Mont St. Michel and Saint Malo

After our trip to the American WWII Cemetery, Danuta, Michel, Dad, and myself stopped by a field full of cows with a view of the distant Mont St. Michel. As we continued our drive post lunch, we could see the mount in the distance as we rolled through the hills of north western Bretagne (Brittany).

When we finally reached our destination, we walked from the car toward the fortress/castle/monastery/cloister/village that is Mont St. Michel. It was impressive enough from the outside alone, but once we crossed the drawbridge and entered the bustling city, it was incredible. As if we'd been transported back in time to the middle ages during a festival, there were banners and colorfully painted signs, narrow paved streets and suits of armor displayed at every other window. I envy the people who still live here and get to experience it on a daily basis because it is truly spectacular.

We climbed the twisting, steep streets, and climbed countless stairs. If there was one complaint about the day, it was that there were too many stairs. I got blisters on my blisters despite being in good, comfortable shoes padded with moleskin. But it was absolutely worth it and entirely beautiful.

I've had incredible luck here with the weather, its been more than a week and every day has been sunny and warm. The day at Mont St. Michel was no exception and so though we perspired as we traversed up the mountain, the sunshine on the water and surrounding greenery was magnificent.

Once we reached the monastery itself though, everything became cool grey stone, it was almost chilly. Winding staircases led us to wide rooms full of historical importance and architectural detail, we passed a giant wooden wheel that was somehow used to lift food to prisoners when the island was used as a prison during the Revolution, and at the very top found the cloister gardens surrounded by some of the prettiest, most intricate stone work I've ever seen.

Once the tour was complete, we made our way down out through the town, tired but satisfied with our journey. It was getting late and we still had a two hour drive before us to get back to Nantes, so Dad and I expected our trip to Saint Malo to be cut. Instead, Michel insisted not only on making our way there, but stopping at various tourist points along the way.

It seems like every single tourist point in France has a set of steps you must climb in order to get the best view or full experience or whatever else. We climbed up the side of a cliff that overlooked the ocean, and at that point I was so tired I was ready to just jump into the water, it looked so cool and inviting after our previous hot walks.

Finally, we made it to Saint Malo. It is a gorgeous seaside town and if you ever have two days to spend in the northwest of France, suggest you spend them visiting Mont St. Michel and Saint Malo, but not both in the same day if you value both your feet and your sanity. After climbing up one last tower to look at the city and the ocean, again, we descended and began looking for somewhere to eat and found a little creperie that was just to our tastes. We shared a bottle of cider which is not like the American version I quickly found out, but was still very good regardless. I had a chocolate banana crepe because after a day of walking, sometimes all you really need is chocolate.

Our drive home through the dark was quiet, I think we all fell asleep from exhaustion, with the exception of our driver and zealous tour guide. All in all, it was a lovely day, I just wish we hadn't had to walk up those last six flights of stairs in the apartment in order to get to bed.

American WWII Cemetery

Hello once more! It's been quite a while since I posted, ever since the somewhat traumatizing event of the escargot. Your patience shall be rewarded with not one, but two posts today. First up is the side trip we took before heading to Mont St. Michel and Saint Malo. Danuta packed a picnic lunch for us and then the four of us hit the car and drove the two or so hours to the Normandy/Brittany boarder.

Dad and I were both fairly disappointed that we weren't going to get to see the Normandy beaches after our previous plan fell through, so Michel decided that as a compromise, we would stop at the American Cemetery near Mont St. Michel before continuing on to our picnic lunch.

It was an absolutely beautiful day with clear blue skies, and there were roses in bloom everywhere. Despite all that these men suffered during the war, I couldn't help but think that there wasn't a more beautiful place to be laid to rest. They might not have ever made it home, but the perfect stillness and silence of the area, the shady trees with their collection of birds, and the blossoming roses gave a peaceful, comforting aura.

There was a beautiful little chapel that bore a small altar as well as illustrations of the war in French and English, and stained glass windows. Someone had left a beautiful bouquet of flowers at the steps of the altar, with a ribbon in the colors of the German flag.

The gravestones seemed to go on for miles, though I'm sure this one was much smaller than the other located near the D-day beaches. We walked through, reading some of the names and wishing we had the time to read them all. It was one of the saddest and most beautiful things I'd

ever seen. As we began the walk back to the car, the clock struck noon and the bells of the chapel rang out, not with the usual chimes but with the song of the American military I believe is what Dad called it. The bells played four songs, sad but somehow with an edge of hopefulness or at least as hopeful as one can get in a minor key.

War isn't something that I particularly like, nor do many people. I just don't understand why people feel the need to fight with each other when things could be solved much more simply and with considerably less loss of life. But something about the cemetery and those bells ringing out across the otherwise silent grounds made me both sad and proud to be an American. Those boys gave everything they had to our country, but why did they have to go to war in the first place? Nothing is ever so necessary that young people are taken from their homes, willingly or not, and never get to see their families and home again.

...and so they made me something else...

I have two lovely days to write about, but I've recently suffered a bit of a shock and therefore must plan to catch you lot up when I get to the hotel in Paris tomorrow.

Let me just start this brief bit off by saying, I'm really not a seafood person. I'm a Midwestern girl through and through, and if I could, I'd subsist on a diet of corn, beef, soybeans, pork, lemonade, and water. So when the family we're staying with had fish for two meals during one day, I put on my suffer in silence face and ate it. Lunch was quite good, dinner was tolerable if considerably more fishy. I hoped I'd gotten it all out of the way.

Yesterday, we went to Mont St. Michel and I have tons of lovely photos to post someday soon. Danuta insisted we stop in a seaside town on our way to Saint Malo for a walking tour, after walking up the ten million steps that is Mont St. Michel. In this little town, she bought about two pounds of oysters. Oysters are perhaps the one seafood that I will never make myself eat. I've even managed fried kalamari during a science-y exhibition thing, but oysters are just a no.

So today we had oysters for lunch, and dinner. I passed them up both times and ate a bit of everything else. They were making fun of me but I thought I was taking it fairly well when Michel asked if I'd tried escargot, I said no but that I supposed I would. A jumble of French and about ten minutes later, there were snails on my plate.

You can get the full story later, but that is my excuse for why I haven't written anything big with pictures and flowery words lately.

And yes, I did eat one. But just the one. As Danuta helpfully said: "Une fois ça suffit. One time is enough"

Day 2: another new time zone. sweet

Greetings once more from the lovely Nantes!

The title of my post comes from the difficulty I've had adjusting to the new time zone. This morning I woke up at 5:45am....the time back home which wasn't exactly concurrent with the 11:45am France time. Ooops.

Once he hauled me out of bed, Dad and I walked into town to mail some things to the cousins in Italy, and a few letters that Danuta asked him to send. I thought I knew French, but when trying to communicate with the worker at the post office, things got quite turned around and she and the other patrons thought we were Italians. Apparently because it was the last language I learned my numbers in, those were the numbers I was using. Whoops once again.

We had two hours to walk around before Danuta wanted us back for lunch, so we walked around the beautiful streets of Nantes, and got a few pastries to soothe our slightly ruffled feathers after the post office difficulty.

Dad got a red fruit crumble, I got a chocolate eclair with chocolate creme inside. We ate the

pastries on the steps of the cathedral with some university students taking their lunch break.

Afterwards, more trekking around and trying to familiarize ourselves with the city and find the epicerie, grocery store, to get the things Danuta had given us a list of to bring back. A very kind security guard at a department store pointed the way: down the stairs. This was a very classy looking establishment, not unlike a Macy's or other nice department store, but it had a legitimate grocery store in the basement, complete with ev

erything from fresh produce (and the little sprinklers keeping them moist) to a ham on display in the butcher section all decked out with the little chef's hat things on it's lopped off limbs.

Lunch was more of Danuta's brilliant cooking, a chicken/apple/rice salad, and tomatoes with vinegarette to start, followed by some kind of fish that I made myself eat (I am a strict non-eater of fish of all kinds in general) it had a hollandaise sauce on it and honestly wasn't half bad. There were also some delicious buttery potatoes, and of

course, baguette with any of three different kinds of cheese (I had Camembert).

After lunch we all had a brief siesta and the Marie took us on a tour of the chateau, which is absolutely gorgeous. While walking around the ramparts I leaned out one of the windows and a boy sitting in the grass by the moat below blew me a kiss. Very storybook like. The tour only strengthened my resolve to get a castle of my own, there's really no beating the thrill of looking out over the city with a moat rushing beneath and splendid gardens all around. Plus, it's a castle. And it made me feel like a princess.

Sadly, I forgot my camera for that bit of the trip, but afterwards we walked along the streets while Marie made another trip to the post office, Dad and I kept safely out of the way this time. After more walking around, we stopped and had some ice cream. Dad got caramel and butter, Marie got cafe, and I stuck with the good old mint chocolate chip, only they called it After Eight and it tasted more like real mint than the American stuff. Yum.

We returned just in time to help prepare for dinner, which I managed to sneak a picture of.

The first course was a salad of grapefruit and prawns with a sauce of mayonnaise and creme fraiche. I'm not a huge prawn fan, but apparently today was a fish day because the prawns were followed by some salmon, and more of the potatoes from lunch time. Then came the salad which I made under Danuta's tutelage. It had a nice vinegarette, apples, cheese, and walnuts that I made a huge mess of cracking before Dad stepped in to show me. Apparently he's quite the pro at it because his family actually cracked walnuts around the dinner table when they were in season. Cheese and bread followed, and then of course dessert which was the same chocolate cake that we had last night.

I skyped with Mom and my brothers today, and of course the cats. We had a lovely chat and as of now the youngest brother and I are at war with awkward pictures we take of each other and then post to Facebook.

Overall, we had a great day and I'm really looking forward to tomorrow! But you all must wait for that because, despite of the 5:52pm time stamp this might have, it's actually almost midnight here and we have to get up early.

Day 1: A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step

Preparations for this trip have been going on for ages, organizing places for me to stay, getting packed, getting presents for friends, and trying to decide if I was flying alone or not.

I am incredibly terrified of flying. It may not be a primal fear that made my cry as a baby like my distaste for elevators, as my mother likes to point out, but it's much more emotionally and occasionally crippling. So after much begging and pleading, we finally decided about four days before I was set to leave that my dad would fly over with me, stay for a week, and then go home. I'm not allowed to worry about what happens when I fly home, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Good thing he came with me too, because as we were going down the little shoot they send you through to give you a taste of the claustrophobia and increase the tension before actually getting on the plane, I tried to make a run for it. Did I mention earlier that the thought of flying is emotionally crippling?

Well Dad and the very kind and understanding stewardess finally got me on the plane, and after a last ditch call for reassurance from Mom, the xanax finally worked and I calmed down enough to not hyperventilate anymore and managed to keep it together for the rest of the ride. As we were disembarking, the woman of the couple who'd been sitting behind us patted my arm and assured me I'd done fine. It was very kind of her as I'd been quite embarrassed about the scene I made before the drugs kicked in to calm my anxiety. She then informed me that she and her husband would be flying all the way to Paris with us. I'm sure she had her fingers crossed that this time they would be nowhere near us.

A four hour layover in JFK, and a couple hours

of getting sick later, We were ready to board the much larger and longer flight that would take us to Paris.

Here's dad looking much happier and better than me in the airport during the layover.

Boarding this one wasn't nearly so bad because, for some reason my fear of planes is like my fear of snakes: the smaller it is, the scarier. Also, I remembered to take my xanax on time before the flight and was sufficiently chill by the time it was ready to go.

We made it to our seats and right across the aisle was the couple from the first flight. The husband and I sat across the aisle from each other and had a silent bonding over our mutual fear of flying as we gripped the arm of our seats and clutched the hand of our travel companion. I'll admit it though, once the plane got in the air, it was very pleasant. They played that movie with Russell Brand, the remake of the old British comedy Arthur, which I didn't watch.

Three hours of Merlin and four Sudokus later, they served dinner which was quite good. They showed the newest episode of 30 Rock and I fell asleep in the first ten minutes of Parks & Rec. Dad and I got lucky, we were in the middle column, but there wasn't a third person in our row so he had more leg room and I was able to lounge across the extra seat. Breakfast was a nice warm croissant with strawberry jam, orange juice, and coffee.

A bumpy but successful landing later, we were in France! We collected our baggage and took the train from Charles De Gaulle into Paris. After some freshening up, and major confusion, we found the lockers and stowed our bags. Our train to Nantes on the west coast of France didn't leave until seven that night and it was about eight in the morning. We struck out from the Montparnasse station, passed the huge black skyscraper that is, I believe, the only skyscraper actually in Paris instead of the suburbs, and found ourselves only a few blocks away from one of our favorite places in Paris.

The Jardin de Luxembourg is beautiful. I'd never seen it anytime except for the spring, so the

early signs of fall were new to me, but it is equally lovely. We walked for a while and saw the chateau in the middle of the gardens and then went to find lunch on Rue Mouffetard where we found a great little bistro/take away that had an olive oil drenched foccacia for dad, and a crepe with ham, cheese, and egg for me. They also had a fantastic chocolate gelato with actual bits of French chocolate in it.but just as lovely. We walked around, gazed at the lovely

After lunch, it was back to the gardens for us, and we both took a brief nap in the fantastically comfortable chairs by the pond. We still had a few hours until the train, but neither of us wanted to miss it so we set off for the station to claim our luggage and wait. A train ride later, we were in Nantes and our French friends Michele and his daughter Marie were waiting to take us back to the family home. Michele and his wife, Polish born Danuta, have six children, but only the youngest is home. Dinner was absolutely delicious, ham and melon, then a chicken and tomato pastry and salad, followed by the cheese, and then finally a fantastic chocolate cake garnished with strawberries.

So that was yesterday, and here we are in France!

Crazy Ideas

For the time being, let's pretend like all pasts posts don't exist and none of you have any idea who I am.

We're introduced at a party and, as usual, talk turns to plans for the future and what we do for jobs/education etc. In May, I couldn't have told you anything specific, just an awkward shoulder shrug and silence and then a desperate jump to a different topic. Well as of July, I could finally give people definite answers: I'm going to France for three months. This, shockingly, was my mother's idea, she's been a Francophile for forever and has passed on to me not only her eyes and questionable attitude about rules but her love for the French and France as well.

Now, most people have been asking me if this is a study abroad thing, something to do with school, and I've been saying no, this has nothing to with school or any other educational organizations. But since I've been here, a grand total of about fifty hours, I have a new answer for that question: Yes. It is a study abroad, a study of myself, of languages, of culture, of life. It may not have any scholastic value, unless I end up a language major which at this rate looks very likely to happen, but the value I will get from this experience is better than anything I could get at school.