Etretat

Friday was spent following Arsene Lupin's track. Arsene Lupin is Marice Leblanc's fictional "gentleman thief", an equivalent to Sherlock Holmes. We watched the movie sometime last week, where we saw Arsene fighting men to attain three crosses that would give the key to open the hollow needle, all while seducing women and stealing necklaces. An interesting character, so on friday we walked around his town and visited a church that he had been in. Outside this church there was a large marketplace with meat and baguettes and seafood. Dr. Rockwell told us that this is where the sans cullotte has always been selling and working, so we took sometime to buy a few things before boarding the bus again.

Next we went to the house of Maurice Leblanc, where we received audio guides and toured the house. The audio guides were a tad peculiar because at one point Leblanc's fictional character began talking to us and telling us how he had to solve the secrets of the hollow needle and attain the treasures of France.



After that we went to the cliffs of Etretat which were gorgeous. We climbed up and there were a million photo opportunities, and we managed to see the hollow needle itself. At low tide people can actually walk out to the needle, but with the wind and rainy weather I don't think anyone was considering swimming. We did actually see some crazy guy in the ocean though on our way up to Etretat.

Paris 2

Tuesday night we were allowed some free time after the Eiffle Tower to find dinner. Given a curfew of midnight, we all manage to find ourselves restaurants to dine at. Rene and I found a little italian place where we shared tagliatelle pesto and a delicious pizza, but decided that this wasn't french enough we left after to purchase off the street a baguette, nutella, and frommage to eat back at the room. Having still a lot of time for our curfew however, we met up with Tarek and Larkin and attempted to find a spot where we could watch the Eiffle Tower twinkle every hour, but because of our distance from it we were unsuccessful and managed to waste an hour and a half of walking around Paris.




On Wednesday we went to another museum that had many artifacts, such as the Roman Baths and little keys and enfant toys. We also saw a grand tapestry with unicorns on it and a lot of ornate jewelry. On our way out from the museum, we passed the statue of Montaigne where we rubbed his foot for good luck.







On our way to the Arch de Triomphe we encountered a slight problem at the train station. Having all of our luggage with us, we could not find a locker or anywhere to keep our things. So we cancelled the trip the the Arch and made a rotation of luggage watch in groups of two at the train station so that everyone had time to go out and eat lunch and do some shopping. Most of us did manage to make it to the Arch though, for of course everyone wanted to check out the stores on Champs Elysees.

Paris

Tuesday and wednesday we took a train from the SNFC train station to Paris. There we stayed at the Luxembourg Hotel, right next to the Luxembourg Gardens. Here we all roomed in pairs and when we went out we left our keys with a gentlemen who refused to speak english with us.
Most of us were excited to be staying in a hotel for different reasons, but the biggest being the bathroom situation. On the way to Paris we discussed the pros and cons of the french shower and toilet. In most houses you will find two seperate rooms, one with the sink and shower, and another with just a toilet. The cons were that it promotes not washing your hands, it's an awkward distance away from each other, and it makes personal time more of a stretch. The only positive is that two people can be in the two different rooms at once. Overall, we prefer the American system of bathing, but this only shows that a small change in lifestyle really makes us think about how different our cultures are, because who really could expected us to have a half an hour conversation on bathrooms. Larkin was definitely the most excited though to shower because at his correspondent's house he can only take baths.

Arriving in Paris, we prepared to take the metro to our hotel. The metro we compared to NYC and even Buffalo's own one way subway, and we all agreed that the French metro was cleaner. There were even some metros that were double decks. Madame made us map out our route on our own before actually boarding so we could associate ourselves with it, and for those who are not used to the metro it was very confusing. The map handed to us consisted of a million different colored lines crossing and weaving all in a tangle, but of course with wonderful guides like Madame and Doc Roc we arrived at the Hotel with no problems.



Tuesday we walked around Paris a little where we saw many interesting statues and sculptures. We stopped to reenact a couple of these statues, before entering this grand church courtyard. There we found another statue that was currently dressed as snow white. This statue has gone through many outfit changes, because when the nurses our doctors go on strike, they dress the statue up as that occupation. The Show White outfit however was a joke played by the incoming interns.





We then went to of course, the Eiffle Tower. Here Tarek, Izzy, Illona, Will, Rene, Larkin, Caroline and myself chose to walk up all the steps to the top while Grace and Cokie took the elevator. around 700 steps to the middle deck, we had to take an elevator to the very tip top. With the wind, it was freezing! But we played the celebrity game to pass the time. The wait to get to the very top however was definitley worth it.

Euro Disney!

It was so much fun even though it rained and snowed. We rode Space Mountain 5 times and made a differnt face for each picture.

It was really nice to spend a day with everyone. Usually Nichols kids are always touring somewhere else. I had alot of fun. The parents were so nice to go out of their way to drive us. (Thank you Cecilia's Mother!) And I want to thank Grace's exchange student's dad for accompanying us everywhere and waiting outside of the Space Mountain ride for an hour! =)

The French Version of Wegmans

Many people looked at me funny when I got really excited and took pictures of everything in the Supermarket. Quite understandable. The food is amazing. I want to buy tons of food before I come back!

This was at fnac in the mall in Le Havre. There was this thing called a Sing Star competition where people sang a designated song for money.
One of my friends, Helene (Caroline's exchange student) actually won 50 Euros!

The guy who directed the whole thing was a famous French rapper. He had photographs in his iPhone of him and various famous people such as Cassie, Snoop Dogg, Alicia Keys and 50 Cent.

Caen was Cool

We crossed this famous bridge on our way to the memorial. The bus driver was so nice.

it was extremly windy.

There were tons of interesting exibits. Going to the memorial really gave me a differnt view of things. I had goosebumps while walking through the museum because everything was so sad. I always knew what D Day was but this was the first time I felt how bad it was. This was a very good experiance. We all learned alot. Thanks to Dr. Rockwell, students were able to connect what they read in the books to real life artifacts.

Thank You Madame for Lending Me the Camera Cord!

The plane ride was fantastic. Larkin and Will really enjoyed the games. Grace and I were way too excited to sleep.



Everyone was really tired on the bus ride from the airport to St. Jo. All slept besides me, I was way too excited. Sleeping was a good idea though since the day had not even started for us at that point.

Yay! Its the Weekend!

Yesterday did not feel like a Friday. This morning Cecilia and I had to wake up at 7 for another half-day of school. It was raining hard and of course we had to walk in it. Cecilia and I arrived at school looking desheviled becuase the powerful wind gusts just blew us away! First period was English Lit. The teacher decided to play this game called "one minute" where you had to talk about the given subject without repeating any words or say "umm...". it was very difficult actually. I repeated a word 37 seconds into the game! The highlight of the class was probably when the door fell off. When the bell rang everyone ran to the door, suddenly we all hear this woosh, bang, and a scream then the door kind of dissappeared. The wind just ripped the door right off! Then we headed back to the international room and enjoyed a fun history class with Dr. Rockwell (She was kind of sad because she did not have her maps to reference to, but we all managed to understand the First World War with her imaginary maps she drew in the air)

Cecilia and I then went shopping in downtown. It actually snowed! Cecilia said it rarely snows in Le Havre. Because we could not stand the cold any longer we took the public bus home. I think people thought I was werid becuase I was taking pictures of the interior of the bus.

I am looking forward to an very interesting night, I hope everyone is having a wonderful spring break!

Another Update

Tuesday we took a much appreciated tour of Le Havre. Of course it required a lot of walking, but it definitely proved useful when on thursday we were left with a lot of free time to wander the city for shopping and eating.
Our tour, or "Rallye dans Le Havre" consisted of stopping at some major landmarks such as a park with odd shaped bird statues, the Volcan, and the Charles de Gual statue.





After we visited these Le Havre landmarks (which took us quite a while considering some of us have the shortest attention span ever, making us stop at all the litle playgrounds on the way), we stopped at a small cafe for chocolat chaud and a few people like Ilona and Caroline ordered some delicious ice cream as well.



Yesterday we went to the Memorial in Caen, and Dr. Rockwell being the excellent history teacher that she is, was very excited for us to learn. The way everything was set up was very interesting, there was so much thought put into the building. The first part consisted of a downward spiral, which became darker as you kept walking down. This symbolized the failure of peace and stability. In another room that started the "Total War" segment was very bright, and your eyes had to adjust after exiting from the dark ages. This meant that the end was in sight and everyone was ready for it.







The rooms were filled with information and videos, all that gave most of us goosebumps. We passed blueprints of the concentration camps and even a wall that was actually the gas chambers. One thing Rene found really interesting was the different colors of parachutes (green for weapons, blue for medicine, and yellow for food).

After going through both World War II and the Cold War, we all decided to go out and visit the American Garden and the Canadian garden, although we all found the Canadian garden to be not as grand as the American Garden. We walked around there for an hour or so before we had to leave, and we welcomed the sun so it was almost warm enough to take off our northfaces. The weather here has been very rainy and quite cold, but definitely not as cold as Buffalo was when we left.

What an Amazing Day

Before I came to France I took typing for granted, it was something i could easily do with my eyes closed and i was proud of that. Now staring down at this foreign piece of technology, i realize my American typing skills are useless. The French keyboard was terrifying at first sight. Instead of the "a" being in its normal position there is a "q". My left pinky felt very lost for a while. The French keyboard has slowed my typing time to 3 words per minute.

Today my exchange partner, Cecilia, did not have school but I still had to be at st. Jo at 9am. While Cecilia was still snoring away, I left the Mondelice Residence with her 19 year old sister, Lauryne. Nichols students all ended up watching a long movie about this very cool gentleman, Arsene Lupin. I have heard of the name but I had no idea he was a fictional French character because I used to read about him in Chinese books. It was a very good and exciting movie even though we had to pause a couple times to ask Madame for a plot update.

After the movie we were able to go and explore Le Havre by ourselves. Wow. it was amazing. After a delicious lunch consisting of Lasagna and alot of French cookies for desert, Lauryne drove Cecilia and I into town and dropped us off at a street corner. When I stepped out of the car I was kind of puzzled because we were supposed to go to this girl's house and there were no residential buildings in sight. Cecilia responded "oh Marie's house is no where near here! We still have to walk for a while" "A While" ended up being 45 minutes and 45% of it was up hill.

I arrived at Marie's house only to find three eager Americans who wanted to walk to the mall. Molly, Izzy, Ilona and I finally arrived at the mall after a much needed stop at an authentic French bakery. The mall was a blast, we didn't buy much but ran into some interesting French boys. It was fun to use all the French we learned because our new friends could not speak English =)

My computer is running out of power now so I have to go but I am looking forward to another fun filled day tomorrow! au revoir!

First day!

Bonjour!

Departing from Nichols at 12:30 pm to catch a 4:45 flight out of Toronto, we arrived in Paris around 6:00 am Le Havre time. The seven hour flight passed by rather quickly for some of us with the help of movie selections such as Juno and Transformers, along with "Who Wants to Be A Millionaire". Those sensible enough to attempt to sleep found it difficult with Will and Larkin's unsuccessful attempts at obtaining millionaire status, but with eye masks and pillows most people managed to sleep for maybe two hours with the exception of Dr Rockwell who slept soundly the entire flight.

After unloading from the plane, everyone found their luggage pieces (singular for the boys and of course plural for the girls, except for Cokie as we were all dumbfounded that she could fit three weeks of clothing into a not-so-big rollaway) quite easily. Being that it was only midnight in Buffalo, we all fell asleep on the two and a half hour bus to Le Havre where we woke up anxious for our big reunion. The swarm of French students outside the bus was massive and we all anxiously looked to find familiar faces. Off the bus and reacquainted, some of us continued straight off to class with their correspondent while others went directly home. Some stayed until returning to the houses for lunch, and then rested and unpacked like me, or other girls such as Caroline and Rene went straight back to school after eating. Exemplified in these many different situations explains perfectly how different St Joseph school is from Nichols: probably three times as many students, all bustling around with different schedules and running between classes to Greek or french literature or geometry, the whole idea is sort of overwhelming. 

Mais quand vous etes en France, faisez comme le francais!