Ever lived less than a kilometer from a 16th-century castle?

Seriously. Imagine walking for ten minutes and being confronted with this view:

Château de Monbazillac, built in 1550.

This weekend one of the teachers I work with, Vero, invited me to spend the night at her family's house and join them for a barbecue. Vero lives about 40 minutes from Périgueux outside the town of Bergerac (which I have visited before, thanks to her). Her family lives up on a hill looking down on Bergerac and a bunch of vineyards and her address is technically Monbazillac, an area known for its wine - not unlike much of this region! But, basically, if you live up on a hill looking down on vineyards and old French towns and you live about a kilometer from an 500-year-old castle...you're doing something right.

View from the terrace at Vero's house.

Some flowers around the terrace (the photo on the left was taken in the evening and the one on the right in the morning - that explains the totally different lighting).

More views... 

Vineyards!

Obviously it's a really beautiful location! It was a bit surreal actually! I went over with Vero on Friday evening and had dinner with her husband and three of her five daughters (the other two are in college in Paris). We had a nice time chatting and eating foie gras and tasting local wine and also an alcohol made from walnuts. We spoke mostly in French though Vero is half-Scottish, half-French and is bilingual, as are all of her children. Today, Saturday, company came over to celebrate Vero's husband's birthday, and they had a barbecue. Again, another example of how nice everyone has been to me here!

One of Vero's daughters, Pansy, who is 11, took me on a walk over to the castle in the afternoon. Apparently she loves walking over to the castle and always volunteers to take guests over to see it. She was a funny character, and we had a good time chatting as we walked over to the castle. She gave me lots of words to practice my French accent - she also found it hilarious when I butchered a few of the tougher ones. My French-speaking friends, there's a 90% chance you are saying the word brûler wrong, I assure you. Also, say this: turlututu chapeau pointu. IT'S NOT EASY. (You're probably saying tourloutoutou chapeau pointou.) Clearly she was giving me words with "u" in it because the French pronunciation of "u" does not exist anywhere in the English language, so it's a tough one to grasp. I've been getting people to help me with it lately cause I want to improve my accent!

Anyway, this is the walk to the château and the château itself that Pansy took me to see:

A pretty stone house we walked past as we walked over. We walked through vineyards and down some little country roads. Wow.

Vineyards next to the château. The wine that grows in Monbazillac is a sweet white wine. I tasted it once when my family was here - but I really hate sweet wine, so I didn't like it. But it's good if you like sweet wine!

Ta-da! Pretty cool castle, right? It's just a very typical French countryside castle. It's very, very cool that they live a short walk from here, right?

The old well by the castle. Pansy threw rocks into it to show me how deep it was - it was pretty deep!

Grassy area next to the castle and the view beyond (a very gorgeous view of the countryside and the town of Bergerac).

Looking back at the castle from that gazebo in the above picture. 

And looking back at the castle and some of its vineyards - SO cool!

It was a nice little weekend - which isn't over quite yet! I just hung out in my apartment this evening though there is apparently a Medieval festival of some sort in Périgueux tomorrow. I have no idea what that is going to entail, though the flyers indicate food, games, and sword fights. We're going to go check it out because, hey, why not? Hopefully I'll have some funny pictures to report back with tomorrow.

I'm down to my last week of teaching and about nine days in Périgueux, which is very strange. It absolutely has not sunk in yet. I'm neither excited nor sad at the moment because I just haven't processed it yet (and then I'll be both of those things). But this week I need to figure out some of my itinerary details and start packing so I'm ready to clean next weekend. Crazy! Hopefully it won't be a difficult process!

Hopefully more tomorrow. Meaning, hopefully tomorrow I'll have pictures of corny knights.

It was a good weekend!

Spring and nice weather has finally arrived in Périgueux! It is sunny and almost 80 degrees here today - I wore shorts and everything! F-i-n-a-l-l-y. Though I'm pretty sure it's going to rain tomorrow.

It doesn't matter, because this is Périgueux today!

So Marina's birthday was last week and we celebrated on Thursday evening with a party at her apartment. We kicked her and her boyfriend out of the apartment and hid her presents and some fake presents and then made her search for them.

...which led to photos like this one.

We snacked and had cake and played a board game. It was a lot of fun, we had a good time!

Birthday, birthday, birthday!

On Saturday I was invited to spend the day with Julie, one of the girls I tutor, and her family. I took the train to meet her and her mother (about half an hour from Périgueux) and after seeing their house and a couple tiny towns, we went to Saint-Emilion, a town in the Bordeaux region that is surrounded by dozens (if not hundreds) of vineyards and wineries and is home of some of the best wines in the world. The town itself is really gorgeous and then it's just cool to drive around the vineyards in the countryside.

Old church in a tiny town close to the town, Sainte-Foy-la-Grande, where Julie lives.

Next to the church was this pond. There used to be ponds like this in a lot of little country villages because it was where the women came to do the washing. Clearly it's not in use anymore; in fact, it was full of noisy frogs. It was kind of charming.

Another small church in a town right next to Saint-Emilion.

Saint-Emilion!

Saint-Emilion is full of tourists in the summer and completely dead in the winter, so we were there at the perfect time. There were people in town, but it wasn't too crowded, and the weather was perfect. We had a picnic right outside the old city wall and then wandered around and climbed one of the towers. Julie and her mother were great - and super generous. Her mother thanked me for tutoring Julie by buying me a bracelet and a bottle of wine, and then in town bought me guide to the city, a box of macaroons that are made in Saint-Emilion, and a pair of espadrille shoes that are typiquement français. They were extremely nice and I had a really nice day with them! Julie and her family are going to be in D.C. and NYC this summer, so I'm looking forward to seeing them again!

Our picnic location - just outside the city!

The cloister of an old monastery in Saint-Emilion.

A view of the city and the vineyards in the distance.

The streets of Saint-Emilion + a funny dog with a ponytail.

The city really was gorgeous. It was just a nice, happy place to walk around and observe. There were little flowers growing out of the walls and even on the tower of the main cathedral. It was a very pretty, springy day! Julie and her mom were also a lot of fun to talk to and chat with.

The gardens of another old cloister where you can sit and taste wine.

Corks grow in the trees at Saint-Emilion - that's how much they love wine. 

In front of a nice flower garden in the center of town.

There were snails in almost all of the tulips in the flower garden - pretty good little hiding place. Though some of them were too big and the flowers were falling over as a result.

Another one the areas to clean clothes - this one didn't have frogs though. 

With Julie at the top of the tower that we climbed.

La tour du roi (the King's Tower) - the tower we climbed to get a view of the city.

Just outside the walls of the city there was this garden with tiny flowers growing all over it. So pretty!

In fact, those tiny flowers are growing all over the place in the countryside. While the vineyards weren't blooming with grapes or leaves, there were thousands of tiny yellow and white flowers growing between the rows of vines, so it was really gorgeous to drive around the vineyards!

In Saint-Emilion, you distinguish the wine by its "château." What this means is that the wine is a Bordeaux wine from Saint-Emilion - and then it's listed by its château which is simply the family/vineyard that grows it. You can just have a little house and still be called a château. So it's not like there are a thousand tiny castles surrounding the city. But it's still really gorgeous!

Walking through one of the vineyards. This one wasn't as full of the tiny flowers as some of the others, but you can still see them! The château is in the distance.

More vineyards.

Vines from 2008 - going to be some expensive (and delicious) wine!

By chance we saw some guys plowing their vineyard with an old-fashioned contraption and a horse. Most vineyards would use machines now, but they still use the old traditions here. I guess that explains why it's some of the best and most expensive wine in the world!

Saint-Emilion was really cool and I highly recommend to anyone who is/will be in the southwestern part of France!

Since it was still really nice today (soooo nice) we went and had a picnic beside the Isle, the river in Périgueux. We spent three hours just snacking and laying around. It was an afternoon well-spent. I also learned while I was shuffling cards that no one in France knows how to do that...Eve, our Argentinian friend could do it, but none of the French or Spanish people could and seemed surprised that we could do it. When I said that I don't think I know anyone my age who can't shuffle, they said they didn't know anyone who could shuffle. Weird cultural difference, right?

Picnic group!

Picnic location!

Flo trying to feed a swan that came over to see what we were doing.

Good weekend! I think it's supposed to be nice in Périgueux this week (hopefully the good weather is here to stay) so we'll probably try to spend a lot more time outside. There were lots of people in the streets today and tons by the river - it's a nice city when it's not dead!

Oof, that was a lot! Have a good Sunday!

Old sights in Paris - and a new one

Wait a minute, is it "tourist site" or "tourist sight"? I'm going to go with "sight" since you go "sightseeing." 

Apparently I no longer know the English language.

It's Sunday and kind of sunny in Périgueux. I set my alarm for 9:00 and had plans to get up and do productive things and go for a run, only to wake up and find out of nowhere that I'm on the brink of losing my voice. Luckily I still have some TheraFlu that Mom brought me over Christmas, so I'll just nurse that for awhile, but still, it's annoying. I'll probably spend most of the day lying in bed so hopefully I won't be sick during the week.

Anyway, I spent Thursday evening to Saturday afternoon in Paris with my grandmother, aunt, uncle, and cousins. Jake and Jenna were on spring break, so my aunt and uncle brought them to France for a week to see Normandy and Paris and since my grandmother loves France, she came along, too!

Jake and Jenna at the Louvre.

Thursday, before I got there, it was raining so they had taken the boat tour on the Seine and seen a lot of the big monuments without getting wet. I played the role of tour guide on Friday and we walked around Paris and hit pretty much all of the big sights: Notre Dame, the Louvre, Champs-Elysées and the Arc de Triomphe, Montmartre and Sacré Coeur, and then the Aschenbrenners (the cousins + parents for those of you not acquainted with my family; it's my dad's little sister and her family) went to the Eiffel Tower in the evening. Grandma and I had already both done the Eiffel Tower several times in the past, so we went out to a tiny little restaurant she had gone to in the past; it was delicious! We had some great authentic French food and had a stereotypical (or perhaps just typical) French waiter who flirted with us and gave us free after-dinner drinks. The Aschenbrenners also got really lucky at the Eiffel Tower and went up, saw Paris, and went down in about two/two-and-a-half hours. When we were there in December, it took us nearly five!

I didn't take a ton of pictures, but here are some:

The street where we stayed, rue Réamur, which caused more problems with it's pronunciation for the non-French speakers. (There are a whole lot of throaty French R noises in that word! Jeff and Karen had a hard time getting a cab driver to understand where they wanted to go). We stayed in a nice apartment with plenty of space for all of us!

Waiting in line to go into a Notre Dame. Clearly we had cloudy weather, but no rain, so it worked out all right! 

Grandma with three of her grandchildren!

The Aschenbrenners + Grandma had been in Normandy and did a good D-Day tour, saw the Bayeux Tapestry, stayed in the mill house of an old château, visited Mont Saint-Michel, and saw some other ares of Normandy. They all seemed really to have liked it, which is great! It was, however, bitterly cold and windy!

Also, shortly after Karen and I recounted stories of getting pooped on by pigeons (Karen) and geese (me), Jenna got pooped on by a pigeon.

My family flew back on Saturday morning (with one of my suitcases in tow!) and I didn't have a train until 1:45, so I went over to the Catacombs of Paris. The Catacombs are part of the old abandoned mines of Paris. There are over 200km of old quarries under Paris; most of them are dangerous and highly illegal to explore. Two kilometers of them, however, are open to the public. They're well-known because in the 1700s, Paris's cemeteries were overflowing and poisoning the city, so millions of Parisians were disinterred, cleaned up, re-blessed, and moved to the Catacombs. There are the bones of six million Parisians now stacked down in the Catacombs in the tunnels of these old mines. As a tourist, you can walk through the tunnels and through the areas with the bones.

So, yes, as you're probably wondering, it's kind of creepy. But I'd always wanted to go, and it seemed like it would be a good time. I lined up at 9:15, a full 45 minutes before it opened - and it's a good thing I got there that early. There were already some people in line and by the time they opened at 10, there were hundreds and hundreds of people in line. So, if you're ever in Paris, get in line nearly an hour ahead of time, otherwise you'll be in line all day (and they only let in 200 people at any given time, so it's not a line that moves fast).

So it wasn't quite as dark as this picture makes it look - but this is the general idea of what the Catacombs are like. Parts are more finished than others; this is clearly one of the parts that is not very built-up.

Some carvings of a port city that a man who worked in the quarries carved from memory. There was also a plaque next to this spot explaining this - and mentioning that the man died when there was a cave-in while he was trying to build an access point to this spot. Slightly freaky to read when you're standing right there.

More carvings by the same man.

It was cool to think that there are more than a hundred miles of tunnels like this under the city. They've been used at a lot of times in history (French Resistance during WWII, during different revolutions in Paris, fictionally in Les Miserables) and were apparently started as mines sometime in the 13th century.

One of the more finished-off parts of the tunnels.

Before you enter the tunnels with all of the bones, there's a doorway with the inscription "Arrète! C'est ici l'empire de la mort" which means "Stop, here lies the Empire of Death." There are also reminders that this is the final resting place of six million people, so please be respectful. Of course there are also reminders that you'll get in big, big trouble if you steal bones. C'mon, people - that is terrible. And really creepy.

I only took one picture of this, but it's tunnels and tunnels of this and plaques saying where the bones came from and also lots of random (and often creepy) quotes about death.

Most of the time there was a British couple walking behind me that I could hear, but at one point I got far enough ahead of them that I couldn't hear them and I couldn't hear the people in front of me anymore and the ceiling was dripping and I was surrounded by bones and tunnels so I sped up to get out of there.

I'm not going to say that it was the most interesting thing I've seen, because it seems a bit voyeuristic to say that, but nonetheless it was an interesting place to see. The history of the mines themselves and then the ossuary of bones (the cemeteries were so full, so dirty that they were literally poisoning the water of Paris) is an interesting one - it just shows how much history there is in Paris.

And the guy at the end of the tunnels (who checked my bag to make sure there were no bones inside - again, yuck) asked me (nicely) if I was québécoise because I spoke French well but with an accent. Despite the Parisians (and most French people) turning their noses up at the Quebecois accent, I considered it a step up. I don't mind being being an American in France speaking French with an American accent - everywhere except Paris. I don't like being an American in Paris because the Americans are just so awful in Paris. The group behind me in line was saying VERY loudly that the French are stupid (they need to be informed that the word in French for "stupid" is "stupide" and that pretty much every single French person knows what the word "French" means) and the group in front had a boy talking about "peeing on the Eiffel Tower." Yes, of course, these people are exceptions to the norm - but, still, jeez. It's those people who give the rest of us bad reputations abroad, which is totally not fair, and, unfortunately, there are a whole lot of them.

That was my morning in Paris. I went to the train station afterward, got delayed slightly because there was a suspicious package that they had to blow up, and then came home to Périgueux! And now only three more weeks of teaching!!

Au revoir à Cathi!

I almost just started writing this in French. Whoops!

So this weekend we said goodbye to Cathi! It was sad, but it was a fun weekend in general and I'll be seeing her again in a little over a month, so it's not too bad. Karen decided to come into town at the last minute so she could see my friends one more time, so that was nice! I went out several times with my friends, on Sunday the family I tutor for had me come out to their house in the country to spend the afternoon with them, and on Monday (we had the day off) another tutoring student of mine had me come to her house to have coffee with her family. As I've said before, people in this region are very friendly!

The big event of the weekend was a goodbye party for Cathi on Sunday night. A bunch of us went to her apartment to hang out and to meet her boyfriend and say goodbye. The highlight of the evening was when we hassled Cathi to sing for us (because we knew she sang in a choir and had never heard her sing) and when she agreed and started singing, everyone's mouths dropped open. (Seriously, I looked around and everyone's had la bouche bée - mouth hanging open). This tiny little person opened her mouth and had an enormous, unbelievable operatic voice. It was incredible! I would be hard-pressed to name someone else I've heard with a voice as good as Cathi's was!

After Cathi amazed us all, Juan, one of our Argentinian friends, got out his guitar and played and we sang and had a pretty fun and easy-going evening.

Singing/listening to Juan. Pictures were taken with my phone so they're not so great!

Marina watching and being impressed by Juan and Cathi singing.

Cathi and Juan jamming + Cathi's boyfriend, Oliver.

This week has started out pretty well; we had Monday off for Easter, so I only have three days of work and right after class on Thursday I'm going up to Paris to see my cousins, aunt and uncle, and grandmother. I have my big suitcase all packed (and weighed - 47.5 lbs) which is a bit surreal - it makes leaving seem much more real! I leave Perigueux this month...very strange.

I should have an interesting blog post or so after this weekend with going to Paris. There's also talk of going kayaking/canoeing if it's nice on Sunday. I'm hoping that we have some nice warm weather!