Un Mariage à Paris

My extraordinary first week in France ended with a bang. I was lucky enough to have arrived in France just in time to be able to make it to my friend Courtney's wedding in Paris.

A little history:
Courtney and I went to high school together where we both took French. Although she was in a different class than me, as she was a year older, we both ended up going on the annual trip to France with a bunch of other students in French. After high school we both went to Marquette and both continued to take French courses, some of which we had together. She studied in Paris a year before I studied in Lille and met a guy named Michaël whom she married this September. When she told me her adorable story about how they happened to meet in the metro in Paris, she inspired me even more to study abroad. Ahhh, l'amour.

Friday September 28th: Heading to Paris!

I took an early 5 hour train Friday morning (the 28th) from Lyon to Paris where I met up with my Strasbourgeoise friend Mélanie who studied at Marquette during the 2010-2011 school year. She and I met because we both lived in Global Village and she and Courtney met through the French club. Once we realized that we all knew each other, we started hanging out together and became good friends before Melanie went back to France and Courtney made the big move to Paris. The last time we all saw each other was last October when I came to visit them from London the weekend following my most amazing birthday week.

Although this short trip to Paris made my schedule a little more hectic with moving in and getting settled, it was a very special and happy reunion which I was very glad to be a part of.

Melanie and I booked a hotel about a half a mile away from the City Hall of Courbevoie where the wedding was to be held the following afternoon. As both of us weren't desperate to be tourists that weekend and we were tired from traveling, we decided it'd be best to get some good Italian food and call it a night.

We were situated by La Défense, a major business district in Paris. The area was hardly like the Paris one imagines from romanticized postcards and movies.

Saturday September 29th: Wedding Day!

Melanie and I woke up in time for the hotel's breakfast and decided to walk around the centre commercial where we eventually got lunch before going to the city hall for the wedding.

Apparently all the weddings that took place there had about 15-30 minutes for their ceremony before the next couple got married. Luckily Courtney and Mike's was the last one of the day, so we were able to stay longer and take lots of pictures.

This is La Mairie (city hall) de Courbevoie:

The ceremony was followed by a photo session at the Parc de Bagatelle, which was a beautiful place to take pictures, even though we had to drive by a few prostitutes to get there. It was kind of funny though because Melanie and I and two other Americans who came for the wedding didn't have a ride so we rode with the photographer who was a rather goofy friend of Mike's. The whole time we all had a feeling we were driving all over Paris and not headed in the right direction until he called Mike, asking for directions and being told things like "take a right at the prostitutes who are having a picnic."

Regardless, I'm sure the photographs turned out beautifully. For example:

Courtney & Mike

Me & Melanie

 Afterwards we headed to a fancy restaurant for the reception near the Chateau de Vincennes. Melanie and I rode with some of Mike's friends again and we got a short tour of Paris, as we had to drive through the center of the city to get there. Whenever I go to Paris, it's a primary goal of mine to at least get a glimpse of the Eiffel Tower, just so I know for sure that I'm in Paris.

Here's my glimpse:

When we got to the reception venue it was all fancy hors d'oeuvres and flowing champagne. We socialized and talked with everyone until it was time for the dinner service. This was truly a multi-lingual/multi-cultural experience; Courtney's friends from work were from all over: USA, Germany, Sweden, and Ireland. At one point she introduced me to her Swedish friend with whom I tried to have a short conversation in Swedish, and then I explained how whenever I try to speak Swedish I think in German, and whenever I'm trying to speak German I think in French, etc. Just as I said that, one of Courtney's friends said "oh! I'm from Frankfurt." My brain was already mixed up from switching between French and English all night, but it was a fun experience that made me feel like my language studies indeed had a purpose.

When I asked Melanie what time she thought we'd be back for the night she said it could be 6 or 7 in the morning. This shocked me. This isn't how any American weddings I've been to have worked (although, admittedly, I've never stayed until the end of one). Then I soon figured out why this is: French meals. The French love to spend a lot of time dining. Not only that, but there were at least four courses to this meal. We started with appetizers while we were still socializing and walking around, then there was the entree (which I guess is an appetizer in English) which was a small portion of fish and vegetables if I remember correctly. That was followed by the main course of steak and potatoes. Thinking it'd be time for cake, Melanie informed me that it wasn't time for dessert until we had our cheese! How the French love their cheese. If you've ever been to a French restaurant, you can usually order a plate of cheese for dessert.

The thing is, I love cheese, but mostly hard cheeses, and France loves soft and extremely smelly cheeses which turn me off from the idea a bit. So here's the plate of cheese I shared with Melanie because I knew I wouldn't be eating much of it and my not-so-enthused face. Wine in hand, of course.

 It wasn't even until 11:30 that we finally got our cake (this makes the meal about 3-4 hours long already). This is also when I learned that French weddings don't typically have cakes like our wedding cakes. They usually have something like this which is called a croquembouche or a croque-en-bouche ("crunch in mouth"):

 The little pastries are like cream-filled profiteroles which are held together by melted caramel or something similar.

At 12:30 the dancing finally started with the first dance of Courtney and Mike.

By this point we all had enough champagne and wine in us to dance a bit. The music was a mixture of oldies, love songs and American group dance songs like the Electric Slide and the Cupid Shuffle. It was really amusing to see the older French people try to do the dances, but then a similar song in French came on which all the older French people knew and we youngsters were left to figure out how it worked. The best part was when an ABBA song played and everyone sang along, and then it was followed by one of my favorite French artists, Claude Francois. If you know me really well, you already know that he's a big guilty pleasure of mine. He's a huge French star from the 60's and 70's who sang disco songs and had funny backup dancers who wore fun costumes like this:

 

 

At this point all the middle aged Frenchies went wild, and I was especially excited to hear him in such an "authentic" setting. Fun Fact: my beloved Claude was the original creator of the song "My Way," you know, that famous Frank Sinatra song that everyone covers.

As the restaurant had to close around 2:30 in the morning, everyone had to leave and we didn't get to live out the party until 6 or 7 am, but we definitely had a really fun night.

Congrats again to Courtney and Mike! 

 Sunday, September 30th: Going back to Lyon and moving in.

Sunday was a crazy busy day because I woke up in Paris, had some breakfast at the hotel and immediately had to get ready to go to the Gare de Lyon (it's a train station in Paris that was originally built in Lyon) to catch my train back to Lyon. Once I got back I contacted Helena to see where she was because this was the big move-in day when she rented a moving truck to move all the big pieces of furniture to our apartment in Villeurbanne (technically kind of a 'suburb' of Lyon, but honestly, it's basically the city-the metro covers us).

 Unfortunately I didn't have much time to help move in because I had to make it back to Belley around 6 pm so I could start my first days of work. I still didn't have a chance to unpack my two big suitcases yet, so I was once again packing a small carry-on from my space bags full of clothes. It wasn't until the following weekend that my life settled down a bit.

Next up: my first few days of work with French high schoolers!

La Première Semaine

So, the first week has finally passed!
Considering I've done a ridiculous amount of traveling this past week, I'll lay out each day and hopefully it won't be too long or boring. This will also serve as a kind of diary so I can remember the first days. So read on as you wish!

Sunday, September 23rd: Leaving Milwaukee
Leaving a place you love and know well is always the hardest part of traveling/moving.
Throughout the summer I was definitely sad to be leaving my fun (and basically work-free) summer as well as missing my usual nights out and of course my friends and family, but all good things must end, right? What made it easier though was knowing I'd be in good hands when I arrived and I'm not completely unfamiliar with France and its workings (very luckily, this place can be confusing--read further for details).

Monday, September 24th: Arrival in Lyon
I made it! The long 8 hour flight to Zurich was bearable and the food was decent. Swiss Airlines was pretty awesome; I got a warm towel, played Sudoku and got to charge my phone the whole time.  Upon arrival, I knew I was back in Europe just by looking at the people around me in the airport. The airport looked really chic and modern and the women and men all around were extremely well-dressed, wearing their best. All that was left was a simple one hour flight to Lyon where I was welcomed by a huge hug from Helena.

Tuesday, September 25th: My first full day

This was probably one of my busiest days. I left Helena's mom's apartment around midday to meet up with other American assistants for some Salade Lyonnaise before meeting up with the other American assistant at my Lycée in Belley, Iris. Once we finally found each other we had to take the metro (with 2 huge suitcases and one carry-on, mind you) to pick up our keys for the apartment we were renting for the night. Once we got the keys it was another hectic and sweaty trip on the metro until we got to Vieux Lyon.

This was the view from our apartment which was a really adorable place owned by the most beautiful and seemingly happiest couple ever. Everywhere you looked there was a happy, artsy couple photo of them. Unfortunately, however, we didn't get a chance to actually talk to them since we came home late that night and ended up leaving the next day while they were at work. Dommage.

So we relaxed a little since we were still recovering from our jetlag (we both left from O'Hare within an hour of each other but were in different terminals so we couldn't meet up ahead of time). Around 7 or 8 we decided we should probably get something to eat. As we happened to be across the street from Johnny Walsh's (an infamous pub I've heard a lot about from friends who studied abroad in Lyon), we decided to go there. When we arrived we were asked if we wanted to play pub quiz, and of course we did. We weren't sure what to expect, especially since it was likely going to be in French. It turned out to be a little different from the pub quizes I'm used to back in the States; they asked the questions in French and English (for kicks, I'm assuming) and then had a break after the 16th question during which everyone left the piping hot basement/cave to go and have a smoke while the quizmaster corrected the first questions. By the time we all reconvened Iris and I were really tired and were losing pretty badly so we just decided to call it a night.

Wednesday, September 26th: Going to Belley
This was a pretty rainy day, and boy did we get the worst of it, Iris and I. We slept in too late to get lunch with a friend, and we hadn't gotten our train tickets yet to get to Belley so we decided to get them from an SNCF boutique (the French national rail system) earlier in the day. As it was raining hard, the streets were full of puddles and I had to share an umbrella with Iris. I was upset that my pants were getting wet, but it was nothing compared to what happened along our walk. While we were standing on the edge of the sidewalk, waiting to cross the street, a car sped past us through a huge puddle which caused a tidle wave of rain water to splash all over us. There's nothing like a nice puddle of rain to the face to wake you up in the morning. Luckily we were only a block from our apartment so we ran back and dried off for a brief amount of time. The only thing I could think was "welcome back to France."

Luckily the rest of our day went better. We got our train tickets without a problem and got to the train station with all of our bags, ready to meet Belley. We were met at the train station Virieu-Le-Grand (there's no train station in the town of Belley) by my contact at the Lycée, Amandine.


The mountains that greeted us in Virieu

Since it was our first night and there was surely not going to be anywhere open to get food, Amandine was kind enough to invite us over for dinner with her husband and two year old son Victor (the cutest kid in France!).

Thursday, September 27th: Exploring Belley
Iris and I didn't have to start work until the following week, so we decided to take advantage of our free days and see what there is to see in Belley to get a feel for where we'll be living for the next few months. We went around the school to get some administrative things done, walked around the centre ville, and went on an adventure on our boarding school's rooftop (by climbing out our bedroom window).

This is Iris.

 

The recreation courtyard

Belley city center

 

 
After walking around the town and having a coffee + pastry, we decided to find out where the nearest Carrefour is (like a combination of Target and Pick 'n' Save). Unfortunately for us, it's about a mile away so we won't be doing any frequent shopping there. However, I did find this adorable decoration and found the perfect place to put it. =)

At the end of the day I had to catch a train back to Lyon so that I could get on an early train to Paris the next morning for a friend's wedding. Although that was part of my first week, I'm going to dedicate a post to it since a lot happened that weekend. So stay tuned, my busy first week continues!