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.

Catch Up

So, I'm a little behind on my blogs lately...After my last it has
been a whirlwind of activities--here's the low down:

My boyfriend, Nick, came to visit me for two weeks in the end of
November, beginning of December. He surprised me with a very romantic proposal on the kissing bridge, which has the tradition on Valentines day of couples going, kissing and locking a padlock with their names on it to the bridge. I had told him about the bridge (but not about the tradition) and asked him to bring a padlock. It was a surprise what it was for. So, that morning I wrote our initials on it with the date we started dating and the current date. I left the other side blank for him. When we got to the bridge, I offered him the lock to write something on it and went to kiss him. While we were kissing he wrote "will you marry me?" and hooked the ring onto the bridge with the padlock. I went to look at it, looked at him and said "Are you kidding me?!" He was down on one knee, and an American couple was yelling,"OMG!" I said, "Of course."

We also went to Oslo, Norway (his country of origin) for a weekend; where we learned that yes, it is the most expensive city in the world, but also very clean and beautiful. He also helped me and my room mates host a Thanksgiving dinner here-- where for many Frenchies, it was their first.

Two weeks after he left, I returned home for the holidays after almost three months of being away. During those two weeks we managed to squeeze in a plethora of activities.

It decided to snow in Paris two days before I was supposed to leave. So, when it was time for my plane to sore off into the great blue skies towards Amsterdam...we were delayed on the tarmac for two hours because the weather had caused some mechanical thing to freeze.
By the time we landed in Amsterdam, my connecting flight to Portland was taking off...without me on board. I thus began the fight for a flight home with a few thousand other stranded people. I was lucky, I only had to wait in line for a few hours to talk with a flight agent. They first rescheduled me for a flight for the next day that wouldn't get me home till after five p.m. west coast time and three hours after our engagement party would have started. The news of that caused me to lose my cool, and I started to cry. After explaining the situation, she told me I had the option to go on stand-by for a flight to Vancouver B.C. and then a flight to Seattle. She offered to hold my flight for the next day too, so I had nothing to lose.

I held a three hour vigil at the gate while on stand-by along with 25 other people. Somehow, I was the first one to get a ticket on the flight. So after about six hours of what would have been into my original flight home, I boarded a plane-- thinking the worst was over.

When we landed in Vancouver B.C., I got to go through American costumes because I was taking an immediate flight to Seattle. Well I was delayed there because I didn't have the next boarding pass and couldn't get through security. Once they managed to get that for me, I was delayed at customs because one of my bags was missing and they wouldn't let me through without it. After sitting for a half-an-hour (I had an hour layover, and had already been delayed at security for 20mins) they managed to get me a missing bag report and let me through. Even though I ran thirty gates, I still missed the last flight to Seattle.

Next step? No, not a hotel. Mission get on U.S. soil.

Nick was already on his way to the SeaTac airport, and I didn't want to wait another night. In Canada if you are over 21 you can rent a car, and that's exactly what I did. It was a little tricky cause I would be crossing the boarder and then needed to be 25. So, I had to pay an underage fee for that, and going across the boarder was interesting too. The agent was a little curious as to why: first, I was driving from Canada and second didn't have any luggage after being in Paris for three months.

By the time I met Nick in Blaine, Washington at the International Motel-- I had been traveling for 26 hours, had been in four different countries and crossed four different customs. Also, ended up going to four different airports: Paris, Amsterdam, Seattle and Portland (had to stop at SEA and PDX to look for my luggage).

Even though my luggage was lost for five days and getting home was a challenge, I had a wonderful holiday vacation. We celebrated our engagement, had four Christmases with all our families, learned how to snowboard and had New Year's with friends.

Coming back to Paris was definitely a challenge for me. It's hard to leave family and loved ones so soon.

Come...I Give You Good Price

As English teacher assistants we have a very rough schedule of 12 hours a week (it's harder than it sounds...for some) and along with that every other month we have a two week vacation. Our first vacation landed in our first month of work. So on the 23rd of October we started Le Vacances de la Toussaint (basically a two week break for All Saints Day a.k.a Halloween).

We had planned a five day trip to Athens, Greece. Our flight was at 6:30a.m., and we had schedule a shuttle to pick us up at 5 a.m. To only be awoken by Lauren's brother-in-law letting us know the shuttle drive had insisted on a 4:30 a.m. pick up time...it was 4:15 a.m. when we received the call. The driver also arrived early at 4:20 a.m. So, we threw some clothes on, grabbed our bags and rushed out the door.

Of course we got to the airport an hour and a half early. At least we thought...
Turned out our flight had been delayed till 9:30 a.m., and we had checked the night before and there had been no change. We had the next four and half hours to kill. Sweet.

(There had been a train strike going on that week, which was the cause of the delay in time.)

We FINALLY boarded our plan at 10:30 a.m., which set us back practically a whole day in Greece, because it was a 4 hour flight there and getting from the airport to the hotel.

From the airport we caught a taxi with an overly friendly Aussi-- who gave us a tour along the way. Once we arrived at our hotel, we had problems with check-in and the pre-arranged price. Of course. So, we ended up switching hotels last minute, which worked out in our favor. Finally!

After dealing with the hotel, we decided to head towards downtown Athens for some dinner. Problem was we didn't know where to go. We literally asked an older American couple if we could follow them to the main streets. They were very nice, and had sons our age. We chit chated along the way till we reached their destination-- a roof top restaurant with the Parthenon behind it. They ended up inviting us to join them for dinner with their friends! It turned out to be alot of fun. We talked about Europe and America-- the differences between them-- and updates from home.

Over the next four days, we got to know the little, twisty roads of the tourist area really well.Athens itself is extremely crowded and polluted (It made Paris look spacious). So we stuck too the cute touristy streets. Where we learned the art of bargaining, which is considered perfectly fine..even in stores. Basically the convoerstaion would go like this: (Imagine in a classic Greek accent)

"Come...look...I give you good price," Sales merchant

"Oh that's ok we are just browsing." or if we found something, "How much is this?"

"Oh this is very beeeuutiful. You have very good taste. I give you good price."

And if we didn't like the price and started to leave, we got this: "Ah, wait I give you good price. Why you don't want? You don't buy yourself enough gifts. You are on vacation and all you do is buy, buy for friend and family, but what about you? Life is too short to worry about money. You only live once. Everyday you buy a little things like food and coffee. You see, these prices add up. So you just buy this one thing and it is the same."

We got very good at ignoring them or when we did want something, we knew if we started to walk away they'd knock another 10 euro or so off the price. I would say my best bargaining was either getting three wallets for the price of one or getting 95 euros knocked off a designer, leather purse.

Along with the learning the art of bargaining, we also did some sit seeing. We went to the Parthenon and saw the Acropolis and Nike. We also went to the Temple of Zeus and walked around the gardens.

In addition to our sight seeing, we went on a one day boat tour of three Greek Isles. Of course it rained most of the trip like it had been most of our time in Greece (another lost opportunity for October tans), but there was one Island that was classic greek style with donkeys and all. We took a 10 min donkey tour around the Island (on this Island, the only form of transportation is donkeys), which I thought was fabulous, but Lauren didn't enjoy soo much.

I would have to say my favorite part of Greece hands-down was the food. Oh! It was amazing! Greek salads, Tzatziki sauce, Zucchini balls, warm (!) bread rolls with the best butter ever, and Gyros.

There was one night we were out walking along the streets, and we had heard about a show that was going on. And while looking for that place, an old man came up whisked us off to a Greek restaurant. He ask, "Do you like to dance? Yes, then you come with me." They had traditional Greek dancing. We ended up getting up on stage and dancing with them. It was alot of fun!

We had our favorite restuarant outside of the Parthanon (the same one the American couple showed us) that we went to three times. On our last night there they gave us a free dessert (fruit) and Oozo shots (super sugary and strong).

All and all Greece was great. I would recommend seeing Athens for a day or two and then going to one of the Islands, but make sure to go when the sunshine is a guarantee.

Paris, Barcelona, Paris, and Athens

Lauren, my room mate, and I have gone on two trips since moving to Paris six weeks ago. Our first was a weekend-jaunt to Barcelona, Spain.

It was the first real cloudy, windy and wet week in Paris. And by Thursday morning we were sick of it. So, I wasn't too surprised when Lauren sent me a text wanting to know if I'd be up to hopping a plane to Barcelona that night. Why not? When in Paris, right?

After rushing home from work, and throwing some clothes in a bag; we were off to the airport for some sunshine and late October tans.

We didn't land in Barcelona till around midnight, and crashed into bed around 1:30 a.m.

Bright and sunshiny early, we headed off to the center of Barcelona-- La Ramblas. During our weekend stay, we pretty much spent our entire time walking up and down La Ramblas admiring the odd street performers and merchants. They sold all kinds of things, from jewelry to pets (bunnies, birds, chickens, mice, ect).

We also took a hop-on-hop-off bus around to all the touristy stuff. Our favorite was Park Guell, which was designed by the famous Spanish architect Antoni Gaudi. It was beautiful with all the flowers, greenery and the tiled architecture -- very breath taking and original. The park is in a French film called "L'Auberge Espagnole."

La Ramblas is also known for pick pockets and even though we were on the look out, my purse was still almost stolen. While waiting for the hop-on-hop-off bus we sat down by a fountain to talk. There were many people around doing the same. A man sat down next to me and I didn't think much of it except he was rather close and breathing heavily. After awhile of him fidgeting, I glanced down and noticed he had his finger on my purse. I instantly grabbed it, placed it in my lap and told Lauren we should leave. I think while he was fidgeting he had managed to move my purse closer to him, because I had originally placed it in between our legs. As soon as we were in line for the bus, two men approached us stating they were police and saw the man had tried to steal my bag. Needless to say it was a little more excitement than I needed.

Unfortunately, it was not very warm. Even though it was sunny, there was a constant wind keeping it just chilly enough to prevent any sun bathing.

--more to come on Athens--