Hyuu! It's Really April Fool's Day?

Well, I guess today is really tomorrow for all y'all that are reading this in lands to the west of France. In any event, it is neverthless the 1st of April in my neck of the woods. This week has been moving rather slowly, but I have somehow already reached mid-ish week and am getting wicked excited for tonight's football match. It's the first qualifying match for the World Cup in South Africa, slated this evening to be between France and Lithuania. Apparently there was a match on Saturday, as well, but I have no idea as to what that's necessarily for. In any event, tomorrow night is the football match and I'm wicked excited for it. I've already said that; I think it's worth repeating.

What's perhaps equally worth repeating is that after a bit of a hiatus, Trevor and I hosted some of our classmates for a full-on meal. Consisting naturally of six rounds (including six pains au chocolat), our meal ended up being for six people in total, the most we've ever tried to have at one point in my room. With this said, everything worked out quite well and with Trevor's help peeling and cutting vegetables the night prior (as we watched Watchmen; which reminds me, on Sunday, we saw Dragonball Evolution while eating French toast for lunch, followed by Bienvenue chez Les Chtites), the ratatouille I made was a bit better than I expected.
With all of this said, tonight's menu was as follows:
Apératifs
Entrée: toasted bread rounds with chèvre and tomato sauce
Plat: ratatouille (my version of which included onion, garlic, carrots, eggplant, zucchini, red pepper, green pepper, tomatoes, emmental and tomato sauce, cooked together with sausage) with pain de campagne (this kind of bread has more mis, or 'meat', i.e., greater inside to outside (crust) ratio, which is good for eating with soup)
Salade: mâche with red and yellow cherry tomatoes
Fromages: emmental, comté and chèvre
Dessert: mousse au chocolat with strawberries and nutella, topped with chantilly
Pains au chocolat + chocolat chaud

Finally, for all of those FRIENDS fans out there, I finally found the video I've been looking for for a while: clique ici.

Paris and the three P's: Puppets, Pétanque and Pastis

Yesterday (Friday) marked the end of my second week of my stage (internship). After work, I got to the train station and bought the remaining tickets I'd need for the rest of my semester (at rather wicked low prices, I must add) and then headed back home. After I got back, Trevor and I made some simple quesadillas and watched Gladiator, then went downstairs to our weekly meal with our host family. Christine cooked a wonderful meal, comme toujours, which included a salmon with a citrus sauce and a home-made strawberry tart.

Today (Saturday), those with last names A-F spent quite a bit of the afternoon together, with Elisabeth (our French language professor), Renée (the programme director) and her daugter. We first went to see Guignol, a French puppet/marionette-type show (kind of like a Punch and Judy type of thing) by the Eiffel Tower. It was rather entertaining, but perhaps more so because it was so apparently made for toddlers; their parents sat on the side aisles, while the obviously American group (or at least it was apparent that there was a definite age gap between us and the main audience) sat in the back row (as the children's benches were rather small for us). Before the play even started, one of the mothers and I got to talking; she mentioned that it was rather funny to see us in the theatre, and asked if we were there for a course or group activity. :-P

After the show, we were greeted by pouring rain and made our way to a café, where we had pastis cocktails (i.e., with a flavouring added to the pastis). Pastis, in general, smells and tastes very much like licorice. While we had our pastis, we also broke into little groups and played card games. Elisabeth taught a few of us a game called Kilos de Merde (yup, just as it translates); in turn, I taught her spooons, which is pretty much the American version to the French game.

Rain finally subsiding, we made our way out to the Champs de Mars to play pétanque, the French version of bocce ball. I must say that since day 1, I was looking forward to this one particular activity. And lo and behold, the weather changed (yet again; something that seemed possible only in Michigan) and we suddenly found ourselves playing while hail fell (rather quickly). I'm wondering if I'll be able to carry a small set home with me...

It was now nearing dinner time and somehow Sam, Jill and I got onto a discussion on foods from Grenoble. After talking about it enough, we eventually made our way to a local grocery store and then back to the Fondation, where they cooked a layered dish of raviole, heavy cream, salmon, emmental, I cooked sweetened carrots and Trevor prepped the strawberries. Pat made sure that the ravioles were good... which they definitely were. To my stomach's content, I found the dish to be very tasty and filling; it's also something that I feel would be pseudo-difficult to replicate.

What was for sure difficult to replicate was our jazz experience that followed. The five of us went to Hippocampus, my favourite jazz club (which is securely tied with Duc des Lombards which, I now recall, Trevor and I went to with Pat yesterday). Eating my mousse au chocolat (which quickly jumped to my favourite mousse au chocolat on the European continent so far) and relaxing to the jazz music, I felt extremely content with Paris and all thoughts outside of it drifted away temporarily.

It's a bit hard to believe that we're more than halfway over with this programme and with everything I have planned for the rest of my time here, I feel like it'll be ending sooner than I expect it to. However, I think I'm soon quite ready to go home. Perhaps unless I revisit jazz clubs more often... :)

"Dude, we're in Paris!"

Back in Paris: Visitors, Round 2

Already I'm finding myself catching up to the present and I'm wicked excited for that.

This past weekend, along with the departure of Sarah, Mark Andrew, Pat and Quinton to the States, came with the arrival of Irene et al., Lauren and Karen (one of Lauren's classmates from Oxford).

On Friday evening, I cooked dinner for Lauren and Karen, the course-list of which included:
Apératifs
Salmon carpaccio
Baked pasta with a pseudo-cheesy red sauce
Sweetened carrots
Salad (mâche, comme toujours !)
Cheese: emmental, comté, chèvre
Chocolat pudding with liégeois
Pain au chocolat and chocolat chaud

With the above menu, I think it becomes obvious why we did not feel like moving after that.

Saturday was my big tourist day with them. I met Lauren and Karen at the Sacré Coeur, after which we sat at a brasserie by the artist's square. We then headed off for some gelato and returned to the square to take a look at the different works on display for selling. Next, we attempted to go to Ste. Chapelle; with confusion as to whether or not we were supposed to pay to get in, we chose to walk along the Seine before ultimately deciding to take a river tour of the "Stars (i.e., monuments and notable sites) of Paris". With the sun slowly setting over Paris, we headed over to the Louvre where Karen got her photos taken with Lauren and the Pyramids. Close by, we headed over to the first English bookstore established on the European continent (got my English copy of HP7, as the French version was too expensive) and then later stumbled upon a street that included an Italian restaurant, two Japanese restaurants (one of them which had sushi), a piano bar, a jazz bar, and a movie theatre nearby. Naturally, we ate at the sushi restaurant and ended the evening with an American movie, Last Chance for Love.

On Sunday, I went to Church and made a quick stop at the grocery store, before meeting up with Lauren for lunch before she had to leave to go back to Grenoble. After a weekend full of activity, it was great to just sit down at a café with her and talk. Yet, the activity resumed as, after she left and I return to my apartment, I got a message to see a movie with Trevor, Tanya, and Camille (and when we got there, Pamela, too). When we got to the theatre, we were greeted with the exciting news that the price would be only 3,50 €/ticket/movie (instead of 10+ €) until the 25th. After watching La Fille du RER, Trevor and I headed back to the apartment, where we then met up with Irene. The three of us then climbed the stairs of the Arc de Triomphe and surveyed Paris at night, before returning back home. For dinner, Trevor cooked rice and beans, definitely feeding us more than was absolutely necessary.

On Monday, Irene left Paris to go back to Madrid, and I met up with Trevor after work. Unexpectedly, we watched a French movie (LOL) and I watched a quickly-spoken but rather hilarious French movie (Coco), while Trevor's second movie was in English.

Yesterday (Tuesday), Debra (my off-campus advisor from Albion) came to visit Paris, my programme and, by extension, me. I met up with Debra and Trevor back at BU and, together, made our way back to Argentine, where we had dinner at the brasserie right next door to our apartment. Following dinner, we met with our host family and impressively kept up an English-dominant conversation for over an hour. We capped off the night with, of course, pains au chocolat and chocolat chaud. Get ready Albion... I'm bringing this back with me!

Back in Paris: Visitors, Round 1

Once again, my continued apologies for not getting all of my photos up by this point, as well as still writing about what seems like ages ago.

After having pseudo-settled back into Paris from my spring break, I woke up on Sunday morning and got over to Mass and the grocery store. Following this, I went with Trevor to attempt to find his sister, who had come to visit Paris (and Trevor, of course), as this was now her spring break week. Out of what seemed like sheer luck, we found them (or they found us?), and by 'them/they' I'm referring to Sarah and her boyfriend, Mark Andrew. Yeah, that didn't get confusing in the least. :-P

Entouk, we walked around Paris showing them around and trying to figure something out to do. (I think we are all just relieved that they finally made it into Paris.) However, with the sun still shining brightly over Paris (though to them our weather still warranted a layer or two more than us), we definitely still had to profiter du soleil, and aimed to go to the Catacombs. Unfortunately, we got there five or ten minutes later; fortunately, after three tries, they were finally able to see the Catacombs. I should also mention that Pat (Sarah's teaching mentor) and Quinton (Pat's son) were in Paris, as well. With the Catacombs not to be visited on Sunday, we made our way to the Jardin du Luxembourg, before heading back to their hostel. After a quick brasserie stop, we met up with them again to go to Argentine and have dinner with our host family, followed, of course, by pains au chocolat with chocolat chaud.

Monday, the first day of our internships (for which I will focus on in a different blog entry) finally arrived. After the end of our internships, we met up with Sarah, Mark Andrew, Pat, Quinton and Jill and eventually found ourselves in the Studio de l’Ermitage (thanks, Trevor, for having blogged about this already). Tuesday was St. Patrick's Day and naturally I wore an unnatural amount of green. May I also say that I knew I wore to much when I realised that I had exceeded what I believe to be the legal limit of green. In any case, no one said anything about it, but the looks were priceless enough. Wednesday came around and Trevor and I were lucky once again to find Sarah and Mark Andrew. We went looking for Pat and Quinton at the Louvre and had dinner near Châtelet. I would like to mention that the mousse au chocolat at the restaurant was by far my least favourite of all that I've tried in Paris. Indeed, it may have been the cause of some bizarre sentiments towards it, as both Mark Andrew and I both seemed to have gotten sick. Unfortunately, this carried over to Thursday and for the first time, I did not help myself to more chocolate when it came time to dessert that evening (my body also seemed to react negatively to the cheese, as well). [To clarify, Sarah, Mark Andrew, Trevor and I had our weekly meal with our host family on Thursday.] For all who may be reading this right now and may be worried for some reason or another, don't worry! I've been back to my old chocolate and cheese eating ways. :) Thursday also marked Irene (art history major from BU)'s visit to Paris.

A Mini Hiatus

Yesterday, I was on a mission in the morning to print and fax two pieces of paper to BU. Though successful, I would soon find out how wicked expensive it is to do those two tasks. In any event, Trevor's friend, Joe, arrived from BU yesterday. He's already been to Paris, so we pretty much just spent the day walking around Paris and stopping at random boulangeries or cafés. We eventually came home to a wonderful dinner prepared by our host parents. We spoke in Franglais (though perhaps a bit more French than English), but we nevertheless had perhaps the best conversation evening with them to date.

Today, I battled with myself to wake up and eventually got up to go to Mass. Since then, I've been catching up on some much-needed blogging time and have finally reached the end. With this said, today marks the beginning of my actual spring break travel plans. I leave for Pisa this evening, will be in Florence on Monday afternoon, and am meeting with Trevor, Joe and one of their friends in Rome on Wednesday. I can't quite promise when my next entry'll be, as I don't quite know the Internet situation.

So, until my next post, cheers!

The End of Part I of My Parisian Semester

Friday afternoon marked the end of the first part of my spring semester in Paris, and I must say there isn’t really much to say about this past week. Each day followed the rhythm of the past weeks since I’ve been here, slowly mounting to the fact that the academic aspect of our programme has come to an end.

All of my exams were completely fair, but nevertheless covered seven intensive weeks of coursework. My Travaux Pratiques (writing, speaking, etc.) final was on Thursday, while my economics and immigration & citizenship finals were on Friday. I think I did fairly well, considering the amount of information that could have possibly been tested. One could also tell that this past week has been on the more or less boring and repetitive side of life because our dinners became less and less complex, and more rushed to try and give us the maximum amount of time to study.

Ah, before I forget, we had two big food accomplishment for the week. First, in my attempt to step things up a notch, I made a pseudo-spicy beef and veg cannoli [ed.'s note: just realised today it was cannelloni] filling, the recipe of which I will include in my supplementary blog soon. Second, Trevor and I winged it and created a slightly better white sauce than our last attempt, eating that with gnocchi (ps/ it was extremely filling).

But aside from all of that, there were three great things about this week, and I’ll save the best for last.

1) About a week or two ago, I found out that France and Lithuania would be playing the first round qualifying match for a spot in the World Cup (ps/ in SOUTH AFRICA) while we would be here in Paris. And guess who’s going… Trevor, myself and 14 other BU folk, although I’m sure many more will join in on the fun. Especially given where we’ll be sitting, I’m wicked excited for this match. I knew it was a good thing I brought my French jerseys with me!

2) For some reason or another, this week was an über-nostalgic one for not only me, but for the majority, if not all, of my SIT: Cape Town classmates from last semester. I noticed pretty evident signs, such as the fact that many of them still have FB profile photos of them in South Africa, and that the conversation back and forth on our walls and photo comments refer to South Africa and our ISPs. Upon reflection, I forgot how tough and overwhelming mid-terms can generally get, let alone the fact that I was stressing over my finals. In any case, the great news is that I’ve been able to call a majority of them and catch up (there are still a few I need to get to). Everyone I spoke with sounded generally happy, but nevertheless nostalgic for SA.

3) Speaking of Safrica (which I don’t really intend to do, but just happen to anyway…), I finally saw ‘Le Roi Lion’!!! …although it was quite an adventure. I went to Théâtre Mogador right after school last Tuesday, getting there rather early. I went up to the ticket counter and asked if there were any student tickets left. The lady said no. I asked her if she knows when the next not-so-booked-night would be and she replied with ‘We are really booked for the next week.’ [N.B. This conversation was in French.] There was also a sign up saying they had no student (under 26 years old) tickets available. I had planned to meet up with Jane at the theatre and as she hadn’t arrived yet, I sent her a text giving her the unfortunate news that there were no tickets available (granted we could have paid the 49 € + / ticket fee, but the student cost was 10 €). However, she was more than halfway to the theatre so I decided to wait for her at the theatre and we’d try and figure where to go from there. It was approaching 19.00 and before Jane got there, I noticed a student line sort of begin to form AND THE SIGN WAS TAKEN DOWN. I was utterly confounded and when Jane arrived we ultimately decided to join the line and figure out if there was still a way to get in. A group of students (nine, I believe) were in front of us. After they PURCHASED THEIR TICKETS (even though the lady had told me earlier there were none available), we asked them if they did get student tickets and they responded with ‘oui,’ but they weren’t sure if they snagged the last ones or not. So, cue a frustrated M.A. Jane and I go up to the window and ask if there are tickets available, to which the lady responded with ‘oui,’ but the seats wouldn’t be next to each other. Fine by us! LOOONG story short… we got in and were about to see ‘Le Roi Lion’!

Catch-up…Again, Part II: « You Can’t Stop the Beat » (The Cooking Momentum Really Picks Up)

(N.B. In a similar style as my previous post...)

Thursday (26): After a late night with my paper, I was totally ready for the weekend and the excitement vis-à-vis cooking that we had in store for our dinner guests. Thursday evening, Gerald, Jill and Sam came over for dinner. Ménu: apératifs, pâte de penne avec une sauce de tomates et des boulettes de poulet et en plus du brocoli, la salade, des fromages et pour le dessert, les poires au four avec une sauce de vin blanc (sucré), de la canelle, et du citron. Of course, we also ended with pains au chocolat et chocolat chaud. (If you couldn't pick up what any of that was, make a note and I'll translate it into English, though I think you should be able to understand all of that.) We also played 1 000 Bourne.

Friday (27): I went to a cooking class taught by Elisabeth, at the Fondation. We made tartlettes, a salad with warmed chèvre, endives wrapped in ham and topped with a béchamel sauce that I made, and mousse au chocolat (there was an extra one that Camille and I shared, at Elisabeth's encouragement to finish it). Our end of the table (including Elisabeth) talked about travelling and food for much of the time, eventually leading me to the kind of cooking I've been doing since I've been in Paris. (Keep that bit in mind...) It was Jane's turn to come over for dinner, and so she and another one of her classmates, Elise, did just that. (Whoa, weird English sentence going on right there...) For dinner, we had: apératifs, salmon (me) with wild rice and asparagus (Trevor), salad, cheese, and had a duo-dessert (halved mango with brown sugar and cooked in rum and lemon juice, and strawberries that had been soaked in a mixture of orange juice, lemon and sugar; the mangoes were served with a reduced sauce of the leftover liquids from both desserts). As always, pains au chocolat and chocolat chaud ended the meal. After Jane and Elise left, Trevor and I continued talking and we got onto the subject of our favourites about our experience so far. Eventually, we got to thinking about who some of our favourite professors are and after recounting my cooking story from earlier in the day, we began thinking about the possibility of us cooking for them before we leave Paris. To make the night even more perfect, we figured out how to open the windows to the balcony. Paris is such a beautiful city.

Saturday (28): Trevor and I met up with Gerald and Jill at the Jardin de Luxembourg; quite exciting was the fact that the day was absolutely perfect (especially in terms of weather). Afterwards, we stopped by St. Sulpice and Tuileries (another garden in Paris). Our final destination for the afternoon was the Arc de Triomphe, which we found out students get in for free! About 50+ pictures and 500 steps later, we made our way back down and decided to do an impromptu dinner (as we were still up in the air as to whether or not we wanted to go to a jazz club). We ended up just staying inside and having dinner: apératifs, baked pasta, cheese and for dessert, dark mousse au chocolat accompanied by strawberries in various forms (including a nutella-filled strawberry with chantilly crème). As we finished up our pains au chocolat and chocolat chaud, we heard a key and were surprised to find our host family having returned from their vacation. Before and throughout their departure, Trevor and I had thought they would be back on Sunday. We (including Gerald and Jill; thanks for all of your help!) cleaned up the kitchen and dining room in the fastest time I had ever seen those two rooms cleaned after one of our dinners. Our host family was extremely nice about the confusion and told us that we could have just carried on, as if they had never arrived. In any event, the day still remained as perfect as it could be in Paris.

Sunday (1 March... when did that happen?!): After the adventure of finding hostels and what-not for my upcoming trip to Italy, I heard a small knock on my door. It was Elisabeth, our host sister, coming to get me for lunch. Our host parents made a wonderful lunch for us, incorporating ingredients from the mountain region where they had vacationed. (Un)fortunately, the food was definitely regional (including the names of each thing) and was not committed to my memory at the time. I wrapped up my hostel searches, booking everything that could be booked, took a bit of a nap, and then went to Sacré-Coeur to meet Patrick for Mass (finally after my fourth or fifth time being in Montmartre, I was able to get to Mass there). Afterwards, we stopped by a crêperie and ate some crêpes en route to the Comédie Française, where the BU crowd watched Cyrano de Bergerac. I'm sure I'd think it'd be as great a play as everyone else thinks it is, if I had been able to understand what was going on. In any event, it was quite the fortunate experience to be at the Comédie Française. For the first time in quite some time, Trevor and I went back to my room to have our first meal outside of our host family's kitchen.

Catch-up…Again, Part I: « We’re Just Getting Started »

Well, in what seems to be customary form, I must now go ahead and finally catch you all up on the happenings that make up my life in Paris. Last week was wicked hectic and my life practically consisted of school, eating, homework and, with some luck, sleep. As a result, I’ve had very little time to actual blog and, when I did have time, I found myself too tired to type. In any event, now that I’m all energised, I’ll do a very quick run-down of specific events that have stood out during my blogging hiatus.

Friday (20): Jane, one of my Model UN friends from my high school days, is currently studying in Paris and Trevor and I finally just got to meet her last Friday. After the dodgy (can’t believe it took me more than 10 seconds to think of that word) phone tag, Trevor and I finally got to meet up with her. We saw Banlieue 13 Ultimatum, had dinner at L'Hippocampus and went to the weekly jam session at Duc des Lombards.

Saturday (21): Trevor and I, for the first time this trip, spent the day at different places. I went to a wonderful aquarium/"movieum"called Cinéaqua. If you're in Paris, I highly recommend going, though it's rather expensive on a student budget. (Avenue des Nations Unis is along the way.) As I took pictures, I gave different sea creatures awards (some of them may be seen here: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2037053&id=36203035&l=d0347). Afterwards, I went to Cité de l'Architecture & du Patrimoine. Unsuccessful at finding a theatre playing Slumdog Millionaire, I met up with Jane and some of her new classmates.

Sunday (22): I went to Mass at 9am at the church nearby my apartment-whatchamacallit and did some grocery shopping. After lunch, Trevor and I met up with Jane and two of her classmates and we all went to Le Marais in search of la Maison de Victor Hugo. We found it and did not take pictures (thankfully, we were allowed to breathe). After that, we all met up with another one of Jane's classmates and headed off to the base of Sacré-Coeur, where Trevor and I split off from them in search of pains au chocolat, which we were able to find.

Monday (23): A speaker came to talk to our econ class about the state of energy and resources in Europe. In retrospect, it wasn't really all that exciting of a lecture. For dinner, I cooked torti pasta with sausage, tomato sauce and cheese, and a side of potatoes, peas and carrots.

Tuesday (24): After our regular course load, Trevor and I had an unexpected cooking night. Trevor made rice and beans, while I made cheesy potatoes and added to our leftover pasta. We ended up not eating the pasta, which turned out to be a bit of a mistake, because I added bolognase sauce (with beef) and...

Wednesay (25): Wednesday was Ash Wednesday, the first day of no meat during Le Carême (Lent). I gave my Revue de Presse presentation on the topic of development in Africa. Based on various press articles, the EU as a whole seems to have made too much of a commitment, whereas individual member states seem to be contributing the most. Interestingly (and unexpectedly), my research brought me to that topic, within the context of South Africa, the Millennium Development Goals, and HIV/AIDS. After our econ class, Patrick, Pamela and I went to Notre Dame for Ash Wednesday Mass. We spoke in English and French throughout the day, including our discussions in the Métro about various aspects of religion and our random topics during lunch. I worked on my paper for Odile (on the representation of youth and immigration in the movie Salut cousin !) back at school, until we had an internship meeting at 6pm. Following the meeting, Trevor and I ate uncustomarily quick and early, as a result of the amount of writing we had to do for the next day. (ps/ I ate slower than usual though, as I picked out all the meat from the pasta.)

Wicked

If you haven't been able to tell already, 'wicked' is now one of my favourite words to use. For the sake of not over-using it, as well as to begin this entry with awesome news, I shall like to begin by saying that Trevor and I cooked the best dinner we've ever cooked. To date. Ever. And we've cooked. A lot. Of food. Did I mention yet that it was wicked good? Because it was.

After the rather disappointing news that no tickets were available (at least for the student rate) to see Le Roi Lion, we decided to change course and cook dinner, yet we didn't realise how intense it was going to be. We went to Franprix (I had to go to a second one, too) to buy the ingredients, as well as to our boulangerie. Cue the jazz music. Trevor and I kept switching roles between head chef, sous-chef, and saucier. And like professionals, we pulled together a fabulous meal that we both couldn't seem to get over. At one point, we had all four pots going and probably took about 1,5 hours to prepare the meal, but it all felt like a rather calm process. We cooked bow-tie pasta and made our own white sauce to go along with it, with a side of broccoli and topped off with freshly cut parsley. We also had our cheese course, as well as dessert in the form of a raspberry-filled brownie and cherry sorbet with a side of macarons, and ended with chocolat chaud. Apparently, we've broken out of the cycle of non-complicated dinners; we ate all of this while watching Gran Torino.

But before all of this wonderful-ness, I went to school and didn't do so great on my quiz and by the end of my Travaux Pratiques class, was a bit overwhelmed with French for the first time this trip. Following this, I had my immigration and citizenship class, which turned out to be even better than all of us imagined it'd be; Odile is so cool. I also got my mid-term exam grade from her. I didn't do too bad and am excited for the rest of this half of the semester!

Clicking in Paris (Written on Wednesday, Posted on Friday)

In isiXhosa, ndiqala means « I start ». And with that, I shall start writing this blog entry by saying that I’m really looking forward to tomorrow evening. In the meantime, let me begin by recounting my cycle of life in Paris.

On Monday, I woke and went to my econ class, hoping to receive my mid-term grade. However, I would not be so lucky and would have to wait a bit before receiving it. On the other hand, I went on a mini quest for « Euro shoes », the term I [and I’m pretty sure others] use to describe the shoes worn by many of the Parisians here. On very basic terms, the shoes have a bit of a point to them. Thankfully Trevor had previously dissuaded me from purchasing them near our area; for less than the price of one pair there, I was able to find two pairs in St Dennis. I’m wondering how I’ll be able to bring all of my stuff home… in any event, that purchase officially ends my list of have-to-buy purchases. As we were unable to interview anyone for our third dossier assignment over the weekend, Trevor and I decided to be brave and try interviewing the women at our favourite boulangerie. In anticipation for the prospects of interviewing them and needing the extra energy to do so, I made a chicken, ham and gouda on baguette sandwich for the two of us. Unfortunately, they were busy (as usual) and we weren’t able to interview them. So, we went over to Franprix to do a bit of grocery shopping, as Trevor would be cooking dinner that night. Shopping completed, we went back upstairs and ate dinner in Trevor’s apartment (now that we know how to use the stove). He cooked rice and beans, with eggs over-easy. It sounds simple, but he cooked our meal successfully, despite the obstacles standing in his way, such as the lack of black beans and the lack of Mexican spices. It was wicked good (that would be the Boston lexicon fusing with my own) and very filling. Despite that fact, we still went through dessert (cherry sorbet with chocolate crêpe biscuits) and chocolat chaud. I then began to write my econ paper (no worries, I had done the research beforehand) and eventually quit as I was beginning to fall asleep writing it. (N.B. I didn’t work on my econ paper earlier, as I was aiming to finish my FURSCA proposal on time. Even though I finished writing it, I was unable to turn it in in the end. *Sigh.*)

I woke up early on Tuesday to finish writing my econ paper and did so sans problème. We then went back to our boulangerie to try and interview the women there, but they were once again busy. As a result we reverted to having to call our host dad. Without a response, I soon went to my Travaux Pratiques class and the five of us who are also in the immigration class together headed over to our class trip to the Cité Nationale de l’Histoire de l’Immigration (I’m going to assume you know what that translates to). I particularly enjoyed the modern, yet not-to-modern, and rather interactive-feel of the museum. However, the journey over to the museum was a bit of a challenge. We had all gotten onto the Métro together and I suddenly realised that it may be possible to take the RER (the one faster than the Métro), but it would mean having to deal with a few line changes. Convinced that I could beat the others to the museum with my alternate route, I separated from them at Opéra and made the trek. However, I hadn’t taken into account the change-over time (walking to each line spot, as well as the time to actually wait for the car to arrive). As a result, I got there a bit late, but everyone waited for me anyway (thanks y’all!).

Cue 18h30-ish. Trevor and I meet up in his apartment and we call Antoine (our host dad) for our interview project. We talked about his job, the economic crisis in Europe, and the like. I’m quite ready to write this paper and turn it in.

Following our interview, I got a move on dinner (baked pasta shells with cheese, with extra cheesy pasta sauce, as well as carrots julienne and cubed zucchini). We ate the meal while watching part I of Aladdin (quite different watching it after a few years). At the pause, I went back upstairs as Trevor worked on some of his homework. Instead of napping, as I had planned to do, I looked up stuff for Le Roi Lion, which apparently is only 10 € for a student ticket on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. As part of the 10th anniversary celebrations, the French version opened in Paris in the fall and should be playing until the end of spring. Trevor and I are planning on going tomorrow and I’m wicked excited to see it. Through my Internet surfing, I found out/realised that the movie was inspired by South Africa and that the clicks in the stage version come from Xhosa! Did I mention I’m excited to see it? A few hours later, I went back downstairs and finished watching Aladdin while enjoying a round of chocolat chaud.

Today, I got to my econ class and received my econ grade at the end of it. I don’t understand the French grading system, but I’m not complaining. Let’s just say I did better than I thought I would-ish. I then went to the outdoor Dupleix market and bought stuff for dinner and then finally made my way to McDonalds (for lunch). Christine’s brother had suggested we try it at least once while we’re here because it’s apparently better here than in the States or anywhere else in the world for that matter). In all actuality, I am a fan of McDonald here than back home.

The plan for the evening was to go see a newly-released film, Le Code A Changé, so after dropping off the groceries in my apartment, I went back out to the school to meet up with my classmates and one of our professors. We then made our way to Passy and the second-biggest movie theatre that I’ve come across so far in Paris. We were watching a French comedy and the hilarity began to start when a big box of popcorn kept passing back and forth along the aisle; Hanadi, the professor who was with us, bought us this giant box of popcorn that somehow sufficiently satisfied the American cinematic experience for about 20 students. Before the movie even began (and while we were passing the box of popcorn), music started to play and it felt like there was going to be a live, opening tango number, on the floor in front of the screen. Alas, that wasn’t the case, but the movie did start with a tango scene. The movie was quite funny and I somehow understood most of it, despite the lack of subtitles. It also seemed to follow a traditional Franco-European feel, including a very open-ended ending. When we got back to the apartment, we had dinner (beef Bourgogne with white rice and broccoli), followed by giant strawberries with Nutella, and finally chocolat chaud. I should also mentioned that we watched a couple episodes of FRIENDS during dinner, before a long night of paper writing for the both of us.

13-5 February: One-Month Anniversary and Valentine’s Day Weekend

Yeah, for the past few days, Trevor and I have been joking about the fact that a month has now passed between the moment we arrived on French territory and the moment that I write this blog entry. As you may have already read, yesterday was our one-month anniversary as roommates… housemates… actually, probably more like friends who happen to live in the same building and share the same homestay family. Definitely expanding that a couple circles, yesterday also marked my one-month anniversary with a city that’s been my home for quite some time now: Paris. In reality, and better yet in the grand scheme of life, a month is nothing. It’s merely a moment, and one of many. Entouk, it’s a moment that I’ve enjoyed every step of the way so far. With that said, please carry on and read the rest of this entry.

Saturday was Valentine’s Day. It also happened to be the second one in a row that Lauren and I have not been in the same place for. She’s currently travelling the rest of the European continent while I’m battling through my homework; okay, really, she’s on her winter break right now. In any case, with it being Valentine’s Day and all, the jokes continued on between Trevor and I, as we went through our itinerary. Actually, we had spent quite some time planning out stuff to do during the day but, as Paris and (especially) South Africa have taught me, there is never such a thing as concrete plans, and you definitely have to go with it.

All of that planning aside, our Valentine’s Day travels eventually brought us to the MK2 movie theatre near Quai de la Gare. In fact, it was actually an MK2 bibliothèque, a film major’s kind of playground I can only imagine (Trevor, of course, was « not » all that interested in that…). We ate what was more like our lunch and got in line to watch a movie. Upon entering the screening room, I was amazed at the black and red motif, as well as all of the comfortable seats. Arm rests between pairs of chairs could be lifted up to create a love seat. Almost forgetting that it was indeed Valentine’s Day, we quickly began to notice that nearly everyone in the theatre were couples. Perhaps even more hilarious was the fact that we saw Ce Que Pensent Les Hommes (English title: He’s Not Into You). I quite enjoyed it and laughed to myself in the beginning when every new shot was of a big-name star. Following the cinematic experience, we went to Rennes to go to Hippocampus. However, once again, we forgot that it was Valentine’s Day and were taken aback when we saw that couples filled the jazz club. The waiter decided to be particularly funny and asked if we were a couple (we had the « right » to be, according to the waiter), but quickly followed up saying that they didn’t have any room. With that, we left and walked around, trying to look for a jazz club and eventually gave up, once again because it was Valentine’s Day.

Bearing in mind that the movie was at 7pm (we left, I think, around 4:30pm or so and it took us a while to even get there), by the time we gave up looking for a jazz club it was nearly midnight and we were getting hungry. So, we made our way back home and stopped off at Charles de Gaulle Étoile to try and find the dark chocolate-covered marshmallow bears that we’ve been looking for for what seemed like forever. Entouk, the candy store was still open (I wonder how late the Champs-Elysée stays open) and we found the bears! ALSO, I FOUND THE CLOSEST THINGS TO TANGY TOPS IN THE SAME STORE!!! That’s a problem, haha. Afterwards, in our quest to find the best pain au chocolat which, I think, is more like our quest to validate the fact that our boulangerie is the best in all of Paris, we picked up some pain au chocolat on the way back home. I made some baked penne with soft baguette and tons of cheese; that late at night, anything’s pretty much amazing. Though I don’t like to brag about my cooking, I must say that that was probably the best pasta I’ve cooked since I’ve been here. And of course, we ended with chocolat chaud brilliantly coupled with our pains au chocolat.

Cue Sunday, 7:27am. I woke up and decided to go back to sleep, as the Mass service I planned on going to was at 9am. However, when I woke up again, it was 10 to 10am and knowing there’s supposed to be a 10am family service, I decided to finally get up and go to the church. Bearing the flow of this anecdote in mind, there was apparently no family service this weekend. I went to the main part of the church and prayed for a bit and then, not wanting to waste time (as I had told Trevor I’d be back at noon), I decided to go grocery shopping. I bought quite a bit of stuff and heard the church bells going. I wasn’t about to go to church with bags of groceries (or wine and such), so I went back to my room and went right back out again. When I got to the church, I found myself in a traditional, Gregorian service (i.e., there was a bunch of Latin thrown in that threw me off my linguistic game just a bit). After Mass, I went to the boulangerie that’s in that area but that we never go to, as well as to the fromagerie that we never go to (ps/ cheese and fish are cheaper in their respective speciality shops than in the supermarkets!) to pick up some fresh bread and cheese from the original cheese wheel (so cool!). Okay, enough excitement for food (for the moment).

After eating lunch (considered, really, breakfast at this point), Trevor and I finally made it outdoors (ps/ the weather here has indeed been perfect this weekend, given the fact that we’re still in the winter season) and headed over to Père Lachaise cemetery, using our recently-utilised transport system, the RER (which has fewer stops, but as a result is a lot quicker than the Métro). There isn’t really much to say other than the fact that there are a ton of graves (I believe the estimate is 70 000); a grave is a grave. Outside of existing foliage, there’s very little colour. As a result, the colours that do exist there catch your eye very quickly. Colours come from plants left by visitors, stained-glass windows, and even doors on some of the graves. Père Lachaise is also a gravesite for the many thousands of people who have influenced French culture and society. With this said, there’s a lot of history buried there and culture that has grown from those great minds. There was a rather peculiar site, that of Jim Morrison’s, that I wasn’t a huge fan of. First of all, his grave seemed to be the only one in the whole cemetery that was barricaded, sort of like with the kinds of gates used to separate paparazzi from celebrities during a movie premier. Also, his site is « so popular » among visitors that said visitors have taken the liberty of scratching « Jim » (along with an accompanying arrow leading to his site) into the tombstones of other people. Not a huge fan. In any case, I shall leave the rest of our adventures in Père Lachaise to speak for themselves via the photos below.

Following our 2,5-3-hour excursion in the cemetery, we decided to come back to the apartment, and once there, we tried the stove once again. I don’t think I’ve mentioned this story (which, if I did, you have every right to skip over this bit), but our host family has an electric, fancy-schmancy stove top. We had spent a while yesterday trying to figure it out, to no avail. In the evening, Christine called us and we eventually asked her how to use the stove (even though she had at first shown it to us twice). Entouk, she told us that their stove top is thermo-conductive or something like that and as a result, there are specialised pots for use specifically for our host family’s stove top. Moreover, she said that my pots wouldn’t work in their kitchen (because it’s not specifically designed for it).

Before being told this information, we decided to bypass the stove-top for a while (just in case it was pulling a JK/LOL or taking a day off) and cook dinner upstairs. For dinner, we started off with apératifs (anyone else try « MA » (not referring to myself) yet?) and boiled potatoes with raclette (cheese) and ham. The next course was baked pasta shells with a bolognase sauce, topped (of course) with cheese. We also had some other colours with our meal, in the form of carrots and zucchini. I had a bit more of the comté I had purchased earlier in the day, followed by dessert and, after cleaning up, we went downstairs to work on homework and I did some laundry in the process. Oh yes, and we watched Top Gun (in English) during dinner. We both spoke to our respective families around midnight-ish and ended our weekend with chocolat chaud and pains au chocolat from the boulangerie we never go to.

I'm Eating Fruit Cocktail

Okay, so the title would've worked better if I wrote this a few hours ago and was, well, still eating fruit cocktail. In any case, I like the title, so just humour me and let me run with it.

After studying for my partiels (mid-terms) into the wee hours of the morning, I found myself surprisingly awake a few hours later and ready to take my exams. They went well; I think I overstudied for one and understudied for the other (which usually tends to be the case). After the exams (around 12h00), Trevor and I went back home and had lunch (unsurprisingly, more eggs and croque-monsieurs), and watched my (and apparent only one of his) favourite French movie(s), Les Choristes. Following the movie, Trevor went back downstairs to take a nap and I found myself somewhat inspired to work on my FURSCA proposal, depite the uncertainties surrounding it. I worked on the paper a little too long and eventually missed watching Slumdog Millionaire, but was at least able to meet up with Trevor and Camille at Odéon. Together, we walked to a crêperie (which happened to be the one right across from the theatre where we saw "La Cantatrice Chauve", and ended up buying paninis for dinner. Following our meal, we went to the Caveau de la Huchette, where we were eventually met up by Jill, Sam, and two of their friends from BU and who are currently studying in Grenoble. We had originally gone there for the jazz, but were soon surprised to see an open dance floor. However, there was only room for us in a little alcove in the back, so we ended up "dancing" (theoretically) back there.


After the Caveau de la Huchette, we trekked our way across the river to Duc des Lombards. Once again, after midnight, there's a great jam session (that's also free to watch), where people just randomly (or not) come up on stage to join whomever else is there. Somehow (and to my amazement) they always sound very good. One of my favourite bits was a solo by a guy playing one of those duo-djimbe-type-drums. I have no clue what that's called, but perhaps you know what I'm talking about anyway? Oh, of note, we all sat in the balcony looking down on the musicians. It was so great; I've confirmed Duc des Lombards to be my favourite jazz club so far in Paris.


Following our jazz evening, Trevor and I went back to my room and made some chocolat chaud (which is pretty much a common occurrence every night, if you haven't caught on to that one yet). I also figured out that each box of milk is 1L, and each serving is 0,25L. With this said, we finished a litre of milk in one day (we had some with lunch, as well). I must say I'm quite a fan of this hot chocolate. To end the night, I attempted to catch up on all of my blogging but obviously didn't finish as I'm wrapping up just now.

I would also like to note that yesterday marked our one-month anniversary here in Paris. I can't believe how quickly time has flown by here!

Hungry much? I mean, I'm not mean, but...

This past weekend has been one of my favourites so far. On Saturday, I got up early to continue my search for a single pair of jeans. I had no success in this endeavour, and realised that an annoying paradox currently exists here in Paris. I'm not the only short guy in this city; indeed, there are many who are shorter than me, and that also happen to be wearing jeans. If they're wearing shorter jeans, that must mean that said jeans should be available for purchase, right? Aïe ! In any case, outside of this, the weekend was really fun.

I completed my early weekend purchasing with the purchase of my Euro bag (some would call it a "murse"). Entouk, it does the job. It was also beginning to snow (which I love over here), and I remember being rather surprised with the increasing number of shoppers in spite of the weather. I got back home around 2pm, and around which time Trevor and I had lunch (even more eggs; I must also say that I think Trevor has perfected his egg cooking). We then decided to go to the Musée du Quai Branly; cultural museum? (Of course!). The museum, architecturally, was quite huge and modern. The artifacts and such were not quite as modern (though we did see a yellow pointalist painting from '96 (i.e., 1996). I did see many interesting things, as all museums have their fair share, though I, of course, was interested in a few areas in particular:

OCEANIA: Australian, aboriginal artifacts
Philippines: It looks like they didn't put the Philippines in Asia or necessarily in Oceania. In any event, I kind of got the chills taking a look at potentially one of my ancestors' belongings.
AFRICA: Cameroon, South Africa (there was nothing from the Xhosa ethnic group, ps).
AMERICAS: Great Lakes regional artifacts (coolest thing was a grizzly bear claw necklace)

After receiving a text from Erin confirming dinner plans, Trevor and I left the museum and completed some much needed grocery shopping. Erin, Liz, and Meredith (though, the professors seem to be convinced her name's Meredyth), arrived and we presented them with our usual five-course hooplah (though I think they were originally supposed to come over for just the hot chocolate in the end. Nevertheless, we started out with apératifs (including pistachios and peanuts), moved on to a main course of baked pasta and cheesy bread, followed through with salad, included cheese and more baguette, and finishing up with mousse au chocolat noir with raspberries arranged differently for each person. Finally, we moved on to the ultimate test and the reason why they came over in the first place (chocolat chaud). I must say I was rather impressed because, after finishing all of that food, pretty much all of the hot chocolate was finished. We couldn't find any regular sized pains au chocolat, but Trevor did manage to find some mini ones for Erin, Liz, and Meredith to try. (ps, the title of this blog entry comes from the regular use of the phrase "I mean, I'm not mean, but..." during dinner)

As we were heading into early morning territory, we had to call an end to the night and we all walked to the respective Métro stations. However, Erin's Métro line was closed, so Trevor and I walked her to the Noctillien, the bus line that's in operation while the Métro is closed. However, as we would have had to wait (weird construction there) about an hour just for the bus to arrive, we thought (at the time) that it'd be a smart idea to just walk home. Eventually, we got to Erin's house and then realised we had to walk all the way back (I think it was about an hour/hour and a half-ish walk across Paris). Suffice it to say, Trevor and I got back to our apartment without much difficulty, and we have this story to tell.

The next day, i.e., Sunday, everyone woke up pretty late, but we eventually met up at Montmartre (second time in the past few weeks for me) and walked around the area for a few hours, making sure to stop at the Sacré-Coeur and the look-out point at the base of the basilica. After our afternoon journey (with beautiful weather, I must add) we stopped at a crêperie for a quick crêpe nearby, and then headed our separate ways. I aimed for St. Clotilde parish for an evening Mass service and got to the church with little difficulty. Although we were in [what I would call] a chapel, it was beautiful inside and felt as though I was in the main parish church. Upon my arrival back home, Trevor and I became stereotypical French (eating baguette and cheese alongside some wine). We worked on some homework and eventually the hours quickly strolled by; of note, Trevor and I also attempted to make post-mid-term travel plans, but luck was not on our side.

N.B. At the time of me writing this, I'm enjoying my weekend so far, even though we aren't doing much travelling.

Catching Up

In a nutshell, life's been a bit hectic here in good ol' Paris. Okay, not quite hectic, but just too fun and serene to really have the time to write blog entries all day. (It's either that, or we just also really have a ton of homework for our classes.) In any case, here are some brief highlights:

WEDNESDAY
*My econ class went to the Assembly of the Western European Union, where we heard/spoke only in English. In retrospect, it was a really cool outing.
*From the AWEU, Camille walked with me to Passy, where I happily found myself lost amidst all of the stores that are ending their sales more quickly than I'd like.
*I took the wrong direction and decided to get lost in Pasteur, and then walked to Montparnasse Bienvenüe and back.
*I continued my search for an elusive pair of jeans at La Motte Picquet Grenelle. Seriously, jeans are too long (i.e., I'm just really getting tired of being short in this country) and too expensive.
*Dinner consisted of baked pasta with cheesy bread.
*Trevor and I spent the rest of the night going through our notes and outils workbook in preparation for our first French quiz. Of course, we ended with chocolat chaud.

THURSDAY
*We had our first quiz in French class, followed by an AMAZING phonetics lesson afterwards - it's equally great when everyone continues to speak in French after just having had learned how to speak it.
*My immigration and citizenship class continued to watch a movie on Algerian immigrants now living in France. We also discussed Caché which, naturally, meant that I understood the movie by the time I left.
*Trevor and I walked along the Champs-Elysée on the way home - Trevor finally found his bag.
*Antoine cooked wonderful galettes for dinner, with Christine cooking the dessert crêpes. We also had cidre from Brittany (i.e., Bretagne). Galette round: ham, egg, cheese; salted ham? (prosciutto), and cheese; salmon; Sucre round: Nutella and banana flambé; Nutella and dark chocolate
*We ended our night once again with choc chaud.
*I also bought my tickets for spring break for less than 150$ !

FRIDAY
*My immigration and citizenship class watched Salut Cousin which was hilarious and refreshingly easy to follow.
*For the most part, Renée and Odile met up with us A-J-last-name-students at the Musée du Vin. We were thoroughly taught (in French) many of the ins and outs of wine. We also tasted two reds, two whites, and a champagne.
*Trevor cooked eggs as the base for our dinner.
*We went out for some jazz following dinner. We met up with Gerald, Jill, and Sam, at Hippocampus. It was especially cool because we were pretty much the only ones there. The theme for the evening was Oldies; they played older music from France and the States, as well as a few that made me want to be back in Louisiana. Trevor and I then went to what I think is tied as my favourite jazz club, Duc du Lombard.

My Ears Are a Bit Colder Now

Chocolate. Cheese. Wine. Chocolate. The French know what they're doing, and also outside of the culinary realm it seems. Today (well, really I suppose yesterday at this point), I decided to check out the coiffure (hairstyling place) once more. If there was no one there, I confirmed to myself that I would not be getting my hair cut at all (at least during this semester). However, as everyone else in the world seemed to know, it turns out that hairstyling places are typically closed on Mondays (apparently in France, as well as in the States). In any case, I set out the conditions beforehand and had little alternative but to have my hair cut, except for the possibility that they couldn't cut my hair at that time (at which point I also would have decided not to have my hair cut). As it turned out, I was able to indeed have a haircut. Somehow, the haircutter understood my hair situation, through a combination of my French and her ability to actually understand my hand motions, and gave me a pretty good haircut. I told her (more or less) that I wanted it relatively shorter than the long hair I possessed, that she needed to pay particular attention to the top of my head, and that my hair gets curly when my hair is dry. Towards the end of my explanation, she asked me if I wanted my hair somewhat like the guy's in the window display poster. I nodded and threw in a oui, and with professional precision, cut my hair within about half an hour's time. Glasses off, I felt the pangs of the past couple of years and a few months of work to keep my hair long and saw the rather dramatic difference in terms of my hair length getting shorter as she worked. In the end, my haircut ended up being 25 €; I'm thinking it's because she cut a substantial amount of hair off and re-styled my look.

After a quick stop at the pharmacie to attempt to try and find some hair gel, I headed off to school. My Travaux Pratiques class was focused primarily on grammar corrections, followed by a reminder of the quiz we have to study for, as well as the multiple dossier projects we have to work on, by Thursday. My immigration class was great, as usual. We're beginning to get into immigration and citizenship theory within the French context. Fun stuff. I know, right? :)

I got my first set of grades back from both classes. I need to learn more French grammar quickly and concretely. Trevor and I have decided to take it upon ourselves to speak even more French and will soon try to proofread each other's papers.

After my five hours of class, we had our weekly conférence. This time around, the subject was the French media. Somehow, the hour-long meeting felt like only 20 minutes. There were two speakers, at least one (if not both) from RFI (Radio France International).

Following the conférence, I joined Gerald, Jill, and Sam, on the métro to tram ride to the Fondation for dinner, where we met up with Claire, Nicole, and Trevor. Trevor and I then went back to my room to work on some homework. In between my corrections and such, I happened to make some three-cheese bread as a snack, even though we both agreed that we didn't need to eat anymore. Comme toujours, we ended the night with my hot chocolate and some pains aux chocolat.

Getting Our Hot Chocolate On

MDR (Mort de rire, i.e., "dying of laughter", a.k.a., LOL). That's the only possible way to start this blog entry.

Today, I woke up to some wonderful Parisian snow, which would eventually turn into wet mush by the end of the day. In any case, the Métro was pretty packed today, especially in the morning, as people were recharging their Métro cards and heading off to work. I eventually got to class, and met with half the class, as everyone else was held back quite a bit because of the snowy conditions. I had my only class (economics) and then had the rest of the day to myself until the early evening when I had to return back to school to watch a movie for my immigration and citizenship class.

To pass the time, I walked along the Champs-Elysées, doing some window shopping for part of the time and taking part in the final markdowns for the winter season for the rest of the time. I then made my way over to the haircutting place I came across yesterday and, after going back and forth on whether or not I should get a haircut, found the place to be closed for the day, even though I was very much there before their posted closing time. I could technically call whomever at the place to set an appointment, but I didn't even see a contact number on the store front. So, I headed over to Franprix, only a few more stores down, and completed my grocery shopping for (hopefully) the next week. Following the end to my shopping excursion, I made my way back to school. On the way over, I found a really great crêperie/bar place just outside of the Dupleix stop; I had my cheapest and honestly best-tasting crêpe there. Were it not for the rain, I probably would've finished all of it by the time I got back. In any event, I eventually got there and met up with a few of my classmates from my immigration and citizenship class. Together, we watched Caché, which for some reason or another, has been added to my list of could-be-kinda-good-if-only-I-understood-what-just-happened kind of movies. After a quick stop at a pharmacy after the movie, I returned back to my room.

Yesterday, Trevor and I had planned to eat the rest of our salmon and green beans leftovers (which we did), but somehow ended up having yet another five-course meal in the process. I'm beginning to think that "leftovers" is an actual course title. In any case, we had:

*Leftover salmon with green beans (plus the choice of including leftover rice)
*Three-cheese (comté, emmental, and gouda) two-pasta casserole
*Salad
*Cheese (five cheeses this time around; the above, plus chèvre and rocquefort)
*Galette de la marmotte (to celebrate Groundhog's Day, we added a chocolate-covered marshmallow bear and a broken up mini macaroon (for the "ground") to our galette de bonne année), as well as liégeois au chocolat

Gotta go and finish up the rest of my homework... To end the night, Trevor and I plan on finishing up with our traditional hot chocolate (i.e., chocolat chaud) course.