Fete de la Musique...ou de la bière.

Bon Bons Galore @ Fete de la Musique

OK. So last night was the Fete de la Musique. Or the French call it a Nuit Blanche (all nighter). There are 4 of them year and this was one of them. This was a pretty crazy night. It "starts" at 19:00 and lasted until 5:00am. I obviuosly did not last that long. I went out at 21:30 and stayed out until 1:00. It was prorably the most crazy thing that I have done.

There was so much drinking and smoking who knows what. Tons of underage drinking. We decided that this is probably one of the nights where many kids get drunk for the first time.

So I did have to recount a story of horror. So there is this square called Place Plume. It is the "hip" place for all the young adults to hang out. And some old adults too. But we made our way there to see what lusic was playing there. So we get to one of the skinny French side streets and it is wall to wall people and no body is moving. So Liz, Lydia, and I try to get through this wall of drunk stinky people to get into the square and I thought I was going to die or at least get beer dumped all over me.

Liz was gutsy and plowed her way through while Lydia and I weren't so agressive. Lydia and I were stuck behind a bunch of drunk French people and a women behind us pushing her baby stroller into our legs. So some "D.A." decided to get angry and starts pushing every which way. Lydia got trapped by the stroller and I couldn't move anywhere so I start falling and grab onto her to help keep my balance and then she is trying to hold drunk people off the women's stroller who is screaming that she has a baby. Phew! We didn't get trampled or beer on us and once we made it through there we left Place Plume decinding that it wasn't a very good idea. In fact, it was a "bad idée".

Needless to say Fete de la Musique was a good experience but nothing stupendous.

Last Saturday we also visited Amboise & Blois. I have visted Amboise before so I didn't want to go into the castle and 2 other girls didn't either. So we decided to take a walk through Amboise to find the Pagoda. Yes a Chinese pagoda in the heart of France. I didn't quite understand the history behind it but we created our own story which was better.

After the pagoda (which was like 5k out of Amboise) we met the grouo at Chateaux Clos Lucé. This is the house of Leonardo di Vinci. It was amazing! And the gardens were even more amazing. I loved it so much. In the garden you were able to play with his inventions. It was very interactive. I was happy to have spent 8,00 euros on it.

Blois was just that Blois. We didn't have a lot of time to visit that town. The castle had already closed so we walked through the town and I had a great grand chocolat chaude! Délicieux. Maybe I will go back some other time. It was a very quaint little French town.

At many of these chateaux the walking on the grass is 'interdit' or forbidden. But the French, like the English, are so polite about it.

The sign at the Clos Lucé said "thank you for respecting the grasses." Very funny. I instantly thought about my mother and her lawn. That she needs one of these signs.

Finally my house mates. Danielle & Laurent Mauclair, and Kerstin. They are great to live with. I really get a long with them all. Laurent is a joker and loves to make fun of us. And I am beginning to get him back. Danielle explains things to us when Laurent speaks too fast. He is like the ever ready rabbit!

Kerstin leaves this Friday night so I am going to be alone at the Mauclair's for one week without her to help me...Yikes!

I did go to church this past Sunday. It felt good. It is a very small branch of about 30-45. They are usually excited for the summer to have many students from Utah come to populate their congregation. There were 8 students there on Sunday. And they made me say the prayer during sacrament. And believe it or not. I did it in French! Yep and I was copmplemented by my family. Oh that brings something else to mind. My host family rotates saying the prayer and they always ask Kerstin to say it but she doesn't. And I say it occassionally too. I am getting some good practice. A least that is something that they don't make fun of me. Or attack me on.

France is going great and I am loving being bilingual. I love speaking French every day and learning new things all the time. I better find a job here so that I can learn to make viennoiseries and other pastries.

Well until next time.

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