Seeing and hearing the ARTs

This morning when I was headed toward the metro I saw a wonderous sight. The Eiffel Tower compassed by clouds so you couldn't see the top. There were plenty of people jogging around the Parc du Champ de Mars. Could you blame them? I mean if I had this thing around the corner and could see it change with the seasons I would be tempted to get up everyday and jog around. The metro was not bad, I've been intimidated about taking the metro before I came here. If you were a suburban girl who uses a car to get around everywhere, wouldn't you be a bit afraid of sitting in something that goes underground? Especially with all those bombings and such that have been on the news lately, they all helped to fuel fire to my fears. Fortunately I survived and a nice lady even pushed the door button when, of course, the door nearest to me wouldn't open at the stop I needed to get out. Can you say tourist? I felt like I had that stamped in bold letters on my forehead, but that moment passed and I followed the people out of the underground. My first stop was the Musee d'Orsay where plenty of Impressionist works of art are displayed. The building itself used to be an old train museum so there was plenty of space. I had downloaded Rick Steves' Orsay Museum audio guide which helped to give me direction so I wasn't wandering aimlessly around just looking without purpose. There is this tower looking place on the otherside of the large clock inside the building where you can climb up to get a good view of the whole thing, but my hands were shaky and I really couldn't get a clear picture. (I think it was that cafe au lait I had before going in the museum, three lumps of sugar with coffee could do that to a system I suppose =) There was this one room at the 5th floor where you can look out through the backwards clock (this one you could see correctly outside the museum) and get a glimpse of Sacre Coeur. Now the thing I like about the Orsay is that it mostly focuses on the Impressionist and I really like the way they use light in their works. I'm sure you've all heard of some of these Impressionist i.e. Claude Monet, Van Goh, Renoir and Degas but today I found a few more less well known artist who's works I like. They are Henri Edmond Corss, George Lemmen, William Degouve de Nuncques and Austide Maillol. Now most of these men that I have just mentioned do pointillism, but if you see the picutres most of you science people will say "hey that looks like stippling" and it does in some sorts. Now I tried to take a picture of what one of these paintings look like but it won't do justice to the real thing. I have postcards of it but I'll have to scan it in later when I get home.

One of the surprises in the Orsay was this very ornate ballroom they had. You don't expect a ballroom in an old train station but there it was. Various sculptures were placed around the room, the ceilings were painted and as you can see gold is everywhere in the room. Here is a one-arm picture of me in the room, there was no one around who I could ask to take my picture.



After the Orsay, I walked along the Pont Des Arts which has a great view of the tip (where there is a park) of Ile de la Cite. Sometimes they have exhibitions of artwork on this bridge hence the name but today it was just a nice place to rest and get a view of some of the bridges of Paris.


The Louvre was nearby and I figured it's time to pay hommage to another famous Parisan-La Jaconde or as we know her the Mona Lisa. Now I was a good, rule obeying person and so I didn't try to sneak in a picture of her like some other tourist who then had the guard go up to them and try to take their camera away. Honestly! Can't people learn how to obey instructions? LOL Now I'm sure after watching the Da Vinci Code most of you have heard that her eyes follow you. So I tried it and it's true! The way Da Vinci painted her does give you that feeling. Also I was good and didn't ignore the other works of art in the room, why just across from La Jaconde was a very large painting by Paolo Veronese about the first miracle Jesus performed. Again I used Rick Steves Louvre Tour on my iPod and I must say it was very helpful and cheap. It's free and you don't have to pay the 5euro that is the average cost for most audioguides. After my tour on the iPod was done I figured I'd use up more time before dinner to wander around the Egyptian wing. I only got a picture of a replica of the Sphinx before my thirst overwhelmed me and the crowds of school age children stiffled me so I had to get out for some fresh air. Body odor is not a pleasant smell anywhere!

Now for those of you who are curious I had lunch at a cafe in the Deono wing of the Louvre. By the time I left the Orsay that croissant and cafe au lait I had for breakfast was long gone and my stomach was protesting. What did I have? Beats me it was the dish of the day and the waiteress told me twice in French (I may have been joking about my brown skin camouflaging me being an American but it's true! People just keep sprouting off to me in French even though I tell them I don't speak French that well but English they just continue on in French.). I had ordered a classic meal which came with an entree, main dish and desert. The entree was a croque monsieur, which is a nice French way of saying a toasted ham and cheese sandwhich, now I did as the locals and ate that thing with my fork and knife. Go ahead and laugh now, I know most of you want to! I was so hungry I forgot to take a picture of it, that tells you just how hungry I was. I did take a picture of my plat du jour, which was a roasted pork and al dente pasta. It was delicious! There was some kind of berry gravey on top of the meat and so the sweetness it was a nice surprise. Now I guess I didn't communicate very well in French to the waitress so when I was trying to order a Perrier, I ended up getting the check! She was nice enough to not include the desert that I was supposed to get to the bill, so I wasn't upset about it.

After all the crowds at the Louvre I decided to go to an underappreciated museum that was covered by my pass, the Musee de la Monie. Yup a money museum, before the whole European Union thing I used to collect coins from different countries that my dad or other relatives would visit. I must say it was nice having a museum all to one's self. This musuem is still a nice side trip and it's not that far from the Ponts des Arts. They show you how money was made years ago and then there is also an exhibition of the current currency around the world today. I can definitely say that this is a hidden gem among all of the museums in Paris.

Then since the Ile de la Cite was nearby I figured why not head to another famous Paris landmark...Notre Dame. Wow! Inside they had some kind of choir practice going on and I took a seat to listen. Words cannot describe the feeling of being in that church and hearing these wonderful voices singing. I got more goosebumps here than I did when I saw the Mona Lisa earlier. It was wonderful, like Hallelujah Chorus wonderful but it was in French and the conductor kept stopping them to correct them. But when they sang a whole song through...amazing! Anyways by that time my feet were screaming "I want a pedicure! Stop walking! Put us up so blood can circulate!" so I headed back to my hotel. I left Ile de la Cite and tried to find a taxi stand, along the way I ran into an Igloo. Yup there is an Igloo in Paris, I guess this is one of the places where they have an open ice rink but it wasn't open yet. Bob I just want you to know that I am keeping my promise about not taking the metro at night but tonight I was sooo tempted to break it because it took me almost 30min before I could flagg down an available tax, they were not hanging around the stands marked "taxi" for some reason!

Pounding the pavement in Paris

Today was my first full day in Paris. I'm glad that my friends insisted I buy tennis shoes to wear on this trip and my feet are especially thankful for that suggestion. Now I took a pedometer with me, but I think it's broken because it says I only walked 28, 161 steps. That's crazy! I walked more than that, if you just look at the map I covered plenty of ground but I digress. Let's see the plan for today was to visit the Rodin Museum and Musee de l'Armee in the morning, then in the afternoon it was the Musee de l'Orangerie and the Louvre. What ended up happening was me walking around the block of the Rodin Museum because even though I left my hotel around 8am the museum wasn't open until 9:30am. So I tried looking for a cafe that wasn't too crowded and ended up finding a bakery where I got a small loaf of bread the size of my fist and a brioche au sucre, which is just French for bread with sugar on top. I walked around the neighborhood not wandering far from the main streets and came up this church which had plenty of flying butresses. (Architecture: a segmental arch transmitting an outward and downward thrust to a solid buttress that through its inertia transforms the thrust into a vertical one.)It was the Church of Saint Clotilde and I had my small breakfast of bread in front of it as I admired the architectural style of the building.
The Rodin Museum still wasn't open when I finished my meager breakfast so I decided to follow the walls around the Rodin Museum. I found the building of Ariculture, the President's Place, the Vice-President's place and a school. By the time I made it around the whole block it was near opening time so I just stood in line with a few others until they let us in the Museum. Now I read about the Rodin Museum in the book Kissing Adrien by Siri Mitchell and I wanted to see the 'Hands of God', 'The Kiss', 'The Gates of Hell' and of course the ever famous 'the Thinker' sculpture that Rodin made. Can I just say that being so close up to these works of art is amazing! You can see where the instruments that he used in molding these things are on the sculpture.

The building where the Rodin Museum is also had some of his sculptures in the garden, which was a beautiful garden by the way. I can only imagine what it must look like in the spring when the flowers are in bloom.

Then it was off to the Musee de l'Armee. I first went into the the Army Museum French War wing, at least I think it was the French War. The place had huge amounts of armor and weaponry. They had knight's armor that you see in those Fairy Tales, swords, daggers, lances, archery material and even horse armor. It was awesome! If you're a guy, this is your kind of museum. But I could so easily picture a knight riding up his white horse with all the things they had in this wing. Then it was time to pay homage to one of the most famous short person and Frenchmen in all of History, Napoleon Bonaparte. His tomb is located under the golden dome and you have to go down the steps to actually see it. For a small guy he has a really big coffin!

By the time I was done paying my homage to Napoleon my stomach was starting to protest at such a small breakfast I had. So I walked up the Esplanade des Invaldides (park area in front of the museum) and onto the Pont Alexander III (bridge) looking to find my way to Rue de Rivoli where Angelina's is located. I had heard that Angelina has the best hot chocolate in Paris and since I really didn't have a breakfast drink that sounded so good. Plus it was near the next museum on my list of things to see. What I hadn't counted on was seeing and walking around the Place de la Concorde, which is this huge roundabout area. There is an obelisk right in the center of it and in the days of the French Revolution this was where the guillotine used to be. A lavish fountain is on either side of this monument.

Lunch was at Angelina and I must say that the hype about their hot chocolate, chocolat l'African was true. It was full bodied, thick,rich and you could add as much cream to the mixture to help diffuse the richness of the chocolate. Bon! I ordered something that I read as beef du Angelina, which sounded really good. What I got on the otherhand was something unexpected. I ended up ordering steak tartare, yes that is raw meat on my plate with a side of salade and French fries. Did I eat it? Yup! All the raw meat along with that egg yolk. I had read beforehand that steak tartare is a French delicacy but I certainly wasn't planning it for lunch today. Oh well, part of my gastronomic experience. Plus the Perrier helped with the digestion of the whole meal.

I took a little break to help with that rather filling meal to sit and watch the ducks in one of the fountains at the Jardin des Tuileries. Also wrote down some notes in my small handy-dandy notebook and a postcard. Then it was off to see Monet, Renoir, Cezanne, Derain, and Chaim Soutine just to name a few painters who's works are shown at the Musee de l'Orangerie. Seeing their paintings up close was just awe-inspiring, you can see each of their brush strokes and how the light plays off the bumps of the acrylic or paint. Wow! But the most wonderful thing about this museum was the 'Water Lillies' series, several of which are planked on all four walls of an oval room. (Yes I know that is an oxymoron, but there is such a room and you should go to L'Orangerie if you don't belive me.). There are two oval rooms and if you sit still in them you will notice the lighting changes and it affects the paintings on the wall. It is such a soothing place to sit and visit. My pictures do not do these things justic so I will just leave it up to your imagination. Then I took some time to sit and watch these little kids playing with sailboats in the fountain at the Jardin des Tuileries. It was just like being in a living painting. I had meant to go to the Louvre after dinner since on Wed. it is open until 9:45pm but first I needed to get an adaptor so I saw that the Galeries Lafayette wasn't too far away. Talk about a mall! This place was huge and it had two smaller buildings next to the main one all of which are located behind the Opera Garnier. There was lots and lots of people, not just tourist but your everday Frenchman as well. I ended up walkin three times between all three buildings trying to locate the department that had electrical wall adapters. It was located in the bottome of the Lafayette Masion building in the back corner past all the lovely housewares and kitchen appliances. So if you ever come to Paris and forget your electrical adaptor, now you know where to get it and won't spend almost two hours like me walking around three different buildings. Needless to say I was exhausted! In the Lafayette Gourmet store I got a sandwich, bottled water and cookies then flagged down a taxi since it was dark (and I made a promise to "Bob" about doing this =) and asked him to take me to the Eiffel Tower. Where I had my picnic lunch with the lights of the tower gleaming down on me as I sat on a park bench to give my feet a rest before their final walk back to my hotel.

Bonjour Paris!

I am in Paris! Little me is in the City of Lights! The flight was uneventful and though I did panic a bit when going through customs they took a while, but fortunately my connecting flight didn't board on time. Eventually I made it to CDG and my luggage came along too. The driver I had requested pick me up was there and so I didn't even have to worry about waiting. I've come to the conclusion that airports are all alike. Sure they may be located in different places around the world but you go through the same motions. You check in your luggage, get your boarding pass, head to the gate, turn in your boarding pass, take your seat and wait for the flight to begin, then you land, get off the plane, go to your next gate where your connecting flight is located (if you're in a foreign country you go through customs) and repeat: head into gate, turn in your boarding pass, take your seat, wait for flight to begin, land, get off plane, hope your luggage comes in at the baggage claim and leave the airport. It doesn't matter where you are the same pattern goes.
So what did I do on day one of my Paris trip? Well first I had lunch at SFO, those window sills are nice to place your camera so you can use the self timer to take a picture of you. Then when I got to Paris on the freeway I was able to just catch a glimpse of the Sacre Coeur. And as we got off the freeway my shuttle circled around the Arc de Triomphe. Of course after I checked into my hotel it was only about 3pm and most French people don't eat dinner until 7pm, so I decided to walk around this part near my hotel. Can you belive what they have in their parks out here?! I ended up walking around the Parc du Champs de Mars like three times trying to let time pass and still it was too early for a typical Parisian dinner. But I was so hungry I just gave up and walked to Rue Cler where Rick Steve's recommended eating at Cafe du Marche. I had their Oceane Salad, which was pan seared salmon with rice. It was absolutely delicious! The salmon still maintained its fishy taste with out over doing it and the rice was actually couscous with raisins which gave it a surprisingly sweet taste. (For those of you who know me taking pictures of food shouldn't surprise you. =)

Butterflies forming in preparation for departure

It's the night before I leave for my trip to Paris and my stomach is in knots. I'm re-reading one of the books that inspired me to go on this trip "Gutsy Women:more travel tips and wisdom for the road" by Marybeth Bond. This book is very practical and can help answer most of the common questions people ask about solo travel. In the beginning of the second chapter the author has a quote from another writer which describes how I'm feeling right now. "Is there anything as horrible as starting on a trip? Once you're off, that's all right, but the last moments are earthquake and convulsion, and the feeling that you are a snail being pulled off your rock"~Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift from the Sea. There will definitely be plenty of prayer said along this trip with the way the butterflies are fluttering right now!

Thanksgiving Meal

I woke up this morning around 5am because I had told my mother this year I would do the cooking and she could have a break. Hahahaha! Boy did I not know what I was up against! I had orginally wanted to make the whole meal from scratch. Inspired by Alton Brown on the FoodNetwork about using a brine instead of basting the turkey I went to work. The day before I had put the turkey in the brine mix and tucked the bucket in the coldest part of the house-the mud room. Also I had mashed the sweet potato before hand to save myself some time since we had a Thanksgiving Service at church. Yes, our church has a service on Thanksgiving day and I know most people spend the whole day with their families but this is a tradition with us. (Plus the one time I worked on Thanksgiving day I discovered that sometimes one day is too much with family members since they do call the police to help mediate the family feud.) I ended up just making the sweet potatoe casserole, peach cobbler, green bean casserole and turkey from scratch. Both the stuffing and the mashed potatoes were from a box and let's not even go to the gravey. (Perhaps next year it will turn out better. I have a whole year to practice getting it right.)
So how did the meal end up? Well the turkey was gone, the mashed potatoes and green beans had half gone and only an 1/8th of the sweet. Here's the thing about My People that I forgot...if it doesn't go with rice it won't get eaten as quickly!

Thankful

There are many things I am thankful for this year but I'm just going to write down the three most important blessings I've had for now..

1. God-He has blessed me abundantly and through his Grace I am assured of where I spend my eternity. He has always been by my side even when it seems others have abandoned me.
   
2. Family-they have been very supportive in all the things I have done or want to do and they have provided the stability I need. I know that I will always have a safe haven when I'm around them, because they accept me for who I am.
   
3. Friends-It's amazing but I've still kept in touch with my college friends some of whom I've not seen in over three years. Also through the wonderful world wide web I've been able to re-connect with high school friends. Of course I am also thankful for my friends at work who help make each shift a little more bearable and sometimes a whole lot of fun.