la vie parisienne

The first weekend of December we had a double holiday (!)- Constitution Day and the Feast of the Immaculate Conception- which meant we had a four day weekend! Maureen, Deirdre and I took advantage of the opportunity to have a lovely cousins weekend in Paris. (I know I am very late in posting about this- I've been very lazy lately- last post was actually written by Maureen after a few glasses of wine but I have finally expanded it and added a few more pics!)

We stayed in a lovely two-star hotel in Montmartre, right near the Moulin Rouge- which is, you may know, basically like the red light district. I had stayed in this area last time I was in Paris, and it is really cute, so I assured Mo and Dre that the hotel was in a really nice neighborhood- they were a little skeptical when we emerged from the metro in front of a giant sign that said Sexodrome. They came around though.

It was just our luck that all the museums in Paris decided to have a giant strike so none of them were open. This didn't bother Mo and I too much because we had already been, but we felt bad for Deirdre as it was her first time in Paris. (The Eiffel Tower was open but once we saw the line to get to the top, Mo and I assured Dre that it wasn't really all that great). It was kind of nice though in that we got to spend a lot more time walking around. It was colder than Madrid, but besides one day of rain we had good weather. Given her love of history, Mo was really excited to walk to the Bastille when she saw it on the map. Imagine her disappointment when we arrived and remembered that the Bastille had been destroyed way back in, like, the 18th century and all that remained was a memorial sculpture and a modern opera house. (Incidentally, if you ever wanted to know where punk ass Parisian teenagers gather to smoke pot and drink boxed wine it's under the electronics store next to what was once the Bastille). After that disappointment, we spent the afternoon wandering around the Marais, which is a very cute neighborhood.

In addition to strolling Paris's beautiful streets and taking in the sights, we ate lots of delicious food. On Friday night, Maureen took us to a fondue place she'd gone to before where they serve wine in baby bottles- tres chic. On Saturday and Sunday we met up with Van, Mo's friend from high school who is working as an au pair in a town an hour outside of Paris, and his sister, Brie, who was visiting him. Both of them are major foodies so they had looked up all of the best places to go. Two nights in a row we had very delicious and very French food at very cute and very French bistros- tres tres chic.

Though Paris is of course amazing, it was admittedly a bit of a relief to come back to Madrid, where we at least have a basic grasp of the language. In Paris, we tried our best to get around with "oui," "merci," and "trois" with little success- though luckily most Parisians were pretty nice about speaking English to us, despite their reputation (I think the key is to attempt to speak in French that is so hopelessly bad that it's kind of cute, or at least pitiful.) I was hoping that the few weeks of Rosetta Stone French I'd done a few summers ago might come in handy but sadly nothing about a young girl on a horse ever came up.

Unfortunately, my camera batteries were dying so I don't have a ton of pics, but here they are:

Paris, je t'aime

Takeoffs & Landings

Okay, so what did Mo and I do last Saturday? We flew planes!

Maria Carmen, the teacher from Maureen's school who is inexplicably nice to us, took us to La Mancha, where her brother flies small planes. We stopped first in Tembleque, a small little manchegan town, which was very cute.

Mo's teacher asked her to come watch her brother fly a plane (and after a subsequent translational blunder) we were flying planes in the sky!

After a brief explanation of the plane's machinations in Spanish, we were off!

Maureen took off into the sunny sky in a two enginer, whilst I took off in an engineless "glider." The only question they asked me was my name and my weight and that was the extent of my training. Fortunately, there was a parachute in the case of catastrophe. Unfortunately, I didn't actually ask how to use it, thus making it only extra weight that would propel me to the ground even faster. Luckily, I didn't need it. The small planes are actually incredibly safe, much safer than a commercial flight, and Maria Carmen's brother's job is to do safety inspections on airplanes at the Barcelona airport, so we were in good hands.

The plane that I flew had to be towed into the air by a plane with an engine, which then cut loose from us once we were at a safe height. Though I was in the front and theoretically in control of the plane, I'm pretty sure the instructor in the back had some kind of master control panel in case anything happened. Controlling the plane simple consisted of manuevering a clutch and pushing two pedals up and down. Once I got the handle of turning left and right, we did a few tricks, including letting the plane hang still in the air until it quivers and drops, which is pretty cool. (Again, I'm pretty sure the pilot guy was actually in control this whole time). Landing was a bit of a harrowing experience as the engineless plane cannot land on the paved landing strip so you have to cruise as low above the ground as possible without actually touching it before scraping down on the rough earth.

Maureen went up with Maria Carmen's brother in a plane that did have an engine, so she got to go much higher and farther. Both of us got an amazing view of the manchegan countryside, which, though very flat and relatively barren, is also quite beautiful with its olive trees and rich green and brown coloring. Though by the end of the day we still found ourselves wondering how we'd ended up on an airstrip in the middle of Spain, it was definitely a pretty unforgettable experience!

En un lugar de La Mancha...