highlights

so we're back today. just got back. still have to finish unpacking but i wanna write a little. we were in paris and did a lot of stuff and also i want to write about the highlights of our trip. and our big news also. we're getting married next summer. that's our big news.

so, highlights.

• j'mafna square (j'maa el fnaa) in marakesh - performers and crowds and buying fresh orange juice for 30 cents.
• eating moroccan crepes, sometimes for breakfast.
• majorelle gardens in marakesh
• our marakesh and fez hotels were pretty (pretty hot in the case of Marakesh) and right in the middle of the souk
• some restaurants had terrace seating where you could look over all the crazy narrow streets
• it had a pool which we frequented multi-times a day
• fez had cobblestone roads like a maze
• we saw a cool tile/mosaic factory. they really do chip those little pieces by hand
• in chefchouen we walked around and saw women blue washing the walls
• trek was nice, especially in the shade and downhill, and was a good break from the cities second day of trek was in the shade, downhill, through village-y kind of houses and yards where residents invited us to pick fresh figs nice to arrive in azilane at the guest house, and relax there was cool water to put on our heads
• tangeirs ultra huge supermarket was really interesting
• rural moroccan coast
• park guell in barcelona was lovely
• narbonne in southern france was a nice break for a few days and we saw pretty churches and markets
• paris was cool; we liked a lot of things like the catacombs and the louvre and two walking tours and a cruisey tour thing on the seinne river and notre dame

the end is near

paris is nice. today we went to the catacombs and saw skulls laid out in the shape of hearts and designs, surrounded by femurs. lovely. and then we went on another walking tour and learned stuff about the french revolution. going to a chopin concert tonight in paris's oldest church and on a boat tour thing and we're gonna eat a crepe. temperature is nice. we leave tomorrow.
yona

cool old stuff and wine

we are in paris. it's lovely, actually. weather is cooler and very nice, and we went on an interesting walking tour today. and my ankle is better so we can do that kind of thing. the walking tour was really cool and we learned a lot about henry the second and louis the 14th and learned a lot. also we did something really cool that i liked a lot. we went to a flea market kind of thing with antique lots-of-things and it was all these little alleyways with old everythings. tables, aposltered chairs, buttons, keys, an old globe that called alaska part of russia... a lot of cool old stuff. we'll be here a few more days and tomorrow we'll go to the louvre. also we've been metro-ing everywhere and we are getting it more than we got the barcelona system.

so in paris they say "voila" all the time. and they don't dress as stylie and fashionably like they did in barcelona - in barcelona everyone was super skinny and dressed skimpily. also everyone was so hip and had tatoos... i even saw a grandmother type with a tatoo on her neck. the tatoo was a flower. here it's more normal. they have a cool rent-a-bike system here and they did in barcelona, too. we'd try it here but my ankle isn't good enough yet. when we were in the south of france we went to two concerts of classical music in old churches. one church was 1000 years old. the other was younger. we saw a saxophonist playing classical music; this was something i'd never heard before. and some opera-type singers. they were young, like 20-somethings, but if you couldn't see them you would think they were older and overweight and with puffy wigs and many scarves and jewelery. but they were young and skinny and hip-looking. so that was interesting. there were grapes growing everywhere around where we were. fields and fields of grapes. it's wine-ville.

yona

Gentrification French style

We left s. france a few days early and took the express train to paris, getting in yesterday evening.

Today, we visited a market and signed up to do a 2 hour walking tour of the Marais neighborhood. It turns out it was the old jewish quarter for many centuries, which of course made Yona very excited. The tour was really well done. One of the things we learned about was a network of state run pawn shops. Some of them have endowments so they charge no interest, while others operate to break even, even splitting the proceeds if the items end up being sold. Back in the day, people would pawn their fancy clothes or even their mattress. Some people even had a morning ritual of pawning their mattress every morning (and buying it back in the evening (perhaps the first micro loan program?)).

As to be expected, there were some amazing 400 and 500 year old buildings, called hotel particuliers. The king had moved into the neighborhood around the 1600s so all the nobility and wannabees quickly bought up property and started building houses. The really old houses have stone window frames and dividers. The neighborhood fell into disrepair after the french revolution, when the houses were converted into factories or warehouses. But recently it was designated a historic area, which has sparked a recovery driven by trendy shops. The neighborhood is gentrifying and in this case it is the jewish residents who are being driven out by the yuppies.

Now it is off to find some dinner.
Josh

Southern France

We arrived in Southern France about a day ago. It is amazingly peaceful and relaxing, especially because we have family to stay with and to house us in their 1790 farm house.



Arriving was almost a disaster. We were supposed to take the 8:45 train to arrive at 12:20, to be promptly whisked away for a concert once we arrived. We went the day before to get the tickets and they were sold out! Looking at buses and other options, nothing got in for several hours later.

After consulting with our Aunt we were told to just get on board the train and assume they would not throw us out and buy the ticket on board. Or at least would not throw us out while the train was moving! Unfortunatly, there was someone checking tickets at the platform, so we had to sneak by him. But then we got spooked because everyone had assigned seats and there did not seem to be any place to go. losing our nerve, we asked a conductor if we needed tickets and he either did not understand us or told us we could get on. So we decided to do that. then some other employee wanted our tickets and we said that the first guy said we could get on without them, which seemed to work. We eventually found empty seats and rode all the way to france without anyone even checking our tickets. In France (3 hours into a 3 and 20 minute trip) someone finally asked for tickets and we had to buy tickets, but only for the France part of the trip. In any case, we got there without a problem.

The concert (which we did not end up leaving for until after 2) was amazing. It is part of a 60 year old music festival held in a Pyrennes mountain village. The concerts (we went to two) were held in two different AMAZING churches, one almost 1000 years old.

Not too much else has happened. Just some farmers markets, which are lots of fun. I believe there were more people at the market then lived in the village. This is a land where they take food seriously.

This may be the last post. Internet is hard to come by in rural france and we head back pretty soon. We may be able to squeeze in one more update once we are in paris in a couple of days.

Josh