Alright, I have not written for about a week and I feel like such a bum. But life is so busy here and now I'm behind so it feels even more busy! I'm going to do my best to remember what's happened in my life, but I do so much better when I write that same day. Sadly, I already have the memory of an elderly person and so we'll be lucky if I can remember what I did. (I guess I can use the pictures and my journal for reminders) Here I go!
To start out, here is a picture of the backyard. This is what I saw from my window Saturday night (I think it was Saturday.) It's so gorgeous, I'm going to miss this view!
Friday I didn't do anything besides take a test. This class is actually a lot more work than I was expecting. I thought this was supposed to be a "Vacation Abroad" I was sure when they called it a Study abroad that the first word was just a typo. Sadly, I was the one who had made a mistake, not them. Good news though: I saw a man give up his seat to an old lady on the metro on the way home and it was just the cutest thing ever. I love it when you see people do things like that. It just makes your day even when it has nothing to do with you. (so does that make me sort of pathetic if the best part of my day happened when I was creeping on someone else?...)
Saturday was actually quite an exciting day. I don't think I took pictures, which is strange for me, but we went to the Worlds Largest Flea Market! I mean, not like I've been to any other flea markets, but I agree that it was indeed very large. It was interesting. And after we returned to the institute building so we could have a place to sit down and eat our crepes. Then we just laid in the sun and enjoyed the warmth. It's sad that it's not warm more often here, but whatever. Not like I can complain, I'm in Paris! After that I went home because I didn't feel like doing another walk for class.
Sunday we generally don't do anything, no pictures, no adventures, nothing like that. But seeing as it was Mother's Day, I did skype with Mom and that was amazing. My second time to talk to my Mom since I left the country. I would be more impressed by her self-restraint if it wasn't for the fact that I'm pretty sure all her free time is taken by our new baby Daniel. (oh well, understandable. When I go home, he can take as much of my time as he wants :D) Oh and Ashley and I went to the ward in Versailles for a musical fireside that night. That was fun because we just listened to some girls sing. It was funny because they sang everything in English, and when we talked to them after we realized they were from BYU too. Pretty funny that we'd randomly meet at a little church building in Versailles. Oh and also Ashely and I talked to the missionaries for a while after church and it was fun because they were all so excited about getting to talk to their mothers. It made me think of my own missionary friends out on missions who would get to call their mothers too. It's so cute. I've never been around missionaries who were looking forward to the call, because I've always been on the other end, waiting with Mom for a call from my brothers. But it was fun to see :)
Monday- the darn RER was 10 minutes late, which automatically made us 10 minutes late to class (I realize I shouldn't cut it so close, but seeing as it's my blog, I'm going to rant). Ashley and I ran into 2 other girls that live in Le Vesinet, so the 4 of us finally made it off the metro and were booking it to class when we ran into the missionaries. They beckoned us over to talk, and we ended up meeting the investigator. She was so cute and had the cutest british accent. I could have listened to her talk all day as she said things like "we go to the Uni" and stuff like that. Seriously, she was so funny. She didn't believe that we were mormon too at first because we weren't wearing the name badges like the elders have. Anyway, we could only talk to her for 10-15 minutes because by that time we were like 30 minutes late to class, but it was so fun :)
For about an hour Heather and I wandered around looking for this crepe place that David had told me about, but it was sort of difficult. The only distinguishing feature that I knew was that there was a second floor you could eat at, so of course I had to go creep through the windows of all the crepe places we stumbled across. Sadly, I don't think we found it, but we'll go back! Around 12 we met at the park in front of the Eiffel Tower for FHE. That was kind of super epic, and I didn't want to leave. It was exciting because something dramatic happened too! While we were eating lunch, these little boys came and shoved something in one of the girls face, trying to get her to buy something supposedly. But what no one saw was that they totally jacked her iphone at the same time. We didn't even realize something had happened until the police brought the phone back to her. Turns out they had caught the boy, so it's good that she got it back, but she had to spend the next 3 hours at the police station and I don't even know what happened to the boys. They were so little, it's sad :/
Today we explored the Latin Quarter. This is me almost touching both sides of the smallest street! Pretty exciting, right? And this is me at the Cafe Procope. This is one of the cool places that the Philosophers started hanging out in the 18th century when they were kind of kicked out of the court of Versailles. What those lamers didn't know was that the social/intellectual wasn't really at the court but with the philosophers, because once the philosophers moved, so did the center of all the action. Anyway, I guess since I've taken this picture there it probably makes me a bit more intellectual now :P
Also, I think I found the crepe place that David was talking about. We are going back later to do a little bit of reconnaissance! I'll let you know how it goes.
Tuesday: VERSAILLES. soo exciting. but really the weather was kind of cold/really really kind of windy and cold. so we just explored the castle and then left. (and when I say explore what I really mean is the slightly less exciting "took an audio guide tour through the rooms that weren't closed off.") Sadly, we didn't even go explore the gardens because it was cold and not as enjoyable. Good news though, I live less than an hour away, so it's not even a big deal to go back.
Plan: Go back, bring a picnic, ride a tandem bike, have fun!
requirements: food, camera, and the sun.
but for now, I just have a couple of pictures of the castle for you. Obviously I tried to get a picture of everything important before my camera died. Naturally this huge fireplace was the top of the list (not to mention one of the first rooms) It's too bad that there were so many tourists at Versailles, it made it really hard for me to take my traditional nap in front of the fireplace. oh well, maybe when we go back. :)
(I guess that's the only picture I decided was worth putting on here, if you want to see more, I put a ton on facebook just now) I went home and ate a delicious gyro with Heather in the Latin Quater. (it's such a handy little place, I like it a lot) and then we watched an episode of City Hunter together at her apartment. It was my first time being at an apartment inside the city, it was pretty cool. Plus it was interesting meeting somebody else's host mom for a change. Overall: very cool.
Today on the metro home I decided to take the missionaries advice and talk to someone on the metro. (disclaimer: this wasn't advice to go and preach the gospel. backstory: I had told them on Sunday that I was sad I didn't have more chances to talk to people. I only talk to Nannicq really besides the professor and the other students. But a lot of the time the other students speak English, and even when we speak French, we don't know enough to correct each other's faults...so, it's not super helpful)
Anyway, after a couple of stops, I worked up the nerve to talk to the lady next to me on the metro, and I had a great time. I was actually able to keep the conversation going (meaning, I understood enough) which was a huge relief because I was worried I would ask her to talk to me but then not understand. (That would be embarrassing) Anyway, I'm really glad I talked to her. It was good practice conversing with someone, plus she told me about a crepe place that I need to try. So double win!!
Wednesday: ahh today was a nice day. I spoke with another person on the metro this morning. Again, once I worked up the nerve to ask her to talk to me, I found that she was actually very nice and willing to speak with me and my rudimentary french. Yay Parisians! Plus I think it's getting easier to ask people with practice. Anyway, after class we decided to go check out the crepe place. However, it wasn't open until noon so we wandered around for an hour. Obviously, I made good use of my time, by doing things such as visiting Irish Pubs and what not. It's weird because I always dreamed of visitng an Irish Pub. I would walk in like I owned the place, sit down and with a completely straight face, order an apple cider (or maybe chocolate milk). That's always been the dream (that's not my only dream!) Yet I always sort of dreamed it'd be in Ireland (I guess because the highschool band almost went to Ireland, so it's been sort of on my mind since that) Anyway, I wasn't expecting to find one here in Paris, but I guess it works :P Well I found it, but I didn't actually go in today, so the dream is still unfulfilled. Next time... 
For lunch we went to the crepe place, and it was super yummy. I mean just look at these crepes!
we were so excited to be there. Plus it was sort of fun for me to imagine Mom, Dad, and David eating there too (If it was indeed the same place) 
After that we decided to start our walk, which was supposed to be a fairly long one, but we knocked it out! We went to the musee Rodin, and it was way cool. I liked it a lot. Especially because it was short :) Obviuosly I had to get a picture with the one art piece I actually knew about BEFORE the visit (art isn't really my forté) Plus, sometimes I like to think too, so it was perfect! 
I'm pretty sure the lady we asked to take this picture thought we were a bunch of strange Americans, but that's okay (because we are.) There were a lot of interesting statues here.
Also, it looks like Heather is just sort of embarrassed to be with us, but let me just say she was also doing the pose.
This is a really cute little archway that we found out in the gardens at the museum, I really love this photo :) I don't know why, it's just adorable to me.
And this is the 5 of us at the museum. These busts (can a bust be just the head or does it have to have a part of the chest in there as well?...I don't know.) were actually based off of us. Can't you tell?
This is us doing the walk. Sometimes we just love to pose so the Eiffel Tower is in the background. It's kind of our subtle way of showing off the fact that we're at Paris :P
If I remember correctly, this was the building that held Napoleon's tomb and some other good stuff like that.We also visited the museum that housed a bunch of stuff from the wars. I might be wrong, but I don't think Rachel is using this canon correctly. But obviously, I've never used a canon.
This was used to break down the doors at Helm's Deep (If I translated the sign correctly)
It might confuse you because in the movie there was fire in the mouth.
Here's me bowing Boromir's horn. If only I was epicly resucing little hobbits from capture. Alas, I was just in a really old building....touring.
This is the sword that Shan-Yu threatened the Emperor of China with before Mulan saved the day.
After we finished the museum we decided to call it a day. And since it was kind of cold and windy all day we decided to wrap up with some warm hot chocolate. And as exciting as it was to be chilling in Paris drinking hot chocolate and watching the people, I have to say that this hot chocolate has got nothing on the 7/11 hot chocolate :)
Oh and on the walk back to the metro to go home we saw this, because Paris is very diverse. (which is why they can have Star Wars, Wii games, Mulan, Harry Potter, and Lord of the Rings all in the same city)
Thursday: (Okay finally caught up to today, don't worry, it's only 1 am now....pretty sure I started a little after 11 pm...ah) Highlights, here's my favorite part of the first museum that we went too. Apparently heads are not chic.
Or at least it's not chic to have the heads attached to the bodies. Obviously it's much more useful to have them in different places..........Now that I think about it, maybe it was like a theft-prevention measure. That way someone couldn't steal it all at once. Hm, that's got to be it!
A lot of the walk today was seeing crazy historical sites like this. I mean, sometimes I just like to go visit the Sorbonne. Really no big deal. It's not like I'm also learning about that in my class.... Oh and we also visited the tombs of Marie Curie, Alexander Dumas, Victor Hugo, Voltaire, Rousseau, etc. It was pretty crazy. I can't believe all the things I'm doing with my life. It's especially cool because I learn about it in class in the morning and then go and see it in the afternoon. That's the way to do it. :) And to top off the walk, we visited the arena where the used to have the people and animals fight to the death. Pretty exciting, right? Well actually, the best part was when I realized that if that had been me back in the day, I wouldn't have been killed by any animals. I totally managed to climb out of the arena from the wall. Sadly, this isn't actually the wall, but this is what I looked like. This was one of those "I have to do it for whatever reason now and if I don't I feel like a failure so I keep trying" things that sometimes I do. So I kept jumping into this wall and trying to climb, but there wasn't really places for my feet and I could only reach the top with my fingertips by jumping. Anyway, long story short, I did make it eventually because: 1) I didn't give up. 2) I took a running jump start. 3) my friend stood behind me and pretended to be an angry animal that was going to eat me if I didn't climb out in time (so motivating) So ya, good news. hundreds of years ago. I would have lived. That's a relief, huh?
Everyone wish me luck getting up in the morning! :P
oh speaking of the morning. I was the first one to class today! I even had to wait for the teacher for like 5 minutes. That really is a new record for me :)
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