I headed off to my architecture class pretty early today because we were meeting up by the Gare du Nord in the 10th arr. We spent our class predominantly in the "Eglise de Saint Vincent de Paul" which is quite incredible (like most all the churches here). Then when they kicked us out, we went to look at the Gare du Nord, which is quite striking on the outside, but then very different (mostly metal) on the inside. We all found it rather disturbing that the man that was locking up the church came down onto the church steps and started kicking the dead pigeons (of which there were two or three) off the steps (somewhat violently...). Very odd.
I took the metro (I keep wanting to call it the subway, but I feel like that is entirely incorrect -- c'est toujours le metro) to Vavin where I got the same delicious salmon sandwich that I had last week and then took it to Reid Hall and ate in the courtyard! Quite a lovely setting. I also brought in a good portion of the cookies I baked last night, which were devoured quite quickly... I had a "langue orale" course for an hour at 1:30, during which we did this questionnaire by Proust (or selected questions from it) -- one of the preferred questions was "how would you like to die". We also looked at some famous photographs and then tried to describe them en francais!
Martine then wanted to show us the Paris III (or La Sorbonne) campus, so we took the bus over and then eventually found the campus....unfortunately, I had to leave early to get to swim practice! I foolishly thought that leaving there at 3:15 for a 4pm practice would give me enough time to get there, but how mistaken I was. I've learned that the wonderful thing about the metro is that it's rarely late and there's no traffic. The downside? It's never really early, and it can't really speed up at all either. So I didn't get home until about 3:50 to get my stuff and then I had to make my way back to the metro, and got off a few stops down, but then was disoriented, and went entirely the wrong way, and so I didn't get to the pool until about 4:25...whoops. So I was able to swim for an hour or so -- I don't even know exactly what all we did because I was too distracted by trying to figure out what I was supposed to be doing! There were about 7 people in the competition group with me and then the rest of the pool was open to the public. But overall, it went well! I'll get to learn a bunch of French, and it's exciting to have something else to do besides go to class and wander around, and it's with REAL FRENCH PEOPLE.
I walked home after that (after finding my way back to the metro station so I would know where to go), and attempted to do some reading! But now that I have internet back, it was easy to distract myself....
Dinner this evening was leftover risotto along with these little half crescent pastry-type things filled with shrimp and other stuff! Quite good -- a Portuguese speciality! And even though I said I didn't like shrimp, I tried one and it didn't taste very "shrimpy"...
It's nice to finally (practically) have my schedule set now. The swimming hours are a little funky, but I think it will be nice to be with a team and a coach who yells out times (in French!) and the like.
Photo of the day: Eglise de Saint Vincent de Paul (with the bird-kicker)
A tout a l'heure!
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