The one you have been waiting for... whether or not you knew it.

Versailles! This is a shot of the gardens just behind versailles. Amazing. So, Versailles is the palace that king louis the 14th (the sun king) built... Its pretty much amazing. He lived there as well as his son louis the 15th, and then finally louis the 16th (the one who got his head cut off... you know, the husband of marie antoinette, who also got her head cut off). It was a pretty amazing day, with lots of pictures and other tourist activities, such as sharing a $5 ice-cream cone, walking so much that your feet ache, and of course being so tightly packed up against people while passing through the rooms in the castle, you feel a slight urge to start mooing like a cow, or baa-ing like a sheep (i just now realized that I don't know the word for the noise that sheep make). Anyway, it was the best. We saw more Americans there than we have seen yet in Paris (not sure why American's are so fascinated with Versailles). We even met a man from South Jordan. We was standing in front of us in line, and heard us say something about missions, and he turned around and started talking to us. He is a member and was just in Paris on business. Sweet guy though. He does iron man's. Plural. I can't remember how many he has done, but he just finished the st. george one 3 weeks ago. He said it is the hardest one around. It was funny cuz we had just been talking about training for a triathalon a few days earlier (and when I say we were talking, I don't mean that I was ever planning on doing one, I mean I participated in the talking part, by telling clay that he should do one). Anyway, it was great. Here are some pics to prove it.

In front of the cardboard cutout of the castle (it looks fake for some reason but in actuality it is not)Just to clarify, this is a real picture of the real versailles castle

Hall of Mirrors. This place was pretty cool. You might want to google it to see some better pics and understand what im talking about.

Me in front of the queens bed. (AKA Marie-antoinette's bed)

Us standing behind the castle

Us listening to our Audio Tour of the castle

So, we haven't posted in a while...

Well, since last week was busy with the normandy trip, etc. we just sort of took it easy this week. We went up to sacré coeur again (for like the fourth time) with some friends on sunday. It was a lot more crowded this time, since it is closer to summer vacation, as well as getting warmer. There was a guy playing guitar and singing on the steps, and everyone was gathered around listening. He kept asking for volunteers to come up and sing or dance or whatever, and we had a friend go up. It was pretty funny. Probably the best thing that has happened this week though, is the "cheque déjeuner" that I recieved from my internship. Basically I have a prepaid check written for 5,40 euro for every day of my internship. They backtracked and gave me some for the last month, so I have them to Clay, and we have had fun going out to eat for free for the past few days!

That is basically what they look like, and they are accepted pretty much anywhere you go. Yesterday for example, for lunch I got a falafel sandwich and some baklava, and I paid 10 cents out of pocket. Pretty awesome.

Thoughts on Normandy

We posted a few pics yesterday, so I just figured it would be good to have some sort of personal account to go along with the pics. I will make Clay write one too, so you get both of our perspectives. The day after Mont St. Michel (so, yesterday) we woke up, and after breakfast, we went straight to the museum to see the Tapestry of Bayeux. Its a 1000 (yup, one thousand) year old tapestry that recounts the story of William the Conquerer, and how he became the kind of England. Its close to 70 meters long, and though its called a 'tapestry' its actually just a long piece of linen that has been embroidered.

We got in for 3 euro because we are students, which was nice, and took a little audio tour that explained each of the scenes on the tapestry. It was pretty cool. After that we jumped in the car and headed of to the beaches and took a self guided D-day tour, with the help of our roomie Andrew, who has been on a D-day tour before and also is a big WWII history buff, He took us to Utah beach, Pointe du Hoc, Omaha Beach, and then finally to the American War Cemetery. It was a really interesting day. The beaches were actually very beautiful, and peaceful, and tranquil... It was really hard to imagine such terrible things going to at that same location 70 some odd years ago. So beaches were really interesting, but my favorite was the cemetery at the end. There was a very nice little memorial/museum there, where we read and watched clips that brought it all to life. Then, walking out into the cemetery, which happened to be one of the most beautiful places I have seen, ever, was just surreal. It was manicured to perfection, with all of the crosses lined of in perfectly straight lines. The one question we had though, was why each of the stars that marked the grave of a jewish soldiers had little rocks stacked on it. Almost every single one we saw had on or several small stones set on top of it. We wondered why, but none of us had an answer. Anyway. Our trip was pretty incredible.

Pics from Normandy

We are going to post our thoughts about Normandy probably tomorrow... We are pretty tired, so we are just putting up some pics.

Notice the parachuter stuck on the church tower.

A quick pic of utah beach.

Pointe du Hoc. More to come about this place. We are standing in a bomb explosion crater.

Mont St. Michel

Here we sit in our hotel room in Bayeux, France. 3 guys in one room, 3 girls in the other. We are currently on a weekend trip to visit Mont St. Michel as well as the D-Day beaches of Normandy. We took a train from Paris to Caen, where we rented a car and spent the day in Mont St. Michel, then drove to Bayeux where we are staying tonight, then off to the Normandy coast tomorrow. We are with 2 other couples from BYU and the cheapest hotel we could find was 2 rooms with 3 single beds; weird, but cheap. The rooms are actually surprisingly clean, and nice once you get past the striking resemblance to cruise ship bunks, and the bathroom being like an airplane bathroom. The shower is literally barely big enough to fit someone standing, but, like I said, clean.
As mentioned we spent the day at Mont St. Michel. Neither of us knew much about this hidden gem before, but we are so grateful to have been able to go spend time there. It is located on the coast of Normandy and is a cathedral/monestary/little french village on top of a mountain/sometimes island . I say mountain/sometimes island because depending on the day the tide raises and lowers 50 feet causing it to clearly be an island sometimes, and other times not. This place is incredible! Apparently this is the cathedral they based the castle in the movie Tangled on. It is known for its seclusion and its rich history of a place Christians have taken pilgrimages for centuries and is listed in the top four places to go on a pilgrimage. The village was beautiful and the view was incredible! Also, thanks to Rick Steves we were able to find out all about the abbey which was way nice. All in all, it was a great day which only got better as we finished with a kebab and panito (whatever that is)!
Oh, did I mention, it's our 6 month anniversary today? Happy anniversary to us! Perfect time to start sleeping in separate bedrooms. It will actually be the first time sleeping apart since being married, which is oddly on our 6 month anniversary.

Hope you enjoyed these pics! Tomorrow we are off to see the D-Day beaches!

Did I mention our house is 100 years old?

Ok, so maybe not 100 years exactly, but the lady who was living here (she moved out a couple months back... she is living with her daughter now) she is 101 years old!! 101! She has lived in this house since 1924. She lived here with her parents, and then when she got married, her husband moved in, and they took over the house. On some future date I will post more pics of the house, but I will just mention that the stairs are the squeakiest, loudest, steepest/skinniest stairs I have encountered. Also, the shower is quite inconvenient, since it was added at a later date (correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think they had showers in 1924). The shower is in the slope-y part of the house, so you can only stand straight directly under the water... also there is a giant wooden beam that goes right through the shower, and I hit my head on it at least five times every time I shower. Also, there is no light in there other than a tiny lamp on the far side of the bathroom... its an adventure to say the least. We live in a suburb of Paris called Argenteuil, which is ten minutes away from paris on train. Because its late and I am tired, I am including some pics of Clay doing our laundry (hanging it out to dry on the line in our backyard) and I will explain everything in more detail on a later date :)

Bonne Soirée tout le monde! We are off to Normandy tomorrow morning, so stay tuned for pics and posts.

Lover number two

Clayton is my number one love. That is clear and obvious. Also it is not negotiable, he will always be number one, but I believe that yesterday I rekindled some dormant feelings for my lover number two; Hot Chocolate. We went to "the place" to get hot chocolate in Paris (as listed in several touristy websites, and also verified by several of our friends). It is called Angelina's, and is just across the street from the Louvre. As Clay mentioned earlier, we went their to rest from much museum activity on our part. And it was so worth it. The hot chocolate costs 7.00 Euro per cup. That's like 11 dollars!! But its worth every penny. It was thick, and dark, and rich... served at the perfect sipping temperature. Oh my heavens! It was bitter and smooth. Pretty much the best thing I have ever tasted. One review we read described it as "orgasmic." I probably wouldn't use that word, but it was pretty darn good. Served with a side of whipped cream and sugar so that you can sweeten it to your taste. When I was a missionary, after a long hard day I used to treat myself to something I called "chocolate soup" which was my own homemade version of Angelina's Chocolat à l'Africain (I think that is what it was called) but mine just doesn't quite reach her level of expertise. I recommend it to any and all who are coming to Paris in the near future, or ever!

Night(s) at the Museum

Taking a look at the last two days of our life, you would think that we are some of the most cultured people alive. For reals. At least you would think that we are the kind of people who attend museums often, because this weekend, thats about all we've done. It started on Friday night when we decided to go to the Louvre. Reason number one why we decided to go to the Louvre (lets be honest here): The Louvre is free on friday nights for anyone under the age of 25. Reason number two why we decided to go to the Louvre: Its the Louvre, Duh. We went with a friend (Ren, in case he is reading this)and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. For me personally it was a first, but Ren and Clay had been before, so they sort of gave me the tour around. We started with La Joconde, or in laymen's terms the Mona Lisa.

It was the opposite of life-changing for all of us. There were tons of people looking at it, and we couldn't for the life of us remember why it was so famous. Clay saved the day however, when we found a card thingy in the corner that gave us the history of it. So bascially it comes down to this. The mona lisa is famous because some rich people had it (they liked her smile) and then later on it was stolen, and then it was recovered... Or something like that. After that we visited the Ancient Egyptian corridor, where we encountered mummified cats, fish, and even a giant crocodile. It was epic.
Voici quelques photos (behold some pics) to prove that we were there.

So the next day happened to be "Nuit des Musées" in Paris, a.k.a., all the museums in Paris were free that night. We spent the day preparing for the museums going around with our buddy Ren looking at expensive designer shops in Paris that we would never be able to afford and by drinking Angelina's Hot Chocolate (More to come in a later post about Angelina's). We started off our Night of Museums at Musée d'Orsay which is just on the opposite side of the Seine. We were able to look at an incredible Manet exhibit, which, thanks to our two Columbia friends who had to explain every art-piece to us, we learned the he is the "Father of Modernity." As we were finishing this special exhibit we passed a portrait by Manet of Monsieur Rochefort. Somebody commented on how funny his hair was and then, Amy made the connection of how much my hair resembles his. It was a very good confidence builder for me.

Also in the museum were paintings you would recognize, especially ones such as the self portrait by Van Gogh, but, we were unable to take any pictures because we learned shortly after taking the funny hair picture that there was absolutely no picture taking allowed.
Before continuing on we had to regain our energy so we found a little Sushi shop just down from the Louvre and got ready to go to Les Arts Decoratifs, a little museum attached to the Louvre but not really part of the museum.
We wanted to go to this museum to see a special exhibit which was Ralph Lauren's car collection. It was awesome to say the least. The museum contained cars ranging from a Bentley Blower to a Mc Laren.

It was a great end to the "Nuit des Musées!"

Pere Lachaise

There are a lot of cemeteries in Paris, since it is a big city this is normal. One of the more famous ones is called Pere Lachaise. There are quite a few famous people buried there, and so last sunday afternoon we decided to take a little walk and go visit it. The little walk turned into about 6 hours of walking around (the map made it look a lot closer to where we were than it actually was) but it was a fun afternoon of getting to know Paris, as well as seeing some cool memorials and monuments in the cemetery. We saw Chopin

We also saw Oscar Wilde

There were a few other people buried there that we did not take pics of... Jim Morrison for example. It turned out to be a pretty fun, but tiring Sunday afternoon activity.

Foie Gras

Since being in Paris we have already indulged in many great French delicacies such as baguettes, French cheeses, French patisseries, Kebabs, duck, lamb, falafel (yes, I understand this is not French but I ate it for the first time in Paris so it counts) and yes, even Escargot. All of these treats were incredible, but, nothing can quite compare to our meal last night.
So this past weekend we had our good friend Landry from Lyon France visiting Paris and we were able to spend a good amount of time together. He finished his stay as we walked around the Paris canals eating gelato as I explained to everyone how one day Amy and I are going to live on a house boat where Amy would respond that she is terrified of water and that we will most certainly not! But that is beside the point. The point is that we spent a great time together and it was sad to see him go until we visit Lyon sometime in July.

As we were saying our goodbyes Landry reached into his bag and grabbed a gift for us. You should have seen it (and unfortunately you never will because we couldn't wait to open it to take a picture first)! It was wrapped in white paper with drawn on stripes of many colors and ribbon tied around it. Well, we opened it and, much to our suprise... we actually didn't know what it was. It was a jar of some yellowy buttery looking thing with a hint of a pink substance in it. Landry then explained that it was artisan foie gras, yes, that's right, straight from the farm, meaning "the good stuff." For those of you who don't know what foie gras is it liver fat from a force fed duck, a delicacy in France. I would like to apologize to any Pita members reading this and tell you that it was a gift, therefore we cannot be blamed. He gave us this gift with only one condition: If we don't like it to NOT throw it away but to give it to someone else because it was too good to go to waste.
On our way home that night we were sure to pick up a couple of baguettes and some brie to eat with it that night. Here is the proof via pictures and, just in case you were wondering, it was délicieux!

COVED

Well, since Amy told you a little bit about her stage (internship) in Paris I thought I would do the same. I am working for an environmental recycling company called COVED. They are a private company under the organization SAUR, which deals with most of the water distribution in France. COVED is responsible for 15% of all of the recycling in France, but only 4% in Paris. This is what my internship with them consists of: I am researching all of the other recycling companies in the Ile de France (Paris) area so that they can look into purchasing one or a couple of the smaller companies in the area, giving them a stronger presence in the Paris area. I am researching these companies based on geographical location as well as balance sheets, financial records, number of workers, along with many other things. Starting next week, I will be going around with the Director of the Paris area, who I am actually working directly under for my internship, looking at these companies and meeting with different people in them. His (the director's) goal for me is to work with him and personally take part in the acquisition of a company. It has been great so far and I have had a bunch of great experiences already. I have my own office and I am starting to get to know everyone there. Sorry if I bored you to death but hopefully that gives you a better idea of what I am doing out here in Paris.

Sacré Coeur

Outing #2: Like I said earlier (or at least I think I did) Clay and I try to go see something everyday (pretty much) after work. So after the eiffel tower, our second outing was the basillica of Sacré Coeur. As I was going around visiting people for my internship, I decided to start asking some of these old people who have lived in Paris their whole lives what I should see while I'm here. So, one lady told me that the Basillica was the best thing Paris had to offer (and its about a ten minute walk from where I work) so off we went to see it. We didn't really know where it was, but we could see some of the pointy parts on top, you know... I don't know what they are called... steeples? turrets? something like that. Anyway, we just started walking up the hill, and eventually found it. We bought a bagette and some brie on the way up, and when we finally reached the top, we just sat and looked out over all of paris, and enjoyed our delicious bagette and cheese. It was the perfect end to a not so perfect day for both of us. We had both been a little frustrated with France throughout the day, how dirty it is, how no one can seem to figure out how to put trash in the trash cans, etc. In fact we both mentioned to eachother that it would be nice to just pack up and go home, back to America where life is.... cleaner? I literally spent an entire day without being able to breath one breath of fresh air. Even walking down the street every breath I took was either full of cigarette smoke, or smelled like Urine. But sitting up on top of Montmarte, and looking around at the view, surrounded by tourists, I rediscovered my love for Paris. Here are a few photos to prove that we went there.

mon stage (my internship)

So, i arrived early this morning, so I figured I could take a few minutes and explain what it is that I am doing here in France. The association that I am working for is called Les Petits Freres des Pauvres, it actually exists in the states as well, Little Brothers-friends of the poor. Its a private organization, basically dedicated to making sure that everyone has access to their personal rights, etc. This organization works specifically with people over the age of 50, many of whom have no family; live off of a very small retirement, or government aid, and don't have the sort of family situation where they get help when its needed. About a third of the 160 clients of this office have at one point or another lived on the street, and our job is to help them get back on their feet and back to a more healthy lifestyle. Basically my job is to do whatever they ask me to do, which so far has consisted of going and visiting people who are lonely or sad, and just talking to them. Also, a few times I have run a few errands, such as delivering food stamps, picking up paperwork (I got to take a taxi for the very first time) and that pretty much sums it up. i get here around 9:30 a.m. and leave at about 4:30 every day. Fridays are short, I'm done around noon. So far, every day after work clay meets me in Paris, and we pick something, and go see it. we have been walking on average about 5 miles a day, seriously. Sometimes more. I'm just guessing on the mileage... so if 5 doesn't sound like a lot, then add some more to it until it sounds like a lot, and then tell yourself that we walk that far every day :) honestly our feet and our legs are just aching at the end of every day, so it must be lots.

La Tour Eiffel

Well, finally, some pics! We are stealing internet from a friend of a friend of a friend, so we are finally able to access the world wide web at home (as of about an hour ago). This first post is going to be dedicated to our first real tourist venture after getting to Paris. I'll start by giving a little background info. First of all, we left Tampa on friday night, hoping to arrive in Paris on saturday, in order to have some time to get situated before sunday. We didn't want to go grocery shopping, etc. on sunday, not only because its the sabbath, but also because its France, and NOTHING is open on sunday. So everything was well planned out, except for the weather which held us over, and we missed our flight in Miami. We ended up spending the night in the red roof inn, because it had a free shuttle from the airport, and also because it was the cheapest (yeah thats right, we are CHEAP!.

We of course didn't pack extra underwear or anything else of use in our carry-ons, even though we had mentioned it to each other numerous times while getting ready to leave. So that means that, by the time we got to Paris, what with spending the night in Miami, and then traveling all night long, etc. we had been in the same outfits for 3 days and 2 nights. We were tired, and stinky, to say the least. At least we had thought to bring some little face wipe things to clean up some

So we arrived in Paris, jumped on the metro, and ran around Paris for about 2-3 hours, first meeting up with andrew and lydia, getting our key, and then finding our appartment.

After a day of sleeping (literally a day, we took about 3 melatonin, and slept for about 14 hours straight). Monday we got up and ran some errands and then headed out to see the Eiffel tower. Like I said in a previous post, by the time we got there, we were too tired to actually enjoy it. Our feet hurt from walking at least 15 miles (at least) and we were hungry, and we didn't stay any longer than we had to. We snapped a few pics, and got out of there.

some things we've seen

So, we have been here about 4 days, and already we have seen a few things. But the first thing I need to mention, is that I forgot how much walking is included in the whole public transportation system. My feet are KILLING me, also I have somre sore muscles in my legs that I didn't know existed... somewhere between my ankles and my calves. Anyway, monday we saw the eiffel tower. Fun for me because it was the first time, but honestly by the time we got to it, we were so tired and hungry that we almost didn't enjoy it! Then, yesterday we went and saw the basilica Sacré Coeur. It was pretty beautiful, and we sat for a few minutes on the inside and listened to the nuns sing hymns. It was lovely. Afterwards, we met up with a friend of Clay's (and now a friend of mine) and sipped on some drinks in a cafe and snacked on some smoked salmon. That and walking through the luxembourg gardens were the perfect end to a long day.

some difficulties...

well, we don't have internet at the house, and probably won't for a few weeks... so that means our blog will be pretty uninteresting for a while... sorry guys.