Happy Birthday Dear David...

Well today is David's birthday (actually, technically tomorrow is, but since it is past midnight I feel that I can say that his birthday is today) and we are celebrating Paris-style. We have been in Paris for four days now and we have two more days left before we will be shuffling through the Charles de Gaulle airport and working our way back home. We can't believe that our study abroad and our 5-week vacation are coming to a close, but we are both still quite excited to be back in America. For now, however, we are still in France and we have been thoroughly enjoying ourselves around Paris, especially because we can get into almost every single monument and museum around Paris for FREE because we are considered to be residents of France. Here are some photos from the last few days to tell the story:

David and I went into the Centre Georges Pompidou (Modern Art museum) so that I could show him the famous "Ensemble of 6 Bic Lighters"... I got a second commemorative photo. 

This is David and I at the Palace of Versailles. And even though the clouds in the background look dark enough to house tornadoes, they were actually just regular clouds (no rain even) and my camera just did some sort of weird lighting effect that made them look super profound. On the other hand though, those clouds did block sunlight and kept the temperature at a brisk 60-65 degrees for most of the day, depending on sunlight and wind factors. It has been really cold!!

Not the best quality photo, but here are David and I in front of the Eiffel Tower, in the same garden area where mom and I took our photos about 8 months ago.

David and I went to the second floor of the Eiffel Tower (the price was higher if you went all the way to the top, and we felt the 704 stairs that we had already taken were sufficient enough) and here is one picture that I took that shows the view over the Seine river, as well as much of the city of Paris.

Another photo of David and I at the Eiffel Tower. We figured we needed to stock up because study abroad in France means that you have to return with at least one cliché photo of yourself at the famous Paris icon. 

We have also been into the Louvre museum two times, once during the day for about 3 hours and then again during an evening on one of its special "nocturnal days" until about 9:30pm. We took this photo when we left actually, so it was probably about 9:30-9:45pm. Currently in Paris it doesn't get dark until about 10:45pm, which has made it really difficult for us to see Paris lit up at night.

This is the Chateau de Vincennes, a medieval residence left from the 1300's. It is a national monument so David and I could tour for free. Unfortunately, the best part of this chateau was its external facade, because the inside was not left with any original furnishings (which is understandable) and therefore was mostly filled with modern art "representing theories and abstract ideas of the middle ages" etc. There was also a cathedral though, and that was pretty cool.

David and I saw the Moulin Rouge! Only from the outside though, no worries!

We also climbed up Montmartre, a hill that looks over the city of Paris to get to this famous basilica, known as the Sacré Coeur. There were probably about 400 visitors walking through the what David and I determined to be not-really-different-from-any-other basilica. It was quite crowded and rather unpleasant, but I guess we can say we saw it, just like every other tourist. 

Here are David and I in front of the Notre Dame, which we have toured from the inside, but have yet to explore from the view of the towers, which were supposed to be open yesterday evening and weren't, and were supposed to be open tonight, and weren't. We wanted to do them at night, because normally you are able to do them on Friday and Saturday nights to get a view of a sparkling Paris, but for some unknown reason they are not doing that right now. We will probably go up them during the day at some point before leaving the city.

So that basically summarizes David and I's time in Paris so far, other than the lack of a photo of our sore feet from all the walking, and you will probably notice at least one thing that is missing: The Arc de Triomph. David and I will be visiting that tomorrow on his birthday (or later today if you prefer) as well as a walk of the Champs Elysées. Besides that we do not have too much planned because we will probably relax a little bit in preparation for our return home and just to catch our breath after all of our crazy tourism. 

Finally, just as a scholastic update, I still have not manages to get any of my transcripts sent to Miami from either of my French universities (which is still normal for Savoie, but is completely ridiculous for Le Havre) and therefore I am impatiently awaiting the arrival of those documents at Miami so that I can eventually work on getting my transfer credit approved. Also, as David and I prepare to return to the US, I will remind you all that we will be taking summer courses to help fill in gaps left from our time abroad, and those classes start this Monday. We will each miss the first class of the session, but after that we will be working, going to class, and integrating back into America all at the same time. I also will have to pass my OPI (Oral Proficiency Interview) upon my return to the US to prove my competency in French as a foreign language before I will be approved to do my student teaching. Since it is an expensive test, and since I know certainly that I am qualified, let's all hope I perform to the best of my abilities so that I can be proud of my score, and get that very important and daunting test behind me. Ok, well I think that probably just about sums up what is currently going on in my life/future life. I expect to send maybe just one more blog post before my depart for the US, so I would be interested in answering any questions you, my readers, might have about my experience abroad. If you do have a question that you would like me to answer in my last post (just nothing too deep or philosophical) then please e-mail me as soon as you can with that question and I will try to build in my response to my last French blog post ever!! Until then, bonne nuit!