6/3
Today was quite possible the most physically and emotionally exhausting day I’ve had since being here. A group of 5 of us decided to take the day to get out of the city and go climb Mount St. Victoire. This is the triangular-faced mountain that was Cezannes favorite subject to paint and it is both vast and beautiful. When the bus dropped us off we were on the dam at the reservoir in the valley juste a côté de la montagne. The water was so clear and blue I almost couldn’t believe it! Coming from the land of Lake Dirty Bird, this place was a dream and far in the distance we could see the cross at the top of the mountain— our destination.
Just before the bus dropped us off I’d gotten a text from Mom saying that Gran was fading quickly so after some quick tears we started up the hill. I was kind of the weakest link out of the group and wanted to linger some more rather than run up the hill, so I utilized my Girl Scout skills and followed up separate from the main pack. The more we climbed the harder it got and the more beautiful the view was so I had all the reasons in the world to stop and look around every couple of minutes. :) When we finally made it to the top, the winds were whipping around but the sun was shining brightly so we sat for a quick picnic of baguette, oranges, and cliff bar. In one direction I could see all of Aix and farther out the coast and Mediterranean Ocean, in another I could see the Alps topped with snow, and in another there were parachuters landing in an open field between olive groves. Beautiful.
From the top of the mountain my thoughts were for Gran and I could only think that soon she’ll be able to see them too and come with us to those high points in our lives. In her body she wasn’t able travel or see anymore, but now she can be a part of all of those things.
Coming down we decided to go a different way and came down the backside of the mountain and ended up in a petit village called Vauvenargues. When we got to the bus stop we learned that the bus wasn’t due for another couple of hours but as were thinking what we should do until then a soccer ball popped up over the retaining wall. We picked it up and went to return it to its owners down below and discovered a group of local firemen playing a kind of volleyball game where you could only use your feet. Allison, Emma, and Torey all went down and asked to play so we hung out with them talking and playing until the bus came. They offered us cokes and oranginas and told us that the big house we could see not too far away was Picasso’s house and that he was actually buried underneath it! Legit!
I didn’t play because by then my foot was acting up and Mom called me the news of Gran’s passing… So, I sat on a bench next to the house of Pablo Picasso and cried while watching the provençal sun set over the mountains. It kills me to be so far from my family right now, but as they told me Gran was proud of me for being here and she loved to paint and be in the mountains. Today I celebrated her life by climbing one of the most beloved mountain of Cezanne and Picasso and it was the best thing I could have done today.
I send my love to everyone at home and thanks for being the best family ever. I love you all!
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Friday, March 5, 2010
Le temps volant passe vitement
5/3
This week we turned into March, next weekend all the boyfriends are coming, the weekend après ça Brooke, Catherine and Alyssa and coming to visit, après ça MOM & DAD GET HERE, apres ca Recca Bector comes to France, and après ÇA, there are only a few weeks before I leave this beautiful place. Wow, time flies! This week has had me in a funk what with Granny being so ill… I’ve been feeling very far away and I don’t like that I can’t just hop a plane home if I need to. There have been a couple nights of restless sleep and feelings of helplessness but I keep reminding myself “Que sera, sera.” Whatever will be, will be.
I also am reminded how lucky I am to be surrounded with such amazing friends over here. I seriously have the best roommate anyone could ask for and I know that Allison and I will be close friends for a very long time. :) She’s been so sweet and supportive this week even when I’ve been holed up in the bathroom through the night talking to the fam on skype. Mind you, the walls are very thin... Our professor, Mr. Tissot even noticed I was looking tired and sad and lent some consoling words. The French are très francs (frank) when it comes to the stages of life and it was an interesting and surprisingly helpful perspective to hear.
Aside from Gran’s troubles, this week has been another thriller! :) We had our first real test so I had to exercise my brain and re-teach myself how to study of my own accord for more than 30 minutes. Lol. (Not that we don’t work, it’s just that most of it is done in class since they are each 4 hours long!) The exam was for translation class and we thought it was going to be over the excerpts we’d already done together so all of us were diligently trying to memorize all the idioms and figures of speech in those. We were successful in that, but when she passed out the exam it ended being from the same text but from a totally different passage. Oh dear. Needless to say, that was interesting! I was surprised though at how much of the meaning I was able to convey. It really showed me how much I’m learning and how much my language has already improved. I still have a long way to go before calling myself fluent, but I’m getting closer to being able to read a text once through and understand it’s meaning as I go… Not once I’ve gone back and looked up the definition of every word. Yay!
On the way back from class today I stopped for some pizza and I wanted to know if they had any with olives. I was able to formulate phrases in real time and had a legit back and forth little convo without missing a beat! SUCCESS! Usually when I try to go to those places they can tell I’m American and either give me the don’t-try-to-speak-French-because-you’re-going-to-butcher-it look whenever I try, or just point and grunt to avoid having to lower themselves to my level. Today however, I definitely got a look but I think (I hope!) that it was an I-know-you’re-foreign-because-of-your-accent-but-you’re-speaking-really-well-so-I’ll-speak-French-back-to-you kind of look! Awesome. :)
Last night Allison and I decided to have Diner Chez Nous: Take 2 and had an absolute blast! We thought it would be fun to make nutella banane crepes for dessert (très français!) so the theme was B.Y.O.B. (Bring Your Own Banana) Bahaha! :) Sometime last week I’d been experimenting with cream sauces and managed a reeeeaaly nice vegetable cream soup so I did my best to recreate it on a large scale for the main course. We had about 16 friends over, Lydia brought a salad, the soup was totally delicious, Clifton brought a homemade Tart au Citron and Tory some flan, we had beaucoup de vin (rouge, blanche, rosé, brillants…), went through ~8-10 baguettes, and had a veritable crêpe flipping party!!! Haha :) I was in the kitchen the whole first half making the soup, but once we’d had the first two courses of dessert everyone jumped into the kitchen and started flippin' em’ like pros! So much fun! I really love having people over, it’s more fun for me than going out even I think. I just really enjoy having friends over, sharing a meal, talking, having some wine, and just enjoying everybody in a super low-key fashion. Seriously, this was such a FUN night :) After everyone cleared out I snapped a little and cleaned and vacuumed the entire apartment (I tend to fixate on things when my subconscious is stressing) and then we met up with some of the friends at O’Shannons. After that we went to Scat club with the Norwegian Contingent (Katja and Maria!) for some dancing and a live band. I needed to dance it out and at one point Allison pulled the slickest I-don’t-want-to-dance-with-you move I’ve ever witnessed! The guy gave a pouty face as they always do, but he couldn’t even complain because it was THAT smooth. Well played my friend! Haha :) We called it a night around 2AM before our 8AM class, but it was definitely worth the epic adventure! Whew!
Again, I’m not sure who reads these, but Dad is always telling me that my “public” is waiting… I’ll try to do little updates more often and I’ll get Rome&Florence posted at some point. That one’s going to take a while so you’ll just have to wait until I can finish it! Right then, over and out :)
Bisous
~B
This week we turned into March, next weekend all the boyfriends are coming, the weekend après ça Brooke, Catherine and Alyssa and coming to visit, après ça MOM & DAD GET HERE, apres ca Recca Bector comes to France, and après ÇA, there are only a few weeks before I leave this beautiful place. Wow, time flies! This week has had me in a funk what with Granny being so ill… I’ve been feeling very far away and I don’t like that I can’t just hop a plane home if I need to. There have been a couple nights of restless sleep and feelings of helplessness but I keep reminding myself “Que sera, sera.” Whatever will be, will be.
I also am reminded how lucky I am to be surrounded with such amazing friends over here. I seriously have the best roommate anyone could ask for and I know that Allison and I will be close friends for a very long time. :) She’s been so sweet and supportive this week even when I’ve been holed up in the bathroom through the night talking to the fam on skype. Mind you, the walls are very thin... Our professor, Mr. Tissot even noticed I was looking tired and sad and lent some consoling words. The French are très francs (frank) when it comes to the stages of life and it was an interesting and surprisingly helpful perspective to hear.
Aside from Gran’s troubles, this week has been another thriller! :) We had our first real test so I had to exercise my brain and re-teach myself how to study of my own accord for more than 30 minutes. Lol. (Not that we don’t work, it’s just that most of it is done in class since they are each 4 hours long!) The exam was for translation class and we thought it was going to be over the excerpts we’d already done together so all of us were diligently trying to memorize all the idioms and figures of speech in those. We were successful in that, but when she passed out the exam it ended being from the same text but from a totally different passage. Oh dear. Needless to say, that was interesting! I was surprised though at how much of the meaning I was able to convey. It really showed me how much I’m learning and how much my language has already improved. I still have a long way to go before calling myself fluent, but I’m getting closer to being able to read a text once through and understand it’s meaning as I go… Not once I’ve gone back and looked up the definition of every word. Yay!
On the way back from class today I stopped for some pizza and I wanted to know if they had any with olives. I was able to formulate phrases in real time and had a legit back and forth little convo without missing a beat! SUCCESS! Usually when I try to go to those places they can tell I’m American and either give me the don’t-try-to-speak-French-because-you’re-going-to-butcher-it look whenever I try, or just point and grunt to avoid having to lower themselves to my level. Today however, I definitely got a look but I think (I hope!) that it was an I-know-you’re-foreign-because-of-your-accent-but-you’re-speaking-really-well-so-I’ll-speak-French-back-to-you kind of look! Awesome. :)
Last night Allison and I decided to have Diner Chez Nous: Take 2 and had an absolute blast! We thought it would be fun to make nutella banane crepes for dessert (très français!) so the theme was B.Y.O.B. (Bring Your Own Banana) Bahaha! :) Sometime last week I’d been experimenting with cream sauces and managed a reeeeaaly nice vegetable cream soup so I did my best to recreate it on a large scale for the main course. We had about 16 friends over, Lydia brought a salad, the soup was totally delicious, Clifton brought a homemade Tart au Citron and Tory some flan, we had beaucoup de vin (rouge, blanche, rosé, brillants…), went through ~8-10 baguettes, and had a veritable crêpe flipping party!!! Haha :) I was in the kitchen the whole first half making the soup, but once we’d had the first two courses of dessert everyone jumped into the kitchen and started flippin' em’ like pros! So much fun! I really love having people over, it’s more fun for me than going out even I think. I just really enjoy having friends over, sharing a meal, talking, having some wine, and just enjoying everybody in a super low-key fashion. Seriously, this was such a FUN night :) After everyone cleared out I snapped a little and cleaned and vacuumed the entire apartment (I tend to fixate on things when my subconscious is stressing) and then we met up with some of the friends at O’Shannons. After that we went to Scat club with the Norwegian Contingent (Katja and Maria!) for some dancing and a live band. I needed to dance it out and at one point Allison pulled the slickest I-don’t-want-to-dance-with-you move I’ve ever witnessed! The guy gave a pouty face as they always do, but he couldn’t even complain because it was THAT smooth. Well played my friend! Haha :) We called it a night around 2AM before our 8AM class, but it was definitely worth the epic adventure! Whew!
Again, I’m not sure who reads these, but Dad is always telling me that my “public” is waiting… I’ll try to do little updates more often and I’ll get Rome&Florence posted at some point. That one’s going to take a while so you’ll just have to wait until I can finish it! Right then, over and out :)
Bisous
~B
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