Paris

I found it! But I am still a muggle

For those who do not have time to read what is about to be an extremely long blog post here is a quick summation of our weekend in Paris: cold cold very cold! Incredible artwork, sketch hostel, a city lit up at night from the eiffel tower, getting lost/learning to navigate the metro, incredible french desserts, learning important French phrases, some of the oldest stained glass and cathedral architecture in the world at Notre Dame and Saint Chapelle, lots of roaming the streets, a bike tour, a boat trip at night on the Seine,  laughter, searching for free bathrooms and warm places,  and wonderful friends who made this the trip of a lifetime. 

Chicken Panini and Nutella Banana Crepe

Very tasty- Kirsten and I shared no worries

A bridge we found with love locks all over it. 

I had an omelet and Lindsay ate duck and it was all incredible food. 

Olympic rings we found at the St. Pancras train station

Yes we are in the extravagant palace making silly faces. 

Back street in Versailles. One of our wobble locations. 

Thursday Feb 9,2012
The trip actually began at 10:30 on wednesday night and we headed out to walk to the train station and catch the last ten pound train to London. We spent the night in the train station at st pancras in London. We found harry potter platform 9 and 3/4! Sadly I couldn't make it through to the other side cause I'm a muggle!  Thankfully the coffee shop inside stayed open all night and they didn't kick us out when we all fell asleep on one another. Our train to London left the next morning at seven thirty and I met a woman on the train front London who lived in San Antonio for a year. Small world! After talking to her for a while I fell asleep for the rest of the two hour trip. On the way back I found out the train actually is only under the water for about twenty minutes and the rest is above ground. The land we passed was beautiful snow covered fields and houses!

When we to paris we were immediately scammed by people pretending to be deaf and when you don't donate money it turns out they are not deaf and can in fact scream at you in different languages! I learned to hold tight to your wallet when in paris. I somehow managed to lose twenty five euros still but that's minor from other stories I have heard. Ha I hope they used it to get something good!Then we left the train station to find our hostel a few blocks away. I managed to book is one of the cheapest hostels in Paris and boy was it cheap! The girls doubled up in beds and twelve people shared one toilet and shower. It's pretty nasty when you think the inside of the shower may get you dirtier rather than cleaner! Haha puddles

We eventually found the other half of our paris group after getting lost around the not so good part of Paris for a while. Thank God for Michael who immediately knew how to navigate the metro and the map. Kirsten and I shared a panini and a nutella and banana crepe (new favorite!) for our first French meal! Then we wandered around some more and found Musee d'Orsay that was an incredible art museum.

We went up to the second level of the Eiffel tower! We could not go all the way up because the top was frozen over. It is actually made of iron and they have to repaint the whole thing every five months so it doesn't rust. Sixty tons of paint are on it! It was originally built as an entrance to the world fair and only supposed to be temporary. The builder was brilliant and asked the military to put an antenna on top so the gov would have to keep it up. Now it is the symbol of France. The view from it was breathtaking and I'm pretty sure we would have instantly become icicles if we had gone any further up the stairs!

On the way home we passed Iike three McDonald's so we thought it was a sign. We all decided to go in and eat a big Mac. They aren't near as big as they are in the states!

Friday Feb 10,2012

VersaillesWe wandered around the winding skinny streets and found a cute tea room to eat at. It was the best omelette and chocolate cake I have ever had. We all got different meals and took bites of it all. Everything this little old woman made was fabulous! I was thankful because ordering in a different language is  challenging! The theme of her tea room was cupcakes and they were so adorable on everything.

Kirsten and I finished this dessert! Every last bit!

Palace at Versailles
Gardens closed due to the snow all over them but we caught as many glimpses as we could out the windows! I have never seen so much beauty and grandeur! Unbelievably extravagant! Paintings and murals on every single wall and ceiling! Incredibly beautiful and detailed. The hall of mirrors made me feel like I was in Anastasia!

Then we made our way back to the heart of Paris and went to the louvre- one of the biggest museums in the world. It truly was massive! I only saw two and a half of the six sections in three hours!
I found the mona Lisa, Athena, Venus de Milo and so many others. My personal fav is all the Greek and Roman statues and artifacts. Yeah nerdy dead languages.

We roamed around some more and found some great dessert at a cafe. All the shopkeepers call you mi belle which means my beautiful. The first time I had no idea what it meant so I am sure I appeared to have a rude response. Oops. Katie taught us as much French as she could the whole weekend and now I can get by on my ten necessary phrases :) I got a coconut macaroon!

We met a guy our age named Marco in our hostel from Venice Italy. He told us all about it and now I want to go there so bad while we are in Italy! Much to figure out for future trips still. He gave us the best advice- stay away from the tourist streets. The best thing to do is get lost away from all that and really see the city where locals live it.

Saturday Feb 11,2012
Sainte Chapelle- The absolute most incredible stained glass I have ever seen! I could literally write a WHOLE post about stained glass and I probably will sometime soon since I have a million pictures of it!
Fat tire bike tour- They happen in 4 cities around the world and we might just get to hit all 4: Paris, London, Barcelona, and Berlin. 1 down and 3 to go!
Our tour guide was originally from Colorado and very kind. My legs are short and they had to get me a special bike for short people from the store so I could reach the ground for balance. Ha my friends will always remember that Courtney rides the short bike. This was one of the highlights of the weekend! I saw everything important in Paris on a bike in a dress :) it can't get any better! AND our tour guide told us all the important history of the city at each stop. I felt like I was living on the edge when we were defying the laws of traffic! Life lesson: pedestrians are sometimes more dangerous than cars. Beware! No worries I did not run anyone over or get run over so it is all good! O and I got a tshirt as my proof of survival. The girls all have matching ones and we are writing quotes from the trip on them. 

Next we found a grocery store and bought glasses and orange juice and grapes and every kind of cheese and chocolate to eat on our boat cruise down the seine river. We took turns toasting to God and Paris and each other and future warm weather and even ACU! It was the best night in Paris we ever could have had!

We also continued our wobble around the world video series and wobbled all over Paris together :) on a bridge, on the subway, on the boat cruise, our bike tour, and in the street at Versailles. It will be one epic video by the way. And don't you worry mcnelson ladies, I am letting my flag fly! High!

Sunday Feb 12,2012We woke up super early and packed up all our things up from the hostel and headed to Notre dame. Friends hostel was an experience but I was happy to tell that friend goodbye :)
Notre dame was remarkable. Movies and pictures will never do it justice. Every stone and arch and stained glass window and statue is perfectly in place and beautiful. We went to mass and it was all in French. I couldn't help but hear what a beautiful romantic language French is. I felt like God was romancing me speaking to me in French in one of the most awesome cathedrals in the world. With so much stained glass! My life felt complete even though I had no clue what was being said in the service.
Then there was a subway restaurant right next to Notre dame. Random yes but also cheap and a warm place to sit so we ate our subway and headed back on the train to Oxford!
Being a tourist is hard work and I am ready to be back in my Oxford bed for a nice long sleep. Heading back to house nine on Canterbury road feels more and more homey every time I leave it.

P.s. Kirsten and I fulfilled our dreams of our favorite movie Anastasia when we were together in Paris riding bikes and walking around palaces and dancing on a boat down the river. Yes we are living in a fairy tale movie :)


 

Paris Song: "Ou est le musee d'Orsay s'il vous plait" We sang it the whole weekend! 

Blast from the Past! Aka- London last weekend!

Last Friday we went on a class trip to London and split up into groups to see the different areas of the city. London is said to be one of the most diverse cities on the planet and I certainly felt like a minority walking the streets all day. It reminds me of the great song by DC Talk called Colored People that Chase taught us during chapel.

I joined Team Peckham for the day and Jacque was our fearless leader! My group consisted of Cameron, Ziggy, Kirsten, Megan, Jackson, Nicole, Julia, Nicolas, and myself. It was my first time to catch a train here and the trip from Oxford to London went through gorgeous green pastures and farms. Once we got to Paddington Station in London, we got a bus to Peckham. I sat in the very front seat on the top of a double decker red bus!! The whole ride it looked like we were going to hit people and signs and other cars every time we turned. It felt like I was livin' on the edge. These bus drivers are bold!

In Peckham we met with the youth minister of a church there named Dave. He gave us a mini tour and invited us into the church for tea. He shared with us the ministry that they are doing in Peckham. Peckham is an area that was very involved in the London riots and is still filled with gang violence at night. It was so interesting to hear what the churches there are teaming up to do in the streets and how to prevent kids and families to getting involved with crime. It put a real face to all the politics and social issues that we are reading about going on in the UK right now. Every Friday and Saturday night there is a group of pastors that risk their lives to walk the streets in Peckham to talk to people and people can turn their weapons into them without any questions asked. This is a really big deal because all weapons are outlawed and if you have one you can have up to five years in prison. Even a pocketknife!! Haha Michael would have been in jail a long time ago!

The library had a really neat sculpture of the world outside of it. It was covered in pieces of tiles imprinted with different languages and images. And I found a disney princess bandaid on it!

Then we took a bus to inner city London and got to play around by Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament! We walked a little further and came upon Trafalger Square where we played on some lions that looked like Aslan! They were so high up and just a warning that you should never jump down from high things when youre feet are so cold you cant feel them. I immediately felt my feet again but not in a good way. SOO worth it tho! And we found an Olympics countdown!

Jacque took us to an underground cafe that I never would have known about! It felt like we were secret agents going down a glass elevator into an underground tunnel with brick ceilings and it opened up into a huge cafe and dining area.

Next we tried to meet up with some people from different groups. We found out that this is extremely hard to do. Especially when no one has wifi or cell phones. We have learned to be very specific for our upcoming Paris trip and to have backup plans and times to meet just in case. We ended going to five or six different playhouses to see if we could get some last minute cheap seats. None were left but I will definitely be going back to see Le Mis and Wicked. They sell discount tickets during the week and for student groups so we have to take advantage!

We stumbled upon a fantastic building called M&M World- 4 stories of all things M&M. I took so many pictures and I could have spent sooo much money! I have never seen so much chocolate in my life. Then we stumbled upon a spaghetti house and stopped to eat dinner with our group of 10. They gave us our own private room downstairs (probably because we are American and very much louder than everyone here). I shared a Tropical Pineapple Pizza with Megan and Nic and it was incredible! Our waiter was so kind and was fascinated by our Texan accents the whole time. He had so many questions! I thought we should have tried to tell him that Texas succeeded and was no longer part of the United States. It totally would have worked!

Then we wandered back to Big Ben and the London Eye at night to see the night view. Lindsay and I began the tradition of Wobble Around the World. In other words we had our own mini dance party to the saxophone in the underground train station. I was so very proud of myself and my group when we finally got back to the house! I learned so much and I navigated London without getting too terribly lost. It was a day of a million pictures and lots of laughter and smiles and cold noses. Go Team Peckham!

Our journey to Paris begins in about half an hour! Here we go!

Nerdin' Out at Christ Church

This morning I had the privilege of being given a personal tour of Christ Church College and Cathedral. We need fifteen hours of service throughout this semester and volunteering to help guide visitors there was one of the options we were given. When they told me it could possibly involve learning and explaining the history of stained glass windows I was in! Long short short I emailed right away and today I met a nice 60ish year old man who works as a guide at the cathedral and he showed me around. IT TOOK THREE HOURS because he told me EVERYTHING and it was INCREDIBLE! I learned so much just in one morning and ...... I got the job! I get to go volunteer in one of the most beautiful, oldest cathedrals in England for two hours every Monday and eat lunch in the great hall that Warner Brothers used as their replica for the Great Hall in Harry Potter. I will walk up the steps to the great hall that are filmed in the movie every Monday!

My guide, David, kept emphasizing the fact that Harry Potter is a fictional character. However, he strongly emphasized the fact that Alice in Wonderland and every character in the story is based on a real person or a combination of places and situations in the history of Christ College. I had no idea. I have never had such an appreciation for the story of Alice like what I have gained today. I frequently thought back to the Alice in Wonderland birthday Kendall had and all the characters we saw. So cool! Kendall and Debbie, I have sooo much information to tell you! I wasn't able to take pictures today but I will get to take some next week I hope :) And I can give you a virtual tour and tell you all that I have learned about Alice and her real life! Peter Pan is based on a real person as well! Who knew?!

Looking back on this, I realize I am quite a nerd but it is so worth it! Stained glass window pictures will be coming soon and perhaps even the elaborate stories that go with them! The oldest window in England is there from 1322! At the end of the tour he said (in his British accent of course): "You have taken such a fancy to all the history and stories that I think you should start straightaway!" (Really I think they are just letting me help out there because I will be the only guide under 60. I'm excited!

We have been missing Mexican food lately so tonight our room cooked a lovely enchilada spread for our group and it was excellent! And Kirsten and Katie made homemade guacamole and salsa!

Paris in a few days!! I can hardly believe I am walking around the streets of Oxford every day, much less going to Paris soon. I feel so blessed.

Mom and Dad- I am sorry that Skype is not seeming to work for us last night and today. I hope we can figure it out in the next couple days but keep checking your email and we will figure it out! Love you!

Superbowl in England!

It is just about 3AM and I am proud to say that I stayed up to be faithful to the sport of my heritage and I watched the superbowl! I am very happy to say that the Giants just won and it was a close game to the very end. I have to admit I did miss watching it with American commentators because the British ones spent most of their time explaining the rules of the game. At one point they described one of the linebackers as "a very big lad"..."I would sure get out of his way!"

Posts will be up soon about the weekend in London! It has been so busy since we got back that I have not had a chance to sit down and write about all of it!

It snowed yesterday when we walking back to the house and we woke up to a winter wonderland this morning. We walked to the St. Aldates church service tonight in the snow and it was one of the best sermons I have heard in years. They have also introduced me to one of my favorite new worship songs- "O My Soul" by Matt Redman. Here is a quote from the sermon:

If being a Christian got you arrested, would there be enough evidence in your life to get you arrested?

Boys Choral Choir at Magdalen College

We couldn't take pictures so here are some of my favorite pictures from London, Port Meadows, and Christ Church. I will definitely be going back here to listen to these heavenly voices. The liturgy felt like home and the sanctuary was elaborate and gorgeous! (Sorry the soundbite didn't work the first time but this one is better anyways!)

Invigorating Day!!

I am declaring today as the best day that I have had in Oxford thus far!
This morning I slept in and then I took a shower and shaved. Accomplishment #1. Don't laugh it is very cold here and shaving is a chore when it is freezing outside and your bathroom has a huge window and no heater.
Then I went out on my first escapade by myself to Summertown! It is a little town about a fifteen minute walk from our house made up of a bunch of little, quaint restaurants and charity shops. It is like a bunch of Goodwills everywhere! On steroids! The British are so conscious of supporting charities all over the world.

Accomplishment #2: I found a few little treasures while shopping! My finds include- an antique tea cup and saucer, a blue cocktail dress, two miniature glasses for cider, and a worn, comfy blue sweater. It is true that the English enjoy talking about the weather. I talked with every store keeper today about the weather. Apparently it makes for great small talk with someone from Texas!


MOM- On the way I passed this house and it looks stunningly like the one in Sound of Music!

Before I knew it three hours of roaming around Summertown had passed and I had to hurry back to the house for my 3' o clock class. After class we booked it over across town to the Candelight Mass at St. Magdalen College. It is where C. S. Lewis taught English for about 30 years. The boys choir sang tonight and I do not know if I have heard anything more heavenly. Every inch of the sanctuary we were in was intricate and gorgeous. It was an Anglican/ Church of England service and followed a traditional liturgy. Afterwards I talked to the clergy and they said the service is the equivalent of an Episcopalian service (almost exactly like a Lutheran one) in the states. It was so refreshing to experience the same liturgy I grew up with at St. Paul. It felt like home to me and the gorgeous scenery and candles made it THE PERFECT experience.


Currently I am procrastinating on my homework for tonight and we are all sitting in the common room mourning over our classwork. It's kind of the ritual study break that happens around 11 or 12 every night. It is incredible how much harder classes are when you are in a new place you want to do nothing but explore. Tomorrow morning we are going to London though and it will all be worth it!

P.S. Evan- When I get back we are going on a date somewhere nice and I am going to wear my new vintage blue dress! And we can make a toast with my new vintage mugs that look like ButterBeer glasses from Harry Potter! So get ready :)


Looking back, today was definitely rule breaking day.
#1- I bought myself new clothes before I wore all the ones I brought with me. I made this rule originally for Kirsten :)
#2- I walked around by myself even though I promised my parents I wouldn't. Don't worry I knew I would be safe.
#3- I broke my little weekly allowance that I give myself for spending. But I am in England for a semester. I can't think of a better time to break my budget!
Breaking rules can be very invigorating indeed. Kirsten made fun of me because of this all day. We are a couple of daredevils!

Today was a nice, quiet day in Oxford and I feel like I am actually slipping into a routine of life here. Wednesdays are market days and I went today for the second time! There is so much hustle and bustle there because all the produce is so fresh and so cheap! I bought kiwis and bananas and apples today. I am officially trying to increase my fruit intake because the other day I ate like an entire jar of nutella. Yes I admit it I am now a nutella addict. Never fear though. The jars here are smaller and therefore it will take me longer to eat larger quantities because I have to walk twenty minutes to the store to buy more. No wonder people in England are so skinny! I am learning how to buy food that is cheap but good! I am in love with having our own kitchen only a few steps away. It is definitely spoiling me and going back to the dorm and camp may be a bit challenging. Our house has also worked out a family dinner schedule every week. There are ten of us and we divided up into teams to cook only one night a week. So I get cooked meals Mon-Thurs but only have to cook on Mondays! It is fabulous and a great time to just chat and laugh and bump into each other trying to fit 10 people in our tiny kitchen. I also have found myself a new specialty item to cook: Egg and Cheese on a Bagel! Worthy of Einsteins!

Kirsten and I did laundry for the first time yesterday and we were quite perplexed as to what all the numbers on the front of the washer meant. So...thankfully there was someone in the laundry room and I had to look like the foreigner and ask her to show me how to wash clothes with these washers. Not as self explanatory as you would think. Long story short I am now wearing clean clothes again so never fear Mom and Dad! Although it did cost about $8 to do 2 loads of laundry so I may just choose to be dirty...if I run out of money laundry is the first thing to go!

A bunch of girls on our floor planted lil flowers and they are sitting in our kitchen window sill. We will wait and see what happens! They should all look different!