I have a knack for Faces

Okay guys so the past two days have been really great and I have to tell you about them so you can be proud of all that I have accomplished.

So I finally got off my lazy butt and started site seeing (mostly because my Vampire Diaries episodes wouldn’t load so I had to do something else to occupy my time)
Why yesterday was a good day: I went to the Concierge and saw Marie Antoinette’s last prison cell before she went to the guillotine. I recently wrote a paper about her and have a new perspective on her so it was really interesting to see her cell. I also happened to spot a girl that looked JUST like the princess in a famous Velazquez painting Las Meninas. The best part was that my Art History professor was with me. When she saw the girl and my comment, she was blown away with how correct I was. It was truly incredible!Then I had a great work out in which I jumped around my room like a crazy person to Girl Talk songs….listen to That’s my DJ—its truly addicting, I have new appreciation for Girl Talk, how he mixes songs is pure harmony!

I showered and went with Katie and Liz to the Arc de Triomphe. Something I regretted not doing last time I came to Paris was climb the Arc, so I did this time! Great view. I love the historical context of the structure; awesome cannot even begin to describe it. But I also died like seven times climbing up spiral stairs…had the worst vertigo when I finally came back down to the ground. I then went with my climbing buddies to Longchamp and emotionally cheered on Liz in her purchase of a bag for her and her sister.

Today was an even better day! I went to the Musée d'Orsay and saw famously beautiful impressionist pieces. But something amazing happened. So standing outside the Orsay, I told the girls in my group that I had this feeling…a feeling that I was going to see a beautiful man (whom I jokingly said would be my husband). Sarah asked me when I would know if I saw him. And out of nowhere I said “We’ll all know because we will unanimously inhale breath in the shock.” Everyone laughed and we began a mini game of searching for my Mr. Hottie. Well as class was being dismissed we were huddled around Madeline (my Art history Professor) and

over her shoulder I saw this beautiful man looking at a painting. I only saw his side profile, but I was intrigued…what this my famous man. Then he turned and looked at me….And my breath was pulled out of my mouth. He was someone famous. I couldn’t peg who he was, but all at once a scene from A Knights Tale flashed before my eyes. I am not kidding, but the guy looked at me and realized that I knew he was someone famous. He quickly turned away. I immediately turned to the group because they knew that my attention was distracted and was like “Guys…that dude over there is famous, he’s from A Knights Tale.” No one believed me at first, but then when they looked over the shoulder and saw him, and remembered the character I said he played, everyone unanimously agreed it was him. I followed him into two different collections (Degas and Monet) and pretended to be interested in the layout of the building when really I was trying to wrack my brain and figure out what other movies he was in and what was his name. I was star struck. My palms sweaty. My heart racing. People who know me know that I LOVE MOVIE and LIVE FOR CELEBRATIES. It was such an exhilarating moment. The guy was Rufus Sewell. If I knew his name I would have totally asked for his autograph. He is here in Paris because he is filming The Tourist with Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp…sadly neither of them attended the Orsay with Rufus. But still, I was totally content.

Being on such a high from seeing Rufus, I went with some of the pople in my group to Ladurée—The famous boulangerie of Paris. I felt like I was in a scene from the Great Gastby, but instead of being having tea time at New York’s Palace, I was having iced coffee and macaroons in Paris. Lovely, lovely day.
And then to top it all off….I went an got my cartilage pierced in the late afternoon.

The end! Haha (Mom, please don’t kill me)

See I finally got the hang of the Paris things—climbing monuments, eating amazing desserts, seeing famous people, and getting body parts pierced. All in two days!

Yeah...I may have a problem

Okay okay so I know I haven’t been as good about writing on the blog, but I’m in a dilemma…I don’t have as much time to write, but I don’t think I’ve been doing much that will justify me not writing… translation, I’ve become lazy…sorry!

So lets do a quick update of what’s gone on

1. School
2. Homework
3. School
4. Homework
5. Weekend trip to Alsace
6. Stress eating Gingerbread cookies
7. School
8. Obsession with Vampire Diaries (The book and the TV show)
9. Stress eating chocolate
10. Running to work off my stress eating
11. SLEEP!

Yeah so that’s how I break it down.

School is good, though time consuming, I’ve had a lot of life altering perspectives. Cliché I know, but when I come home, you’ll understand. I don’t even recognize myself.

We went to Alsace this weekend, which doesn’t really hold much significance besides the fact that I went to a Champagne cave and bought celebratory champagne for when I graduate College. And let me tell you that day couldn’t come any sooner! But I’ll elaborate on that when I see your lovely faces on my return

Thing that is most worth mentioning right now (which also is quite humiliating)…yes ladies, I have found a new obsession. And it is called Vampire Diaries. Remember how I was with Twilight…yeah well this is worse! I picked up the book on random in Denmark and can’t seem to put it down. Worse is that the TV show encourages me to revert back to my teenage crazy days and obsess over super hot hunky actors.

I am a magazine and a pair of scissors away from being that psycho that cuts out pictures from “Teen Beat” and pasting them on my wall. Yeah, I’m in Paris right now and I’ve essentially lost my shit. How the hell did this happen. I really and truly don’t know. Maybe it has something to do with me living on my own…no judgmental roommate to snatch the book out of my hands. This is just so sad! The only reason I have managed to write my blog is because I am currently waiting for an episode to load… I told you guys, it really is bad.

When I come home, someone please slap me. And then promptly check me into an insane asylum.

Paris is good, I go jogging in the morning so I get to see a little bit more of the city. I have enjoyed seeing more sites and realize that I haven’t been that bad of a recluse. I did venture to shop a bit but then saw the potential of becoming very broke very fast so I quickly hoped on a metro home to avoid further damage to my wallet. I have made it a sincere goal to avoid shopping as much as possible.

Um…well I’m drawing a blank as to what else I should tell you about my life in Paris. I am going to Amsterdam this weekend so will probably have a lot more to talk about after the weekend, but right now I am going into panic mode because my Vampire Diaries episode isn’t loading. Borderline hyperventilating…haha no I’m kidding, really I am fine….sort of…god damn it why won’t it just load already!

Okay I am going to step away from the computer now

Ladini

And then i saw a Gap in Paris

Okay guys, its official…I am homesick!

Lets start from the beginning. Berlin was amazing. I am sure I have overused that word, but seriously like this was the favorite city by far. We came in Friday and each day we did a walking tour of the city. Me being the massive history buff loved the tour we took on the Third Reich. I just about died when I got to see Hitler’s bunker even though it just a parking lot now. Saturday we just did a standard tour of the city talking about Prussia and the empires in Potsdam. Sunday we went up north to Sachsenhausen, a Nazi labor camp created to be the model concentration camp. I am not going try to pretend like I could understand what happened there, but having been there I feel like I at least attempted to scratch the surface. Great experience, cheap place to visit, wealth of history, you gotta go there.

Then things took a slightly negative turn. One of the exciting features of my trip was that we were going to take a sleeper train from Berlin to Paris Sunday night. I love trains and was so pumped to get to sleep in one! Well we get to the train station half an hour early and are lazily sitting in burger king, when we find out that our train was canceled. Apparently Europe is capable of having hurricanes and the weather was too bad to allow trains to travel at night. Awesome…. thanks for that warning people! Well what we were told to do was take a train that night from Berlin to Frankfurt and wait until morning to take a second train from Frankfurt to Paris. We had no other choice so we took the train from 8:30 pm in Berlin and arrived about 1:30 am in Frankfurt. Our train to Paris left at 6:00 am. Unlike an airport where it is nice and warm and totally okay to sleep with your luggage in the terminal, a train station is different. The train tracks are outside, and there isn’t much of an “inside” area for you to safely hang out. The only place that was covered was the subway station underground but nothing could make me logically sleep there at 2 in the morning seeing as how subway stations are hella dirty and hella sketchy. We were just asking to get mugged. We start to freak about a bit (We as in Me, Katie, Liz, and Nathan) but we find a McDonalds. We ordered only what they would offer us…four-hour-old cheeseburgers and sprite. They ran out of water…yes let me repeat myself THEY RAN OUT OF WATER. How the hell does that happen? I have no idea. McDonalds closes at 2 am, so we don’t have a place to stay. I never have ever felt more like a homeless person in my life. We sit down on the side of the train station and begin to mentally prepare ourselves to sit on the street and wait out for the next 4 or 5 hours. Luckily, Nathan is wandering around and finds a train “lounge” for us to hang out it. It is a large tiled room with a bunch of hospital-like couches (you know, like a giant waiting room). Most of the couches were taken so we camped out on the floor. You have no idea what it felt like, it was heaven compared to the idea of sleeping on the train platforms. So many other people were in the same dilemma as us so it was nice to feel united in a sense. But because everyone was cuddling their luggage and looked a little beaten by their travels…Katie said it felt like we were Katrina victims. I don’t mean to joke…but it really did feel like that. All of us packed in like sardines being handed water to drink and yeah. I slept on the floor next to a young German solider who looked like he couldn’t have been older than 16. It made me kind of sad to see him in uniform at such a young age. Literally, there were a few guys and all of them looked incredibly young. Some even had braces! Well we managed to sleep a little. I broke my hip basically by sleeping on the tiled floor. But I knew it was better than the street outside so I didn’t complain. Somehow, within my sleep I ended up getting nose to nose with the solider, I guess I migrate towards warm bodies. Haha, luckily he was passed out and when I woke up I moved away fast.

We finally got onto our train at 6 am only to find out we were not given an assigned seat and the train was booked. We sat down at what we thought were empty seats but at every stop between Frankfurt and Paris, more people boarded and used our seats. So we would stand, walk around a bit and sit in another spot, only to have to move again an hour later when someone boarded the train and had that spot reserved for them. It was like musical chairs but not fun. Obviously, with this constant shifting of seats, we didn’t sleep much

We arrived in Paris around 10 am and went straight to our school to get our living stuff. I love my dorm. I have it completely to myself, with a bathroom and little kitchenette. This is where the homesickness comes in. This is the first time I am truly living on my own. I have gone to the grocery store four times so far and don’t know how to feed myself! Going from home, to the dorms, to alpha chi for two years…. I’ve never had to cook for myself, or truly live in on my own. It’s really weird! All I do is sit alone in my room and facebook creep and see that everyone is having a great time in Lawrence. Yes I realize that Paris is amazing, and I am having a unique experience, but I just miss seeing you guys. When you comment on my facebook or send me an e-mail it makes my life. So yeah please, let me know how you are doing. You don’t understand how much I miss you all very very much. It has led me to stress eat…and I’ve gained a bit of weight! Haha

The homesickness really hit in when, get this, I saw GAP in Paris. They are all over the place. I wanted to run inside and scream, “I love denim!” Then Monday night I got to go to dinner with Katie and meet her parents who flew in for the week. They hugged me upon meeting me…do you know that that is like my first hug since January when I hugged my mother goodbye. Do you know how much I miss hugs? Please hug me when you see me.

Anyway, that’s all I have for now. I’m sure I’ll be okay

Love you all!

Ladini