Last Week in France!

Well...I'm sitting in my hotel room at the Paris airport about to spend my last night in France. I can't believe my month long journey in Europe is over. This past week we had to do all of our assignments for class which sucked but still so much better than a normal class. Our main project was to create a campaign and my group won the competition. The teachers also informed all of us at the closing dinner that we all received an A in both classes! The closing dinner was Thursday night and it was great. We followed dinner with a pregame and out in Juan Les Pins with our whole group, even the teachers! We went to the most popular discoteque and got in for free again! It was a lot of fun but sad that it was our last night. Gabby was the first to go at 6am Friday so I had to say bye to her on Thursday night. Maggie and Bridget were next at 9:30 Friday, but we all had a goodbye breakfast. Friday was pretty lonely at the residence and everyone was just ready to get back to America or on to their other Europe travels. It was sad to see everyone go because when you're in a situation like this, these people become your family. This morning we woke up early and me, Jenny, and Karly took the train up to Paris. We had a great dinner at our airport hotel and are now getting ready to go to bed. We have an early morning wake up call to get to the airport and on our way to America! I really enjoyed my time over here but with that being said, I've never appretiated America so much! It feels so right to be coming home just in time for the 4th of July. This is my last blog post, so goodbye France and hellooooo America!

Cannes!

      So my 3rd week abroad and 2nd week at the program has come to an end. Last Sunday through yesterday (Saturday) was the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity which is all about advertising and marketing. I got to see some really cool people like Nick Jonas, Martha Stewart, Robert Redford, Pharrell Williams and will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas. The festival had lots of free stuff everyday like ice cream, coke zeros, smoothies, vitamin water, and red bull. On Monday after the seminars, we went to google happy hour on the beach and got free drinks with important people. I also got a free t-shirt which I designed and was instantly printed. Tuesday night was the "young lions party" which is for all the younger people at the festival. We got 3 drink tokens for that and then could buy more if we wanted. But being American girls, after we ran out of our tokens, we would just go around to different bartenders and order. But when they asked for our token we would start looking all through our purses and saying things like, "Oh my gosh I know I had one." This worked like a charm and needless to say we got more than 3 free drinks. Then we checked out the famous Gutter bar which is a huge gathering in the street of people from the festival. I met some business men from London and I told them that I'm Kate Middleton. I don't think they were very amused. oh well. Wednesday night we were all on the list for the Microsoft beach party which was SO MUCH FUN! An open bar all night, dancing, and snacks. What more could you need? Yesterday a few of us were so tired of ham and cheese paninis and sandwhichs that we were on the hunt for American food. Me, Jenny, Gabby, and Karly ended up walking for miles before we found the McDonalds. It's ok though, because it was so worth it. The fries aren't as good and you don't get free refills but it was still so good. Also, there were more French people eating there than we do in America. I've figured out that the reason they are not obese is because everyone smokes cigarettes. So I've discovered 2 big things, 1. French people love American fast food  and 2. They love American music. I find it somewhat ironic that they are rude to us and hate Americans when they love everything that we have produced. Anyways, today I went to the beach and now I have to do lots of school work! Here is a picture from our first day at the festival.

First week in Juan Les Pins

It's been about a week now since we first arrived in JLP for the program. There are 22 girls and 1 boy but everyone gets along so well! Our first day we decided to take the train to the next town over (Antibes) to do a walking tour. Antibes was really cool but some of the group thought it would be a good idea to walk back to JLP saying it would only take 20 minutes. Well, 3 hours later we realized its a good bit longer walking on the coastal route. Lesson learned- never let a man lead. Sorry Tommy. Ha that was the highlight of the first day but Monday was so fun. We had orientation instead of class so that was a joke and then we went to Cannes for the afternoon. It was really cool and it's where we will be spending everyday next week. The beach is really nice but the topless women take away from the beautiful views. Monday night we got our whole group to go out because it was Rachel's birthday. Anywhere from 10-14 euros for one drink is pretty absurd but whatever, we're in France. We found "our bar" and now we go there everytime we go out. Luckily there is a late night food place called Master Burger conveniently located right across the street. Just let me tell you what they think of Americans....They have a menu item called "the American" and it is like sub sandwhich bread with 3 hamburger patties across it, THEN topped with fries and ketchup and mayonaisse. So of course we had to try it late night! Anyways, this week we have also gone to Nice and Monaco. Nice was alright, just kind of a big industrial city, but Monaco was awesome! It is so ritzy and glamorous. I also went scuba diving in the Mediterranean this week which was really scary at first but I got the hang of it. The water was frezzing but I saw some colorful fish and an octopus! We also went to the discoteque opening night which is a 16 euro cover charge. But telling the door guys that we knew someone and "Americans make the party better" got us in for free. Some of the group tried to go last night but poor Tommy couldn't get in for free. The discoteque was really fun though except that European men are gross and they stink. All the guys here really want to take a picture with us so Tommy always has to get out of the picture. Today we are going over to Cannes to get our badges for the festival which starts tomorrow! Today is our last free day so we'll probably go to the beach. This week has been so awesome because it's like our teachers don't want to have class either. Our "class" starts at 11am so we get to sleep in every day and it only lasts 2 hours tops. And we can just stare out the window at the yachts in the Mediterranean! But starting tomorrow we will be super busy with the festival and our assignments! Here is a picture from Monaco!

Portofino and Cinque Terre

We arrived in Portofino Thursday evening after a very long train ride! Our hotel was beautiful with an amazing view of the Mediterranean! We walked to dinner in the tiny town and ate at a place right on the harbour. This was the best meal of the entire trip so far. I had fresh pasta with a mix of sauces that tasted delicious! The next day we walked around Portofino and hiked up to the castle there for an amazing view. We could see the whole town and it was beautiful. After that, we went to check out of the hotel and headed to the train station where we caught a 45 minute train ride to Monterroso which is the 1st town in The Cinque Terre. We checked in to our amazing bed and breakfast then headed out for the hike because we didn't know how the weather would be the next day. Unfortunately a big part of the hike was closed but we did the longest and most strenuous leg of it from Monterroso to the next town Vernazza. It was about 2 miles and took almost 2 hours. It was intense with hundreds of stairs to climb and edges of the cliff that were only wide enough to walk single file. The views were amazing though, and well worth the exercise. As soon as we got to Vernazza we got some gelato and sat on the rocks next to the water. The views of the town and the water were amazing, minus the topless women walking around. We took the train back to Monterroso and went to our room where we met up with Lanier and her friends from her study abroad! The bed and breakfast was small so it was like we were all living in a house together with just people that we knew! We got ready for dinner, drank some wine on our roof top terrace and headed to dinner for another great Italian meal! After dinner we found a great bar that was playing American music. We met some other American college kids and had a lot of fun. On Saturday we woke up and headed to the train station to visit the other 3 towns, Riomaggiore, Manarola, and Corniglia. Needless to say we had some train issues and this took all day! Corniglia was our last stop and we were exausted. You should have seen our faces when we realized the town was up on a cliff and we had to climb hundreds of winding stairs to get up there. When we finally got back to Monterroso we got ready and went out to find a place to eat dinner. We figured we would just pick a random place and we couldn't go wrong. Mistake. Everyone hated their food and it was definitely a disappointing Italian meal. I orded something that said in english "pasta in a seafood sauce" and it came out with a tiny bit of pasta and creatures practically still alive staring at me with their eyes. We definitely had to get some gelato after that! That night we had a relaxing night on the terrace drinking wine with all 8 of us. We said our goodbyes to Lanier and her friends and went to bed before our 3:15am wake up call. Our train was at 4:55am. Well, no taxis run at this time of the night so the four of us had to haul all of our luggage across town to the train station at 4am in the dark. Luckily it's a small town! We got to the train station way early and had to sit there for an hour which was pretty sketchy in the dark because train stations are creepy! But we made it on and got some sleep before arriving in Juan Les Pin where we will spend the next 3 weeks with our entire group!

Paris day 2 and 3

On our 2nd day in Paris we woke up to rain. It pretty much stopped by the time we went out to see some sights but it was still a nasty day and the jet lag was catching up with us. We went to the famous Notre Dame cathedral. It was absolutely amazing. Then, we walked around for 30 minutes trying to get a cab because we obviously didn't know the right place to get one. We finally got one then headed to the army museum and Napolean's tomb. There seemed to be a lot of "gendarmerie" (police) around all day. We were curious if this was normal so we asked our waiter at dinner and he told us there was a "terrorist". We're still not sure if he was just messing with us for a good laugh. We did finally figure out the metro system though which was really exciting! We were so tired and it was starting to rain again so we took a 3 hour nap before dinner! We didn't leave dinner until almost midnight. People eat really late here! Then the real fun began when we went to a pub that we though looked american. It ended up being irish but that was just as good because it meant american music and people spoke english! We had a ball there and the bartenders liked us so much that they skipped cleaning to come to another bar with us. It was a vip bar and Jenny was talking to a French boy about the meaning of a "French kiss". He may or may not have demonstrated :). So we finally got back around 4 and slept until 11.
Day 2 was by far the best! Finally great weather! We got french baguette sandwhichs and ate them in the park next to the Eiffel Tower. The line to go up was too long but we got some great pictures. Then we went to the Arc de Triumph which was really cool. Then we walked down the famous Champs Elysees street. It had some great shops and was just amazing. To end our day we took the metro to Sacre Coeur. This was the perfect ending to a great day. It's an amazing church and the highest point in Paris so we were looking out onto the entire city of Paris. It was probably the most amazing thing I've ever seen! Then we got ready for dinner and found a great place. All of our meals were great except I tried Jenny's goose liver and I almost vomited at the table. We walked off our meal at Luxembourg Garden which was so pretty. Finally we got tickets for the river cruise at 10:30. We saw all the sights at night when they are lit up! The Eiffel Tower was amazing! Now we are going to bed because we have to wake up at 5:30 to catch our train to Portofino, Italy! I'm excited for Italians that are supposed to be nicer than the French!

1st day in Paris

Bonjour! We arrived in Paris this morning after a bumpy flight that was kind of scary! After we finally made it through the airport we found the right train to get on. Jenny threw away her ticket so she had to break through the gate and she hadn't eaten or slept so she was pretty grumpy. The train was sketchy with random french people staring at us like we were aliens. We finally made it to the hotel, then we went to the Louve museum and saw the famous original Mona Lisa. Then we walked around for a long time to get used to the streets in Paris. We were so exausted but we got ready to go to dinner. We found a cute restaurant not far from our hotel. I ordered steak frites and said medium but it was pretty much well done. We had 3 bottles of wine at dinner. Then we asked our waiter where a good bar is and he sent us somewhere close by. Well...it ended up being a gay bar and we had french women asking us to go back to their house. So we finally got out of there and went to a store across from our hotel to buy more wine!