10 May 2008

A day in the life

Hello readers! I'm truly sorry to have neglected this blog basically all semester- I generally think that going out and doing things is better than sitting at home and updating the blog. You don't know it, but I actually have 12 unpublished posts from this semester in which I've written ideas for posts, but haven't gotten around to filling it in with substantive information. So don't be surprised to see backdated posts! I'll update each real date when I do it, so you can go back to the specific earlier date and look. Also, I'm sorry about not updating pictures recently- I've been taking some every single day since two days before I went to Morocco (which was April 17-27, for those of you who don't know) and it's getting to be a bit much. They will definitely be up this summer at the latest!

As for life right now, the semester is winding down, and finals are next week. I can hardly believe that it's over, right as I'm feeling much more comfortable speaking French and right after I've finally made friends with all of the girls in my Sorbonne class! Not to mention that the weather has finally become perfect- 75 degrees Fahrenheit and no clouds- every day of the week, which makes Paris almost a completely different city. However, happily, I still have about a month abroad, making travels to Freiburg/Munich/Prague/Berlin/Amsterdam with Livy, Aix-en-Provence/Marseille to visit Teresa, and Frankfurt to visit my German pen pal, Anni as well as returning to Paris three times before I come home.

For now, I want to give everyone a snapshot of what life was like day-to-day here for me in Paris. Last Tuesday May 6, I decided to keep track of everything I did, complete with pictures. Enjoy!

Mardi, le 6 mai 2008: Un jour dans la vie

7:30 am
Wake up, get ready, eat a breakfast of Nutella on baguette and hot chocolate
8:17 am
Catch métro line 9 at Marcel Sembat, change to line 10 at Michel-Ange Molitor, change to line 13 at Duroc, and arrive at Gaité
Switching at Michel-Ange Molitor
8:53 am Arrive at IES Center on rue Daguerre
9:10 am French Language and Culture class starts 10 minutes late. Topics of the day: le discours rapporté passé (how to narrate a dialogue) and "Ulysse" by Ridan (French singer), based on the words from the poem by Joachim du Bellay
10:30 am Bolt out of class to RER line B at Denfert-Rochereau
10:45 am Arrive at Port Royal, walk to centre Michelet where I have Sorbonne classes and run into my friends Claire and Alexia on the way
10:50 am 20 minutes late to make up a TD (travaux dirigés, or discussion in the US) for my Sorbonne class in Art History. Listened to three students give exposés on Olympia and Le balcon by Manet, and Une baignade à Asnières by Seurat (same topic as my exposé a few weeks earlier).
12:30 pm Say goodbye to my art history professor as this is my last TD for the semester, take RER back to Denfert-Rochereau
1:00 pm Buy a sandwich from the Greek place near IES (choosing neither the viennoiserie nor the boulangerie that we pick from every day) and go back to the IES courtyard to eat
IES Center courtyard in the spring
1:30 pm Leave IES after finishing sandwich and a 0,40 € coffee (thank goodness for SOME things that are cheap!) and walk down rue Daguerre to get watch battery replaced at a bijouterie (jewelry shop)
1:47 pm Decide not to get gelato at Amorino, the Parisian gelato chain, though sorely tempted
2:15 pm History of Paris class: last lecture of the semester, covering the Haussmanian transformations of Paris in the 1850s, Franco-Prussian War, and the Third Republic up until World War II (though only 2 sentences were said about World War I...go figure)
3:45 pm Make copies of history notes in the IES center from a day missed due to Morocco
4:00 pm Visit with Kendra, the study abroad director at Indiana University who happened to be visiting that day
4:30 pm Take the RER line B from Denfert-Rochereau back to Port Royal
4:40 pm Decide to buy a chocolate macaroon near Port Royal, since I'm already almost an hour late to my last Sorbonne lecture
Delicious macaroon at Port Royal
5:00 pm Arrive an hour late to my last Sorbonne lecture on the representation of myths in art. Sit with friends Stéphanie, Timothée, and Claire while Prof. Texier lectures on representations of Theseus and the minotaur. (Note: the only reason why I went to class was to see my friends again, since all of my work for the class was already done)
6:00 pm Walk over to Jessica's (my best friend from high school's) homestay since it's only 5 minutes from the centre Michelet, randomly walk through rue Mouffetard, my favorite street, as we're talking
Hi Jessica!
7:15 pm Catch métro line 7 at Les Gobelins, change to line 6 (outdoor métro line) at Place d'Italie and see the Eiffel Tower and the Seine as I'm on the train, change to line 9 at Trocadéro, and arrive at Marcel Sembat
7:53 pm Arrive home to see that my host mom and sister have already eaten due to my host mom's night class, so I eat my portion of Indian chicken, rice, and cauliflower by myself in the kitchen
8:45 pm Call Bloomington via Skype to figure out why we have $955 to owe for our apartment (notice emailed the day before); find out that it's our subletters racking up late fees and not turning in rent. Great.
9:00 pm Take métro line 9 from Marcel Sembat to Franklin D. Roosevelt: to exit the station on the Champs-Elysées, I have to make the ridiculously long transfer to line 1 and then exit
9:40 pm Meet with Whitney (one of my IES friends) on the Champs-Elysées as the sun is setting behind the Arc de Triomphe to buy tickets for Disneyland Paris
Quite possibly one of the best pictures I've taken in Paris.