Scandinavian adventure

The flight into Stockholm this evening was beautiful!  Despite the delay at Roissy-CDG, we managed to make in into Sweden before the sun set.  The view was absolutely breathtaking!  When I'm back in Paris, I'll post the photos that will inevitably fail to do justice to the view from seat 10F at that particular moment.
Once we descended below the cloud level, a gorgeous body of water, scattered with tons of little green, forested islands appeared.  It felt like looking at the Earth from outer space except that we were only at an altitude of about 10000 - 15000 feet.

The arrival went off without a hitch.  I felt right at home thanks to a little Swedish hospitality.  As we deboarded the plane, a Starbucks greeted us upon our entry into the concourse.  After taking my bag from the claim area, I inserted my card upside down into ATM (a procedure which had confounded the French family in front of me who assumed the machine didn't work), and took out my 900 Swedish Krona (SEK).  The exchange rate at the time was about 6.5/7 krona to the dollar.  I had reserved my round trip airport bus (Flygbussarna)  online and found and boarded the coach from Arlanda airport into central Stockholm.  As we entered the interstate, I looked to the front of the bus and saw the mass of taillights up ahead, and I realized that I should have taken the Arlanda express.  It is a train that makes the trip in half the time (20 minutes as opposed to 45), but is also twice as expensive.  Given that it was 5 o'clock, I figured the mass of Volvos, BMWs, Mercedes and French-model cars would keep up company for at least double the predicted time.  And yet...welcome to Sweden!  As we approached the slowing vehicles, the Flygbuss accelerated past them in our own designated bus lane!  The driver made a couple of stops along the way (apparently on a little bus stop-exit ramp which allowed the bus to continue on a virtually straight path into the city), and we arrived at Stockholm Central Station 45 minutes after our departure from Arlanda.  
In the days leading up to my departure, I was a little anxious.  Usually when I am in a foreign country, I  am often able to speak the language, or at least get by on a minimal level of prior exposure.  Swedish, however, is rather difficult to decipher, at first, anyway.  It's not quite as difficult as Russian, as the alphabet is more or less the same, with a few extra accents scattered her and there, and some words look similar to English.  That being said, it seems that most people that you encounter here speak English well enough to help you out.  Although I haven't had too much time to explore, that has been my experience with the people at the hostel, the local convenience store, and the cafe-buffet where I ate dinner.

This is my first hostel experience, so I'm not exactly in the habit of to sharing a room with complete strangers.  The place seems pretty nice, though, and apparently Sweden is known for having some of Europe's best hostels.  It should be of no surprise that all of the furniture and the bedding is direct from IKEA.  I have only sat down on my bed, but it seems pretty comfy. 

Best Hostel - City (near the Hotorget T-bana)

Showers in the hall

My room (tennis racquet marks the spot!)

Kitchen

Breakfast area and lounge

Everything that I have read about prices here suggests that the cost of traveling in Sweden is VERY expensive.  I got a very good deal on the hostel, but my first meal out here provided a bit of the forewarned sticker shock.  I had a decent salad (even if it did have iceberg lettuce), a slice of quiche (listed as "paj" - sounds like "pie") and a bottle of water (which I had actually already purchased at the aforementioned convenience store, but was apparently the exact same kind they had at this cafe so that charged me again!  I didn't realize it until I sat down.  In America, I would have contested it, but given that I had only been in Stockholm for a few hours, I enjoyed my very expensive water and kept quiet.) The bill: 178 SEK.  At about 7 SEK to the dollar, that little meal put me back about 25 dollars!  I guess it's just the sort of thing that happens when you are "fresh-off-the-boat" and don't really know what is going on.  I'll definitely be a little more careful in the future.  I brought a stash of nourishment from France, so that should get me through at least one meal a day.
If you've read the Stieg Larsson books, you may or may not have realized that 7-11, where Lisbeth often shops, is pretty much as ubiquitous as Starbucks in larger US cities.  I may be going there quite a bit to supplement my other packets of food.  Surely I'll find a Konsum or one of the other Swedish grocery stores in the morning when it's light out, and when I'm a little less hesitant about wandering around looking lost.

Well, that's about all for now, folks.  Tomorrow is the day that I have dedicated to sightseeing.  On top of the list of things to see is Skansen, described in my trusty 2005 Rick Steves' Scandinavia guide book as an open-air folk museum, giving visitors a taste of what Sweden used to be like back in the day. 
Another of my planned visits includes a trip to the Vasa museum, which is supposed to be fascinating due to the fact that it houses a restored 16th-century ship that was recovered from the bottom of the ocean.   I may have more time if I don't get into the tournament here.  I'm 17th on the waiting list, but I was 126th a week and a half ago, so while it may sound improbable that I will play this weekend, I'm still holding out hope. I would like to try splurging one night at the Grand Hotel, which apparently serves a wonderfully worthwhile smorgasbord with tons of traditional Swedish food.  I guess the possible gorgefest will depend on whether or not I need to be able to move around a tennis court.  Herring, salmon, reindeer, lingonberries, meatballs, and cinnamon buns, among other Swedish delicacies, are probably do not top the list for a reasonable pre-match meal.  Oh well.

From Alice Through the Looking Glass to Le Dernier métro

"'I should see the garden far better,' said Alice to herself, `if I could get to the top of that hill: and here's a path that leads straight to it -- at least, no, it doesn't do that -- ' (after going a few yards along the path, and turning several sharp corners), `but I suppose it will at last. But how curiously it twists! It's more like a corkscrew than a path! Well, this turn goes to the hill, I suppose -- no, it doesn't! This goes straight back to the house! Well then, I'll try it the other way.'
And so she did: wandering up and down, and trying turn after turn, but always coming back to the house, do what she would. Indeed, once, when she turned a corner rather more quickly than usual, she ran against it before she could stop herself."  - Through the Looking Glass, "The Garden of Live Flowers", Lewis Carroll.

Alice's anxious anticipation of and frustration towards the elusive garden on top of the hill very justly parallels my experiences in trying to navigate my neighborhood park.  Her amazement and angst at her inability to reach her intended destination faithfully mirrors my own reaction to consistently futile effort I put forth in trying to assert my cartesian sense of direction on the wooded environs.  Although I have encountered no outlandish creatures (save for the Frenchmen in running tights), the fear of losing time and peace of mind is ever present on the smaller, ever-so-slightly-turning trails.  It is clear that the architects of the grid system of streets in Chicago and New York did not have a hand in designing the gravel-covered routes of the bois de Vincennes.  Or maybe they did and the bois represents their drunken liberation from the oppressive (although reassuringly logical) system of perfectly perpendicular intersections.    However, as surely as other oppressed peoples have cried out at the injustices surrounding them, I say to the confoundingly homogenous mass of trees, bushes, winding paths: "I shall overcome!"
 
My last "Through the Looking Glass" experience in the woods occurred just before my departure on the 10h54 TGV to Lyon.  Fortunately, marathon and tennis training has supplied me with the endurance to overcome the potential fatigue of an unexpectedly prolonged run.  Having left a little time cushion for precisely this type of delay, I made it home and onto the speedy train with plently of time to spare and little time to waste.

The entirety of the weekend was superb.  I arrived at Lyon Perrache and was met at the entry to the train station by one of my gracious hosts.  For lunch, we decided to head back to their apartment perched on a hill over looking the city.  On this particular weekend, it was better to observe the center city from afar rather than find oneself mixed up in the aftershocks of the week's earlier protests and violence.  Although the destruction in Lyon was linked to the nation-wide protests against certain reforms in France's retirement system, the most egregious destruction seemed to be enacted by certain young people who simply took the unrest as a pretext for unleashing angst and a repressed desire to reek havoc.  The news reports claimed that many of the young people involved in the crowd (not necessarily that actual destruction) were female high school students, and there were very few in the group who actually had any kind of history of this sort of behavior.  Apparently the possibility of acting out with impunity was too great a temptation to be overcome.

The afternoon was to bring more excitement and action from the CRS (basically, the French riot police) and Police helicopters.  While my host and I were meeting up with some other friends from Charlottesville, we observed, from the children's playground, the overhead surveillance and the street-level parade of 10 CRS vans pass, fortunately on the opposite side of the Saône river.

Time spent in Lyon on this trip was not be long.  In the early evening, when the better half of my duo of hosts returned home from work, we loaded up the car and headed to Praz-sur-Arly, a ski area in Haute-Savoie, not far from Mont-Blanc.  From the backseat, as I have done in the past, I marveled at Lyon's lights and beautiful landscape as we left the city and began our journey towards the mountains.  In the daylight, the outline of the alps actually appears rather quickly after passing the city limits.  In my child-like fascination with mountains and snow, I anxiously awaited the gradual appearance of the peaks appear before my eyes.  Alas, given the hour, it would have to wait until morning.  The following photographs represent the view from my bedroom window, and subsequently the ajoining balcony, at the Meyer's apartment in Praz:

If you look closely on top of the mountain, there are ski lifts in the snow patches.

 

We arrived on Friday evening and slept in a bit on Saturday morning before our "hike".  I must qualify the word "hike" by saying that it was really just a car ride to Megève (a well-know and super glitzy French ski resort) plus a 20 minute walk up the mountain to enjoy the fall air and ham sandwiches alongside the local alpine bovine.  In our defense, one of my hosts' friends from Grenoble made the climb with an 8-month old strapped to his front.  Hence the brevity of our trekking. 

Megève

A view into the valley of Megève as we began our hike

Our wonderfully gracious hosts, Alix and Marlène

Off we go

Hmm...where are we?

A garden with a view

View from our sandwich stop

Emilie, mother of the petite Lison

Post-hike, we returned to the apartment for some relaxation and sauna time before beginning preparations for the main dish of the weekend: Fondue!  Although we were a little short on good weather for the weekend (it rained all day Sunday with snow starting at altitudes a little higher than the base of Praz), we suffered no shortage of good company and good food.  Given the relatively sparse quantity of activity, one might even be tempted to say that we over-indulged.  However, given that for most of France, this past weekend announced the beginning of the Toussaint (All Saints) holiday, we just made sure to get vacation off to a good start.  (That being said, your dear correspondent's university apparently didn't get the memo about the holiday.  Although, I suppose that after only one week of teaching, perhaps complaining about being overworked is probably in slightly bad taste.  Nonetheless, we do have off on November 1, All Saints' Day.)

Lessons in language proficiency: Playing "Taboo" in French
Once we soaked as much bread as we could with cheese, and filled our bellies with as much as they could withstand, we moved on to what the French call "jeux de société."  An example of one of these large group style games is Taboo, a challenge that involves two teams, a deck of cards and a board on which to advance each team's token.  On the header of each of the cards is a word with five words below it which may not be used in trying to help the other members of the team guess the word.  While I certainly experiences tests everyday of my proficiency in French, this was a reassuring one.  Although I did manage to help my team out a little on the guessing end, I was much better at the role of describing the word.  Only a once was there a word that I just didn't know.  Its English equivalent is "tire tracks".  A new word added to my vocabulary: les ornières. 

Speaking about one's level of language proficiency to others who have no knowledge of the language in question is actually quite easy to exaggerate.  Since I have studied French for about 15 years (now officially longer than the amount of time that I haven't studied French), those who want to judge my fluency by some sort of "tangible" measure, often ask whether or not I dream in my second language.  I have never been able to answer this question satisfactorily, neither for myself nor for another interlocutor.  In fact, the response to the question may be unimportant since we could never prove to anyone concretely, including ourselves, that about which we have dreamed.  While we may remember particularly vividly certain images, it is really about consciousness.  When I think that I may have dreamed in French, I'm not quite sure because in a dream, it is about what I have understood.  Even in waking moments, there are times when it takes me awhile to realize that I'm talking to myself in French until I come to a thought about which I'm not 100 percent sure of  how to express in French.  Only then do I become aware of the distinction between the two languages, for each has settled in my brain at a very fluid level of comprehension as well as production, though of course at varying degrees.

At the end of a wonderful weekend, I made my way back to Paris on the TGV with two little girls who were trying everything in their power to make sure that no one in the car would be able to get the sleep that would normally be expected to accompany a two-hour train ride that began at 10:42 on Sunday evening.  In spite of their struggle to use "inside voices" and the parents' unwillingness to do what was necessary to achieve that goal, I must have managed to doze off for before I knew it, the familiar TGV chimes were sounding our imminent arrival into Paris Gare de Lyon.  Looking at my watch and thinking hopefully that the metro might not yet be closed, I sped as quickly as I could through the sleepy travelers on the platform and tried to dodge others who clearly were of the same mind as me.  By an amazing feat of timing, I managed to arrive at the tracks of the métro, Direction Château de Vincennes just a few short minutes before the last train came through the station, saving myself at least 6-7 euros in cab fare.  A dramatic, cinematic end to a delightful weekend.

Chez moi (at my apartment)

Inside my studio (clockwise: Bed, TV (out of the photo), desk, microwave, kitchen, washing machine, hallway with bathroom on left and closet on the right, bookshelves)

 Photo number two of the studio from the opposite side.

 

From the entry

Bathroom

Bathroom

Hallway

Button to open the Main doors from the inside-out (a FOB key is used from the outside-in)

Entryway and mailboxes

To the basement

To the storage units in the basement

The famous "vélo"

Too brief or not too brief

It is way past my bedtime, but it has been a busy 36 hours, so I thought I would just hit on the major highlights:
Friday 13h30:
Went for a run in the Bois de Vincennes.  Got lost.  45 min run turned into an 1h30 run.  Although I was lost, I found a tennis club along the way.  The pro there offered to hit with me on Tuesday for a couple of hours.  Chouette! (Sweet!)
Friday 17h:
Back to the bank to sign one more paper.  Hopefully I'll have my carte à puce (debit/credit card with a little chip at the end -indispensable in France; possession of one is another sign of initiation into the club; paying with a credit card that you have to slide through the machine is a clear sign of foreignness)
Friday 19h30:
Instead of taking the métro into the city, opted for the 86 bus from City Hall to Saint-Germain-Odéon.  Met a friend for a drink at one of my favorite café-restaurants, Les Editeurs.  The whole place is lined with book-filled shelves.  For the winter, they have delish vin chaud (mulled wine).

Saturday 10h30:
Woke up without an alarm and am finally over jet-lag.  Found the local library, paid my 10 euros for a year-long membership and borrowing card.  Received a nifty pen with the website for the library catalogue.  Checked out 3 books.
Saturday 11h:
Headed to Monoprix along with the rest of the residents of Saint-Mandé.  Apparently Saturday = market day.
Saturday 12h30:
Met up with a woman who I met in Charlottesville two summers ago.  At UVa, played tennis with her then 12-year-old son and promised to stay in touch.  Today, we went to the tennis club to meet the pro and schedule a hit.  Ate lunch together.  Fricassée de Poulet (chicken)/riz (rice) + Crème brûlée for dessert.  She invited me to a play.
Saturday 15h:
Went to the Cartoucherie near the Château de Vincennes to see a play by Georges Feydeau called Le Dindon (The Turkey); written in 1896.  Quite hilarious.  Actually understood most of the jokes.  Audience was laughing almost the entire 2h15.
Saturday 18h15:
Tempted fate with another run through the bois.  Didn't get lost. :)
Saturday 20h:
Met up with Kelly (Midd friend) and her husband Yann at Robert et Louise, a restaurant in the Marais (the Jewish and Gay neighborhood in Paris) serving lots of hearty meat dishes.  We shared Rillettes d'Oie (not sure how to translate - like shredded goose meat to spread on toast/bread) and Escargot (snails) for an appetizer; then shared a big slab of less than medium-rare (i.e. "saignant" = bloody), sautéed potatoes and a little salad.  Corbières wine to go with.  The girls shared a gâteau au chocolat (chocolate cake that looked more like a moist brownie) Yummmmm!

These are a few of my favorite things...

Well, here's number one (especially with the Cubs hat!):

 But here are a few of my favorite things in France (in no particular order):


Jordan's Country Crisp:
Definition: A granola cereal filled with all kinds of different nuts!

On my first trip to Monoprix (a national chain of grocery stores), they were out, and I almost settled for the one with chocolate instead of nuts, but I resisted, and was eventually rewarded for my restraint!


The next favorite thing for which I have a picture:
Danone Jockey Petit Encas:
Definition:  The creamiest, yummiest yogurt on the planet!
NEWSFLASH! The reason this "yogurt" is SOOO good...well, it appears that it's not actually yogurt, it's "fromage frais", leaning more towards the custard side of the dairy dessert spectrum.

Larger than most yogurt containers in France, Petit Encas is somewhere in between snack and dessert.  After I had this particular yogurt for the first time, no other yogurt has really come close (ok, there was one at Trader Joe's...)  This stuff is amazing!  It's SOOOO creamy, and while my local Monoprix only seems to carry Strawberry (Fraise) and Peach (Pêche), I'm on the lookout for my favorite flavors which are Apple Vanilla (Pomme Vanille) and Pineapple (Ananas).

Other favorite French things (to be continued and with pics to come):

Salade de chevre chaud (Hot goat cheese salad):
Definition: A bed of leafy greens with a creamy vinaigrette dressing, upon which are perched little toasted slices of baguette topped with warm, round slices of goat cheese.  Absolute heaven!

Le Métro:
Definition: The famous Paris subway, which has many detractors, but is truly an amazing example of mass transit (And I mean MASS, particularly at rush hour when you are forced become quite intimate with complete strangers while acting as if it is nothing at all that the only way to hold onto the center pole is to place your arm in the middle of your fellow traveler's chest).

Le Petit Marseillais products:
Definition: Le Petit Marseillais makes personal hygene products like soaps, hair care, body gel, lotion, etc.  I don't know that there is really anything better about it (although the various scents are often different than anything we have in America), but sometimes different (and French) is just more interesting, and consequently seems better.  Plus, I'm kind of a sucker for packaging.  The little boy from Marseilles is just too cute!

French pastries:
Examples: Pain au chocolat (Chocolat croissant), Pain au Raisins, Chausson aux pommes (Apple turnover, of sorts), Viennois au chocolat, Brioche avec sucre ou avec pépits de chocolat, Croissant aux abricots.   (Photos to come)

If only photos could capture the smell and the taste - it's amazing that French people manage to stay so thin when you have to walk past a bakery almost every 500m or so if not more often.

Couscous and Mint Tea (the a la menthe):
While neither are actually French in origin, the North African population in France has helped to make both a common sight around the country.  Both are absolutely delish!  And this is not the mint tea that you can buy in the tea bag in the store.  It definitely has sugar and its fair share of peppermint leaves in the tea pot.  I've never encountered mint tea like this anywhere but in France (although I have yet to visit North Africa.)

Linear time is so 19th century: A flashback to my last weekend in Jax

While I hold no strong philosophical objection to the natural linear progression of time, my iPhoto decided to go on strike at the particular moment that I would have liked to create a post.  So, in more modern narrativist fashion, this blog has forsaken linear time and returned to a more distant past than the previous entry. 


I've always thought of myself as rather adventurous, but my dear boyfriend provides constant reminders (usually through actions and less so through words) that insisting you are open-minded may often actually be a sign of closed-mindedness.

And so, we went on our first fishing trip together.  I would never choose to go fishing on my own, but Ky's enthusiasm is quite persuasive and usually just as contagious.  After an earlier trip to purchase most of the necessary fishing equipment from the local sporting goods store, an extensive conversation with the seemingly competent sales person, and several hours of reading on the internet about how, where, and when to catch fish as well as what fish one could expect to hook in North Florida (my inherent skepticism was looking for an answer to the question why one would want to try to catch fish when the Publix down the street offered a perfectly nice selection of seafood), we set off early Saturday morning on the 9th of October to purchase some bait (shrimp and minnows) and headed to our favorite Northeast Florida beach.

I let the fisherman do his work, while I adopted the role of photographer with my relatively new digital camera (a gift from the fisherman in question).  Having finally read my manual, which was actually supposed to be a precondition for my use of the camera, and having learned a few things from our household's professional photographer (and amateur fisherperson), I managed to snap a few worthwhile pics.

Without further ado, I present you with a photo montage of a "fall" fishing scene from Fernandina Beach, Florida:

 

Le Catch du jour

Old Man and the Sea :)