Playing Catch Up

To all my dedicated fans, I apologize. I have no excuse for my long absence other than laziness. So, on the eve of my next vacation I’m finally going to write about my last one in Berlin. You’ll be spared a lot of the historical details since I don’t remember them any more and mostly you’ll just be able to look at the pictures! The first night we got to Berlin it was late and so we just made our to Sophia’s grandfather’s apartment and hung around and went to sleep. The next day we walked into town and saw a cathedral that was damaged during a bombing in WWII and never restored in order to remind everyone who saw it about the realities of war.

We also saw a really cool break dancing/ street performance. Interestingly enough the men conducted the entire performance in English (I guess because there were so many tourists) and his English was almost perfect. I haven't encountered any street performers in France with such a high level of English....



Cool sculpture:



We then made our way to the Brandenburg Gate, which was commissioned by Friedrich Wilhelm II and built between 1788 to 1791. It used to be the gate to the city and later became part of the border between East and West Berlin.



Next, Danae and I went to the Reichstag which is the German government building. If you look closely you can see me in my light brown coat at the bottom of the stairs on the right.



There is a really cool modern glass part of the Reichstag that Danae and I climbed up:



After our day we went home and relaxed with some beers at the apartment. This is Barbara and me enjoying some green beers from Berlin:



The next day we went to the Turkish Market in the area of Berlin where there are a lot of Turkish immigrants:



After the Turkish market we went to the Jewish Museum, which traces the history of Jews in Germany from the Middle Ages up to today. The architecture was really interesting and was made to make you feel unsettled / unsure to show how the Jews have felt throughout history after their many journeys to new countries.

The next day we went to Potsdam, which is a suburb of Berlin and home of lots of the castles of the German (Prussian) royal family. We took a tour of Sans Souci (French, not German, for Without Worry), Frederich the Great's summer palace.



More castles:





At Potsdam, I bought a book about Kaiser Wilhelm II's mother (Empress Frederich/ Princess Victoria of England) and I'm still working on it seeing as its about 500 pages but its really interesting to read it after having seen all of her palaces and the places she visited in Berlin.

That night we went out to a club to experience Berlin's famous nightlife. I wasn't disappointed! We managed to find a club that was both huge and really unpretentious. It was sort of like being at a huge party with all of your friends. This is us before we went out:



The next day after an (ahem) late start, Danae and I went to see Checkpoint Charlie and the Checkpoint Charlie Museum. Checkpoint Charlie was the barrier between American Berlin and Soviet Berlin:

Then we went to a Sri Lanken Restaurant for dinner where we decided it would be a good idea to take pictures like this:





I'm pretty sure the waitress thought we were insane. I guess Barbara was either too classy to participate or just really liked being the photographer.

The next day we went to the East Side Gallery which is a part of the wall that still standing and is covered in murals and graffiti.

This is us on the walk there followed by some pictures of graffiti:

Note Barbara's head at the bottom.



Barbara, Danae and me in from of the River Spree




(not me)


("we were here" also not us)







not on the Wall but still so nice.

After the Wall it was just about cake time (something that really exists in Germany!!) and so for the sake of full cultural immersion we decided to participate:






After cake, Danae and I went to Museum Island to visit the Cathedral:




We got up the next day at 4 to catch our flight (which, of course, was delayed!) and then I went off to Alsace which I will document in my next post in about 10 minutes!

Tour de Cesson, Mont St. Michel, and St. Malo!

Well, even though this all happened two weeks ago I've just gotten home from Berlin and Strasbourg so I'm going to post it all now. Before heading to Berlin, Paul came to visit Brittany. The day after he got in we decided to take a walk to the Tour de Cesson which is a tower, now in ruins, built in 1395, that was used to guard St. Brieuc from pirate attacks. It was about a 45 minute walk and we also got to see the port. Unfortunately, we found out when we got there that the tower is private property and so we couldn't get right up next to it. (It seems like something the owners should think about changing since they could make a little money charging a euro or two to get close to it. Ah but there I go being a typical capitalist American).

Port area:


The port; the tower is visible on the hill on the right:


Tower on the top of the hill:


Ducklings we saw in someone's yard:


On Saturday we went to Mont St. Michel and St. Malo with Chantal and Clare. Mont St. Michel was totally incredible. It's technically in Normandie but its just over the border from Brittany so it wasn't too far of a drive. My pictures from Mont St. Michel don't do it justice at all so I'm going to wait 'til tomorrow to post any. (I'll have to steal them from others).
St. Malo was really nice too and the weather was warm enough that we could stick our toes in the water. By random happenstance we saw our friends Jessica, Otman and Rodrigo there as well.

In this picture you can see the ramparts of St. Malo as well as Paul and Chantal looking at Paul's camera.



Just some pretty views of the islands from the shore:




I'll add more pictures with people in them as I can collect them from others. Even though it was February it was warm enough to wade a bit! I'm tackling the Germany and Alsace posts tomorrow.

Morlaix!

I've gotten a bit behind on my blog entries. I don't really have an excuse either because, let's face it, it's not like I'm swamped down at the office or something. Last Monday, Chantal, Clare and I visited a really cute town in the département of Finistère (the westernmost département in Brittany) called Morlaix. According to legend, this town got its name because when the English tried to attack the villagers screamed "S'ils te mordent, mords-les!" ("If they bite you, bite them back!" pretty vicious!). To understand this legend, it must be explained that "mords-les" and "Morlaix" are, inexplicably, both pronounced "morlay."

We tried to do what was called the Circuit des Venelles, which is a tour of the town's historic sights, but we ended up only making it to half of them. The entire tour is supposed to take one hour and fifteen minutes and it took us about three hours to do half. I like to think it was because we stopped to smell the roses but I think it had more to do with my less than stellar sense of direction coupled with a hand drawn map from c. 1976. In any event, the town was really cute and really breton!

Famous Morlaix Viaduct:


Chantal and Clare and a historically important fountain (dry):


Graffiti translation: "Ticked off High School students." Someone probably tried to get them to learn English and so they went on grève.


Breton Venice:


Cute houses:


Anne de Bretagne's house (she had many):


Well-earned hot chocolate in a café after climbing up and down venelles all day.


All together a successful trip! More about Paul's return trip, Mont St. Michel, St. Malo and la Tour de Cesson soon! Now I'm off to Berlin!!

Cahutta, Dinan and a Party

As usual, Ellen, the sole assistant in Loudeac, came to St. Brieuc for the weekend. We planned on going out to one of our favorite bars but we accidentally got sucked into watching approximately 15 episodes of Real World: Sydney on mtv.com. Our favorite roommate was a fun-loving hillbilly from the Georgian mountains named Cahutta. We both basically fell in love with him. His accent was too funny and we couldn't stop watching his romance with Texan KellyAnne bloom. At one point he talked about how he wanted two or three mountain babies running around and that he'd better start looking for a girl cause he wasn't getting any younger (he was 23). In short, spending Friday night having a Real World marathon was a fabulous use of time.
The next day Ellen, Clare and I took a day trip to Dinan. I went once before with Paul but that was right before Christmas and it was cold and already dark. Saturday was a beautiful day and it was light out so the town looked totally different.

Dinan Cathedral:



Some views from the ramparts (which are the longest in Brittany):



Château de Dinan:


Medieval Commode:


View from the top:


Sun Worship:


Walk down to River:


Rance River:


Saturday night we had a very successful party at my house to welcome Clare as our 5th roommate:

The assistants at Lycée Rabelais:


A French girl and two North Americans:


Dancing with Jessica:


All in all, an excellent weekend.

Retraction

La Vie en Breton would like to issue a retraction. As it turns out, many people who had not consumed any quiche became violently ill as well and, as such, we have concluded that it was, in fact, a 24 hour bug. La Vie en Breton wishes to apologize to whomever made the quiche. It was delicious and we hope that we have not caused you any undue pain nor defamed your reputation as a quiche chef. La Vie en Breton sincerely regrets the error.

p.s. Paul sent me some pictures so I added them to Odds and Ends!

Raw Oysters and Food Poisoning

Interestingly enough, the two subjects in the title of this entry are unrelated. I'll elaborate:

On Friday night, our friends Kati and Lena threw an oyster tasting party. Not steamed or smoked oysters either, raw oysters. Normally, in the States, I don't eat seafood at all (being a vegetarian) but since living here I try some from time to time since it is a specialty of the region. For some reason that doesn't make sense to most people, I would much rather eat an oyster than tuna fish so once in a while I'll make an exception in my vegetarianism for a mollusk.

Anyway, the party was really fun and it turns out raw oysters mostly just taste like a mouthful of seawater. Here are some pictures:

Our victims:


The table:


Lena and her precious landlord, René, who helped throw the party:


Lena, Kati and Ellen:


Me and Clare:


Ellen and me:


After the party, most of us headed to O'Kenny's.

Rodrigo (my Spanish teacher), Clare, me:


Clare, Jessica and Ellen


Ellen, Me, Chantal:


The next day we went to visit our pals in Rennes. We went to a party at their friends' house where there was a lot of food. Jessica and I were really hungry and so we pretty much camped out next to the snack table. The others tried a little food but not much. We especially liked a quiche/tortilla espanol thing and, since no one else was eating anything, and there were two whole quiches, Jessica and I went to town with one of them and pretty much ate all of it ourselves. If we knew then what we know now...

These are our shiny, happy faces after we ate the quiche but before it tried to kill us (Julian on the left was quiche-free):


Gwendal, Ellen and Clare, also quiche-free:


Note: Gwendal looks really tough but he has a heart of gold.

I'll leave out the details but suffice it to say, the next day Jessica and I were supremely nauseous and had to travel back to St. Brieuc in a terrible state. I will tell you one story even though its possibly slightly inappropriate:
At one point, a man came up to Jessica outside the train station and asked her for money, while she was literally in the middle of throwing up. Maybe that's too much information but it was too funny not to tell.
The moral of the story is, don't eat quiche that has been sitting out God knows how long, and that has been prepared under possibly slightly unsanitary conditions. Fin.

I am writing this post from my own home

I can't express with words my joy over having the internet in my house. Its totally thrilling. So thrilling that I'm not going to ruin my good mood by posting about how my landlady is INSANE. I'll save that for another day. As a teaser, yesterday she reached new lows of irrational and illogical behavior.

I have a few more stories about things my students say:

1. Mathieu: (points to self) It's a good boyfriend.
Me: How old are you?
Mathieu: 20
Me: (incredulous look)
Mathieu: Bahhhh, 20 in 4 months.
Me: Soooo, 19, in other words
Mathieu: but I am major! (He meant that he wasn't a minor. This is actually alarming since he's in the French equivalent of 11th grade and should be almost 17 not almost 20)

later....
Mathieu: Sarah, we like you (meaning he and his friends in class).
Me: That's nice, Mathieu, I like you guys too.
Mathieu: You are very interesting
Me: uh huh
Mathieu: (points to self) It is man (points to me) It is woman. It works.

No, Mathieu, it doesn't.

2. In Anglophone Jeopardy, students were asked to give the capital of South Africa. One boy raised his hand very enthusiastically and yelled, "Venezuela!!!"

3. Similarly, when the question was "Name 3 Presidents of the US not including George W. Bush," a very excited girl called out "Canada!!!" Really, there's no excuse for that since the words in English and French for "president" are exactly the same.

Sigh.

In other news, Clare has held 3 different students' hands. Thankfully, these have all been guys in the technical college program; she hasn't done any hand holding with high school students...yet.