My Feelings, As Summed Up By A T-Shirt

I think my problem with Paris was that I never really wanted to study abroad in the first place.  I remember so well the months leading up to my departure, the reactions from friends and family when they heard I would be spending the next semester in Paris.  I tried resolutely to mirror that excitement, that anticipation, that awe back to them, hoping that by pantomiming what I was supposed to be feeling with enough gusto I could make it real. Those two words are probably the heart of how I ended up in Paris: "supposed to."  I'd been studying French ever since the 7th grade, and every teacher that I'd ever had in the subject, noting my hard work and terrible accent, said I should study in Paris.  Within weeks, they claimed, you'll be fluent, and it'll be the greatest experience of your life - if you have the opportunity, you simply must go.  Studying in Paris was basically the point behind studying French - a semester eating croissants justified the hours spent memorizing irregular verb conjuations and faux amis.  Coming to NYU, I was immediately interested in the study abroad program, because smart, cultured people studied abroad, and NYU's program was supposed to be one of the best.  Most people, I learned, went their junior year; it was presented as much of an expectation as anything else.  And you'll love it, was the unanimous opinion of those I spoke to about it.

Love would not be le mot juste.  I don't regret going, if only because if I hadn't I would have wondered forever what it would have been like.  And that has been the common thread of my experience of Paris - trying and learning new things, if only for the sake of knowledge.  I've learned a lot of things about myself that I didn't know before.  Maybe the biggest one: I always characterized myself as a city person, and now on further reflexion I'm not sure that's true.  I haven't felt a particular connection with Paris, or London, or Chicago, or D.C.  I always thought the big draw of New York for me was its size, and the glorious anonymity that came with it.  But Paris, as a place to live, i too large for me, too disconnected and distant.  I greatly preferred Marseilles, which was smaller and more intimate and thus totally goes against my own understanding of what I look for in a place.  I've theorized that this stems from the fact that Paris is a comparable size to New York and as a result, the two share several similarities, which causes me to think of New York often during my day and inevitably make comparisons.  In all the differences between the two cities I always prefer New York, so Paris suffers for my scrutiny.  Marseilles is too small to suggest such comparisons, so I could just judge it based on its own merits.

Also, I was only there a weekend.

Barioloche1

The trip started with a twenty hour bus ride. Bariloche is a touristy town right at the base on the Andes Mountains in Argentina. Two friends and I, arrived on a cloudy and miserably rainy day. We checked into the hostel and began to explore. Bariloche is very hilly and is known for its chocolate. We had our first chocolate with coffee shortly after checking into the hostel. Then we went on adventure to buy long underwear. In Argentina, the only type of long underwear available is designer and very expensive. I and my friends were intent on finding some that was cheap. We managed to go to six different stores all around the city looking for some, but we were unsuccessful. We caved and bought some from an upscale camping store. The next thing on our list to buy was tarps for our tents. This proved to be even more difficult to find. None of the camping stores seemed to carry them. We traveled to over a dozen stores, until we gave up. When we made it back to the hostel, we asked the front desk, and luckily they had the answer. We needed to go to the Ferreteria or hardware store. The problem was that the store was on the other side of town. After a quick dinner of pasta and fake mash potatoes, we made the epic journey across Barioloche, up its hills, and dodging its cars in order to get the tarps. Once we got to the store, we met the singing song clerk who sang the whole time we were in the store. It was incredible. He was so helpful and friendly. We were so thankful after such a long journey that the buying experience was fast and easy.

The next day was clear and sunny and we got a picturesque view of the Andes Mountains. We met a kid from Barcelona who had an amazing accent. I have never been to Spain and to hear a Barcelona accent after listening to the Argentinian accent for so long was an eye opening experience. We went with him to a coffee parlor, because he told us the Medialunas there were the best in the world. He was right. They were warm throughout, had a crispy outside and a fluffy inside. Tasting them was the best part of Barioloche. My trip to Barioloche to begin my spring break was incredible, and I will never forget it.

The Sanskrit word for yoga

The entrance to my yoga studio is a big, weathered-looking wooden door, which opens (via buzzer) onto a cobblestone courtyard. Very Parisian: old and charming, with lovely natural light. The glass doors lead into an entirely different sort of beauty: with white walls, woven floor coverings, and lots of low-slung couches, the atmosphere is zen but welcoming. You’re likely to hear a mix of English and French amongst the practitioners: certain classes are taught in English, albeit with a thick French accent. The front desk staff speaks only French, and I’ve been glad to see my interactions with them becoming more expansive and easy as my French gets smoother.

I started classes at Rasa just about as soon as I got to Paris. Since yoga has been one of the only consistent threads in my time here so far, practicing at this studio has taken on a meaning beyond the yoga itself. At the beginning, when my apartment felt chaotic and cramped (we think New York apartments are small…!) and my social world was still very much in the making, the studio was a place where I knew what to expect. There is a certain ritual to going to morning yoga: waking up early enough to have breakfast, get dressed, hop on the metro toting your mat, transfer, walk to the studio, settle in… as my favorite teacher at Rasa once said, “yoga starts long before class.” In the first few weeks, when every day seemed to bring new challenges (communication complications, getting lost constantly, figuring out my bewildering washing machine), it was soothing to take two hours to return to this calm, airy space full of familiar faces.

There is something equalizing about the yoga studio, as well. No matter where you come from, vinyasa yoga is more or less the same: each class is a long sequence of poses, many of which you’ll recognize, that flow smoothly from one to the next. When I take French classes, I may hear unfamiliar words (I now know how to say “shoulder blades” and “groin” in French…), but the movements are familiar and I can follow easily. It’s pretty profound to be in a setting where, languages and backgrounds aside, we are all just bodies going through the same synchronized motions. I never feel like an outsider, or at any disadvantage because of my foreign status. The other day during handstands, for example, I gave my partner a tip to hold her balance better. Her big smile and “merci!” when she stood back up gave me the warmest feeling: for once, it had been me teaching the Frenchie something, and not the other way around!

The Long Walk: A beautiful road in Galway, Ireland.“Putcher seatbelts on please!” rang out over the loudspeaker on the bus when everyone had boarded. My friend and I looked at each other incredulously and buckled up. My immediate thought was, “We never have to do that shit in America.” Years of bus riding at home have given me a rebellious attitude towards seatbelts on buses. But as the ride got underway, I quickly realized how comforting the feeling of the seatbelt was. Because at home, I ride in cars all the time. Not necessarily in New York, but whenever I meander back to New Jersey I am blessed with the comfort of my own car, seatbelt strapped firmly on. It is a sanctuary, an emotional and mental freedom that it is difficult to experience while being completely tied to mass transportation. When I think of travel in America, I think of getting in the car and driving away. Throughout the planning process of any trip my friends and I have taken here, there has always been at least one day where I’ve thought, “If only I had a car.” On this particular bus ride, my friend and I were on our way from Luton Airport outside of London, into the heart of the city itself. London is, of course, notorious for its incredible car traffic, and it’s easy to see why. There is simply not enough room in that place for the big highways that span the New York tri-state area. You don’t want to have to ask the Earl of Whatever to move his palace that’s been in the family for centuries the way you can ask the gas station owner on Route 80 for his property. The towns here are also very much clustered together, with spans of land in between. As soon as you think you’re in the middle of nowhere, there you are somewhere again. The land has been mapped out on this continent for centuries. The geography and the roads are dictated by an ancient agrarian system that has never held American soil for long. The open road is often depicted in synonymy with the American Dream. I never quite understood why until coming here, where the open road is never quite the open road you think it is and there is no golden land to the west, or metropolis to end all metropolises in the east. Flying down the interstate at 80 mph don’t fly here, cause it’s hard to get interstate, and once you get there, you realize it’s somewhere very much like somewhere you’ve been before.

The Aftermath of a Parisian Meal

Over the past two months, I’ve grown very comfortable in France. While I don’t have any French friends or a perfect French accent, I feel pretty immersed in the lifestyle here. Despite my assimilation, I am still painfully uncomfortable in restaurants. From sitting down to paying, it’s an anxiety-ridden experience.

First there’s getting a table. Do I ask to be seated? Are the tables outside only for drinks? This is where the anxiety starts. I love the French and the French culture so I do not want to offend anyone’s sensibilities. Then we move on to viewing the menu. This sounds simple, however, many restaurants in Paris don’t have as many menus as they do chairs so, more often then not, you have to wait for one. But how long do you wait before asking for one? Once you get the menu, it takes anywhere from 5 to 25 minutes for someone to take your order. How long is too long?

Next we have the main event. Ordering. I’d imagine that this step would be simpler for someone who is not vegetarian, but for someone who is, it is considerably more difficult. Can I ask for something sans jambon? Don’t even think about asking for egg whites. On top of that, asking for extra dressing or butter is interdit. Also, how do you get the servers attention? Saying “Garcon!” seems rude, though the French do it.

Then there’s eating. Do I have to hold the fork and knife in the appropriate hands? Can I put them down? Is it ok to answer my phone? As if I didn’t have enough anxiety about eating in the first place, this brings my food issues to a whole new level.

Finally, at the end of the meal, you must ask for l’addition, because otherwise no one will bring it to you. It seems that in general, the French prefer cash, and American credit cards always seem to cause a problem. In France, you don’t have to tip, which is great for students who want to save money, but at the same time I always find myself reluctant not to leave one. So is 1 euro condescending? Is 5 too extravagant? Hell, I don’t know, and I’m not sure I ever will. At least the food was good.

One of my favorite acts/scenes at Le Cirque PlumeOne of the classes I’m taking here is European Theatre and, in addition to reading and discussing plays, we get to go to see a play (for free!) once every few weeks. And this past Wednesday evening, we went to the circus. It isn’t the circus as we traditionally think of it, though the piece takes places in a big tent and the audience sits on bleachers drinking beer (or hot mulled wine, something you’d never see at Ringling Bros.). There are acrobats and gymnasts and jugglers and climbers; however, there are no animals, no fire-eaters or sword-swallowers, no motorcyclists criss-crossing inside a metal sphere. The troupe we saw, Le Cirque Plume, is a part of (actually, the inventor of) a movement called le nouveau cirque, or new circus, which originated in France in the 1980s. Nouveau cirque transforms the traditional circus acts into scenes within a narrative; it’s kind of a cross between circus and theatre.

The piece we saw, “L’Atélier du peintre” (“The Painter’s Workshop”) told a story of artistic creation through various vignettes of painting, sculpture, and acrobatics, some more theatrical than others. There was dialogue, but not much. There was, however, gorgeous live musical composed by one of the members of Le Cirque Plume. There was a juggler, but not simply in isolation, as in a normal circus: as he juggled rubber balls and bounced them off the floor, the rhythm of the balls becoming the percussion of the song. While he juggled, some of the other actors rolled more rubber balls across a mirror on the floor, which reflected the patterns onto the wall behind the juggler. At the end, the actors laid across the mirror so that they formed the image of a smiling crescent moon in the reflection.

I loved the references to actual works of art in the circus: famous paintings of reclining odalisques, a rectangle of white fabric with a slit in the center, recalling Lucio Fontano, from which “clowns” emerged and fell back into. My favorite scenes, though, were probably the ones with female acrobats. One acrobat climbed a piece of fabric hanging from the ceiling, wrapping herself in it and then flipping and tumbling almost to the floor—like a circus acrobat, it was daring, but here, with the lighting and music and simplicity of the set, the feat seemed more elegant. The circus, or play, or both, is one of my favorite things about Paris so far.

Looking back at this past semester thus far, I can honestly say that much of the first month was dedicated to fall break planning. Trying to figure out where to go, who to travel with and how much it would cost. The headaches that came from logistics made me almost dread the whole experience and I found myself just wanting to get it over with and get on with life. Still, I had heard from past study abroad students how fall break (or spring break) was one of the best weeks of the whole semester so I was determined to make the most of it and have an adventure of a lifetime.

Who knew I would get just that…

First of all, never plan to go on a trip with 9 other people. The sheer number is bound to cause some problems.

Second of all, if you do plan to go with 9 other people, don’t plan to go to five different cities. Again, bound to cause some problems…

Third of all, make sure everyone knows exactly what your budget is so they don’t book things on the fly. And last of all, if you do not heed the first three advices, always attend every planning session and make everyone swear not to book things without approval first because once things are booked, they’re booked and there’s no one to blame but yourself for not putting your foot down.

Day 1- Train to Rome; Plane to Barcelona.

Outside our hostel in Barcelona.: Little did we know what was to come...

So far so good. Aside from the ridiculous number of hours spent traveling (about 8 hours), not actually seeing anything, and starving because you barely ate lunch, finally finding a Spanish restaurant at 11pm and enjoying the best meal ever seemed to launch the week off on a fairly good start.

Day 2- Walking around Barcelona with all your luggage because check out is at 10am and because at 2am one day someone decided to book a plane to Madrid without informing the rest of the group. Plane to Madrid.

Day 3- Madrid.

Estadio Santiago Bernabeu: I didn't actually get anything, but pretended I was cool enough to afford it.

After an almost failed night of trying to “party it up” in one of the top party cities of the world, enjoyed a pretty relaxing day visiting the parks, gardens, and museums. Then we went to sleep. With bedbugs. One girl did not come away unscathed…

Day 4- Back to Barcelona.

Because of the bedbug crisis, spent a good 4 hours of our last afternoon in Spain at the Laundromat. Saw a few famous sites but soon enough it was time for bed so we could get ready for more traveling the next day…

Day 5- Plane to Athens

Before departure, a medical emergency arises when one of the girls in our group becomes incredibly ill and refuses to leave without first seeing a doctor. With just 30 minutes until boarding, another girl is able to reach a family friend in Barcelona who will house the two and the rest of us proceed to Athens.

Problem: We had planned to take a ferry to Crete that very evening and one of the girls staying behind had booked half the group’s ferry reservations. Upon arrival in Athens, spent the first few hours trying to convince the ferry company to cancel the reservations and refund the cost. No luck; though they gave us some hope by saying if we faxed them medical documents, they might be able to give us a refund. Highly doubtful in my opinion. Found a hotel on the fly and walked through a pretty shady part of town to get there.

Day 6- A whole day in Athens!

Acropolis in Athens

Fairly successful sightseeing though people wanted to go to the beach since we were missing out on Crete. Found some random beach in a town outside of Athens where we had Applebee’s for dinner… How American are we.

Day 7- Another day in Athens!

More sightseeing; though at this point, people are fading. Some went back to the hotel to rest while the rest of us trekked onward. Greek dinner, finally? Nope, somehow those who went back to the hotel found out there was a Korean restaurant in town… (In all fairness, it was pretty good.) Also, because we had to book a random hotel in place of Crete, we had to move into a different hotel which was already booked for our last night in Athens. More traveling!

Day 8- Ready to board a plane for Rome

Arrived at the airport. Looked at the monitor. Flight to Rome: Cancelled. At this point, I found everything pretty hysterical and I wondered if this trip would ever end. Turned out there had been a strike with EasyJet in Rome so there was no way of getting there. After failed attempts to book a flight with other airlines, we decided to take the next available flight which was set to leave Sunday evening. Fortunately, EasyJet gave us free accommodations and meals. Little did we know that the free accommodations would be at Sofitel- a FIVE star hotel. Things were looking up.

Day 9- Sofitel Hotel

Woke up at 10am. Bummed in my 5 star single bedroom. Ate a free lunch provided by the hotel. Jumped in the pool. Hung out in the sauna. Took a bubble bath in the nicest bathroom. Bummed some more in the bedroom watching German MTV. Ate a free dinner. Jumped in the pool. Celebrated one of our friend’s 20th birthdays at midnight. Sleep.

Day 10- Back to Italy!!

Ate free buffet breakfast. Check out at noon. Spent the next 6 hours at the airport waiting to board our plane back to Italy. Finally arrived in Rome at 7:30pm. Now to get back to Florence… Took a train back which finally arrived at 1:45am in Florence.

What a week. And I’m glad to be able to write it all out now while the memories are still fresh. Definitely unforgettable. Most of all, I was able to share some very fond times with the people I travelled with and have gained a greater appreciation for them. So would I do this whole week over again? In a heartbeat!

Giverny: Claude Monet's Home

This past weekend I went to Giverny with a couple of my friends for the day. Giverny is a little town about 45 minutes outside of Paris and it is famous for being the site of Claude Monet’s house and gardens. I heard from many friends who went earlier in the semester that it was completely worth it and absolutely beautiful so we decided that we would go before it is too cold to enjoy being outside.

We left on Saturday in the early afternoon from the Gare St. Lazare train station and arrived shortly after 1:00 PM in Vernon, which is the town closest to Giverny. From there you can take a taxi, bus, or bike to complete the journey. We decide that the Bike option sounded like the most fun, so we rented bikes and grabbed a map.

I had seen pictures from friends who opted to take the bikes as well so I was imagining a leisurely, scenic, and flowery ride of about 30 minutes. Of course, even though it was beautiful all morning and there was no sign of rain when I checked weather.com in the morning, it started to rain as soon as we got on our bikes. It didn’t rain very hard but it was enough to be obnoxious and make the bike ride slightly less pleasant than what I had anticipated.

Once we got there, the rain stopped and the sun came out. The rest of the afternoon was beautiful as we walked around the gardens and toured Monet’s home. We also brought some chalk pastels (borrowed from my sweet art teacher) along for our journey so that we could experience the gardens in a truly “Monet manner.” This was really fun but also really funny. I certainly do not claim to be an artist but I like to think that I can create some semblance of a nice picture if I put my mind to it, but pastels are a particularly difficult medium to work with and the final outcome wasn’t exactly what I would describe as beautiful. All the other people walking around the gardens kept stopping to look at what we were doing and it was funny to see their reactions when they realized that we were not actually very talented artists. Nonetheless I am really glad that we did this because it was a different experience from just walking around and forced me to really pay attention to the details of the place.

After several hours in the garden we started to get a little bit chilly so we headed to a quaint little inn to have some lunch and warm up. The inn was absolutely adorable and very quite so we enjoyed a nice, relaxing lunch before grabbing our bikes and heading back to the train station, when of course it started to rain again.

Despite the rain during our bike rides, Giverny was an absolutely wonderful place and I would recommend going to anyone who has the chance. It really gives you a new appreciation and perspective of all Monet’s paintings that you see in museums after seeing his original inspiration.

Giverny II: Lily Pads

Thames River Festival
Being in London, home of the much beloved British accent, I have discovered a few things about accents in general that I perhaps may not have otherwise learned.
First thing is that the accent does not make everyone attractive; it will only enhance the attractiveness of someone who already fits into that category. For example, the accent will not make my history professor attractive. He is an older man, who would probably be a fantastic grandparent. However, the accent may actually make a boy my age more attractive. It would be wrong to say that the accent would make any boy my age attractive. This is a rather common view people have: “the British accent makes any guy/girl hot.” After being here for nearly a month and a half, I can safely say that is not true. A creepy person is creepy no matter what accent they happen to have.
Second thing is that there doesn't seem to be any benefit in faking an accent unless you've had lots of practice doing it. Practice not in the presence of those with said accent, however. One of my friends, one of the very first days here, decided he was going to try out his British accent when ordering a drink at a pub. When he returned to us with his drink, he told us that the bartender told him he “needed work on his accent.” Considering it was the first day and he had not had much practice, I knew the bartender would figure it out. I was afraid that they may actually be insulted (I don't think people are fond of having their accents faked). Many of my friends from home ask me if I've picked up the accent yet and every time my answer is an emphatic no. I refuse to even attempt one because I know that there are phrases I will utter that will automatically give me away as a New Yorker. More than one person I've met here has picked up on the New York accent I seem to have only when I leave New York.
Which brings me to the third thing I've discovered about accents. Oftentimes, the only way to realize that you actually have one is to leave the place where you're from. Suddenly, the people around you notice the way you say certain things. Last year, a friend of mine from California pointed out that I kept saying “wait on line” instead of “wait in line,” which is apparently the right way to say it. I consulted a few other people and the results were that only people from Long Island (where I'm from) seem to say “wait on line.” Well, prior to that moment, I'd never considered that phrase to be a problem; but after that, I began to watch how I said it, simply because it was confusing my friends. Here in London, I've found that though I don't have the Long Island/New York accent that Fran Drescher made famous, I somehow have a distinct enough accent that Londoners can tell where I'm from. The odd thing is that they don't mind Americans who say that they're from New York. They are always interested in it and inevitably say “oh I want to go there” or “I've been there.” Either way, they seem amiable when you say New York; say anywhere else and...the reception may not be as friendly.
So far, sticking to my New York accent has been working out fine. British people don't seem to mind and I don't risk offending them by trying to fake it. But the urge to add “mate” or “blimey” into a sentence is always looming.

Monsters from the Rain forestBefore this weekend I hadn't been out of Buenos Aires capital in over two months, and the pressure and anxiety of the city was beginning to become to much to bear. Similar to NYC, life in BA is one of ups and downs, times of pure bliss and moments of shear hatred. I was sick of eating steak and empanadas and hitting up the local bars and clubs that have become my weekly routine, but luckily this trip came just in time to save me from falling into a hole of study abroad madness. The trip consisted of a trip to the ruins of San Ignacio, a one day adventure through Iguazu falls and a tiny journey through an indigenous village close to the waterfalls. I have always enjoyed traveling by bus and the 14 hour ride to San Ignacio was no exception. As I sipped away on wine and whiskey, chatting with someone from the group whom I had never met before, I felt at ease for the first time in weeks. Memories of past weeks dominated by graduation anxiety ceased from my mind as we exited the world of BA and entered the realm of the real Argentina. Groggy and confused as to where exactly my location was in the world, I exited the bus and downed a cafe con leche that brought me back to life. I wasn't exactly excited to see the ruins, as the most important part of the trip, Iguazu was scheduled for the next day. Nevertheless the tour of the Jesuit ruins at San Ignacio were intriguing enough, even if I was hungry and dehydrated, and I left being able to check off another place on the map of my South American Odyssey. The next day was by far and away the best part of the trip and possibly the coolest natural occurrence I have seen in my short but sweet life on this earth. The roaring rapids of Iguazu falls shook the core of my inner being, as I drank Isenbeck beer and pounded nerds, and left me pondering on the beauty of the natural world and human discovery. I wondered what it must of been like for indigenous people to have first encountered this magnificent feat of nature. Though modern humans have built sky scrapers, engineered aircrafts, and crafted highways that span the lengths of countries, the creations of mother earth far exceed those that humans have created. The falls were here before us, and will most likely survive far longer than humans on this earth. The eternal flow of the waters at Iguazu prove the perfection of nature and show that there is something greater than our human existence. Sure humans are great and all I and get along with plenty of them, but they wouldn't be here unless the earth had brought them to fruition. I was happy to leave the falls cold, drenched, muddy and stinky. Sure I'm sick as hell now and I'm back in the real world, trying to deal with midterms that I have no interest in, but for a moment this weekend I enjoyed pure bliss in the mysterious and beautiful world of the rain forest.