Chamonix and Mont Blanc

If you had told me a year ago that one day I'd be hiking in the Alps, specifically down the Alps, I would have laughed you out of the room. I hate descending escalators, much less mountains. But that is what I found myself doing less than 72 hours ago, and I am so glad that I did. I went on a drive out with two friends to Chamonix, France. We almost ended up in Italy by accident, but a friendly border patrol agent steered us the right way.

In the summer, the melted snow and glacial ice of the mountains in Chamonix form copious freshwater streams and waterfalls that cascade throughout the mountains. In America, each waterfall would get its own observation deck. In the mountains, one more waterfall is not such a big deal.

I took the cable car to the highest observation deck. I love the observation deck because the rates to go up are not exhorbitant, and once you get to the top, you are not price-gouged when you try to buy souvenirs and food. Things are priced the way they'd be priced outside the valley. This was shocking to me.

At the top of Auguille du Midi, it was literally freezing outside, but the panoramic view of the most immense, beautiful mountains was worth wearing a down jacket in the middle of summer. From the observation tower, I saw a huge expanse of white dotted with black (alpine hikers). Small black birds flew about the top of the severe mountain ranges; their preferred method of taking off was to dive headfirst into space for several hundred feet before opening their wings. At such altitudes, I'm not sure what they would live off of besides snow. Perhaps the dark, beautiful butterfly/moth insects that also flitted about in the thin air.

My hat goes off to the intrepid engineers who built very tall observatory decks on top of mountains. There are photos inside the observation deck of the old-school civil engineers sitting causually on iron girders stuck into the granite faces, feet dangling.

I could barely bring myself to look down. My favorite peak to gaze at was Pont du Sud, which looks improbably sharp, with striated red stone. It would not look out of place in the Grand Canyon, and it keeps company with the dark granite of several other mountains. I feel like it is the odd child in the family.

Mont Blanc, the highest and best known mountain, has a domed top. The top of Mont Blanc was hugged by a little pouf of cloud fed by snowy powder being blown off the relatively smooth mountain-top. The pouf flows from the top of the mountain like thick smoke from a chimney. It remains rooted to the mountain even though it is pulled to and fro by the wind, like a flame can be blown to and fro but remains rooted to the match. I had never seen such a cloud before.

It was so beautiful, that not only was the view perfectly clear, but several variations of rainbow formed in the sky above the mountain while I was on the observation deck. First, there was a double rainbow (two parrallel rainbows). Then the rainbows started to merge into a sideways "Y" shape. Then there was only one rainbow with a very intense center portion, accompanied by a huge circular rainbow radiating around the sun itself (beautiful but painful to look at if you weren't careful). Then there was only one rainbow again, which faded with the mist. I did not bring my camera, but my friends tried and failed utterly to take a single bad photograph. Many thanks to the beautiful Katie for taking a photo of the moment!

After staring like an idiot for what could have been minutes or hours, I took the cable car to the middle of the mountain and began a light hike down some very level, well-established trails along the side face of the mountain. I bought hiking boots and they made a huge difference because I didn't have to worry about my ankles turning. The wildflowers, the well-worn trail, and the utter quiet made for a very tranquil, relaxing hike. The birds and the marmots provided background music. I did a happy dance when we found marmots.

It was daunting to look to one side and face nothing but the open air, the valley below, the mountains in the distance. Sure beats the stair-master. It was a fairly long hike in thin air, to be honest I have no idea how far we walked. I was completely tuckered out by the end.

When we made it closer to the bottom of the mountain, we took photos by the glacier lake frozen along the side of the mountain. You can see where the water was flowing when it froze. It's not that big a lake. My friend is into environmental law and she really enjoyed seeing the glacier lake in person.

We took the last old-school train down the rest of the mountain to the main village. Mountain rescue team members boarded the train with us. They had a Saint Bernard on a leash accompanying them. I was so excited to see the dog, but he only had eyes for his handler, a gentleman who reminded me of an older Jason Statham. Whoever he is, he is cool in my book.

It was definitely a trip to remember.

En Geneve

Have you ever been in place so perfect, that you feel like there is some higher presence guiding everything? Some people get that feeling from Disneyland (and everything is definitely planned out there). I got that feeling in Switzerland. It's hard to tell where divine intervention and human intervention meet, which makes the natural orderliness of the place all the more uncanny.

In the center of the city, there is a huge geyser fountain shooting from the middle of the cobalt Lac Leman, on the banks of which I enjoyed an utterly perfect day. I recommend La Terrasse, a popular meet-up by the lake where you can imbibe on the grass nearby or go down to the water for a quick dip. It's the perfect place to sip and view the local talent. The sun also does not set until around 10 pm, which is also nice. It was surprisingly cold, but at least it was warmer than Paris (which is comparable to Canada in terms of global latitude).
I felt very much at home. Geneva feels more like a global town than a global village. Like DC, the grassy knolls of Geneva are filled with the idealistic, ambitious interns who work on issues of global import for next to nothing; they seem to live on pure will.

The social scene was a very exclusive, almost incestuous club, where everyone can make jokes in several languages and is comfortable with speaking in acronyms. The WTO, UNHCR, ILO, ICRC, WIPO, IOM and countless other NGOs and intergovernmental bodies restent en Geneve. For my human rights class, most of the sites I visited worked on human rights / humanitarian issues. During the presentations, I felt pretty much in awe all the time.

Not surprisingly, the architecture of the UN High Commissioner on Refugees reflected humility - it reminded me of an adobe plueba in a cliff-face, or maybe a bunker. A very safe, nonthreatening bunker. The Palais Wilson, named after Woodrow, was a grande dame of a building on the outside, but the inside did not have very ornate rooms. One of my favorite features was a giant statue, in front of the United Nations office, of a wooden chair with one leg broken off. It reminds me of a broken school chair, or perhaps a bar fight. Someone mentioned to me that the statue refers to torture. On the U.S. stance on torture, I can only say pbbbbbbbt. We could certainly use more visual reminders.

It is not cheap to live in Geneva; in fact it was too much for my fellow students and I. I was lodging in the sticks of Fermey-Voltaire, a perfectly charming village in France that takes it name from its founder/benefactor, one of the masters of satire. There is one main cobblestone road flanked by parked Volkswagons and Citroens. High-end boutiques and some truly sublime restaurants line both sides. At one end is a freeway leading to Geneva, at the other is an intersection leading further into the suburbs. When I arrived on Sunday evening, it was so quiet and pitch black that not only could I see the stars, I could practically hear them as well. To be honest, it was a little spooky. I'm used to more noise at night from car alarms, ambulances, maintenance workers, etc. Apparently even the construction workers get the evenings off. I spent some quality time in the local Carrefour, one of the only places to get cheapish groceries in the area, making a bread run an opportunity for networking with Genevois who stop by to save on the essentials. Photo credits to the lovely Katie.

Next up, Mont Blanc.

New Friends In New Places

(photo by Katie)

While I've made a few great friends on this crazy European journey, some of my favorite memories also involve chancing upon strangers.

Yesterday I was feeling particularly gregarious. At Sacre-Coeur, I was making my way down the numerous steps when I saw a little old lady walking slowly in front of me. From the gauze on her eye, she had recently had surgery. Everyone was walking arou

nd her. When she reached the top of the stairs, she looked behind her (I assume for a companion), and then hesitated before placing one foot on the first step. She reminded me of my grandma after she had hip surgery. I sidled up to her and asked her, Puis-je vous aider? while extending my arm. She took it without hesitating. We walked down the stairs together arm-in-arm like old friends, and at the bottom she thanked me to an embarrassing degree. I hope that she found her companion. I will always have a soft spot for little old ladies and I hope that I get to be one eventually.

I also saw a drum troupe near the Eiffel Tower in full drum getup. I approached them and asked where they were from. They started talking to me in Ha

ngul, then switched to English when they realized that I was not Korean. They are apparently a group of university students from Seoul University who are traveling the world to promote awareness of the Dokdo Islands, an area which is under dispute between South Korea and Japan.

Two guy friends of mine were checking out two tourists from America. They were just staring at these two women and talking very loudly about their impressions overall. Feeling bemused, I walked over and chatted up the women being devoured by my friends' eyes, in order to show the boys that women are people, too. I waved over my friends, who were totally flabbergasted, but at least did not turn down an invitation to chat.

In Montmartre, I stopped by a wine shop owned by a very genial young man. His shop had a good assortment of local varietals, including several that he produced on his own vineyard. Yay entrepreneurs. His mostly-organic house wines ar

e packaged in simple bottles and are also very food-friendly. The brand is called Enclos de la Croix. One of the reds without provenance, called "Oh Yeah," was a great intro to organic French wine. Being less-oaky and tanniny, it felt light and slightly minerally, but it had all the fruitiness of a traditional red. I brought it to a class picnic along the Seine, where it was well-received. It was an excellent buy overall.

(photo by Katie - a BYOB picnic)

Well, it looks like it's back to class for me. Au revoir.

Paris Part Deux

The last 48 hours have been quite something.

To recover from a virulent cough/flu/cold/plague, I slept for most of yesterday. It was beautiful outside and it was Paris, but sometimes rest is absolument necessaire. I had a TON of robutussin-fueled dreams of awesomeness. I think I may have resolved a quarter-life crisis or two in my sleep. When I awoke this morning, I was bright and chipper and ready to tackle anything.

Then it was off to Les Invalides to explore the tomb of Napoleon's I, II, and III. Napoleon (the original) is a huge figure in France; people revere him for initiating the French Civil Code, instituting much of the architecture and infrastructure of modern France, and ushering in a revived empire of culture and conquest. He was not actually that short, according to the French. Rather touchingly, Bonaparte allegedly wrote, I wish my ashes to be scattered along the banks of the Seine, close to the French I've loved so much.

His tomb is immense; even the casket is a structure the size of a Peugeot, in a dais surrounded by huge marble statues. Too much? Jamais. Nearby was the French Military Museum, which was actually pretty neat. There were many uniforms donated by the families of French, British, American, and German combatants from the two world wars, some still torn with bullet holes. One of the uniforms still had a tag affixed, indicating that the soldier had been wounded in battle. It was pretty affecting stuff, considering that many of the boys who died in the wars were much younger than I am now. Leaving the assortment of buildings was much harder than it looked, since most of the exits were blocked. A very helpful Frenchman guided us out in the way that "required the least amount of thinking." Apparently, he had dealt with Americans before.

I received the ultimate compliment at dinner, when a waiter provided English language menus for everyone at the table but me. He left one French menu at my chair.

In the evening, we stopped by a used music/record/book shop. I picked up a copy of Flaubert's Trois Contes, which are sure to be bawdy and very flamboyant. I look forward to reading more from the creator of Madame Bovary. It is so much easier to read about love, than to face it head on in real life.

Bonjour, Paris

J'aime Le Quartier Latin

We entered Paris via bus, passing by too-close traffic and urban scenes of young people playing basketball under bridges and biking amongst Renaults. As we drove through Paris, I understood why il n'y a qu'un Paris. My apartment here with my roomie K is amazing. We are smack dab in the middle of the Latin Quarter facing the Seine. Our room has a view of a little oasis of a courtyard. We have a dishwasher and a study nook in our room. And a microwave. And a flatscreen TV, with excellent French programming. Did I mention how much I love French TV? The only thing missing is an oven and maybe a La Creuset. I'm going to figure out how to microwave-bake profiteroles.

I am in love with the city. The buildings, the people on their bicycles, the sculptures, the language... everything is unspeakably beautiful. I was beaming all the way from Notre Dame to the balsawood foyer of our building. Paris is the reason I came here, and she is even more beautiful in the warm weather than in the festive wintertime. I don't want to study indoors; I want to take my books out to the concrete banks of the Seine and read over the smell of cigarettes and fresh bread.

We passed by the fountain of Saint Michel, where I remember I shopped around for A4 holepunches three years ago. It hasn't changed a bit.

The evening we arrived, my professor took us out on a brief tour of the Left Bank and the area surrounding the Latin Quarter. We passed by la Conciergerie, where Marie Antoinette spent her last night among the living. We passed by the highest court in Paris, where un sans-abri was resting under one door of a tryptich; the door was labeled "Liberte."

For dinner, we walked through the Latin Quarter, dining at Le Vin et Terroir. Rockfish soup and a very fresh salad signaled to my tummy that I had arrived enfin. I passed by all of the young lovers and tourists here, and I felt no twinge of envy. As the weather warms, there are young amants everywhere.

I walked along the Seine this morning, and all along the concrete banks there were young people sitting together, reading, talking, hugging. One of the bridges, there is a chain link bridge where there are multicolored bike and locker locks attached to the links, souvenirs left behind by individuals and couples. Mostly couples, whose initials are engraved in the locks. It's quite cute.

Business Casual in France Can Include Velvet Attire

On Friday, we visited the OECD, the Organization of Economic and Cooperative Development, that sounds a bit like a development think tank, since it offers no loans to member countries, but does provide best practices guidelines for member states and organizes regular roundtables amongst members. The OECD binds members with anti-corruption, anti-bribery regulation and issues guidelines on avoiding bribery, particularly in areas of government procurement. The OECD's membership does not include China, although China sits in on many meetings. One of the OECD's challenges in the near future is maintaining relevance, when the majority of the world's capital will shift to non-OECD member states.

We also visited the ICC, which issues arbitration and alternate dispute resolution rules and provides infrastructure support to parties who elect to follow ICC dispute resolution procedure. Our speakers gave excellent presentations on their work and the ICC's mission. Apparently, casual Fridays are also a good day to wear a navy velvet smoking jacket with designer jeans (this was an outfit favored by more than one gentleman). The lady who worked in the Alternate Dispute Resolution group seemed genuinely excited about her specialty - if employed effectively, it offers quite a few advantages to disputing parties. It has been the "future" of international legal practice for quite a while, but it's still exciting.

The Seine is Extraordinarily Lovely at Night

Yesterday, after finals, I changed into something dressy and hopped on a glass-enclosed boat docked near the Eiffel Tower. I took a boat ride on the Seine. My classmates were all decked out and enchanted by the view of the sky and the river under the sunset. A live ensemble of a fidder, a singer, and a wicked Spanish guitar serenaded us. It was a wonderful evening and everyone was in a celebratory mood, having completed the first half of the program. The sun set over a rotunda covered in verdegris and the light on the water was exquisite.

The view from the boat was wonderful. I wish I could capture in words the change in the light over the water. I think Monet did a pretty good job of capturing this effect after painting the same scene over the Seine over and over again. I realized how lucky I am to be young and to be surrounded by good people.

J'aime ma langue paternelle

The Parisians I've met have been polite enough not to correct my French outright, except to tell me that bonjour is not appropriate for night, at which point Bon soir or bon soiree is more acceptable. My grammar is not perfect at all, but they understand me. Some of the more useful nouns have included: "espangle" - safety pin; "blessure" - wound; "l'addition" - the bill; "savon" - soap. It is funny that I, with my mediocre French skills, have become a go-to translator on this trip. Whether it is haggling with a vendor, communicating an urgent message with the hotelier, or reasoning with a positively oafish coatroom clerk, je suis a votre service. I think it has more to do with my bedside manner than my actual vocabulary. My dad is pretty amazing because he speaks French; I have a long way to go.

However, this is a little thank-you to all of the under-appreciated public school French teachers of the world, faced with the herculean task of getting kids to roll their r's. My high school French teachers put up with a ton from us unappreciative students. I was a total snot when I was younger. But now, I am glad for the extra-intensive lessons and the public discomfort of PALS and other exams. I still remember many of the grammar and cultural lessons, which were fun. But I remember wondering when I would ever have to use those lessons. Welp. It does help to know something about the Napoleonic era after all when you're in Paris. It does help to be able to read, too.

I was in Notre Dame, and the stained glass was beautiful. What was really cool, however, were the public signs about the people who left their imprint on the church. One nave was dedicated to a Chinese priest who had constant contact with the Pope. He was apparently very active in spreading Catholicism around China and eventually left his reliquary with the cathedral. Pretty neat stuff.

Brussels

Wherein I See What It's Like to Be a Diplomat

In Belgium, I entered a crash course on the EU. It's incredible that countries which were at total war in the last century are now bound legally under this new and evolving entity.

The EU headquarters were quite impressive in their practicality. I sat in a meeting room of the Council of Ministers, where a member of the Office of the Secretary General explained some of the complications of the office. I sat at a seat marked in Greek. Each of the country names were, of course, written in their native language. There was Espana, Deutscheland, etc. I recognized my seat as Cyprus; Greek and Cyrillic are quite similar. After visiting the frankly opulent offices of the OECD in London, I was used to the presence of flags and the neat little microphones near the tables. In fact, both EU offices we visited struck me as unostentatious. That is, if buildings assigned their own blocks could avoid ostentation.

Along with my law school friends, I also met some law students from Norway, who came to study the EU. Norway is not a member of the Union, and it takes only five years of university to become an advocate there. sitting in on different round-tables, I learned quite a bit from the different players who spoke; we heard from a technocrat, a career diplomat, and a man whose job seems mostly to manage other bureaucrats. It was obvious that sometimes the different parts of the wheel were not really always keeping tabs on the others, but somehow everything works well enough. There were a lot of acronyms to keep track of.

Chocolate, Chocolate Everywhere

The Grand Place is one of the most beautiful boulevards I've ever seen - all flatstone steps, gallery-like windows, and glass archways. There are chocolate shops everywhere, replete with chocolate fountains, chocolate statues, chocolate in every form and shape imaginable. The sheer number of chocolate shops is a bit overwhelming, even for a chocoholic like me.

At Pierre Marcolini, I felt like I was entering a jewelry store and not a chocolate shop. I was too scared to even take the sample chocolate. The carpet was super plush.

I bought most of my chocolate not from one of the grande chocolatiers, but from the nearby grocery store, where the house chocolate was superb. I knew I had made a good choice when I bumped into one of the longtime program professors, who highly recommended one particular brand of Belgian candy. Having been on the program for several years, he knew which tourist traps to avoid and what was worth taking home - he was bringing back one brand of chocolate home and it was, in his opinion, as good as the stuff in the shop windows and infinitely more portable. I was glad to have his advice, as some of the chocolate being sold in the grocery store, particularly Cote D'or, was not what I would consider to be real chocolate. If there is any fat added besides cocoa butter or nuts (such as palm oil - I shudder), it is not chocolate to me. Do not speak to me of vegetable oil.

Belgians are Cool

The Belgians I met were just as eager to speak French as English, but they appreciated my attempts to engage them in French. I met one pair of Flemish speakers, who were eager to show me the scenic route to the art galleries. Everyone near the city center seemed well-educated and had much better English than I had French. In fact, I felt positively embarrassed when classmates spoke to locals slowly and loudly in English - only to find out that the locals spoke fantastic English. Quel surprise!

Belgian waiters, on the other hand, were not as customer-service-oriented as one would like. In the U.S., the customer is always right. In Belgium, everything goes.

The Art is Surreal

The mascot is a statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain, or Manneken Pis. There is also a statue of a little girl peeing and of a little dog, too. Bizarre and endearing.

The Magritte gallery and the Joan Miro exhibit at the Royal Place were fantastic. I remember Joan Miro from an art project in elementary school. Sadly many of his paintings look like they were done by a child, which might be why I liked him so much when I was eight. However, his series of Constellations were pretty cool. Even with the random titles, most of which involved a woman and a bird, or a woman and bird and star, or a woman and bird and [insert noun here]. S and I looked at the paintings and tried to find out where the bird/woman in each of the paintings was. It was fun, although I am sure he was bored out of his mind.

Magritte in particular was effortlessly enjoyable. Unlike the Magritte museum, the Magritte gallery was free. The surreal art matched the incongruencies of the city. Everyone knows the painting of the man with the apple in front of his face - called the Son of Man. There' another painting that complements it well - a painting of a woman in a dress, her face obscured by a bunch of hyacinth. I learned from British TV that hyacinth is the flower of forgiveness, according to Victorian-era flower-speak.

The Beers are Fantastic

Over dinner near the Belgian Bourse, I met my friend B. As always, it was raining. My friend B and I munched on croque-monsieurs and some excellent trappist beers. One of B's favorites is Tripel Karmeliet, which is available in DC at breweries like Brasserie Beck. Also worth checking out are the Belgian fruit-flavored beers. The Mort Subite Framboise, a light raspberry beer, is an excellent choice to accompany a burger. Of course, I tried the moules frites. I will just say, mussels are not my favorite bivalve, but they go very well with beer.

One of the nicest things about travel is catching up with old friends. B and I had about 12 years of catching up to do. We talked about whether fate exists. I felt that thousands of miles from home, in a dank and somewhat dirty bar, I was exactly where I should be. Even the music of the bar reminded me of home. We had grown up well. B noted that Belgium, since the PM's resignation sometime last year, had no working government. Everything was working at the municipal level - electricity, water, schools... we shrugged.

The Countryside is Beautiful

Riding the train from Brussels to Paris, I felt so free. Without any pain of attachment, I passed by the pictueresque thatch-roofed houses scattered like pebbles along a vast sea of wheat and barley. The wind turbines turned slowly in the distance. The color of the grain changed under the shadows of massive clouds on an otherwise perfect day. The cows passing were bone white and spotted with brown. As I left Belgium, I felt astounded that so much rural order and urban lassitude could go hand in hand.

Then all too soon, the orderly rows of farmland gave way to muddy tin structures, and finally the urban highrises and efficient homes which abutted the rails. We arrived in Paris.

Whenever One Door Closes

While walking through Chelsea last week, I saw an Audi, several Ferraris, a Porsche, an Aston Martin, and a Rolls Royce in a gated parking area. But that was not the impressive part of the decor. Behold.




So my mandate (via the beautiful Have Degree, Will Travel) was to find some AWESOME doors. This door belongs to a very, very nice house that features circles, a handle in the center of the door, and a giant fish knocker. Photographed by the lovely Josh, who was kind enough to whip out his camera in the rain when I was jumping up and down excitedly over this door.

London was lovely - the people were lovely, the food was good despite what everyone says (particularly the Indian food), and the dancing... oh the dancing was fantastic. I think that people become more attractive with British accents. Of course, everything has been a complete whirlwind. I have photos from the Bridge and the London Eye, but those will have to wait until I can develop my little instant camera.

Love and hugs.