church and the children's museum

Well, today we decided to try the Presbyterian church we passed on our way home from the Eiffel Tower. Unfortunately, we slightly miscalculated how long it would take us to get there...so we were about 15 minutes late. Still, we went. It was all in French. That was kind of our first culture shock, because it was our first exposure to absolutely no English. The minister must have mentioned us in some way, because everyone turned around and stared/smiled at us during what we think were announcements. Slightly startling. He may have asked us where we were from, but we have no idea. Anyways. We took communion-that was cool, because they had everyone form a circle in the naive of the church and then individually gave the bread and then brought a wine glass around to dip your bread in. So, we were glad we went, accidentally arrived late and left without meeting anyone, but still appreciated it. We also planned on going to the Grand Palais. But apparently if you go into the back of the museum it's actually a children's museum. That was very interactive and interesting. We liked it.

Lots of walking

Well, this morning we got up early again and went to get our daily chocolate croissant. But they were out! So, Margeaux and Kate got plain ones and Monique and I decided we would try to find crepes. We found some just around the corner and got ham and cheese. Delicious! We wandered around gradually making our way to the Eiffel Tower. On our way there we found a beautiful church.
And as we got closer to the Eiffel Tower it got louder and louder, with people chanting and yelling and blowing noise-makers. There was some sort of major rugby game happening and the crowds were crazy! We waited in line for about 45 minutes to climb to the second story of the Eiffel Tower. Then we took the stairs.












As you can see, we were soo excited. There were alot of stairs. But from the top you could see just how high the MegaJump was. There's some sort of crazy skate-board roller-blading competition going on under the Tower this weekend. I got a pick of this guy jumping.




Crazy! We didn't stick around too long though because pretty much everyone was drunk from the rugby game. Most of our day was spent walking trying to find somewhere to eat. It's very expensive next to the monuments and if you go down the wrong sidestreets, nothing is opened for lunch. We ended up eating at the same place we ate yesterday, because it is cheap and delicious. Then we got ice cream cones at a gourmet ice cream shop. So, right now my feet are killing me, but we are gonna watch the Mormon Pride and Prejudice and eat cheese and baguettes. And tomorrow we're gonna go to church-and it will probably all be in Latin.

Monuments

Well, it's true what they say about Paris being asleep till about 9am. We woke up at 5:30 and waited around for awhile. Then we decided to go out, at about 7:15. Everything was closed, but the lighting was amazing and there were no crowds.We saw the Triumphal Arch and the Eiffel Tower and all the fancy shops. We didn't go in any though because we felt a bit under-dressed. The Eiffel Tower was so different than I expected. Much more sturdy and iron. Not sure exactly how to describe it, but it was Huge! The Louve and the gardens were amazing! Lots of gold-plated domes and statues. Also alot of pigeons-I got pooped on. That was an experience! On our way home we saw this strange grocery store for only frozen foods. Kinda reminded me of something from a futuristic movie...or something in space. here's a pic...that's it for now!

Very early here...

Well, we flew for 14 hours and slept about one. When we finally landed in Paris it was 6:30am...It took a bit of time to figure out the map of Paris, but eventually we found the direction we should go. So, we lugged our huge suitcases through the streets of Paris-creating entertainment for everyone around us, I'm sure.We saw the construction for the French open and then we saw Notre Dame. We'll definitely have to go back there, because jet lag had set in by that point. So at 3:30 we turned on a movie in our apartment to try and stay awake. We all fell asleep in the previews. We slept for three hours unfortunately, so we had to try and get back to sleep. Casino Royale did the trick again though. We woke up about 5:30 am here and are gonna go out and try to find groceries-mainly toilet paper, cuz for some reason we were only given half a bright pink roll. That's all for now!

Goodbye Palouse

So, we leave tomorrow for Paris...It's surreal. I'm excited, but I'll be really excited when I finally get on the plane. My bag is 20 pounds overweight, so I'm gonna work on that tonight-of course. right now Kate, Linds and I are sitting in front of the fire watching America's Next Top Model. Anyhoo-I'm excited...so's Kate.

The Beginning

I used to say I would never get a blog. Now I have one. Ironic.

Why?

In 5 days I leave for Paris. This is where you can read about what's happening on that side of the world. well, not really. mostly you can just read about what we (Kate, Margeaux, Monique, and I) are doing, learning, eating, and seeing. Not in that order and hopefully not at the same time. So here's to some interesting stories.