Excursion en Normandie

March 26 - March 27

Bonjour mes copains!

I have just returned from my excursion in Normandy (see title). We left from IES at 7h45 Saturday, March 26th and started the 4 hour 15 minute drive to Caen. We originally thought the weather was going to be cold and rainy but it ended up being sunny and in the low 60's. 

Caen

We arrived in Caen around noon and had a little over two hours to walk around and get lunch. We were dropped off in front of this giant castle so we decided to go check it out. The inside was not actually that cool but we saw the ruins of Guillaume the Conqueror's chateau. Guillaume was the Duke of Normandy and the King of England until his death in 1086. Mallory and I went and explored this church that was right near the castle and it was pretty cool inside. It was the Saint Pierre Eglise

Chateau 

St. Pierre

We then got back on the bus and visited two of the big abbeys in Caen that were built at the beginning of the 11th century. Guillaume and his wife Mathilde built two abbeys: l'Abbaye aux Hommes (The Abbey for the Dudes) and l'Abbaye aux Dames (The Abbey for the Chicks) where they are both buried respectively. We then went and visited the Caen Memorial that had a museum built into it that talked about the 20th century, specifically the Second World War and D-Day.

l'Abbaye aux Hommes

Tombeau de Guillaume 

l'Abbaye aux Dames

Tombe de Mathilde 

We then arrived at the hotel around 7 pm and had a delicious buffet dinner. Since daylight savings time was Sunday morning at 2 am, we went and got a glass of wine and then went to bed. Harkiran order this local drink called Calvados which is basically a very alcoholic apple liquor. It was nasty. 

Les Plages du Démarquement 

We left the hotel at 9 am and headed toward Bayeux, Omaha Beach, and la Pointe du Hoc. On our way to the little town of Bayeux, we stopped at Arromanches where the British built a temporary port to help them land on the beach. 

False Ports

Bayeux

We then drove to the little town of Bayeux to see the Tapestry of Queen Mathilde, a 60 meter-long tapestry that tells about all the conquests of her husband Guillaume. Mallory, Sarah, Harkian, Julia, and I ate at this adorable little creperie and then went and explored the Bayeux- Calvados Cathedral, one of the most amazing cathedrals I have seen. 

Cute little Creperie 

Cathedrale Bayeux- Calvados 

Inside of the Cathedral 

Bayeux

Omaha Beach and the American Cemetery 

We then drove to Omaha beach and the American cemetery where there are almost 10,000 headstones for American soldiers who lost their lives during WWII, especially D-Day. On D-Day alone, 6,000 American soldiers died, 3,000 of them at Omaha beach. 50 million people lost their lives during WWII, 5X the amount that died in WWI.

Pointe du Hoc

La Pointe du Hoc was a strategic point between Omaha beach and Utah beach that the German's originally occupied. On D-Day, 225 US Rangers were charged with the task of sneaking up on Germans and steeling la Pointe du Hoc from them. Unfortunately for the Rangers the got a little lost and had to traverse 3 miles of beach under enemy fire and then climbing up the cliff with specialized ladders and grappling hooks. They managed to get to the top of the cliff and destroy Germany artillery while holding back the Germans who were desperately trying to get the point back from the Allied forced. Two days later at the end of the whole ordeal, only 90 of the original 225 Rangers were still alive. La pointe du Hoc is still littered with huge craters left by bombs and there is a memorial to the Rangers who valiantly risked their lives to kick some Nazi ass. 

The uh...monument 

We then headed back to Nantes. Normandy was beautiful and I learned a lot about WWII and Guillaume  the Duke of Normandy. The weather is getting warmer and my time in Nantes is passing too quickly. In April I will be visiting London, Marseille, Aix-en-Provence, and Ibiza. Until next time, A plus tard! More Pictures of Normandy

KSG

The Half Way Point of My French Fairy Tale

March 7- March 20

My dearest friends and family,

I am sorry I have not updated my blog in two weeks, I have had midterms and currently have a cold so had nothing that interesting to post except for studying and sneezing. My host parent's youngest son, JD, lives in Tokyo with his wife Yuko so the week before last was kind of stressful. They are both currently safe in Singapore and are staying there until the nuclear situation in Japan improves. My heart goes out to all those Japanese people. Other than midterms, I really did not do anything of interest so here are the two interesting things that have done since I last spoke with you.

La Belle Au Bois Dormant:

On Friday, March 11th, my host mother's birthday, my host family took me to see the ballet La Belle Au Bois Dormant known to anglophones as Sleeping Beauty. The St. Petersburg Ballet from Russia is doing a world tour and preformed at the Palais de Congrès in Nantes. The ballet was amazing and had an amazing orchestra. After the ballet we went out to dinner at a restaurant called le Square. I had chicken with some sort of grain- rice thingy and yummy chocolate cake for dessert.

3 Soirs Pour Trois Grandes Histoires:

Thursday, March 17 I went with my French class to see an Algerian storyteller. The performance was one middle-aged woman with curly, crazy black hair and green eyes. She was very animated and had an amazing singing voice. She was very expressive and acted out each of the characters with a mix of Arab and French. The first story she told us was about a 15 year old girl, Yunja, who gets adopted by this ogre witch lady. One day, a hunter stumbles upon Yunja and falls in love with her and they have to run away because Yunja's mom eats people and ya bad news bears. The story goes on and on and mixed into another story which I did not really understand. The last story however, was about a woman who farts, gets banished from her house, runs away to the forest, meets an old lady who takes her to the fart queen who lives in the fart kingdom. The queen gives the woman her fart back and tells her to open it (the fart is in some kind of container) at her house with all the windows and doors closed. The woman obeys and when she opens the container it is filled with gold and she immediately becomes rich. Her neighbor tries to copy her but ends up releasing all the farts of the world in her house. Yay Algeria and their toilet humor. 

That is really all I have to update on, I went on a walk today, Sunday, March 20 and took some pictures of the river a few minutes from my house. Here are some of the pictures and I will update again once I have something interesting to write about.

Japanese Garden

View of the River

House Boat

St. Donatien

Voyage en Italie: Churches, Clubbing, and Creatures

25 February- 6 March

Dear friends and family,

I am terribly sorry I have not updated my blog in a while, but I promise to make up for it now. Last week I was on vacation in Italy and then Paris for the weekend. We had plenty of adventures and misadventures. Let us begin:

Day 1 (2/25/11): Trip to Roma

After our final French class with Madame de Pous we gathered our things and headed off to the Gare de Nantes (train station of Nantes). While on our two hour trip to Paris, Sam and I were sitting next to two French engineering students. We chatted with them the whole and they were very nice. Once we arrived in Paris, we had to take the metro to Palais de Congrès to catch a train to the airport. Now, when buying our tickets, Ryanair failed to mention that the Airport Beauvais was 1.5 hours outside of Paris. Anyways, we took the bus to the airport and waited around for our flight. None of us knew what to expect from Ryanair but we landed in Ciampino (Rome Airport). Once we landed the played a little song and everyone clapped, it was funny but a little unnerving. We then took a bus to the center of Rome, and we got off at the main train/bus station Termini. By this time it was almost midnight, everything was closed, no one spoke english, and we had no idea how to find our hostel. We ended up taking a cab to the hostel and later found out it was a 5 min walk. Anyways, after checking in we realized we were located in the Chinatown of Rome and ate at a little Chinese restaurant in Rome; yes, that's right, my first Italian meal was Chinese food. We then went back to our hostel and went to bed. 

Day 2 (2/26/11): First Day in Rome!

We woke up at 8:30 am because the hostel was noisy with people coming in and out. We ate our free breakfast of toast and tea before heading out on the town. Our first stop was Basilica Papale Di Santa Maria Maggiore; a really pretty church. Right next door there was a church store; it sold priest robes and religious accessories, it was really interesting to see where priests do their shopping. 

We then walked to the Colosseum; it was one of the most impressive buildings I have ever seen. The fact that people could design and engineer a structure that immense and complex thousands of years ago is baffling. We wanted to go inside but the line was way too long so we decided to walk around the outside. These fake gladiator men came up to us and took pictures with us then tried to charge each person 10 euros. We refused and gave them like 2 each but we knew we had be scammed. While at the Colosseum, this club promotor named Jeff gave us flyers and told us about a club crawl that started at 10:30 that cost 10 Euro for free VIP entry into two of Rome's big night clubs. 

After voyaging to the Colosseum, we walked around to try to find a little park Dmitri had been to when he was in Rome a few years ago. We did not find THE park but we did find A park. Even though it was chilly out there was sun and we saw plenty of Italians out running and working out. In this park there were little apparatuses (apparatae?) for people to work out on. We then found a little restaurant and had our first real Italian meal: Pizza! We are all starving and each ate our own plate-sized pizza, mine was cheese, sauce, and prosciutto ...delicious.  We then met up with our friend sam who was staying with a friend from home who is studying in Rome for the semester. He took us to the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele ii, a monument/ museum that was constructed in the early 1900's to celebrate the unification of Italy and its first king Vittorio Emanuele. It had amazing statues and views; apparently the Romans are not too fond of it for some reason. 

After that we went to the Trevi fountain, Pantheon, and Spanish Steps. The Trevi fountain was pretty cool but there were a lot of people, I threw a coin in for good luck. The Pantheon was not as impressive as I thought it would be considering its one of the oldest buildings in existence (built around 31 BC). The inside was cool though, the oculus (big sky light in the middle of the Pantheon) was originally the only source of light in the building. The Spanish Steps were pretty but there were a ton of people so it was hard to really appreciate them. 

Trevi Fountain

Oculus of the Pantheon

View From Spanish Steps

After all of our site seeing, we headed back to the hostel to shower and get ready for our big night on the town. We met Sam and his friend at this restaurant called Magnolias. The food was delicious and not too expensive. I had spaghetti bolognese and to drink a Hurricane. After dinner, we bought some wine and headed to the Colosseum to see if the club crawl was legit. We met a couple from Norway, June and Heine, who were looking to go out but did not know of any good bars or clubs in Rome and we invited them to come along with us. We got to the metro stop and the Colosseum and there were about 30 or 40 other people so we decided to stay and try out the club crawl. It ended up being an amazing time and we danced the night away to mostly American music. However, I have never had my butt grabbed by so many people in my life, the Italians in the club had practically no concept of personal space. At 4 am we took a cab back to the hostel and went to sleep. 

Day 3 (2/27/11): Nothing Special

We woke up Sunday afternoon at around 2 pm because we were all exhausted from the night before, it was overcast and cloudy so we did not really go site seeing. We met up with Sam and his friend again and watch a soccer game at Magnolias. We then went back to our hostel where Harkiran and I cooked dinner for the boys and ourselves: spaghetti with tomato sauce, very simple, very cheap. We found out that breaking the spaghetti in half to fit in the pot it a sin in Italy, thankfully it was two girls from Nigeria and China who told us this so we did not offend anyone. The boys went out to bar and Harkiran and I stayed in and went to sleep.

Day 4 (2/28/11): Roman Forum

We woke up Monday, around mid-morning and saw that it was sunny and not too cold. Dmitri, Doug, Harkiran, and I decided to pay the 8 euros to check out the Roman Forum, the ancient city center of Rome. It was really cool and really huge! There were plenty of ruins as well as gardens. Some of it is up on a hill and we got to see magnificent views of Rome. 

Roman Forum

View from the Forum

More Forum

After that Harkiran and I went back to the hostel to cook the rest of the pasta because we did not feel like spending money on dinner. While eating dinner we started talking to an Italian guy who was living in the hostel until he found a place to live. His name was Luka and he spoke very little English, we sat there using google translate to communicate. He invited Harkiran and I to a gay bar he was planning to visit. Harkiran and I split a 1.5 liter bottle of cheap wine and Luka finished his bottle on the floor of our hostel room while trying to converse. We then went to the bar, which had no name that I could see, just a rainbow, and met this group of local Italians. One of the girls spoke some French so we spent the entire night trying to communicate with each other in a mix of French, Italian, and English. Harkiran and I went home to our hostel around 2 am and went to sleep. The next morning we found out that the boys had tried to take a bus home from the bar they were at and ended up falling asleep on the bus. They woke up an hour outside of Rome with no clue how to get back, they tried calling us and texting us but we were already asleep. They managed to find a bus back to Termini and finally got to the hostel around 6 am.

Day 5 (4/1/11): Ciao Roma, Buongiorno Firenze!

Tuesday morning Harkiran and I packed our things, said our goodbyes and thank you's, and began our journey to Florence. We took a 1h45 min train to the main train station of Santa Maria Novella. We then walked and found the hostel we were staying at for the night. No one was there. I called the guy and he told me the woman who was usual there did not show up for work and we could leave our stuff inside and he would be there around 8 pm. This was a little unnerving so I called my friend Carly from Marblehead who is studying in Florence and she said we could keep our stuff at her apartment. We climbed the floor flights of stairs with our stuff and just relaxed for a little. Carly cooked us dinner and then we checked into our hostel and headed back to Carly's, wine in hand. After playing a view games of president, we headed out to their friends apartment with Carly's roommates Jeanine and Nikki. After going to a few bars and getting croissants at a secret bakery, Harkiran and I headed back to our hostel. 

Day 6 (4/2/11): Firenze!

The next morning Harkiran and I grabbed breakfast at a little cafe, then dropped our stuff back off at Carly's for the day. We then began walking around and started at the big church: the Duomo! Carly's apartment is located right next to the Duomo, you can see it from her apartment window. We first walked around the Duomo and then went inside.

Duomo

Amazing Duomo 

We then crossed the Arno river on the Ponte Vecchio which is a little bridge with little buildings protruding off of it that sell really expensive jewelry. We then walked back towards the Duomo and found the market where they sell a bunch of leather goods as well as scarves, clothes, jewlery, and other touristy things. Harkiran bought a present for her sister and I just window shopped. A little later we were hungry so we found a cute little restaurant and ate meat lasagna for lunch, it was delicious. After that we decided to hit up a museum, the Museo di Palazzo Vecchio which used to be a palace that housed all the important Fiorentini (Florentians). The museum was really impressive and had lots of paintings of Roman mythology on the ceilings. We then went into the "For the Love of God Exhibit" we go to the door and a guard checks our tickets, then two other guards come get us and lead us, just me and Harkiran, into this small pitch black room where you can literally only see this bejeweled skull and nothing else. I started to get really nervous because I could not see anything and heard people moving around. After about 5 minutes which felt like 5 hours, the guard let us out. We thought we were going to kill us and steal our organs; it was not a fun experience. 

Jewelery Bridge

We then went back to Carly's to freshen up and relax a little. After showering I noticed I had red bumps on my arm, hand, and back; so began the hysteria. I convinced myself I had scabbies (a skin mite that lives in your skin and lays eggs. You can get it from hostels some times) for about two hours. Carly gave me some benadryl and they started to go away so I relaxed and accepted I did not have scabbies. Harkiran and I then met up with my family friend Blaire who is studying to be a singer and is do a program in Florence for the semester. we had a delicious dinner before dropping Harkiran off at the train station. I returned to Carly's house and we had some wine and went to an Irish bar. 

Day 7 (4/3/11): Walking time

After waking up and going to the market to pick up some fresh produce and meat for dinner, we ate lunch at this amazing deli that Carly called "the secret sandwich shop". I had a panini consisting of mozzarella, salami, and prosciutto..amazing. We then walked all the way across the river and up about 1000 stairs to Piazza Michelangelo. There was the most amazing view of Florence and the surrounding mountains and countryside. We then walked around Florence a little more before returning home to nap, cook dinner, and prepare for my final evening in Firenze. After eating a delicious dinner of pasta with zuchini, onions, and balsamic vinegar we drank some wine and headed to the Thursday night hot spot where they had free face painting for carnivale so I had my face painted like the milkyway...Carly taught me how to say star which is stella so thats all I said to the lady. 

Florence from Piazza Michelangelo

Day 8 (4/4/11) to Day 10(4/6/11) : Off to Paris!

I woke up Friday morning well aware of the long journey ahead of me. I took 1h45 minute train from Florence to Rome, then a 1 hour bus from Rome to the airport, then a 1h40 min plane ride to Paris Beauvais, and then finally a 1h45 minute bus ride to the center of Paris. I was sitting next to a Slovakian girl on the bus to Paris and we chatted for a while. Once in Paris I agreed to help them find the metro station and ended up leading a group of like 15 Slovakians to the metro. I then found my friend and went to sleep. The next morning I woke up ate a croissant and met up with my friend Hilary for lunch. I then walked around and saw the Louvre, Notre Dame, Champs d'Elysees, and the Arc de Triomphe. My red bumps had gotten worse so I was kind of distracted by that. As soon as I got home I showed my host dad and he reassured me that my red bumps on my arms did not look like scabbies. To be safe though I put this scabbie cream stuff all over my body and am washing my clothes with an anti-insectiside. 

Today (4/7/11): Scabbies Free!

To be safe I went to the dermatologist today and he confirmed that I am scabbies free! He thinks it was bed bugs from my hostel in Italy and all I have to do is wash my clothes and use cortisone cream. A big thank you to all my old and new friends who hosted me (Carly you're my girl!) I had a wonderful vacation! Here are some more pictures from my vacation I will update again soon so stay tuned. Until a tout! 

KSG