Brrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr! It's chilly in France this week! And living in a house with no carpeting, only tiled floors, makes it even colder, because you're never warm! The cold seeps through, even when you're indoors!
Unfortunately, this was the day we planned our trip to Versailles, which means we didn't get to see the gardens because only a crazy person would walk around in the freezing rain.
But, the amazing part of today was we got to sleep in! Because we didn't have class! Yahoo!
I decided that I really like the RER. It doesn't stop as often as the Metro, so it's not as convenient, but it's so much more comfortable. And there are usually more seats. It's more like a train than the Metro.
We started almost 45 minutes late, though, because one girl in the group. Sigh. But that's ok. We still made it to the chateau in time. This girl is a very nice girl. She kind of reminds me of Lady Katherine from Pride and Prejudice, though. Oh, man....lol.
Anyway, when we got of the train, it was pouring! Bleh. :/ So Paris and I looked around the gift shop and got something to eat before meeting the group at the line to get into the chateau. I made a bad choice of what kind of panini to get from the sandwich shop. I'm not sure what was on it (some kind of cheese and white fluffy stuff) but it was gross. And way overpriced. lol. Oh well. It was almost as bad as the raw-bacon sandwich I had last night for dinner. Seriously, it looked and tasted like raw bacon. It was chewy and had tons of fat on it... And all it was was that bacon stuff and butter! I think I should try to make better sandwich selections next time.... I can't believe people eat that stuff.
After eating and walking up to the chateau, we had to stand in the freezing rain for over half an hour until they let our group in! Paris was sure it was snow or ice, not really rain. It was way too cold to be rain!
We finally made it inside. Can I just tell you, the chateau of Versailles is massive? Holy cow... I wonder how much of the castle they don't let visitors into (and what they do with all of those rooms!) because what we saw was huge, and it was only the royal family's quarters. They didn't show us any ballrooms or courtiers rooms or anything like that, and there had to be tons of those if the whole court was there!
I decided that if you lived at Versailles, the rooms had the potential of giving you a headache. There was gold and shiny things all over! Every wall and ceiling was dripping with gold! And the paintings were so beautiful. They had such deep, rich colors. I can't imagine ever living in something so enormous and grand! I'd be afraid to touch anything, because I'd probably break it.
Needless to say, Louis XIV knew how to make a castle. And he definitely knew how to control a court. Man... People had to go to his waking up and going to bed ceremonies everyday. That doesn't seem like it would be amusing for the courtiers or the king or anyone else involved. What kind of terrible alarm would that be? People all gathering around waiting for you to wake up. Staring at you. Ugh. I mean, who actually acts dignified when they wake up? And there would be no snooze button. (I guess you could throw a slipper and yell at the courtiers or something, but....I couldn't fall back asleep with 50 people waiting on me.) And the queen had to do it too, I think. Poor lady probably didn't know what she was getting into when she married him. :/
Although, I might marry the guy just to have the queen's bedroom! It was gorgeous! Everything was white with pink roses and green leaves touched with gold. Simply stunning. I would love to have a room like that. At least for one night. Maybe I'll have a room like that in my future home. :) (HAHA!) Of course....it might look funny in my little French cottage, but at least it would match the French theme!
I also really loved the Dauphine's quarters. They weren't quite as over-the-top as the king's and queen's. There was one room that was a sort of study for the Dauphine, and instead of gold all over, the accent was a pretty sage green on white walls. The desks in that room were pretty cool, too! And there was an awesome view of the gardens.
There were so many portraits in that place! It was crazy! And they all looked exactly the same. Well, at least the girls all had the same face, and the boys all had the same face. I decided that in real life, they must have shared very distinct family characteristics, or else the artist was kind of a one trick pony. Or I guess it could have been the style to have your portrait painted with that kind of face. I dunno. One of my favorite paintings was of one of the princes, because he was dressed like a girl! Luckily they dressed him in a dark blue and blue dress, but still...it was very much a dress. Hoop skirt and everything. I think that would be so hilarious! How could you tell boys and girls apart when they were that young? Maybe they made sure to dress boys and girls in different colors. I don't know. Or maybe it was because the whole time period wasn't very manly in general. They had to teach their sons early. I dunno. lol. :)
I guess I should also mention the hall of mirrors, because that's everybody's favorite. It was pretty cool. Huge, like, everything else. Lots of sculpture and paintings glorifying Louis XIV. I bet on a sunny day, it would have looked even more magnificent (and it looked pretty awesome on a cloudy day.) Also, there was this really cool hall that was just as big, but it had huge paintings of all the French war victories through the 1800s on its walls. Those paintings were really pretty, even if some were a little gory. There were also a couple halls that had huge classical statues of a lot of the kings of France and some of the other powerful or talented people in French history. I liked those halls too.
After the tour (which was via audio guide) we waited for the rest of our group outside. (Ugh!) We were huddled under a covered passageway trying not to freeze with all of the smokers. :P It was so gross. That is one thing I love about Provo, especially BYU. NO SMOKE! (Well, very little... at least where I usually hang out.) I swear, my life is going to be cut 10 years short from this trip, and all because of unintentional second hand smoke!
Dinner was pretty awesome, even if it did go a little long. (And by a little, I mean we were sitting at the table for two hours...) We finished eating before Mr. Devarenne and Aude got home, so we sat through them eating dinner too. lol. But it was fun, so I didn't mind. We ate radishes (at least I think they were radishes...some kind of red root) for the first course. I didn't think I'd like them at all, especially because they were raw, but I actually really liked them! And Paris liked them too, which was even crazier. lol. We buttered a little piece of bread, dipped the end of the radish in fleur de sel (which is like table salt, but bigger grains and a lot fancier), and ate them together. Yum! There were also tomatoes with some herbs on them and carrot sticks. The second course was some sort of lasagna. It wasn't exactly like American lasagna, but it was still really good! And then we had cheese (which always makes me happy) and dessert, which was a fruit salad of delicious cantaloupe, kiwi, and a couple other things I really didn't recognize.
One of the best parts about dinner, though, was talking to Mme Devarenne. She is honestly one of the most funny ladies I have ever met. lol. She cracks me up. And it's so cool, because she laughs at herself all the time. (And everyone else.) She's just a happy-go-lucky person and has such a positive view of life. We talked about my internship with BYU Athletic Communications and how she spent her early years in Algeria and how her daughters are all engineers except Aude and how she used to think Aude was so smart when she quizzed her on multiplication, only to find out Aude had drawn the multiplication table on the tablecloth. She told us how she used to have to drive her older sister places all the time because her sister didn't have her drivers license, and they both hated it. But it was because of driving her sister around that Mme Devarenne met Mr Devarenne. And she said she got married when she was twenty! Which is so early in France. She also talked a lot about some of the past students she's had stay at her house. That was pretty fun.
C "Paris, vous devez aller avec Rachel pour faire la conaissance des membres des equipe des sports! On peut trouver un garcon pour toi."
P "Oui. Peut-etre ils sont beaux!"
C "Si il est sympa, ca c'est le plus important. Si il est beau, c'est un bonus."
P "Oui, mais j'espere qu'il est mignon."
C "Rachel, ton petit ami, est-il mignon?"
R "Ouais!"
(on rit)
(Note: En realite, Paris a un petit ami. Aussi, ca c'est un peu paraphrase.)
Then Aude and Mr Devarenne got home and we talked about how cold it was going to be this week. (Bleh.) And Aude told us stories about when they went to Morocco and she went to dye her hair at a shop, and they turned it bright orange! So when she got back to France, she tried to dye it herself, and she turned it blue! And she had to go take a major test with blue hair. lol. After she dyed it blue, she asked her dad when he got home if he noticed anything different. He thought for a second, and then said, "You got a new sweater?" And he was dead serious. (heeheehee.)Then she went to a real hair dresser and had to sign a waiver saying she wouldn't sue them if her hair fell out when they were trying to turn it back to a normal color. She also talked to us about how she loved how cheap fake nails are in the U.S. (In France, they cost 90 euros!) She got her nails done when they were in the U.S. a little while ago, and before she went home, she ripped all of them off herself and went to get new nails put on so she could have them longer when she got back to France. lol.
A demain!
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