Sunday, May 31, 2009

la tour bretagne

Welcome to Nantes. The photo below shows the "Tour Bretagne" - the tallest building in Nantes, by far -- maybe the only tall building in this city of half a million.  The fog/blue stick people are part of some installation art project in the center of the city.

la plage


The other IES students and I spent this weekend at la baule. The first day, it was our private beach!

Thursday, May 28, 2009

Musée D'Orsay


Visited the impressive Musée D'Orsay while in Paris. I saw a lot of famous artworks that we covered in art history class, including the Degas below. I think I enjoyed it even more than the Louvre! 





Wednesday, May 27, 2009

Pere Lachaise

While in Paris, we visited Pere Lachaise cemetery, the resting place for Colette, Chopin, Jim Morrison, and Oscar Wilde, among many other celebz of yesteryear. The vastness of this cemetery is impossible to capture or describe.  118.6 acres of mausoleums...



Carpeted in kisses from lipsticked devotees, Oscar Wilde's grave was a semi-touching experience.


chocolat chaud

While in Paris, we sipped on Angelina's world famous hot chocolate. One of the girls who I was with saw Orlando Bloom in this restaurant when she was there last year. 

La (vrai!) Tour Eiffel

The Tour Eiffel has been photographed from every thinkable angle. Its image has been captured by some of the best artists to touch planet Earth. Still, there is something fun and special about taking my own little photos of this monster. I guess it's just a tourism requirement, and I'm too much of a tourist to resist. Either way, The Tour Eiffel:
The Eiffel Tower is much larger than I had expected. It's difficult/impossible to adequately describe the sensation that accompanies experience something that I had seen so much through reproductions --this realization has been a recurring theme of my trip thus far. I ascended the tower later that night, but my camera had run out of batteries. C'est la vie!


la joconde

People always comment on how the Mona Lisa is much smaller than one would expect. Since the world population's remarks led me to believe that M. Lees would be practically microscopic, I might be the first person to say this: 

I expected it to be much smaller. 

Thus, here is a photograph with people in order provide scale.

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

la tour eiffel

Yesterday, I realized that I saw Vegas's knockoff Eiffel Tower almost precisely 1 year before departing to check out the real deal. 

la naissance du blog

I'm not sure how regularly I will update this, but if I manage to do so occasionally, wouldn't it be a nice way to record and remember my experience while keeping those at home updated? 

Um, that's my goal. We'll see how this works out.