Best Day in Paris

This past week and week-end were quite eventful. Many of my friends had visitors in town, as this past week was the UC Spring Break, so I got to do a lot of fun touristy stuff with them. Wednesday, I even got to see the wonderful and FABULOUS Yuna Shin, who updated me about life in Berkeley over a nice hot chocolate by the eiffel tour. Yuna is a total gem in every way and it was nice to check-in with her about home and it made me realize how much I miss her and all my Berkeley hommies. Although I'm seriously getting quite used to Parisian bars, museums, parks, and party posse, I think all of the fantastic friends I have at home are going to make my transition back to Berk sooo much better! (Plus I get Raf, Allie, and Melissa in Berk too, and Andrea--just a train ride away in SB).

Other than that, I've had a lot of school work (!), which I've nicely balanced with tons of fun (perhaps a little too much fun, thinking about this week's bar expentitures...). Sciences Po is challenging, and I feel like I can't bullshit my way through it, as I often do in my classes at Berkeley. However, being the perhaps slightly-masochistic girl that I am, I wouldn't haven't any other way. And insteading of just screwing around while being abroad (which, don't get me wrong, I'm doing plenty of), I'm learning A TON. All in all, every day is different and wondrous and fun and stimulating and educational and everything I could ever want or imagine from my abroad experience. I am a REALLY REALLY REALLY lucky girl!!! REALLY.

Today may have been the best day in Paris yet. I'm going to officially count the day as beginning at midnight last night, when I found myself at a party in the seventh, hosted by an Australian friend, Cara. The guests at this party were such an eclectic mix and it was just as much fun to watch the group dynamic as it was to interact with everyone. I think I just I really enjoy people, especially the kinds of people who live in Paris. One of the people I really enjoy is my friend Song-My, who arrived at the party last night shortly after midnight, marking the beginning of her birthday! This prompted (or perhaps I prompted...?) many multi-lingual renditions of the "Happy Birthday Song". I can recall Farsi (spell-check...?), Chinese, Korean (Song-My's personal favorite), Finnish, English, and of course, French. There may have been more, considering that everyone I meet seems to know 17 million languages. Moments like these make me laugh at all the fears I had about being lonely prior to coming to Paris. Instead there are so many gems here--truly exceptional people!

This afternoon, I visited the Salon du Vin--an exposition of independent wine sellers from all over France. I got to go the exposition for free thanks to my wine class (anyone in California who has been reading about said class has the right to be totally jealous), and headed over with Andrea, her boyfriend Luke who is visiting from Santa Barbara, and the birthday girl. As we headed inside, we were handed a glass, and found ourselves face to face with hundreds and hundreds (maybe thousands...?) of wine booths in an enormous hall with multiple rooms. Overwhelmed, we began at a booth from Loire Valley, the region that Andrea, Song-My and I are focusing on for the presentation we are going to do for our wine class. I think we spent a good 20 minutes at the first booth, talking (in French + English, or "Franglais" if you will) with the wine producer about everything from the production to the marketing of his Chardonnay, as we tasted it and some Muscats. He gave us some literature about his exports and was so friendly and helpful. At the end of the day, we actually returned to his booth, picked up a couple of bottles, and discussed even possibly visiting him and his wife at their vineyard! How does that sound for homework? Throughout the day, we basically traveled booth by booth and tried wines from all over France, talking to the producers as well. I could go on for days and months and years about how great it was, but I will just say that I was in wine heaven, which for me is basically plain old heaven. In fact, heaven might be a let-down compared to the Salon du Vin. I think my life is complete now.

After a trip to heaven, how could my day possibly get any better? Simple, with a trip to visit our favorite jazz musician, Patty Sherlock, for a celebration of Song-My's birthday! I absolutely LOVE our Sunday night jazz bar expeditions, and tonight was especially fun because Patty, who is quite fond of Song-My, dedicated a few special birthday songs to her. Aaand, at one point, he compelled the entire bar (well over 50 people) to sing her the Happy Birthday song, which I thought was pretty cool! Aaaand, maybe it was all the wine going to my brain, but I had a particularly good time, and felt more compelled to dance (which I of course did) tonight than I have at any other jazz.

I think my blog might be insanely boring to read, because I feel like I just babel on about how great my life is. So I'm really sorry, but I just can't help it. My life is really great. Have I mentioned that I'm REALLY REALLY lucky? Well I am. Thanks Mom and Dad and Aunt Berta and everyone else for the best semester of my life so far.