Excuse Me, Are You From Alabama?

So with our first weekend securely under my belt, lets talk a little about parisian nightlife. Considering I've only been out twice, I'm by no means an expert but here's my experience so far. Friday night, my roommate and I met up with another BU girl Emily and her Estonian roommate at a club called Six Seven, which was right off the Champs-Elysee. Now, the most important thing to understand about Paris at night is that, basically, europeans party way harder than americans. Period. Most clubs don't even open until 11 or 12, and like in the states, it's a huge faux pas to be caught at a club when it opens. The french are all about being fashionably late. And since the clubs don't open until the wee hours, it's completely normal to be out partying until sunrise. To drive this point home, we got chastised by a young frenchman for going home "so early". It was around 3 am.

Even more of an adventure than club Six Seven (some of you know what specifically I'm talking about!) was trying to get home afterward. Like Boston, only more reasonably, the metro stop running around 2 am on weekends but there is a special bus service called the Noctilien Bus which runs around the clock and is essentially a bus for drunk young people. It's also very confusing. Luckily for us, being young american girls dressed to the nines, we attracted the attention of a young parisian, whose opening line was: "excuse me, can I ask you a question? Are you from Alabama?" Since neither Camille nor I have a strong southern accent, I'm assuming Alabama was the only US state he knew...but again, luckily for us, he was extremely nice (and extremely attractive) and not only helped us find our stop, but walked us to our connecting bus.

This leads me to one of the biggest surprises I've encountered during my short time here. The parisians have this notorious reputation for being some of the most unwelcoming, elitist people in the world, and yet, I can only say nice things about them so far. Granted, I'm sure I have it easy for being a young american girl, who speaks french, but almost everyone I've interacted with has been very nice. Or at least no more rude than the natives of Los Angeles or Boston. As expected, as soon as they detect our american accents, most parisians will respond to us in english, but we've also found that persistence is key. If you keep going a francais, they eventually surrender.

One final note, yesterday we went to the Chateau de Versailles, the extravagant palatial complex built by King Louis XIV. I was lucky enough to have visited during my first trip to Paris, but this time we were able to take a tour of the expansive grounds in a disneyland-esque tram. We also got to take tours of the Grand and Petit Trianon, smaller chateaus built for the royal mistresses, as well as the private farm of Marie Antoinette. Unfortunately for us, the weather was absolutely miserable. It was raining and bone-chillingly cold. By the time we got back to the train to Paris, we were all borderline hypothermic.

This week is our first week of legit classes. My schedule is:
1. French, obviously.
2. Paris Aujourd'hui, an analysis of contemporary french theatre, cinema, and music.
3. Contemporary Art and Architecture in Paris.

I'm sure I'll have much more to report when I really get into the swing of things. Until then, beaucoup de bisous mes petits chous!

xoxoxo