My first blog post from France! :D
It’s been a long journey, but I’m finally here safe and sound. After spending a couple weeks in Spokane with the family, I went back to Seattle for a few days and got to say goodbye to people. My friends from church even threw me a surprise party on my last day and sent me off with a scrapbook with encouraging letters. :]
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| Goodbyeee Seattle <3 |
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| <3 CG |
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Bye Max
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On Monday afternoon, my family, along with two good friends, sent me off on my trip! After flying through Chicago, then London, and waiting for a good eight hours there, I reached Lyon 24 hours after I’d left.
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| Heathrow Airport |
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| Why is the butter the same size as the bread?!? |
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| Airport in Lyon! :) |
Because I hadn’t found a place to stay yet, I stayed with two siblings, Caroline and Nicolas, who I found through couchsurfing.org. They were wonderful hosts and made me feel very welcome and at home. They both also spoke perfect English, so it was very easy for me, maybe too easy! Most of the people I’ve met here in France so far speak English, so it’s been very easy.
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| Half of the room where I stayed (I had a bed..not the couch) |
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| First breakfast in France - BREAD :D |
The first day that I was here, both Caroline and Nicolas had things to do, so I was on my own. I had heard about an apartment from a girl who was from the same church as a missionary I emailed from the contacts a church friend had gotten from a lady she’d met while in Lyon (phew!). So, I went to see the apartment!
Turns out she was just moving her things into the apartment. She showed me around the apartment, which is just a one-bedroom apartment with a shower room, a kitchen, and a water closet (the toilet room). She also introduced me to some of her friends that went to the same church as her and were helping her move the apartment. They were all so nice, and I really liked the apartment. It’s much cheaper than I had expected to pay and in a great location – about two minutes from the grocery store, the post office, and Avenue des Frères-Lumière, a road with lots and lots of shops (Trivia: it’s also named after two of the pioneers of cinematography!). In addition to being close to all the necessities, it's about a 10-15 minute walk away from my school! My hosts were also VERY surprised that I found my apartment on the very first day that I was here! They were expecting me to stay at least a week, because one of their previous couch-surfers took two and a half weeks to find her apartment!!
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| Front door area |
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| One corner of the kitchen |
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| Bedroom |
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| WC |
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| Bathroom |
That night, after coming back from the new apartment, there was a going away party for Nicolas because he's going to Dublin to study for the next year. So, they invited me to come along. It was a small party on an Australian pub boat, called Ayers Rock, that's docked on the Rhône, one of the rivers of Lyon. The view from the boat was amazing, and in Lyon, at night, a lot of the buildings are lit up, which makes it look even more beautiful! :) A lot of Caroline and Nicolas’ friends that were there are from other countries - Holland, Bulgaria, Germany, Cameroon, Spain, etc! So, some of them gave me advice on the best phone companies, etc. It was a really nice way to end the first night – having a glass of wine on the river :D
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| Hotel Dieu by night – former hospital, future hotel |
The next day, Caroline brought me to the mall at Part-Dieu (the biggest downtown shopping center in Europe…) to get my French SIM card. I have never, ever had to deal with phone plans and stuff, so it was a HUGE help having her there, since my French is definitely not good enough to figure out a phone plan! Unfortunately, the card wouldn't work with my phone, so we had to go to the city center to get my phone unblocked. It cost 20euros to get the phone unblocked, but it's a lot less expensive than the plan with the new phone. I'm not sure if they have the option in the US, but here, if you use an old phone when renewing your plan, then the price of the plan per month is a couple euros cheaper than if you buy a new plan with a new phone.
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| Part-Dieu |
For some reason, the first two days that I was here were very, very hot, and then a short thunderstorm in the middle of the day. So while we were walking, there were a few drops of rain, but very heavy thunder with lightning. It was pretty scary, because we saw the lightning hit something just two stores in front of us! I’m pretty sure that’s the closest I’ve ever been to lightning! Because the wait to get my phone unblocked was about 25 minutes, we decided to do some sightseeing first.
So, we walked to Place Bellecour, the largest pedestrian square in Europe. Caroline gave me the choice of climbing Fourvière, a huge hill, to see the Basilique de Notre Dame or to walk around Vieux Lyon (Old Lyon) and see the different shops. I figured it was such a nice day, and I wasn’t sure if anyone else would want to climb Fourvière with me again, so I chose the former. :]
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| Streets of Vieux Lyon :) |
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| Vieux Lyon |
So, we climbed up the hill, which basically circles around the whole hill. On the way, we stopped by the remains of an amphitheater (from 2000 years ago!), which are pretty amazing! We then climbed the amphitheater to Basilique de Notre Dame. The Basilique Notre-Dame (not Quasimodo’s cathedral in Paris...) was dedicated to the Virgin Mary, because they believe she stopped the plague from spreading way back in the 17th century. It was very pretty! My art history siblings would have appreciated the Byzantine style, etc…
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| Basilique de Notre Dame |
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| Inside the basilique |
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| Walking back down from Fourvière - Caroline and her French bulldog, Kimi |
In Lyon, there are things called traboules, which are basically doors that are actually passageways to other streets. They were used a lot during the revolution for the rebels to escape the police. It’s hard to tell which ones are traboules because they are also the passageways to people’s homes. So, you just have to try different doors and see if it works! It was a lot of fun looking for those and finding some. I’m going to have to go back and do that more! :P
Later that night, we went and ate a bouchon, which is where the typical lyonnaise food is served. For starters was a salade lyonnaise, which was lettuce with pork bits, croutons, and a poached egg. For the entrée was andouillette, a sausage of pig intestines and tripe, in a mustard sauce. It was actually pretty good! And for dessert was a panna cotta with raspberry sauce. It was all surprisingly good, even though I was a little skeptical about the andouillette at first..
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| At the bouchon - L to R: Caroline, my CS host; Deborah, Caroline's friend; Forgot his name...Italian guy, Deborah's CS |
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| Andouillette in mustard sauce |
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| Panna cotta with raspberry sauce |
The next day, I moved into my apartment! It’s definitely a relief to have a place now and not have to worry about that! My roommate, Fidji, is a medical student at another university here in Lyon and speaks perfect English and French, as well. I spent the day unpacking, relaxing, and getting my adaptor for my chargers! That night, Fidji and I went to her friend’s home for a birthday dinner. Being super sleep-deprived from not being able to sleep because of my jet lag, it was even more tiring and a little frustrating to only understand different chunks of the conversation. It’s also pretty frustrating not being able to speak. I get the words I want to say all formed up nicely in my head, and then when someone actually starts talking to me, I have to rearrange my words, and I get all mixed up and VERY nervous. This language wall just comes up, and I end up not being able to speak well at all… I don’t think I’ve ever not spoken so much in my life! :(
Although I didn’t speak throughout the whole dinner, except to say (in French) thank you, a little bit, please, no thank you, and vanilla, the food was good! We started with a smoked salmon on top of cheese on top of avocado! So yummy! Then we had lasagna, bread, and salad. For dessert we had some sort of apple cake and ice cream. Pretty American... Then, I sat around listening to people talk and trying to understand what they were saying. It really is very draining.
Today, is my now my fourth day here. Everyday that I’ve been here, I haven’t been able to sleep in. So I slept for 11 hours! It feels kind of nice not having to do anything, besides grocery shopping, today. Hopefully, I’ll take more pictures and blog more often so that I’m not posting super long posts like this one! Until next time! :D
