Lille, France

I came to a city called Lille in France on the 5th of March until the 8th.

After considering some transportation options, I was left with only one; driving for 3.5hours on my own. I still have the sense of living in Japan or in the US, so the fact that I can cross the countries by car without showing a passport doesn’t click in me yet.

However, I do enjoy when I travel to the country where I can use Euros. The most troublesome thing when traveling abroad is to determine how much I need to exchange which is the amount that I can spend it all by the time I am back to the airport I just arrived. It cannot be too little because I would have to exchange with a higher rate at hotel, or cannot be too much because I would have to pay the ridiculous amount as a fee for the exchange. I remember when I came back from some country, I was supposed to get back ten Euros. It turned out that I received only 3 and the rest was for the fee. It can’t happen again.

Usually, I put the remaining local money in the charity box at the airport, but sometimes I realize later that I had some left in my pocket. A couple Chinese bills are still sitting on my dining table now. I think it’s worth about two dollars.

I ordered shrimp, and duck came out. I at first thought that it was for some other table but brought to me by mistake. But no one came to take it off my table. So I guess I ordered it…?

I thought that probably the waiter made a mistake, and I didn’t want to embarrass him, so I ate the duck. Oh well, after ordering a shrimp dish, I was thinking that I should have ordered meat, so it turned out to be better for me, actually. This dish was fantastic! Duck sliced steaks with pears.

In France, there are not that many people who can speak or understand English compared to any other European countries (expect Italy). Of course, I have no knowledge of French, so everything had to be translated at work.
I came back to this restaurant because I was there the night before, and they have English menus, waiters can speak good English and most importantly, their food is excellent! But when I ordered shrimp from English menu, I remember the waiter went to see the French menu and came back to me. I think that is when my order got messed up. He probably saw something else in the French menu; perhaps one line above or below. And that turned to be this duck dish. When I think about it, I remember we weren’t communicating very well. I ask some questions about the shrimp dish, and he was giving me the answers about the duck. I remember him saying that the dish comes with pears, and I thought it was not mentioned in the menu. I’m pretty sure my order was already switched at the point.

The area I stayed seem to be an old part of Lille. I love those stone pavement streets. (This is one of the reasons I loved SoHo in NY.) They have such a unique appeal. Buildings here were also beautiful. I think Lille is much prettier than Paris. Actually, I am not such a fan of Paris. When I was in Paris, I didn’t think I would want to live there, but in Lille, I can think that. (Just in case, I checked out real estate advertisements.) Even walking around by myself at night in this neighborhood, it is very romantic. Somehow, there were so many shoe stores. Is it French? Also, I really enjoyed the window shopping there at night. All the stores are of course closed, but their displays are very well done (very pretty).

I would love to come back to Lille again. It is only 3.5 hours (without traffic jam, supposedly 2.5 hours), so I could come and visit for a weekend, but other than work, I am not sure if I would want to do that on my own driving that far.

La Plagne, France

I went to a place called La Plagne in France from the 3rd of February to the 10th or skiing. It was the annual get-together trip from my company (240 people!), so my colleagues/friends and I flew in a few days earlier and made the trip a bit vacation-like.

I was planning to snowboard for the second time in my life, but I got chickened out in the last minute. Yes, I skied. I hadn’t skied for a while, but I really enjoyed skiing for the full three days. The weather was great for the first two days. It was beautiful! The different thing in La Plagne compared to Japanese ski places is that there is no really the “you can ski along this path” but more like people can ski wherever they’d like. Some of my friends, especially the Swedish ones, are really good with skiing. One of the guys has these skies that only the toe part is attached to the skies, so he can lift his heals during skiing. I don’t know how that works, but he wears a helmet so I assume he can go really fast with them. (He broke his arms during skiing a few years ago, so a helmet doesn’t really help that much for all the accidents.)

This is a guy with a parachute. Those guys fly by themselves and as soon as they get on the ground, they start skiing from the top of the mountains. Of course, there is no really a path for skiing, so they go into the deep snows I assume.

The view from my room. Everywhere you see, you can ski.

After skiing, I got this fabulous hot chocolate. I think it’s French but didn’t get the name of it.

Every night, we hanged out partying; drinking and dancing (me no dance) with all the people from UK, US, Germany, Sweden, Netherlands and other places. It is a lot of fun. Sometimes, it is too many drinks. This year, it was too many people.

Paris, France

On the 5th and 6th of December, I went to Paris. On the way back, I stopped by this souvenir shop, and the first thing that caught my eyes was Foie Gras. (Ok, the first thing that caught my noise was cheese. (me no like cheese.) I’ve never bought this expensive canned food before.
I have eaten foie gras in a restaurant, but I’ve never bought one to cook. I was really hesitating if I should get it or not because I had no idea how foie gras was packed in the small can or how to cook it myself. But I told myself that if I didn’t get it now, I would have never bought it. Or I probably would spend as much time to determine whether to buy one or not. There is always a first time with everything, so there I go. I bought that one expensive canned food.
I actually got to taste one; raw foie gras (or just as is from a can) on a piece of bread. Ok. This is not my favorite way to eat this thingy. I can really imagine or feel the liver with my tongue.

When Josh came in town, we open the can. We both were very excited but at the same time very nervous. We didn’t know what to expect. When we opened the can, there is this yellow gelatin thing on top of the foie gras; not that beautiful thing to look at, especially on something we are about to eat.

Josh had a little piece as is from the can on bread, but no second bite. That tells you something. I sautéed 1cm-thick foie gras slices with salt and pepper. Ohhh…this was so good! After sautéing the second half, I added red wine into the pan to make sauce. It came out to be good as well! Overall, it was fantastic! I think I’ll get it again the next time!

Paris, France III

The town view in Paris. The historical buildings are very attractive. The architectures and the city made out of them are very beautiful. Every few blocks, there is an intersection like the one in the pictures where more than 2 streets meet. This is a very common view in Paris, so all the intersections look very similar from one to another. It was very easy to think that we just passed this intersection a few minutes ago.

The windows are decorated by some flowers on apartment buildings.

I love Crêpe! The first morning in Paris, I had it for breakfast; Banana chocolate Crêpe. Actually, this was more like pancakes and chocolate and banana were inside. It looks almost like an omelet.

The last morning also, I had Crêpe. This one is more like it; it’s thin and folded more than once. But there is no whipped cream or powder sugar like how I know it from Japan. The Crêpes in Paris were thicker than what I am used to. Is this the local style?

The last night, we came back to the Eifel tower. Good bye, Paris!

Paris, France II

The last four days of July, I went to Paris with Josh who was visiting Amsterdam for two weeks. The trip was very easy; four hour ride with a train. I am still having difficulty getting used to going to one country to another without an airplane in Europe. Paris was something I was saving for my honeymoon. Oh well, who knows whether I will have such a thing in my life, so I decided to go when I had the chance. (I’m trying to be positive here.)

It was hot in Paris. It seems this year, we have a hot summer in Europe compared to other years. So, we were not very looking forward to coming back to the hotel every night because our hotel did not have an air conditioner. When we got back to the room, we were opening the door to get as much breeze as possible. It was actually not that bad if we opened the door. Of course, there are people passing by in the hall way, and they peek in the opened-door room. But we cannot be sensitive about that. The heat was incredible! I think it was close to 90 degrees. But of course, we have to close the door when we go to sleep, but the window is wide open without a screen. Because of that, every night, mosquitoes were after me. Every night! What’s frustrating is that Josh never got a mosquito bite! They just love my blood regardless of which country I am in!

Even with this horrible hot summer experiences, I actually enjoyed the trip very much. The picture is the Louvre museum. Because I read “The Da Vinci Code,” I was very curious about this museum. When I saw the pyramid, I was so excited! Also, I saw Mona Lisa and some other paintings that I’ve seen in magazines or in text books. It was great!

After the museum visit, we went into a café. The iced coffee that I ordered was serviced first with two containers. I could tell which one the sugar was because I could see it through the container, but the problem is the other one on the left. I thought it was milk because of its shape. After I poured some of that, I realized that some oil was floating in my coffee. It was actually dressing for the side salad for the sandwich we ordered. I wish they did not put dressing in such a container that totally could mislead when you order some drinks! Oh well, I ended up finishing my ice coffee though.

	When walking down the street, these little round sweets caught my eyes. This is something my sister asked me about a few weeks ago, and that’s when I learned about it. These are French sweets, called Macaron. I think I’ve seen them in the states, too.
	After passing by some bakeries, the next thing I saw was this one. It’s huge, and it looks like a hamburger! I tried it and it was very sweet. I am not a big fan of it (yet).

	We passed by this temporary amusement park, and there was this swing-thing. I love this since I was a child. Everything in this park was very old, especially the rides, and they all look like they’ve got some history behind them. Even the horses of the Mary-Go-Round have some characters in them. Actually, their faces crack me up. They look pretty funny.

Paris, France I

Hello Paris!