Last Mango in Paris.

This past weekend I went on a trip to Paris with my friend Mary. If you weren't already aware, my parents had bought me tickets to see Jimmy Buffett in concert at a venue in Paris for my birthday this pat July.  Also, if you ANYthing about my family and myself, you know we're a little Buffett crazy, and along with our family friends the Sieplers, a special connection with the song "He Went to Paris" by Mr. Jimmy Buffett, so it was only fitting for myself to see the legend himself in Pa-ree. My parents were gracious enough to send me with an extra ticket so I could bring a friend, (the ever so amazing Mary). Mary had been to Paris several times before, and a HUGE help when it came to navigating the French Metro System and the city in general.  She was my Sacajawea of Paris :)

So our journey began Friday afternoon with the highspeed train ride into Paris Nord station. Because of the French transit strike, the train after ours had been canceled due to lack of staff, and the shoved all of those people onto our train. Lucky for Mary and I we had seats, but were 3 cars away from each other, and seated next to very...interesting French people. We then headed to our hostel, which was the first time both Mary and I had ever stayed in one (we're spoiled, we know!) The Montclaire Montmarte turned out to be a really cool place, despite being under construction during our stay. Breakfast was even included, and it was about a block away from the metro which was awesomely convenient. This was my skepticism of the establishment when we first arrived, which quickly faded as we discovered how awesome this place was!

After we had checked in, it was time to head to the concert! We decided to walk to the concert (google said it was only a 30 minute walk) which turned into us getting lost in traffic circles, and an adventure in itself, but about 50 minutes later, we arrived at our destination, The Olympia for one of the best concerts I have ever attended!

I wish I was able to record the entire concert and upload it for you all, but that is just not feasible, so I'll put up a few clips and pictures for your enjoyment:

Cheeseburger in Paradise:

Fins:

Margaritaville:

He Went to Paris:

Check his outfit, stud muffin.

Cheeseburger hat for Cheeseburger in Paradise.

Now, in my usual fashion, I'll make a few observations in regards to the concert:

• The average age of people in attendance was about 40. 
• The lower level of the concert was standing room only, so for the first few songs Mary and I were near the back, but managed to work our way up to within about 20 feet of the stage!
• The pit at a Jimmy Buffett concert filled with 40-50 year olds is no where as intense as say, the pit for Rise Against at Warped tour, meaning people weren't packed together making it easy for us to make our way to the front of the crowd.
• Most of the old people were wasted, and it was awesome. Double fisting pints of beer, because as sacrilegious as it sounds, there were no Margaritas at a Jimmy Buffett concert. Thanks a lot France.
• I love parrot heads and their strange get ups.Even foreign parrotheads get it.

• I'm trying to find a setlist for the show, because it had a ton of classic Buffett songs including Fruitcakes, Brown Eyed Girl, Volcano, Tin Cup Chalice, Fins, Come Monday, Changes in Lattitude Changes in Attitude, I Would Play for Gumbo, Southern Cross, One Particular Harbor, Last Mango in Paris, and the list goes on!
• Jimmy rocked the performance, he's still got it and is still lookin damn good, you go sir.
• People kept throwing hats up to him on stage an he would wear them, it was awesome, some lady threw her bra onstage too, Jimmy's still got it!
• Mary and I wanted to be the two women background singers, they had super cool coreographed moves.
• Jimmy's guitarist was super hot for an older guy.
• Mac Mackinaley was a G as always.
• Some crazy French performer named Antoine came onstage and did some songs with Jimmy, and it was pretty bad ass.
• There were mostly Americans there, (we met some really redneck/drunk/freaking weird couple from Georgia and a very nice man in a Saints jersey that works for NATO who let us stand in front of them near the front) and a noticeable number of Brits.
• It was easily one of the best concerts I've ever been to, and I'm so greatful my parents gave me this amazing opportunity to see one of my favorite musicians since I was a wee one!

After the concert Mary and I went on a quest to find a bar to get some drinks (because believe it or not, we were sober the entire concert thanks to a HUGE line at the venue's bar), but were unsuccessful, and ended up just heading back to the hostel around midnight. The next Morning, we set out around ten to see the sights of Paris. I don't think Mary or I had ever walked as much as we did that day, but it was amazingly beautiful and SO worth it. We started off by going up to Sacre Cour, which is a beautiful church on a hill that overlooks Paris. It was an awesome way to start off the day, from there, we went to the Arc du Triomphe, and then walked from there to the Eiffel Tower, which by the way, is way farther away than it looks! By this point, my memory card was full of videos from the concert from the night before, and was useless.  An unfortunate lense error on Mary's camera had put her camera out of commission as well. Thank the heavens above that we have the same model of Cannon camera, so with her memory card in my camera, we had ONE functioning camera between the two of us. Clearly we make an amazing team! Here are a few pictures from our Parisian sight seeing extraviganza!

Me near Sacre Cour overlooking Paris & the Eiffel Tower

Mary and I at the Arc du Triomphe, my favorite of all the Parisian monuments.

Mary and I at Notre Dame

Later that afternoon, Mary and I met up with my good Friend A.J. (who I have mentioned in my previous posts, who had come to visit me a few weeks ago) and he showed us around some of the sights of the city including Notre Dame. He's super knowledgeable and told us some amazing info about Paris and it's history.  (He even lives down the street from Ernest Hemingway's flat!) I'm so glad to have such gracious friends who will take time out of their hectic lives to be my own personal tour guide! We even met up with some of his friends that evening and drank some wine (in my case beer) on the grass leading up to the Eiffel Tower (until it was unbearably cold and we left to find the baby bottle bar, which didn't end up working out :( )

We went out for some drinks and crepes, then back to the hostel around 12:30 that night. The next day we did some more sight seeing, including the Louvre, and Moulin Rouge. The Louvre was an absolutely incredible experience, and being able to see works of art like the Mona Lisa and the mass amounts of Asian tour groups was breath taking. We spent the morning there and met up with A.J. for lunch at the Louvre food court, which was kind of expensive, but considering we managed to get into the museum for free with our European visas, I think a plate full of Moroccan food, a drink and dessert for 15 euro was moderately justified...kind of. Paris was a ridiculously expensive city...and I thought Brussels was bad! I had a good time none the less (although my parents bank account may not agree)

Sunday was a loooong day. A lot of things were closed, it was raining, and really cold.  Our train didn't leave until 10:25 and we were done sight seeing around 6, so we killed some time at the hostel, then headed to the train station at 8, where we witnessed quite a few of Paris's surplus population of crazies, and tried not to freeze our butts off.


In short, going to Paris , I had no idea what to expect.  The city is a uniquely beautiful and busy one, filled with so much history.  I think Parisians get a bad rap, seeing as I had no problem with anyone I came across, minus the crazy man on the metro ranting and raving (in French mind you) about people coming to France who are not French and telling people that if you do not speak French, do not come to his country or eat in their restaurants. Okay guy. Paris was amazing, and I will for sure be back in the future!

Want to learn more about Belgium?




^^Click the link, and giggle a bit at the expense of the Belgian Gov't. LOVE.

If there's something strange in your neighborhood, Who you gonna call?

Ghostbusters?


I'm not sure how other metro and subway stations are in other cities around the world, but in Brussels, they like to play music. A fabulous and extremely random assortment of songs, which makes the metro even more entertaining than it already is. I cannot tell you how many times I've been standing by myself at a metro stop and must fight the urge to sing along, or break out some of my awesomely Caucasian dance moves.  Now, for your enjoyment, I will compile a list of some of the songs I've recently heard at various metro stops throughout the city, so you too can appreciate the randomness of it all:

• Come on Eileen- by Dexy's Midnight Runners
• Money - by Pink Floyd
• Baby Come on Over - Samantha Mumba
• Crazy - Gnarles Barkley
• Don't Bring Me Down - E.L.O.

And my personal favorite, the GHOSTBUSTERS theme song. Not gonna lie, there's something  pretty badass about jammin' to that song waiting for the metro standing amongst a bunch of old people, and of course, A.J. Rawls who was lucky enough to experience this soundtrack on his first ever metro ride in Brussels.

 There will be more metro playlist updates throughout my stay, so please, stay tuned.



So back to A.J. he is currently studying abroad for the year in Paris, France so he hopped on the train to come see me, (of all people) this weekend. Not going to lie, it was freaking awesome. We did some exploring around the city, discovered a super sweet parade and a super cool playground, that probably wasn't for grown ups, but let's be real, I'm no grown up.

On Saturday, Mary A.J. & I ventured to the Atomium! Woooo. It was a super cool building, and we paid 8 euro to go inside of it. The view was super sweet, but I really wasn't sure what the point of the exhibits inside were. Slash I'm kinda sad we didn't make it to the Atomium in August, because they have it set up so you can zipline off of the top!!

Anyway, it was super fun. Then I got to take A.J. out on both Friday & Saturday night to experience some Brussels night life :) Including Frites, Waffles, and of course Sultans of Kebap. (No, that's not a typo) Although the sign in the picture below may be, or just lost in translation...

We went to a karaoke bar, and let's just say, Casey rocked it :)

Well, That's all for now, I'm off to Amsterdam with some friends from VeCo as well as a few from SJSU this weekend. Updates shortly thereafter.

Belgians & Their Beer: It's a Beautiful Thing.

Goodness it's been a while hasn't it? Well, hope you're ready for this weekly update, cause it's a doosie. 

• Let me begin with our failed attempt at Pub Quiz night. We suck. Definitely placed last, but we will be back tonight with a vengeance!
• So there's this fashion trend that's sweeping the great city of Brussels: Aladdin/parachute pants. I don't know why women wear these things. You neither live in Agraba, or have the name of MC Hammer, you look like an idiot. I will try to snap a pic of these illusive creatures soon.
• Mary and I discovered the Belgian equivilant of Boy Scouts, the Sea Scouts. We shared a train car with them on the way back from Ostend. It's boys and girls ranging from ages like 9-16. Needless to say I wanted to punch them, but most of them were busy punching each other, so they took care of it themselves.
• I don't know what it is about the butter here, but it's delicious.
• Also, I am obsessed with the super markets here. You can buy Mickey Mouse shaped lunch meat. Ever trip to this magical land of food and produce is an adventure in itself.
• Fruit beer is freaking weird.
• Doing your laundry here is a pain in my butt. My washer is in the basement, I live on the 3rd floor.  
• I'm pretty sure they don't believe in dryers here. I have to line dry my clothes like the good ol days. Laundry is like a 3 day process. 
• They have been updating the facade of my apartment building for the past 2 weeks... it was supposed to take 5 days. I'm tired of being woken up by construction at 8 am. Lets get the job done construction guys. 
• Friday was another student gov sponsored event, this time: The Draft Bar then some club.
• The bar was SICK. The bartender juggled and lit the ground on fire!

• The club was kinda cool too! But it was some random place in Brussels so when it came time for us to go home, we luckily figured it out.

Now let me move on to the greatest event in Brussels. BELGIAN BEER FESTIVAL

• Pictures above is how you purchase the beer. The yellow tokens are your deposit for the glass (because every beer has it's own type of glass) You take the yellow token and anywhere from 2-4 bottle caps and get a beer.
• The more caps the beer costs, the stronger/ better the beer is.
• Once you finish your beer, return the glass to the brewer you got the beer from, and they give you your yellow token back, and move onto your next beer. Repeat till you can't stand, or run out of bottle caps.
• One cap is one euro, one yellow token is 2 euro(which you get back when you return the token at the end of the day, unless you manage to break a glass, in that case, you're out 2 euro)
• These guys had a bagpipe leading them into the festival, and a possee. ->

• This is Corey & Dan, along with Will, we went both Saturday, & Sunday, starting around 11 AM and leaving around 5 or 6 each night.
• Please note our festive gnome hats. We got the fo free from the La Chouffe brewery who's logo is a little gnome. There beer was also delicious, and we got free key chains. It was like a gnometastic Christmas hat, complete with bell.
• We wore the hats the rest of the day.

• This banner is awesome, made me feel less fat.  
• I heard more English spoken in these 2 days at the festival than I have my entire month here so far. The amount of Americans there was unreal.
• There were also may families there with their small children with them.  I like their style. "Now mommy and daddy are doing to have some special juice, so run around and collect coasters and throw hopps at people why we have our drinks"
• We met a very nice family from Michigan who have lived in Brussels for 3 years and there 3 boys, who were a riot. New faves.
• Also met another person from Palo Alto. WTF?!

• Above is the highlight of my weekend.
• No not the crazy Spanish man there for his bachelor party, but the glasses of golden goodness in our hands.
• Behold: Westvleteren. Possibly the rarest Trappist beer in the world.
• We waited for 45 min the first day, and 25 the second day. They got a shipment of 28 cases once in the morning, once at 2 in the afternoon. They're gone in less than 5 minutes each time. Unreal.
• Needless to say, it was freaking delicious, and it's an aspiration in life now to consume the other 2 beers brewed by them, that are harder to get your hands on.

• After the beer fest on Sunday, Casey and I went out with some friends to Delirium, again.
• On our way home, we made friends with a fraternity from Amsterdam. They were all matching, even had the same kind of shaggy surfer boy hairdo goin on. 
• They were doing some scavenger hunt of something, sooo Casey and I sang some song with them in Dutch that was probably extremely inappropriate, but hey, it was fun.

Needless to say it was an eventful weekend, and I love Belgium more and more with each passing day!