First Crepe, Rue de Rivoli and other adventures

HEYYYYY HEYYY HEYYYY!
So I missed another day! So bummed! But it really wasn’t much of a day. I woke up Saturday feeling sick. Not really sick, but my throat hurts, no beuno. And I’ve been coughing, which sucks. So I woke up a little later and wanted to get a lot done but really only ended up going to Pere Lachaise. Which was soo cool! I really only went to see Michel Ney’s grave. (Of course I would go see one of Napoleon’s Marshals of France and not Jim Morrison).

“Known as “The Bravest of the Brave”, and arguably Napoleon’s greatest marshal, Ney displayed great courage in action, above all during the retreat from Moscow, when he was reputed to have been the last Frenchman to leave Russian soil.”

But yeah, the whole thing was really interesting and I’ve always loved the idea of having a family burial chamber. I think its classical and yeah. So anyways I walked around for a couple hours – but it was very very cold outside and I knew it wasn’t helping me feel any better to be walking around in the cold. So I made my way back to FIAP. I spent most of the rest of the day just resting and trying to feel better. I guess it helped a little, but not much.

Other than that Bret came back around midnight and it sounded like he had a really good time in Copenhagen! Not much really happened on Saturday, I felt a little better when I went to sleep hoping I would get a bunch of sleep. I’ve been also feeling really fed up with the internet here at the FIAP, it basically sucks. Its slow and makes talking with anyone difficult! Only like 6 more days of it! No worries!

So Sunday was nice. I woke up feeling a bit better, less “sick” and more just a scratchy throat. Which is annoying but a lot better than also feeling sick. So I went out today on a long walk from FIAP to the louvre and Rue de Rivoli to buy gifts for everyone back home! Then I walked through tuileries and over the Seine a couple times. It was perfectly sunny out and it got much warmer! It really was the first nice day in a while. I also felt good because I was able to take some pictures and have something to show you all! Ummm so then I came back to FIAP and relaxed and felt warm again and took a brief nap. Went to dinner with everyone and came back to the room. Nothing has really happened since.
If I think of something later I’ll add it to this post, but I really just want to get this up with all the images and get to bed soon. Its just been a good day! And tomorrow should be laid back with a fantastic dinner at the Meurice “Le Dali” which I CANT WAIT FOR!

Oh I did remember something – I had my first crepe since Ive been here today! At the ferris wheel at Place Concorde. It was sub par, not bad, but not what a paris crepe should be!

Oh and yes lots of pictures today! I know Ive been lazy and preoccupied for the past few days, so here you go!!

byeeeeeee

Le Meurice + Puligny Montrachet = PERFECT

So just got home from dinner. We all went to this cute little restaurant rightnear the louvre. Very nice traditional French food. I really enjoyed it! But – the highlight of my night was after we left the others went off to some bars near by and I took a little walk over to the Meurice, my second home in Paris. I had a perfect Puligny Montrachet at the bar, well I was relaxed in a comfy chair. One of the best moments of my whole trip, I love the Meurice, and I love Puligny Montrachet – it was sublime! Just thought I’d post and make you all very jealous. I think I’ll have to go back at least one or two more times before I leave – It always puts me in the most perfect of moods!

That’s really all I had to say – I’ll write more tomorrow and let you all know how my weekend is going!

Cheap water and other musings while abroad...

Heyy all!

So Im sorry I missed the update yesterday. I was in the room for hardly 20 min all day! I’ll give you all a brief rundown of my day though!

So I woke up really early because Bret was taking an early flight to Copenhagen, and I stayed up till maybe 7am then fell back asleep with the intention of getting back up at 9 so I could in class on time to finish my printing for Fridays crit. BUT I feel asleep and just kept hitting the snooze in my sleep and when I finally opened my eyes it was like 10:15 and I was ohhh noo!!! So I rushed my morning routine and had no time to do anything! I just went right to SPEOS and I was feeling just all a mess. Anyways I contact printed my film and made some nice prints I ended up using 5 prints from my negs and 5 digital print for Friday. I really enjoy contact printing – I love the size but on a big wall its not big enough I think unless you get up right next to it. So Im thinking I need to try 8x10 when I get back to school. (I don’t want to buy a 8x10 camera dad – don’t worry, just try it!). So then I went in a figured I would test out the Epson inkjet that they pulled out of storage for us – It worked fine,I had no RIP software so I just printed out of photoshop and got some nice prints. Im really excited to print my final next week, I think Im going to keep them 8x10 or smaller – a more intimate experience. And when I finished my prints its was around 2pm and I had brought my Louvre membership (Thanks to my wonderful girlfriend Minali <3) so I decided that I would just take a quick trip over and check it out a little bit (we had a lecture at 5:30, so I had to be quick). And it was soo nice to just get away from everything and wander around and get lost in a big museum. I had forgotten how much I love to wander and get lost like that. I hadn’t been in a really big museum by myself in a long time. I really enjoyed it – I saw mostly just the Napoleon I and III rooms – soo lavish. Actually the best part was I wander right into Napoleon I’s throne room. And I didn’t know it until I was like WOAHH! It was really a treat! And I saw Hammurabi’s Code, which is something Ive always wanted to see since middle school (IDK why, just always struck me as a really cool artifact). After a couple hours I figured I should head back to SPEOS and maybe get sandwich for good measure ☺.

Our lecture was from one of the teachers at SPEOS that has been heloing us in the darkroom, Niloufar (http://www.niloufarbanisadr.com/SITE-ANG.html). It was pretty interesting, I think there was some language barrier, but it was nice to see some of her work and things that she’s had to work though. Umm after that we went back to FIAP for some dinner. The food is ok, its cafeteria food. But somehow every meal always ends up being creatively mushed together by the time it reaches the trash. I guess I was never much of a play with my food kinda person. Just an observation hmmmm. We all decied that we should go out and have a good night. So we did that. I suppose I can write this, I hope noone from FIAP is reading it. But a few of us tried to go buy booze and bring it back into FIAP – well we got caught! Which has never happened in the past! So they took it and put it behind the desk for us to pickup next time we leave. Well we just picked it up when we left to go out to the bars and smuggled it back in! So yeah. (Sorry Anna! ☺). Umm but yeah Jeff and Paige, and Madeline and I all went out. First to the Oberkampf area and went to this cozy bar. And after a drink we left and wandered for a while until we were all like “Hmm all the paris streets look the same, where’s the next bar?” and we stumbled right into “Le Pop-In the bar we had gone to a few weeks ago! So we stayed there a while and had some more drinks until 2ish and decided we should work on getting home. My inebriated French got us a cab that could take 4 (which is really hard) and told him where to go – I even had to explain where because he wasn’t quite sure! I was so proud of myself for that! Anyways we got home and pretty much just hungout and went to bed around 3ish. It was a good night – we didn’t have crit until 2 the next day so I was looking forward to sleeping in finally!!

So TODAY! I slept in!! Until 11! Yayay! Woke up and was surprised that the maids hadn’t woken me up sooner, in fact I didn’t see them at all today! Anyways got up and had a pleasant morning – went off to school and got my usual sandwich on my way. Got there around 1, hung up my work a just relaxed. I got a bottle of water at the store next door. And just an observation – I got a 1.5liter bottle, a lot of water. It was .22 euro!!!! Wtf! Why is it so cheap here! That would be like $3 or more in the US. Anyways I wont bother you all with water. We had crit, It was good. IDK too much more to say about it. I was thinking the past couple days – I really came to Paris to work. And by that I mean that I came not to take serious photographs but to be more relaxed about it but make really nice work. But I came to work, I love Paris the city, but its just a city. I can go out and have fun in any city, but I cant make photos of Paris anywhere else. And plus I have more fun going out and making work than going out to drink… Just another observation, I know everyone here is like PARIS!!!!!!!! Lets go party. And maybe I sound lame thinking what I do. But I don’t know, I go out, I guess its just recently that Ive noticed that too many people just want to drink and shit, its just a little immature. Whatever, Im having fun and so Im not going to worry about it!

Soo having said all that, tonight I think the four of us again are going to out but for a nice dinner! Which Im excited about! Ive only gone out once for dinner so far and I really want a good dinner! Were not sure where were going to go yet, but Im sure it will be great! And other than that not much is happening or has happened oin the past couple days.

I don’t have any pictures for today ☹ but I figured I could post some videos that I’ve taken over the past few weeks. And I promise to have pictures tomorrow! Im going to try and take a nice long walk tomorrow and take lots and lots of pictures!

Ok well the videos are not loading onto blogspot because of this awful internet!! anyways I hope your all doing well!
See you all soon!

I hate making titles for posts - Im going to call this one "The Crazies"

Hola!

So I’m writing this now (8:18pm) because I don’t know if were going out later tonight. So I just wanted to update you all on my day. Woke up and went in early to develop my negs from the past couple days. They turned out OK. Not as happy as I wanted to be with them. I have one holder that’s a little sticky and fucked one up and I guess I miscounted because I didn’t have one that I knew I took and I went back to look at my holders and I still have one that I haven’t developed. Which is too bad, but Im not going to shoot 5 more just to get that one frame, besides I took it with the digital camera also so I’ll just use that. I imagine that for Friday I’ll have about 5 or 6 film prints and the rest digital, which is fine – I’ve been generally more happy with my digital work this trip than the film. OMG I’m getting addicted to the sandwiches here. They have basically taken over my diet. So again today we had our favorite French tour guide, NICOLE! And today we were off to the Henri Cartier Bresson Foundation – Which I was really looking forward to, but it was a little less epic than I had hoped. There were only like 10 or so prints and we ended up watching a film about him with him in it. It was a pretty interesting film, a little too long but good to see. And it was nice to see the prints – but to be honest Im not much for seeing prints in person vs seeing them in a book. That is unless the person is truly a master at printing and is (like me) super anal about technical quality. I remember nearly breaking into tears looking at some Hiroshi Sugimoto prints last semester. And I love HCB but IMO a 5x7 print is about the same on the wall as in a book. I love them, but you get it. Also just to clarify, I really do enjoy our tour guide Nicole, and I think she has some interesting information – I just happen to be a photo major and have a pretty good photo background so I don’t need her giving me a photo 101 history lesson. But other than that Shes been informative. Soooo then we all broke up and dispersed around the city. I went back to FIAP and on my way went to a café near FIAP and just hung out for a little while – killed some time, I feel so French!

Anyways, I went back to FIAP and rested a bit and had some dinner. Just got back from dinner and Im not up to too much. Im really looking forward to knocking off my prints tomorrow and maybe going to the Louvre in the afternoon or something. We’ll see. Bret is leaving tomorrow for Copenhagen until Sunday. So I plan on stealing his pillow and I’ll sleep well this weekend! Other than that not much to report for today. I have no imgaes for today (Im sorry) the next couple days will be processing and showing and not so much taking. But I’ll try and get some photos up tomorrow for you all to enjoy!

Also worth noting for myself to remember, the crazies across the street are active today! many windows open and they were on tables, in beds, making alarms go off at 7am this morning! Just making a mess of everything today!

Hope you’re all well!

Tuesday

Happy January 25th Everyone!

Not that today was any real special day, but I thought I should wish you all a happy day! I myself had a pretty good day. I got up early after having gone out last night (which was nice, just a quiet Monday night out). Missed breakfast again, and went to class around 9:30am. The morning was absolutely beautiful out, sunny, somewhat chilly but nice sun and nice light! I was determined to make 3-4 nice 4x5 negs today at Parc BelleVille, so I went off to class and loaded some film and went off to the park. It was soo much nicer today than yesterday. The ground was still wet so the light glistened off it at times and it didn’t rain and I didn’t get any mud on my shoes :D. I spent about an hour and a half making 3 more frames. Nothing in particular happened, but it was really peaceful and nice to just walk around. As I had done before, I walked back down to the metro and stopped in the same café for another café crème. Sooo good. And I enjoyed typical American pop music videos on the TV again ☺.

Our afternoon was the real treat of the day though! We had another guided tour, but this time instead of a gallery or museum we went (with our usual frenchy tour guide – Nicole.) to the Albert-Kahn Musee et Jardins. It was an exquisite Japanese/French collaborative garden. (Most of the pictures I posted today are from it!). It was just beautiful even though most of it was out of bloom, I can only imagine what its like in bloom. Next time I get the chance to come to Paris in the summer I def want to visit it! And its only 1.50 euro to get in! Such a deal! Its actually outside of Paris and in one of the suburbs at the end of the 10 line.

So that’s pretty much been my day so far. Well its 11:36 now so its really been my day. I’ve really been enjoying the past week, Im really happy with the work Im making both film and digital and everything’s been falling into place nicely! I’m setting aside this weekend and next week as my museum and gallery week, since my final will just be this blog and working on it is pretty easy everyday. And as far as tomorrow The afternoon group is working in the morning and in the afternoon we have another guided tour, but this time of the Cartier Bresson museum!!!! Very excited to see this!! Im going to try and go into class though and develop my negs and get a little work done so Im not swamped on Thursday to make too many prints.

Id really like to get breakfast tomorrow – Im going to try and get up at 8 and just pop down to get something. Although by now I’ve kind of worked into a rhythm of missing it and getting a sandwich on my way to class then eating mid afternoon, usually another sandwich.

Anyways I hope everyone is doing well and I cant wait to see you all!! Were getting down to the final days here!

Hey my avid readers! So I just got back home from the bars! But let me tell you about my whole day! MONDAY! Woke up and went off to class determined to get some actual work done (and by that I mean film) today. Went into SPEOS to load some 4x5 and go off. It was kinda rainy going into class and it stayed that way for a while. After loading film I left SPEOS and went to the BelleVille metro stop where I had been before. It was my goal to find the BelleVille Parc, I had heard of amazing views from the top! Well I found it! It was beautiful! Like OMG! So perfectly situated atop the hill. (There was some construction going on, a children’s jungle gym was being built). But besides that I climbed to the first peak of the park and found a pleasant little bench and view. Just as I had climbed to it it started to rain ☹ And the ground was wet and I got mud on my shoes – No Beuno. But other than that I was surrounded by this really ethereal sort of mist. It was soo cool! So also I found out that like 5 or 6 cats love to hang around this area, which was soo nice to see! I miss my cats back home and It was so nice to see so many cats (they looked to healthy to be strays) in the park. Anyways I continued on through the park – Oh I should note that I think for my friday crit Im going to exclusively photograph this park and some of the streets around it. I really love parks and this one in particular seemed to be so pleasant! So I continued on throught the park upwards and onwards! Just near the peak of it I looked down and saw what seemed to be a TV show shoot! I stayed and watched for a while. I saw a woman in red dancing and singing and the film crew getting set up. And in the distance on the highest point of the park I could see a couple practicing like some form of martial arts. I went over to look closer and then looked out onto the city and I could see all of Paris. It was beautiful! It totally made my day! It had stopped raining but it was still foggy and I could just see the Eifel tower in the distance wrapped in a layer of fog. I stayed there for a while to take it all in and then continued to the bottom of the park. When I got down to the bottom I worked my way over to the metro to get back home. But before that reached the metro I stopped in one of the oldest cafes in paris (I’m trying to look up the name now but I cant – I’ll post it later) and had a café crème, and watched American pop music videos on tv. I love how American pop is one of the biggest exports to Europe!

Anyways, I got back to the FIAP finally and realized I wanted some bread and cheese!!! So I left swiftly to find it. The cheese was easy, at the super marche a metro stop away, but when I got the Boulanger down the street I found it closed on Mondays!! WTF why would you close on a Monday, people are hungry!! So I went off to find another on my walk to FIAP ( I knew of another off a side street) meanwhile just as I left the first it started to rain. And when I found the second Boulanger it was closed too!! And it was still raining!!! I was sooo annoyed!! I was determined though and continued up the street until I found yet a third one. And wouldn’t you know just as I had walked out of it with a baguette in hand the rain stopped and the sun came out. Honest to god, it was like a miracle. I was happy and so was the weather!!! So I went back and ate it up!

From there on my day was pretty normal. I took a brief nap and took a shower and stayed in the room for a while until about 10:30ish when some of us decided to go out for a couple drinks. And that’s basically what we did. We went out for a few hours and got some drinks. Nothing fancy, just beers. But it was all pretty empty being a Monday night – nothing really exciting. Anyways that’s been my day! Im pretty tired now so Im going to go off to bed ☺

Hope you all are having fun!!!

Bleh!

Hey ALL!

I don’t really know how to start this one off. I had a really good day today! Woke up around 10 and got out of bed around 11. It was the first day in a while that we had sun in the morning, which was a pleasant surprise!! So as I mentioned earlier, I had hoped to get a chance to go to that market today with Bret. It was nice out, and we decided it would be a good day to head out. The market was suppose to be at Porte De Clignancourt so we went off in that direction. Took us a good 45 min metro ride to get there and when we did we explored a little and found a market. Unfortunately it wasn’t the market we were hoping to find. It had a lot of knockoff merchandise and not so much in the way of antiques. Regardless we had a ncie time looking around. We continued to walk along the street and followed the street market for some blocks. Hmmmm It was a nice walk but boring overall, not boring in the moment, but not really worth writing about…

Anyways after a while we stopped by a café near Gare Du Nord and had some food :D. we continued on down Rue Du Faubourg Saint Denis – where we found a plethora of sex shops and prostitutes. It was an interesting area, we just sort of stumbled upon it. Pretty interested and full of photo opportunities. Bret even got yelled at for taking a picture of a hooker across the street! Then we finally stumbled onto the Rue du Rivoli and walked along it for a while until we came to the louvre and walked around the tuileries for a while. Then we crossed the river and walked back down to find this irish pub Bret had mentioned he had been to earlier. We stopped by the pub for a drink and watched some rugby. It was a good day. I had a lot of fun not really worrying about taking pictures and just walking through the city. It got kinda cold and rainy toward the end. I really don’t know what else to say. I had a good day but nothing too notable happened so sorry if this just sounds like a laundry list of thing, that was pretty much what happened today.

My plan for this week is spend Monday and Tuesday shooting with the 4x5 and Wednesday and Thursday developing and printing for Fridays crit. I think for my place to explore will be the Belleville area. I really enjoyed the first time I went and want to spend more time there.

Bleh, im really not feeling this whole blog thing right now…I really just want to go to a concert.

Oh yeah looking back at the pictures we saw a horde of rollerbladers. Like 5 min of rollerbladers taking up the street with a police escort…

Well until tomorrow!

Slap Happy Hour

Hey Again!

I hope everyone’s weekend is going well so far! I guess I can start off where I left off – last night. Last night was decent, we waited a while to go out and it was probably 11:30 by the time we actually left FIAP. We went to the Bastille area, which seems to be where a lot of good bars and night life is (on the weekends anyways). I think the bar we went to was called l’in Fini (im not sure though – it wasn’t bad, I think we’ll go back sometime). Thinking of going back I just want to mention how fast this wintersession is going by; just yesterday in crit we were talking about how we only have 2 more weeks of class! Its really been going quickly! Anyway, the real highlight of the night wasn’t the bar (oh let me mention before I get to the metro ride home, the food!) So before we got to the bar we stopped into a little pizza and burger joint next to the bastille. OK so maybe were just not finding the right places but so far our experience has been that the idea of “fast food” never properly translated into French culture! In America, fast food is an easy substitute for real food, its fast, full of MSG and pretty good for the most part – especially when your under the influence. In France, the only thing fast food is, is fast. And even that is debatable. It took sometime for them to get 2 slices of pizza (for bret) and a cheese burger (for myself). And neither of us could finish them! The pizza in France is actually just awful! The pizza idea never translated also. But the burger, was just awful! But anyways we know now…

Now to the real drama of the evening: A Friday night at the Bastille, there is bound to be some violence and police and whatnot. We were standing on the platform waiting for our metro (it was pretty crowded on our side, not so much on the other) and suddenly we see 4 or 5 cops running in a line on the other side all the way down the platform toward what wasn’t really visable but looked like a brawl. And without even breaking anything up the cops joined right in and started to break the people arepart and beat up on the others. We wernt very sure who was good or who was bad or what was happening because just as the cops started in our train pulled up and blocked the view ☹. But then just as we got onto our train car on one end (we were in the middle) were these 3 or 4 guys all playing kinda rough and then 2 of them started to really kick the shit out of eachother – right as the doors were closing!! The one getting off was caught in the doors and kept slapping the others head and they were shouting in french and the one not caught was making fun of the other or something. He finally got out of the door but then they were fighting through the windows smashing there bottles on the train and whatnot!! It was pretty crazy and it was clear that they were drunk. So all this happens and were just like W O W. Then the guy in the train (who looks like he wants to be irish, but still clearly French) starts just drunkingly rambling on and making a scene in the car. Finally he starts talking to a random man standing near us and they seem to think alike and embrace. A couple minutes later the drunk is still babbling and we think that he said something racist or offensive (the non drunk random man was black) and the other guy just walks over and starts to slap and pucnh and yell at the drunk! Like even more than the other guy! And then they really go at it and other people get invoilved and restrain them, fyi this is all happening like 2 feet from me. Im like somewhere between excited and afraid of what might ensue! So after several minutes of this the train comes into the next stop (Place D’Italie) I think and the black man gets off and is still antagonizing the drunk to come fight him. The doors close and the drunk stays on the train. So Im sure that is sufficiently confusing for everyone but we had a lot of fun watching it and it was defiantly the most interesting part of our night!

So then We just came home and went to bed around 2 I think. TODAY! Bleh! Today was fine, but kinda rainy and cold. I really wanted to make some work so I sent out – just with the digital, I hate using the 4x5 in the rain and cold. Its suppose to get better tomorrow so I’ll shoot film tomorrow I hope! Anyways went out today with the plan of going back to the place behind FIAP. Or atleast just in that direction. I walked a found HUGE park and wandered around there for a while, which was really peaceful. Passed by some local college student smoking buds – it was so obvious, made me smile ☺. To be honest I cant really remember what I thought about in the park. Hmmmmm. Well It was wet out, but not too rainy – and I love shooting in that kind of weather because the light just works beautifully in the wet streets. And other than that not too much happened today. I really enjoy the way Ive been working – with no goal in mind and not really trying to take it seriously but really trying to have fun. And honestly Im having the most fun when Im by myself and just wandering around. And I guess I work that way anyways but at RISD theres so much more pressure to be producing new and good work all the time that Im enjoying the break. And because I don’t have that pressure to make work Im actually producing more work than I do under that pressure. But I will be ready for second semester. As nice as this all is I cant wait to get back into the swing of things at RISD. And Springtime, Its gotten to that point in the winter that I hate the weather unless its sunny. I didn’t get to do any winter things this year which sucked but now Im over it and just want spring and second semester.

Hmmmm well I bettr go figure out dinner and stuff. We might be going to this club tonight or not, Im not sure yet and Im going to try and rest before anything happens anyways.

See you all soon!!