Paris, je t'aime...

Hello once again from Paris, the City of Light! Certainly the infamous city lives up to its name at night, but also during the day. The sun has been shining a lot, and it's very very hot!

So what, exactly, have we been up to? Along with working on our projects, we've also been having a lot of fun with our homestay families. In the same format as the last homestay post, I'll report to all of you guys about what's been going on with our homestays, and what we've been doing.

Joanna's family was, for her first week, in Africa, so she was staying with the aunt of her homestay sister. However, they are now back. Joanna says they are very very nice and they brought her back a really beautiful necklace from Tanzania. I should know how pretty it is... I saw it yesterday! She, as well as myself and Emma, went to see the movie "What Happens in Vegas" although here it's called "Jackpot." Those of us who have seen it are giving it good reviews. She wants me to add that Napoleon's bedroom is leopard print... hmmm...

Carly's brother is currently playing in a professional volleyball tournament. She went bowling, and says that for once she was actually good at it. She says the bowling alley was more like a night club with a bowling alley in it. (For those of you who are dying to know, the French word for night club is "boite de nuit" or, literally translated, "night box" which I think is just great.) She says her sister really enjoys being with Carly and that she eats cake and brownies for breakfast. She also attended a party and met a bunch of French people.

Esme says she ate Chinese food for the first time in 2 months. This is exciting, but if only we could find some pho! She saw the Lion King at the theater and says it was impressive. She's been taking more nature walks with Carly, specifically one at Buttes Chaumont, a sprawling park that she says is similar to Seattle.

Jack attended a jazz concert in a bookstore, and said it was "really artsy." The band was an American band called The Cosmosamatics. He says the sax player was really funny and kept doing little jumps as he played. He also went to an antiques market with his brother.

Colin also attended a jazz concert. At a bar. He says it was unique because along with the band there was also a DJ scratching, which he says was really cool. Afterwards there was a sort of jam session that included a freestyling rapper, whom he says "looked like a Tommy Hilfiger model" and he couldn't tell if the guy was good at it or not, but he said it rhymed so he assumes the guy wasn't too awful. He then went to a party at the jazz pianist's house, where they asked him about his opinion on French girls.

Claire says she's finally got the opportunity to hang out with her otherwise busy family (we just had a long weekend and everyone had days off). She says she went grocery shopping at a local market with the family and says it was actually really fun. Her mother is a big fan of a parsley and pork pate, which is apparently a specialty of some region of France... unfortunately we don't know exactly what region. She saw a play called "Le Cul de Judas" which, translated, means, "Judas's Ass" and I don't mean "ass" as in "donkey"... It was a one-man show about a doctor who worked during the Angolan civil war. She says it was bizarre. She also went to see the school play called "L'Oiseau Vert" or "The Green Bird" which she says was very good. Her homestay brother was in it, as one half of a "shrieking arch."

Rebecca's mother joined a choir a year ago and says the mother practices all the time, which drives Rebecca's homestay siblings crazy. Rebecca won brownie points with her mother by saying the singing is not what bothers her, but rather her siblings telling her mother to be quiet. Bon travail, Rebecca!

Emma ate at a Cuban restaurant with her sister and her friends and saw the movies Jackpot and 15 Ans et Demi (15 and a Half Years) which is a French movie (I've also seen it... very cute indeed). She also went to one of the big flea markets here with her family.

As for me, well, my family took me to the beach for 5 days. It was very nice but also very difficult because they had some family friends there and I was really quite shy. I also didn't bring a bathing suit. The mother in the other family was Russian, and brought her parents, who don't speak French, which was really cool to see other people in my situation who were older. We were in the Normandie region, close to where Saving Private Ryan was shot. My family was very adamant about pointing that out. The other family with us had two young children, ages 6 and 9, and they both spoke French and Russian, which was really neat to me. I ate way too many crepes while I was there, two each day on Friday and Saturday. (Saturday night we ate dinner at a place specifically for crepes. I ordered a bacon, spinach and cream crepe.) My homestay sister really enjoys seeing movies, so I've seen at least two, one French and one American (see above) and both were enjoyable. I have gotten started on my theater project, and on Monday Annie accompanied me to a HILARIOUS sketch comedy duo called "Garnier & Sentou". It was hysterical, both of us laughed so hard we cried. Afterwards, after asking for a favor from a friend working the doors, we managed to meet up with the two comedians and went with them to chat in a bar next door. What originally would've been a half hour conversation became a 3 hour conversation, which was absolutely amazing. I wish I could describe the night but the words fail me. We conducted the conversation in English, which was interesting. I asked them how they learned English and they told me from watching movies, which I thought was amazing, especially since their English was near perfect. They were really amazingly nice guys and gave me some really good advice for succeeding in the theater world. If you'd like to check out their epic genius, their website is http://www.garnieretsentou.com/. They also have a MySpace and a Facebook, and apparently some of their stuff is on YouTube. They're hilarious. Francophones should definitely check them out. The sketches are full of movement, so what you don't understand can be made up for by the huge facial expressions. My favorite skit that I saw is not on YouTube, but I did locate another fantastic skit that had me crying with laughter. Here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_F-IukzJd1M Again, it's in French, but the huge expressions make up for it and some of the French isn't hard to understand. Also, this is just the last three minutes of the sketch, so if you're a little lost, sorry. If you want more, check out the song they have on their YouTube page, "Siamois a toi" (or something like that) because it's also very hilarious, especially live. Enjoy!

The group has been meeting regularly to gallivant around Paris. Monday, we met with Pierre (our friend from La Ferriere) to take a walking tour, where we discovered the Moulin Rouge ("Diamonds are a girl's best friend!"), attempted to find a market that wasn't there, and saw stores selling stolen cellphones (quelle horreur!). Yesterday we went on one of "Annie's Tours of Death" to the Pere Lachaise cemetary, which is the resting place of such known celebrities as Oscar Wilde, Moliere, Edith Piaf and Jim Morrisson. We successfully located his grave and found much silly graffitti on the tomb next to it, including "Rock on Jim" and "Break on through to the other side" which brings us much amusement. We took pictures of the family names that were unusual as well. It should also be noted that Colin and Jack unfortunately could not accompany us... they showed up at the right time at the wrong cemetary. Such a shame!

We would like to thank Jack McHenry for sending a copy of The Rambler to Rebecca. It brought us joy.

That's all I've got for you this week. Next week is Emma's turn, and she'll keep you updated next week. Hope everyone's AMP week went swimmingly.

Salut!
Rachel