a Parisian suburb, and proceeded to yell and scream at us in French during our entire 5 minute ride. We were terrified, tired, physically exhausted, and very disheartened to have met so many mean people in just one day. He did bring us to our housing though, so we were happy to finally be somewhere that we could relax.
Delph paged us in, and we then had to walk up 5 flights of stairs with all of our luggage (technically the 4th étage here). She shared her lunch with us - the best quiche au jambon that I have ever been blessed with eating in my entire life, and gave us water, and showed us our room. We called home, and ended up passing out for much of afternoon/evening.
We woke up in the evening for a few hours, and embarked on our internet apartment search. We are able to find apartments, however, after our short amount of time in Paris we learned quickly that it's really important for us to have an english speaking landlord. After doing some research, it seems as though our only real option is to go through a rental agency and just suck up the agency fees. We found one we love in the 17th arrondissement, and are waiting to hear back right now.
In the mean time, we went to the mall for some much needed retail therapy at H&M. It is oddly comforting to know that the prices are nearly the same and the clothing items are international. We also gave directions to a man in french, which is ironic considering we were lost on the exact same street the day before. We returned to our temporary home and made a shopping list, and completed our grocery shopping for the week (about 45€). Now we are just vegging out until we can think of something else to do. Tomorrow we will venture into Paris!
À bientôt!
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