Long showers me miss.

Monday le 4 mai 2009
The legendary Saint Denis without his head, which he then carries five miles before really dying.

Monday the whole class went to the Pantheon after learning all about Saint Denis. It was pretty incredible and the professor paid for it which was pretty cool! The crypte was very very quiet. Jamie and I found parts in this circle walk way where our voice would bounce back to each other or to the other person. We also got to see the tombs of lots of famous people like Victor Hugo, Alexander Dumas, Madame Curie, and Voltaire! Wowzers...
The inside of the Pantheon

The halls in the crypte underground (below the Pantheon)

Victor Hugo and Alexander Dumas.. They share a tomb room. I wonder what they talk about, or write together??

After that we found a "Champion" and grabbed a quick something to eat, which we took to the Lutece Arena. There we watched some kids play soccer, ate our lunch, and read some of our reading for the next day. Our readings are SO hard-REALLY! We spend probably an hour each night reading everything that he has given us to learn and we don't get much out of it. Its pretty impossible to decipher.

We do la soiree familiale (FHE) on Mondays at 4:40 for those who have dinner with their families that night. We hurried to the professors flat to meet everyone else, got there early for once and got to get our cell phone! We're excited to be able to contact the other students when we can't find each other. Oh and Jamie and I volunteered to teach next weeks FHE (in french!)so if you have any ideas or suggestions for a good study abroad topic.. let me know.

Tuesday Le 5 mai 2009

Tuesday was the first day that class interested me. We talked a lot about architecture and the professor told lots of interesting stories! When class was over Natalie, Rachel H., Emily S., Jamie, and I wandered over to L'eglise de la Madelaine (Gorgeous). We were doing our first complete Paris walk that day. I love the Paris walk book (and whoever wrote this walk did it very well) because of all the descriptions it gives, the symbolism, and the maps are especially helpful. This walk was titled in french "putting your nose to the wind" which is kind of an idiom the french use to go wherever the wind takes you.. which the writer also used to indicate a smelling walk. We started at the flower markets next to the church, then we went inside and read everything. The whole walk we did was located in a ritzier part of town so we took pictures by Chanel and such. The walk book had us go into a patisserie and told us to get some macaroons because they are the best there. Of course since they were tiny tiny tiny tiny and tres cher we didn't actually by them, but they were definitely drool worthy. Then we turned the corner and went to a tiny little church. It had seats for the congregation that made a semi circle around the pulpit and behind us there was a tiny set of organ pipes. The way they were laid out reminded me of the Mormon Tabernacle choir.. just itty bitty.

The last stop on this walk was to the Perfume museum (mom would have Died I think). There were so many different fragrances and all of them were very strong. The teacher told us to take sprayed strips of them, write down their names and smell them again later. We'd been smelling them so often that our judgment in smells was kind of off. It was pretty interesting to see how they were made though. Oh and as we finished our walk- the closest metro stop was at the Academie Nationale de Musique! I wish we could've gone in.
The perfume museum: Fragonard
In front of the Academie Nationale de Musique

When all our senses were used up, we all had back to chez moi and I let the girls use my internet for hours upon hours. Our Madame was really excited to meet our friends, she is pretty cute.

Mercredi le 6 mai 2009
I'm kind of tired of writing.. but I don't want to forget so I'll post the pictures. Kay?

These pictures are kind of out of order.
THE coolest metro station "bouche"
The underside of the Louvre
A "Flaming" Gothic Church where we sat in for a mass today
The ceilings of the Notre Dame (we went inside today right after class so this should be first))
More Notre Dame photos
In the garden of the Palais Royale
A boy climbing a tree in the garden
Me, Jamie, Natalie, and Becky in the gardens again.
We went to study and rest our feet in a small park.. I ended up playing
A much cuter kids playing in the park. :)