My Last Week as an Au Pair

July 8th-12th. Girl Week with Apo and Ninon!


GirlWeek by f694964026

Le Dîner en Blanc - The Dinner In White

The coolest thing I've been a part of was the anual flash mob of Dinner In White that takes place at a different and secret location in many cities around the world. On their website, it says, "Le Dîner en Blanc events are held on some of the most prestigious sites of the city, often without authorization. The first editions were not easy to put in place. Today, the authorities know the organisation and know that it’s always well controlled. Moreover, the event’s photogenic quality adds to the city’s image of a modern and stylish city, open to the world."
Somehow I ended up going to the one last night at Le Louvre in Paris, and it was fantastic! It's totally exclusive, and you have to know a guy that knows a guy in order to get in. I really felt clueless and undeserving when I arrived and saw all the fancy smancy people with their feathers and fur. I tried to act like I belonged but really...

So how did this happen? Well, I teach english to an Italian woman here in Paris, and one afternoon when I was at her apartment, she was telling me about the party and what it was. I didn't really understand exactly, so I kept asking her questions about it till she finally asked if I just want to come. So last minute, so random, and not even sure if I was allowed to be there, I got ready for some random party I knew nothing about. Didn't matter though. I wore white, so I belonged I guess.

It was a huge pique-nique and everyone brought their own food and drinks but everything was shared between tables. It didn't matter who you were, food and drinks were passes around. I mainly ate typical French finger foods like cheese and foie gras with French champagne and then some Italian wine. Craziness.

After eating, there were a lot of people dancing, so of course I joined in. I got to meet people around my age which was good because for a while, I thought I was the youngest person there.

I really felt like Jack Dawson in Titanic being invited to a fancy first class dinner. He said, "Just the other night I was sleeping under a bridge and now here I am on the grandest ship in the world having champagne with you fine people." My case might not be that extreem, but it sure was how it felt.

Les Médiévales de Provins

I anticipated this day for months! The Medieval Festival in Provins, France! It took about an hour and a half  by train to get to the city of Provin, so Paige and I left early in the morning. Shortly after, our friend Fany met us there. We sure did get a lot of people staring at us on our way to the train station. Imagine taking the Metro early in the morning wearing these wonderful outfits. Paige got more attention that I did because at least I was dressed like a girl. I guess it's a scandal when a girl is a knight, idk.

  

Our first impression of Provin was that is was soo cute! it had a canal running through the city with a castle on a hill. How perfect! It was very medieval and the perfect place to have a medieval festival! At the festival, there were many booths with medieval style food, super fattening food, costumes and jewelry, and nick-nacks. For sure I looked at everything and found a super awesome necklace to buy for 8 euros!

We were very entertained by all the stuff to see and do there. We climbed up the walls of the castle, did archery, ate wine flavored macarons, danced along with the music all around us, and got pretty freaked by the people in scary costumes.

Toward the end of the festivities, there was a parade with all the people in costumes. They were very lively and interacted with the crowd as they went by. It was so much fun! I wish I could go to a festival like this every weekend. Oh and to make everything better, the weather was perfect all day long. like 70 degrees but no need for sunscreen.

Danse Classique!

I started doing Ballet in Paris about 2 months ago going about once a week. My studio is called Studio Harmonic, and it's close the center of Paris near Bastille. I chose this studio because the people that come to it are adults in all levels of dance. I can also choose the classes I want to take without having a set schedule. 

The first class I took was a Ballet Beginner class. The teacher was good, but It didn't seem like a beginner class. I found out that Beginner really means middle beginner and the easier classes will be "special beginner". It's confusing, but all I'm trying to say is that it was kinda a hard class. She would show us the combinations once and explain it all in French and then expect us to do it. Some people in the class were good, but I was slacking on my first day. After not working out at all for a few months, your dancing will suck suck suck, but it's gotten better now.

After a few more classes and trying out different teachers, I found one I really like. She uses contemporary music and makes the class very fun. She isn't too hard, but it's challenging enough for me, and I really work out while dancing. I'm sore!


My friend Paige came with me to my ballet class and took pictures from outside the room. This was me before class started, and I was "warming up"


Being a Beginner still in Ballet (I've only done it on and off for 3 years), I really appreciate good ballet because I know how hard it is. Last Friday night, My oldest girl had her dance concert that included all the students off all ages at the dance studio. It was a long show because there were so many classes. There were little kid dancers, adult dancers, and bunch of teenager dancers. Most of the dancing was ballet and girls were wearing pointe shoes and everything. The little 6 year olds were better at ballet than me I think. But of course, Apolline was the best dancer. She does Jazz right now. She is the smallest one in the front on the right.

I still find it so weird though that french music wasn't used at all in the dance performances. It's always music in English. French artists wont get as much of a profit if their music is in French I guess. We are familiar with French artists, but they sing in English like David Guetta, Daft Punk, and Pony Pony Run Run. Ignore the band name, they're pretty good. But anyway, at the dance show, on the radio, and in stores, I guess there's no need to worry about explicit lyrics...no one understands the words anyway.

Exploring the Little Cities Outside of Paris

Paris has zones that make the symbol of a targer, and with my metro pass, I am allowed to to through zones 1, 2, 3, and 4. Those are the centermost zones. There are also zones 5 and 6 on the outside, maybe more, but nothing cool is that far out. Zones 4 and 5 are the zones with all the cool stuff like castles and medieval cities! I can travel to all the zones for free on the weekends though, so I am going to take advantage of that! On Saturday, I went to the cute city of Pontoise! It's not too far from where I live, but it's in the northwest region outside of Paris and is very old. I went by myself because sometimes, I just like to explore by myself. I'm totally fine with that, and I always know where I'm going. I knew Pontoise was a small town so I just got out of the train station and walked everywhere. The weather was amazing for a day of walking and exploring!

I went to two small museum. Le Musee Tavet showed modern art and Musée Camille Pissarro has painting from Camille Pissarro with most of them being paintings of the city of Pontoise. One painting actually gave me and idea of where to go next. It was a painting of people in a garden called "Jardin de la Ville". I decided to find it and I did. I went to two parks that day. Jardin de la Ville and Parc du Chateau.

 

 


I found two adoreable shops to look around at! The first one was L'Arbre Blanc with cute homemade things. It was also a cafe where you can eat some of their original homemade things. I bought a bottle of L'huile D'Olive a la Vanille! Vanilla olive oil! I can't wait to try it! The second store was called Exotiqua with so many cute tea sets, baskets, and soaps! Everything was very much my style.

 

One of my favorite parts of walking around in the city instead of taking busses is that you get to find cooler things and go off the main roads. I found these cute places from walking around and going down the smaller streets. France is a very old country with a lot of history, but in the big cities, a lot of the history has been destroyed over the centuries or redone. In a city like this with not a lot of people, all of the walls, buildings, and roads will still look like they did in the 15th century.

I Never Expected Any Of This Super Awesome Stuff!

I became a fan of Ellie Goulding a while back but never imagined that I would be able to see her live the way I did last week! Last week was spring break and France gets 2 weeks off. The first week, I was free, but the second week, I had to work and stay home with the kids. Usually I stay home with them the whole week, but because of holidays and random days off work, the parents got to stay home on Wednesday and Thursday meaning I didn't have to work those days. Thursday was the day of the concert! I WAS SO LUCKY. I bought my concert ticket back in December not really thinking I would have to work till 8pm, and by the grace of God, I didn't have to work at all that day! It was unbelievable because, trust me, I was freakin' out for a few days before thinking I would miss the concert or be really far in the back. I never expressed my stress to my host family because my job comes before a concert and their jobs. But anywhosie! I got to the venue in Paris 3.5 hours early(because im crazy but very smart) and sat on the sidewalk in a line till the doors opened. Because of that, I got there before 85% of the concert goers and got up to the stage super close! There were soo many people behind me in line! I was shocked!

She sang all of my favorite songs. Well I have a lot of favorites, but she sang ALL 19 OF MY VERY FAVORITE SONG :D including my super favorites like...

Halcoyn

Figure 8 

Salt Skin 

Hanging On

 Explosions

I Know You Care 

Your Song

 My Blood 

Only You 

Animal

Starry Eyed 

I Need Your Love

 and finally Lights and then a crazy dubstep ending to Lights that was possibly the best thing ever.

And I still made it home before midnight! success!

When I got home, I noticed a note on my desk from my host dad. He was panning a top secret surprise for the mom for her birthday. Once the mom left for work in the morning, I was to wake the kids up, get them dressed in nice clothes, and take them to La Tour Montparnasse in Paris. It's like an hour away by train and metro, and it was the first time to take the kids into Paris by myself. Normally they are kind of worried to take their kids into the big city, especially with just one adult like me who looks like a teenager. But that's what I did. We got to the tower on time and safe with no problems!

 

When we got there, we met up the the dad and the 5 of us went all the way to the top of the tower to go to the "Ciel de Paris" meaning the Sky of Paris. It's the highest restaurant in europe and has an amazing view of the city! I never thought I would be able to eat there! It's just a tad expensive. I understand why the dad chose to go for lunch. I had the best meal though. Of course I ate Duck. Of course. And the dessert I got was a little Lemon-lime tart that was soooo good. I never eat slowly, but I ate that thing like a little ol' grandma. I wanted it to last forever! But the mom was very surprised when she saw us all there. The dad sent the mom text messages and clues on where to go but was never specific on what what happening. She was very happy to see all of us there in Paris waiting for her!

 

American Girl Weekend!

A few months ago, I found a deal online for a new bus route from Paris to Lyon for 10 euros round trip! That is unheard of cheap! Once I found those prices, I went to my other deal websites to see if I could find a place to stay for a night in Lyon that was a good price. Most hotels were the super expensive ones so getting a hostel was looking like the best idea until a came across a really nice one with a buffet breakfast, good location, and free wine in the evening. I immediately contacted some friends to see if we could make it a weekend in Lyon, and they all agreed!

Paige, Meghan, Loretta, and I met up at the bus station Friday night for our overnight ride to Lyon! We left Paris at 11:15pm and would arrive in Lyon at 5:45am. It would have worked out perfectly if we managed to get some sleep. We really tried. We spread out because the bus wasn't full, and each of us took up 2 seats. There are only so many positions I can fall asleep in while in a moving vehicle, but none of them really worked. We were all disturbed half way through the voyage when the bus driver stopped for his hour break. We all agreed that it was impossible to sleep. Once we continued driving the rest of the way, I think we all were able to doze off maybe a little bit, but we arrived in Lyon early in the morning ready to start our huge day sightseeing. Once we got to the hotel, we waited and rested for an hour. The sun started rising, and we were able to see a little glimpse of what Lyon looks like from our window.

Then, we left around 9 to get our day started! Just from the bus ride into the center of the city, we could tell that Lyon is absolutely beautiful! We got off the bus along the river across from the giant church on the hill and ran into markets and perfect photo opportunities. We loved the color of the city! We went through the markets and bought snacks that smelled awesome. What I loved about Lyon is that when walking around, we could tell where to go to see the cool monuments. We could sorta tell which areas were newer (filling with shopping) and which were the older parts (cool buildings and people wearing renaissance costumes walking around).

Walking toward the older area across the bridge, we ran into so many awesome things. From all the people in Renaissance costumes, we found out that saturday only was a huge festival. Out of all the days to come to Lyon, we happend to pick the day when everyone is so festive!! Everywhere we went, there was dancing and music, cannons being blasted off, horses, drums, and happiness! We ran into a square in the old part of Lyon with an awesome church and small streets to walk through.

We decided to go visit that giant church on the hill...mountain actually. We went up soo many stairs, but every time we turned around, the view was amazing. 

We got to the top, and by that time is was getting warm. I have not felt the warmth of the sun yet this year. It has only been a bitter cold until now. We were south of Paris, but once you leave Paris, I think the world is a little brighter and warmer. That goes along with everything Parisian. We all agreed on this trip that Lyon is a big city, but it is a big, beautiful, and nice city. Paris gets so much glory, but once you live there so long, you no longer see the beauty that had you amazed when you first came. It's especially hard to enjoy it in the winter for me. You only see the crazy, dirty, harsh, "inner-city pressure" part of Paris after a while. This was a good reminder that France is still beautiful once you're out of the tourist filled and sometimes heartless big city. It was good to get some fresh air! It was especially refreshing to be able to see the Alps in the distance!

We spent time looking at the Basilique Notre-Dame de Fourvière that was honestly too big to fit in one picture. It was Beautiful and breathtaking just like everything else in this city. By this point, it was around noon, so we still had an entire afternoon to explore! Not far from the Basilique was a Roman Theatre! I got so excited when we saw this! I have never seen Roman ruins before, and I was over joyed that it was a theatre! It was so crazy to imagine people there in that time putting on a show and wearing masks! It was one of my favorite parts of the day!

We finally got around to eating lunch. We waited around for a happy hour to come along at 3pm so we could get a 3 course meal for 10 euros at a super cute restaurant in a great area. We came at 2:30, but they let us beautiful girls get the discount anyway. :) The food was amazing. I got a Salade Lyonnaise which had a tangy, creamy dressing and bacon. Lyon loves their meat! For the meal, I had Cod with potatoes, and us girls shared a bottle of Rose wine that was perfect for the sunny, warm afternoon in France! For dessert, we all had the chocolate tart!

Here is a video with a few examples of the Renaissance festivities going on throughout the city. 

The rest of the day was filled with exploring, experiencing the city, and having fun. We found a giant park to sit in the grass at and talk. It was beautiful, and the weather was perfect! At the hotel that night, we enjoyed our free glass of wine and soon went to bed. We were all beyond tired! The next morning, we had our amazing French buffet breakfast! Of course it wasn't as good as the Texas shaped waffels you can get in Texas hotels, but it was a pretty satisfying breakfast! Loretta had to leave after breakfast because she took a train in order to get to Paris sooner, so it was just Meghan, Paige, and I exploring till our bus ride at 4pm. We walked through a market that was filled with amazing deals! I was surprised by all the cheap prices on fresh and organic fruits and vegetables! Meat, wine, and cheese was still expensive though of course.

 

We didn't do much on Sunday other than explore a little more. We saw mostly everything the day before, so we enjoyed the weather some more before getting to the bus station. Our energy level was really low by the time we got on the bus. We rested a little bit during the day, but later on that evening, we got to enjoy the scenery a little bit when the sun was setting. We could see mountains in the distance at the beginning of the ride, but at the middle to the end of the ride, it was just the hillside country. We stopped once in what felt like the middle of nowhere, France. There was a little restaurant and gas station where I only bought ice cream. It didn't feel like I was in France at the point because it just looked like a normal gas station on the side of a highway. We continued on the bus to Paris still enjoying the different scenery in the distance like the small villages where the one church in the middle is the tallest building around and the random castles on hills (where we plan on living when were older and making our own wine. Plans. Big plans).




Once again, it hit me that I'm in the middle of France, and I got here on my own, by myself, according to God's will. It still amazes me. I'm very thankful for my weekend in beautiful Lyon!