Beaucoup de Choses!

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Aside from classes this week, I visited the Louvre again with Catherine to see the big french painters and the galerie apollo. I also had a wonderful dinner tonight at the house of Elisabeth et Bernard, the other set of Louis' grandparents.

On Thursday I went to chez Catherine where we had a wonderful lunch of a soup with mini ravioli and some good charcuterie. We then tried to go to the Orangerie, but the line was quite long, so we decided to head to the Louvre instead. On the way, we encountered an interesting trick I have not seen before. A man palms a ring and pretends to pick it up from the ground, then asks if we dropped it. We said nope, and he asked if we wanted it, it didn't fit on his fingers. Catherine told him to take it to the police if someone lost it. I didn't realize it was fake until I saw someone try it again. I'm not sure exactly what the point is, maybe to cause a distraction and then steal something? Or if they try to sell the ring to you? Who knows.

The Louvre was quite interesting as always. I bought a small reproduction of my favorite Mme Vigée Le-Brun painting. We had tea at Mariage-Frères which was absolutely AMAZING. This chain seriously needs to come to the states. I had a tea called fruits of passion which was delicious and we also ate crème brulée with strawberries that was absolutely delectable.

I also got my first test back on Thursday on which I got a 17! Grades in France are out of 20, but it is not a percentage. a 17 is an A 😊.

Thursday evening I went to the Opera Garnier to see the Ballet La Dame aux Camelias. The dancing and costumes were beautiful, and the 3 hours flew by. Even from the top balcony we could see, though the seats were not anyone's idea of comfortable.

Yesterday I talked to some Canadian girls at lunch. Their French sounds odd! They were pretty nice. They started to talk about how they were there on some trip for Campus Crusade for Christ, but luckily I was able to turn the conversation into a sort of interfaith discussion. They invited me to some sort of meeting for it that night, but I didn't end up going...it was some sort of recruitment thing.

Today I went to Catherine's for some tea before heading to Musée Cluny. She bought me more wonderful books, I think I am going to need an extra suitcase just to bring books home! Haha. Especially since on the way to the museum we passed the used bookstore that has a lot for 20 euro cents! I will be checking that out in between classes on Monday, I think.

The museum was quite interesting. It has artifacts from the middle ages. There are pictures from there as well as the other places here on pages 5-7.

Dinner was wonderful. We started with tea, I picked another Mariage-Freres winner called Marco Polo, which was a mixture of different fruits and flowers. Accompanying the tea were some delicious macarons (my favorite French pastry so far I think, though I have yet to try very many!). The patisserie where we went for them smelled like heaven. For dinner was some sort of pork pastry with salad that had potatoes, corn, onions, and greens. It was accompanied by a red wine that I actually liked! After that was cheese and bread, pineapples, ice cream, and cake, and after THAT was herbal tea. Needless to say, I am quite full!

After dinner we had a nice tour of Paris at night by car, the first time I have been in one since coming to Paris! It was a nice treat to get a ride home instead of taking the metro.

The trip to Morocco is on! I will be there from April 15-20. Because I am paying for it myself, I may travel less for the rest of break, but I still have to see. Tomorrow is the Brocante, lunch with Catherine, and the Jewish History museum in le Marais!

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Comments

[mathieu]

Paris
I love this city