A list of things I have eaten today:

-A whole box of pina colada tic tacs

-Three chocolate chip cookies

-French fries with ketchup

-Beer

-Hot chocolate

-Spaghettieis (Ice cream shaped like spaghetti, with strawberry sauce and shaved coconut to look like cheese)


The middle four items were consumed in a tree.

Munich is awesome.

Well in a completely spontaneous, last minute manner, somehow I have found myself in Germany again. I was told at work that I should take vacation and they told me about 5 days before they wanted me to take it... I put it on Facebook that I was off for 9 days or so and Pete suggested Munich as a vacation spot. He didn't think I'd take it seriously, and I didn't at first, but it got me thinking... In an I-can't-believe-how-crazy-this-would-be sort of way, I started to look up flights and before I knew it I was set on going. I've never planned a trip so spur-of-the-moment... I booked flights only four days or so in advance, and I packed about two hours before my mom came to pick me up. The whole time I couldn't believe I was actually going to go through with it, and even now I can't believe I'm back. It's been just over two years since I left, just over three since I came here the first time.

My mom took me to the airport and had lunch with me there. The flight went well--flew out from Hartford with a layover in Philadelphia. The captain came on the speaker system shortly after boarding and said something, but in my typical Sara fashion I was absorbed in a word puzzle of some sort and had absolutely no idea what he said. I hesitated to ask the woman next to me because I was worried about annoying her--when I got on the plane she had to get up so I could get in, and then immediately after I realized that I had put my bag in the overhead compartment and I wanted stuff in there, so I made her get up again so I could get it. She looked like a professional, a buisnesswoman of some sort, definitely accustomed to flying. I figured she would think I was a froot loop. She got up after the announcement was made and still I had no idea what was going on. Eventually I asked her what was said--apparently the plane was delayed because Philly was too busy. She was very nice about it though, and said that Philly is always like that (I was right, she was flying on business). She asked about my connecting flight, assured me that they pad the schedules so we probably wouldn't be too late, and when we got there she let me go ahead of her so I could go quicker. We ended up only being about 10 minutes behind schedule, and I had plenty of time to catch the second filght. I don't have the foggiest idea how the first flight went--I was out cold before we even took off, and woke up just in time to land. The second flight was longer--I read, ate, and slept. No big deal. It actually went surprisingly quickly.

I had bought a blanket and pillow at the airport before I left. I debated whether or not that was really necessary, but I was so glad I did. I tend to be cold and the blanket I brought was much warmer than the one provided on the plane. I ended up using both blankets and both pillows and it was amazing. The best part was when I spilled tea all over myself during breakfast, an hour and a half before we were to land, the blanket helped catch some before it soaked into my pants, and then I used it to help mop up the rest. I am a genius.

Then I went through passport control and the lady seemed very skeptical of me--i have never experienced such scrutiny during one of those things. Usually they just glance and send me on my way. First she asked me if I was with the people who just left. Which would be weird, because if I was, I would be mad becaues they were walking away, not waiting for me. So i told her no, and she asked if I was travelling alone. Since there was no one around me, I figured this was obvious. I replied yes, I was. She asked me when I was coming back, and I told her on the 8th, a little over a week. She then asked me, "To Germany?" Huh? We were in Germany! And I had just flown here. And I was going through passport control so I could leave the airport. So I responded with something witty and clever like, "What?" She clarified "Only to Germany?" "Yes" Now that my verbal test was apparently over, she took a good 10 to 15 seconds to scrutinize my passport, flipping pages, looking at me, flipping more pages, looking back at me, looking back at my passport, turning it around. Who knows, maybe they don't have Asians in Germany. With a last scrutinizing look, she finally surrendered my passport and I was free!

The rest was easy--the first bag I saw was mine, so i grabbed it. Pete wasn't there when I got off the plane so I found an ATM and got some Euro. I debated trying to call him or something but I went back to look for him again and I found him waiting for me. I snuck up behind him and asked if he was waiting for someone--I think it surprised him because I was coming from the wrong direction.

We went to his house, dropped off my stuff, and headed out towards the Karlsplatz area, near where I used to live. We wandered around and sat on a statue, like old times. Pete seems as fun as ever--goofy and silly like always, we've laughed a considerable amount already and i haven't even seen him that much. I can't wait to hang out with him more. We've done a considerable amount of reminiscing--it seems unbelievable we met about three years ago.

Then we got lunch at the Hofbräuhaus outside. I had käsespätzle (I'm not sure how many umlauts are in that word... I'll just throw a bunch in) and beer--so German! I miss that stuff! As we were eating, an oompah band started playing, and a pretzel girl was walking around. All the waitresses were in dirndls. It was perfect.

Then we went back to his house and he had to leave for work--just a half day. So I wandered out again and found myself back in the same area. To my surprise and delight, I wandered by a Burger King (that was not the surprising and delightful part, but I'm getting there.) There used to be a guy there who played the violin (badly) and sometimes over his head. He was a fixture, and I often left him money--there was even one time with Pete and Perk that we asked him to play over his head for us (I feel like I need Pete's feature and make that a link to his blog.) Pete and I had been just talking about him, and he said that he hadn't seen him in a while. I was hoping he was okay. Anyway (surprising and delightful part) when I went by Burger King I saw him! He was playing the same as always and when I put a few Euro in his case he grinned at me, played his violin over his head, and blew me a kiss. I'm sure he didn't recognize me, but it was nice to see that he was up to his old antics. It made me smile.

For old time's sake, I went and got my hair cut at the first place I ever got it cut in Munich, right next to where I used to live. I love getting my hair cut in random places--Maine, Georgia, Munich, Paris, Beijing--I don't know why. The place has changed--it's bigger and more people work there, but I'm pretty sure it's where I got it done that first time. For some reason I suddenly couldn't keep my eyes open--I actually fell asleep briefly as I was waiting in the chair, and then while the guy was cutting I kept closing my eyes and trying not to nod off. He was laughing at me.

I could probably have used Pete's computer at some point, but just for fun I came back to the place I used to go for internet before my computer arrived. It is still here, and it seems the same as ever. It is some sort of game place--there are all sorts of games that are constantly beeping, whirring, and playing snippets of tunes. It sounds very familiar. So here I am again on this crazy German keyboard, switching Y and Z and constantly losing the at sign and question mark. And since when does it require shift to make an apostrophe? I keep typing random things like ö and Ä and spelling things like crayz.

My current tentative plan is to visit MIS tomorrow while Pete is at work. Then ultimate frisbee tomorrow night. I'm not sure if I wll be able to play--I sprained my ankle a couple of weeks and it stil bothers me, which I think is just stupid. Ultimate frisbee is exactly what I should not do for an injured ankle--running without looking on uneven ground, stopping, starting, turning, and twisting. But I think it's stupid that it would still bother me, so I might just give it a try. Regardless, it will be good to see everyone and hang out afterwards, which, lets face it, is what frisbee is all about anyway. I'm not exactly Miss Athletic, who are we kidding?

Anyway, since I am back in Munich, I thought it fitting that I add a blog entry to this old page that I haven't touched in two years. I thought it especially fitting that it be from the same internet place. Drinking spetzie, which is orange soda and coke mixed together. I have no idea how to spell that word--I looked it up and didn't find anything useful. I might write another blog, I might not. I'll try to write some more and take pictures as well. Tsüss!

...don't know when I'll be back again....

 

Well I'm home.  It's been a strange few days.

Thursday I had a game night, which was totally fun.  I had been talking to this guy Kevin from frisbee just a few days earlier (I just met him--that was the first time we ever talked) and he mentioned Cranium and how it was the best game ever.  I got all excited because I had the game with me, so we planned a game night.  I invited tons of people, but a lot of them couldn't make it.  Kevin was the first one there, followed shortly after by Stefanie (a friend of Kevin's, also just met her through frisbee.  She's excellent.) 

Unfortunately, there was no sign of other people coming, so the three of us sat around my living room on our cell phones making calls, trying to scrape together enough people to play.  Eventually a few more showed up and we started playing, and more people trickled in.  More people did end up showing up, including a few of my friends (John, Tony, and Don) and we had about 10 at one point.  It was a fun night. 

What made it interesting was that a lot of the people who came, including Stefanie, were German.  (Kevin, Don, and I were the only Americans--Tony is Canadian, John is English, and everyone else was German.)  The language barrier posed a challenge--for example, once I had to sculpt a rolling pin out of clay, and my partner only knew the German word for it.  He said it in German, but I didn't recognize it as the correct answer so I kept going, trying to get him to guess.  Besides the language difficulties, it is a very American-biased game, with cultural references and things like that.  The Americans had a distinct advantage.  I was paired up with a German I had never met before.  We actually did pretty well though.  I was pleased.  It was a very fun night. 

After they left, I stayed up all night packing and attempting to organize my room.  I am a total slob.

Friday they came and packed up my stuff (lots of running around and chaos, complete with locking myself out of the apartment), then Friday night we had a little going-away thing.  A bunch of us met at the Hofbraeukeller, a beer garden type place.  First people there were Tony and Steve (frisbee people) and we got a table near a Sausilito place that was having a happy hour.  I bought a round for the three of us, then I didn't buy another drink all night--they somehow just kept appearing.  It was actually pretty cool :) 

There were a bunch of people who showed up--I was really psyched to see everyone.  This guy Miles had said that he was going to be away, but he called and said that they sent him home early, so he came after all.  It was cool because I hadn't really seen much of him lately (he's another frisbee-er).  Liz came too--another frisbee person.  She's cool.  I like her, but I don't like guarding her in frisbee... she's much better than me! 

To my surprise, Petra and Dan came as well.  Petra is the music teacher at the school, and she was giving me voice lessons for a while.  I worked with her for the junior school choir performance.  (I took headshots, made photo displays, wrote bios of the cast, and made the program.)  Dan (or Professor, as the kids and I call him) was the accompanist for the show.  He played piano for the show, but his main instrument is clarinet and he also plays saxaphone.  Petra and Dan are both pretty cool.  I was psyched they made it.  They brought me a balloon and Petra gave me a pinecone charm "from the choir."

A bunch of other people showed up too--Nick (ex-hausmeister from the school, who I hadn't seen in a while), Scott and Eli (frisbee), Bea and Tim (old frisbee people, haven't really seen them since "Jaeger night"), John (toytown), Stefanie, 151Dave (frisbee), Jay (AKA Jay-hay, from frisbee)... I'm probably forgetting people.... 

A bit later, I talked to Kevin on the phone, but he said he wasn't coming out.  Somehow we started talking about running through fountains or jumping through fountains or something, and I was like, "Oooooh I'd do it!!"  He agreed to come out if we could jump into a fountain.  So we did.  Stefanie came too.  It was totally excellent.  Unfortunately, we couldn't get the rest of them to come with us, and they went to a club. 

After our fountain excursion we went to the club-thing to meet up with the rest of the people.  Some of them had already left (we had been gone for a while and we got lost and had trouble finding them) but some were still there.  It was fun, but I'm reeeeally not a dancer...  It was fun to watch them, and they tried to get me to dance.  I sort of attempted it a little, but I'm not very good.

The trains had stopped running by the time we left, so Tony, Miles, 151Dave, and I went back to 151Dave's place and we all crashed there at around 5 in the morning.

Saturday I cleaned.  And cleaned and cleaned and cleaned.  My roommate had torn a ligament in her knee so she couldn't do too much.  She asked if I wanted to clean or hire someone to clean or what, but since I had been a gigantic slacker in the cleaning department for a lot of the year, I told her I would take care of it.  I was sort of planing on getting together with several groups of people that night, but it took so long to clean I didn't get the chance.  I was up all night again, not finishing until about 3 in the morning.  Then I met up with Kevin for some Bavarian festival thing at the Chinese Tower at 4 in the morning.  I'm still not exactly sure what that was.  It was fun though.  We were supposed to meet up with some of his friends but we couldn't get ahold of them. 

When we left, I got together with John for coffee, and then stopped by the Hofbraeuhaus to pick up a T-shirt for my brother.  I had just enough to dash home, chuck stuff in my suitcase, say goodbye to my roommate Catharine, and run off to the train station to go to the airport.

I hadn't been tired up until that point, but by that time I was.  I fell asleep on the train on the way to the airport.  Then after I made it through baggage and security and everything I laid across three chairs and feel asleep on my backpack.  I boarded the plane and promptly fell asleep again (I don't remember taking off or anything else until we landed in Paris.)  I didn't have time to fall asleep in the Paris airport--it was pretty confusing--but as soon as I got on the second plane I fell asleep again.  They woke me up for dinner, but I didn't stay awake too long after I ate.  I slept until we landed. 

When I finally made it through the passport checking and customs craziness, I saw my smiling family, complete with sign that said "Bullock."  (My brother made it and was holding it up--it was pretty funny.)  I stayed up for a little while talking, but ended up falling asleep in the car on the way home.  We went to bed shortly after we got home, whereupon I slept until 11 this morning.  It was pretty sweet, actually.  It was the easiest traveling experience ever--it seemed super fast because I just slept through the whole thing.  I think sleep-deprived travelling is the way to go.  I highly recommend it.

It's nice to be home--the best part was getting up this morning and finding food in the cupboards.  It's been a while since I had food in the house :)

But I think I'm a little contact-deprived.  I went out every night for the week before I left, and I would say that I typically go out at least 4-5 times a week.  Especially towards the end, my phone was ringing off the hook, messages constantly.  Now, nothing.  Particularly strange because they are six hours ahead so I know I'm not going to catch them online or anything.

Hopefully people will keep in touch though.  I met some super-cool people.  And I kept meeting new people right up to the end.  I really liked that. 

Good times.

Just realized two things.  One is that it's Friday the 13th.  Oooohhh.

The second is that the date on my blog was all messed up--it said it was the 12th, at some random time.  I fixed it.  I didn't notice it before--was it always like that...??

So it is 7 in the morning and I have yet to go to bed.  The movers are coming at 3 today to pack up my stuff, so naturally I'm sitting in the middle of a gigantic mess, "packing."  I need the stress of waiting until the last minute... I can't do things ahead of time. 

I'll do a better blog when I have more time (maybe) but things have been pretty busy here lately, and closing in on the end.  They ship out my stuff tomorrow, then I fly out on Sunday.  Craziness.  I can't believe how fast the year has gone.  I have had so many new experiences, tried so many new things, met so many people...

So much has happened since I last "blogged..."   End of school--good byes to kids, good byes to teachers; good bye to Palaeontologist Dave (he left for China and I won't see him before he gets back); rather spontaneously went to Essen and Cologne with Pete; got back into frisbee and met a few new people; Game Night with aforementioned people (last night we played Cranium... it was excellent)...  After they pack up my stuff a bunch of people are meeting at a beergarden type place as a bit of a going away thing. 

I said goodbye to Pete yesterday too--he's going to Saudi Arabia for work and won't be back before I leave.  It was sad :(  
It's been nice to spend some more time with him lately.  We have plans to keep in touch and we made a vow to have another adventure someday.  (AKA "Travels with Crazy Asian Part III," according to his blog.)

I gave him my plants.  Remember my avocado pit I planted?  It's huge now--probably over a foot tall with maybe 15 leaves.  He also took my little christmas tree (the "kleines-little Treechen"), and a little plant that I got from the old principal from the junior school.  I very nearly killed it, but it recovered--it was a bit of a medical miracle.  They can keep Bjork company--Bjork is a tiny little cactus we got in Essen.  We like to name things... we're silly like that.  :)

Okay, back to work. 

Maybe.

I've been sorely neglecting my blog of late, and there's loads to fill in... But I wanted to get this down before I forgot it. 

We went on a field trip today to Sea Life.  It was pretty fun, but it was a really hot day and the kids all ran around and played at a playground afterwards.  Then the bus was super hot and not very pleasant.  So the kids were dragging a bit by the end of the day.  I was at the back of the line as we walked from the bus back to school, waiting for the "stragglers."  Bene was the last, and he was drooping.  As we meandered along behind everyone else, he turns to me and says, "Did you ever taste your own sweat?"  Before I can reply he says, "It's salty.  Did you know, that's why water is salty? Because fishermen sweat a lot.... I guess." 

I love my job.

Louvre today--such a gigantic place... totally overwhelming, really.  We went to some of the main highlights and then went to a few select areas.  It would have taken days to see the whole thing.  I thought we saw quite a bit though--the big stuff, anyway. 

One of the really big attractions was the Mona Lisa.  Our Paris guidebook refers to it as "arguably the most famous painting in the world."  It was pretty crazy that we got to see it up close.  Although especially compared to some of the huge mural-like paintings, it was tiny!  The room was pretty crowded with people trying to get close to this one big wall, and right in the middle towards the bottom, was this tiny little painting.  It was very cool to see it live.  She looks better in person, I thought.  From photographs it's hard to see the infamous smile everyone always raves about.  In person she really does look like she's smirking at something--more so than in pictures.

There was a bit of a line to get closer, and guards were ushering people through to get a better look, so we got to go pretty close.  I was trying desperately to get a picture of it, even though cameras weren't allowed at that section.  I was trying to get it when the guards weren't looking--I figured I would just play dumb tourist if I got caught.  I actually did get a picture, but it was blurry.  Oh well.  It was kind of incredible that I was standing so close.  I couldn't have reached up and touched it, but I could have thrown something and hit it.  Not really sure why that is my inclination... I never would have done it--I guess that's just my measure of distance. 

The other really big attraction was the Venus de Milo.  That was almost cooler than "Mona" because it was right out in the open, in the center of a room.  I don't think cameras were technically allowed in that room either, but everyone was taking pictures and no one seemed to mind.  So naturally, I got several shots, although they weren't all that great.  Again, I was just totally star-struck that I was seeing some of the most famous pieces of art ever...stuff that I have read about and seen countless times in art books and postcards and photographs... just totally crazy.

Although less famous, one of my favorite pieces was a set of sculptures by Michelangelo (okay, so still pretty famous!).  They were two slaves--"Dying Slave" and "Rebel Slave"--which I guess were intended for the tomb of a pope who had comissioned Michelangelo.  From what I have read online, there are also several other slave pieces in various stages of completion that were intended to be a part of it.  Both pieces had part of the original marble block appeared to be "stuck" in the stone.  Dying Slave had his eyes closed and appeared to be giving up, but Rebel Slave was contorted, muscles bulging, fighting to get out.  Both were pretty awesome and as a set they were even better, but "Rebel Slave" was really amazing.  I'm not even sure what exactly made him so compelling--partly the fact that he was really amazingly carved, partly the fact that you could see the original block of marble... but mostly because he was just so lifelike--it really gave the impression of movement.  It wasn't just a person half in a block of marble--he was really fighting to get out. 

Someday he will. 

(Maybe when he does he'll give Dying Slave a hand too--he won't make it on his own.)

So those were the big ones--we saw tons of other paintings, mostly depicting religious scenes or battle scenes.  Some of them were absolutly gigantic, with dozens of people who were larger than life.  I can't even imagine how one would go about doing a painting like that.  It was really pretty incredible.  The paintings that intrigued me the most were the ones that played with light in interesting ways.  There was one that caught my eye as soon as I walked into the room--I have no idea who it was, but one of the figures was holding a candle that really seemed to light up a portion of the painting.  It was really quite incredible that it gave such an illusion of illumination.  ("Illusion of illumination"... how's that for a tongue twister...)

One other painting that I thought was cool was one that I had attempted to copy in high school.  The assignment was to take a piece from the Neoclassisism period and put ourselves in it.  I took one of a woman on a sofa and shortened her a bit, with the intention of putting my face in it.  I managed the background, the sofa, the lamp, and her dress, but I never really got around to finishing it.  I found it recently in my closet.  Anyway, it was pretty startling to see the real thing staring at me today.  It was strange that it was so familiar.

After the Louvre, we ate outside at a little bistro place.  It was nice.   It was a gorgeous day, and it was fun to sit outside and people-watch.  After that, we walked around a bit and went inside the Notre Dame cathedral.  Much less busy today.  I had hoped to go up, but I think that part was closed.  It was pretty beautiful inside though--stained glass and some pretty ornate detail.  There was some sort of service going on and when we went in a man started singing.  He had a really nice voice.  We came back to the apartment for a while, and went back out and walked around by the Seine.  We stopped and watched some guys rollerblading and doing tricks while a guy played saxophone nearby.  It was pretty excellent.

Last day of Paris, flying back tomorrow.  All in all completely ideal.  We saw tons of stuff, ate some good food (and good ice cream!), the weather was gorgeous, the apartment was perfect...  It was a great trip.

 

Oh man, that makes two horrible Monet puns in a row.  Sorry about that...

Well now I've sort of started a precedent for daily blogging, so I feel compelled to continue.  One more day left--it's really flown by.  Today we started by going to the l'Orangerie.  The main thing there was the Nympheas display, a series of Monet's "waterlilly" paintings.  There were two rooms, each of which had four mural-type paintings, absolutely gigantic.  I had no idea how big they were--my dad's guess is 25-30 feet long.  I tried to take pictures, but they don't really show just how big or impressive they were.  I attempted to take four pictures of one of the paintings, in hopes of putting them all together into one really long (albiet skewed) painting.  We saw a bunch of other paintings as well, but the Monet exhibit was probably the biggest.  They also had a few very un-Picasso-like Picassos.  They were some of his more realistic works--I prefered it to the really "Picasso" stuff.

After l'Orangerie we took the Metro to the Arc de Triomphe.  That was the only sight we've seen so far that wasn't particularly spectacular.  It was nice, and worth seeing, but there wasn't much to do there.  We sort of just looked at it, took a picture, and moved on.

After that, we visited the Eiffel, because hey, no visit to Paris is complete without seeing the Eiffel, right?  I had wanted to go up to the top, but it didn't really work out.  At first we were both planning on going up to at least the first, maybe second level, and then maybe I would go to the top.  (Dad is not such a big fan of heights...)  But then upon looking at the open-ness of the stairs, he decided that it just wasn't going to happen!  I was contemplating going up myself, but the lines were incredibly, incredibly long and I didn't really want to wait that long just to go up.  So we walked around the base and took pictures and stuff.  I took tons of pictures, but it's really hard to capture.  It's enormous, and it's just really cool looking.  I've seen pictures and stuff, but the structure is really quite amazing.  It was pretty excellent to see it up close.

We hung around for a while and then stopped on our way back and had dinner. 

I have decided that conversations sound better in French, and it could be simply because I have no idea what they are saying.  There have been a lot of tourists around, and the snippets of American conversations (they are clearly American) that I have heard just seem incredibly inane, whereas if the same thing had been in French, it would have sounded much cooler.  For example, English statements that I have overheard include the following:

In the d'Orsay, obnoxious lady pushing her way in front of people with cameras: "Well, you know, they don't really need to take pictures--they could just buy postcards."

Also in the d'Orsay, a family walking out of the Van Gogh room: "Really?  I always knew that he cut off his ear, but I didn't know why."  "Oh yes, well it was buzzing in his ear so he cut it off."  (Very ambiguous use of "it..." and not like any version of the story that I have ever heard...)

Walking by the l'Orangerie, Man to Wife: "Hey, ya know, they have Claude Monets in there"  Wife, continuing to walk in the opposite direction: *Shrug*

As we sat down to dinner, there was a 20 minute monologue by a guy to his girlfriend about cars--which make and model he might buy, which colors are more prone to showing dirt, which models look better in which colors, how much each one costs, how much he was looking to spend.... on and on and on....

Now if any of these had been in French, they would have sounded pleasant and probably reasonably intelligent.  Even the wacko in the train station who was ranting and raving to the crowd seemed slightly better because I have no idea what he was saying.  The only phrase I caught was "les miserables," which I took to mean that he was a musical theater fan.  :)

One day more (speaking of Les Miserables)... plan for tomorrow is the "Louver" (said in a horribly American accent, rhyming with "Hoover," for comedic effect).

Edit:  In between Arc de Triomphe and Eiffel I also got my hair cut.  It was interesting because she really didn't speak much English and I don't understand any French... so there was a lot of gesturing and guessing.  I like it though--she got rid of some of the layers but didn't go too short.  She has the front over to one side at the moment.  I don't know if I'm going to do it like that all the time, but it's a bit different.  It was looking messy; it's better now.  I like getting my hair cut in foreign countries.  :)

So ends a joke which is very possibly the very worst joke in the entire world.  So bad, in fact, that the beginning is really, really not worth repeating.  But what is more interesting about that punchline is the fact that I saw paintings by all three of these artists and more today at the Museum d'Orsay.  The museum was beautiful--an old train station that was rennovated and converted into the museum.  Absolutely beautiful.  There were several different sections, but three main floors with sculptures, paintings, furniture, and other stuff.  I found the paintings the most interesting--we skipped over some of the furniture kinds of stuff. 

The top floor was the Impressionism section, with some of the incredibly famous paintings.  It was almost like meeting a celebrity--I couldn't believe that I was face-to-face with some of these paintings I have seen over and over.  I could have reached out and touched Van Gogh's self portrait, or Monet's "Blue Waterlillies."  (Yes, I know it would have been frowned upon, but they were right there!  They weren't even behind glass or anything.)  The cool thing about it was that they allowed photographs, so I have a bunch of photographs I took of the paintings.  I was a bit star-struck, really, that I was seeing works by these people I learned about in art class in high school--Monet, Van Gogh, Degas, Renoir, Cezanne, Gauguin, Cassatt... images I've seen from art books and postcards--and I was seeing the "real live" originals! 

If I get around to it, I might post some of the pictures I took.  I thought it was really cool when I recognized some of the works, like Van Gogh's self portrait--the really famous one, like from art books and everything.  The "Waterlilies" painting by Monet was not one of his best (in my opinion), but there was a fantastic one of one of his bridges, which I'm pretty sure I've seen before.  There were some of Degas's dancers--not any of the really famous ones, but the style was very recognizable.  That's true of a lot of it actually--I didn't always recognize exact paintings, but the style and subject matter of a lot of was very familiar.  It was very cool.

Tonight after the museum we did a bit of shopping around and stuff and went out and had a really nice dinner at a little French place.  It was excellent.  It was one of those super-French three-course meals with the appetizer, main course, and dessert.  I opted not to have the escargot, foie gras, or frog's legs, but I had French onion soup (I figure that's French, right?).  For my main course I had this steak thing with potatoes and a pepper sauce, and chocolate ice cream for dessert.  It was excellent.  Dad went a bit more interesting with salmon tartar, duck steak, and creme brulee.  I tried his duck and creme brulee, which was really good too.  Everything was presented beautifully and arranged nicely.  It's all about presentation, really.  I love when food is pretty!  It was a really nice meal and nice atmosphere and everything. 

Tomorrow the plan is the Arc de Triomphe, Musee l'Orangerie, and Eiffel Tower.  We've been doing pretty well on the whole planning thing.  So far whole trip has been just about perfect.

I have decided that having internet access at the apartment is definitely conducive to frequent blogging.

Another excellent day in Paris.  The weather was absolutely gorgeous--I wore a light jacket but I really didn't need to--sunny, warm, just beautiful.  Today we went to the Natural History museum ("Museum National D'Historie Naturelle").  We got crepes for breakfast there and ate them outside.  There were some really nice garden areas (I guess the whole thing is refered to as the "Jardin des Plantes") on the main grounds, with the seperate museums all around.  It actually consists of several different museums all in the one area.  We went to two of them:  the "Grande Galerie de l'Evolution" (about evolution, obviously) and the "Galeries d'Anatomie comparee et de Paleontologie" (paleontology and comparative anatomy).  Incidentally, French has these crazy accent mark things, but I'm skipping them for the blog.  So this is my disclaimer that the French spelling is not entirely correct.

My one gripe about the museums was that they didn't have any English translations... so we had to sort of guess at times.  They were interesting to look at, regardless, but I do think I would have gotten more out of them if I had understood the French.  It was fun though--I was trying to decipher things from my bits of knowledge about classification and the Latin names and things, and my dad was trying to decipher from his bits of French.  It was a collaborative effort--I actually think we did pretty okay. 

The evolution museum was interesting.  It was beautifully done--nicely laid out, nice lighting, aesthetically pleasing...  They had models of animals grouped mostly by habitat and classification.  They had some real specimens too, mostly around the outsides, but a lot of it was fake.  While it was nice to look at, we both decided it wasn't as compelling as real animals. 

I found the paleontology and comparative anatomy museum much more interesting.  The comparative anatomy part was basically one room, jam-packed with skeletons grouped in different ways.  One of the displays had about five human skulls ranging from infant to adult so that you could see the changes as the person ages.  Next to these, were the same stages of different species such as chimps and gorillas so you could compare over time and across species.  It's hard to describe what else was in there--just hundreds of different specimens, different comparisons... it was very cool. 

The other section I really liked was mostly preserved specimens in jars, and they were grouped by system--digestive, circulatory, etc.  The first was digestive system, so they would have a bunch of esophaguses (esophagi?) from different species, for example, and a bunch of stomachs, and a bunch of intestines, etc.  It was really pretty cool to see the differences and think about why they would have differed so drastically.  Really, I think they could have used captions or something, driving home the purpose of the organ and why they differed in the different animals based on size, living conditions, diet, etc. (that whole form vs. function thing).  Granted, even if they had captions, they would have been in French so I wouldn't have understood them anyway.  But I think it would have been cool.

The paleontology museum was interesting, but that's where I really wished that they had English translations.  I sort of went around and said, "Oh wow, look at that--that's really big", or "That's really detailed," but I didn't really have that great of an idea what I was actually looking at.  One of these days I'm going to have to look up exactly how fossils are formed.  They baffle me.  It was still interesting though.  Archaeopteryx is my fav.  :)

After that, we tried to get in to the menagerie part, but it was an extremely long line and it was closing relatively soon, so we figured we wouldn't have enough time.  We came back to the apartment and just to chill for a little while, and then we took the metro out to the Montmartre area and walked up the hill to the Sacre-Coeur.  It was really pretty and gave us a nice view overlooking Paris.  I tried to get pictures, but they didn't really capture it.  We looked in the church, and then sat on the steps for a while.  There were a couple of guys playing guitars and singing.  They were not so great, but entertaining nonetheless.  Ironically, as we walked up to the church, the first song we heard them play was "Losing My Religion." 

We left and got back on the Metro to go home, when some craziness started, which is still a bit surreal.  First, we were getting to the train, and there were people swarming and cops everywhere--we had no idea why.  We got on the train and went one stop, when people started going crazy!  I still have absolutely no idea what was happening--I couldn't see anything.  But there were tons of people on the train, people off the train, people getting on and off the train... people shouting, pushing, and generally getting riled up.  I think there was some guy with a pipe or something outside as well, and it was just sort of generally getting ugly.  Up until that point I had thought French was this lyrical, beautiful language... but then I realized that French screamed by a bunch of angry teenagers is just as unpleasant as any other language screamed by a bunch of angry teenagers. 

The train stayed in that one spot for quite a while--seemed like ages--but it finally died down a bit, most of the people got off, and the train started up again.  We got out at the next stop to switch trains, when the next bizarre thing happened.  We got on the escalator to go up to the next level, and some guy sort of ran in front of us to get on first.  I didn't really notice at the time, but we realized what happened later.  As we got to the top, the guy dropped a bunch of stuff right at the top and stopped to pick it up, blocking our way.  I started walking downwards so as not to run into him, and dad was kind of balanced on the very edge at the top.  The guy picked up his stuff and got off, and I noticed that there was another piece of paper that I thought he had left.  When I picked it up, we realized that it was the cover of a notebook that had been in my dad's pocket, and we found the notebook on the floor.  We realized that he and the guy behind us had been a team of pickpockets--the first guy purposely blocked our way, counting on us to be nice and avoid trampling him.  The second one took advantage of the chaos to help himself.  He probably figured that the notebook was a wallet, and threw it away when he realized what it was.

Craziness! 

I was mad that they counted on our being nice to take advantage of us.  (Yeah, I know, I'm naive.)  But really, if we had just pushed them out of the way, or just run into them, they wouldn't have had a chance.  Instead, we were polite and accomodating--which they knew we would be--and they used that against us.  Grrr..... so much for being nice.

But on the other hand, I can't help but admire it at least a little bit on some level--it was a genius plan really, perfectly executed, the right targets, the right timing... Also a very skilled slight-of-hand sort of dexterity--Dad didn't feel a thing. 

Midnight now, so going to bed.  Plan for tomorrow is the Museum d'Orsay.