Halloween is a big deal in America. Costumes are planned sometimes a few months in advance. Decorations are out on October 1st. Scary movies and TV shows are on TV all month long.
People in France don't realize it's Halloween till about 5pm on October 31st. How can they live like this!?
Well it's less than a week before Halloween, and I wont let this family forget it. I pulled out my stash of saved up toilet paper rolls (because I'm a freak that saves them for future crafts), paint, and glitter. I also snatched a few acorns from the yard! They kids loved the idea of painting them! Heres the work in progress and the final creations.
After that, the girls and I made a banana chocolate chip loaf, and of course we added some food coloring to make it orange! This is the whole families favorite desert that I make from scratch and totally guess on all the measurements since they dont use cups in europe. I'm too lazy to convert everything to grams. So if it looks right, smells right, it probably wont kill you if you eat it.
They love baking!
They're wonderful little chefs!
We added an orange sugar glaze on top!
But I'm disappointed in the French for not celebrating a potentially very fun holiday. Now I will make fun of France for it.
Speaking of Germany, I'll be spending all next week in Germany visiting a friend! Should be awesome!
So technically, I don't live in Paris, but I'm a train ride away. I still end up in the city of Paris about 6 days out of the week. It's not a big deal to ride the train down there, but it is a big deal getting back home if I'm in Paris at night time. Until now, I never stayed in Paris too late because of my fear that the trains will stop, and I wont be able to get home. The trains stop running close to midnight. For the first time this past weekend, I actually stayed out late. whoa! Saturday night was a gathering at the American Church of Paris called the ACP Cafe where we spend time listening to music, talking, and eating. It was very chill and pretty fun. A good opportunity to meet people and enjoy the live music. And of course, eat free snacks. That ended around 9:30 I think, but some people where going to hang out afterwards. I ended up staying out with some friends till close to midnight.
It was very worth it. I had a lot of fun talking to my new friends, but in the back of my mind, I was in a panic because I desperately want to get to the train station before the last train for the night. Without an awesome phone with internet, I couldn't find out with the last train was, so all I knew was to get to the station before midnight. I got there pretty much exactly at midnight, and the last train for the night left at 12:20am. I felt so relieved. If I missed that train, the next one would be at 5:30am. Trust me though, I would have taken a taxi if that happened.
That station was creepy. Only young people like me and creeps are trying to ride the train at that time. So as I wait for the train, I stand close to other girls who are probably just as creeped out as I am. Two guys tried talking to me, and I just walked away. I felt so rude. I'm not exactly interested in talking at a train station at midnight. I'm more concerned about my safety.
I got on the train shortly after that, and I figured I was safe. No one really talks to each other on the trains. Everyone usually keeps to themselves and listens to their iPods. However, half way home, some dude comes and sits in the seat facing in front of me and tries to talk to me...I am a little creeped out. I told him I didn't speak much French, and he said something and left. I thought he was gone. But no, he came back with his friend that spoke a little English. CRAP. Now two creepers. They told me that the reason they started talking to me was because I looked Polish. These two men were from Poland, so they thought I would speak Polish....uh no. I'm from Texas, but close..?
I'm still creeped out when they started asking me questions like why I'm in Paris and stuff. But my favorite question was what did I do in Paris tonight? club or bar? um no I went to church. That blew their minds. Young girl going to church on a Saturday night. That's crazy. But that started a conversation on christianity. They told me that going to Church is great, but most christians they've met are very pushy with their beliefs. I got an opportunity to share with them my views about how Jesus tells Christians to be the salt of the earth. If you add too much salt on your food, it's ruined, doesn't taste good, and dehydrates you. No salt is too bland. Just the right amount of salt makes it taste good and makes you a little thirsty for more. Sharing Christ should be like a sprinkle of salt. Not too much to turn people away, but just enough for them to see that it's good and thirst for more. The train ride ended after explaining all that, and we went our separate ways. They thanked me for talking to them, and I was thankful I got to share my views with them. If they didn't understand all of it, maybe they will see my kindness. Because Jesus was never pushy on people but performed miracles, prayed, and loved people. I follow Jesus and pray that He revealed through me to the people of this country.
Sunday I went to the American Church of Paris for the first time! It takes about 45 minutes to get there from where I live, so I wanted to go once I knew exactly how to get there. My first time there seemed really good. The service started with worship, and I was overjoyed when everything was in English! One song we sang was very powerful! It's this one:
The lyrics stating, "We are one in the Spirit, We are one in the Lord, And we pray that all unity, May one day be restored" really hit me with my situation that I'm in. Being in a different country, God is still the same for these people here and around the world. And the people here are still the same as the people in America. There are times that I feel it's hard to see God in a big city like this that is constantly busy and everything you see is man made. And it makes it harder to see God through a different culture that is new to you. I'm not really sure how to explain it. But singing "We are one in the Spirit, we are one in the Lord" just emphasizes that no matter who you are, where you are, the body of Christ connects all Christians together for the glory of God. The chorus of the song says "And they'll know we are Christians by our love, by our love". Thats what I hope for while I am here. I feel like this city is in need of love. It's supposedly "The City of Love" and "The City of Light", but I'm not feeling the love between the people here and between the strangers you meet. I come from a smaller town, and I am very used to people just being nice to each other all the time, strangers caring for strangers, hospitality, and humility. In a way, I don't exactly want to just emerge myself into this culture and live like the people here do because I want to live the way God told us to. I believe that the only light in this city should be God's light shining through the people. This city is beautiful for sure, but I think it could be so much better.
But anyway, the church seems pretty good. I met some people my age there who are au pairs as well. We all are from different places, so it's a good, diverse group of young people. We all have two important things in common: we all speak English, and we are all part of the body of Christ. That's really all we need. So I don't have any fears of being uncomfortable in Paris when I know that there are so many people in my same position.
I am very excited to attend this church. They do a lot of events for people my age, and I can stay informed about the fun things going on in the city.
So my mexican dinner the other night turned out amazing! I found cilantro! and a bunch of avocados!
You can't really tell but theres chicken, tomatos, rice, corn, and bunch of spices in there! To top it off, I sliced up some tortillas for everyone to grab and drop in their soup. Everyone loved it! And before we ate, I played a spanish song for them to set the mood...not sure if George Strait counts as "mexican music", but that's all I had on my iPod that was close enough.
They used their pre packaged guacamole seasoning to make guac, and I made my homemade guac! it's the chuncky one on the bottom! For dessert, since soup is filling, I cut up some kiwi! It was perfect!
I promise I wont do anymore cooking blogs lol
So my adventure today was to go shopping! I wanted so badly to find a Forever 21 because I know they have cheap but cute stuff. There is one if France, but it's in another town kind of south-west of Paris. I'm north of Paris so I kinda had to travel a while to get there. I took 2 trains, a metro and a bus to get there. Since I knew I wouldn't go out there probably ever again, I went ahead and bought all the girls in the family their christmas gifts and birthday gifts! I bought most of their gifts from H&M, and a lot of it was on sale.
I calculated how much I was spending before I checked out and decided to stop at 50 euros. Once I got to the cashier, everything somehow came out to 15 euros. I was so confused. I was expecting her to say 50 and I was about to hand her 60 but stopped because something was just weird. I asked her "what? how much?" and she repeated it was 15. Even she was a little shocked at how much I bought for only 15. After I left, I counted up how much It all should have cost, and it came out to 57,60 euros. With things being on sale, it marked the total down to 39,85 euros. How 24,85 got chopped off the total is beyond me. I think she hit a wrong button, but it was my lucky day for sure.
Unfortunately, I left all my luck at the mall because after that, It was downhill fast. I left the mall at 5pm, and It was raining just a little bit. I got on the bus to go back to the metro station. As I'm on the bus, I am really convinced that it's not going the direction I need to go. I silently panic for about 10 minutes. Turns out, it was going the right way, and I am a genius after all.
I got on the metro to take me to the middle of Paris. Since I was so far out, it too a while. Almost 40 minutes. I got off at a station to get on another metro to take me to a major train station in north Paris. That metro was SO PACKED. Literally, I took one step onto the train and I couldn't move. I could only stand there and hope the doors will close before I fall back out. It was nuts. I hate taking to metro on Saturdays.
Once I got to the major station, something was a little strange. There were more people standing around than usual. There was a change in the trains, and all the trains that normally go north of Paris weren't running. Only the trains that run east were running. That doesn't help me get home... So I took a train back down to the center of Paris where I can take a different train home, but by that time I was hungry. I got off and found a tiny Italian pizza restutant in the Latin Quarter to have dinner at. I was pretty cheap, and I was the only person there. Check out my awesome low quality phone pictures.
Theres my pizza as I was eating it. It was super good!
Here's the skinny, empty restaurant and my view of the street out there that was full of people walking around.
This was the street. It was so cool! So alive!
So that made me feel a little better since I got some italian food. I missed my Italian food. But things went sour again after that. I was going to take a train home and I thought I knew what train to take. The track splits and the train can either go north or south, and of course I got on the one that goes south. I got off that train at some random stop and decided to just walk to the previous train stop because I thought it would be faster than to wait for another train. I was wrong; It totally took longer. And it was raining pretty hard now. But I made it to the previous stop after maybe 20 minutes of walking in the rain. I walked right up to the Eiffel Tower. Duh. Where else would I be?
So that brought a little happiness into my crappy evening.
But it went back down again. After I took this photo, It was like a scene from a movie where the poor girl thats having a bad day is standing on the sidewalk when a HUGE bus drives through a giant puddle and splashes water all over her...yeahhh I was already soaked, but that made my pants all sticky. I was officially over it after that. I just wanted to go home.
So I got on the train to take me home, and some gangster dude comes in and sits maybe 4 rows in front of me playing his thug life french rap music really loud. The whole bus is staring at him like "uhh dude, nobody wants to listen to your french gangster rap", but that went on for 20 minutes. I liked it better in Texas when you only heard people's loud rap music for maybe 2 seconds as they drove by in their car. Playing music out loud for everyone to here is just the "cool" thing to do here.
After that train ride, I had to get on another train and go up one more stop in order to get closer to the house.
Total I took 2 bus rides, 3 metro rides, and 6 train in one day. I am getting so sick of city transportation. I'm wondering if it would be cheaper to just rent a car. It might be about the same price. It could help with my sanity because I didn't get home till 9. Minus a 30 min break for food, thats spending 3 and a half hours trying to get home. Ridiculous.
My first day of school went really good! I arrived 45 mins early because I'm always scared that the trains will have problems. I went inside the building just fine. You have to type in a code to unlock the door. Then once you're in the foyer, you type in the code again to open the second set of doors. Then it looked like this:
and check out this elevator:
Yeah that's an elevator. and yes, I did try it out since I had time to spare. It was so tiny!! Like everything else in this country...seriously, the Eiffel Tower is only popular here because it's big. French people aren't used to big things.
My school is on the second floor (1er étage in french) and the door looks like this:
My class today had about 17 girls in it. All of them are Au Pairs and around my age! The girl next to me spoke English but was from The Netherlands. Maybe 6 girls were from Germany and 3 were from the U.S. It was a crazy mix of girls. Everyone seemed pretty talkative and nice. My teacher only spoke French, so I really had to pay attention when she spoke. I managed to understand most that she said today. We get a break time in the middle of class where we all go to a break room and drink coffee or hot chocolate, eat cookies, and talk. That's my favorite time!
I had a few issues today though with space. Like I said before, everything is tiny here. Im used to having elbo room, room to spread all my books and my purse out on the table. Theres no room for anything here. I knocked over two things durring class today because I can't seem to keep all my crap on the desk. I need to practice living in small spaces. I need more poise.
My class today will be the same on Thursday, but my Friday class will probably be different. I'll have to wait and see. Tuesdays and Wednesdays, I don't have school.
As for tomorrow, I am making tortilla soup for dinner IF I can find cilantro at the grocery store. If not, bbq chicken sandwiches it is!
