New Videos

There & Back

Created for a final presentation in my Cultural Translation Workshop, this is a video translation of the last academic year of my life between Paris and Minneapolis. With over an hour of footage to narrow down, I chose clips depicting the constant movement and restlessness of living in two places, which can result simultaneously in both excitement and loneliness. No matter where I live, in Paris or in Minneapolis, my heart is always missing the other.

April

My regular monthly video for April, including visiting Fontainebleau, running the The Color Run 5K, visiting Annecy and Geneva with my sister, hiking on my birthday in the Alps and, of course, regular life in Paris.

A Walk on the Wild Side

     As a not-born but bred Minnesotan, I'm feeling a little guilty that I made it through a winter without any snow in France. A few times, I've found myself complaining that I was cold, which I don't have the right to do while living here. After twenty-something years of dealing with hell Minnesota Winter, which has provided me with such warm memories as full-out blizzards on Halloween 1991 and my late-April birthday in 2013, I'm contented with the fact that Paris's leaves are now in full-bloom, jackets are optional and my shoes don't have salt stains. It's getting increasingly hard to argue that I'm not on a year-long vacation. Grad school abroad is really, really hard and it only looks like a vacation, I promise.

     On Saturday, after months of whining about it, I was finally able to convince my friends Matt and Emma to go along with me out to the little town of Fontainebleau to visit the château and hike in the national forest, which I did once two years ago. The royal château, dating back to the Renaissance in the sixteenth century, is an old, pre-Versailles royal residence that is infinitely more enjoyable to visit when the weather warms up because the crowds aren't so dense and it doesn't quite have that cattle-barn feel that Versailles has with its borderline-insane tourists. (On an unrelated note, Lana Del Rey's "Born to Die" video was filmed in the Trinity Chapel.)

     The 110-square-mile Forest of Fontainebleau was once a royal hunting park and now it's a great escape for city folk to experience some true, un-manicured nature within Ile-de-France. The forest is also popular for bouldering (Hear that, Emily?) and hiking. While I definitely love living in Paris, I also desperately need breaks to get out of the city, hear twigs crackling underfoot, get mud on my shoes and be among trees that aren't obsessively pruned into rectangles. 

Did you know the Seine isn't always brown, either?

Cheers,

Rachel

     

No tigers here!

The non-brown Seine

P.S. Here's my monthly video for March

Champagne Supernova

I, admittedly, haven't seen much of France outside of Paris. It's a little strange that I've seen much, much more of Italy, for example, than France. Last year, I spent a weekend in Marseille and Arles and went on a day trip to Giverny with Central, as well as an awesome hiking trip to Fontainebleau on my own with friends, but other than that, I know nothing about France outside of Paris firsthand. Quel dommage! I see this as a real problem, because it's like only visiting New York in the States (I hate when people say 'the States', but I just did it.). When Parisians realize I'm American (Which takes all of two seconds), they immediately start confessing their love for New York (And sometimes California) even if they've never been there. When I say that I'm actually from Minnesota, I think I burst their bubble. It really peeves me that New York is somehow a microcosm of the U.S. for foreigners in the same way that Paris is for France. In reality, most Americans are NOT from New York and don't live that lifestyle and I think the same goes for the French in regard to Paris. It seems like I'm constantly defending and promoting Minnesota, but I think it usually falls on deaf ears (I think Parisians are just not interested in our lakes or freezing your ass off in the nearly year-round snow).

I sometimes find myself wishing I had just gone the TAPIF route and been placed in a small town in the middle of nowhere just so I can have that alternate experience of France. But I love Paris too much, so I couldn't let that happen. Yet. Maybe another time, since the program allows you to do it until you're 29. But by 29, I should maybe try to have my life a little more put together (Or not. We'll see where I'm at when the time comes. A wise philosopher once said, "YOLO." and I've taken that to heart).

Anyway, my point is that this past weekend, the graduate students went on a day trip to Reims, at the heart of the Champagne region and I loved seeing more of France. There was so little time to see or do anything, so after our two-hour bus ride in, we immediately went to Notre-Dame de Reims, a beautiful thirteenth-century Gothic cathedral whose structure resembles Notre-Dame de Paris, but whose façade is much more ornate. We also saw the Basilique Saint-Remi de Reims, which I actually enjoyed more due to the lack of tourists and a choir practicing in the back. I am such a sucker for European churches. I'm starting to get a little jaded when it comes to their aesthetic beauty, but it just floors me how old they are and to think of how many generations have spent their time- very personal time- in them. I also love them because they're free.

The rest of the day, we spent at the French Champagne house, Pommery. Again, clearly knowing nothing about France at large, I was expecting a Champagne house to be in the countryside and to be able to see the actual fields where the grapes are produced, but Pommery is well within the bounds of the town. I'm learning.

We had a tour of the cellar, where an astounding 28 million bottles are currently stored. Shit! Think about that. Like really think about it. If I did my Googling  math right, that's more than five bottles of Champagne for every Minnesotan. I've done winery tours before (In Italy and Greece), but nowhere near as massive as Pommery.

So here are the photos I took while in Reims that don't really do it justice.

Love,
Rachel

Notre-Dame de Reims

Notre-Dame de Reims

Notre-Dame de Reims

Notre-Dame de Reims- the windows were done by Marc Chagall in the 1970s

Notre-Dame de Reims

Notre-Dame de Reims

Notre-Dame de Reims

Reims

Basilique Saint-Remi de Reims

Reims

Pommery

Pommery

Pommery

Pommery

Pommery

Pommery- this wall engraving was done under candlelight and took a year to complete.

The oldest Pommery Champagnes

Pommery

Pommery

Paris (And Fontainebleau) When It Drizzles

     Tout à coup, it's springtime in Paris. Last week, it was even warm enough to skip wearing a coat. Everything is coming to life in Paris and I'm so happy to see the sun again. The fountains in the Jardin du Luxembourg are turned on and there are so many runners and tennis players. I can't wait to get my running shoes in the mail so I can run again and maybe find a place to rent a tennis racket. That's what I really hate about winter, being inside all the time. I really just want to lay in the sun all day long with a good book and a croissant, bien sûr. 

     I never really thought about how much I love being in nature until I went to Fontainebleau this weekend. Anna, Anna's friend, Greg and I left early Saturday morning to take the 60-kilometer train ride out to see the château and go hiking in the Forêt de Fontainebleau, which is known for its boulders and rare species of trees. I'm getting really jaded to how beautiful everything is in Europe and I was not really shocked by how insanely lavish the château was. When I come back home, I'll probably be in shock that Target doesn't have frescoes and gilded ceilings.

     Since it was beautiful weather all week, of course it had to drizzle on and off all weekend in Fontainebleau and back in Paris. Despite the cold, it was not really all that bad since we were under the trees during the hike. It was actually really beautiful since the landscape was covered in a layer of light fog. We hiked up to the bluff overlooking the towns of Fontainebleau and Avon, picnicking and having great conversations with wine, baguettes, and croissants on the boulders. It's strange to think as you're walking, silent except for sticks crackling underfoot, that the urban jungle of Paris is just a forty-minute train ride back. I love being in the city- whether it's Minneapolis or Paris- but it's wonderful to get away from the crowds and the noise and be present, in the moment, and actually hear what other people are saying, instead of shouting over ambulance sirens and bumping into every impatient, black suit-wearing Parisian that ever lived.

     I'm now really looking forward to our weekend hiking trip in May that I'm working on planning right now of which our location hasn't been decided yet. Never thought I'd miss the Apennines from last summer this much, but I do.

Rachel