Daily life

It's been a slow month for posting, and I've just realized that I've only posted three times in all of May! Yikes! I guess it has been a fairly quiet month, one with a total of four long weekends (today is the last one), and one where Erik was pretty stressed for most of it, and therefore, not a whole lot of fun. Not that I can't entertain myself, but in an effort to save up for our trip to Canada, I've discovered that many days off + no money makes some things a lot less interesting.

Anyway, here's a recap of what we've been up to for the last couple of weeks:

• Erik went to Montreal for an interview with Concordia, which he thought went very well.
  
• Erik did his presentation for the permanent French position at his lab.
  
• I was offered a full time job at one of my schools, but then they changed their minds. Because I'm not French. That was a fun week.
  
• We got dressed up ('casual chic'--what does that tell you?) and went to a cocktail party at the swanky Hotel Crillon. It was a fundraiser for one of my schools, complete with a live auction where a signed guitar was sold for 3000 euros. Very fun. Plus, there was champagne.
  
• We went for apperos on one of the many bridges over the Seine. It's an event that gathers Parisians in one location every Thursday night in the summer for BYOsnacks and drinks. It was fun to see the tourists pushing through the crowds of us on the bridge, amidst bottles of wine and party mix, with looks of confusion on their faces.
  
• We went for dinner with Erik's aunt, uncle and cousin who were passing through Paris on a recent European trip that they took.
• Our good friend Alex has decided to accept a job transfer to Switzerland for next year. :(
• all the clocks on our blog are an hour behind, but I can't be bothered to fix them. We have a real clock in our bathroom with the same problem.
  
• I've been quite bad about bringing the camera with me, as I have absolutely no pictures of any of these things that we've done.
  

That's about it. I can't believe that it's almost June already, and that we leave for Canada SO SOON! We're a bit excited.

Welcome Mom and Dad

My parents arrived in Paris on Saturday after spending a week in the south of France. It's great to have them here, and we celebrated their first day with a lot of eating (dinner at the Midi Vins. Yum!). They have rented a cute apartment in the 12th, and it will be fun to get to know that area of the city a bit better. We went over for dinner last night for a meal my parents prepared with their purchases from the local market. Lovely.

Last night we were lucky enough to be able to experience a true European television viewing experience. Eurovision. Neither Erik or I had ever hear of it, but Alex had us and some other French friends over for dinner last night so that we could join in the fun.

Eurovision is a Europe-wide (and the term Europe is used quite loosely, with performances by Russia and Turkey, to name a few) singing contest. Each country submits a musical act that is performed in the country of the previous years winner. This year the twenty four finalists sang their hearts out in Helsinki. After watching all the super cheesy performances, there is a fifteen minute voting period where you can vote for your favorite. But not the contestant from your own country. My favorites were Spain, whose boy-band D'NASH performed a super cheesy rendition of their hit I Love You Mi Vida. Also at the top of my list was Ukraine, whose group Verka Serduchka performed a number clad completely in gold and silver lame, and the lead singer wore a large silver star on his (her?) head and ran around tapping the backup singers on the butt. Very funny. France's entry was also hilarious. Their song 'L'Amour a la Francaise' was sung with bad accents and ridiculous costumes. The highlight that kept getting replayed was one of the lead singers wearing a fuchsia blazer running around the stage singing to the stuffed black cat on his shoulder. Fantastique!

Unfortunately, the humour seemed to be lost on the voters, and France came in 22nd out of 24.

We learned that countries tend to vote mainly for their neighbours and allies, and so most of the Eastern European countries did quite well, with Serbia taking home the first place honours. Their performance was quite good, but nothing too special, or memorable, we decided. We were also surprised at the number of votes that both Greece and Turkey received for their almost identical, and equally bad numbers, involving scantily clad back-up dancers and unattractive lead singers. Erik was voting for the UK to get zero votes, but they unfortunately picked up their only votes from Ireland near the end. Too bad. It was interesting to hear the kind of music that was popular in each country, and the countries that did quite well were all similar in terms of (what we would call) cheesiness.

I guess we just don't get it. For a contest that has been going on since 1956, there is obviously a lot of tradition involved in the show. Alex is a real veteran, and kept pointing out how the wind machine was very 'Eurovision' as well as the over the top costumes and cheesy 'I love Europe' lyrics that we often heard. We also thought it was funny that although the official languages of the show are English and French, only two of the forty+ that voted spoke French. I'll leave it to you to figure out who they were.

On My Own

Erik left yesterday morning for Montreal, leaving me on my own to stay out of trouble.

Easier said than done, as we're into the second of three consecutive long weekends this month. I met up with Alex yesterday afternoon to do some shopping, I need to get a dress for the various weddings we're going to this summer, and after trying on a zillion different things, I managed to find something at Kookai. After picking through the accessories at H&M we cruised through the Grande Epicerie in search of snacks before heading off to our cooking class.

We met up with Marie, and made our way to one of the newer locations of Ateliers des Chefs. I have to say this location was a thousand times nicer than the Galleries Lafayette and Nation locations, which are glassed in kitchens in the middle of the housewares section of each department store. The rue Peclet location, where we were yesterday is it's own storefront, with a large kitchen in the back and a cooking supply store in the front. Much cosier, more private, and the staff were very friendly. On the menu last night was supreme de volaille avec persillade and blanc manger avec fraise au balsamic (chicken supreme with parsley crust; blanc mange (I have no idea what it is in English, but it's tasty!) with strawberries and balsamic vinegar). The whole menu was easy and delicious as usual, and we were even able to enjoy a glass of wine with our meal. The three of us are all gung-ho now to take the macaron class, and the cocktail class that they offer. If only I had a professional kitchen to go along with all my newfound culinary knowledge....

After our 'dinner' Alex and I headed up to rue St Maur to meet Anja at the scary bathroom bar (whose real name is Boui Boui). I'm happy to report that the bathroom is getting progressively less scary, and the owner is just as friendly. He remembered us, and gave us another carafe of wine instead of the bill when we asked. Which we happily accepted. The best part of the Boui Boui is that it is one of the few places we've found where you can have three carafes of wine for less than ten euros each.

Today I went on a 'gym date' with one of my gym friends. It's nice to know that I'm not alone in my mild obsession with these fitness classes, so we made our way to her other gym, which was offering an Attack class this afternoon. It's always fun to check out different gyms here in Paris, because I often have the impression that people don't really work out here. But apparently they do, as there were easily 70 people in the class that we took today.

And now I'm taking my sweet time getting through my planning for tomorrow. Three day work weeks are always a treat.

A+ :)

Champagne, encore

This weekend marks the first of three long weekends that the month of May brings to the people of France. The holidays all fall on Tuesdays or Thursdays, and so the French have created a way to make the most of these statutory holidays. Faire le pont. It means that they generally will off the day of work that falls in between the weekend and the holiday, to make the most of a long weekend. So, Alex, Katharina, Erik and I decided to be like the French and take a trip to Champagne.

We went to Champagne last June with our lovely friends Nancy and Daryl, and had a great time. Since we are now experts, Erik and I decided that one day in Reims and one day in Epernay and Hautevillers would probably give us enough time to fully enjoy the region without breaking the bank, so off we went on Saturday morning in our (brand new!) rental car (mental note: don't rent a car next time. No one wants to drive).

The one advantage of having a car is that we were able to stop at some lovely little towns along the way, and were able to visit more of the small, independent champagne makers that sell only directly to customers.

We spent the first evening in Reims, and had a nice dinner at the Brasserie Flo on the main street. On Sunday, after visiting Reims' famous cathedral (you know, the one where all the kings used to be knighted) we set off for Hautevillers, the tiny town that houses the abbey when Dom Perignon first invented champagne. The town is also home to lots of small vintners that we had enjoyed the last time, so we paid them all a visit again after a nice picnic lunch in the vineyards.

We spent that evening in Epernay, and had some fantastic couscous for dinner, before calling it a night. Monday morning was spent on the avenue du Champagne, at the houses of Mercier (third most popular brand in France and not sold outside of Europe--or in our Monoprix, for that matter) and Moet et Chandon (best caves, and best tour).

The weather was fantastic, if a bit too hot, but luckily all the caves in the region are at a constant temperature of about 10 degrees. Plus, what's more refreshing on a hot day than a nice cold glass of champagne?

You can take a look at the pictures here.