The City of Blinding Lights

Well, folks, it's been a while. Let that be a sign to you that I am actually having fun here in Spain, and not wasting too much time on the computer. The past 2 weeks (has it really been that long?) since Morocco have been full of one after another beautiful days in the neighborhood. I figured out how to get streaming video on my laptop (they have restrictions on it when you're outside the US), which means that now I can watch FOOTBALL!!! This makes me so happy, I can't even describe it. And Wake Forest's program in Salamanca came down to Granada at the beginning of last week for a few days, so I got to see some Wake friends and show them around the city. It was so fun to a) hang out with people who had known me more than a month, b) be able to talk about Wake Forest and know that the people I am talking to actually care, and c) be the one who knows what they're doing in the foreign city (usually I'm the lost, confused one)!

After my first full week of class in a while (4 days in a row... it was rough.), I left Friday night for a weekend in Paris!!! I arrived at the Madrid bus station (after a fabulous 5-hour bus ride sitting next to a man with a very long mullet), and then the Madrid airport at 2 a.m. Saturday morning ready to camp out for the night. After reading 3 articles and one act of Bodas de Sangre, and writing 2.5 papers, I found a nice, soft, almost-clean square of carpet on which a car was displayed and fell asleep (sort of) with images of Tom Hanks in The Terminal dancing in my head. Saturday morning I woke up, had a cafe, finished a paper, flew to Paris, conquered the Paris public transportation system, met Ellen, and we found our hostel... all before lunch! It was so so good to see Ellen (again, having someone around who has known you for more than a month is a nice feeling), and we decided we'd make our trip as much like a weekend-long date as possible, since we were in the City of Love.

The first stop (and first of many picnic locations) was the Eiffel Tower, where we met up with Kendra, who was on the tail end of her Paris trip, for lunch on the lawn. It was just like you'd imagine... a huge, green lawn with people everywhere lounging and talking and eating baguettes and cheese... it was fabulous. After wandering around basically all of Paris that afternoon, we decided to return and partake in the oh-so-touristy ritual. We pretty much saw all of Paris that we wanted to see that afternoon and night through our wanderings. On foot. We were tired.

The next day, after sleeping a little later than planned, we embarked on our tour of Paris's tourist attractions. We began with the Louvre, which was a bit overrated. The Mona Lisa was cool, I guess, but it looked the same as in every photo I've ever seen, and there were too many people to get close to it. Then we took a picnic break and headed to the Musee d'Orsay, which is housed in a beautiful old train station, and was my favorite so far. We saw tons of Monet, Renoir, Van Gogh, Picasso, Degas, Cezanne, and other Impressionists and Post-Impressionists. That afternoon we went to the top of the belltower at Notre Dame, which was gorgeous, headed back to the Tuileries to rest and people watch, and found (after some searching) some delicious and reasonably-priced French onion soup for me and escargo for Ellen. After dinner, and a brief trip back to the hostel to doctor some blisters, we went to the top of Arc du Triomphe and wandered down Champ d'Elysees.

Monday morning we got up early to see the L'Orangerie, which houses Monet's Waterlillies. These paintings were the kind that, no matter how many times you look at them on slides or how much you study them, you can never do them justice unless you sit in the middle of them. Probably my favorite work of art. After sitting and gawking for a while, we headed out to Versailles, and,, even though the chateau, museum, and apartment of Marie-Antionette were all closed, it was so worth it to enjoy the gardens and the town. We got a baguette and took a small siesta in the grass under some beautiful yellow oak trees surrounded by statues of who I'm sure were very famous people. It was one of those surreal moments where you have to stop and remind yourself that yes, this is in fact your life.

I got back to Granada at about 5 am, set my alarm for 8, heard it at 8, rolled over and turned it off, and skipped my 9 am class. When I got back for lunch, my madre had made a delicious meal to welcome me home, and even played French music at lunch(at least it sounded French, and I told myself it was in my honor...)! I'm here this week, trying to get a handle on what right now seems like a lot of work, but at this time next semester I'm sure will not. I hope you are all enjoying fall and football for me!!!