Reunited in France

Sunday, June 19th, 2011
     On Saturday night after returning from Brugges and Sunday, Erin and I hung out with our friend, Phillip, and some of his old high school friends that he was travelling throughout Europe with this summer. 

 Phillip, Erin, and I having some wine and catching up at Luxembourg Gardens 

Cool U.K. sailboat a little boy rented!

I've had nearly every class with Phillip since Freshman year when we met in our Honors preceptee Biology class. We've definitely become best friends studying and working on our lab reports in the library until it closes every night, even the weekend, when the rest of our roommates or friends are doing thing that seem much more exciting, like surfing or hanging out on the beach nearly every day. He's one of those people that I'm literally around for 15 hours every day between all of our studying and classes we have together. Next semester, we have the exact same schedule, which is pretty hard to avoid when there's so few classes you can take as a Biochemistry major trying to fulfill the Honors program requirements with the few Honors GEs that are open. Next year, we both are two of the five preceptorial assistants on the committee for the Honors preceptorial program, on the exec board for Chemistry Club, one of fifteen pre-health advisors, and both are participating in the Scripps doctor shadowing program where we are fortunate enough to have prestigious Scripps doctors as mentors and the opportunity to see the excitements of different areas in the hospital, including the ICU and ER, on busy Friday and Saturday nights until 3 AM or so.
     It has been really interesting having so many friends just roaming around in Europe this summer, and even more exciting to actually meet up with them and hang out in pubs or have a bottle of wine in Luxembourg Gardens. We tried to go to the Catacombs today, but apparently getting there two hours before the last entrance isn't early enough. Hopefully, we can fit it in with the three full days we have left  in Paris. Boy, thinking about how we leave on Friday really shows how it's gone by so quickly. With all the things we still have to do before leaving, really baffles me how some people can come here for less than a week and leave feeling they've truly visited Paris. I've been here for nearly three weeks, yet still think there's so much we're going to leave unexplored when we leave. I still haven't even seen the view from the top of the Arc de Triomphe, the Eiffel Tower, or the 56 floor massive Montparnasse business building - many tourists are able to cram these activities all into one day, which sounds like what we might have to resort to in the few days we have left!!
     I'm truly going to miss Paris once I leave. There's so many restaurants I've fallen in love with that I want to return to before leaving, but there's just not enough meals in the day to get to all of them. I'm going to miss my fresh, warm French pastry every morning. My favorites have been Chausson aux Pommes (a delicious, flakey crust croissant like pastry filled with a gooey apple sauce like filling), a croissant (the plain, flakey buttery ones are definitely my favorite and definitely beat the panera croissants that I was never very fond of but my panera coworkers raved about - panera has nothing on the French pastries even though they too baked them daily), and the Croissant Amande (an almond croissant topped with sliced almonds and powdered sugar, but has the perfect balance of crispy, nutty, yet the almond paste inside perfects it - similar to a "bear claw" in America, but cannot even touch it). 

Croissant Amande

 Macarons

Chausson aux pommes

Those are just my breakfast favorites. Don't even get me started on my favorite snack pastries. The macarons have still remained my favorite. Every time I walk by a patisserie with macarons, I make myself stop in and indulge. These delightful little cookies from northeastern France are made from egg whites, almond powder and icing sugar. They are handburger-like shaped pastries made with two thin cookies with a thin layer of flavored icing in the center. A quality macaron has proven to be delicately crunchy on the outside and are moist, chewy and flavorful on the inside. On Sunday, I came across a bakery with macarons and could not resist the temptation of this light little treat. As I was trying to order, neither of the cashiers spoke English and the macarons were not labelled with flavors. I didn't feel like splurging 3,50 euros on a large macaron, especially when the smaller ones still satisfy the macaron craving, so I finally thought up "mini and petit" to lead the attendant in the right direction, but we still couldn't communicate which macaron I wanted. I really didn't care which flavor as I haven't been disappointed by any of the flavors, but obviously didn't have a way of communicating that to her. Luckily, a woman came in to the bakery during this incident and was able to translate and order the macaron for me. Chocolate filled coconut. mmmmmm. so worth the wait. I still have yet to be disappointed by the kindness I've been shown here in Paris. If someone was struggling this much with the language barrier, I'd probably judge them and think, why does this person feel entitled to come to my country and not know the language. I'd still try and help them out as I always try to when I can, but I'd definitely ignorantly judge them to myself.
     This experience in Paris has really changed my perspective on topics and opened up my views in the world. I really like to experience things first hand to remove my ignorance where possible.