Mais Oui! May 31, 2009
Posted by adelle387 in France, escapades, travel.add a comment
Last Thursday I flew to Paris for a petite vacation; the plan was to spend the weekend in Paris and the week in Aix-en-Provence, relaxing and boning up on my spoken French. Here are some of the highlights of my trip:
Thursday/Friday
1. On the plane I sat between a cute but slightly bewildered older American lady, and a cute but slightly bewildered older French man. I knew he was French before he opened his mouth because he had his sweater draped over his back, the sleeves tied at his chest. A number of people wore their sweaters this way, all of whom turned out to be French.
2. The French man and I chatted quite a bit en français during the trip, and I even told him about my wheat allergy. I had forgotten to look up the words for flour and wheat before I left, so when he asked if I was going to eat the piece of bread and crackers that I had left on my tray I explained that “no, I have an allergy to… things like this.” After listing a few other things I couldn’t eat he understood what I was trying to say: la farine. We talked a bit about how much it sucked to not be able to eat so many tasty things that contained la farine, and I explained that even beer was off limits because of it. He was very surprised. La farine? Non! So I was like, mais oui! beer comes from la farine. The man was genuinely surprised and I wasn’t sure if he belived me. I realized a few hours later that I told him beer came from FLOUR (la farine), and not WHEAT (le blé). So he was correct; beer doesn’t come from flour.
3. I managed to sleep on and off during the flight from Minneapolis to Paris which was great, because I went straight from the airport to the hostel to drop off my bags – and then straight to the Facebook office in Paris because I had to kick of my vacation with… work. It was nice to meet the Facebook Paris crowd (shout-out to Xavier L.) and see another Facebook office. They too are well stocked with Red Bull, which I dearly appreciated.
4. Back in the hostel there were two other girls in my room – Heather and Julie – and we decided to go out and about in Paris together. One of Julie’s friends told her that students could get into the Louvre for free after a certain time on Friday evenings (or something like that)… and it worked! We didn’t even have to be students, just 25 or under. As it turns out, discounts for les jeunes is very widespread, and I was able to get one almost everywhere. It kind of made me sad that I have less than a year left of being 25.
5. As we were staying in the Marais, we set out to get the best falafel ever at L’As du Falafel. Some friends introduced me to this place when we were studying in Paris in college, and Heather’s guidebook said that Lenny Kravitz was a huge fan. Fortunately, Heather’s guidebook also had a detailed enough map of the area that we were able to find it pretty easily. Unfortunately, it was closed; but there were at least 4 other falafel stands around so we just had some that wasn’t the best ever.
Saturday
6. The three of us set out for brunch together and found a brasserie near our hostel with free Wi-Fi. When ordering I put my newfound (newly remembered) vocab to the test, asking of the sauce for the plat du jour had de la farine or du blé. The person who took our order (and who was filling in for our waiter until he showed up) assured me that it didn’t. Unfortunately, when my waiter brought out my meal it came in a big bowl of pasta! I explained my allergy to him and asked if they could switch out the pasta with some rice. He said they didn’t have rice but that he could give me fries, so I accepted the fries. When he brought the plate back out it had rice.
7. No, Paris is not a great place to have a wheat allergy. And I couldn’t be in Paris and not consume a crepe or a croissant, so I tried to choose my poison carefully. I ignored the bread that came with meals, made sure I wasn’t ordering dishes with wheat, etc, and then “splurged” on a crepe. At least in the beginning. Towards the end of the trip I was running out of money so I kind of started eating anything… but more on that later (stay tuned for Sunday-Friday).
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Seoul: the Play by Play September 17, 2007
Posted by adelle387 in epics, fashion, travel.1 comment so far
Day 1: (September 10) The Arrival
I arrived at my hostel in Hyehwa around mid-afternoon… and no one was there. I thought this was fair because I told the hostel owner I wouldn’t arrive until 5, so I just waited outside. And waited. Luckily for me two young people walked up and opened the door for me. Apparently it wasn’t locked – it never was – but it was a push door and I tried pulling it. Even after 5pm the hostel owner hadn’t shown up, but I was fine hanging out inside, intermittently chatting with the young people and looking around small interior. The two people I met were Chinese-Italians, and it was quite pleasant listening to them speak in Italian while throwing in some Chinese here and there; but of course, they spoke English with me. I didn’t have any plans so they invited me to go out with them for the evening. We met up with a new friend of theirs – a Korean whom they had met in China earlier in the summer. We somewhere and had a moderately spicy but incredibly tasty dinner. I thought it wasbibimbap but that’s actually a rice dish. What we had came in two separate hot skillets on the table, and it was kind of a stew made mostly of vegetables but a little meat as well.
After dinner we hit up the Dongdaemun area to see the famous night-markets. It was Monday so one of them was closed, but there was still a lot to see. Even before we entered the official ‘night market’ we passed hordes of street vendors who set up shop after dark. Once inside the night market I was floored – by the absolute ugliness of everything I saw. Really! You’ve heard of the ‘ugly store’ right? Many of us know people who occasionally shop there. Well, this is the place where the ugly store buys wholesale. Walking through was like looking at a fashion train wreck – I was horrified! But I couldn’t stop staring. The prints were hideous, the embellishments garish and elementary, and there was no shape to anything! Another interesting thing – all the merchants seemed to be sleeping in the backs of their stalls; I wondered if they had day jobs as well.
Day 2: Getting to Know Hyehwa
I’m not an aggressive tourist. I don’t like to plan out massive iteniraries and I don’t obsess over seeing every minor – or major – cultural landmark. On this day, however, I felt like I should probably make an effort to do something cultural because I knew I wouldn’t have a lot of time in Seoul. I wanted to visit a castle, a park with traditional Korean houses and the Seoul Fashion Center. It proved too much for me to handle, as I spent a good deal of the morning wandering around Hyehwa trying to figure out if the Fashion Center was within walking distance, and then wondering which place I should go to first. I finally gave up and decided to just check out the area I was in. It turned out to be quite a cool area!
In a last-ditch effort to get directions to the fashion center I entered a jewelry design center/art school building, and discovered an exhibit of a Japanese poster artist. I got the directions and stayed to check out the exhibit. After exiting I looked down the street and felt pulled to explore it. There were so many interesting looking shops and side streets to be looked at! I dimissed my earlier plans and set off on a self-guided walking tour of Hyehwa. I saw lots of interesting shops, great looking restaurants and lots of small and medium sized theaters. I also saw a Krispy Kreme – with no line whatsoever! I felt compelled to walk in, and at that point I wrote the following:
I’m writing at Krispy Kreme because I needed a place to sit down and write. Also, because I can. No line! I’m so thirsty! Vending machines aren’t everywhere here like they are in Tokyo. For some reason they gave me a free donut. That’s awesome cuz I could eat the free one now and save the next for tomorrow morning. Anyhoo.
Korea. 3.5/5 cars are Hyundai – I haven’t seen any European, American, or Japanese cars. I’m staying in a really interesting artsy area. I went to one shop, Rainbow Hall 3, that had some amazing dresses and some interesting jackets. It looked like a sample sale space and I didn’t see a conventional fitting room. There wasn’t a fitting room! And I couldn’t try on the dresses, only the jackets. After a few wistful glances I left. I didn’t want to try on the jackets if I couldn’t try on a dress – they would only be a consolation prize and that’s not the kind of tone I like to set for shopping.
At another store – Martha’s Grotto – I bought a blue and silver glitter striped cardigan. The shop owner discounted it by 10,000 krw (about $10) plus she gave me a free pair of really cool earrings. A gift! I should mention that she made up the price of the sweater, I mean, it wasn’t printed on the price tag. None of the prices were. We spoke a little Japanese together. She’s been to Tokyo and likes Shinjuku, Shibuya, Harajuku, Jiyugaoka and Shimokitazawa. She also offered me a cookie that her parents brought back from Africa the day before. She put a sticker to close my bag like in Japan, and even walked me to the door and bowed a few times as I left.
Man I’m thirsty. Forgot why I felt compelled to sit and write. On my way!
I made three more notes:
metal chopsticks – restaurants in Korea supply you with reusable metal chopsticks, unlike the disposable wooden chopsticks you often get in Japan. The wooden ones are much easier to use though, especially when eating noodles.
BK uses real cups! – both Burger King and McDonalds in Korea use real, reusable cups with disposable plastic tops.
can’t buy shoes here either – enough said.
Later on that night my two new friends (the Chinese-Italians) and I met up with a college friend of mine who had recently decided to remain in Seoul for a while. I didn’t want to stay out late because I had to wake up early for my tour of the DMZ… and when I got back to the hostel there was quite a gathering in my room. They were nice people so I didn’t mind; they invited me out with them and I declined. I didn’t want a battle with my alarm in the morning!
