Thanksgiving? Alert the Press!

Happy Belated Thanksgiving. My Thansgiving story includes the usual turkey and stuffing...as well as three forms of French media and a French guy named Antoine.

Here´s how it all started: the grève. There was a lot of striking going on in France (comme d´habitude), you probably read about it in the paper. It was extremely annoying because it was difficult to go anywhere. Anyway, the night the strike began, I was almost stuck in Metz. I thought it was set to start the following day. There was, however, one bus to take me back to Pont-a-Mousson. No one seemed to know where the bus stop was so I wandered around with other stranded SNCF customers looking for a way home. I heard someone ask, ``Does the bus stop at Pont-a-Mousson?´´ and I was like, ``I hope so! I have to go there as well.´´Enter, Antoine.

Antoine is a 21-year-old guy studying history who is extremely French (in the worst way). But anyway, it turns out he lives right across from me. Thinking it couldn´t hurt to have another French friend in town, I invited him to meet me and the other 4 assistants at the pub that Friday night. He met us there and Laura and I made the (mistake?) of telling him about our Thanksgiving plans and how I had ordered a turkey from the butcher. This was in between his history lectures on the 2nd World War and a few partriotic tirades. By the end of the night we were all just like, if I hear la deuxième guerre mondiale one more time, I might scream. I like a good history lesson as much as the next guy, but 2 hours nonstop in French is a bit much for me during a Friday night out. Anyway, he is really really nice, but in small doses. We got a good laugh out of situation. Little did we know, there were many laughs to come.

The next day, Antoine sent me a message that he found all of the food for our Thanksgiving dinner. I was confused. Why was he looking for food? Two of the other assistants randomly met up with him at the cafe and he explained that he talked to the town board of shopkeepers and they decided they would like to sponsor our dinner out of the goodness of the season or something. Huh? Where´s the catch?

This was great news though, because Laura and I were stressing a bit about the whole turkey situation, never having cooked one before, let alone in France, where the Celcius/metric differences are bound to make any culinary venture ten times more difficult. Also, I was having trouble ascertaining he exact size of the turkey and whether it would fit in my tiny oven. When we called the butcher, he just repeated over and over, ``it´s not a chicken! it´s not a chicken!´´ Thank you for that helpful information.

Anyway, Antoine took us to meet with the head of the association, Jean-Luc. He is a really nice jolly guy and he really just wanted to give us a turkey and get a little good publicity for his association. Awesome.

The next day, Antoine called again and said something about an interview and the newspaper. Later that day, Laura, Chris (the British assistant) and I were interviewed for the newspaper and the radio. I have no idea what I said. When it was over, we were like, I can´t believe we just gave a radio interview in French. And Chris was wondering why he was even there, he was like, ``why am I giving interviews about Thanksgiving, I´m not even American!´´

Okay, so when Thanksgiving Day finally arrived, Laura and I went with Antoine to pick up the turkey. They had cooked it and everything, all we had to do was reheat it! They had invited a TV news crew as well to get us all smiling with the turkey and ask a few questions. I was nervous. Giving a TV interview in French is even more nerveracking than a radio one! Laura and I kept glancing at each other trying not to laugh. The whole thing just seemed so ridiculous! But really nice. We also got a copy of the newspaper, which had the article as well as our picture. The title of the article was ``Une dinde internationale´´ or, An International Turkey. Ha.

So, we returned to the apartment with a cooked turkey, many bottles of champagne and wine, as well as spinach and boiled potatoes (don´t ask, somewhere along the way we got our wires crossed on traditional turkey day foods). Laura made a pumpkin pie and cranberry sauce the night before (which was actually really good, despite the fact that they weren´t actually cranberries). She also made stuffing. I made a spinach casserole and bought some appetizers. And we made mashed potatoes as well (as Chris is an expert) so we pretty much had everything except pumpkin pie! The meal was a little heavy on spinach, haha, but it was delicious.

Antoine couldn´t come until later because he had to work. Two minutes after taking off his coat, he took out a volume of French poetry and began dramatically reading Prevert poems to the group.

I thought I would be really homesick on Thanksgiving, and while nothing beats Thankgiving at Aunt Kathy´s, the absurdity of my Thanksgiving took my mind off it completely! Next year, I will probably miss sharing Thanksgiving with a Spanish girl, a German girl, a British guy and the regional press. When we sit down to cut the turkey, I will think, wait, where are the reporters?

Back from Bohemia

Well, I wasn't traveling in only Bohemia, but it makes a good title.

I had a great vacation. This is going to be a long post. Here we go...
Laura and I started our vacation in Vienna. We took a night train from Strasbourg. It was very Harry Potter with separated compartments. You could even close the curtain. Unfortunately, there was no snack cart with Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Bean.

We didn't want to pay the extra cost for the sleeper car so we tried to make do sleeping in the regular train. It was fine for a while because you can pull the seats out and it was just the two of us in a 6 person car. A couple of hours into the trip, however, a German girl wanted her exact seat so we had to push some of the seats back in. In the end it wasn't too bad. This photo was taken in the morning before we got to Vienna.

Vienna was really cool. We went to the Hofburg Palace and Sissi Museum. Apparently, everyone is obsessed with Princess Elisabeth and there is a strange museum in the Palace dedicated to her. There is also 8 million plates and dishes and forks that were the Hapsburgs, but overall the museum is really interesting.

We also got to see the Vienna Boys' Choir at one of the chapels. It was amazing and one of my favorite parts of the trip. It was free too for standing room. They sang as a part of the Sunday morning church service in a Hofburg chapel and then performed a song in front at the end.

We also went to the Freud Museum in the building he lived in and had his office. That was cool except there was no couch because that's at the Freud museum in London. His doorplate is shown in the photo.

We went to a wonderful but cheesy Mozart orchestra concert in period dress. There were two elderly ladies in front of us just loving the concert. It was good, but they were so into it, it was hilarious. They had moved to the front row by the last song. The concert venue was the Wiener Musikverein, home of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. It is considered one of the top venues for acoustics in the world.

We also went to a Viennese coffee house and tried apple strudel. I also made sure to try the Wiener Schnitzel. It turns out I had no idea what that was. It tasted like a big, flat chicken nugget.

Our hostel in Vienna was nice. It was trying to be all modern and posh. (see photo). We had our own bathroom and room that we shared with two other girls. These girls were on an insane backpacking trip. They were going all over Europe, Australia and Asia! We met other people like that too-an Australian girl was doing Europe, USA, and South America in a year. How exhausting!




Budapest was beautiful. I am so glad we decided to go there, though at first it was a bit stressful. We couldn't find the hostel! We went up and down the street, but it was nowhere to be found. Finally, we noticed our reservation listed a ring code. A ring code? This seemed odd. We eventually found the address and there was no sign except a teeny tiny listing next to the doorbell for the building. Strange. Also, the door was completely covered in graffiti. Anyway, we buzzed in and had to go up several flights of stairs to the hostel. The entrance and stairwell was covered in graffiti as well. Luckily, the hostel was fine once you got inside. I mean, it was a traditional hostel with many beds in one room and one bathroom for the entire place, but it was only $11 a night. Budapest was really cheap in general.

Budapest was interesting because the part we were staying in seemed less touristy. I think we didn't see Budapest's best side when we first arrived and so we were amazed when we saw the beautiful part. It was also really walkable. We took the subway at first, but we hated it so we started walking everywhere. The subway in Budapest is scary. It is dark and very deep in the ground and it looks like the subway cars should be in a museum. They are that old. Also, the tickets were confusing. You have to pay for transfers. Also, Budapest like all the cities we visited goes by this honor system. There is no turnstial barring entry, you just have to have a ticket in case of random checks. In Budapest, the subway workers stand at the top of the escalator in their scary uniforms leering down at you. Walking was better.

So basically in Budapest we walked around a lot. It was great, but at this point our feet really hurt and we had to bandage them for the rest of the trip. But we saw lots of great things--the Chain Bridge, Buda Castle, Parliament on the Pest side of the Danube. The view from Fisherman's Bastion was amazing. We also tried Hungarian food at a very local-feeling restaurant. We ate our fill of goulash and potatoes.

The weather was really cloudy the whole time we were in Budapest, but it was so beautiful at night. My photos doesn't really do it justice so here are some I found online:

Next, Laura and I took another night train to Prague. The Hungarian train wasn't quite as nice, but we were able to stretch out in our own compartments. These scary men in intense uniforms kept waking us up to check our passports as we passed from Hungary through Slovakia and into the Czech Republic.

We arrived in Prague pretty early in the morning, which was a beautiful time to see the city despite our fatigue. Our hotel in Prague was really nice too, which was great after the Budapest hostel.

Prague was really beautiful just like everybody says. We also lucked out with really good weather. Prague is strange though because it didn't seem as much like a city as the other places we visited, it seemed smaller and less urban. Also, it seemed like EVERYBODY was a tourist. I thought maybe visiting offseason would work to our advantage, but it was packed. Some of my favorite sites were the Old Town Square with the Town Hall Tower and Astronomical Clock. The medieval astronomical clock is really cool. I don't completely understand it, but one of the clock circles shows where the moon is and there is a third smaller circle with zodiac signs.

Other cool sites include the Tyn church, the castle with the St. Vitus Cathedrial and the Church of St. Nicholas, Charles Bridge (dating back to the 1400's!), and the Franz Kafka museum. Laura and I tried hot wine and grog (because they were on all the menus and we were curious) and also ate more goulash and dumplings. I've had my fill of dumplings for quite a while. We also tried garlic soup, which is quite strong. Luckily we had gum. The restaurant was really cool though, it was mostly lit by candle so you could see how dark it would have been!









On Saturday morning we took a bus to Berlin. I slept for a lot of it so the 5 hour trip didn't seem too bad. In Berlin, we stayed with my friend Maren. She was an exchange student at Clarkston High during my junior year and it was great to see her again and to see Berlin with a Berliner. Laura had friends in Berlin too--Americans studying for the year. It was nice to be in the company of friends and let them guide us a bit. It was the perfect and least stressful way to end the trip.

I had a great time staying with Maren and meeting her family and friends. Maren's home is really cool--it is a multi-level apartment that stretches over a street. Maren's family was really nice, they cooked me a delicious dinner and Maren gave me lots of German chocolate and gummy bears to try. It was really comforting to meet up with someone in Europe who knows where Clarkston is and who loves Michigan!

Berlin fascinated me. The history is so interesting and there is so much to see. I got to see a lot by car at night, which was really cool. Also, on Sunday Maren, Laura, Laura's frien Alec and I walked around the city and saw many things like Potzdamer Platz, the site of Hitler's bunker, the Holocaust memorial, the Brandeburg Gate, Gendarmenmarkt square and more. Alec is a history major so it was like we had our own private tour guide!









I also saw the East Side Gallery with the longest stretch of the remaining wall. On Monday, while everyone was in school Laura and I went to the Jewish Museum and the Checkpoint Charlie museum.









Laura and I saw a lot--it was exhausting but definitely worth it. It was a great trip, but now I am looking forward to getting back to a routine in France. I start teaching again tomorrow and begin taking French classes next week. I have a feeling November is going to fly by and it will be Christmastime before I know it. I am looking forward to that--it was weird to go on a big trip like this and take a plane home and return to France not Michigan! But I was really excited to return to France where I can communicate in the country's language!

I know I always say this, but sorry for the long post. This one wasn't for the faint of heart. I think it was more for me, so I can remember everything!