I apologize that this post is coming nearly two weeks after the last! I had hoped to post here weekly and will try to get back on that track now. Needless to say I have been very busy here! I'll attempt to summarize it all now.
Classes have officially begun and I'm enjoying them so far. At IES (my program), I am taking a French Language & Culture course, where we work on our grammar and writing as well as speaking by discussing current events and reading different articles or stories in French. I really like the conversation aspect of the course and it's great to be able to actually discuss things going on in the world instead of just reviewing verb tenses for an hour and a half (like many of my previous French classes have been). I am also taking a class entitled "Francophone Paris", which focuses on immigration in France. It's really interesting to see the differences in how the French view immigration, diversity, and culture in comparison to how we see it in the US. More on that in later posts. My last IES course is a class on French Cinema and Society, where we watch, analyze, and discuss French films. As I've never really seen any French films outside of Amélie, I'm really excited to see them! I just hope that I understand what's going on...
In addition to my IES courses I will also be taking two classes at the Institut Catholique de Paris (ICP). I wish that I could tell you how those courses were this week, except that I haven't actually attended one yet! Monday morning I went to the campus to attend my first course, which was supposed to be a Philosophy course on Linguistics. After much searching around and asking the secretary, I found out that the course was no longer being offered. The French educational system is quite different from that of the US; universities don't post all of their classes, syllbuses, and professors months before the semester. They post them a week or two before and change them up to the very first day (or after) of the semester. This also happened with the Theology course that I had planned to take. I was forced to find new classes to take that still fit within my schedule: stress nightmare!! If you know me you know that I stress very easily when it comes to classes, life-planning, etc. so this was really not my favorite day so far. Thankfully I was able to find two new classes to take.
So Tuesday I headed back to ICP with the hopes of attending my first class, History of the Church in the 20th century, where I wait for around 20 minutes only to find out that the professor is sick. They also don't really inform you of that here either. So in summary: I have yet to attend any of my ICP classes! Hopefully next week I will actually be able to write about how they went, but we'll see.
The highlight of last week for me was our visit of the Opéra Garnier, which houses hundreds of ballets, operas, and plays each year. The building is beyond incredible, with grand staircases and golden chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. I am really hoping to be able to find tickets that are not too expensive to see a ballet here later this year. I can't really explain the shear beauty of this building adequately enough but I recommend that you take a look at my pictures from it! You can find them on the link to the left at my webshots page.
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| Opéra Garnier |
The weather the past two weeks has been pretty cold, with an average temperature around 0 degrees Celsius. Luckily it warmed up slightly yesterday so a few friends and I headed to Le Marais, which is home to many Jewish restaurants, synagogues, and Parisians. Here I had my first falafel! It was absolutely delicious! If I ever had to be a vegetarian, I am pretty sure I would eat falafel every day. If you're not familiar with this Jewish/Egyptian/Middle Eastern cuisine, falafel is a fried ball of chickpeas, usually placed in a pita pocket with vegetables and sauces. It's absolutely amazing and I really recommend that you try it if you never have! The restaurant we ordered it from, L'as du Falafel, is considered one of the best and most famous places to order it in Paris (consider it the "Pat's Steaks" of falafel in Paris). Glad I got to try it!
After walking around all day we settled into a café for some chocolat chaud and later had dinner at a great pizzeria. One of the things I love about Paris is that most non-French restaurants are very authentic; for example, the pizzeria we went to had Italians working there and all of the Jewish bakeries had Jewish people working there. Not only is Paris a great place to get a croissant, quiche lorraine, or boeuf bourguignon, but it's also home to many other cultures and styles of food. As someone who especially loves food, this makes me very happy. :)
Today I am heading over to visit the St. Germain-des-Près district of Paris, where in the 1920's many artists, writers, publishers, and the like settled. Later many famous French writers are known to have frequented the area, such as Albert Camus, Jean Paul Sartre, and Simone de Beauvoir. Pretty excited to check it out!
That's all for now, I'll try to post again in a week!
À bientôt!
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