au revoir, tours

{Written Sunday afternoon, but didn't have wifi, and then had wifi but no time, so I'm posting this now}


Leaving Tours feels like coming full circle.

Though I was in France briefly a year ago, the last time I spent significant time in a francophone country was 3 summers ago when I spent a month doing an Experiment in International Living program in Switzerland. That summer was eye-opening for me; I was the most independent I had ever been, I realised how beneficial immersion is in the language-learning process, and for the first time I began to fully appreciate travel as more than just something awesome and fun that I got to do from time to time- I began to see it as something fundamentally enriching, a way to grow as a person and learn about oneself. I still get waves of nostalgia whenever I hear a song from Adele's album "21", my Swiss host family's favourite CD to listen to in the car whenever we drove anywhere. But if there's one thing I wish I could change about that trip, it's how hard I was on myself. At various points during my month in Switzerland, I remember thinking, "Next time I do something like this, I'll be able to communicate better with my host family," or "Next time, I'll be able to speak good enough French to chat with teenagers my age and not feel self-conscious," etcetera ad nauseum. I was acutely aware of where I was and of where I wanted to be with French.

Coming to Tours, living with a host family, and immersing myself in the language gave me a sense of déjà vu, and I'm very happy to see how far I've come. Long gone are the hesitations before speaking, the constant gnawing anxiety at the thought of being misunderstood or of sounding ridiculous, and the frustration at not being able to express myself fully and articulate my thoughts to the extent I wanted to. I still have a ways to go before I speak fluently, but I'm right where my 16-year-old self would have hoped I'd be, especially after not having set foot in a French class for nearly a year, and living in Argentina and Israel surrounded by other languages in the interim. I've definitely improved since I've been in Tours, and that's satisfying to know.

And I've had such a good time here. I've made a group of hilarious, lovely friends, gotten to explore a region of France I hadn't been to before, and enjoyed every minute (with the possible exception of my marathon Friday afternoon art history lectures involving an actual literal projector and dozens of slides of the interior decor of various châteaux) of my 6 weeks here.

It was sad to hang out with our friends last night and know it was the final time. But when we were all out dancing and a remix of Adele's "Someone Like You" started to play, I knew I was exactly where I needed to be.

Leaving France feels like the end of an era- it's the last long-term portion of the gap year. But the adventure's not quite over yet. I'm writing this on the train from Tours to Paris, where we're meeting Tamar, putting our bags in a storage locker for the afternoon, and spending a few hours in the city before boarding a night train to Munich. The next two weeks are about to be insanely busy, but I can't wait.

À bientôt,

x
M

un weekend en irlande

anyone who knows me knows about my thing for ireland.

magic has always fascinated me. as a little- and not so little- kid, i wrote extensive letters to the tooth fairy, left may day baskets out, and even built and carefully maintained a fairy garden in the side yard of my house. it comes as no surprise then that visiting a country that consciously cultivates its mystical image for two weeks the summer i was nine was quite honestly a defining life event. i could almost taste the potential magic glimmering right beneath the surface everywhere in ireland, just past the next pile of peat in a connemara bog, behind a brightly-painted georgian door in dublin, in the rafters of trinity college's cavernous old library, amidst the frothy wake of the boat taking us to the isle of inishbofin. i was lucky enough to have seen quite a few incredible places in the world prior to that trip, and i've continued to have the privilege to travel in the years since, and there are a multitude of places where i've met amazing friends or done fascinating work or seen beautiful sights or adored the culture, and all-around loved the country. but ireland has always stuck in my mind as being special in a different, more personal kind of way.

when marit and i were entertaining the idea of travelling over our 3-day easter weekend, and realised that there was a direct flight from tours to dublin, and that it was far less expensive than any of our other possible destinations, i have to admit i had a moment of hesitation. i've been dying to return to ireland for the past decade, and never imagined it would happen this year, but at the same time, how can any place live up to a decade's worth of mental buildup? i'd mythologised ireland for so long at this point that it scared me to think that it might not be as special as i remembered it being- that perhaps the connection i felt to it had more to do with where i was in my life at that time than it did with the actual place. but then i came to my senses and remembered that ireland was my favourite place i had ever been and how cool it was that i was being presented with this opportunity that i'd been wanting for so long and that i couldn't think of any better way to spend my birthday weekend than in the best country with my best friend.

so we bought our tickets, and we went.

we didn't have time to go to the west coast, which will always have my heart, but we did make it outside dublin to spend friday afternoon getting amongst nature in the ~real ireland~ aka howth, a touristy but very cute village on a peninsula on the north side of dublin bay. 

walking around the trinity campus on saturday morning.

grafton street.

dublin castle.

post-guinness factory tour. 

the view of the liffey from the ha'penny bridge at night.

we went to easter mass at christ church cathedral. marit was happy we picked christ church because it's the episcopalian cathedral of dublin & glendalough dioceses. we were both happy because the church- and its crypt, which is the oldest building in dublin and which houses tons of historical artifacts- usually costs several euros in admission... but if you attend a service, you get to explore it for free. 

st. stephen's green.

 

we had to take a short yoga-selfie break in the park- une petite pause, as our french profs would say. 

parliament. 

it was a fantastic weekend, and over all too soon. but it's okay- spending those three days in ireland only solidified my desire to study abroad at trinity college dublin my junior year with the st andrews english department's erasmus exchange with TCD. i think if you're lucky enough to find the one place that you feel that particular, singular connection to, il faut profiter de ça. knowing that i'll be back in two years makes me so, so happy. 

so as it turns out, ireland is just as magical as ever. 

x

M

avril

it's been a while. 

life has been its usual mad amazing whirlwind. 

i've had classes at the institut every monday to friday and i really do feel like i've gotten much better. i'm at the point with french where i don't have trouble communicating ever but i tend to beat myself up over messing up or forgetting small details- but every day i feel more and more confident and competent in french. whilst part of that improvement is due to class, a large part of it is coming simply from being immersed in french life, doing everything from talking over the many complicated eurail ticket options with the very patient people working at the gare, to bantering with the employees at the hole-in-the-wall sri lankan restaurant where they know by now to start making nutella sandwiches on naan as soon as we walk in on any given weekend night. i find myself absently talking to myself in french instead of english half the time. it can be frustrating when i make mistakes or blank on a word, but i'm getting there. i'm getting there. i'm getting there. 

outside of class, i've been hanging out with friends and trying to make the most of my very limited remaining time here! 

a couple weekends ago it was sunny so a few of us spent the afternoon lounging around on an island in the middle of the loire. 

some other highlights of the past couple of weeks: our uzbekistani housemates gifted us fancy patterned bread. 

i turned 19! it was a wonderful day spent with wonderful people. even spending most of the day in class wasn't too bad since marit and i started the morning off on the right foot by grabbing chai lattes and muffins at our favourite overpriced coffeeshop.

courtesy of our friend loes, who has a car, and the institut, for giving us wednesday afternoons free, we've instituted the new tradition of château wednesdays. two weeks ago, it was château d'azay le rideau.

last wednesday we went to chenonceau, which was every bit as storybook-perfect as i had imagined it would be. 

today we went to amboise, but i haven't yet uploaded those photos unfortunately. it was beautiful, though, and the town was charming. 

the main excitement in my life recently, however, was last weekend's trip to dublin! it was incredible and i still can't quite believe it actually happened. i can't think of any better way to have spent my birthday weekend. that'll be another post, for sure. stay tuned. 

xo

m

p.s. OUR EURAIL PASSES ARRIVED! 

and in a 48-hour planning blitz, marit and tamar and i have now successfully booked every single train and hostel for our two weeks of backpacking! now comes the fun part, aka planning how to fit everything we want to do/see in each place into the short time we have there. suggestions on (extremely low-budget) things to do in munich, florence, nice, marseille, or barcelona are more than welcome!