Un petit week-end

I had a pleasant week-end and I’d thought I’d share the happenings. On Friday Amy headed off to visit her friend in Berlin and I was contemplating just staying in and getting ahead on schoolwork and soaking up some me time. I went to the market and got some of that brebis cheese I like so much and a baguette, and some strawberries. Strawberries with melted nutella’s my new favorite treat. I had a very me meal which requires no cooking but lots of grazing snacking. As I was engorging myself with savory things spread out on a cutting board in front of a simpsons episode I had never seen (which is a rare phenomenon) that had French voiceovers, I heard a knock at the door, which revealed Kristina, who was angrily sick with boredom.
I immediately got to work on the internet because I always keep notes on what I want to do around town but it can be a chore to get people to come with me, and you can only do so many things alone.

Here was some of our options:
There’s a film festival going on right now called CineRail (which caught my attention because it had the notorious image of Melies’ “Trip to the Moon” on the advertising posters in the metro)
A free world music concert
Fleche D’Or music venue
Museums are open late on Fridays
An exhibit on the body with real bodies that are pumped with plastic type stuff!

I forgot how much of a city girl I am. Imagine I circled Fleche D’Or. I'm a music junkie. There were 4 incredible bands that night, the last one had this platinum blonde singer with hair to her butt and a flapper dress and a tambourine that she made a show out of. It was mesmerizing. It’s about the only place in Paris with interesting looking guys, but if I got so much as a half second eye contact I was flying high.

On Saturday we did the fabric shopping thing and then went to le Marais district where I had that tasty meal with the honey melty crusted cheese.

That night, Kristina and I went to a language speaking club. It was really helpful. It was in a place called “Café Livre” and the place was brimming with people in the club. It was packed and I even had to sit in people’s laps in order to get where I wanted to go. They have different tables for different languages, but it ends up all just mixing together. I talked to two French people, one who was really good with me and the other one went waaay too fast and kinda spit on me a lot so I was more focusing on when he would turn his head so I could wipe my face versus focusing on what he was saying. I also talked to a Brazilian, and then a sweaty Italian guy who speaks French but wanted to practice English. So he spoke English to me and I spoke French to him. We had a lesson on the difference between the pronunciation of “cut” and “cat”. I would say, “cat” and he would motion scissors and I’d shake my head and say, “no, that’s cuuuuht” and then he’d meow. It went on for a long time like this before we got it down. I felt like I was in an Abbot and Costello skit, …”Who’s on first!” -“That’s what I’m asking you, who’s on first?”

I had to once again turn down this girl that I’ve been trying to meet for weeks that Rhea stayed with when she was in Paris in order to go to a club called La Loco mostly for the benefit of our friend Otmara, who had family in town and wanted to take them out. She never even showed up. Summation of that place: I paid 24 euro to watch a really good break dancer and listen to some American music, and then get harassed more than I’ve ever been in my entire life. I was pushing guys hard and saying “No, leave me alone” (if you can ever imagine me doing this you know how bad it was), and I’d walk around to the other side of the room and seriously 30 seconds later they’d be right by my side doing the same thing. I had to juggle… 6 of these guys, all the same game. French girls really curse themselves when they say “no” when they mean “yes”. Lesson learned.

Sunday I spent the whole day cleaning the studio and when Amy got back from Berlin we went on a droopy eyed dreamy light lazy sunny Sunday walk. Paris is a completely different city in the sunshine. I got a crepe with feta, spinach, egg, tomatoes, and various spices at our favorite stand behind the Sorbonne and Amy and I ate as we made our way to the Seine, where we grazed the metal stands lining the river that sell souvenirs and retro prints. She bought a poster. I opted out of bringing money because it inevitably burns a hole in my pocket.

So yeah, un petit week-end. That’s about how it is. Can't wait to share it a whole week plus with ma mamie et mon papie. If only Erik could come too!! :(

Am I really here? Or is this a bizarre dream?

One thing about my trip here is that it doesn’t fit the picturesque expectations one has after watching countless romantic movies set in these old cities that are portrayed magically like what they were like 100 years ago during the golden years. I was rather excited to go to the Champagne region. I daydreamed of acres of vineyards, a sunny barrel-filled tasting room with a charming older guide with a lovely accent, large caverns of yummy smelling concoctions, and sitting around tasting various flavors as we look upon all the countryside. I got something quite different than this dream. We went to the Champagne region on a Sunday. We went through a whole ordeal debating whether or not we should go because the train tickets were very spendy, and finally decided to go – Me, Amy, Elizabeth, Hilary, Laurel, and her sister Molly, who was visiting. We got there only to find out that the tour we looked into was closed on Sundays. So a cab driver took us to the Madame Pommery champagnery (?), the woman to actually invent champagne, and the only tour open on Sundays. When we got there, we found out that the next available tour in English was at 4, so we decided to do the 2:30 tour. We had some time to kill so we went into the town. Nothing was open of course because all of Europe is a ghost town on Sundays so we did the only thing there is to do on Sundays – go to the local massive church. I’ve seen so many churches, but I really like them here because it makes me feel like I’m a little girl in Catholic school again. The churches are three times as big so I feel three times as small. Instead of feeling reflective and respectful, I get the mischievous feeling everytime I enter a big beautiful church. It’s kind of that “giggle during mass” feeling – it’s the one place where you know you can’t be naughty but you REAlly really want to. And all catholic churches kind of feel like home to me since I spent so much time around them. It’s weird being comfortable and respectful of a place at the same time. It’s fun, I think I’ll send my kids to catholic school just so that they can fully revel in that feeling, too.

Speaking of children, I have a tangent… as we were on our way back from the Elie Saab show I was thinking of the name “Coco” since I saw Coco Rocha, and recently I’ve been really in love with the name Coco Rose if I were to ever have a little girl (Ally will make scornful fun of me for this to my dying day). Then I got to thinking about the name I’ve always had in mind for a boy, Toby Orion, and I was thinking what kind of kid he would be and I flashed to him getting married and I got a little choked up. At which point I realized that a) I really am too much of a Fulton and b) I was an overworked delusional busy bee from doing so many shows during fashion week. I don’t even know whether I want to get married myself. (Even so, if any of you cousins steal those names, I know where you live).

Anyway… so we went back for our tour. The French speaking tour guide led us through what looked like purple versions of the doors into the Emerald City and thus began our darkside of willie wonka champagne tour. We went down 122 slippery weathered steps to the cellar, and into a room that had a walkway down the middle and on either side there were amps and electric guitars and hundreds of chickadee like birds that chirped like squeaky toys. They’d land on the guitar strings and take off and it would make noises. I had no idea what was going on. And we couldn’t understand the tour guide because he was speaking French like an auctioneer. After that, we went through a series of rooms that were a cross between batman’s layer, the bottom of a well, and the caves the goonies go through. They were these rounded cave like rooms that were taller than cathedrals and the only light that was emitted into the place were what looked like a single manhole at the tip top of the room. It was so dark, and each “cave room” had some bizarre artwork. There were creepy videos and mirrored hallways, an old ship that was covered in glitter, a rickety staircase that led up to a creepy shack house that was lodged in the middle of the wall, a projection of an alien jesus, and room after room of bizarre things where we just kind of had to give each other looks just to make sure we didn’t slip into a nightmare. The only thing that had to do with champagne were rows and rows of black bottles coated with a few mm of dust that lined the “halls” between the caves. Occasionally the tour guide would pick one up and hold it up to the light as he was speaking a mile a minute. I can tell you one thing: I was more than ready to have a few glasses of champagne by the time that tour was over. It was an experience. We went back to the more comfortable ambience of the tasting room (although not rustic – it was like a trendy club) and each had two/three glasses before buzzily giggling our way back to Paris. Madame Pommery must have been a very cookoo lady.

I went to the Erotica museum on the (I’m going to call it) sex block of Montmartre. I invited my friend Sebastian as I was on my way and didn’t really consider that it might be awkward. It was fine, though. I saw a real chastity belt and statue after statue of very interesting positions with characters with the funniest expressions on their faces. Each ancient culture had very distinctive faces that they’d put on their figures that were doing the deed. I want to go back to that area to get souvenirs for my immature friends and my dad J.

For St. Patty’s Day we went to an Irish Pub. The waitress gave us a free shot of whiskey and various cheesy irish freebies. I got a free clip-on skinny green satin tie. Me and a couple other girls found a hookah bar as we were on our way home, and I had to go down some weathered slippery steps again into the basement and I fell HARD on my butt, down a couple steps, and the people all looked at me like I was some vile creature as I was the only one laughing. They didn’t even crack a smile or say “Are you ok?” in French. My middle name of “Grace” is a curse. I still have a bruise about the size of a baseball on my left cheek. I couldn’t sleep on that side for a couple nights.

Amy and I had an excursion to Milan and Bellagio on lake Como. We found a free place to stay through couchsurfing.com. Our host said that he loves dancing and he could teach us some latin moves before going out to some good clubs, but when we got there he didn’t seem interested at all the first couple nights, and the last night he decided at 12:30 he wanted to go but we were too pooped. He also said he had towels for us, and we took his word, only to find out that they were still wet from whenever he used them himself. Bleh. And like most Italian showers, there was no curtain. I showered once out of the three days and tried to dry myself with toilet paper. I have a picture to show how greasified I was.

Milan is the place to shop, so that’s what we did. The next day we decided in order to avoid more shopping we’d go have a scenic day trip on lake Como. We went to the actual Bellagio via a ferryboat and I can see why it’s the source of inspiration for a place of hospitality. It was my unexpected rustic picturesque experience. The town is so beautiful. There’s nowhere to drive a car, really, it’s all just foot traffic down cobblestone roads that are a few meters wide. I wish I had about three days there because we just got a little taste and I would’ve loved to get lost in the town and discover hidden treasures. We had a gelato on the lake (pistachio is hands down my favorite flavor), and went back to the train station by bus. It was this huge almost double decker bus, and he went about 50 mph through these winding steep mountainous roads. It was kind of like a rollercoaster. We’d whip through these beautiful mountainous towns as the bus driver is perpetually honking his horn around corners because the road hardly fit the bus itself, any oncoming cars would be a disaster. The towns we passed in the flurry were perched on carved out sides of mountains overlooking the lake. It kind of reminded me of the elf towns in Lord of the Rings. They were so quiet and sweet, and each town had a bridge over a nearly bottomless pit valley. We were doing all this during sunset, so it was quite the site to see.

The ultimate souvenir I want for myself is the sheet music for the accordion in the amelie soundtrack. They don’t have it in the states, the closest thing they have is piano, and that’s no help because the base is half of playing the accordion. I know the composer, so I’ve been looking in music shops for it. No luck so far, but it has revealed some really cute parts of town. I’m excited for the two week break when my parents come so that I can actually spend more time really seeing Paris. I hate that we have class til 5, and usually we’re not even doing anything in class. I’m actually writing this blog in class because I am not doing anything else. And it’s only 10 am. 7 more hours of nothing when I could be out on the city. It’s ridiculous. We have to be in class for the allotted time, it’s not like in the states where when you get your work done in lab class you can go. I feel like I’m in grade school. Oh well, not everything can be perfect.

I’m having a really hard time finding souvenirs for people. Anything specific that anybody wants from Pareee?

I did skip class the other day to go see the Eiffel tower during the day time. It was windy and cold, but I still sat and soaked it in as I sketched for one of my classes. The Eiffel Tower is an incredible place to go if you have kids. They have about 5 different very unique fun playgrounds. One of them had a pedal car race track, and another had a carousel with suspended swing type horses, and you could crank it so it’d spin around and you’d get a little height on the horses from the momentum. Paris is all about carousels. Every square seems to have them. There are a lot of stereotypical things about the city. One weekend I awoke to carnival music, and when we were walking to go out somewhere we were eager to see where it was coming from, we turned a corner expecting a full carnival but alas it was coming from a guy who was pushing a cart that he cranked and it would boom this music. It was so loud that we thought it was a whole production, so it was funny that it came from something the size of a bicycle. A lot of the time I feel like I’m dreaming because things don’t seem real. On our way to the airport for Milan we saw a guy walking two ponies and a donkey down the street like they were dogs. Man, I have no idea how I’m going to survive back in Corvallis after leaving my dream town.

Favorite meal purchased thus far: A salad with a sweet balsamic vinaigrette type sauce with sautéed potatoes, a baguette, and (ready for this?) a honey roasted block of camembert cheese. It was a combo of all sorts of flavors and textures. We went into the restaurant right before a rain/hail storm hit, and it cleared up just in time for our check so we could go out for a crisp sunny walk.

Today I had to go buy some fabric and the best place to do so is Montmartre, where Amelie takes place. I kind of felt like her today. You know how she'd dip her hands in bags of beans and such for a small pleasure? I realize I've been doing the same with fabric. I find myself just spacing out in these warehouse size stores just petting some $50/m buttery cloth that I could never afford. It's so nice.

I think that’s all my adventures since last time. Hope all is well on the homefront and love and miss you all.

Fashion Week

This is going to be a good one.  Are you ready for it?  I don’t know whether I’m quite ready to write it, frankly.  I’m not sure whether I can do it justice.  First of all, I’m celebrating a long but very successful and fulfilling fashion week with the best cheese I’ve purchased so far and a glass of red wine that pairs quite nicely, I think.  I’m reading the label of the paper the little cake of cheese was wrapped in, and it says “lait brebis”, which is ewe’s milk.  So I’m essentially eating what lambs get to have everyday just in a different form.  Lucky jerks.  Actually, today we had a lecture on the production of accessories, and we learned that you have to calculate a 30% loss in materials when it comes to animal skin.  And the animal skin isn’t the full skin, so pretty much baby lambs are killed for about 40% of their skin to be used in a half of a bag.  So they aren’t quite so lucky.  I do like fashion, but that’s just unnecessary.  It’s funny, because this season’s collections were brimming with all types of furs and skins.  Today’s class convinced me even further that I want to work for Stella McCartney, who’s super enviro conscious and ethical, but still produces really nice stuff…specially lingerie, which is what I want to go into intitially.

Ok, enough with the tangent.  I had to ease myself into attacking all that’s been going on.  So, fashion shows.  I’m sorry, I’m going to do a lot of name dropping.  A good resource if you want to match faces and shows to the names is style.com – you can look up the shows, the models, everything.  I watched A.F. Vandevorst, Leonard, and Dress 33.  I worked at Estrella Arch, Jeremy Bueno, Veronique Branquinho, Manish Arora, and Elie Saab… I think that’s it.  The only one’s that are on style.com are Vandevorst, Veronique, and Elie Saab, but I highly recommend also looking up at least Manish Arora because his stuff was really dramatic and fun.  Estrella Arch was my first and prolly my least exciting.  I liked some of her stuff, even though some of it was unfinished and unfunctional and still had sewing marks and unfinished seams.  But they do production within like two weeks before the show in order to be trendy, so it makes sense.  Her color scheme was black and neon green and pink, with a little white.  She had some Schiaparelli influences, and then some really pretty horizontally pleated assymetrical black knit dresses.  It was my first show so I didn’t know what to expect and it didn’t run so smoothly.  I was assigned a model, Tullulah Morton, who had two outfits: a suede fringy black jacket with black heels, and bright pink leather and knit tight pants and a black loose v-neck sweater with a bright pink onesie that you had to snap at the crotch underneath.  And two pairs of shoes that were a size too small.  She was the first model to arrive to the dressing room, and she didn’t have her makeup or hair done.  I told her we were doing a rehearsal and she had to change.  I turned around to talk to someone else, and when I turned back I almost ran my head into her naked boobs (they are at eye level).  The dressing room was so tiny, and about 14 of us had to be in there.  The only “super model” that was in that show was Ikeliene Stange, who I talked to about the designer Ruffian, and she was really sweet.  Tullulah had to go and get here hair and makeup done, so I was late getting her into her first outfit for the show.  You have less than a minute to dress the girl when she gets back from her first run.  So I was waiting ready with the nylon onesie all scrunched up in the appropriate places to throw over her conehead hairdo when she got back.  But she took it from me and started putting it on backwards, so I had to take it back and rescrunch it as she put on her leather pants halfway, I reput the flimsy shirt on her, and someone was trying to help me but was retarded and started turning the sleeve inside out.  I had to kinda yell at her in order for her to snap out of her panicked fumbling to tell her it was fine and she didn’t need to do that.  Meanwhile people are yelling at me to be quicker and the model’s throwing out obsenities.  We snap the onesies, yank on the leather pants, I jam her feet into the too small pink pumps, and she’s off for her second run.  And that was Estrella Arch.  We sat around for 3 hours before the show, the show itself was a frenzy, and after 15 minutes, it’s done.  I don’t really mind the stress or the yelling because it’s kinda like I’m a part of a machine in a factory.  We have to produce something, and if we’re lacking or not working right, the mechanic’s going to swear at us as s/he fixes the problem.  It’s nothing personal.

The second show we worked at was Jeremy Bueno.  It was a lot more casual.  He is a graduate of the Paris American Academy.  His show was held in the coolest building I’ve seen in Paris.  I was so in love with it the minute I walked in the door.  It was old and unrestored with all the original doors and fixtures.  All the wood was old and weathered and exposed, but there was this juxtoposition because some things were really well taken care of.  Make up and hair was in a room that looked like the library from Beauty and the Beast.  The dressing room was like a library you’d find in an old fashioned mansion, with dark oak cabinets and a tall ceiling and heavy drapes.  And then the runway was in a room that kind of reminded me of the Holy Names auditorium or something you’d find in St. Joes.  I just knew there was something special about this place.  And then I found out that it was the place where the Lumiere bros made their first films, and they tried to keep it in the same condition since that time.  Which is SO cool, because I love the vaudeville and the beginning of film and the Lumiere brothers were some of my favorites.  To give you a little taste, they were the first to create a “movie theater”, and their calling card was the film of a train coming towards the camera where movie goers quotably jumped out of the way back in the beginning of the 1900s.  So, I was on board and stoked to be there.  There was a French filmmaker doing some sort of piece with the models before the show, and he was staging this model taking cameras from paparazzi and throwing them to the ground, and he wanted us to stand behind the camera and use the flashes on our digital cameras to add effect.  It was fun.  It reminded me of AV tech projects in high school.  We waited around for a couple hours (I explored the building as we were waiting), and when it was time to go over the outfits for the show and dress the models, we discovered some “uh ohs”.  Apparently Jeremy had never used or knew how to use organza before because some of the dresses were coming apart at the seams, which had to be quickly dealed with.  The outfits themselves were celestial themed, and really reminded me of the first film ever made with special effects, Melies’ “Trip to the moon”, the show itself sounded awesome.  We couldn’t see it because we were bustling about backstage, but they had a Pink Floyd laser show to accompany the star themed ensembles.  Dressing was really unorganized, but the walk was so long that we had plenty of time between outfits to make all the models look flawless.  I asked the designer whether he was inspired by early film for the collection, and whether the place was picked intentionally to go with the collection, but I was reminded that I’m just way too much of a nerd and he hardly knew anything about the Lumieres or early film.  There were quite a few cute guys at that show, but it’s the worst place to try to talk to guys because you’re surrounded by models and beautiful people and you’re sweating and stinking like a pig because you’re running around trying to make sure everything’s where it’s supposed to be.  And I was there for 4 hours and these people just showed up in their freshly fabulous outfits 20 minutes ago.  My point being, this is the first time in my life I can remember actually making the effort to talk to a guy and him showing no interest at all.  But, I had a great time anyway.  Afterwards my roommate Amy, me, and this new student Hillary went to Le Deux Magots, which is a famous café, and had a little dinner and hung out for a long time drinking wine and laughing about all the run ins we’ve had with the French – both good and bad.  We explained to her that we know the complete lowdown on the status of our upstairs neighbor’s relationship.  And everytime they have a little afternoon or evening delight, all of our surrounding neighbors have strategies to drown out the sound.  We turn up the music, our next door neighbor vacuums.  We know this because when there’s a hint of it stopping, all the neighbors turn down their music or turn off their vacuum, but without fail they start up again, so once again we’ll hear the vacuum going or other people’s music turned up.  It’s funny.  And Hillary has had about every thing that could go wrong go wrong.  The guy she was staying with came onto her the first night, so she had to find a new place, which she had to find within pretty much 48 hours, so it’s been a trip for all of us.

Ugh, sorry, enough with the tangents.

Veronique Branquinho was a show I was nervous about and didn’t expect to be laid back.  But it was by far my favorite.  It’s funny how thing’s work out that way.  It was in the same venue as the Estrella Arch show.  Her clothing was so classic and beautifully tailored, and it felt like butter.  It was split into black, beige, and ivory mini collections. My model at that show was my favorite.  Her name was Alina, and she was so calm and collected and positive.  I took a picture with her after the show and she wanted to even look at it, which I was really surprised by.  And afterwards she even thanked me and kissed me on both cheeks.  The pace of the show was just as quick, but a lot more organized and relaxed.  Even though I had the wrong size shoes for my model.  I had to put in three inserts in order for her to not fall out of them.  I even corrected the designer on what shoes go to what model!  I had it down.  And the designer was totally open to listening, it’s not like I was some brat trying to tell her what to do.  She seemed really cool.  After the show they had the most BOMB hors d’oeuvres.  I can’t even explain a couple of them because I have no idea what they were.  I had 4 different ones and a few glasses of champagne.  One of the hors d’oeuvres was a seaweed salad wrapped in something sushi like and it was pinned together with a tiny clothespin, and then there were these cookies that were like little sandwiches with a cream inside, and the outside was a cookie that was crispy on the outside and an almost caramelly brownie consistency on the inside.  I wish I could explain the flavor, but I don’t even know, it was kind of butterscotch/ginger.  I don’t know, it was yummy.  The models thought so, too, they were crowding round the tables scarfing down the appetizers like ravenous wolves.   I met my future husband as I was sipping some champagne.  He was this beautiful guy with well manicured dreads, miles of style, a face that I didn’t know could exist, and so much passion for what he does.  I soon found out he was a bit older than me, and I think he realized I was a bit younger, so he never put off that he was interested at all.  I don’t know whether he was even straight.  It’s so hard to tell in Europe, and in the fashion industry.  He said he designed from 1996-2002, and got spent on it, so he taught (or assisted teaching) and now he owns a boutique in London called “The Convenience Store” where he sells Veronique amongst others.  The reason I thought he was so cool besides the obvious was that he vocalized all the things I’ve been thinking about fashion lately and it was really refreshing to hear.  Very down to earth and an interpretive artistic view versus the whole “I’m a slave to the fashion gods” point of view, which I’ve been really burnt out on recently.  I like to do things in moderation, but I’m still a passionate creator.  So it was nice to meet someone else with that kind of attitude.  And it’s usually embarrassing for me to talk about fashion because so many people view it as an unintelligent subject, so it was nice to talk to someone who shares the same cultural perspective and interpretation on fashion and that clothes are such a big part of his life like it is mine.  He had a few words of wisdom because he had a few years on me, and I came out of the conversation really refreshed and ready to take on the rest of the shows.  

That night we went dancing in a way too crowded bar and I met a couple of new friends, Amine and Muegged, who my friend Elizabeth and I ended up hanging out with and playing uno with and watching the Discovery Channel until 4 am.  And I’m being 100% honest.  They told us we were going to a house party, but I guess something got lost in translation cause we just went to their apartment and hung out for forever.  Amine’s a good friend to stick around because he took it upon himself to be a French tutor for me and he absolutely refuses to speak in English sometimes in order for me to “progress”.  That and he doesn’t speak English that well.  He also decided to call me “Jennifer Aniston”, because “Hattie” is too hard (the French don’t pronounce H’s).

I have two more shows to explain!  Lordy.  I’m going to be brief.  Manish Arora is a crazy designer from India, his designs are high quality couture with the most detailed techniques and incredibly crafted structure.  His inspiration for fall 09 was butterflies, and he had these quilted pieced together pieces that looked like butterfly wings, and they consisted of velvet, leather, jewels, and lots of beading.  It was a good show, and I was fascinated to go around and look at how all the pieces were constructed.  My model was from the Seattle area.  So that’s that.

Elie Saab was the biggest of the shows we worked at.  He’s a designer for a lot of Hollywood, especially come oscar season.  I saw a lot of supermodels who were in that show:  Coco Rocha, Chanel Iman, Jessica Stam, Heidi Mount, Sasha Pivovarova (if you look them up on Style.com you may recognize some of the faces).  It was nuts to see these girls in the flesh after seeing so many of their pictures in countless adds and spreads in magazines.  The clothes were stunning and classic.  My model’s name was Ksenia Kahnovich, if you look her up on style.com, the first two pictures are the outfits I put her in.  I really liked the first dress, the beigy grey one, but they had me add this necklace to it and it was so much more beautiful with out it.  The dress already had some jewels on the border of the lace, and I feel it had so much character without the barnacle looking additional necklace.  The bare lace was so much more provocative and classically sexy.  I didn’t really agree with the stylist for the Elie Saab show, and apparently neither did the old stylist who was still on staff.  They were arguing until the last minute.  If you look at the show, I think the accessories even take away from some of the overall ensembles.  But it was really well organized, and I had the whole dressing thing down to a tee by then, so it was a piece of cake.  And I got a picture with the model of the moment, Chanel Iman, which was the cherry on top of my fashion week.

Other adventures.  I went to Fontainebleau with Amy and Hillary last Sunday.  It was the “weekend home” of the royalty of Versailles, which means that it was still the hugest building and grounds I’ve ever seen in my life.  Every room of the castle was lavishly and ornately decorated and every room had a huge fireplace.  And there were so many discreet and hidden doors!  I was thinking of “the secret garden” the entire time I was there because it reminded me so much of that castle.  I wanted to find some private corridor that led to a secret room or garden, but alas, all the doors were locked.  I checked.  I was so giddy when I was there.  I don’t remember feeling that way since I was little.  It’s a rare feeling.  When you’re an adult, you can appreciate things or think they’re beautiful, but it’s so rare to have that full blown childlike excited contentment to explore the new.  The gardens were my favorite part.  The day started out raining, which was perfect for us to be roaming about the castle, but then it cleared up when we went out to explore the grounds.  I half expected a troop of horses and hounds to come gallivanting out hunting for rabbits.  It was so nice to get some fresh air in such a beautiful woody/manor setting.  We happened upon a fountain with swans in it, and I got to feed a swan directly from my hand.  It made me miss my ducks.  This trip made me want to get a bunny and more ducks when I get back home.

Sidenote: I read recently that the rabbit is supposed to be the animal of this time because it symbolizes rebirth, collection, intuition, and quiet persuasion.  I thought that very fitting considering the economy and all the hell that needs to be figured out.

I found an incredible music venue, too.  We went to Fleche D’Or (flesh of gold) after the Elie Saab fashion show.  If you imagine Central Perk Café from the tv show Friends being transformed to a music venue/bar you arrive at something like Fleche D’Or.  It had cute comfie couches and it was just a really nice ambience and they had bands that were my flavor and the type I truly enjoy dancing too.  Not even like good Michael Jackson dancing too, but like the Strokes and T. Rex I like dancing to style.  Which I’ve never found outside of my bedroom.  The live bands that played all sang in English, though, even though they were French.  I find that a lot.  It’s kind of disappointing because French is so beautiful to listen to in song.  I was kind of even talking to the cab driver on the way home about how beautiful French songs are, and how excited I am when I actually hear them here.  And I spoke to him 100% in French, thank you very much.  I understood 90% of what he was saying, too.  But he talked very very slowly.  We had a conversation the entire time, he, my friend Laurel, and I.  One of the first things the French are guaranteed to want to hear about is Obama.  I’ve had to talk to so many people about it.  I tell them I voted for the green party and avoid any conflict as much as possible.  I was talking to this very drunk girl from South Africa about it one night and she was expressing pretty much the way I felt about the whole thing, and how nervous she was about the state of the world being in such unknown unexperienced hands, and how it sucked to watch it all because all the world depends on the United States and they couldn’t do anything about it, which got another guy from Wales a little heated, at which point I butted in and said that the thing I’ve learned from it all is that I don’t like politics because most of what it does for people like us is point out our differences when really everyone has more things in common than we have different.  And politics is not a conversation that should be dealt with in drunk minds.  So luckily that killed it, because the Presidential election is one of my most uncomfortable topics and as soon as people find out I’m American I just wait for them to ask me about something related to it all at which point I flinch.

School is going swimmingly, too.  Peter Carman, the president, mentioned to the costume teacher that I had an interest in costume (I don’t even remember telling him this), and so she offered for me to make purely historic pieces instead of modern pieces.  So I chose a time period, the 1890’s, about Mary Poppin’s time, and I’m going to make a jacket, a skirt, and now I guess an actual hat in genuine costume construction – which is totally different than the way we make clothes right now and the true secret to making costume look like it did back in the day.  But it means that I won’t be making an haute couture jacket, which I’m kind of sad about, but I don’t want to go into Haute Couture, so it’s a compromise and it’ll look better on my resume to be the assistant designer to  Colleen Atwood ;)

Hmm,  I think that’s actually it for now.  All is well and I am once again head over heels for Paris.  I gage my level of interest by nutella crepes.  I haven’t had one for over two weeks now, and everytime there’s a lull I comfort myself with one.  So as long as I stay busy, the more stories, and the less love handles I’ll have when I return home. xox