More Holiday Lights

I went for a long walk last night...

down Rue des Martyrs

along Rue Cadet








past the Louvre










through the Tuileries










across the Place de Concorde









to the Champs-Elysees







The lights on Champs-Elysees were definitely worth going to see. The trees lining the street didn't have just normal lights-- they had this vertical light strips that made it look like the trees were dripping with sparkles---amazing!

The holiday season in Paris

'Twas the month before Christmas, and all through ile-de-Paris,
The streets were filled with lights, and shoppers on a spree.

Well, I'm definitely not a poet, so I won't torture you with my poor attempts. Christmas time is pretty in Paris... lots of fun lights are strung up in the streets and the department stores put out their nicest, flashiest displays:









It even SNOWED yesterday! It didn't stick, but it was nice to see. I'm still planning on seeing the lights on Champs-Elysees-- I'll post the pics as soon as I take them :-)

Over the weekend, I did some sightseeing in the 11th arrondissement. I started off by visiting Cimetiere du Pere-Lachaise ("A" on the map below), the largest cemetary in the ile-de-Paris. Supposedly, it's the world most visited cemetary, packed with beautiful mausoleums, trees and Jim Morrison's grave. The Cemetary was opened by Napoleon I after another cemetary was closed, however due to how far it was from the center of the city, the administrators had to "advertise" for funerals there by bringing in the remains of La Fontaine (poet) and Moliere (writer/actor). Now the cemetary holds over 300,000 remains.

As I continued to walk, I came across the St. Ambroise Church ("B" on the map below) named for St Ambrose of Milan. St. Ambrose was famous for being accidentally elected Bishop of Milan in the late 300s (A.D). At the election for a new Bishop, Ambrose went to address the rowdy crowd and someone yelled "Ambrose, Bishop!" and so he was. After being elected, he was effective in converting Arians to Catholics and was later martyred along with his brother and sister.

I can't say that the day ended perfectly-- I had meant to walk northwest from St. Ambroise and walk along the canal, but it got colder, I took a wrong turn, got fed up and took the Metro home. There's always another day...

A Happy NY/NJ Thanksgiving!

I had a very nice Thanksgiving back in the States... it all started just one week ago~~~

Tuesday, November 25th: got to Charles de Gaulle around 8am (I have figured out that this airport is the main reason that the French stay thin... you must walk for at least 15 or 20 minutes with all of your luggage to get to where you need to check-in for your flight-- then you can walk for another 10 to get to your gate). The security person only minorly confused me when she asked me who else had given me objects to put in my luggage (the answer sounded something like "umm, nobody?")

I made it to New York around 1pm (amazing what gaining 6 hours gets you, besides really tired) and worked for the rest of the afternoon. 5pm rolled around and I started dragging people out of the office to head over for happy hour at Gingerman. Here are some pics (sorry about the laziness of not continuing to take pics throughout the night)
:








A few too many beers later + diner = passed out at Casey and Ashleigh's apartment...




Wednesday, November 26th: Worked half day and enjoyed the first of the 2 Thanksgiving feasts during lunch with the WebCollagers.

Naturally on Wednesday evening, Thanksgiving-eve, there has to be a problem with the trains. In addition to the warnings all day long of terrorist threats and extra security at every corner, NJTransit couldn't manage to keep their normal rush hour schedule, let alone the special holiday travel schedule. The crowd in Penn Station was nearly indescribable (Terrorist target? Does that describe it well enough?) And of course instead of trying to control the crowd or at least help it to disperse, NJTransit didn't make any announcements on what was going on or why everyone was stuck away from their family for the evening.

So after waiting on a line to get some information, I found out that there was a train stuck in the tunnel between NJ and NY. After a few minutes on the phone with my family (and very nice offers to come in to pick me up), I figured that all I had to do was get to Newark Penn Station in order to get on the connecting train there. At this point, I was overheard by a cute production assistant who was headed to the town next to mine in NJ. With my new travel buddy, we headed over to the Path and out to Newark. It only took me 2+ hours to get 31 miles.

Thursday & Friday, November 27th and 28th: spent with mom, Ted and Harry T... saw the whole family on that side-- Tracy, Brian (the MEAN uncle ;-) ), Nana, Kim, Dan, Gwen, Karlee, Kevin & Sasha, Kayla & Josh (and "squoosh?"). Thursday we ate lots of turkey (I think my favorite part of dinner was when we were making fun of my mom and Aunt Kim said to me "well you're related to her" and I spat back "well, so are you!!") and Friday we went to "cut down" the Christmas tree (yeah, that's in quotes because they won't let us cut them down anymore :-( ).

Friday (evening) & Saturday (daytime), November 28th and 29th - after I hauled all of my goods to my dad's house, we went to visit Gramma (who did NOT cook dinner on Friday night as we had discussed, boooo-- don't worry, we didn't go with out gramma's home cookin'-- it was rescheduled to Saturday). My dad and I rented WALL-E; I think I want one-- him or "MO". On Saturday, my dad and I did some shopping, including buying a 2 foot tall [fake] Christmas tree + mini-ornaments for me to bring back to Paris.

Saturday (night), November 29th - Mini-WH Reunion, Ian Freeman's apartment, NYC
Sarah and Ian organized a mini-reunion of WH-ers and those who attended include Henry Rich, Justin Restivo, and Mara Palumbo. Also in attendance were Sarah's bf Adam and a few of Ian's friends. Fun of the night included laughing at Damian's jokes and the anatomically-correct Devil that he and Carrie brought to put on top of Ian's Christmas tree, making ornaments for Ian's tree, lots of yummy food and heading out to the LES with the WH crew. (see facebook for pics!)

Sunday, November 30th - I'd like to say the weather got dreary because New York was sorry to see me go, but the fact that my flight was only delayed for 1 hour meant that the fates were saying that I had to go back to Paris. Countdown to Christmas vacation-- t-minus 20 days!

While there are things that drive me crazy about traveling, here are some of the positives of traveling around Europe:

• watching British football games in a pub (with no alterior motives-- can't I just like the game?)
• Alcohol freely distributed on all flights
• Chocolate-- especially Swiss chocolate!!
• Funny new holidays, like Guy Fawkes day-- a day to celebrate the foiled plot of Guy Fawkes to blow up British Parliament back in the 1500s. The Brits celebrate by lighting bonfires then throwing in a homemade voodoo doll of Guy Fawkes.
• Drinking German beer in Munich

And of course, the downsides...

• delays in airports with no one to entertain me
• BAD hotels... let's just say I stayed in one without a proper fire exit... at least there were no bugs

Oh well, I'll just have to learn from the bad experiences and always remember the good ones.

Halloween - NYC style

HALLOWEEN 2008

Featuring the ladies: Frenchy, Flappa, Jessica Simpson-Romo (that hyphen is for you, Ash), and Audrey



And the gentleman: Indy, Ghostbuster (you know, the long lost Liepmann one), and JFK



And how could we forget, the random beer bottle (yep, that one get its own category):



I managed to make it to dinner and three separate parties on Friday night on about 6 hours of sleep (plus losing 6 hours of time... does that allow me to break even?)-- 2 in NYC and 1 in Hoboken. I had such an awesome time! Thanks everyone!

ps- countdown is on... I'll be back to bug you guys in 21 days!

I may have over-reacted...

Alright so maybe I overreacted. Maybe they are just mosquito bites. I guess it makes sense- my face was near the window and I had it open-- the rest of my body was covered by sheets, so not accessible to mosquitoes. And Brugge does have canals that would encourage the growth of mosquitoes...

Anybody? Am I right?

Just so you know, I feel like a total fool right now. I went off the deep-end yesterday about this and now I feel like an idiot. Please try to refrain from making fun of me and instead cross your fingers that all I have is mosquito bites.

it looks so beautiful-- if only you knew what crawls in the night...

Well, I gave Belgium one more shot. This time I headed to Brugge for work. The town is absolutely adorable, although I do not understand who lives there, because the streets were dead at 3pm, 6pm and 10pm, except for a few English-speaking tourists and the IBM-ers.

Maybe I know why. MAYBE they don't like being eating by bedbugs. Maybe the smart people moved out when they woke up with three red dots on their face. Oh no wait-- that was me! Not to mention that when I get down to the reception desk at 7am, all of the lights are off, there is no one to be found, and the front door is locked so you can't get out. Fire hazard much? Finally, some non-English speaking woman opens the door for me and I run out and make it to the train station with a few minutes to spare. Needless to say I couldn't get far enough away fast enough.

I guess it wasn't all bad. I met some nice French IBMers that invited me out to dinner; we did some sightseeing and had some good food.

The moral of the story is: check your hotel room before sleeping in it and DON'T GO TO BELGIUM!!!

LaTiSu (Lauren Tia and Susan!!)

Susan and Tia came into Paris, so I took a few days off to have some fun with them. We had a solid 4 days of fun, shopping and sightseeing.

I'm really glad they came (for more than one reason, obviously) because I really got to know my area of Paris. For example, we found some great boutiques up in the Montmartre area, not to mention some great restaurants.

My new favorite is the fondue restaurant (thank you Marco for the suggestion!!), Refuge des Fondues-- it's certainly not your everyday, proper etiquette type place. Picture walking into a small restaurant with 5, 4 person tables on each side and walls covered in the markings of the previous guests. Then picture climbing over the table to get to your seat, then having a 4 inch deep pot with boiling cheese placed in front of you. And how could I forget the wine served out of baby bottles?? Alright, so it sounds super strange, but the atmosphere was great and the fondue was amazing!

We also made sure that we had some nice rich hot chocolate on a cool afternoon, sat in the Jardin du Luxembourg (you can't go wrong there on a sunny day), saw the Mona Lisa at the Louvre, and ate breakfast crepes near the Eiffel Tower.

We also headed out to Versailles for the afternoon, and I never thought I would say this, but I was disappointed! Jeff Koons (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeff_Koons) had a modern art exhibit going on throughout the Chateau and IT COMPLETELY RUINED THE EXPERIENCE. Here is Susan making fun of one of the "works of art":


Sadly, the vacation had to end and the ladies have gone home, however, I will see them next week in the US (yes, that's right, I'm coming home!) and I may live with Susan when I come back home for good (still not sure exactly when, but we'll figure it out).

A weekend away in the UK-- which felt so much like home...

This weekend I headed out to the UK to stay with [those whom I now consider] my adopted UK family- the Waimans (at home this weekend was Mom (Myra), and 2 of 4 children, Ruth and Alex). This is my second stay at the Waiman residence, and it always proves to be fun, interesting and educational. Friday night we sat down to a traditional Sabbath dinner, filled with family friends and lots of good food (it was a "meat" night).

I also got to see a beautiful part of northwest London- Hampstead Heath which is complete with green rolling hills, a view of central London and a "secret" garden. The weather was absolutely amazing -- 70 degrees with no humidity -- what can I say-- I bring the nice weather.

Saturday night we went out to a few bars in an area of East London called Hoxton Square. The club that we went to played the most random music but everyone had a good time dancing to it. Then we ate night burgers at one of the few restaurants open in London past midnight-- gotta love late night burgers and chips.

Then today, it was back to work... just need to make it through tomorrow and Wednesday, then I get 2 days off (plus the weekend) to spend with my girls Tia and Susan when they come to Paris!!

(Sorry blog readers-- I didn't take any pictures this weekend, and I couldn't find any online that did the park justice. I hope my descriptions will fill that void...)

International MeetUp

Last night, I put on my game face and went to a bar in Paris. Okay, well I shouldn't give myself that much credit-- the bar was specifically chosen to host an Internationals MeetUp night. found a site online called Meetup.com and basically I what you do is search for a group that has common interests and you can go to events that they have scheduled (or eventually, create your own events).

I found a couple of different ones- one for American Expats and this one for all International Expats. I met people from various countries - Italy, France, Germany, Bulgaria, Croatia, U.S. etc. I also told myself that I wanted to remember their names and for the most part, I do! It really does help to say their name right after you meet them (try it sometime!).

Everyone there was so nice and knew exactly how it felt to live in a city and not really know anyone, so there is one thing that you know that you already have in common! They were all pretty amazed that I was from New York-- THE BIG APPLE. I would definitely go to more of their events and on Friday I'm checking out a different group (meetin.com), so we'll see how many new friends I can make!

New sites, new experiences...

I had a pretty fulfilling weekend... went to the Louvre on Friday night (since I've decided that I at least want to try to see it all) and then was invited out for drinks and a Parisian apartment party by my friend Tory.

First, we went out to a bar called La Perle in le Marais (3rd arrondissement). Apparently, that's where everyone hangs out because I don't remember the last time I saw a bar that crowded (not counting Forum, of course). Then we headed over the apartment party.

At first, I was a little uncomfortable because I was afraid that I would stick out like a sore thumb due to my blantant American-ness (is that a word?) and my serious lack of the French tongue. However, everyone was extremely nice and hosts were very inviting (not to mention the fact that everyone pretty much spoke English, though I still felt bad that I couldn't speak to them en Francais). Fast forward through a few hours of dancing, drinking and chatting, we headed home. I ended up sharing a cab with a Swedish girl who lives right up the block from me, so... potentially a new friend!

Today, I did my new thing of taking a weekly long walk. Today, I chose to walk around the 5th arrondissement, so I took the Metro to Gare d'Austerlitz and took a walk through the Jardin des Plantes and past the Museum National d'Histoire Naturelle. Then I walked up to the Pantheon and actully went in this time. I checked out the crypt where all of the famous people of France are buried (Braille, Zola, the Curies) and thought it would be pretty cool to be honored by being buried there (granted, you're dead, but it's still a nice honor).

Finally, I took a seat in the Jardin du Luxembourg, where they had a band playing near the fountain and I read for a little while. To top off my night, I'm headed over to my aunt's apartment for dinner and some drinks.

Mister Norlander or Monsieur Norlander?

This week a certain Mr. David Norlander came over to Europe... first I went to Munich for a meeting (of COURSE I had a beer while I was there - it's Oktoberfest for god's sake!). Then I met Dave over in Stuttgart.

We had a great meeting in the morning and on my way out, I chatted with one of the cute Sales Reps... hmm, I may need to spend some more time in Germany...


Then Dave and I met back up in Paris and did some sightseeing. We started down by the Louvre; we didn't have a chance to go in, but we walked around outside and through the Tuileries. I found a cute restaurant through Zagat's that had been serving French food there since 1919 (right).


Then we walked over to the Notre Dame, but made sure we were over by the Seine at 10pm sharp so that we could see the Eiffel Tower sparkle. The last part of our evening tour took us to the steps of the Sacre Coeur where we watched a guy playing with fire (you know, when they spit at a torch with some sort of alcohol)... I think we were both waiting for this guy to burn himself...

Here are the pics-- enjoy: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lfed/show

P.S. today we went to La Defense-- that's where the last 3 pics were taken-- you can see from the La Defense Grand Arche to the Arc de Triomphe and the Louvre's Pyramid (if you can see that far...).

A walk in the 9th

I took a nice long walk in the 9th arrondissement today... that's the area that I live in. For those of you that are unfamiliar with the Ile de Paris, it's broken up into 20 sections, or "arrondissements." Check it out here:


<------- I'm up here in the middle








My walk today took me past

• Notre Dame de Lorette - a sadly run-down church named after the Italian city of Loreto
  
• the Gare St. Lazare - many famous artists, including Monet and Manet, lived near this train station-- the 2nd busiest in Europe-- and put the building in their works
• the Church [l'eglise] of Madeleine - originally a church, whose present form is a temple celebrating the glory of Napoleon's army
• the Galleries Lafayette - of COURSE I stopped there-- it's a department store... and a super cool one at that. The store is a very old building that is open in the center under its dome. When I went through, there was a fashion show / dance show going on in the middle of the store-- very cool!
• Opera National de Paris (aka the Opera house) - needless to say it's on my list to actually take in an opera-- I've never seen one, and I think it will be really cool!

Maybe next time I'll bring my camera on my walk and take some pictures :-)

feeling quite french...

I went window shopping...

I don't leave the apartment without a scarf...

I ate croque monsiuer...

I made ratatouille...

I drank a cafe creme at a cafe on a warm afternoon (got a tan too haha)...

I have Serrano ham, Goat cheese and Camembert in my fridge...

and of course, and open bottle of wine...

Une semaine a Paris avec Sarah (see! I'm learning!)

Sarah (as she pointed out, the person I have been to the most contintents/countries with) came in last Sunday... we both worked during the days, but had some fun in the evenings including:







The Louvre:
The Louvre is the world's most visited museum in the world. Nearly 35,000 pieces are spread out across 60,000 square meters (that's 650,000 sq feet-- and 1,300 times the size of my NYC apartment). Construction of the Louvre began in 1190, but was not completed and open to the public until 1793. The history behind the name "Louvre" is unclear-- it could be one of three possibilities: 1) L'Œuvre, meaning masterpiece 2) rouvre, meaning oak for the place that it was in the forest that was once there 3) leouar, meaning castle.


Eiffel Tower:
The Eiffel Tower is the most visited monument in the world, with over 200 million visitors since it was built in 1889. When Gustav Eiffel had the structure built, it was only meant to stay up for 20 years before the City of Paris took ownership, then could take it down. However, they decided to keep it and it was used during WWI as a viewpoint, and it took on a new meaning as a victory statue.


The Pantheon:
This neoclassic building was completed in 1789, which was the beginning
of the French Revolution. The building was deemed to be used as a burial ground for great French citizens. Here are a few examples: Victor Hugo, Louis Braille, Jean Jacques Rousseau, Voltaire, Marie Curie, and Emile Zola.




A bunch more pictures... check them out here: http://www.kodakgallery.com/I.jsp?c=8iofsxj7.6z76ozq3&x=0&y=-6wx6pf&localeid=en_US

La Rive Gauche

Today I headed over to La Rive Gauche (the left bank of the Seine). Actually, I got off the Metro at Cité, which is located on Île de la Cité. I saw the Notre Dame Cathedral, took a walk around inside and took some pictures (it said no cameras, but everyone else was taking pictures, so I figured I wouldn't be the first one to get thrown out). Did you know that it took them 185 years to build Notre Dame?

Then I walked along the Seine towards the Museé D'Orsay, and had some lunch along the way, but decided once I got there that since it was late in the afternoon and there were long lines, that I would just keep walking. I was extremely tempted to buy some original art pieces that vendors along the river were selling, but I figured I would have plenty of time to do that.

I ended up at the Eiffel Tower and just sat and took some pictures there. I can't wait to go up it again, but I figured I would wait until later this week when Sarah is here!

I can't wait to insert some of my own pictures into my blog, but currently my camera's USB cord is in the U.S. Perhaps my Aunt Sue will loan me hers one day? :-)

Thankfully the rain held off so far and I was able to get in another nice day of sightseeing! Going to have dinner with a new friend (I hope) tonight.

Here was today's route - a solid 3.3 mi/5.31 km (click image to enlarge):

A Beautiful Day in Paris

Today was my first real sightseeing day in Paris... well this time around anyway. I decided since it was such a picture perfect day, that I would go out and take pictures. I took the Metro down to the Louvre and once again, marveled at it's size. I decided to walk on the Seine-side of the Louvre, heading towards the Tuileries (biiig garden-- probably not doing it justice-- check out the pics, if I ever get to post them).

Along the way, I saw the Place de la Concorde (which used to be called Place de la Revolution-- aaand the guillotine used to be there) and the Obelisque (given to France by the Egyptians).

Then I headed down to the Champs-Elysees and scoped out all of the stores that I'm going to take Sarah to next week, had a cafe au lait while people watching and of course, saw the Arc de Triomphe.

Check out my route - 2.7 mi / 4.35 km (click on the image to enlarge):

1st evening of sightseeing

For my 1st night of sightseeing, I decided to stay close-- I went to the Sacre Coeur Basilica... well worth the short walk, as I will probably make the steps in front of it my favorite spot to hang out when I don't feel like sightseeing elsewhere.

The Sacre Coeur was built on the highest point of Paris so when you're up at the top, you can see all of Paris (and Jen Lash tells me that the view gets even better in winter when the trees lose their leaves and you can see the Eiffel Tower). The most interesting fact, in my opinion is the following:

Sacré-Cœur is built of travertine stone quarried in Château-Landon (Seine-et-Marne), France. This stone constantly exudes calcite, which ensures that the basilica remains white even with weathering and pollution (Wikipedia).

Oh the little things you learn everyday...

For dinner I had a Chevre Chaud Salade (yeah that's salad with bread and heated cheese-- COME ON, it's like combining two awesome things-- grilled cheese sandwiches and salad!)-- I foresee myself getting addicted...

DAY 1

I think I'll blame it on the lack of sleep, but today did not go as smoothly as planned... the broker was late (by an hour)... then after showing me around the apartment, he mentioned that I hadn't paid anything to his company or the landlord, but we did wire the money! So after being reprimanded for about 45 minutes, the broker finally left (albeit empty-handed).

The good news is that the landlord found the transfer so we are on our way with that (at least he doesn't think I'm a total deadbeat)

I did manage to get the internet (and the router) to work, which a nice accomplishment for the day... next step is to send out some last minute emails, then take a realllllly hot shower and watch a movie that will make me laugh before I completely pass out.

t-minus ~2 days

I'm all moved out of my NYC apartment (6 flights of steps + me + dad + uhaul =my body hurts)... so sad to leave my first real apartment.

On the upside, I'm nearly packed for Monday and I don't think I'm bringing too much stuff... but I probably am.

In the meantime, I'm going to get one more beach day in tomorrow at the Jersey Shore.

Happy Labor Day!

t-minus ~7 days...

The flight has been booked and the lease for the apartment has been signed.

I'M MOVING TO PARIS ON SEPTEMBER 1ST!!!

Also, I'm pretty excited that my favorite travel companion (a certain Ms. Sarah Freeman) will be over there to help me explore during my first week.


Here is my contact information for the duration of my trip to France:
email: lauren@webcollage.com
email2: lauren0214@gmail.com
SKYPE PHONE * : 347.410.9679
* please use this number if you call me-- or you will get charged!!
French phone # (just in case): +33 6-35-33-89-70
Address: 60 Rue de Dunkerque, Paris, FR 75009

t-minus ~16 days...

And you'll all be rid of me! Well, on this continent anyway.

Here is the place that I'm most likely going to get (hoping to solidify that on Monday):
http://www.parisattitude.com/apartment.asp?numProduit=3618

And I should be living there on or around September 1st (2008-- in case I'm reading this blog 30 years from now and I don't remember the date, haha).
PLEASE COME VISIT!!

European [big] cities that I've been to prior to this trip:
UK: London, Slough, Hemel Hempstead, Nottingham
FR: Paris, Bordeaux
DE: Hamburg, Munich, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf
ES: Sevilla
BE: Antwerp, Brussels

I can't wait to add on to this list!