spring break

Sorry I haven't written in a while - I've been an absolute bum this week enjoying the rest of my vacation, but as I recieved emails from mom and gma, I suppose it's time to update this thing. I'll start from the begining, so prepare yourself for a long post.

The day before break started, my group was lucky enough to see a Paris National Opera ballet performance: Noureev, Balanchine, Forsythe. We all got dressed up for the evening at the modern opera house in the Bastille. It was a performance of three ballets - scenes from a classical performance (Balanchine), a modern take on a classic ballet (Noureev), and the last one was an incredibly modern peice (Forsythe). It was SO COOL and made me realize how much I miss dance classes and the bar. It also made me realize that I have to quit my dance team when I get back to Champaign - I'm sick of dancing on what amounts to be a high school poms squad. I liked the modern piece the best - it was really bizarre and utlized a ton of lights and claps, very hypnotic. The evening would have been perfect had it not been for the group of junior high kids sitting behind us - what a bunch of shits.

Break started on Friday and Marina and I took the train to Aix-en-Provence - an incredibly beautiful town that moved at a deliciously slow pace. We got off the train at night and not having any idea where we were, we were forced to take a taxi. This wasn't the best way to start off our trip as we had promised that we'd work on a budget, but it didn't matter by the time we got to the hotel. It was raining and dark and we never would have found it on our own. The hotel was just outside of the city center; very small and private settled right in the middle of an olive field. Our room was pretty standard, but comfortable with amazing views of the hotel garden. As it was late and the rain showed no sign of letting up, we gave up the idea of going out for the night and promptly crashed.

For our day in Aix, we bought ice cream and walked around the town soaking up the sun and taking pictures of the cobble stone streets. We had a few beers in a sun-drenched town square, I dragged Marina to just about every church on the map, and we finished up the day at an exhibit of the 9th art - really creepy comic book stuff. Loved that. We kicked off our trip in style with dinner in a tapas bar and then tried to get picked up in the city but there wasn't much of a night life. It's so sad - we were getting so desperate to flirt with french country boys that when we found a bar full of men we practically ran to it only to be promptly turned away - it would appear that we found the only boy bar in the town.

After Aix we went to Nice which is probably one of the most beautiful places I've ever seen in my life. No, IS the most beautiful place I've ever seen. We lucked out and stayed at one of the most highly recommend hostels in the world. Despite it being a bit of a treck to get to (tram ride, thousands of flights of stairs), it was worth it because we got free breakfasts, cheap beers and an accommodating staff that really hooked us up with all the ins and outs of the tourist sights. We spent our first night in the hostel bar and met a ton of really interesting people from all over the world that were either backpacking around Europe or on their spring break like us.

Day number one we went to an antique and flower market (where I found some bizarre and lovely jewelry) and checked out the Nice beach....it's all small blue stones and nothing like the beautiful white sand that spoils me so much in Siesta Key, but still an incredible sight. In the afternoon we went to Eze, and though it was really cool to see this medieval town, I have to say that I wasn't nearly as blown away by it as Grandma was. I found it to be a little too touristic and disgustingly expensive. However, we did take the recommendation of the hostel and had an espresso on the terrace of the Golden Goat castle. The unexplainable view made the seven euro coffee worth it, but just barely. After checking out the church we hiked down the side of the mountain and jumped back on the train to Nice where we got off at a few petit fishing towns and wandered around covered streets from the seventeenth century.

That night we tried to go to a jazz club in Monaco, but finding it closed we just walked around the deserted Monte Carlo. It's so clean and sterile - like a Disney Land for adults that sells Chanel purses insead of mouse ears. We parked the car in a deck (we went with a group of people led by the hostel owner's son, Albert, so nobody better give me any crap about jumping in strange cars with strange men) and there wasn't a single tread mark on the asphalt. The whole city has a new car smell to it and all the palm trees are wrapped in lights and the fountains look like a movie set. In general it seemed fake and over priced, but still pretty cool.

For our last day in Nice, we had planned to go scuba diving in the morning (Marina insisted and as it didn't cost THAT MUCH I said I'd go along) but ended up getting faulty directions to the port and were nearly thirty minutes late for our appointment. We were walking all over the damn city trying to find this little boat and when we finally got to it there were only pot-bellied, middle aged men in wet suits - not one other woman in sight. We were both in such horrible moods after booking it across the city that we just decided to not go and save our money. We were already late and had expected that the boat would be gone, so I had resigned myself to the fact that we couldn't go, anyway.

Marina was BEYOND pissed, especially when I bailed and said I'd rather not go and I was hung over and didn't want to be on a boat for five hours or under water for that matter when I wasn't in a good mood. She didn't really talk to me for the rest of the morning and we both sat in silence as we ate filet-o-fish and fries at Domac (that's french slang for McDonalds - it's the verlan (lanvers) or the inversion of the word by syllable). The day was off to a shit start, however we managed to salvage it by taking the train to a little cove and soaking up the rays.

We started off on the rocks as we were too stingy to spring for hotel chairs, but quickly had to cough up the five euros as the waves started crashing up on the beach and completely soaked us. Just as we had settled down and taken our tops off (oh yes, we embraced the french way of life), a MASSIVE wave came and drenched us and all of our shit. We jumped up screaming and I'm sure everybody on the beach got a laugh at our expense.

After beautiful Nice, we finished our trip in Marseilles - an old port town. We both decided that it was our least favorite place...it was just seedy and the people were less than savory. Despite the layer of salty grime covering the cit, it did have it's own distinctive look and tons of interesting churches and things of that nature. After we got off the train we decided to spend the afternoon at the beach, and though it wasn't really warm, we stuck it out for a few hours and took cat naps in the sand. As it was the last night of our vacation, we wante to treat ourselves and have a fancy meal - a genuine sea food feast. We decided to be brave and shared oysters on the half shell for starters follwed by a main course of Bouillabaisse - supposedly a Marseille specialty that runs about forty a person, but we found a restaurant with a set menu that allowed us to sample all of these fruits de la mer at only 20 euro each including a half bottle of wine. That should have been our first clue that we were in for it.

Oysters on the half shell is like eating slimy salt. I want to believe that I liked them, but really I just insisted on finishing my share because I paid for them. If you covered them in vinegar and olive oil and then ripped them out of the shell and put them on some buttered bread and plugged your nose and didn't really examine what you were eating then I suppose they weren't so bad. I stomached mine with a grimace, but Marina couldn't even eat half of one - her face was PRICELESS. I've never laughed so hard in my life. We caused a scene and it was even worse when she started hiding her oysters under the lettuce in an attempt to convince the chef that she had actually eaten them. I couldn't stop crying.

And yet, the oysters were nothing compared to the fucking Bouillabaisse. Specialty my ass...I could have swam in the ocean with my mouth open and it would have tasted better. First the waitress comes out with a plate of fresh sea food - fish WITH THE HEADS, whole crabs, a ton of mussels and some potatoes. Then she comes back with a bowl of broth and makes a ceremony of spooning the broth over the pieces of whole sea food. That's it. Another picture moment, I assure you. The smell was something else, too. I ate the mussels and the taters, avoided the crab all together and ate the fish until I'm certain I ate a bone or cut my esophagus or something of the sort and had to stop eating. I felt like a had a bone in there for a couple of days, but thankfully the cut healed or a swallowed it. We couldn't stop grimmacing as we ate the soup and the cook was glaring at us from the kitchen the entire time.

For our last day in Marseilles, we decided to check out this amazing church up on the highest point of the city with this incredible golden statue of some saint that glitters over the old port - Notre Dame de la Gard. We followed the picture and the bus directions on the map to a T and thought that we were headed in the correct direction. It wasn't until we realized that we were in an entirely different town that we knew something was wrong. We ended up in the little town of Estaque without a clue which was kind of cool because I've been studying this town in my art history class - it's where Braque went and started the cubist revolution (not Picasso).

As it happened, the little town does have a church worth seeing, Notre Dame de la Galline, so we asked around and discovered that it was just a little jog up the colline (which means hill but in this case mountain is more like it). The farther up hill we got the more people stopped to ask us where we were going and when we asked for the cathedral they responded with, "oh you mean the church?" and then finally, "oh the little chapel in the mountains? Keep going on the main road up, up, UP! and eventually you'll find it."

So we walked. And walked. And walked some more on the hottest day I have yet to come across since flying over the big blue ocean. Marina flagged a car down to ask if this church was even worth seeing and the driver said that we still had a demi kilometre to walk (and what does that mean? the American school system really screwed me over, just want you to know) and that we'd have to ask the little old lady in the farm next door for the key to the chapel. WHAT?!?!?! Eventually we found it and the little old lady, but I have to say all the walking and sweating and swearing was worth it. The chapel is one little room that was built in the 1000s or something of that sort with no more than five pews and an interior that curves upward to a crumbling cieling with an iron chandelier and nothing electric or modern about the place. Very much like stepping back in time.

After our religious experience, (hahaha!) we only had two hours to get back to Marseilles, run to our hotel, get our luggage and make our train. We made it with minutes to spare, sweaty and disgusting. All and all a very awesome vacation with lots of great memories. I enjoyed the train ride back to Paris and watched the flower fields and mountains fly by. Marina headed off to Greece and the second half of her vacation, and I have spent the last few days bumming around my dorm and reading book after book - recovering from my vacation.

Today I finally got out of the building and went to the Salvador Dali museum up in Montrematre. There are over 300 works by the artists including sculture, lithographs and paintings - very, very cool. After visiting l'Espace Dali, I've decided that I MUST marry a man with an eccentric moustache. I'll have it no other way.

Everyone will be coming back from their travels in the next few days and I'm excited to hear what they've all seen and done. Then it's back to school for three days only to jet of to Amsterdam on Thursday. Life's tough, ain't it?