(65) is Friday, 12 March 2010
So, because we don't get enough free time as JYA students, the various Universities of Paris have given us a second break: two weeks in the second half of April. Naturally, this merits another vacation, so the Madrid crew got together at my house on Friday to focus on making plans.
Focus. Yeah, we're good at that.
We ended up making a spaghetti dinner and watching episodes of Jackie Chan Adventures, one of my personal favorite cartoons from elementary school days.* We left my house around 1 (in time to catch the last trains). Only, I went with Kirill and Liz, and crashed at Kirill's temporary apartment. That actually gives us a rather nice transition into
(66) is Saturday, 13 March 2010
during which we just hung out at the apartment and around the Bastille area. We got Sushi, which was one of those things I had no idea how much I was craving until I had some. Trouble is, I now know how much I want sushi. Hopefully my parents' impending arrival this Friday will help me resolve this problem...
This was my first really lazy day in Paris. I'd forgotten how gratifying those were. Just hanging out with friends in an apartment with nothing better to do, hanging out, having fun, and watching great TV (Jackie Chan, again)... this was just an afternoon full of everything great about being our age.
And because sushi for lunch wasn't enough, we met up with Aaron, Dan, Becky, and her friend visiting from Germany for Vietnamese food around dinner time. It was pretty good. Do you ever play the game when you go out to eat with friends and you each happen to order something different and, after everybody's tasted everybody else's and decided what they like and what they don't, you decide who won? I tried LizMac's Pad Thai, Aaron's curry, and a few other things. I had mussels.
I lost.
(67) is Sunday, 14 March 2010
Okay, you may have figured out that I don't often write about Sundays. So, you know today was awesome.
I woke up and got dressed on the nicer side because I had someplace very important to be. I had a quick breakfast, hopped on the metro, and found my way to the Opera station, near the center of the city (here's a metro map to help you visualize).
In writing this, I have decided to cut out the tangential (and only mildly entertaining) story I was going to include about how I went to the wrong metro station... apparently Google Maps doesn't distinguish between Paris's Opera Garnier and Opera Bastille. Though they're the same organization, they're 8 metro stops apart. I ended up getting to the more modern (but still gorgeous) opera house about 5 minutes late.
But, it's all good, because I still got to see Verdi's Don Carlo in a beautiful production featuring some superb singers in an incredible opera house. This was actually my first time going to the opera, so I wasn't quite sure what to expect.
I was very pleasantly surprised, however. Based on what I saw, I found that Opera is a lot more accessible** than it's usually made out to be. The story was actually really good, the music was beautiful, it was a lot of fun to be in the balcony and watch the orchestra, and it was ALL SO EPIC. I will say, though, that keeping everything at such a sustained intensity can desensitize you to the epic-ness after a while.*** But it's okay, because I knew going in that that's what I was in for. And It was well done, so I just really enjoyed it... the four hours went by rather fast, and there was a stunning sunset over the Paris rooftops waiting outside the balcony's panoramic window when we left.
Oh, and did I mention that-- thanks to Reid Hall-- I got to see all this for five euros?
I then came home and watched the returns for the first round of the French regional elections (which took place that day). This is where each region (kind of like each state in the U.S.?) votes for which party they want (and there are a few) in charge of things like infrastructure and funding... sort of like a gubernatorial race. All but the top three (I think) either get dropped or can make alliances with parties in the top three, and then the second round is the following Sunday. The Socialist party (because "liberal" means here what we Americans associate with "conservative" politics... pro-business, for example) came out higher than any other party, although more than 50% of France apparently didn't vote at all. This is actually a big deal for them, whereas we Americans are used to chalking it up to laziness every other year.
So, yeah. Good weekend, I thought.
-Andy
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Notes de bas de page (any guesses on what that means?)
* Imagine Jackie Chan as an archaeologist after the fashion of Indiana Jones in a very funny show with good plotlines and great characters and dialogue. If you're curious (or want to remember why you loved it), enjoy: http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=E6DD1D766498161D&search_query=jackie+chan+adventures
** I figure if I keep putting footnotes in weird places, like the middle of sentences, you'll stay curious enough to keep coming down here. Anyway, I footnoted that because-- speaking of accessible-- this was an Italian opera, so there were French subtitles. I understood a solid 95% of them. I was very pleased with myself.
*** This is actually why I don't like Les Misérables (and get angry reactions just like the one you're having now). As someone who likes (and, on occasion, writes) musical theater, I find it's much more effective to have characters sing only during the most important moments (either in terms of emotion or the story). It creates better dynamics and gives the audience a break from the exhausting emotional fortissimo of constant epic arias. Also, it saves you from painful, contrived, and generally unnecessary rhymes like "He stole some bread! He should be dead!"
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