Time really does fly when you’re having fun :) And I’ve had one damn good year. I got my B.A.F.A. certification (merci French government) summer 2010. I graduated from college with a double BA in Geography and French in June 2011. I took my first Math class in 5 years and did NOT fail. My twin brother graduated with some DAMN good grades from his university June 2011. One of my big sister’s got married to her best friend from university in Scotland July 2011. I had surgery on my right knee because, yes it’s true, I tore my ACL playing dodgeball on trampolines July 2011. I skiied my ass off. I laughed. I danced. I grew. I learned. I enjoyed my friggin’ life! Hence the 1 year and 5 month or so hiatice. No

I will be restarting my blog upon my return to France at the end of September. I got accepted to the TAPIF program and will be an assistant English teacher at a highschool in the adorable seaside town of Berck. Never been. Looking forward to exploring more Socially (Un)acceptables!

Until then, bisous and ciao!

Welcome to Bologna! Bologna houses the oldest university in the world, founded in 1088 I believe. As such, this city has a very obvious and fun loving university atmosphere. The first thing that I noticed upon arriving in the city (after a day spent taking the wrong train in the opposite direction to Torino) is the porticos. There are porticos and covered walkways just about everywhere that you go in Bologna. It’s so gorgeous. It’s refreshing not to have to bolt in and out of doorways and bus stops when it’s raining like people do here in Paris. Lord knows rain is toxic, stains your clothing, and negatively alters your mood. I don’t see why people have such issues with rain. But I digress.

Wandering around the porticos, cobblestone streets, weaving around some very old school cathedrals, and smelling food around every corner was pretty freaking nice. Our first day was rainy but that did not make the city any less amusing. Alyssa, my sweet tarte de pomme friend from Denver who is studying abroad in Bologna for the year, was kind enough to escort us around her city. She lead us around the enormous outdoor market, a hand basket full various pretty locations, the best meat and cheese shops, which as you can imagine, had me drooling. Bologna is considered the food capital of Italy and as such I was proudly incapable of finding anything negative to say about what I ate. I had the best apple I’ve ever eaten, no question. I also had the best gelato which was the richest, creamiest, finest chocolate and hazelnut infusion which kissed my mouth, messaged my throat, and bear hugged my stomach = orgasmic. Now I’m drooling again. And the pizza, well, the pizza was glorious. I’m sure Alyssa’s palate is that of a gourmet critic at this point. Nommm nom.

After meeting a number of Alyssa’s friends in what ressembles an Auberge Espanole type of housing situation, I began noticing how drunk the city is with students. There were Germans, Frenchies, Spaniards, Austrians, Americans, Italians, Dutch, and tons more from all brands of life. As many universities and institutions that Paris has, she has no where near what I would call a thriving student life like the one in Bologna. Yes, there are students everywhere and student bars and cafés, but I still don’t get that student vibe. Perhaps Paris is too diverse to notice or maybe my own bar hopping agenda has lead me astray from the student life. In Bologna, it was obvious and it was cool. And yes, one of these pictures does say “Canabis Protectio.” God bless the original university town, right?  

Welcome to Alghero, Sardinia! When my friends and I were deciding what we should do for our spring break vacation, we had one unanimous requirement: must have beach. It was our luck that we were looking at flights with only one week before we intended to leave. All of the other locations we were interested in were too expensive. All but one! We were about to give up on the ryanair website when we decided to just look at all of the options out of Paris. We saw Alghero as the first choice which had a flight for about 30 euros. We were all pleased, but none of us knew where it was. We looked it up, found that it was on the Northwest coast of Sardinia and had great beaches, then booked it! 

Et voila! None of us speak italian so needless to say the three of us were equally curious to see what the sardinian culture had in store for three americans. First off, in France, everyone knows some english so getting around is usually not an issue. This is NOT the case in italy I have found. Most people do not speak english even if they listen to anglophone music. Communication was an issue since we were attempting to order food, determine restaurant etiquette, and traffic laws in our best knock-off italian/french mixture. We stayed in an apartment on the edge of town and immediately discovered that it is in fact true that italian men do not leave home until they are married. It was nice to be able to cook for ourselves as well as discover all of the wonders of the local grocery store as well as it’s house brand version of boxed wine. 

The town was adorable. Cobblestone streets, houses shoved into an awkward yet effective formation, dogs and cats literally everywhere, public milk dispensers, impressive condom vending machines, fairly stealthy internet shops, and all the gelato and pizza you could possibly want. Coolness may or may not be measured by the size of your sunglasses (the bigger the better obviously). Americans are apparently allowed to rent cars (I didn’t think I would be able to since I’m neither an EU citizen nor am I over the age of 25). Speaking of driving, as I mentioned after my trip to Rome, Italians are god damn crazy behind the wheel. Take any speed limit you see and pretty much double it. Ignore any and all lines on the road for they are purely decorative. Pass other cars during long bends in the road when it is most beneficial to floor the accelerator and cause the most honking. God forbid you should take more than .25 second after a light turns green to react. Highway police serve no purpose so fret not you can still book it 65 km/h over the speed limit…maybe even wave hello to them as you pass by. Traffic laws in general don’t really exist. It was scary at times yes, but actually quite liberating! Many stereotypes are true. Italians are very loud, vigorously orchestrate conversations using their entire upper bodies, hit on all women as if it is something wired into their very core, and are momma’s boys. It also seems to be socially acceptable to eat one or more full pizzas every day, something which we shamelessly took advantage of in Alghero.

Voila our WEEK long vacation courtesy of the erupting Icelandic volcano which, in all seriousness, stranded us on this beautiful, serene, and delicious little slice of pizza called Sardinia. 

Spring time.

It is socially acceptable to be absolutely obsessed with football (soccer). There are tons of people in the states who devote solid portions of their days drooling over the latest sports gossip, columns, scores, etc and insist on talking about it with everyone they see as a conversation opener. The interesting thing here, which only just occurred to me during a conversation with a friend a few days ago, is that American women play on a whole different field than Parisian women, so to speak. This is to say that in the states, women are just as likely to be as athletic and/or sports obsessed as men. In Paris, on the other hand, women do not occupy themselves with sports in the same way. I take that back. They don’t occupy themselves with being athletic or caring about pro sports at all!

In the over 7 months I’ve spent here, I cannot ever recall seeing groups of girls flocking into pubs to catch that awesome rivalry game between blahblah and blahblahblah. Ever, actually. You will always see guys herding towards the bars and huddling themselves as close to the widescreen as possible, cheering and booing in unison as their own little équipe. The only occasion where I have ever seen a girl around is either 1- because she is dating one of the herd members or 2- is a foreign student like yours truly. I am the kind of girl who stayed up until 4 am watching the USA vs Canada Mens hockey games in Vancouver. I’m finding Parisian girls to be somewhat prissy in this way because they consider it to be a man’s domain. Eff that. With such a rebellious and inherently feminist based culture of women in France, how is this the case?

I am starting to wonder if this aspect of American girls is one of the driving forces behind American girl - French guy relationships and why they happen so frequently. This is not to say simply that French boys are solely turned on by our ability to enjoy sports and be able to maintain conversations about everything included, but perhaps that the boys are attracted to American girls because we can play with the boys and aren’t putting on airs because heaven forbid I should walk around thinking that knowing a thing or two about football will make me seem less attractive. Hah. It seems as though American women have mastered the balance of loving sports and maintaining our femininity. I guess this falls under more of the socially ‘unacceptable’ category but I’m writing in a chain of thought. In the end, to each her own, and more beaux gosses for me! 

The best things in life are free. 

I love being reminded of why I love living here. Human beings thrive on assurances which is why love is such a pain in the ass..but that’s besides the point. Having a long time friend with a long time adoration for art and art history come to Paris for a week was a fruitful prompting on what makes this city beautiful. I get used to what I see on a daily basis, even those out of the ordinary things like the posting of a recipe for what was deemed to be the best chocolate chip cookies ever on a wall in the metro or some guy rocking out to music and barrel-assing down the bike lane on roller blades with no shirt on. You know, the kinds of things that are unusual and leave you smiling. Showing the major tourist sites of the city is what you gotta do as a resident showing around friends. Then comes the fun part when I get to spend a night out and later wander around in the wee hours merrily drunk with friends gives me new perspectives on things. Under the influence, I am more likely to notice how good looking the statue of whatshisface is, and I’m not afraid to admit it! Beer goggles are hilarious. Anyway, seeing the expression on my friend Amanda’s face when we strolled through the ever majestic Tuileries gardens was exactly the kind of reminder I needed. She’s been one of my best friends for years and it’s funny how time and land masses may separate us and yet we still pick up where we left off every time. The mark of no airs, no expectations, just friendship. I’ve been somewhat homesick (off and on..but god bless Skype) and that week made me appreciate all over again why I love to live in Paris. Dubbed the most romantic city in the world, I wanted to put that to the test. Well the results are in and it’s true. It doesn’t mean that you have to necessarily be with someone or be married or anything. I find it’s more about you and your relationship with the city. It’s true, and I’m a total lame ass for this city now. It’s just so damn pretty!

It’s amazing how at home I feel in Corrençon en Vercors. This tiny little mountain town is where I did an internship last summer for one month. I lived in Villard de Lans with 6 other students from Denver, and we all had our own jobs throughout the town. The program was to live and work and improve our spoken French skills. That it did, and we made some solid friends along the way. My favorite memory is EASILY the time when I drove through the town on the voiturette éléctrique with Cameron and Courtney laughing hysterically at the number of people staring at us and just getting high on life. 

I went back to this little patch of sunshine for my week long winter vacation which brought back some good memories. The first thing I noticed was that the entire region was covered in snow, which made my Buffalonian heart happy. Even though it rained most of the time that I was there, I still managed to enjoy the outdoors, the food, the people, and the simplicity of life. It’s the kind of town where everyone knows everyone and gossip is a favorite past time, like any kind of small town you’ll find. The residents work just to make ends meat, not necessarily because they have some burning desire to succeed or get ahead or what have you. It’s a no pressure situation but everyone still works hard (and just plays harder afterwards). 

Also considering the fact that this is a very outdoorsy area (high glacial valley surrounded by exposed rock faces and hills and vibrant greens of every variety), these people, or les Corrençonais, are all a laid back breed of French. This area reminds me a lot of mountain towns in Colorado, except everyone speaks French. They all sport their latest spandex fads and warmest polertech fleeces, and even the birks. I feel very comfortable there. A very relaxing and rejuvenating week full of cheeses, meats, tiny french children, drinks, friends, just the good times. 

Amsterdam. Sweet Jesus what a trip. I have renewed hope for this world.

Before I continue I’d like to say if any of you reading this will be made uncomfortable by the subjects I’m about to cover, like prostitutes, drugs, and my numerous fun culture shocks, tough shiza because you’re going to read it anyway just to see what I say. You can’t help it. Neither can I. Let’s play on the same team, shall we? Teamwork!

My friends and I took a bus from Paris to Amsterdam which is 8 hours give or take. Not too bad considering there were a number of stops along the way, plenty to see outside, and fairly cheap. We saw a bit of Lille, a good portion of Brussels, Antwerp, and some others I cannot pronounce. Brussels was adorable and passing through it made me want to see more of it. Once we made it to the bus station Amsterdam Amstel, we were warmly welcomed to the city by the police (and K-9) who searched and scanned everyone’s bags. Yikes. That was the first time I’ve heard Dutch in person and by god it’s complicated. We cracked some jokes about they were ‘weeding’ out the terrorists at which point a nice old lady behind us laughed along. Once inside, it took all of our brainpower to figure out how to procure metro tickets to head to the city center. We fussed with kiosks for a while, asked some people for help, and all ended up using the metro with train tickets instead. That should’ve been easier but we saw the humor in it figured we could pull the ‘but we’re tourists and didn’t know better’ card if the need arose. Once we made it to Amsterdam Central, I immediately noticed how diverse the people were. I’ve become so used to the ethnic diversity of Paris that I was somehow expecting it to be less so in the Netherlands. By the end of my trip I figured why needless to say!

I am aware that this is a touchy subject but I can’t resist it considering I was surrounded by it all weekend. It being weed. There. I said it. You read it. Let’s move on. Spending the weekend in a city where pot is legal and tobacco use is frowned upon was pretty enlightening. I read in an article from a tourist magazine called BOOM! (Year 16 Issue 2) of the history of how this all came to be. It states “Holland decided drug use is more a health problem than a criminal issue. Instead of locking up hundreds of thousands of non violent people, the Dutch decided to turn a blind eye to “coffee shops,” where small amounts of marijuana could be sold.” It continues on to say that “the idea was to separate smokers from criminals who would deal drugs if they were illegal. What do you know? It works!” Amsterdam, though it has had its fair share of ups and downs throughout this issue, has figured out how to organize and support the legal growing and selling of marijuana without unleashing citywide chaos and destruction, which is too often the assumed outcome if it were to be legalized in the US. I particularly enjoyed the line “in other countries the mayor might not know the price of a bag of weed, but in Holland the man shaping the drug policy knows the facts.” It just goes to show that the efforts put in to open the industry were structured and supported from every angle. Who’s to say this cannot be the case in the US? Easier said than done, I’m sure. The US is obviously a hell of a lot larger than the Netherlands with a much more diverse population and political landscape. As such, if the legalization of marijuana is to ever become a real possibility, everyone would need to play ball. I am for the legalization and see many of the benefits of doing so. Holland has organized laws and taxes around the coffee shops to regulate the age of the buyers (strictly 18+), to limit how much can be sold at any given time (5 grams maximum), to track purchases by requiring the buyer to show a legit ID to be scanned (staves off illegal dealers), to place taxes on approved coffee shops (which they gladly pay to stay in business), to designate the building of smoking rooms (in which you are almost never allowed to smoke tobacco considering it is detrimental to the health of the staff), and so on. The EU is not a fan of Holland’s laws since it puts pressure on surrounding police forces who try to catch people smuggling weed outside of the country/leave the country under the influence/what have you. I feel that the use and/or possession of marijuana should not be a criminal act. There is more than ample evidence as to its benefits. I will not go too deep into this issue because I can go on for a forever about these pros and cons. What I will say is that it was pleasant to see first-hand a functional, artistic, green, economically thriving city where the legalization of marijuana had been warmly embraced.

Other than that, the city was esthetically quite enjoyable.  All of the buildings seemed to touch each other as they wove around one another herding pedestrians over and around the umpteen canals. The architecture along the canals was especially cool since no two consecutive buildings had the same height or style of facade. They were all huddling together which was, well, cute. As it is winter, lights (energy saving ones, mind you) were hung up all around, which from the looks of it captivated all those people who were under the influence of all sorts of wonderful things. Bravo, Amsterdam. Also, there seemed to be few, if any, curbs. Seriously! Strange thing to notice, yes, but it was noticeable in the sense that most of the streets were inlaid brick or cobblestone with no separations between sidewalk and street. It definitely made me feel like pedestrians dominated the whole city, which in reality, they did. From the hostel to the people to the experience as a whole, Amsterdam, I hope to see you again some day!