HELLO! I am sooo glad that I have the internet right now... I'm currently in the AUP computer lab going on every website possible. After touring around London - Paris - Madrid/Valencia, I realized that finding FREE wireless is harder than I thought! As soon as I *think* I have free wireless, a page opens up asking me to log in or pay... grumble grumble.
Now I'll talk about what I can remember up to this point!
Aug 18 : I MADE IT TO EUROPE! Cue the muzak!
- I made it to Paris, barely got any sleep on the airplane- probably nerves
- Successfully got on the Eurostar train to London
- Navigated the London Underground - very very easy & made it to the hotel, luckily they let me check in early!
- My cousins + my aunt finally arrived pretty late around midnight
... - Aug 21 : LONDON
- We didn't do too much, just the basics because we were tired, lazy, and had young kids- oh and it was mostly rainy! Blehhh...
- London Eye (didn't go in), Big Ben (didn't really go up to it), Trafalagar Square (watched the Olympics), the museum at Trafalagar (forgot the name), aquarium
- We did the bus tour, glimpsed at the special parts, that was pretty much it. Didn't feel like going to Buckingham Palace haha
- The highlight: Madame Tussaud's in London! It was really funny taking pictures with the wax figures... especially Daniel Radcliffe & David Beckham! I really hoped for a Rupert Grint wax figure... but it's kinda good that there wasn't, because who knows what I would do to it MWAHAHA ;]
... - Aug 25 : PARIS
- The WORST part about the Metro is how it's NOT handicap accessible. So if you have luggage and you must transfer to different lines, you have to drag your stuff UP and DOWN so many stairs... it was really terrible with heavy luggage (now I gotta use cab or bus!), but everything else is cool with how there are many signs & there's a board that tells you when the next two trains are coming (Why can't we have that for the NYC Subway??)
- The highlight: Walking for around 30 minutes clueless w/ my cousins, eating Chinese food, then turning the corner to see the HUGE, clear view of the Eiffel Tower- it was so amazing to see it for the first time! I thought I was gonna tear up- it just was so awesome to see it after studying French for so long!
- Did the bus tours & a boat cruise - saw stuffs
- Eiffel Tower (didn't go up), Louvre (went inside, saw the Mona Lisa, Venus de Milo, etc), Sacre Coeur at Montmartre, Arc de Triomphe at Champs Elysees, Notre Dame, etc.
... - Aug 29 : SPAIN
- At the ass-crack of dawn I went to take the RyanAir bus shuttle to Paris Beauvais airport to Madrid & arrived at the airport only to discover Devinson's phone number was not working! So I paid 1 Euro to check Facebook and luckily he had a working number
- Easy-to-use metro system so I was able to find him and visit ICADE where they were still doing construction- tiny seats in the classrooms, blue & white tiles all over
- Met up with Thad in the late afternoon, went to the bus station, decided that the consigna luggage storage was a bit shady so we went back to Charlotte's place to drop off our shit and go "light" to Tomatina
- Took a 4-hour bus ride from Madrid to Valencia, arrived at around 12:30am? Wandered around on foot ALL night because we decided a hostel wasn't worth it-- there were crazy drunk people all around town getting naked & wet in fountains, particularly from Australia on the FANATICS group tour
- Got followed by a baby kitten, got VERY confused on the train system looking for the one going to Bunol- we went back & forth & ran up and down stairs and talked to SO many people... finally we found some shirtless Canadians (one of whom talked EXACTLY like DOB) and they gave us false information, then we found the correct way, and Dev & Thad shirted them [Important: You need a shirt to board a train]
- Took the first train to Bunol, dropped off luggage, and we took "bare essentials"* to Tomatina: goggles, ear plugs, monies, shoes. *Don't even bother bringing that, it's all useless
- Dev & Thad got pissed drunk off pineapple juice that some girls ditched on the train + rum, attempted at the ham pole, got injured in bits and pieces
- Tomato fight occured, I got scurred with all the pushing + shirts ripping off, lots and lots of hard tomatoes were thrown, I thought my toenail fell off
- Finally found Dev + Thad, we eventually got back to Madrid early, only to find no one answering Charlotte's door but LUCKILY her brother was home and let us in after we called her from a payphone
- SLEPT, then I went on a Madrid bus tour, went to the Bodies museum, met up with Allison + Dev + Thad, had dinner, then went to the airport
This is not me, but this is probably what I looked like... except with a gazillion people surrounding me on all sides and in more pain.
... - Now : PARIS!
- Currently I'm being housed at the FIAP in the 14th arrondisement near Denfert Rochereau & Glaciere Metro stops
- Orientation started- there are a lot of visiting, freshmen, transfer, & graduate students of all nationalities.. I think there are ~100 nationalities represented at the AUP currently
- My roommate at the FIAP is very cool luckily, but I haven't met many people so far that I'd hang out with on a daily basis... I'm getting kinda nervous about that. There are a lotta... snobbish, rich girls with LV bags haha but... there are a few nice ones too... It's just annoying because I want to feel settled! Oh well...
- I bought a pay as you go mobile phone for 40 Euros + added minutes... this is my number: 06.59.81.28.87 / from the US add 33 and drop the 0 so: 336.59.81.28.87
- Yesterday I discovered my ATM card was NOT working- WTF! I tried calling yesterday but it's Labor Day in the States (boo!), so I called them this morning... should be good now, I spent all 650 Euros + 50 pounds that I bought at home already
- Today, I have my housing meeting... I'm hoping to: 1. Be near the school (7th arrondisement near the Eiffel) 2. Not pay that much 3. Have internets (very very important!)
Few things I've learned...
- There is some racism in France- you've just gotta deal with it and move on and not say anything or else you can get in huge trouble. Once my cousins and I were at the Trocadero metro stop after visiting the Eiffel and a huge group of French black men from across the stop were calling out to us calling my little cousin "Bruce Lee" and making like asian-chinese sounds.. it was really dumb and pathetic. I really wanted to shout back at them in English, but I knew that would be dumber so I let it go. It's a good thing though, because I heard stories of someone at AUP who flipped off a carful of people who were flipping him off and then they stopped the car & beat him up.
- The plumbing system sucks- deal with it
- Bread is SO freakin good... You will not get better bread anywhere else!! I can't even eat "French" bread in the US anymore, it's just NOT the same
- "Bon soir" is not a goodbye... it's a greeting at night! Did not know that... There are also such greetings such as "Bon journee" & "Bon continuation"... Don't ask me what that means just yet
- Don't smile at men in Metros... or they'll chase you.
That's it for now... I wrote too much anyway. Will update when I get my chambre de bonne**! Oh & I miss me mum!
**aka a really really really small amount of space that I will call home for the next four months
My current mental status: A little anxious about everything, but generally happy!
I'm seriously trying to figure it out. At first I thought, maybe they're just trying to talk to a group of asian girls... but the thing is, they're assuming we're asian tourists who can't speak their language, so what were they gonna say after they said "Konitchiwa"?? Were they just gonna walk away? Try to speak in English? It's just seriously irritating... BLAH! And honestly, after the 1309328th time, I'm getting more and more irritated at each person who does it. Hopefully we get our point across when we tell them that we don't speak those languages, we're American, third of all, we're Korean, and ultimately they can't assume.
