THEY'RE UP!
Okay, so I
finally got up the last of the entries about my initial trip. What a relief!! I tweaked the dates so they're in order (heh, heh), so here are links to each message, if you're interested in reading them.
Day 6Day 7Day 8Day 9And just FYI, Mary Ann and I have decided to spend the break in northwestern France: the Loire Valley, Normandy, and Brittany. We're really excited, of course. :o)
I hope you're all doing wonderfully. My family and friends are in my thoughts and prayers daily. God's blessings on you all!
One Month in Cavaillon!
(Before I begin, let me try to express my sincere disappointment that this blog hasn't been more orderly this past month. I'm still clinging to the idea of posting the rest of my entries about my initial trip, but alas, it'll have to wait.)Yep, tomorrow is the one month anniversary of my arrival in
Cavaillon. There's no way I can summarize what this month has been like, though I can run through some major themes and events. (There's time enough for all the little stuff later. I've got a Works document
full of the beginnings of many a post on life in France that I can't wait to share.)
The family I'm living with is awesome. It's a great fit for everyone, I think.
I was homesick for the first week or so, but only when I let myself think about it. Since then, I've been great for the most part. (Don't get me wrong: I still miss you all!) BIG PRAISE.
I'm getting used to the town and finding my way around. It's a fun little adventure in itself.
The church,
EPEC, is small, but great. I'm impatient to get more familiar with the church body, but it's coming bit by bit.
I am one of six language assistants associated with Cavaillon. There are two German girls, an English guy and girl, and a Columbian girl I haven't met yet. There are lots of others in the region, too. The social scene is still kind of settling, but has had a promising start.
Three weeks ago, there were orientation activities/sight-seeing for the language assistants in Avignon and Marseille. They were great for meeting people and for getting a glimpse of two major cities in the region.
Teaching began two weeks ago. The kids are totally excited about learning English. So far it's just been introducing myself, the U.S., Nebraska, and Lincoln -- with a little English vocab thrown in, too. Very easy. The teachers are nice, patient, and seem pleased with me (I think!).
Anyway, that's the long and short of it!
Oh, and by the way, I leave for Paris again tomorrow. :o) School's first twelve-day vacation is Oct. 22nd - Nov. 2nd. The kids have been in school for over a month already. I've been teaching for two weeks. Vacation? Now? For me?? Heck, yes! My friend Mary Ann and I are meeting up at her place in Paris where we'll plan our voyage. Nothing's decided, but I'm pretty sure we'll be keeping it to France. Woo hoo!
My Apologies
My apologies for dropping of the face of the earth like that (again), but I've been without Internet at home for over a week, I think. I knew I'd be kicked off for a couple of days, but it turned into more than that(!). Anyway, I should be back in full force on Monday or Tuesday, though I wouldn't recommend holding your breath. :o)
Oh, and in case you're wondering, I'm using a school computer to write this. Yep, I am officially earning a living again!
And it's time for them to drive me back to Cavaillon, so... until next time!
Day 9: Wed. Sept. 21st -- PARIS (through Th. morning)
Paris photos with titles and some captionsParis photos in slideshow formatWe arrived in Paris and grabbed breakfast. (We narrowly missed “ending up” at McDonald’s. Who wants to go to McDo’s when they’re in Europe??)
We started by going to Notre Dame, passing Pont Neuf on the way. The church was beautiful, of course. Next we headed over to the Saint Chapelle, which has excellent stained glass art (though it’s small and kind of difficult to see).
We then went to the Musée D’Orsay, discovering on the way that we’d have to cut it very short if we wanted to make the train to Giverny. We saw a good part of it (wow!) and promptly left.
We booked it to the train station only to find that our information was incomplete and we had actually missed the last train to Giverny. Shoot. Plan B: going up the Eiffel Tower. (I love how that was our Plan B!)
The Eiffel Tower was neat. It truly is an architectural masterpiece, and the view is pretty fantastic. [For any who plan to go, my advice would be to save money and give the very top a miss, because the second (of three) levels was better in both my and Elissa’s opinions… but it depends on what you want.]
We had time before Elissa’s train to Madrid, so we went over to the Arche de Triomphe and walked down the Champs Élysées a ways.
(Singing the whole time in my head, “Oh, Champs Élysées! Oh, Champs Élysées…”)We retrieved Elissa’s luggage (no extra charge!) and she got on her train for Madrid.
(deep breath) Okay, onward!
I then got on the metro and found my hostel, which wasn’t too difficult. I liked my room, which was good, because I had paid a chunk extra to have one to myself (with its own shower, etc.). I relaxed. I slept. Ahh.
-------
I dreamt about home again (something I did just about every night -- like I had to give it and the people there an appointed share of brain activity).
-------
I left pretty directly in the morning and spent way too much time trying to find an Internet café. Way to much time. I
wanted to check for a response from Patrice (my host dad) to ensure that they were, indeed, expecting me to show up on their doorstep that afternoon, courtesy of my school principal, who’d get me from the train station in Avignon to Cavaillon, and my new home. Anyway, no luck.
I retrieved my luggage, and had to pay a sum for it (which I had expected until Elissa got off the hook). Managing my luggage was comparatively easy this time. :o)
I got on the train to Avignon, and a new adventure began.
Day 8: Tue. Sept. 20th -- VENICE
Venice photos with titles and some captionsVenice photos in slideshow formatThe first thing on our
schedule (even though I wasn‘t allowed to use that word on the trip, strictly speaking) was the Piazza St. Marco, which was cool… and full of pigeons. We also went in the church, which was remarkable because, 1) it has beautiful gold tiling everywhere, and 2) the marble floor is uneven because, hey, it’s Venice!
Upon leaving the church, we found that the tide had invaded the piazza, which meant we had to find a different way back to our hostel, where we were supposed to meet someone (who didn‘t show). Before finding our way back we perused the area shops, which house lots and lots of masks. We treated ourselves to a snack that looked uncannily like a large wedge of chocolate brownie, but alas! it sure wasn’t.
Our goal for the afternoon was to find a couple others and share a gondola ride (‘cause they’re expensive!). We had zero luck for a long time and were about to give up when we found a young British couple who were up for it. What a fun experience.
We finished with lots of time to kill before our night train back to Paris and so wandered, ate, and showed up to the station early/on time for a change. This night train was much less notable. There was an Italian guy, a Pakistani guy, and a couple of gals (mother-daughter-types, who weren’t really in the couchette during waking hours). Yeah, nothing really notable this time.
Day 7: Mon. Sept. 19th -- (FLORENCE) VENICE
Venice photos with titles and some captions
Venice photos in slideshow format
We got up in order to have time to make a quick stop at Santa Maria Novella church before taking the correct train to Venice (now that we knew how the trains worked). We grabbed coffee on the way. (Mine was a *small* café latté that was about three inches tall with a two inch diameter at the top. Tiny!) We were actually only allowed into the church’s chapel when we got there, since we were too early.
We then caught the Florence-Venice train, which was as confusing as all get out. We spent probably the first twenty minutes on the moving train trying to figure out where we were supposed to be -- including walking the length of the train -- and finally landing in a couple of *thankfully* vacant seats (vacant, that is, after two people moved their stuff off the seats).
The directions to this hostel were the best yet. We ditched our bags, got a bite to eat, and pressed on to the two museums we wanted to see in Venice (since both are closed on Tuesdays). First, we went to the Peggy Guggenheim Collection, which included some Dali and Picasso, which was cool. Then we went to the Musei Civici Veneziani, which seemed (dare I say!) pretty mediocre. There were lots of paintings of Venice, but also just a lot more chiefly uncovered bodies. *sigh*
We made one final effort at finding an opera, concert, or something to attend, but it didn’t pan out, which was disappointing. How cool would it have been to go to an opera in Italy?! (Maybe later this year…) But regardless, we enjoyed the beauty of Venice!
Having nothing better to do than get dinner (and with me characteristically hungry), we struck out. We went to what looked like a 20-something café and allowed the waiter to bring us the reported Venician specialty: the (alcoholic) Orange Spritz, which we both liked. He also brought us a bowl of peanuts, which we chowed down on. After a while, it became apparent that this wasn’t a dinner place after all. Shoot. We were getting ready to make a move (i.e. - pay and leave) when the waiter brought us refills on our spritzes, courtesy of an Italian dude who was sitting with his friends outside, on the other side of the window from us! He came in, introduced himself to us (or rather to Elissa, whom he‘d been facing), and invited us (Elissa) to meet up with him later, which we in no way promised to do, though we were nice about it. We were then obliged to try to finish our new drinks, even though it was our second and we only had peanuts in our stomachs. We exercised caution. :o) Anyway, we left not long after.
We found a restaurant and I ordered anchovy pizza, as I’ve heard tell of it for years and figured that there’s no better time to be adventurous in cuisine than when in a foreign land. (Or is that the worst time, because it’s less convenient to be ill?) Anyway: DUDE!! A new taste adventure! One bite of anchovy = one day’s allotted salt intake. But you all probably knew that. I think that was the only meal I didn’t finish because of the taste. :o)
Day 6: Sun. Sept. 18th -- FLORENCE
[OKAY: me, my memory stick, and a foreign computer are FINALLY posting the rest of these entries. I should have done this a long time ago, but I kept thinking we were almost back online, plus I was busy, plus I was experimenting with patience(!!!), and then I had issues getting my memory stick to work on other machines. Argh! Anyway, these‘ve been done for a while (it‘s been a month, after all!), so here they are.]Florence photos with titles and some captionsFlorence photos in slideshow formatElissa and I decided to go to mass at the Duomo because it was supposed to be beautiful and touristy (meaning we wouldn’t stick out as much). I tried to follow along, and while I got some, I didn’t get a lot. It was interesting, at any rate.
I wore a skirt for the service and ended up wearing it the whole day, which was a nice change -- except that it was rainy again and probably the coldest day we had the whole trip, which meant that my legs were cold all day. Oh, well.
We breakfasted at a place that was kind of “too nice”, but of course the food was good, so I was happy. After that we wandered a street market for a good while, which was a nice change of pace and quite fun.
The Palazza Pitti: A definite highlight. It houses an exhibit of modern art, which, while not what I would call extremely
modern, did make a nice change from the masses of renaissance stuff we’d been seeing. I particularly enjoyed the painting of the three women at the piano, the one of the painter trying to woo his nun subject, and the one with the lower ranking officer/soldier protecting the higher ranking officer/general in battle. Good stuff.
And oh, the Pitti Gardens! They started out normally enough, but the further along we got, the more we realized, a) the vastness of them, and b) how enchanting they were. We kept referring to each newly discovered nook as a “secret garden” because they all seemed so tucked away and private -- and were absolutely beautiful. This (despite the cold, my aching feet, and my hunger) was probably my favorite part of the trip.
We left in search of food, but in vain because restaurants don’t open until 6:30. We bought cookies to tide me over. (Elissa opted for fruit. What’s that about?)
Dinner (finally) was good, and afterwards -- even though it wasn’t very late -- we went back and hit the sack.
Day 5: Sat. Sept. 17th -- (ROME) FLORENCE
['I'm truly sorry to make you all wait longer for the daily life stuff, but I have it in my head that I have to finish this first, and I just can't talk myself out of it. I'm'a hurryin'!]
Florence photos with titles and some captionsFlorence photos in slideshow formatWell, since we felt we’d cheated Rome a little, we decided to stay the morning. We went and saw the Trevi Fountain (which was cool!) and tossed our coins in, which supposedly means we’re destined to come back to Rome. :o) Then we walked over to the Colosseum. It was pretty amazing. (Yet again, I felt I needed more knowledge to get the full experience. Oh, well. I took lots and lots of pictures regardless!) Actually, between the Vatican and the Colosseum, I feel like I’ve gone on an unintended Christian pilgrimage of sorts. Cool. Oh -- and I scored a deck of excellent Rome playing cards at the Colosseum, which is very cool because I collect playing cards (preferably place-specific).
Then we booked it over to the Termini to catch our train to Florence -- you know, the trip we supposedly only needed our Eurail passes for. We actually checked with second guy before we got on, too, and he just nudged us onto the train. Okay. So we picked a spot and sat down, feeling like stowaways because we didn’t have reserved seating. After about fifteen minutes on the train, the guy came by for our tickets and threatened to make us pay extra because we hadn’t written in that date of travel on our Eurail passes
before we got on the train. Oohhh! Evidently, you’re not supposed to do so in front of them, but he turned a blind eye (rather than charge us full price for the trip). Ack!
So, the train we took was fine and all, but it wasn’t exactly the express. We stopped at almost every single little town on the way to Florence, making what we thought would be a two-hour trip four hours. It sure was pretty, though!
La bella Italia!We got to Florence all right, and while it seemed pretty enough (I was kind of too absorbed in trying to find our hostel to care), we couldn’t ignore that it didn’t smell so great. Oh, well.
After much walking, we found our hostel and successfully checked in. Our room was all girls, but the bathrooms were very mixed and not as private as one (me!) might hope. Very early morning showers it is!
I got to check my e-mail for the first time and very nearly cried at the e-mail I got from Mom (and would’ve, had Elissa and some guy named Juan not been there).
It had begun to rain a little (which did wonders for the smell!) and we set out because we were hungry and we wanted to take advantage of the daylight. We walked a while, grabbed a bite, crossed Ponte Vicchio (the house-bridge with all the fine jewelry stores -- wow!), and found a cute little café, where we talked and journaled.
Then it was back for bed!
