Here's a photo the Eiffel Tower on Wednesday... it looks like haven't yet finished building it. It was a rainy day, and the city was covered in a beautifully sad mist. Et voilà, Paris en hiver.

This is a photo from Sunday's Rotary meeting with all of the exchange students. The three Aussies have to go back on Thursday... not an easy goodbye!

Agnes

I swear this is the last one!

Agnes

and this one too...

Agnes

Ok, this cracks me up...

Soggy Socks

As I walked down Rue Clotilde I felt the water penetrating through the holes of my old and worn Minnetonka moccasins. I was headed for Place Saint Genviève to find my favorite café and escape Paris's November rain.
I'd been having a rough day (it was just 4 days before Thanksgiving) and I couldn't wait to get out of the rain and sit in my café.
I had been restless all day and was walking at a speed faster than normal, just rushing to get to a cup of tea. As I turned the corner, my old Minnetonka's lost traction on the old cobblestone street and I fell.
"Merde!" I muttered to myself. (I've gotten pretty good with the French "four-letter words.")
"Ca va?" asked a man walking in my direction.
"Oui, merci," I said quickly picking myself up, pretending it hadn't happened.
I took off quickly and continued on my way, but about half way down the block I let out a giggle to myself . . . I could only imagine how funny it must have been for that man to see me take a spill. As I laughed to myself, I was reminded of the time that my cello teacher had once told me that there are times where you have to decide whether to laugh or cry. I could either laugh because I had taken spill that must have been pretty funny to watch, or I could cry because I was having a bad day, my socks were soggy, and I had fallen.
Sure, my knee was a little bruised, but once I started laughing about the situation, it wasn't so bad. "Laughter is the greatest medicine." It's so true, and we musn't take life too seriously. Sometimes we (when I say "we," I really mean, "I") get too wrapped up in seeing the negative and we forget to laugh and life's humor that we stumble upon.
LAUGH. LAUGH. LAUGH. LAUGH. LAUGH. LAUGH.

"The times they are a-changin'"
Bob Dylan

Over my fall break, I got to go to Bretagne (as you know) and stay with my host mom's brother's family. I received a mail from Patrice (my host mom's brother) after Obama won...


Yes ! You can !
From France, the beautiful Obama victory is the victory of all americans (and maybe of all democrats in the world) who do not identify with the 8 years that just passed ...
What a wonderful event which carries in a moment millions of people around the world since the camp of those who couldn't stand anymore this America to the camp of those who want to dream with her...

I have a dream [a hope...] today!
Patrice (from Britany the little !)

Yes ! You can !
Depuis la France, la belle victoire d'Obama est celle de tous les américains (et peut-être de tous les démocrates dans le monde) qui ne se reconnaissent pas dans les 8 années qui viennent de s'écouler...
Quel formidable événement que celui qui transporte en un instant des millions de personnes dans le monde depuis le camp de ceux qui ne pouvais plus supporter cette Amérique là dans le camp de ceux qui veulent rêver avec elle ...

J'ai fait un rêve [j'ai un espoir ...] aujourd'hui !
Patrice de Bretagne

Thank you, Patrice!!!

Notre Dame

Bonjour!

Today I didn't have school so I got to do a little sight-seeing today. I went to Notre Dame with two other exchange students and we got to go up the towers and see an amazing view of Paris. It was quite a walk up to the top, but so worth the view. In the second picture you can see Sacre Coeur off in the distance. It was a gorgeus day for going up, and it was funny to see all of the places that I've been visiting since I arrived.

What a day!

Le Tour Eiffel

A photo from the second floor of the Eiffel Tower! Sorry it isn't of the Eiffel Tower itself,

but I thought it was kind of an interesting photo.

What if...

Obama did it! He really did it! I'm more than happy right now to see that it really was possible. It's incredible how much can be accomplished when we work together for a better cause. I'm amazed at all of the money raised for one man's campaign, at the way our country united for HOPE and CHANGE... we are in desperate need of both of things, among many others.

Obama's campaign is proof of the power of unity for a specific cause, I just wish that we would unite more often than every four years. I wish we would give our money to a good cause more often than every four years. I wish we would donate our time more often than every four years. Just think if we put that time and energy into the AIDS crisis in Africa, our deminishing environment, the homeless people that walk the streets in hope for a piece of bread... the list could go on for pages. We've united once, it's possible to do it again. We have the leadership that we need and we're energized and ready to go!

Imagine the difference that we could make. Just like every vote matters, every human being matters.

The True Peace

The True Peace

The first peace, which is the most important,

is that which comes within the souls of people

when they realize their relationship,

their oneness, with the universe and all its powers,

and when they realize that at the center

of the universe dwells Wakan-Taka (the Great Spirit),

and that this center is really everywhere, it is within each of us.

This is the real peace, and the others are but reflections of this.

The second peace is that which is made between two individuals,

and the third is that which is made between two nations.

But above all you should understand that there can never

be peace between nations until there is known that true peace,

which, as I have often said, is within the souls of men.

Black Elk, Oglala Sioux & Spiritual Leader (1863 - 1950)

La Bretange

Here's another photo from Bretagne!

This photo is of another ménhir. You can see that Bretagne was gorgeous, green, and a little bit what I imagine Ireland to be...

I made it back to Paris, but I had a great fall break in Bretagne! A little R&R was really nice after my first 2 months here! Whew! I cannot believe that it's already been 2 months! My time has flown by and I have already done soooooo much... it's kind of funny to look back at my blog and my journal and re-read everything about my little day-trips, weekend trips, my thoughts about life in France. I sure have been lucky!

It's back to school on Thursday, but until then I'm going to spend some time relaxing and taking it easy.

Oh, and GO OBAMA!!! I sent in my absentee vote a couple weeks ago... let's hope for some change!

Le Petit Prince

"On ne voit bien qu'avec le coeur, l'essentiel est invisible pour les yeux."
Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

"We can see only with our hearts, the essential is invisible to our eyes."
Antoine of Saint Exupéry

Bonjour!!!!!

I'm spending my fall break in Bretagne... it's a truly beautiful region of France.

I've been spending my time at the sea, travelling around the region, eating food that is too good to be true, spending time with the French (which are too much fun), drinking a little wine now and then, eating seafood (tonight was crab, shrimp, oysters, and crayfish [ I think], and really just having too much fun.

The first photo is of me (duh! :) at a "menhir," they are placed all over Bretagne and are hundreds of years old. There is a sort of legend that if you throw a rock up and it lands on the ledge, you will be married within the year... no worries, it took me 3 times to get the rock to land! I guess that means that I've either got 3 more years, or it'll be the third man? We'll see! But I guess that means no worries, I won't come back married to a French man. At least that worry is crossed off the list, Mom and Dad!

I've been lucky with mostly beautiful weather (although the rain can be as equally beautiful as the sun), and truly generous hosts here.

J'adore La Bretagne...

Well, here's a little taste of my life at school... sitting on the Parisian streets during my nice 2-hour lunch breaks! haha. School is, well... I'm trying! But the kids at school are really nice so that makes it better and less "chaint." (don't look that up! and if you do, it's only a "blague.")

I'm heading off to Bretagne next Monday for my fall break and definitely looking forward to that! I'll be a in the country so it will be quite a change from Paris, but I can't wait to go!

Bisous! <3

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DAD!!!!!

Hi to all!

I just realized that I never put this story on my blog... but it's a good one, or at least I think so :) I know that my dad will really appreciate this one!

When I went to go find my rental cello (yes, I get to take cello lessons here!!!), the man at the store asked me where I am from in the US. Usually when I say, "Indiana," they kind of give me a nod and have no idea where that is. When he responded to know Indiana, I said that he was one of the few to know. He replied with "Ah, yessss, the Wabash River," as he pulled an old guitar out of the corner of the shop. He struck the first chord (and it was horribly out of tune) and began singing "Back Home Again in Indiana." Just when this little trip to the music store couldn't get much better, another man started playing it on his clarinet. I was in shock. I was singing "Back Home Again in Indiana" in PARIS, FRANCE. What in the world???

The world feels so big some day, but other day it really is "a small world after all." Music can bring us together, make the world feel smaller, and make incredible connections that could have otherwise been "lost in translation." It's a beautiful things, isn't it?

Bonjour!

This past Saturday I got to have a traditional French meal and I guess it was kind of like a fondue party... but it was really cool. I ate too much, (here comes the exchange student weight gain!!!) but it was just too good. Essentially, you heat a piece of cheese and pour it over potatoes and charcuterie (basically just fancy ham). I liked it, maybe even loved it, more than I ever could have expected.

Most things are like that here, though, different than I expected. I think that it's just because I don't really know what to expect from day to day; but I'm finding that it's also half the fun! I'm still finding surprises at every turn - my biggest being that gym class here is actually mildly fun at times! JK.

I'm still drinking coffee at the local cafés too much and enjoying my time here so thoroughly. That doesn't mean, of course, that there aren't days where it's a little rough. But I think that's to be expected when you move half way across the world for a year. I keep telling my parents that I am just curious about how the leaves are changing back home, and the things that are so normal to life. It was a treat to get a letter from my dad with some Indiana leaves, and I immediately smelled them to, just for a few seconds, take me back to Indiana.

Joni Mitchell's song, "The Circle Game" just came on my iPod shuffle (and it's too perfectly timed), but it's just so true to what I am feeling some days.

The seasons they go 'round and 'round,

and the painted ponies go up and down

we're captive on a carousel of time

we can't return, we can only look behind from where we came

and go 'round and 'round in the circle game.

I'm moving on and growing up, but I still have such a need to hold on to what grounds me... like the smell of Indiana, the smell of home. Well gosh, that just got depressing. Sorry. Moving on...

Tomorrow is my short day at school and I get to go vintage shopping with a couple friends! How fun, right? Only in Paris! J'aime la vie!

Weekend at Mont St-Michel

Over the weekend I got to go to Mont St-Michel and it was quite an experience!!! All of the exchange students from the Paris region got to go, and we are certainly an energetic group! We roughed the dangerous conditions and walked through the quicksand, the river that came up past our knees, and the winds - but it couldn't have been better! We spent about 3 hours walking but enjoyed ourselves the whole way.

After our journey, we had a traditional dinner of the region and got to listen to live traditional music.

The weekend was filled with fun and laughter... it's so great to be an exchange student. I'm still amazed at how lucky I am. I never could have seen myself doing all of these things, but here I am. Wow! Sometimes that's all I can think to say. There is no way for me to express everything that I am thinking, feeling, and absorbing here.

It's been a month and one week since I arrived, and some days it feels like I've been here an eternity, but usually I just can't believe how much I have done in such a short amount of time. I keep meeting great people, learning more and more French (and more and more slang), and starting to realize just how much has been placed before me. It's overwhelming and exhilerating at the same time. I sometimes look around at all of the people on the Métro and wonder what exactly they're doing in Paris. Studying, working, following a lover, escaping another life? But it essentially comes down to the same thing - we're all just living our lives and the rest doesn't really matter in the end. People here are the same as people anywhere else. There are, of course, the cultural differences, but in the end, none of us are really all that different. I love it, though. We're all doing the same thing, just taking our own route to get to the same place in the end. But, as I've always been told, "It's about the journey, not the destination."

Autumn in Paris

I know the cliché is 'April in Paris,' but I sure am loving the autumn here! The leaves are starting to change and it is making the Parisian streets even more beautiful. I absolutely adore the crunch of the leaves under my feet and the cool autumn air on my cheeks. I got caught in a little Parisian rain shower on my walk today, but it felt so good! No harm done! The mist looked absolutely lovely as I was finding my way on a new path that I have never taken.

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

-Robert Frost

After writing the beginning of this post, it made me think of this poem. Just a little food for thought...

L'histoire du canard

Host mother: 'Maggie, t'amie le canard?' (Maggie do you like duck?)
Moi: 'Je ne sais pas. J'ai jamais mangé.' (I don't know, I've never eaten it.)
Host mother: 'Mais oui, tu as mangé pour le dejuner aujourd'hui.' (But you just ate it for lunch today.)
Moi: 'Oui?!?! Ah, c'est meiux que tu m'as dit après je l'ai mangé!!! (I did?!?! Well, it's probably better that you told me after I ate it!!!)

Oh goodness gracious, here we go again. Like the beer story, I wasn't exactly sure what I was consuming. I swear it looked like beef!!! And it tasted like it too!!! I must admit, it was really good, but the thought of eating a DUCK...

Peut-on nier l'existence du temps?

Can we deny the existence of time? This is my prompt for my philosophy essay for the weekend! Oh lordy! If you have any suggestions on where to begin, let me know, because I am most certainly stuggling with this. haha. Ce n'est pas facile!

Other than that daunting prompt, school is going well. I am finding myself loving my history class. I never would have that thought I would find globalization so fascinating. But this is a year of paving new paths and doing a little bit of self-discovery. But finding myself loving globalization??? Not sure if I should be posting that on a public website, proclaiming it to the whole world.

Little thought: Today on the Métro, I heard an American couple talking, and they were so obviously tourists, from the fanny pack down to the tennis shoes, but it made me somehow feel proud that I could identify with them. I don't think that I had ever really wanted to identify with the American way until I came here. Some days I find myself putting away my skinny jeans and opting for my American bellbottoms. There are certain days that I long for a super-sized hamburgers and fries. It's a bizarre feeling, something that's hard to explain, but being the foreign girl, the American girl, has almost made me proud of this sometimes negative image. I am the exchange student. I am Fez (from That 70's Show). I am American. I used to identify with being Irish and German (and perhaps a little English), but now I AM AMERICAN. There's no getting around it. I eat peanut butter and popcorn, I drive my own car, and I went to a high school with a football team and cheerleaders.

I get to vote in America's election this year. When the French ask me who I am voting for, before I can finish saying, 'Barack Obama,' it is met with a high-five or a big smile. The people here are crazy for Obama. I cannot wait to go to the US Embassy and cast my absentee ballot in support of a change that I so badly want.

I am saddened every day by seeing the beggars in the Métro and on the streets. It's impossible for me to pass them without wanting to give them some money, bread, and piece of fruit. How did I get so lucky? Why can't life just be fair? It just pains me to know that I get to spend a year in Paris, France, and there are people trying to find enough money to buy a loaf of bread. Maybe they made a few mistakes in their life, but don't we all? Aren't we all just learning?

I just know that we need someone in office who will truly be compassionate. Life is too precious to let anything else happen to an already troubled world.

VOTE!

I don't know if anyone really reads this, and I hope this post wasn't to painfully long, but some days I just have a lot to say.

Pensez avec la compassion, et donnez avec tout votre coeur.

Ce week-end, je suis allée au Lille! It's way up north and super close to Belgium :)

The food there was very different from the food in Paris, but it's sooooooo good. Any weight that I may have lost was definitly gained back in my weekend there. Too good!

There is a lot of Flemmish influence there, and half of the signs were in Flemmish... I was a little worried at first when I couldn't read anything! The city reminds me a lot of the French version of Boston, and it was truly lovely.

I got to go to the ocean on Saturday, and the weather was absolutely perfect! The dunes there made me think of Lake Michigan (it was nice to have a little reminder of home).

That's all for now, hopefully more soon!

Ok, this has absolutely nothing to do with France, but I think it's kind of hilarious. A friend did it for me and it just cracks me up! Here's the 50's version of me!

Well, today I got to go to the Champs Elysées and do a little sightseeing! It was incredible to walk up and down both sides of the street and see all of the famous stores - Louis Vuitton and such! After that we walked up and down the back streets, and got a little lost, but eventually found our way home. After all, it's about the journey, not the destination!

Coucou! Well, it's Friday! Today was a long day at school, but I am getting into the swing of things here! I found a new park today that is about 2 or 3 blocks away from my school that I can go to during breaks... and there is a French sandwich shop on the way :) Just my sort of thing!

Not sure what tomorrow's plans are, but I think I may try to get a little shopping in!

Bisous!

Bonjour! Today I got to go to Versailles :) It was absolutely lovely there and so peaceful and calm. It was nice to get out of the city and enjoy another part of France. It is about 45 minutes from where I am living and it was a nice little drive to the countryside. The gardens there were incredible and the chateau was gorgeous!

It was the Grand Trianon and King Louis XIV lived there from 1688 - 1715 ... a lot of history there! It's hard for me to believe that I was walking through the same rooms that a former king lived in! WOW!

Salut! Today was pretty relaxed, but we certainly accomplished a lot... I start school tomorrow! I think that I would be content spending all of my days wandering around Paris. haha. I am looking forward to tomorrow, though. I will take Le Metro to school and find out what a French school is like.

The photo to the right is from a few days ago, but that's the Seine at night! Très joli!

A demain!

-Maggie

Montmartre

Bonjour de Paris! Today we went to Sacre Coeur and spent the day in Montmartre. The walk up to Sacre Coeur was beautiful, and the view from the top was even more beautiful. Once we got to the top, we were able to look out on the city and see a lot of the sights that I've seen in the past few days. After going to Sacre Coeur, we spent the day walking around Montmartre. It is gorgeous there, and the art scene is strong... there were offers for a portrait left and right :) Montmartre is my favorite place thus far. It has a laid-back atmosphere and it's easy to spend the day milling around the old streets. I think I could spend every day there.

After going to Montmartre, I took my first visit to Le Tour Eiffel. I've been seeing a lot of it in the distance, but today was the first time I had ever been able to see it up close... it was truly amazing! :)

There is always so much to say about everyday... and I have missed a few. Since the last post I have visited Le Boulevard St. Michel, about a million churches (which I love), I've seen Les Champs Elysée, and lots of parks and fountains.

The top left photo is in Montmartre... just some random musicians singing an American rock song - there is a lot of American influence in the music here. Kind of interesting. The top right photo is of me in front of a monument dedicated to peace. You can see the Eiffel Tower in the background! :) The bottom photo is with my host sister, Aurélie when we were in Montmartre.

Until the next post, au revoir.

-Maggie

Well, I made it to France and things are going really well so far. I got in yesteday and I've already done a little sight-seeing! I went to the Notre Dame and also got to see the Fountain de St. Michel. Things are gorgeous here! I love it!This picture is in the park outside the Notre Dame. You can see part of it through the trees. It's gorgeous!

Hey!

I'm leaving for Paris on August 26th and will arrive on the 27th. I'm going to keep this blog as a little journal to keep you posted on my excursions abroad! :)