off to the Conference!

Well, I'm off to a conference for the next 6 days! I'll be in Agay, on the French Riviera. Should be fun! No idea if I'll have internet or not, so don't worry if I don't post until next weekend.


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Have a good week everyone!

The first of many food posts

Well, I thought I'd get right to it! So far I haven't eaten much that an American wouldn't recognize. I've had a croissant, a tarte-du-pom, some juices, cereal, and a nutella crepe. Mmmm. Yea, haven't exactly been eating healthy, but that will change once I'm more settled into a routine. But for now, here's a few snacks that I bought yesterday at the grocery store. No idea how "French" these are, but they were at eye-level in the snack aisle...

First up, Mini-Choux in flavor Bleu Noix.


Much like the picture on the box, these are little crispy shells with a soft blue-cheese-tasting filling. Now, I may be in the land of cheese, but I should have realized that the fact that these little darlings weren't in the refrigerated section was probably a bad sign. And the flavors and textures were not a winning match either. The crispy shells had almost no flavor at all and the middles tasted like a poor substitute for real blue cheese. I ate one. The rest will probably sit on the shelf until 2012 at which point they will go bad.

The next snack was Feuillety's Snacks feuilletes in flavor Sel de Guerande.


I don't know what these were supposed to be, but they tasted like little crisped bits of croissant! YUM! And buttery! And crunchy! Mmmmmm! I definitely ate like 5 of these yesterday (luckily they are small). These definitely will not last long.

So yea, anyone want the Mini-Choux? Because otherwise they are going in the trash and I'm going to keep my feuilletes!

(Don't worry, Mom, I've also eaten a bunch of fruit, but so far there is nothing interesting about fruit here - an apple is an apple! Or, well, a pom. But pretty much the same thing.)

Paris

For all people say about the French disliking foreigners, I've found the complete opposite. Of course, there are the people who chided me for not speaking French, like the woman at the "Help" desk in the airport who gave me a French map when I asked if they had any English ones (because English was one of the listed languages for the maps), and she said "well, you should be learning French anyways". But I was surprised in my travels yesterday the number of nice, friendly people I encountered on the way. For example, the lady who eyed me in the airport and later stopped by to say hello because she saw me knitting and her daughter knits too. There was also a slightly ridiculous conversation on the RER-B between me, a Brazilian, and a Frenchman. We settled on semi-English but I'm pretty sure that the majority of the understanding was communicated by gesturing and pointing. And then when I finally arrived at Luxembourg and set about hauling my suitcase up the (many) stairs, a nice French guy offered to carry the large one for me while I brought up the smaller one! He and his girlfriend asked me where I was from and how I liked Paris while he lifted my suitcase like a pro. Its much like New Zealand, I find that there are nice people everywhere, if you are patient enough to look for them. And really, I can't complain because I know that if a European person traveled to the States, it would be unlikely that anyone in the stores would speak French (or German, or Dutch, or Russian, etc) and yet I can communicate quite decently here between my broken French and good English. And seriously, would anyone in line at the grocery store be patient while a tourist studied the coins to figure out which one was worth what? So I shouldn't expect that here either!

And adding to the wonderful people in this city, I went to brunch with Sungyon!



We ate at a little cafe in notre quartier and walked a bit. Sungyon helped me find the grocery store (subject of another post later) and a water filter. Yay! Then I showed her my apartment and we chatted about life, research, and everything! It was great to talk with her again! Letters and emails are one thing, but its definitely more fun to catch up in person.

Oh, and across from our cafe was a little boucher and I swear it looked like a picture out of my French textbook!



I wasn't quite daring enough to go in and try to buy anything, plus I leave tomorrow for a conference near Nice so its not really worth buying things because they will go bad by the time I'm back. But watch out for upcoming food tastings! I'm already in love with French pastries.

je suis ici!!!

Well, I made it here! After a tight connection in Iceland, a redeye flight, and a LONG time at airports, I arrived!

Its a small world. For example, when I was going to catch the RER-B into the city at the airport, I ran into a former labmate of mine, on his way to Boston!



And when I finally made it to my train stop, Luxembourg Gardens greeted me in all their glory.



My neighborhood is so cute!!



More tomorrow, I've been awake for 30+ hrs and need some sleep!

last day

I'm packing. I have so much stuff. My apartment is still a mess but the most awesome guy on the planet volunteered to take care of it so that I don't stress about it. Speaking of the most awesome guy ever, he took me out for dinner last night at my favorite restaurant in all time.



Yum yum Chateaubriand! (Or as they say in France, miam miam Chateaubriand.) He looks good in a suit, doesn't he?

I'm going off on a grand adventure. I'm off to meet new people, do cool research, and make new friends. I might even learn French along the way. But there is one thing that I will definitely miss the most, and that will make me so happy to return to Boston in August...

2 days

Well, 10 days quickly turned into 2 days. In 48 hrs I'll be sitting at Logan airport, waiting for my flight. The calm has evaporated into alternating excitement and dread. I am thrilled to be living in Paris. I am dreading being away from most of my friends and in a city where I don't speak the language. But I think that the time will really fly by no matter what, so I'll just hold on for the ride.

I'm trying to focus on the positives, like the new yarn that Amy bought me as a going-away present. (Amy, you better stop this or I'm going to go away more often! Its Madelinetosh Tosh Lace yarn and its absolutely a joy to knit with.)

And another thing to look forward to when I arrive:



Mathieu!!!!! Mon cher ami de Paris, who kindly picked up the keys for my apartment. I will be seeing him on Friday when I land!! I am excitedly awaiting my welcoming bisous. :-D

ten days

I leave in 10 days. I am strangely calm about this impending occurrence. The to-do list has been whittled away to things like "find gifts for people who help me in France" and other such fun things. Only not fun things left: (1) packing my entire apartment into storage and (2) saying goodbye to my boyfriend. I think I'm in denial about both.

I feel bad that I've made 3 posts without any pictures, so here we go... this is what I have to look forward to when I get to Paris:


Sungyon, my friend, confidant, former-labmate, scientist, and overall amazing person who currently lives in Paris.