fyi- it's finished!

Well- the last piece of the Italian trip puzzle has been added. It may be the longest post ever written in all of time, but I had a lot to write! Enjoy! Time to get ready for school!

Reste cool:)

ps- nothing exciting to post from today.... went on another run in the park because it was nice out.... but this evening there was a terrible thunderstorm. Everything is all clear now!

so much to do!

Ah I feel like I can't get anything done! I had such a long list of things to do today (lesson stuff, blogs, cleaning, April trip planning).... and I keep getting distracted by anything and everything! Granted, I did talk to Maggie, Thomas, and Victor for a total of 3.5 hours today.... so that took up some evening productivity (no complaints of course.... just excuses hehe). This blog about Siena is taking me forever! We seemed to do so much! So I'm going to stop saying I'll do it tomorrow, and maybe it will actually get done?

School was good- more excitement telling teachers about my engagement and showing them the ring. Pierre, the director, said, "Wow, must be a big love," when seeing the ring. (He likes to practice his English.... ) Another teacher said, wow.... he sure started your life together right! Corinne said... wow! Did you buy it at the Ponte Vecchio? I said.... no! He came to France with it! (They have such a different idea of how marriage proposals work!)

Anyway- time for bed!!! Reste cool:)

Back to work Monday

Good evening!

I had a great day back to work.... thankfully, before my long 2 week break, I planned a good first lesson for my unit on the Gingerbread Man (which amazingly has a lot of good English language learning opportunities). However, I did not intend on using the book with every class, just the older kids. I ended up reading the story 5 times today, to everyone but Sabine's CE1 class. It was awesome to see how the book could be differentiated to fit the CP level to the CM2 level... (wow, that was a really nerdy teacher thing to say, but it's true).

Besides getting really good at saying "Run, run, as fast as you can... ," I had fun seeing my kids, talking to my colleagues about their break and mine (they were so excited to see the ring hehe), and reading the postcards from our penpals in Ms. Caitlin Varley's 5th grade class (thanks again Caitlin!). The class was ecstatic.... they had no idea what they said, or whether or not the names were "girl" names or "boy" names.... but they were excited to have something addressed to them with a real postcard from America. I read a few to give them an idea of what types of information the cards contained (they could figure out most of it once I read it.... I guess we do mostly do oral listening type lessons at this age and very little written.... still what a great language/cultural experience for them!). They thought the names were cool and they were surprised at how bad some of the handwriting was, lol. *Sorry French kids, we don't have them start practicing cursive script in preschool.

I had a nice big school lunch (salmon lasagna, potatoes, baguette, cheese, salad, and yogurt) and talked more with the teachers. They talked a lot about Japan and all the different stories they've heard on the news. One of my teachers said one her closest friends was just in Japan for a week with her kids on vacation and left a few days before the earthquake happened.... said it really shook their family up. We also talked a lot about the nuclear plant explosion.... it hits a little too close to home for the French because they are the 2nd largest producer of nuclear energy in the world.... there are like 5 nuclear power plants in the Rhone region alone (around Lyon)... although we don't have a lot of earthquakes or other natural disasters.... there is still always the potential danger for something to go wrong. Apparently there has been a lot of discussion on the news about the dangers and the reasonings why they have so much nuclear energy in France, etc....

Anyway, I left school and walked a good part of the way home because it was a bright and sunny afternoon. I had a nice long video chat with Victor who made it safe and sound last night. He enjoyed watching the in-flight movies, but was very tired when he got home. Since it was so nice, I went for a run in the Parilly park after my chat... it's the one where I went bike riding with Corinne's family. It has really nice running paths and workout stations along the way..... an excellent place to workout, but I am now pooped and ready for bed! (I still haven't written my last Italy blog! What a slacker I am!)

Besides that, nothing much going on over here in France! I have exactly 45 more days until I come home! I am planning a trip to Nice/Provence in April with some of the girls, so that's exciting! I'll have to keep you posted.

Ok, must get my bag ready for tomorrow! I'm fading fast!

Reste cool:)

Last days with my mec :(

I know I know..... my blogging regularity is all out of whack! I still have to blog about our third and fourth day in Italy (very important days hehe), but I know it will take me a bit to sit and think about all that we did those days.... so I need a longer chunk of time than I have right now! I've got to get ready for school tomorrow and get to bed here soon, so I'll have to just update you on yesterday and today!

We accomplished a lot yesterday.... we did more laundry (Victor wanted to go home with clean clothes and I wanted to start my week off not having to think about when I could get to the laundromat next) and had lunch at the kebab restaurant down the street. Kebab restaurants are all over France..... and sadly I had only ever tried the fries at this particular place. It was pretty good, although I think the meat tastes a little bit like taco meat, oddly enough. Guess I could go there to get my Mexican fix if I was really in a bind! We folded clothes and packed most of Victor's stuff before heading to the grocery store. I got a few things to stock up for the week and we got a bunch of goodies for family and friends. We bought 4 bags of chocolate croissants to send back, among many other treats:)

After getting the apartment back in some shape, we got ready to go out to dinner for Victor's last meal in France. We went to Brasserie Georges for some authentic French/Lyon cuisine. For a starter, I had les escargots and Victor had French onion soup (the menu said that it was famous onion soup). Both were delicious and I even got Victor to try a snail! The soup was the best I've ever had. For our main course, I had my usual scallops in leek soup with parmesan crumble. Victor ordered the famous pistachio sausage and mashed potatoes. We greatly enjoyed our meal, but the restaurant became extremely noisy. It's a wide open layout, kind of like a train station, and tables are packed in close together. Waiters in tuxedos whip in and out bringing food out very quickly to your table. There was even a jazz band playing at the front of the house. But after a few quiet and low-key days in my apartment, so much noise and interaction got a little overwhelming.... so we left without dessert (probably for the best hehe) and headed home on the tram.

This morning we got up to check that France hadn't changed the clocks forward and went back to bed after finding out that, nope, it's just the US that does it today. France will spring forward in a few weeks, but until then, I'm only 5 hours ahead. We got ready and did the final pack up before our taxi came to pick us up at 10:50am. We paid 50 euros for the 25 minute cab ride (15 euros more expensive on a Sunday!) and got Victor all squared away checking bags and getting boarding passes. We had time for a last little chat before he went through security and I started my tram/bus journey home (free, but long.... left the airport at 12:30, got home about 2).

I spent the rest of my day catching up with my family (nice long video chat) and some friends.... wrote a few emails.... and now time to make sure I have everything for my lessons tomorrow.

Enjoy the pictures of our dinner!

Reste cool.... and good luck to Victor getting home today! I'll be right behind you in about... oh 50ish days!

Friday Afternoon Outing :)

Victor and I have finally almost recuperated from our Italian Stallion trip, haha. Of course just as I was feeling better, Victor started to feel sick with a sore throat, so we've been lying low in Saint-Priest since we got back Wednesday morning.... we did some laundry (Victor met my laundromat lady), we went grocery shopping (so nice to have help with big heavy bags!!!), and I unpacked. While we were grocery shopping, we saw one of my students who said, "Oh it's Lindsay! She's the girl who speaks English and lives in Springfield." Silly kids... of all the things they remember about me lol.

It was a beautiful day today, so I lured Victor into Lyon with the promise of viewing tigers at the zoo at the Parc de la Tête d'Or (he really likes tigers). We had a really nice walk around the park, saw everything from the bengal tiger to flamingos to hoards of turtles. The park was packed with families enjoying the sunny weather.... lots of roller-blades, scooters, and bikes... picnics, kids playing soccer, and even a group of kids playing American football. We picked up a gaufre au nutella on our way out (waffle with nutella)... it was a little bit of a process because our street vendor woman looked like she was 100 years old.... she moved at a very slow pace and gave me 30 cents change instead of 3 euros.... but it was a good waffle anyhow.

On our way back to the metro, we walked along the Rhone river where there's a nice walking/bike path. We enjoyed the sunset and made our way up to a bridge to cross the river towards the Opera. We stopped to watch some teens at the skate park before crossing the river and hopped on the metro at the Hotel de Ville. Our trip home was fairly eventful.... we saw a toddler punch a man in the butt, we stopped to take the tram and pick up a baguette for dinner, and over near the Porte des Alpes mall, there is a small circus tent set up... and a little ways away from where the tent was, in an open field, there was an unaccompanied camel grazing on grass.

Now we are home and getting ready to make dinner. Hope you're having a nice day! Gotta go entertain my guest!

Reste cool:)

Italy Trip Days 3 and 4: Siena+Tuscan Tour

We got to Siena after a rough train ride from Florence. (It was only rough because I thought I was dying, but turns out I'm just fine...lol). The train station was a little ways outside of the city center, so the map I drew myself from google looked a little too complicated at that time. We opted for a taxi ride up the hill and got to our B&B, La Coperta Ricamata. It was gated and sort of hidden away, so we hesitantly rang the buzzer. We were welcomed into the beautiful farm house by Luciana, the owner, who said, "Hello, this is my house,"(the bottom floor was her house, the upstairs apartments were the rooms of the B&B.... still caught us off guard). She took down our passport info and showed us to our room. A man also came with us, who we think might be her husband. Luciana didn't speak much more English than, "You like?", so her hubby explained that we had to use 3 different keys to get into the house. It sounded much more complicated than it actually was, but the room was gorgeous- tall ceilings and windows with a nice big bathroom (bidet included). We took a nice little nap so that I could stop feeling like crap and we eventually made our way into the old city center (with the help of a google map printed off by Luciana+hubz).

Siena is a gorgeous town in the heart of Tuscany. The legend says that the town was named after and created because of Senius, son of Remus, escaping the wrath of Romulus in Florence (erm maybe?). He was welcomed to the city by wolves who raised him... and so began the rivalry between Siena and Florence (as Siena was created by Senius). Not sure how accurate I am with the legend and how historically accurate the real legend is, but sounds neat! Both cities actually did fight throughout the Middle Ages... fighting for land, money, and power (you know- standard stuff). Florence usually won, although Siena was stronger for a hundred year span of time somewhere in there. As I said, I'm not too sure about the wolf story, but there are tons of statues of wolves around the city... several of them showing the she-wolf suckling babies.

We first walked through the quaint, ancient looking, crowded streets (still Carnival time.... not as big a deal here as in Venice, but still had some little kids dressed up and confetti everywhere) towards Piazza del Campo. Il Campo is the largest public open space in Siena, popular as a city hang out since it's construction in the 1300's! You actually have to take stairs into the bowl-like structure that slopes downwards towards the beautiful Palazzo Pubblico (the castle with the tower). The middle of the area looks like a seashell the way it fans out and is divided into nine sections. All around the center is the track for the Palio horse race held twice a year since the 14th century. The neighborhoods of Siena compete (well, their chosen jockeys ride bareback on horses) for a silk flag.... flown with pride for the rest of the year until the next Palio. Seems dangerous.... as the course can't be long enough for a race lasting longer than a minute (unless they go around a few times?).

We took some time to marvel at the area, Victor got some gelato and I had some salty nuts (I was still feeling faint... how lame I know), and we had a nice sit on the sloping campo, people watching and taking pictures. After awhile, we made our way towards the Duomo of Siena, which is equally, if not more ornate than the one in Florence... We weren't able to go in because you had to buy tickets for a few euros.... but the outside was pretty spectacular enough.

It started to get a little chilly, so we went back to the campo to have dinner at an open terrace cafe. I had some minestrone soup, while Victor had some delicious looking lasagna. The sky was so clear, and as it got darker, the sky was almost a pure navy blue color.... it was a gorgeous backdrop for a meal, no matter how lame my menu choice was.

The next morning, we woke up bright and early to fetch food from the hallway where Luciana said it would be. We had a little basket to fill and bring back to our room. It was so cute.... the sun was shining through our tall windows as we nibbled on pastries (well, I nibbled, Victor ate). I was almost feeling better, but didn't want to push it with our big tour day ahead of us. We were both super excited about our tour.... although I bet Victor was a little more excited ;)

A few minutes to 9am, we went outside to find a minivan parked on the street. Carlotta, our Siena-native guide, got out to shake our hands and welcome us into our transportation station for the day. She is very tall, which sort of surprised me for some reason, but very nice. She was a little quieter than other tour guides I've had.... so I'm not sure if it was the language barrier or if she just wanted us to be able to enjoy talking amongst ourselves.... but we felt a little awkward talking amongst ourselves with her driving us around, as it was just the two of us on the tour, so it was pretty quiet in our van. At first I tried to maintain a conversation, and Victor would chime in with extra questions every once in a while, but that didn't last longer than about an hour. She mainly gave us information when we got out of the van... giving us plenty of time to quietly enjoy the Tuscan countryside on the hilly roads.

Our first stop for the day was a medieval fortress for Siena called Monteriggioni. It is completely enclosed and up on a hill.... perfect for seeing if neighboring rival Florence was on the attack. Carlotta walked us around to show us the view.... we were able to see San Gimignano, a village we'd be touring later in the day, where Florence should be, mountain ranges, which parts were considered Chianti wine regions, which weren't, etc. Other than that though, we didn't do much here. The fortress is now a very small village of about 50 inhabitants (or less), and it being the beginning of March, the tourist town was not real hoppin'. I guess it was also about 9:30am... so a little early for the tourist rush, if there was one? Carlotta said she liked the fortress better this time of year because it isn't so crowded.... it kind of reminded me of Perouges in the way that it was sort of a ghost town in winter, but will be a hot spot in the summer for medieval festivals.

We left the fortress for the town of Greve in Chianti next, obviously part of the Chianti wine region (pronounced keyahntee). This was the type of wine we'd be trying at our wine tasting later in the day. The town of Greve is the birth place of Giovanni Verrazzano, the Italian explorer, famous for discovering the New York Harbor (ie the Verrazzano bridge). In the town square there is a large statue of the man- citizens of the town seem to be very proud of his accomplishment. However, Carlotta informed us that Verrazzano was eaten by cannibals on his third voyage to the Americas by a Carib tribe in the Bahamas. He died at the young age of 43 :( What a way to go....

After that informational tidbit, Carlotta gave us about 30 minutes to explore the little town on our own. There wasn't much but a famous butcher shop (she told us to go in an smell the meat.... Victor was more brave than I), coffee shop, and Chianti Classico gift shop. The Chianti Classico wine symbol is a black rooster. If it doesn't have the black rooster label, it isn't considered real Chianti Classico. There was something else about having a pink label as opposed to an orange label.... but I can't remember. In any event, the gift shop had everything from wine glasses to golf balls with the Chianti rooster. We stepped in the shop after a stop at the coffee place, where I had some freshly squeezed red/orange juice. It was nice to talk freely without our personal tour guide there, but when we came out and started our walk back to meet her, she was still standing in the same spot we left her at the statue. Kind of made us feel bad.... but onward we went, back to the van for the ride to the Verrazzano castle.

We drove up a steep and windy drive to the castle. The grounds were enormous; there were several groves of olive trees, forests, and of course vineyards surrounding the castle house, wine cellar, restaurant, and gardens. We were a little early for our appointment with the castle guide/wine expert, so Carlotta gave us a lot of information about the process of wine making. Let's just say it's very complicated and a million factors influence how a wine tastes, and basically no bottle of wine will taste exactly the same.... or something. Carlotta is taking a course to become a sommelier, so I think she was excited to teach us about what she was learning. Meanwhile, we were overlooking the beautiful vineyards and hilly countryside of Tuscany in the bright sunshine, so we didn't really mind (although it was a little windy).

We eventually made our way up to where we were meeting our guide, Gino. Gino is a very, very passionate wine lover. He also spoke excellent English, with at times an almost George W accent. (We later found out he's married to an American who came to study Italian when he was giving language lessons once upon a time... ooh la la! ) He made a few jokes and talked to Carlotta in Italian for a bit while we awkwardly stood out of the wind in what looked like the accounting office. Soon enough we realized we were waiting for others on our tour; four American college-aged girls came huffing and puffing up the big hill. They had taken the bus from Florence where 2 of the 4 are studying (the other 2 were visiting on spring break)... but didn't realize how much of a hike there was from the bus stop.

After some introductions, we followed Gino to the splendid gated gardens of the castle. There were potted plants and fountains.... green green grass with little purple and white flowers blooming. He had us pick a purple flower and smell it.... he said the wine is produced from the same "momma and papa as this flower...." (sun and earth?) and influences the flavor of the grapes.... etc. etc. It was a fairly theatrical beginning to our tour.... but interesting enough!

After our garden chat about environmental influences on how the wine tastes and a mini lecture on touring with our eyes and not the screens of cameras (it's true... it's easy to do), he walked us through where they hang grapes for a certain type of wine, vino santo...at least I think, a type of sweet wine (the grapes have a longer time to shrivel up and store more concentrated sugar). We then went into the wine cellars where he explained that "there is no wine without food, no food without wine." Food was stored in the cellars back in Verrazzano's time as it is today.... and fresh food compliments wine, as well as the wine complimenting the food.

We spent a little more time outside in the warm sunshine.... Gino said "Let the sun kiss your face, just as the sun kisses the grapes." Yes.... he said things like this lol. He was verryy passionate, as I said. We took a few pictures and were finally ready for the food-wine/wine-food

tasting. Gino explained that for each course, we'd try a different wine, perfectly paired by himself.

We sat at a long table and got to know our tour-mates a little more before the first course arrived- yummy garlic bread, plate of Italian meats, and olive oil. I was able to eat mostly everything I put on my plate, but didn't chance drinking full glasses of wine with everything... so Victor got to taste a little extra wine than the others;) (Hopefully, this wasn't the reason for the second part of this story hehe).

For our second course, the pasta course, we had noodles with a ground beef sauce. It was pretty fantastic even if I couldn't finish it all. For our third course, they brought out beans, a cabbage salad, and a huge plate of meat from the large fire in the kitchen. There were ribs and sausages.... I tried a very juicy rib, but no sausage. Victor tried both and said it was good. For a sort of in-between cheese course, they brought out something similar to parmesean or compté cheese broken up in small chunks and had us chew the cheese while sipping very sweet balsamic vinegar. They were weird instructions, but it was soooo good. A little burst of flavor from the balsamic was amazing with the cheese. And of course there was wine to go with it. For the final course, we tried the sweet, yet strong, vino santo wine with almond biscotti and real Italian café. It was quite the feast.... Gino was getting deep in conversation with the college girls... talking about staying in Italy and the culture shock it can give you after a long period of time.... etc. Victor and I were kind of done listening to him ramble.... not really being able to follow his train of thought- whether due to the wine or the heat of the kitchen, I can't be sure, but I needed air.

We bought a few bottles of wine to save and give away before going to take pictures in the gardens. On our way, we met Carlotta who I asked to come with us to take our picture. (Little did I know what was about to happen!) We got into the gardens and had Carlotta take a few shots with Victor's nice camera.... and as I was turning to leave and ask Carlotta what was next on our tour, Victor lingered in the garden, saying he wanted to soak up the sun a little longer. The next thing I knew, he was down on one knee asking me to marry him! Conveniently enough for us, Carlotta still had the camera and documented our little engagement moment:)

We left the gardens a little too soon.... we could have stayed there all day after what had happened.... but we knew we were still with our personal tour guide who was on a schedule. She took us on a long quiet ride throughout the countryside to our last stop- San Gimignano, the New York City of Tuscany (because of it's many towers).

The medieval city was much more touristy than anything else we had visited for the day, but probably nothing compared to what it is like in the summer peak season. Carlotta explained that the city had so many towers because it used to be a symbol of wealth... the more money you had, the higher the tower you built. The city used to have many more towers, but whenever you went broke, you had to dismantle your tower. The remaining towers were mostly ones used for protection.

Carlotta took us on a little walk through the town, taking us up to a beautiful overlook. Victor and I enjoyed the tour, but we were ready to get back to our B&B for some alone time. It was hard to be excited and lovey-dovey with her right there.... so it was nice to take a few pictures and to finally head home. We paid for the tour and said our goodbyes before taking our 3 keys and getting back to our room. We enjoyed a nice little calzone dinner in the room and made a phone call to my parents. What a wonderful way to end our Tuscan vacation!

Hope you enjoy the pictures and our engagement story! I'm so lucky to have such a special story to share:)

Italy Trip Day 2 and 5: Florence

On our second day in Italy, we had a nice breakfast at the Abazzia Hotel in Venice and checked out for our 11:30 train to Florence. The streets in Venice were jammed packed with people, so it was nice to take the regional train to the other Venice station where we caught our high-speed train to Firenze (Florence). However, this train had to have been the most packed and loudest train I've ever been on. On trains in France, people are given dirty looks when you answer your cell phone or are too loud with your friends or have noisy children. On this Italian train trip, we had huge families all seated together, sharing sandwiches they packed for the ride, toddlers running up and down the aisle, men standing in the aisle talking, kids watching DVDs without headphones.... it was just busy. By the time we got off, I was feeling a little overwhelmed... but we found our hotel very quickly and were able to check in right away.

We set out for the Duomo (easy enough to find, as it is huge). We were both in awe at the size and detail of the marble siding of the cathedral, baptistery, and campanile. We stopped for some gelato and pizza before going inside (I had the gelato, Victor had the pizza.... I wasn't really hungry for much more.... so either this was clue number one that I wasn't feeling well or it contributed to me feeling worse later on). The Duomo is equally as huge on the inside, but not very ornate. After a few pictures, we headed towards the Piazza della Signoria- a square with a sculpture garden in front of the Palazzo Vecchio (the fortress looking castle). The sculpture garden includes a replica of Michelangelo's David; the original is housed in Florence's Accademia museum (the original used to be placed in the square but it was moved to prevent degradation). We didn't have too much extra time to spend museuming this trip, so the replica was all we got to see. It was still amazing to see how large it is...

After seeing the sculptures, we headed towards the Ponte Vecchio, the first and only original bridge left standing after World War II. The bridge dates back to the 1300's and has always hosted shops displaying goods. Today, the merchandise is mostly jewelry- lots of gold, silver, and diamonds- fun place to window shop/ogle. We crossed the bridge and walked toward what we thought would take us up to the Piazzale Michelangelo, an overlook of the city. We climbed a few hilly streets and ended up back behind the Belvedere Fortress... walking along the old Medieval city wall of Florence. We eventually got up to the real stair climb to the piazzale. It was a sort of misty grey day, but we knew we wanted to see the view of the city in case we didn't have time or had even worse weather the next time we were in Florence. It ended up being a spectacular view and we took several pictures before making the climb back to our hotel. We were both completely exhausted and had very tired feet by the time we got back.

After a little nap and a quick walk around the closing leather markets, we were ready to try to find a restaurant our friend Nancy had recommended (Yellow). We found it and got seated in the basement where it was nice and cozy. I ordered a glass of wine, gnocchi with red cream sauce, and a salad, Victor ordered the spicy spaghetti and an omelet. We had both gotten through our first course (in Italy, this is the pasta) when I started to feel a little funny. I thought I had just eaten too fast and that my jeans were too tight, so I did the Joey Tribbiani unbuttoning of the pants move to enjoy my salad. I got through maybe 4 bites before I started to tell Victor I didn't feel very well and needed some water. The last thing I remember was seeing spots as Victor was getting up to get water... apparently, he heard a loud clinking of my silverware and a "donk" as my head hit the table. I woke up lying on a bench near the stairs with my legs held up by an Italian woman and Victor with a wet towel on my forehead. The woman was saying "Caldo?Caldo?" and Victor looked scared and confused.... I just thought.... where the heck am I?

Everyone in the restaurant was turned looking at me. I tried to get up a few times but would need to lay back down. The waitresses called for a cab and reduced the price on our meal since Victor didn't even touch his omelet. I made it upstairs and into the cab... but started to feel sick again when we got back. Poor Victor was so freaked out thinking we were going to have to go to the hospital. I just needed some salt in my system after our long day of touring and eating weird things.... I got to sleep just fine, but wasn't really back to normal the next morning. I left the breakfast table at the hotel feeling like I was going to faint again.... and then I was pretty much sick the rest of the day with some sort of stomach flu. Yuck.... not a fun thing to have when checking out of the hotel and training to Siena! But, we made it and I'll fill you in on Siena in the next blog post.

We came back to Florence on the last day of our trip. We saw all the same things, but in the beautiful sunshine. We even took the climb back up to the overlook. After sitting and enjoying the view for a long time, we went shopping in the leather markets. I now have a nice leather wallet and leather gloves. Victor got a pair of leather gloves and a new belt.... so a successful little shopping trip! We finished our day with an early Italian meal at a restaurant decked out in Texas Longhorn flags and LSU memorabilia. The owner had friends in Texas and is a huge American football fan, oddly enough. I thought I was back to normal.... but sadly couldn't get through dinner again :( Poor Victor has said it's been nice to finish eating a meal with me since we've been back from Italy....

And that's Florence! Enjoy the pics!