One Chapter Closes as Another One Opens

I've been home for a few months now, and I keep trying sit down and write a final post about my experience, but it is hard to put into words all of the feelings and emotions that go along with such an ending.

I guess, I should tell the story to the ending first.

The last few weeks seemed to fly by. All of a sudden it was my last day of work; and an odd day it was. All of my regular classes were canceled. So, my plan to say goodbye to all my students fell through. Instead, I worked one-on-one with a young girl trying to improve her pronunciation of the Martin Luther King Speech. It was interesting trying to explain the meaning of the speech to her in French. I left that day without really any closure; no one said goodbye to me...no one really noticed. I said goodbye best I could to the students without disrupting classes.

I was bummed but I had bigger and better things ahead of me. Nick was coming in just two days and we had an adventure ahead of us! Or at least I thought.

This was all around April 17th or if you had been following international news just three days after the irruption of the volcano in Iceland. It would ultimately stop Nick from coming for our two weeks in Italy, and lead me to a two-day-travel-adventure to get home sooner.

Nick's flight was canceled the day he was due to leave and instead of spending a week in Chicago waiting for a flight out, we decided he should get his refund and I'd figure out a way home.

I went from having two weeks left to get all accounts shut down and seven-plus-months of clothes and memorabilia packed and ready to leave within five days. Now, in America that is no problem. In France in the middle of their spring break and when all forms of transportaion is shut down, it was like being in the middle of Nordstrom on Black Friday. The bank was closed two out of the three times I ended up going there, the train was on strike so there was limited tickets available and two hours lines to just get a ticket, and then there was the constant vigil I held on flightstats.com to see if my flight would even take off.

But, I'm getting ahead of myself...I haven't even explained the plan to get home. I had two options, get to Barcelona or Italy to fly back home. Either one was a toss up because who knew how long the ash would stay out of those airways. I went with my gut and I chose to get to Barcelona and take the soonest flight out. I got the last over night train ticket available for Tuesday, April 20th leaving from Paris to Barcelona that would get me there early morning, but not enough time to catch the cheap flight home.

I had found a ticket home for $500, which in the middle of an airlines crises that has kept millions of people stranded is a dirt cheap price. Only problem was I didn't have enough time from the train station to the airport to make it. So, I went back to the drawing board and found what would be the most expensive ticket I have ever purchased. It was well of $2,000 for coach. But it was my only option unless I wanted to wait another two weeks. So, I said goodbye to any future shopping trips and bought my way home.

This was all on Saturday when Nick was supposed to have arrived. So, the next three days I was neurotic with checking flightstats.com to see if my flight had taken off that day. Sunday: it didn't. I was in tears and came to the conclusion that I was going to have to stay longer and deal with it.

I know alot of you are probably thinking being trapped in Paris wouldn't be so bad, but when you've been away from the love of your life for so long and dreaming of this two week travel fest through Italy; it kind of a bummer. Also, at the time no one knew when this would stop or when the airports would open back up. We had no idea when we all might make it home. Luckily, I had great roommates who were totally supportive and helped me with everything, and also helped me to see that another few weeks wouldn't be the end of the world. Of course, after I came to that conclusion, the flight took off on Monday.

Booya, we were in business. I was going home!

After that, everything went surprisingly smoothly. I got to my bank to close my account, I finished packing a day ahead of leaving, and I got to spend my last day in Paris with my friends and just enjoy its beauty.

It took me approximately, 35 hours to get home. I had a 12-hour over night train ride, a three hour window at the airport, an eight hour flight from Barcelona to NYC, a six hour lay over and then a six hour flight to PDX. On top of that I had a total of four bags, one big enough to fit me inside of it, that I had to lug on the train, lug off the train, get in a cab, get to the airport, drop them off at check-in, pick them back up in customs at JFK, lug through a thousand people to walk through customs, put them back through check-in and then finally pick them up at baggage claim. (I made Nick carry them then and he had trouble with it!)

Another lucky break was that Barcelona was the ONLY airport in all of western Europe to stay open. My gut lead my right once again.

After I got home, we used the rest of Nick's vacation to go on a week and half road trip through California. It wasn't Italy but it was defiantly a great replacement.

Since I've been back, I've had all kinds of mixed feelings. I'm so happy to be home and starting my next chapter in life, but I have my moments when I miss Paris and it's old windy roads. There are some mornings where I wake up and don't know where I am, because I had just been dreaming of my Parisian apartment or our favorite restaurant or park. The whole adventure was such a mixture of emotions and experiences, I will always look back on it fondly and with a great feeling of accomplishment. Really, it's hard to write a final blog on the time there, because it has played such a big part in my life before, during and even after I was there.

Part of me still expects to be going back soon, and even though I don't know when, I know I'll be back someday walking through the windy streets of Paris, eating a pain au chocolat and remembering my days there.

Raiding King Louis XV's Wine Cellar

Last Friday, two of my room mates, me and a friend went wine tasting at Ô Chateau. A historic cellar that is walking distance to the Louvre and used to hold Louis XV's private collection for the court.

We did the Tour de la France tasting that included six wines: one champagne, two whites and three reds. All of them from different regions of France and each exquisite.

We also had a young sommiler, someone who knows their stuff about wine, who was in charge of leading us through the world of French wine. He was humorous, honest and knowledgeable.

He started off telling us the three steps of wine tasting.

step one:
- See.
Hold the glass by the stem; it is the best way to measure the clarity of wine . To measure the clarity of the wine hold it up towards the light-- look at it -- is it lighter or darker? If it has a lighter clarity than it is going to have more acidity than sugar... so more dry than sweet. If it has a darker clarity than it is going to be very sweet. Sweeter wine has a golden color to it...plus 250 grams of sugar. Dry wine will always be in a green or brown bottle and sweet wine will always be in a clear bottle.

He said that in France those are the only kinds of colors for bottles of wine you can find, but around the world that is changing...he once found a blue bottle of wine in Oregon.

Now to check the vintage of the wine, you must examine the wine's meniscus. To do that you continue to hold the glass side ways but hold a white piece of paper behind it; this will make it easier to see the two layers of color. The top layer is the meniscus. If the meniscus is paler than it is an older vintage and if the meniscus is darker it is a younger vintage.

Moving on to step two:
- Smell.
First you need to oxidize the wine by swirling it. Then you hold your nose up to the rim of the glass and inhale. Smell the different aromas.

There are five categories of flavors:
- Spice
- Flowers
- Fruity
- Woody/ Oak-y notes
- Animal flavors

Then raise your glass to your neighbor and dit santé (cheers) while looking them in the eye.


Step three:
- Taste.
Oxidize the flavors by taking a little bit of the wine into your mouth and swirling it around on the tip of your tongue. Best way to do that is to shape your mouth as an "o" and breath in while slightly moving your tongue. This will enhance the flavors and you will really sense the alcohol in the back of your throat.

He told us some neat wino facts, such as how to measure the amount of alcohol or sugar in the wine. If there is more sugar than alcohol, you have more legs (streaks that run down the side of your glass) but if the legs run down fast there is more alcohol than sugar.

He also explained how the weather can affect the vintage of wine; like in June or July when the grapes are warmer and dryer the vintage is better. Or in southern France the wine is darker in color because the weather is dryer and warmer year round thus giving it a higher potential to age.

And he touched on a few interesting wine cultural differences between France and other countries. Such as in their marketing for the bottles; it is illegal to name the grapes used in the wine over the name of the region. While in the "New World" (California and Australia) the focus is on the grapes from all over the country or state not on the region the wine is made in.

Another one was the difference between how we pair wine with food; we think of wine more as taste or a dessert. Where they pair the wine with food to enhance their diets between salt, fat and sugar. For example, they'll balance a high in fat meal with an acidic wine, because the acid in the wine will eat some of the fat from the food.

It was a blast and a perfect way to spend part of an afternoon in Paris. We learned about French wine, culture and all while in a historic location.

Welcome to Camp Kellerman's

Because France is a catholic country, we had the benefit of getting Easter Monday off--giving us lucky English assistants with Friday libre a four day weekend.

After much deliberating and scanning of weather.com, we finally decided to spend our Easter weekend in France's version of Florida---Tunis, Tunisia.

For those of you who don't have a keen sense of geography...myself included...Tunisia is a small country located on the African content between Algeria and Libya. Because of this location, our families weren't super excited about our tropical destination as we were. I believe the terms, "Oh perfect" and "idiot" were used in their descriptions as well as "kidnappings" and "terrorism". Of course, if you ask any French person what they think it's usually followed by this response, "Ohh la la, I luuve Tunis!" and a rather shocked look when you tell them you've never stepped foot near an African border.

I consulted trip planning gurus at expedia.com and found us a four star, all inclusive resort on a private beach. Sun, check. Food, check. Beach, check. Sounds perfect.

Should of known that Africa's version of four star was different than our American standards...explains the awesome price. We literally walked into a blast from the past and entered the world of the family style camping circa 1980's and participating was not considered optional.

After many Dirty Dancing quotes, we got a little annoyed of being lectured by the Animation staff for not participating in activities or not wanting to join in on conversations. I mean all we wanted to do was lay out by their overly colorful pool and tan our booties off; not be questioned to death about our origin and why we said we lived in France or lectured on our manners (good thing we said we were Canadian) for not saying good morning once or leaving their overly touchy, freaky cabaret right when it ended. (One of their skits was a rendition to "Grease Lightning" and we were the only ones who actually knew the lyrics, including the actors. Another was two men doing a skit where one was an instrument and the other was playing him and touching him in odd places.)

We came all the way to Africa to be the clique that everyone had at camp that thought they were too cool to join in on any of the fun. But we hadn't signed up for camp; we'd booked a sun filled, relaxing stay at a four star resort where our main objective was to find our lost tans. Interesting the difference between cultures and what is expected at a resort.

Besides being harassed by amp'd up Animation staff, we spent an afternoon in the main market where Lauren was felt up by some girl trying to find a money belt, and we bargained with the sale clerks for the best prices on local, touristy treasures. Another afternoon we spent horse back riding on the beach, and rode up to a traditional Tunisian hut where they made us bread and took pictures of us in native clothes...actually made us take pictures in customary wear. It was fun galloping along side the ocean and taking in the beautiful scenery, but I did rip my jeans on the saddle and nearly fell off when mid-gallop my stirrup broke.

We did manage to spend a good number of hours by the pool or on the beach soaking in the wonderful sunshine and getting some much needed R & R.

It was very eye opening to see such a vastly different culture from ours and even France's. The poverty level is very high there and a majority of the homes that would not be considered livable here. They had giant holes in the side of them, didn't have roughs and looked close to tumbling to the ground. It defiantly gave me a whole other level of gratitude for where I came from and where I live now. Another boost of American pride.

Let Them Eat Cake

Well, we may have not eaten cake, but we sure did eat alot of cookies during my family's two week stay here! We also visited the main courting grounds of the woman who may have uttered those infamous words.

Versailles.

I've been to Versailles six times now and I'm still not bored of it! I love it there! It's always breath taking and you never run out of things to see or places to explore in the chateau.
Even though it was my sixth visit there, it was my first time to actually make it to the outer areas of the grounds that include Trinanon, Le Petit Trinanon and Marie Antoinette's Farm. I insisted that we rent a golf cart and drive down to see those areas before we actually took the tour of the main chateau. I knew if we did the main tour first, we'd be too tired to make it to the rest. Also, by foot it would take an hour to walk to the mini-chateaux and farm; thus why we rented the golf cart.

You had to be over 24 and have a valid drivers license to be the lucky one behind the wheel. None of us met all of those recuirments, my sister, kim and I all being under 22 and my dad not having a drives license. Here's where the language barrier comes in handy, they failed to notice the bold, capped letters across my dad's ID saying, "NOT A VALID DRIVERS LICENSE." So, we zoomed off at four miles an hour down the "corn maze-esk" gardens of Versailles to find Marie Antoinette's favorite country escape from court.

On the way, we drove past a man-made canal that is in the center of the Versailles gardens, where tons of people were strolling by, laying leisurely on the grass, riding bikes, walking their dogs and even rowing row boats across the lake. A perfect way to spend a warm, spring afternoon in gardens that were started in 1661 and took forty years to come to their full fruition.

Trinanon and Le Petit Trinanon were both built for favorite women of the French kings. Marie Antoinette had control over both of them at one point, and were one of her favorite places to be outside of the main Cheateau. They are still shown under the style she had them decorated and are beautiful. They're both way smaller than the main chateau and it gives them more of an intimate feel, giving the viewer a more personal insight to life back then. It was fun to walk through the smaller, average size door frames (which are tiny compared to our current door frames), to examine the smaller rooms and be able to imagine people actually spending time in them, living their lives.

We didn't make it to Marie's farm because we had already surpassed our hour time frame for the golf cart, so we scurried off to return it.

After dropping it off, we proceeded to do the main tour. Like always, there was another wing to the chateau added on to the tour that I hadn't seen yet, which was a pleasant surprise. We ended up having to rush through though, because it was cram packed with tour groups.

It was a perfect visit to Versailles with the clan. We had a blast driving through the gardens, exploring the past and enjoying the early spring sunshine. I plan on going back in the next two weeks with my fiance and taking one of those lovely boat rides.

A Waking Dream

My Dad, Sister and Kim left early Sunday morning. I was sad to see them go; their trip went by way too fast.
We took the first few days easy while they adjusted to the time change by staying close to home and exploring my neighborhood. We did go on Friday to Trocedaro that has a famous view of the Eiffel Tower and took some shots; including a "Wear in the World" Blazer t-shirt photo with the Eiffel Tower behind us. I sent in two photos with the hope of them being shown during one of the next Blazers games!

On Saturday, my sister and Kim went to Salvokia for four days to visit a friend of theirs who studied abroad at their high school last year. So it was just me and my dad left to explore the city. We were going to try and go to the Loire Valley on Saturday after dropping the girls off at the airport but were exhausted from our five a.m. wake up call and fell asleep for a few hours instead. We ended up going for a tour around the out laying country side around Paris and saw a few Chateaux and an Abby. The Abby was by far my favorite!

For some reason it reminded me of the secret garden and I kept expecting to find a half hidden door behind some ivy.
I took tons of pictures and even imagined having my wedding there...unfortunately, my fiance seems to think that the Abbaye des Vaulx de Cernay is too far for our friends and family to travel. So I spent that afternoon day dreaming and wandering through the green gardens taking photos.


We spent a leisurely Sunday walking through the Jardin de Tuileries starting from the Louvre and going to le Grand Palais. We even stopped to cross the kissing bridge so I could show my dad the spot where Nick proposed.

On our walk, we came across several artists selling their paintings along the river. My dad found one artist in particular that he liked and bought several paintings. We ended our walk at a cafe called Chez Francis that had a lovely view of the Eiffel Tower, and enjoyed some Pierre and home made ice cream.

On Monday, my dad came with me to school to experience the joy of teaching English in a foreign country! We got there and turned out our first class was canceled...of course..so we walked around the little town looking for something to do for an hour and a half. We got back and taught for a half an hour and then found out that the last class was also canceled. So it was back to Paris after a three hour commute for a half an hour class. Oh the joys of being an English assistant. On a positive note they did inform that they would be on strike the next day and I had the day off (yippie)!

Another Fastforward

I know I had another drop off the face-of-the-blogging-world, So I'm going to do a quick catch up (plus try to blog regularly for the next month)!

When I came back from Christmas break, I wrote a few blogs but
really didn't have much positive things to say. I was close to a breaking point and really wanted to return to the states. So instead of blogging about it, I decided to just power through and focus on spending time with my room mates and distracting myself from being desperately homesick...until my next trip home.

My mom was a big support in helping me through the first week back, plus some. I had horrible jet lag and was sick, which made it unable for me to sleep the first four nights back (even with a double the dose of sleeping pills). My mom sat with me for hours on the phone keeping me calm and trying to talk me to sleep. After a week of talking at all hours of the night/day and across the cont, she decided to come visit me in early February and celebrate her birthday here.

So, Mommy saved the day and came to spend eight whole days with me. We had a lovely, lovely time together. We stayed in a hotel a few blocks from the Arc de Triomphe that was close to the train station to my work; we had wonderful French dinners together and shared a glass of wine at each meal; we warmed up over several café viennois; we read four books together and watched Friends laughing late into the night; and we spent a day in Reims and a relaxing weekend in Tours. We survived the bone chilling wind, a random snow storm and the gray skies. We learned through those chilly days that a little sunshine and blue skies transforms Paris into the magic city we all love and dream of.

It was the perfect mother, daughter trip. She brought home to me and helped me make it through the last dreary days of winter.

A week after my mom left, I got to go home for another school break and spend some much needed time with my fiance. While I was back in Portland, we were able to find the location for our wedding (Oh la chance!!), go snowboarding, celebrate my friends birthday, have dinners with family and friends, and go to a Blazers game! A wonderful two weeks.

Again, I found myself dragging my feet to leave again, but I'm very glad I did (many thanks to my very supportive fiance and family), because I've learned a great deal about myself and inner strength. Many people won't be able to understand why living in Paris is so much more than the glamor of it all but a challenge, but I'll know how much I've concord and grown from the experience. I know I can achieve anything now, and that is priceless to have full confidence in oneself.

A Dream Realized

My whole love for Paris and everything French originated from a book my Dad used to read to me called "This is Paris." It was my Dad who got me interested in the architecture in Paris and led to my desire to learn the language. My Dad and I weren't that close when I was growing up, and I had always dreamed of coming to Paris with him and exploring the streets we used to read about together.

Today I realized that dream. I picked my Dad and Sister up from the airport around 7:30 this morning. Originally, I wasn't supposed to be here because we had a scheduling error and I was going to be in Dublin, Ireland for St. Patty's day when they arrived. I decided to stay and see them instead, and it was worth every penny.

They've only been here for a few hours, and are currently napping, but I couldn't be happier and can't wait to take them for a walk around my neighborhood, La place de la Bastille, and show them the life I've been living here for the last six months.