Bonjour!

Today was quite a long day! Waking up for class was pretty tough because I think the tiredness from the marathon weekend finally caught up to me. Erin and I went to breakfast at 9:10am and it ends at 9:15am but it was funny because basically every other student was there that late too. Everyone is just so tired from all the traveling so everyone seemed to sleep in and it was funny because looking around, I noticed that everyone was in their pajamas in class. Professor Kennedy, our teacher from VT, gave the lecture today. It was about entrepreneurs and what an entrepreneur actually does. It was interesting and particularly exciting to be able to understand him without having to carefully listen to each word like I do for the teachers with the heavy accents.

After class we all of us girls met up and went straight to Montmarte. Montmarte is the area with the Moulin Rouge, the Sacre Coeur Basilica, and it is artist central. We started by climbing the stairs to the Sacre Coeur and going inside to see it. J It was beautiful, as is every church I've seen so far in Europe! The view from the Sacre Coeur is incredible. You can see so much of Paris and it is just unbelieveable. Naturally, we took a million pictures! We grabbed some dinner right in the middle of the artist square. It was pretty amazing. Since it is the last week we all decided to get super French food to be wild! So, I had liver pate with boeuf bourgignon. Absolutely delicious…and I am super proud of myself for eating liver!!! It was the perfect French day. We all walked around and looked at the art too - some of the art is so different. There were watercolors, oil paintings, 3D paintings, paintings with abstract modern takes on the Eiffel tower and others were very traditional, French looking paintings with the little shops and cafes with the Eiffel Tower in the background. It was a really cool experience. J After ooing and awing at all the paintings, we walked back down the giant hill and found the "I love you" wall. It has "I love you" written in every language in the world. It was one of my favorite things I got to see today. On the way to the wall, though, we ran across these people in a window just singing and having a great time and they serenaded us! It really made it such a perfect day!! The last thing we did was head to the Moulin Rouge which of course was the worthy of a ton of pictures as well. I wish I could go in the Moulin Rouge and watch a show but maybe next visit to Europe since the tickets are so expensive and nobody wants to spend the money…definitely next time though!

It was a perfect day in France and I am so happy I went to Montmarte even though I was and still am so tired. It was totally worth it though. J Now all I have to do is start packing because I know it will be at least a two to three day process! Haha! It is sad that I only have a few days left…tomorrow we are going shopping in Pompidou because they have great vintage shopping, Wednesday we have to study for exams, Thursday we are going to the top of the Arc de Triomphe and then to a boat party (international people get in for free! Woo!), Friday we are having a wine tasting, Saturday is Bastille day, and then Sunday we leave! L I don't want to leave yet, especially because the people I have met are so amazing! The girls and I have already talked about having a reunion next summer. J

Countdown until heading back to America: 6 days L

Au Revoir!

Tori "Still missing Rome" Marshall