Normandy

Bonjour all! I had a great trip to Normandy this weekend. I left my apartment early Friday morning and met up with everyone in central Paris. We got on our coach bus and met our tour guide who explained to what we would be doing the next two days. The first stop of the trip was Bayeux, a small french town, about 4 hours from Paris. We visited the tapestries museum there, which houses the largest tapestry in the world (at least in my opinion!) It was interesting to look at but not worth spending an hour listening to the portable audio guide we were each given. My friend Kathryn and I opted to head to lunch after quickly viewing the work of art. We found a cute little restaurant near the cathedral. I had a very good Niçoise salad (greens with potatoes, tuna, olives, carrots, and some type of vinaigrette. It was delicious! Afterward, we headed to the cathedral--it was much less ornate compared to the cathedrals I've seen elsewhere in France. The we walked through the town and found some of the other people in our group who were getting gelato, so of course we followed suit and got some as well (mint and cafe for me). By 2pm we were back on the bus waiting for everyone else to arrive. Unfortunately one person did not arrive back to the bus and we were forced to leave a half an hour later.

Next, we traveled 45 minutes to Omaha beach, one of the famous American DDay landing sites. It was something I had been waiting to see since I had learned about DDay in grade school. I am not really into history, especially compared to the rest of my extended family who are all history buffs, but I have always been fascinated with WWII. The beach looked like just a regular resort town beach, but I tried to imagine what it had looked like on June 6, 1944. I constantly was thinking back to the movie "Saving Private Ryan", a favorite of mine. As I turned away from the beach, I noticed the steep hills, something that probably proved to be problematic for the Allies. There was a memorial sculpture built on the sand of Omaha Beach, which commemorated the DDay landing and remembered those who were lost on that day and the days after the first landing.

Following our visit to Omaha, we drove to the American Cemetery, which is located on a hill next to the water. As we drove up to the cemetery, the gloomy weather seemed to only get worse, and it began to rain. The rain seemed fitting--it would have been strange to be there in beautiful weather. The walk from the parking lot to the cemetery seemed as if it took forever. When I finally got there, I couldn't believe my eyes. Thousands upon thousands of white crosses and stars laid before me. All of the men (and a few women) had died in either WWI or WWII. Some were brothers, some were fathers and sons, and some were unknown. Our tour guide had given us the plot numbers of famous Americans who were buried here, like the sons of Teddy Roosevelt and the brothers who inspired the movie "Saving Private Ryan, but the cemetery was too overwhelming for me to navigate and figure out who was buried where so I just started walking around, looking at names, where they came friend, when they died, etc. At the two end of the cemetery stood beautiful memorials. On the backside of the memorial in the front was a courtyard enclosed by a wall. The wall bore the names of all those who were never found.

After this emotional visit, we headed to Arromanches, where Gold Beach, a UK DDay landing site, is located. The "caissons" are are retaining walls that were used to create a harbor during the war. Some of these caissons are still in the sea, as well as on the beach. After a short stop there, we traveled to the town where we would be staying the night, Trouville. Trouville is a seaside town that is very busy in the summertime. Many people come to Trouville from Paris just for the day to go to the beach. The hotel we stayed at was much nicer than I had expected. We had dinner together as a group and then were free to do as we pleased. Some people headed to the casino across the street from the hotel, but Kathryn, Michael, and I decided to walk around town. It was raining pretty hard outside, so we didn't stay out too long but I got to see a lot of the town.

The next morning we had breakfast at the hotel and then headed to the Chateau Breuil, a calvados distillery. This region does not produce wine, but it is known for its calvados. Calvados is a very strong alcohol made with apples. We toured the distillery and then tasted a drink called pommeau, which only had 17%alcohol in it. I like it a lot--it had a very apple-y taste to it and the alcohol was not overbearing. The second tasting was a calvados aged for 15yrs. This was 40% alcohol and it tasted like it. The look on everyones' faces as they tried the drink was priceless. It was very very very strong. I barely could take a sip of it. After the two tastings, we walked over to another building where we sat down and had some water or apple cidre. The staff brought out apple pie, a Norman speciality. This apple pie was out of this world. I have had some excellent apple pies back in the States, but this was incredible. I could have eaten the entire pie, it was that good.

Our next stop was the city of Caen. Caen was almost completely destroyed during the battle of Normandy. The castle of William the Conqueror still stands today, despite some missing sections. My friends and I walked around town and grabbed something light to eat at a cafe. Later, we

drove to the Caen Peace Memorial, which is a museum that has exhibits on the DDay invasion, the events leading up to WWII, and the aftermath of the war. There is also an exhibit about the Nobel Prize. The museum is regarded as the best WWII museum in France. The movie that is played in its theatre describes the events of DDay with video footage which was incredible to see. It also featured speeches from Charles de Gaulle, Winston Churchill, FDR, and Hitler.

The museum was our last stop of the trip. We raced to the bus after the movie so that we could leave as soon as possible in order to miss traffic in Caen and Paris. We got back to Paris late that night. I was exhausted from everything we had done and slept very well that night.

So far this week, nothing major to report on. This Friday I am going to the Selon de Vins (Wine Fair) with my Oenology class. I will make sure to report back on my findings next post. Au revoir!

-MEP

Brugge

To continue on with my trip to Belgium this past weekend, I will pick up with Saturday.

We all woke up early and got to the train station by 9am. There are trains leaving for Brugge every 30 mins or so, so we did not need to worry about trying to find one to get there. Tickets to Brugge are €13 round trip on the weekends which is a steal! We arrived in Brugge around 1030am and made our way to the centre of town on cobblestoned streets lined with small houses. The village (I can't really call it a city), is considered at UNESCO World Heritage Site. It is considered a more medieval-looking Venice. I was definitely glad we chose to check it out because we only really needed one day in Bruxelles.

In Brugge, the locals speak Flemish because it is located in West Flanders, a northern province of Belgium. Flemish is similar to Dutch, the language spoken in the Netherlands. Fortunately, almosteveryone there speaks English. I am so used to speaking french in France that I didn't even use english until I realized that a lot of people did not know french! I have to admit that it did feel good to use my english and speak with others who didn't mind speaking in my native tongue (I try not to speak in english in France because I don't want to offend the locals).

Once again, the main attractions of the day involved food and eating. We first went to a bakery to get some pastries since we had not eaten breakfast before leaving Bruxelles. Then we walked to the main square, called Markt, where we saw the Belfry, a bell tower. After seeing the tower, we walked around some side streets, off of the main square. We noticed that there was a chocolate museum nearby, so we quickly made our way there. Belgium is famous for its chocolates so we knew this was something we couldn't pass up.

Inside the chocolate museum, called "Choco-story", were 4 stories, each filled with information about the history of chocolate, dating back to the Incas, Aztecs, Mayans, and Olmecs, of ancient Latin America. There were lots of artifacts and videos. Normally, it might be boring to me to just be constantly reading information about the invention of chocolate, but this museum made it fun and interesting. I just kept wanting to read more. One of my favorite sections of the museum was at the end, when we got to see a chocolate making demonstration. A woman spoke to us from a test kitchen and showed us how she made chocolates filled with a

hazelnut cream (hazelnuts are VERY popular in Europe apparently). After she was through with her lecture, we all received a piece of freshly made chocolate as we exited the test kitchen.

Afterward, we searched for a place to have lunch--yes, we were still hungry despite eating a handful of chocolates. I noticed an Irish pub on a street near the museum and suggested we try it. The food was delicious! I had an Irish breakfast: eggs, bacon, sausage, baked tomato, and toast, along with some authentic irish tea. Midway through our lunch we noticed a crowd of people moving into the bar area near us. Apparently there was a rugby match on television that everyone wanted to watch. It reminded me of going to a bar/restaurant at home and everyone coming in to watch the Eagles play!

By the time we were finished lunch it was almost 4pm. We decided to head back to the train station to go back to Bruxelles. We were all very tired and desperately needed a nap before we went to dinner. After napping, we headed out to find a restaurant that served mussels, a specialty of Belgium that my friend Sam desperately wanted to try before we went back to Paris. We were successful in finding a restaurant that served us mussels, fries, bread, and a beer or wine for only €12! The mussels were out of this world. We were quite sleepy after dinner so we headed back to the hostel and slept very well.

The next morning we checked out and went over to the chocolate store once more. We also had our last waffle in Belgium--this time I had strawberries with powdered sugar, yum! Libby needed to get to the train station to catch a bus to the airport in Charleroi, which was an hour away from the city. We walked towards Gare Midi and stumbled upon a Muslim open air market, which caught the attention of Sam. After saying a sad and teary goodbye to Libby, Sam and I walked back to the streets near Grand Place, where I knew I could find some souvenir shops. After buying some souvenirs, I saw an escargot vendor down the street. I really wanted to try some but I was a little nervous to buy them from some guy on the street. There were lots of locals eating them though so I figured it was safe. Sam and I split a container of them, 5 for each of us was surely enough. They were awesome! The only issue we had was that there was a small snail sculpture looking right at us as we ate the escargot, which made us feel a bit weird. As if escargot, waffles, and chocolates were not enough, we went to the chocolate shop again and I got my friend in Paris some chocolates.

Godiva happened to be across the street from the chocolate shop, so we stopped in and had some delicious hot chocolate (mine was dark hot chocolate!). Since we had basically eaten all there was to be eaten in Bruxelles, we decided to head to the train station, hoping to exchange our tickets for an earlier train.

At Gare Midi, the Thalys customer service (a term I use lightly, as there is not much "customer service" in Europe) told us we had to call a number to change our tickets. The number did not work so we planned to take the train we had tickets for. When the train finally arrived it was missing cars 1-11. My seat was in car 7 and Sam's was in car 5. The conductor said that they were going to connect the trains so we would have to wait a bit. Our train pulled away and another one came, so we figured it was ours. We got on the train and after 10 minutes Sam called me to say that it was not our train. I immediately got off, fearing the train would pull away at any second and I would be stuck going God knows where!

When I got off I saw Sam and we started laughing in the middle of the station. We didn't know what to do so we just waited around, hoping that there would be some sort of announcement. An announcement did come and we got on the correct train. I figured that we would be leaving shortly so I got comfortable and began to eat the piece of pizza I had purchased at the station (it was from Sbarro's, I had to get it!) I felt my phone vibrate, checked my messages, and read a text from Sam saying that there was smoke in her car and she, with everyone else in the car, had evacuated the train. As I read the text, an announcement was made by the conductor, telling us that there was smoke in one of the cars and that the train was being cancelled. It was said in french first, but I understood that whatever it was, this was not good because the Frenchman next to me was cursing a lot.

Once again I got off the train, saw my friend, and this time began hysterically laughing. What were we going to do? We talked to some other Americans who told us to wait for an announcement.

Nothing was ever announced so we went down to the customer service desk and were told we could take the next train to Paris. We got on the train and realized that we didn't have seats. The train was basically full of both the passengers from the cancelled train and those who had seats on this one. It was packed to say the least. Thank goodness the train trip was only 1 hr, 22mins. We stood in the narrow cavity between two cars, where the bathrooms are located, with 8-10 others. Sam and I could not keep from laughing, so at least we made the best of it. When we finally got back to Gare du Nord in Paris, we said goodbye and went home. I went to bed shortly after I got home, exhausted from such a fun weekend.

Belgium is a very beautiful country and I am so glad I got to see it. Until the next time! Au revoir!

-MEP

Bruxelles--eating at its finest

Bonjour! I have a lot to report on with regard to the past week and weekend so I will probably split it up into two, focusing on the week and Bruxelles in one and Brugge in the other. Wednesday my International Business class met at "Breakfast In America", the best diner I have ever been to; it was better than in the USA. I had dark chocolate chip pancakes that were absolutely divine along with a bottomless cup of coffee, something that is non-existant in Paris. The whole atmosphere of the diner made me feel as if I were at home. The staff was friendly and the class thoroughly enjoyed our time there.

Thursday I went to the Musee Carnavalet with my fashion class. Our professor gave us a guided tour of the museum, which is located in the heart of Le Marais, a neighborhood of the city that is close to my school. The tour was wonderful and I got to see lots of paintings, sculptures, and other works of art.

Late Thursday evening, my friend Sam and I headed to Gare du Nord, one of several Paris train stations, to catch our train to Brussels (Bruxelles in French). The train was not crowded, so we were able to sit together comfortably spread out. The train, a TGV, only took 1 hour and 22 minutes to get to Bruxelles. When we arrived in Bruxelles, we immeadiately could tell we were not in Paris anymore. People were actually coming up to us, attempting to help us figure out how to get to our hostel--this would never happen in Paris. We finally found our way to the right metro and made our way to the hostel. Upon arrival, I found my roommate and best friend from Pitt, Libby, sitting in the lobby. We ran to each other and hugged--we were both so happy to see e a familiar face,I'm pretty sure we both were on the verge of tears. After checking in and putting our luggage in our hostel room, we walked towards Grand Place, a huge plaza where the Hotel de Ville (city hall), is located. We met up with Libby's friends from Spain (where she is studying) and headed to dinner. And so the eating began...I tried my first Belgian beer, very tart and powerful, and had a light dinner of aubergine gratinee (eggplant that has been baked with melted cheese over it). By the time we were through, it was nearly 1230am! We walked home and immeadiately fell asleep.

Friday, Libby, Sam, and I walked around the city for about 7 hours! We walked through Grand Place again, saw Manneken Pis (Bruxelles "mascot"), Palais de Justice, Palace Royal, Notre Dame du Sablon, and a few parks. We also had a self guided tour of the last brewery still located in Bruxelles. It was very interesting to see people working in the factory making beer. The whole process was very cool; we saw the barrels of beer, the containers that it ferments in, the area where the bottles are filled, and how they place the labels on the finished product. At the end of the tour we were told to sit at the bar and the woman who worked at the front desk gave us two different beers. I am

not a huge fan of beer, I prefer wine, but I must admit that both beers were delicious. The first one was very yellow and had a strong taste of lemon. The second one was a pinkish-red color and tasted like red fruits (raspberries, strawberries, ect.). What I liked most about this place was that we were the only tourists there and it was not very commercialized, so it was like finding a hidden treasure; it's definitely something I would recommend others do if you ever get to chance to go to Bruxelles.

One of the highlights of the day was seeing the American flag. I noticed it and then

paused for a second before truly realizing what it was. We all started walking towards it and then realized that we had stumbled upon the American Embassy. We all began taking pictures and then guards started to yell at us from across the street, saying that no pictures were allowed. We stopped taking pictures and began walking towards the metro but a policeman ran after us and asked to see our cameras. He told us,

in french, that we had to delete all pictures of the embassy, as the American Embassy cannot be photographed. We were a little confused, but followed orders and were on our merry way soon enough. By the time we got back to the hostel we had been walking around for 7 hours and had consumed chocolates, waffles, and fries. We topped off the day of calorie-laden food with dinner at Chi-Chi's--a wonderful Tex-Mex chain that was thrown out of the USA after it made half of America sick with salmonella poisoning. It was outstanding. By the time we were done with dinner it was past midnight, so we headed back to the hostel and got some sleep because we knew we needed to get up early for Brugge the next day.

The weekend and Champagne

On Friday, I spent most of the day relaxing and at night I went to Hotel de Ville (City Hall) to ice skate. I must admit that it was a lot more difficult than I remember. The little children ice skating made it look like a piece of cake. It was not. I did not last long and decided to give up before I got hurt (only fell once!). A few friends weren't skating so I watched the others skate with them. I also had an encounter with a french guy who attempted to invite me to coffee, though I declined. French men are extremely forward and do not hesitate to tell a girl they like her or to ask her out but this method of dating is a bit much for me. If a guy did that in the States, I'm pretty sure he would either get slapped in the face or be cursed off. Later, I went to dinner with my friend Amy. We both had delicious French onion soup! So good!

Saturday I had to wake up at 645am because we were all meeting at the Bastille Opera House to get on the bus to go to Reims. Reims is located in the Champagne Ardennes region of France. It's about a 2hr bus ride from Paris...plenty of time to get a good nap in :) The first thing we did in Reims was go to the cathedral. Cathedral Notre-Dame de Reims is beautiful. It looks very similar, architecturally, to Notre-Dame de Paris. Inside it had beautiful stained glass windows and an astrological clock, similar to the one I saw in Strasbourg. This church was very exciting to visit because my great aunt and uncle were married there during WWII.

After touring the cathedral, we all headed to find a cafe for lunch. We stumbled upon a restaurant that served some alsatian specialties as well as lots of seafood. I had poulet supreme (chicken) with a champagne-mushroom sauce and rice. It was so good. The desserts were extraordinary. A bunch of people got sundaes while I got creme caramel (similar to flan).

Following lunch we got back on the bus and headed to the Pommery estate. Pommery is a huge champagne maker in the region and we toured the cellar where champagne is made and stored. The bottles ranged from typical size of .75 litres to 1.5 litres to 9 litres. The 9 L bottles were gigantic and made the regular size bottles look tiny.

Later, we had a champagne tasting of extra brut Pommery champagne. I then went to the boutique where everyone had gathered to purchase some bottles. There were many choices available to us and I had decided I wanted to buy at least one bottle. I bought a bottle of "Brut Royale" and two bottles of "Pink Pop" (it's in a cute pink bottle!). I decided to save the bottle of Brut Royale for my 21st birthday because is supposed to be good for the next 2-3 years (and I won't be 21 for another 15 months).

Afterward we headed to Hautvillers, the town where Dom Perignon, the father of champagne, lived. We visited his grave, located in the town's church. The village has breathtaking views of the valley, where all you see is green pastures and lots and lots of vineyards. By this time it was

nearly 430 pm and we were all very exhausted from the long day we had. We got back on the bus and got to Paris around 715 pm.

Yesterday I spent the day doing work. For some reason I had so much homework and did not realize it until yesterday. I had a presentation on Airbus today for my International Marketing class as well as a marketing plan outline on Brazil and water filtration systems for the same class. I'm leaving for Brussels on Thursday night with my friend Sam. I'm so excited! I get to see my best friend from Pitt, Libby, and we

haven't seen each other since December...it's been way too long! It will be great to see a familiar face because it is tough not having someone to talk to about people and things from home.

Well that's all for now. I'll be sure to post something after my trip to Belgium!

Au revoir!

-MEP

Strasbourg

So this past weekend I went to Strasbourg, France. It was a very quaint, cute city, completely the opposite from the hustle and bustle of Paris. It was quite refreshing to get out of the big city and escape to this beautiful, german-looking city in eastern France. Strasbourg was once part of Germany, often switching hands between Germany and France until after WWII. It's located in the Alsace region of France which has many food and drink specialties. One of the best foods I ate there was something called a "tarte flambee" which is a very thin pizza-like crust with cheese baked on top of it. It was out of this world delicious. My friend, Kathryn, and I ate it both nights we were in Strasbourg. I tried out the local wine, Riesling d'Alsace which was very good. My wine teacher had mentioned that I should taste this wine.

Before I continue on, I must explain what happened to me last Friday morning. On my way to the train station (Paris has 6-7 of them i think), the metro I was on stopped. There were announcements made in french about what was going on but of course I didn't really understand them, until they made an announcement that told us to get off the metro. I grabbed my suitcase and walked off the metro at the stop Port Royal, which of course doesn't have any other metro lines. I tried to get on the metro going the other direction but the line was completely suspended. Apparently there was an accident at the major station, Chatelet, which caused all trains to be suspended for the next hour or so. I realized that I couldn't wait that long so I tried to hail a taxi, something I've never done before. I finally was able to get a taxi and made my way to Gare L'est.

We made it safely to Strasbourg with no other issues. We checked into the hotel and then began exploring the city. Unfortunately the rain had followed us from Paris, making it a very cold, wet, and windy day to sightsee. We realized that the next day would probably be nicer for sightseeing and walked back to the hotel after a few hours. The best part about the hotel was that we had a tv in the room. I hadn't watched television in over a month and I was dying to see the Olympics. I was able to watch lots of skiing and skating events, as well as bobsledding.

The next day we went to the Cathedral Notre-Dame de Strasbourg, which was gorgeous. The architecture was very different from other cathedrals I've seen in Europe. I also went to Petite France which was a cute little area of the city. Later in the day we decided to go take the bus to the Jardin des Deux Rives, which are gardens located on either side of the Rhine, one side is France and the other side is Germany. There is a pedestrian bridge that connects the gardens, which we walked across. It was so bizarre to walk across the bridge and be in a different country! I was so surprised that we didn't need to show our passports or anything!

In Germany, everything was, of course, in german. In Strasbourg, everything was written in english, french, and german. Kathryn and I wanted to get some lunch while we were in Kehl, the german town were in, but when we tried to read the menu, we had no idea what anything was. It was amusing and frustrating at the same time. We wandered around time until finally we found a menu in french. We have never wanted to speak or see french more than when we were in Germany! After lunch, we headed back to France and to our hotel and watched some more Olympics :)

At night, Strasbourg gets very quiet. There aren't many places to go after 8 or 9pm so we didn't really do much after dinner. I was feeling a little sick so I tried to go to bed early but woke up at 4am with the worst headache of my life. I didn't really sleep the rest of the night and by morning all I wanted to do is go home. I got some medicine which helped my headache. Kathryn and I attempted to find a place to go to breakfast but there weren't many places...we eventually found an amazing bakery that also had pretzels, a local specialty. With nothing really open on Sunday, we checked out of our hotel and headed to the train station, hoping to exchange our tickets for an earlier departure. Unfortunately, we couldn't get an earlier train so we just chilled in the train station for 3 hours. Unbeknownst to us, there was a major storm hitting western France and Paris, causing every train arriving and departing Strasbourg to be delayed. Our train was only delayed 25 mins, however we got on the train and ended up spending the next two hours sitting at the station! With a bad headache and the onset of a cold, I was not happy to say the least. We finally made it back to Paris around 7pm and I went straight home and slept for the next 12 hours.

Overall, the trip was very enjoyable. Delays in travel are bound to happen, c'est la vie (as the french say). This week has been good, I got medicine from the pharmacy so I am doing a lot better. On Wednesday my International Business class went to the Selon D'Agriculture, an

agriculture expo which showcased foods from different regions of France and of the world, as well as lots of farm animals (yes, as in chickens, baby chicks, roosters, cows,

ect.), horses (all kinds), ponies, dogs, cats, and donkeys. Apparently this expo is very popular, as they were expecting 100,000 people to come to it that day. It was interesting and definitely not something I would expect to see in Paris.

Ok enough for now! I'm going to Champagne on Saturday, so I'll be sure to update afterwards:)

Au revoir

-MEP