Thursday, December 31, 2009
New Year's party
Well, I am headed out to a New Year's party. We'll see how this goes... there will be lots of kids, and of course their parents. I can't tell if there will be anyone really MY age, but shall enjoy myself all the same. I would tell you happy new year now, but it's quite early for all of you. So I'll leave that for whenever we get back tomorrow. Hope you all have fun plans!
Wednesday, December 30, 2009
Brat.
I taught someone a new word in English today: Brat. Because there was a kid being an absolutely rotten, horrible brat. I suppose we all have our moments.
Yesterday, I thought about going out. And then I realized it was raining. Raining, raining, raining, all day long. I don't melt in the rain, but at the same time, when one is walking without much of a goal, rain is not the best company. At least not when one has such a limited wardrobe on hand, as is my case here. So I did work. On my thesis. Aren't you proud?? Not too much, don't worry, because I was also playing with the 4 yr old. Later on, the dad and I went out for a beer, to show me a little bit of Lille night life, and it seems like he likes to get out of the house sometimes, too. The mom's sister was maybe going to come, but it turned out today that she fell asleep early instead. At first I didn't know what to say, I'm not very good with new people lots of times, unless they talk a lot. Then once I get comfortable, it's easy. But after a bit, we got talking and had a good time. When we got back to the house, we were talking about whether there were any current French authors worth reading, and so I got a few recommendations. In the form of two large piles of books to flip through, to see if I like the authors. You can't get stuff like that at a hotel.
Today it was nicer out. Me and Mr. 4 read for a while in the morning (yesterday, there was plenty of "sabres lasers" with him being Anakin, and me any random bad guy, so I was very happy to read.) It's interesting to see what's in kids' books different places. Turns out that, for that age, it's mostly the same. But at the same time, different. A boy is sent out by his mom to go shopping at the market. He goes around talking to all of the different merchants. You know, things that don't exist in the US now. I don't know how much they ever did. After lunch, I rectified a serious problem. Well, two, actually. Since arriving, I had not eaten a single crepe! C'est pas possible!! So while wandering in the city center, I got me a crepe au creme de marrons (chestnut creme, such a ridiculously good thing, you have no idea.) I also went into the bookstore a bit, to check out the cooking section. I haven't decided what all I'll bring back, but at least one dessert cookbook. I also got a long-sleeve tee to put under some short sleeve shirts that I brought thinking... well, not thinking, actually. But I can wear them now! I think I will wear one tomorrow...
Yesterday, I thought about going out. And then I realized it was raining. Raining, raining, raining, all day long. I don't melt in the rain, but at the same time, when one is walking without much of a goal, rain is not the best company. At least not when one has such a limited wardrobe on hand, as is my case here. So I did work. On my thesis. Aren't you proud?? Not too much, don't worry, because I was also playing with the 4 yr old. Later on, the dad and I went out for a beer, to show me a little bit of Lille night life, and it seems like he likes to get out of the house sometimes, too. The mom's sister was maybe going to come, but it turned out today that she fell asleep early instead. At first I didn't know what to say, I'm not very good with new people lots of times, unless they talk a lot. Then once I get comfortable, it's easy. But after a bit, we got talking and had a good time. When we got back to the house, we were talking about whether there were any current French authors worth reading, and so I got a few recommendations. In the form of two large piles of books to flip through, to see if I like the authors. You can't get stuff like that at a hotel.
Today it was nicer out. Me and Mr. 4 read for a while in the morning (yesterday, there was plenty of "sabres lasers" with him being Anakin, and me any random bad guy, so I was very happy to read.) It's interesting to see what's in kids' books different places. Turns out that, for that age, it's mostly the same. But at the same time, different. A boy is sent out by his mom to go shopping at the market. He goes around talking to all of the different merchants. You know, things that don't exist in the US now. I don't know how much they ever did. After lunch, I rectified a serious problem. Well, two, actually. Since arriving, I had not eaten a single crepe! C'est pas possible!! So while wandering in the city center, I got me a crepe au creme de marrons (chestnut creme, such a ridiculously good thing, you have no idea.) I also went into the bookstore a bit, to check out the cooking section. I haven't decided what all I'll bring back, but at least one dessert cookbook. I also got a long-sleeve tee to put under some short sleeve shirts that I brought thinking... well, not thinking, actually. But I can wear them now! I think I will wear one tomorrow...
Tuesday, December 29, 2009
Yep, really old.
Grandpa's job? Antique dealer. So that paper was really 463 years old. And the US/France treaty was probably printed in 1778. (It didn't have the signature and seal, though, so not the official original, just the version printed up for other people.) Crazy...
Monday, December 28, 2009
Old.
In museums you see old stuff. Pretty often. Sometimes you find old stuff other places. Like in the UT library, I've checked out books that were published in the 1800s. But today, I had very old paper in my hands. It was crazy. The original of one is dated 1778. A treaty between the US and France. I don't know if the copy I saw was that old, but it was on yellowed thick paper with an uncut edge. And in the old-style typeface. They used a slightly different alphabet then - I think it was used some for English, too - and the spelling was quite a bit different. Still, I could more or less read it.
The other one was definitely older. The estimated date for when the original was written was 1646. I can't imagine someone just handed me something that old, (and it's sort of hard to believe the paper would still hold together at all) but I also don't know how they would have made a copy like that. It's all written in this slanted, scrawly handwriting, quite different from writing today, with loads of old spellings and letters. I could make out very few words. The French people there could make out barely more. And the paper, a thick, dark yellow-brown, had gotten wet in a few spots and the ink there was illegible.
So where the heck was I? Museums don't let you handle the collections! At the house of the dad of the people I am staying with for the next 5 days. The two older kids went to spend the night at grandpa's, where they also have an uncle who is 8. (I said that wasn't too different from my family - though I don't know how old dad's brother is now since I don't really know anything about him... I guessed like 6, but it was a total guess. But the kids are much younger, and their grandpa looks about 60, so still, it's different.) I said something about studying French, and out come these two very fragile-seeming old documents. Amazing.
The apartment I'm in now is just 5 minutes from the center of Lille, but on a fairly quiet street. It is in an old building and I LOVE the place. The mom called it a small apartment, but I think it's a very nice size. 3 bedroom (though one is fairly small) with a decent kitchen, a living room, and a large office. Really neat floors, everything is clean and well taken-care-of. For an apartment in a city, it has a great view. And the family is very nice. Mom teaches English for French homeschool (they have a really well-structured home school system here, I never knew that!) Dad is a project manager for a company that creates websites. Kids are friendly and fine with new people. Well, the 4 yr old took a couple of hours, but what do you expect from a 4 yr old?
As I sit and type, I can look out the window at the city library. May have to go in tomorrow. When I replace my hat. And buy more minutes for my phone. I sort of want to go shopping, especially for warmer things that I can layer (so that they'll be useful in Austin, too) but I know that Les Soldes begin Jan. 6. Giant sales, somehow determined by the government. Everywhere. Well, everywhere that has stock to get rid of. Must find good balance between warmth for the next 9 days and waiting for better prices. I wonder if bookstores participate in them, too...
K, I just looked it up. Books are not allowed by the government to be sold with a discount greater than 5% except in very specific circumstances. Apparently a somewhat controversial law. And now I understand why nobody has a book cheaper than anybody else. Well then, I may have to lose myself in the bookstore one of these days... before the clothing sales begin...
The other one was definitely older. The estimated date for when the original was written was 1646. I can't imagine someone just handed me something that old, (and it's sort of hard to believe the paper would still hold together at all) but I also don't know how they would have made a copy like that. It's all written in this slanted, scrawly handwriting, quite different from writing today, with loads of old spellings and letters. I could make out very few words. The French people there could make out barely more. And the paper, a thick, dark yellow-brown, had gotten wet in a few spots and the ink there was illegible.
So where the heck was I? Museums don't let you handle the collections! At the house of the dad of the people I am staying with for the next 5 days. The two older kids went to spend the night at grandpa's, where they also have an uncle who is 8. (I said that wasn't too different from my family - though I don't know how old dad's brother is now since I don't really know anything about him... I guessed like 6, but it was a total guess. But the kids are much younger, and their grandpa looks about 60, so still, it's different.) I said something about studying French, and out come these two very fragile-seeming old documents. Amazing.
The apartment I'm in now is just 5 minutes from the center of Lille, but on a fairly quiet street. It is in an old building and I LOVE the place. The mom called it a small apartment, but I think it's a very nice size. 3 bedroom (though one is fairly small) with a decent kitchen, a living room, and a large office. Really neat floors, everything is clean and well taken-care-of. For an apartment in a city, it has a great view. And the family is very nice. Mom teaches English for French homeschool (they have a really well-structured home school system here, I never knew that!) Dad is a project manager for a company that creates websites. Kids are friendly and fine with new people. Well, the 4 yr old took a couple of hours, but what do you expect from a 4 yr old?
As I sit and type, I can look out the window at the city library. May have to go in tomorrow. When I replace my hat. And buy more minutes for my phone. I sort of want to go shopping, especially for warmer things that I can layer (so that they'll be useful in Austin, too) but I know that Les Soldes begin Jan. 6. Giant sales, somehow determined by the government. Everywhere. Well, everywhere that has stock to get rid of. Must find good balance between warmth for the next 9 days and waiting for better prices. I wonder if bookstores participate in them, too...
K, I just looked it up. Books are not allowed by the government to be sold with a discount greater than 5% except in very specific circumstances. Apparently a somewhat controversial law. And now I understand why nobody has a book cheaper than anybody else. Well then, I may have to lose myself in the bookstore one of these days... before the clothing sales begin...
Sunday, December 27, 2009
Pictures, you say?
Well... my photo software on here is... lacking. I can't make it save the pictures as turned the way I want them. Um, stupid! But, if you really want pictures, then here we go. Not too many, though, b/c it takes a bit to get them on here.
We begin at sunrise, 30,000 feet above England. Yes, I was over the wing.
Welcome to France, country of fashion, croissants, wine, decadent desserts, and toilets that look like this:
This is an airport toilet. Which means it's nicer than some. See the handy foot-flush? I like that. No dirty handle that I typically push with my foot anyway. But nope, no seat at all. At least I didn't have to pay to use it. You know, beyond the price of the ticket.
From there, time to jump onto a train to Lille!
And this is where I stayed the first four nights! It was actually about 30 min outside of Lille in a cute little town. Tiny town. Perhaps 'hamlet' would be more appropriate. We got a good bit of snow the day after I arrived. It was pretty. And cold.
In Paris, then, here is some chocolate I definitely did NOT buy. I don't even think I could eat that. Too pretty. And then it would all just go to waste, so what's the point?
The view of the Champs Elysees from the Louvre/Tuileries end:
And the crowd around Portrait of the Artist:
And a lesser-but-still-well-known VanGogh that I somehow missed getting a pic of the title:
A poster that would have been SO cool to... re-purpose, but they apparently were aware and kept it behind glass. How cool would that look on my wall? No silly art-nouveau cocoa boy for me, just a gregorian chant concert that was at Notre Dame.
And my middle-of-the-street view from the Arc de Triomph (aka opposite from other pic) end of the Champs Elysees.
Pretty.
We begin at sunrise, 30,000 feet above England. Yes, I was over the wing.
Welcome to France, country of fashion, croissants, wine, decadent desserts, and toilets that look like this:
This is an airport toilet. Which means it's nicer than some. See the handy foot-flush? I like that. No dirty handle that I typically push with my foot anyway. But nope, no seat at all. At least I didn't have to pay to use it. You know, beyond the price of the ticket.From there, time to jump onto a train to Lille!
And this is where I stayed the first four nights! It was actually about 30 min outside of Lille in a cute little town. Tiny town. Perhaps 'hamlet' would be more appropriate. We got a good bit of snow the day after I arrived. It was pretty. And cold.
In Paris, then, here is some chocolate I definitely did NOT buy. I don't even think I could eat that. Too pretty. And then it would all just go to waste, so what's the point?
The view of the Champs Elysees from the Louvre/Tuileries end:
And the crowd around Portrait of the Artist:
And a lesser-but-still-well-known VanGogh that I somehow missed getting a pic of the title:
A poster that would have been SO cool to... re-purpose, but they apparently were aware and kept it behind glass. How cool would that look on my wall? No silly art-nouveau cocoa boy for me, just a gregorian chant concert that was at Notre Dame.
And my middle-of-the-street view from the Arc de Triomph (aka opposite from other pic) end of the Champs Elysees.
Pretty.
Rainy Sundays are good for sleeping in.
Especially when you stay up til 6. Everyone is now awake and breakfasted. I was up for a bit around noon, because I had drank all the water in my bottle and needed more and then once I did that I couldn't get back to sleep. But we had fun yesterday and last night. It's neat, everybody who lives here gets along pretty well and they actually eat meals together and clean up together. Probably not all the time, but often. I'm sure it's related to how meals are treated in general here.
Turned out that the market is on SUNday, not Saturday, so in the morning we mostly hung around a bit. Then in the afternoon, went out to eat something around 4:30 and get food to make dinner (that we ended up not making because, really, when you eat at 4:30, who wants to eat a lot again at 8 or 9?) After that, we came back here and hung out. Not doing anything in particular - talking, listening to music. Then we went to a really relaxed bar a couple of blocks away (luckily! since we were walking and it was COLD. Oh, and I lost a glove *and* my hat somewhere between my hotel in Paris and the train station here. The hat was old and ugly, and the gloves were super cheap (though still warm) so it's not a huge loss, just a major annoyance when one is cold.) There was a guy DJing at the bar, and one of the guys here is really into that. Like mixing and 'scratching' and stuff, not like lame-o radio DJing. It was interesting to see someone doing that. It seems like it's a bigger thing here, too. Or maybe I just don't the 'right' people at home. After that, more music, talking, some dancing. And around 5:15 we sort of realized the time and everyone wound down and wandered off to bed. Quite nice.
I may post again here before I leave, but tomorrow I'm going to stay with a family for about 5 days and I don't know what their internet situation is, so consider yourselves warned to be patient.
Turned out that the market is on SUNday, not Saturday, so in the morning we mostly hung around a bit. Then in the afternoon, went out to eat something around 4:30 and get food to make dinner (that we ended up not making because, really, when you eat at 4:30, who wants to eat a lot again at 8 or 9?) After that, we came back here and hung out. Not doing anything in particular - talking, listening to music. Then we went to a really relaxed bar a couple of blocks away (luckily! since we were walking and it was COLD. Oh, and I lost a glove *and* my hat somewhere between my hotel in Paris and the train station here. The hat was old and ugly, and the gloves were super cheap (though still warm) so it's not a huge loss, just a major annoyance when one is cold.) There was a guy DJing at the bar, and one of the guys here is really into that. Like mixing and 'scratching' and stuff, not like lame-o radio DJing. It was interesting to see someone doing that. It seems like it's a bigger thing here, too. Or maybe I just don't the 'right' people at home. After that, more music, talking, some dancing. And around 5:15 we sort of realized the time and everyone wound down and wandered off to bed. Quite nice.
I may post again here before I leave, but tomorrow I'm going to stay with a family for about 5 days and I don't know what their internet situation is, so consider yourselves warned to be patient.
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Wazemmes
I'm staying, til the 28th, in an area of Lille called Wazemmes. It's supposed to be very cool. I've figured out two things: It's very international. The people I'm staying with are cool. There's a couple, and then a guy and a girl who live here. All are near my age, 3 work, one is in school still. They remind me somewhat of people I know. Some of the movies they own: Pulp Fiction, Requiem for a Dream, Little Miss Sunshine. That may not help some of you, but others should get an idea. Today we're going to go to an outdoor market right near here that's pretty popular. So this is me, off!
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