It's been a while...

Since my last post, the following has happened:

• Dodgers start spring training
• We met our French neighbor, Sam
  
• 8.8 magnitude earthquake in Chile
• Bradley Smith posts Holocaust denial ad on BH website
• Four consecutive sunny days in Paris (sorry dad)
  
• Two French exams
• Alex Vojdany created a blog that already has more followers than mine
  

Yeah, like my title says, "It's been a while." The past 10 days or so have been awesome, hectic, and down right tiring. It's hard to say if I've been doing more during this period than any other during my stay here, but it sure has felt like a lot.

Believe it or not, today marks the two month (eight weeks) point in my study abroad. When I got here on January 8, I knew about nine words in French, didn't know a single conjugation, and I was unable to order a croissant in a bakery. Over the past two months, I've even impressed myself with the amount I've been able to absorb, and with almost three full months of French classes to go, I'm sure I'll come home being able to speak butchered French with anybody I choose.

OK, now to the play-by-play:

On Tuesday, Feb. 23 (yeah, THAT long ago), my parents arrived in Paris. It was great to finally see them after six weeks on my own in France. Then again, I feel like they used my study abroad trip as an excuse for them to come to Paris again. Don't feel bad — if I were in their situation, I would probably do the same.

I didn't do a lot of new things with them, other than go out to eat a lot. Since it's a pretty expensive thing to do if you're a student, my parents spoiled me for eight days, and I must say it's pretty damn amazing. We had some lovely meals, but none could match up to our lunch at Jules Verne, a 5-star restaurant at the top of the Eiffel Tower.

Now I say it's 5-star, but it really only has one Michelin star. Regardless, if you know what that means, it's a pretty big deal. The meal was truly exquisite. I started off with a raw marinated sea bass with caviar. For my main dish, I had another sea bass that was amazing; its sauce had a hint of coffee, and it was on a bed of leeks and shallots.

Seabass

Turbot

Dessert was my favorite. Not only was everything great, but there was so much I couldn't finish. I got some strawberry tart with a mango citrus sauce, my dad got a souffle, and my mom gave me and my dad her incredibly rich, chocolate tart/cake thing. But that's not all. They gave us marshmallows, chocolate truffles, cookies, macarons (not as good as La Durée), and more chocolate cakes in a minty syrup. Yum.

Yum

Our view from Jules Verne

I don't want to give you the impression that eating is all we did. Really, it was a great opportunity for my parents to see Paris during the day and see me in the afternoon and evening. Since I'm now a "full time" student, I sometimes have class all day. But as a result of taking a great art history class, I was able to show my parents some cool parts of the Louvre that most people would ignore otherwise.

During my parents' stay, Abroadco had a trip planned to Tours and the nearby Château de Chenonceau. My parents went to Champagne. Fair trade-off, I think.

Tours was just OK, aside from the great food prices compared to Paris. The chateau, on the other hand, was unlike anything I've ever seen. The pre-11th century castle was used by dozens of monarchs, and still has a feel from every era in between. I don't really know how to describe it without selling it short, but I took plenty of pictures. My favorite part was the kitchen, where our audio guide told us to "imagine it bustling with dozens of people." I didn't really have to imagine it, considering there were dozens of people actually down there. Here are some highlights:

Le Château de Chenonceau

The BIG Hall

La cuisine

Aside from that, not too much has been going on. Many of you probably know that the Badger Herald is keeping up an advertisement from a well-known Holocaust denier. It has given the paper a lot of (good, bad?) publicity, and I actually wrote a letter to the editor on the subject. I won't talk about it too much, simply because I haven't written about anything else for the past week, but here's the link to the story. Let me know what you think, I'd love to get your input.

That's pretty much it. French class is pretty fun and pretty easy for me. That's not to say there haven't been challenges, but I'm definitely doing better than most of the people in my class. That, and the fact that you only need a 50% on an exam to pass is making this pretty easy. I got a 17/20 on the last one, which at 85%, is an A? I think?

Jon and I go to London to visit Zac Miller on March 12, and then we have to figure out some other stuff to do during our free weekends before spring break. Tomorrow, we'll be going to either another chateau or something else cool. While Paris is a wonderful city, two months in one place is a pretty long time. I'm ready for a change, even if it's only for a day.