La Guerra y Paris

I left off with the Spain/England soccer game, so I will start there now. Everything you have ever heard about the madness of European soccer is completely true. If what I witnessed on Wednesday was just because of an international friendly that didn´t count for anything then I´m not sure what else to expect for a FIFA Qualifier or something really important. A guy in the street referred to it as "La Guerra" (hence the title of this post). Translation: The War.

The city was buzzing all day because of the game. After our morning classes finished up April, Amanda, and I went to run a couple of errands through El Centro. We passed a park on our walk that was having a huge Spain pep rally, so we paused to check it out. There were booths everywhere selling Spanish national team jerseys and merchandise, bars, and small fields set up for juggling and soccer tennis. We hung out there for awhile and then kept walking. Further into El Centro we started running into huge crowds of English fans. The biggest gathering of them was at P. Flaherty's, an Irish pub that we go to a lot. At the time that we walked by they seemed pretty tame, but according to our friend Keith who was in El Centro later on in the afternoon things got a little out of hand - apparently the riot police came to Flaherty's and started beating the English fans with those little black bats because they were all drunk and had started throwing oranges at every taxi that drove by the pub. I guess we could say the afternoon was a good prequel for what was to come.

Everyone going to the game finished class by 7:45, so we all just left straight from school. Our senoras packed us bocadillos (sandwiches) to bring with us, so we headed straight for the stadium to botellon (the Spanish equivalent of tailgating - it's a pretty recent phenomenon apparently; basically all the younger kids buy alcohol and drink in the street in huge groups). It was absolute madness outside the stadium, thousands upon thousands of people all in red and gold singing, dancing, and drinking. We hung out for a bit to talk to some of the Spanish fans, went to the stadium store to buy some Spanish soccer gear, and then went inside. We had pretty good seats, especially considering we only paid 10 euro. The Spanish fans were pretty awesome - they didn't go five minutes without singing or starting a new cheer or doing the wave. I was impressed with the English fans too, although they were on the complete opposite side of the stadium from us so we couldn't hear what they were saying. I was pretty curious because some of the things coming out of the Spaniards mouth were pretty foul (especially when David Beckham was on the field), and apparently the English fans can be even more brutal. It was a pretty exciting game but in the end Spain dominated and won 2-0. It was a pretty awesome experience, I hope I can get to another game before I leave. We game ended around midnight, and I went straight home because I was leaving the next morning.

That brings me to one of the biggest things I've done since being in Europe - my trip to Paris. I had such an awesome weekend, the city was great. My flight left the Sevilla airport at 9:55 on Thursday morning. I left my apartment around 7:30 that morning hoping to catch the 7:45 bus to the airport, just to make sure I had plenty of time. I didn't factor in how much my luggage was going to slow my walking down (I packed way too much and paid for it in sore arms the next day), so instead I caught the 8:15 bus. I got to the airport and on my flight with no problems. I didn't really consider the fact that I don't speak a word of French until I had already landed in Paris and was trying to get a cab to my hotel; luckily my driver was really nice and spoke decent English. I got to my hotel around 1:15 and met up with Jocelyn (one of my UNC roommates studying in Paris) around 2:45. It was so good to see her; at school we are more or less attached at the hip but we haven't been able to talk much since being in Europe. We spent basically all of Thursday just catching up - we got lunch at a Brosserie (I might have spelled that wrong), walked around the city some, and then went back to her apartment to cook dinner with her roommate and our friend Misha from UNC who is also studying in Paris. We hung out with them for most of the night, went to get coffee, and called it an early night because she had exams the next day and I was exhausted.

On Friday Elizabeth and Amelia came from Sevilla, so I had to switch to their hotel. After checking in Joce and I did a little sightseeing. Les Invalides, Musee Rodin, and the Eiffel Tower were the highlights of the afternoon; unfortunately the weather was cold, wet, and foggy so my pictures didn't turn out that great. Later on we met up with Elizabeth, Amelia, Kara, and Sarah (friends of Elizabeth who are studying in the UNC program in Florence who came to Paris for the weekend) for some shopping. After shopping we all went back to the hotel to get ready for dinner; the other girls went off again and I met up with Joce and Misha to go to dinner for one of their friend's birthday. We actually ended up at a South American restaurant with a waitress who spoke either French or Spanish, so I had no trouble ordering. After that we went to a bar called Footsie in the 9th arrondisment. It was a Dow Jones bar, which means the prices of drinks went up and down throughout the course of the night depending on demand. It was a pretty cool concept, but we didn't end up staying long because it was a really nice place and therefore insanely expensive (although everything in Paris is, I don't know how anyone can afford to study there). After Footsie we went out in an area of the city called the Latin Quarter, which is known for being very young and ecclectic. It was a really good time; we went to a couple of bars, bought crepes from a street vendor (incredible), went to one of Jocelyn's friend's apartment, and then called it a night.

Saturday the weather improved significantly - it wasn't quite so cold and it was sunny. Joce and I started the day by going to the Arc de Triomphe and then we walked up and down the Champs-Elysees. We met up with the other girls for lunch on the Champs and then went up to Sacre Coeur. Before I went to Paris I asked Chris what he did when he was there during his semester in Ireland and he mentioned that he went to some cool place with a bunch of steps that overlooked the city, but couldn't remember the name. I'm pretty sure Sacre Coeur was the place. It was an awesome sight - the church is in the northern part of the city and sits on top of a hill. Just like Chris said, you can sit on the steps leading up to the church and look down on pretty much all of Paris. We toured the inside of the church, which was beautiful, and hung out on the steps for a bit. After Sacre Coeur we figured it was Valentine's Day, so we treated ourselves at some fancy chocolate shop. I really have no idea what I ordered, I couldn't pronounce any names so I just pointed to something that looked good; it was some kind of chocolate cookie/cake thing and it was amazing. After the chocolate shop we went to Moulin Rouge. Then we split up again and Joce and I went to the Louvre. Unfortunately we were 15 minutes late too late to buy tickets to go into the museum, so we just wandered around the atrium in the glass pyramid and then walked around the plaza outside. We then started walking in the direction of the Seine river just in time to see the sunset over the river with the Eiffel Tower in the background; it was absolutely beautiful. After standing by the river for awhile we went to one of the major Parisian department stores for more shopping and then went back to Joce's apartment to cook dinner because it was so much cheaper than going to a restaurant. Later that night we went out with all of the other UNC girls, Misha, and some of the kids from Joce's program.

The next day Elizabeth, Jocelyn, and I went to 10:00 mass at Notre Dame. We got there around 9:30. The cathedral, like pretty much everything in Paris, was gorgeous, easily the most beautiful church I have ever seen. It was very odd though because even though there was a mass going on at 9:30, the church was still very much open to tourists; people everywhere were taking pictures, there were audio tours going on, and there was even a souvenir stand open. It seemed pretty disrespectful and inappropriate for all of that to be going on during the mass. However, for whatever reason you didn't really notice the commotion going on on the outskirts of the church's interior when you sat down in the pew; it all seemed to just disappear. The mass was one of the most special that I've ever been to because, besides the fact that it was in Notre Dame, all of the singing was done by the monks in Gregorian chant. It was incredible, and it didn't even matter that I didn't understand a word of anything (it was all either French or Latin). All in all the mass at Notre Dame blew the mass at the Sevilla Cathedral out of the water - when Elizabeth and I went to mass in Sevilla it was very dull, didn't not have music, and was over in about 30 minutes; not exactly the special experience we were looking for. We are thinking about trying to attend mass whenever we travel because most places we are going have very famous churches; for example, we want to go to St. Patrick's when we are in Dublin next month.

After mass Elizabeth left to go see her friend who came up from Montpellier for the weekend (if you haven't already guessed, studying abroad second semester sophomore year is big at UNC and pretty much everyone has friends spread all over Europe). Joce and I got a traditional French breakfast at a cafe along the river and then went back to the Louvre, this time to actually go inside the museum. I actually really enjoyed it, much more than I thought I would. We spent about two hours just walking around. The museum was insanely big and pretty crowded. I actually enjoyed the museum itself, which was the palace for the King of France before Versailles, more than the artwork; the building was one of the most elaborate I've ever seen. Going through the museum was fun with Joce because we took an art history class together during our first semester at Carolina and absolutely hated it because our professor drove us crazy, but it was pretty cool being able to identify a lot of the works, even if we did so grudgingly. After the Louvre we slowly headed back in the direction of my hotel. I bought one last baguette and a couple of chocolate croissants for people back in Sevilla (another incredible asset of French food) and then Elizabeth and I took a cab to the airport around 3:15. Minus the fact that I think I spent more money in 4 days in Paris than I had in 1.5 months in Sevilla (you couldn't even find a coffee for under 4 euro), the weekend was pretty much flawless. Paris is an amazing city and Jocelyn couldn't have shown me a better time; I really hope I get the chance to go back someday.

Unfortunately I had a pile of work waiting for me when I got home. I should probably get back to that now. Will update again as soon as I have something to write about besides my essay on Spanish poetry. Miss you all! <3