Day 27: Pau, France

I had fun today.  I started my day by going to class.  We did something really easy--I don't remember what, and it was terrible.  After class, I went to La Vague by myself.  It was nice to just have a little quiet/alone time.  After, I went to talk to Ryan in the USAC office about my class.  He said to still wait, but that they would peobably talk to her.  I don't know if he did or not, but either way, class in the afternoon was much better.  We reviewed a couple of verb tenses, and I think one of them may have actually been new to me.  I don't recall ever having learned it. 

After class, I went home to practice.  I managed to play for about two hours in one session.  That in itself is a huge improvement.  I'm still not where I need to be, but I do think I am not embarrassing anymore, either.

I then went downtown to eat with Erin, Laura, Jenny and Courtney.  We ended up finding a little cafe in the old part of town near the chateau, and eating there.

Looking into the old part of the city.

 The dinner was not really fantastic, but the one lady who owned the place and cooked and served was really nice, so it was fine.  After, we went to an ice cream place on the Boulevard des Pyrenees.  Most of the cafes around here have chairs that face out towards the mountains.  They don't really work at night...
The peach sorbet I got was really, really good.  (Markedly not as good as the mango sorbet I had in Spain, but whatever.) It was nice to just sit and chat for a while.

Erin, My Knee, Jenny, Laura, and Cou- at the ice cream place.

 When we finished our ice cream, Jenny and Courtney went to drink and Laura and I went back to Erin's room and we watched Fight Club.  I've seen it a lot of times, and I like it, but I was really tired, so it was tough to enjoy it.  When I tried to leave, I discovered I had left my house key safe and secure inside of my house.  Unable, to get inside, I slept in Laura's dorm room. I slept on three bed sheets folded up.  It was really great.

My really fancy luxury bed. 

Day 26: Pau, France

Today was fine.  Nothing excited.  I guess I will just tell you what I did...

If you are still reading, thank you for being a really great friend or my mom.  Today I woke up early to practice.  IT WAS SO BAD.  Really, absolutely dreadful.  I did about 1 hour and 20 minutes of long tones and easy lip slurs and clark studies.  My the end of that, my chops still felt terrible, but at least I still sounded really bad.  I then went to class, which today, actually was fun.  It is my "option" class, which is different for different people.  For me, it is "Langue en Acte" it is basically an improv class in French.  We do goofy activities and improv and acting and work on diction and breathing and that sort of stuff.  There are only 10 people in the class which is cool.  We don't wear shoes, and we sit on the floor.  There are some new students, from other levels, so now I have also met people from Korea, Japan and Hungary.  It is pretty cool. 

After class, I grabbed lunch at La Vague.  It was good, as usual.  Another reason France is better is that they are way less wasteful.  Yesterday for lunch we had green beans.  Today for lunch, one of the chilled salad options was a green bean salad with tomatoes.  I ate quickly, and went home again, to practice.  This session went substantially better.  I did about 45 minutes of lip slurs, arpeggios, and a tiny bit of articulation.  This is where I made a mistake.  because I am dumb I thought class started at 15 h 00, but it was really 14h 30.  The class got out early, and I missed the whole thing.  Which is too bad, because I missed the review of salutations.  I was really hoping that last yesterday WAS a review.  Anyway, we had to go survey 8 French students about sports.  It was kinda cool to go talk to French people, and my French is not as bad as I often think it is.

After class, I went home for practice session three.  It went much better than the last two, but I am still nowhere near where I need to be, and the first opera rehearsal is in a week.

I then met up with Laura so we could do lit homework.  (This lit class is a survey of French literature, which I have found to mean talking about French literature a lot more than actually reading French literature.  I am ok with this, because the excerpts are hard enough for me.  We have studied early French literature, and have now made it to the renaissance.)  Anyway, after an hour of working diligently, we decided we should probably go get some crepes. 

The name of this place always makes me laugh.  We pass it on the way to crepes.

Every time we go, I am shocked by how good this place is.  There is only one waitress, and I don't think she hates us so much for being stupid Americans anymore.  We spent the evening there, and then we went back to finish our homework. (Watch Arrested Development)

Day 25: Pau, France

Today was pretty good.  I didn't have class until 11h, so I was going to get up early and practice or something, but I didn't feel very motivated, so I slept in and didn't practice.  Or anything.  Class today was gripping.  We learned different ways to say hello and goodbye.  We also introduced ourselves again, and said our birthdays.  We reviewed the French alphabet, and spelled our names.  It was great. After class, I had an hour and a hlaf lunch break, which is just enough time to do nothing.  It's ok, I'll just have a very relaxed lunch. After, I went back to French class.  It got really interesting, because we were in a different classroom, and we learned to conjugate regular -er verbs.  I want a new French class.

Today, I got my very own Universite de Pau ID card.  Now I get to print stuff for free!!! (Up to 50 pages.)

All of the cards here have this little chip in them for added security.  I guess the American credit companies have collectively decided the additional security for their customers is not worth the cost.

After class, I hurried home, because I wanted to practice.  I just missed two days, so I really want to spend some time playing.  I played for almost three hours, with a little break to help get ready for dinner.  It went really well.  (Not really, but it wasn't nearly as bad as I have been producing lately.)  It was nice to finally make a little progress. 

Dinner was fantastic.  We had pizza,  made completely from scratch and it was delicious. 

Finally, before I left, somebody(Dad) told me that Google translate is really, really great, to which I replied: "Yeah, it is good, but it doesn't always work." And he said, no it really is good.  Anyway, I use it a lot to check stuff in my reading because, occasionally(often), I get stuck, as does GoogleTraduction.  I am going to start putting things it tells me in my blog.

Text: ...où les anciennes traditions francaise se combinent avec la mode nouvelle:

Google: ...where ancient traditions are combined with French fashion news

Day 24: Pau, France

Today was finally my first day of French courses.  It was good to finally be learning French.  Although, we don't really learn much.  We just kinda talk in French or talk about French culture in French or do whatever IN French.  It is pretty difficult to think in French for as long as I did today so intensively.  The make up of the class is pretty cool.  There are 14 people in the class, but only 3 boys.  There are people from Cuba, America, China, Korea, Syria, and Nigeria.  It is very cool, especially because most of them don't speak English at all.  It is a lot of fun trying to interact with them. 

I got this candy bar on a break.  It is SO GOOD!!...Bueno...

After my first class, I had a nice lunch break, and spend some time with some of the people in French level 3.  The cafeteria is still really good. 

After lunch, I went to my second French class of the day for two hours.  Immediately following that was my 2.5 hour literature class.  It was a long four and a half hours.  My only real frustration is that my level of comprehension in level 3 French is about the same as in the much harder French literature course. 

After class, I went to Laura's room and we made pasta with pesto.  Then I went home and relaxed and played a little trumpet. 

Day 23: Pau, France

Today was really exciting, and a lot of fun! Not really.  It was like most of my other day here in Pau.  I woke up early for breakfast provided by the international students' office.  I was coffee and a croissant.  Haha it was a nice thought.


As soon as breakfast ended, we went to Laura's dorm room and worked on literature homework.  Decided to change it up a bit.  I had to write a story about a fox.  Like a fable.  We then headed to lunch and then class.  It was really hot in there.  After class, we went to Leclerc to buy our literature text books.  This was our third try.  We finally got them.  After, we got the results of our French placement examination.  I am in level 3 of 7, which I think they call Intermediate French.  Basically what I expected. 

Me with my new schedule.

In case you were actually interested in my schedule.

Once we had our schedules, I headed over to play soccer.  It was much more fun today, and I did much better.  I am not nearly as sore as I was last week.  There was one guy who seemed a little confused about which football he was flaying, so I have some scrapes and bruises.  I'm sure I'll still be pretty sore tomorrow.  After football, I went to town with Jenny, Erin, Courtney, and Laura.  For kabobs.  Still changing it up.(I really did change it up--Today, I had two Oranginas avec my sandwich.)

Now, I am working(blogging) on homework with Laura(facebook) for class tomorrow. 

Me, working probably not quite as hard as I could.

I am very excited to start my French classes tomorrow.  It will be nice to finally start actually learning French.  I'm sure it will help me with Literature a lot too.  I will also now only have literature once a week.  Praise the lord!

Adios!

Day 22: Pau, France

I think I am going to make this a habit for Sundays. I didn't do anything today except eat brunch, practice and play trumpet.  It was really great to just relax.  Trumpet is still going really poorly.  I really hope things start to get better with that soon. Dinner was very good.  We had little pancake-y things with ziziki, tabouli, some mushed up egg plant stuff and green beans.  It was all really great.  My family does not eat very much meat.  if they do, it is during lunch, but never during dinner.  It is really great.  Everybody, listen.  Just stop eating meat at dinner.  You'll be better off.

I did take this picture of the house in which I live in.  My window is the small one in roof.

Day 21: San Sebastián, Spain - Saint-Jean-de-Luz, France

Today is three weeks that I have been in Europe.  I feel like there's no way it has only been three weeks. 

Today was a lot of fun, and much more relaxed that yesterday. at 9h 30, we met in the lobby and walked to the aquarium of San Sebastian.  It was cool and cloudy, and it was a pretty nice walk.

Here's the harbor on Saturday morning.

  The aquarium was very cool.  It began with a museum of the maritime history of the area.  It seemed interesting, but we didn't have a ton of time there, so I didn't see it all.  The fish exhibits were pretty cool.  There was a huge tank with an under water tube to see the animals.  It was very cool.

It was cool to be so close to animals like the shark.

If anybody makes a Finding Nemo joke, I will block you from this publication.

As far as I could tell, these jelly fish were just too damn lazy to actually swim.

This was in the gift shop, but I don't think he was on display the day we were there. Bummer. :/

After the aquarium, we headed back in the direction of our hotel to eat, and then catch our bus.

Dad, I figured you'd like these bendy rocks.

For lunch, we found a cafe on a side street near our hotel.  I got tapas for lunch.  It was pretty good.

 This is my tapas.  The stuff on the left was this like deep dried cream puff.  It had some sort of cheese based cream and some type of ham in it.  On plate two is a big mushroom with some bread and sauce, some sardines on bread and a very tiny sub sandwich.  Then there are some artichoke hearts and olives and peppers.  The drink is some kind of really tasty lemon soda.  It was a good lunch. After, I got some sorbet made from fresh strawberries.  It was terrible.




At 14h 00 we left San Sebastian for St Jean-de-Luz, France.  This is a quaint, tiny fishing village south of Biarritz, and very close to Spain.  The only problem is that lately lots of people have apparently discovered how nice and quaint St Jean-de-Luz is, and it is becoming very gentrified.  It was still a very nice place. 

Boats in the harbor of St. Jean-de-Luz

We didn't do very much there, mostly because we were so tired from from Spain.  We did go see the Eglise Saint-Jean-Baptist.  This is an early gothic church that housed the wedding of Louie XIV.  It was very ornate, but a little dark, as there are not many windows in this architecture.

 After visiting the church, we just explored the streets.  The streets were packed and bustling with people.  Things here were a little more expensive, but it was a nice place.

People hustling and bustling.

 When we got back to Pau, I went out with Laura and Erin and we got pizza.  We took it to Laura's room and we watched Arrested Development.  It was a lot of fun and a good end to the day/trip.

Day 20: Bayonne, France - San Sebastián, Spain

Today was really fantastic.  I had a lot of fun! I was in a different city!!!

Our day started at 8 h 30 when our bus left from  Pau for Bayonne.  It is less than two hours by bus.  When we got to Bayonne, we did a guided tour of the city.  It is a very cool place.  It is located on a major river, in the Basque country, near the Spanish border, and on the ocean, so it has seen a lot of history.  Until 1907, it was listed by the French government as a military stronghold, so there was to be no construction outside the fortified walls of the city.  It would be too easy for the longbow men of invading armies to use those houses for cover.  Good to see that the French had a really firm grasp on the warfare tactics of the day.  Anyway, there is a lof of cool, very dense construction inside the walls.

In 1907, they cut this hole in the defensive wall to allow for construction on the outside.

On the tour, we stopped by the Cathedrale Sainte Marie in Bayonne.  It is a beautiful example of late gothic architecture, with soaring vaults and beautiful stained glass.  Stained glass is very difficult to photograph, but I got a few good ones. 

This is behind the apse.

This is a picture of Jesus performing a miracle.  In pane 1, we see a little girl(in red) crying.  In pane 2, the mother is asking Jesus to help.  In pane 3 is jeezy creezy himself, in pane 4 are his disciples.  In pane 1, over the girl, you can see the demon(in black) that JC as exorcised from the girl.  In the foreground of panes 1 and 2 are the people who paid for the painting.  It's all for the good of the church.

The abbey that is adjacent to the cathedral.

After the tour, we had a very good lunch at Le Victor Hugo, which was included in the trip.  We had chicken breast that was very good, with a tomato sauce and rice.  It was a good lunch.  After, we had a few hours of free time to explore Bayonne.  We walked through the main shopping district and spent some time looking through some shops.  We then went to Chocolate Cazenave.  At one time, in Bayonne, there were more than 20 different chocolate makers working.  Now there is only one, but many of those families still own chocolate shops in the city, just using pre made chocolate.  The specialty at Chocolate Cazenave is Chocolate mousseux, a frothed hot chocolate drink served with freshly made whipped cream.  It was by far the best thing I have had in France.  I don't even really like chocolate, but this was fantastic.  

Finally, on our way back to the bus, we stopped in the botanical garden of Bayonne.  It is built on the old walls of the city.  In the first photo of this entry, you can see plants from the garden hanging down the wall on the right.  The garden was not so big, but it was very pretty.  The flora here are quite varied, and it was interesting to see it all in one place.

As I'm sure you know, France has a storied history of pruning shears.

After Bayonne, we took a short drive to San Sebastian, Spain.  It is a very beautiful city on the coast.  It was primarily a mercantile and fishing village for much of it's history, though it has had some military significance due to its close proximity to France.  In the 1800's the Spanish court decided they wanted a summer retreat like the French had(see: Day 8) so they moved in, and kicked the shipbuilders out.  I didn;t get any great photos of the city, but here's the bay:

This was the view across the bay from near our hotel.  On the right is the Old Quarter, with Urgull, a hill, just behind the old city.  That is JC again on top of the hill.  To the left is Isla de Santa Clara.

Laura and I decided to climb to the top of the hill.  Nobody went with us because they wanted to go drink.  It was like 19h 00.  Anyway, the climb was very nice, and only took 30-40 min, at a very relaxed pace.  There were paths and stairs that wound around the hill to the top.  On arrival, we were pleasantly surprised to discover Castillo de la Mota, an old Spanish fort that would have protected the bay.  It is very cool remains, and would have proved a very defensible location.

This is me standing on a lookout tower in the castle.  This is one of the only added safety rails on the whole site.

The history of the fort is apparent in these arrow slits that lined many of the walls.  I'm sure these were abandoned when they discovered cannons. 

You'd think the fact that he was 40 feet tall would have made it into the gospel...

We then walked down into the Parte Vieja, which I think is Spanish for "Tapas Bar".  I am not sure that most of these people are even aware that real food exists, or that this is such a thing as a restaurant.  I am certain that most of these people only eat tapas. Either way, the Old Part of town is very, very cool.  There were countless tapas bars, ice cream shops, and tapas bars. The night life was extremely vibrant.  Even at 1 in the morning, the streets were crowded with people.  The very cool part was that there seemed to be a pretty even mix of people between the ages of about 20-50.  We walked along the beach for a while, and found a seaside restaurant.  It was pretty good, though it did reinforce the notion that the concept of a restaurant may be slightly foreign.  I did have a nice view, though:

After dinner, we headed back to the Parte Vieja.  The highlight at this point was the mango sorbet I had.  It was absolutely incredible.  It ruined any other mango sorbet I will ever eat, as well as other flavors of sorbet and actual mangos.  Laura got tiramisu flavor and it ruined anything the mango sorbet didn't cover.  Actual tiramisu may be off the hook.  But only if it's really good.

The city of San Sebastian also has some very strict rules for their beaches. You are allowed to move your wheelchair in either direction, and sling shot-ing babies is permissible.  However, don't put your Tootsie Rolls in a cup, and the Olympic Games are out of the question. 

San Sebastian is a fantastic city, and I really hope I can make it back before I leave.  It is very easy to access, so it should be do-able. 

Day 19: Pau, France

Today was great because I didn't have any class at all.  I slept in pretty late, which was nice.  I got up a little after 9 and put some laundry in.  I spent the morning doing nothing and practicing trumpet.  I finally felt a little better about my playing this morning.  It didn't last long, but hopefully that continues. 

I met Laura for a quick lunch, and then headed back home.  There, I took a nap and practiced more.

In the evening, we went to get kabobs for dinner, and then headed to Le Garage for some drinks.  Le Garage is still a great bar.  It is decorated with all sorts of car parts and signs from garages and service stations.

Let's go Mavs!

 It was really nice to finally get out for a little bit.  It has been really frustrating having so much time consumed by homework for literature.  Tomorrow, we leave for a trip, so no class again. 

It is annoying that there are so few boys with the program.  I am getting a little tired of only hanging out with girls.  Hopefully, when language classes commence, I will meet more people.

My friends (Lto R): Erin, Jenny, Courtney and Laura

Day 18: Pau, France

The top story from today is again, extreme pain in every single muscle in my body.  Here is a brief summary of things on me that hurt:

• left ankle
• right heel
• both lower calf/Achilles areas
• right hamstring 
• both hip flexors
• my bottom ribs on the back half on the right
• laterals on both sides
• right pectoral
• left bicep
• my entire back
• parts of my back still feel like massive contusions
• my neck

Bear in mind that this list is incomplete, and only highlights the worst regions.

Besides that, today was a thrill.  I woke up earlier than normal, and met at the university at 9 h 00.  Feel bad for me.  I took a really fun test that made it apparent that I speak very little French.  I suspect on Tuesday, when cources commence, I will be learning the alphabet and the days of the week.

This is the main administration building on campus.  I like the design.  It is a segment of a circle, with the chord of the full circle represented by the brick wall that runs through the building.

The wall at the other end.

After the test............wait for it.............wait for it.............I went to Lauras dorm room.  If you don't know what we were working on, I hate you for not religiously reading this blog.  Today, it was a French poem from the middle ages.  Turns out they used different words back then.  For lunch we went to a cafe near campus.  I got a croque monsieur, which, it turns out, I don't like.  She got a panini with three fromages on it.  We switched.

Class was boring and felt slow because today was like my Friday.  Anyway, after class, I went home, and went for a very short(20 min) run.  This helped a lot in loosening some muscles and relieving some soreness.  I then practiced for just over an hour.  I am getting better really, really slowly.  It is very frustrating.  I don't think my breakthrough is going to happen...

For dinner, I went into town to Chez Maman for crepes.  Delicious, again.  This was by far my best dining experience so far.  It was just very nice to relax and have a nice meal.  For desert, I got an orange crepe and a cafe.  It was all very good.

Day 17: Pau, France

I am so sore it is ridiculous.  Basically everything between my neck and my toes is sore.  I am sticking to chess from now on.

This morning, I woke up early and went straight to Laura's dorm room.  We worked on literature homework.  Then, we went to our phonetics session, to discuss with the computer, the ideal pronunciation of French words.  While I was waiting, for Laura's individual session, I got a Kit Kat.  In France, they loook and taste almost the same, except the chocolate is definitely of a higher quality.

I prefere this packaging.

After, we worked on literature homework, and were able to finish by 13 h 00.  we went to lunch and then watched some episodes of Arrested Development.  It turns out that this show is really, really funny. After we went to class.  It was great.

Laura's present.

If you think my gift looks like an old umbrella handle, you are right.  I have been using it to roll out knots and massage my muscles.  It works really well for this.  I will probably try to keep this thing for a long time.  I have been using it pretty much constantly today.  There are muscles on my back that are so sore, they just feel like giant bruises.  Also, my ankles hurt--especially the one I sprained in high school.

After class was trumpet and dinner.  I am slowly getting better at trumpet.  I am hoping for a breakthrough day soon.  Hehe i know it's coming.  Just one more day...

Day 16: Pau France

Big news, everybody! I got my first hit from Russia! I think this thing is going viral.  I assumed it would...

I received a lot of questions on my last post about my feet, so I'll answer them here:  My feet hurt. 

Today began with a brief orientation session full of stuff that would have been really nice to know 10 days ago, whhen I got here.  They told us where to catch buses and trains and taxis, and where the post offices are, and pharmacies, where the grocery stores are, and how to make international calls.  It was fine.  After, I met up with Laura, so we could work on literature homework.  We had to read and answer some(many hours worth of) questions on Tristan and Iseult.  We just read the first paragraph of the story and the last page.  It is very dramatic. In the middle, we got lunch at the cafeteria, and it was fantastic, again.  I had some kind of pork skewers.

After homework, we had class from 15 h 30 to 17 h 30.  This is a really difficult time of the day to stay awake, especially if you just ate a giant pork skewer lunch.

After class I grabbed my cleats from home and played football with French people.  This is a 'class' of about 30 people, organized by the university.  We play for an hour and a half once a week.  It was really, really hard.  I am so out of shape, it is absolutely ridiculous.  Hopefully, I will get there soon.  Regardless, it was a lot of fun to be playing soccer again, and it should be a good activity for the semester. Also, my new cleats were great.

Aren't you jealous of my cleats?

After football, I stagger to the store for a sandwich and went to the dorm building.  I met up with Laura.  We did literature homework.  We had to read a story about Renart le renard.  He stole a bunch of fish.  After a while, we gave up, because I was tired, end Laura gave me a great present.  I will tell you about it tomorrow.  (Probably in about an hour.)

Day 15: Pau, France

Today was awesome, because I did not do anything.  I slept in, and then I had brunch with my host family.  It was pretty good.  Then after, I went to my room and worked on homework and practiced.  I basically did this for the entire day.  For dinner, we had crepes, and they were delicious.  This is basically my entire post.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that I had a great visit on Skype with my mom, dad, Paul and Heather from their lovely home in WIllis, TX. It was almost like being there.

I also spent a little time researching my opera.  So to recap, I am playing in a local production of Les Mousquetaires au Convent.  It is technically an operetta, in three acts.  Basically, the governor places a group of soldiers in town to discourage uprisings.  Some of them steal some monks robes and proceed to visit the convent.  Hilarity ensues.  It should be fun.  There are 25 musical numbers in the production, but I'm not sure how long the whole thing is.  The company is a mix of amateurs and professionals, so they should be pretty good. I don't know the actual instrumentation, but we will be playing with one horn, one trumpet and one trombone.

I am very excited about this, and it should be a lot of fun.

Day 14: Pau-Lourdes, France

Today was one of my most memorable days so far.  I went hiking on le Chemin d'Henri IV, which goes from Bizanos(near Pau) to Lourdes.  It is about 40km between the two cities, and the hike took about 8 hours. The trail begins at Chateau de Franqueville, which was Henri's other home in Pau.  It probably functioned as a hunting lodge or something, and it also has a small vineyard.

The Chateau, from the vineyard.

The train was very nice at times.  Often, it was just very small roads through farmland.  I don't have a whole lot else to say yet.  I mean, we walked, for 8 hours.  Here are some pictures:

A lot of the trail looked basically like this.

These giant slugs were everywhere.  This one is 4" long.

These ones are eating a Chestnut.

Verily, King Henri crossed this highway many a time.

My readers from Nebraska will love this picture.

Neat little abandoned farm house in a clearing.

Don't worry.  I took the road less traveled by. (left)

This slug is bright orange.

I only posted like maybe half of the pictures I took of slugs.  Your're welcome.

Lunch time with Anne(ME), Kate(CA) and Jamie(OH)

Another cool abandoned farm house.

Me somewhere in France.

Frog in the trail.

 So basically, things went really well, until we got to within about 6km or Lourdes, and then we were in Pouyferre, which is not Lourdes.   This was pretty demoralizing, since we were all very tired, sore, and it was beginning to rain.  We had to walk about 5 km on a highway before we finally made it.  It was nice to arrive.  We went to the train station and caught a train back to Pau.  We had planned to spend some time in Lourdes, but by that point, we just wanted to go home.  Back in Pau, we went for kabob sandwiches.  It was still fantastic.  The walk back home was possibly the hardest part.  My foot hurt and it was cold and pouring rain.
The hot shower at home was completely fantastic though.  Really long day today, but very fun.

The castle in Lourdes