Marching into Spring.

It's been an entire month since I wrote a blog! Yikes!  I've just been so busy I've forgotten. I'm just going to give an account of what I've done this month... so here we go!

March is the traditional start of the cycling season in Europe with one of the best (in my opinion) races of the year. The 'Course au Soleil', the Paris-Nice.   I went down to see the Prologue in Houilles which is a nice little town in the Yvelines departement. I arrived in the town, not knowing where the heck I was going.  I ended up walking about 2,5km of the course.  It was a cold day, but an exciting one where I got to see many of the riders close up, one by one.
The stage was won by a young Europcar rider Damien Gaudin who has basically come out of nowhere to win.  But it was a French win so the local crowd was (obviously) delighted.

The next day I took the long trip to a town called Nemours in the Seine-et-Marne departement, this town is some 100km outside of Paris, a town that has inspired writers such as Honoré de Balzac and Victor Hugo.  It's not too hard to see why, the town has a beautiful river, church and small chateau, it was a ideal setting for the finish of the first road stage. Again, this one was won by a French man, Nacer Bouhami (who went and crashed out the next day) in a sprint finish.Those of you reading who may follow cycling will know of a man named Jean-Francois Pescheux who is the route director of the Tour de France and other cycling races owned by the ASO, the Paris-Nice being one. As he was born in Nemours, there was a small presentation to him on the podium after the stage.
Then I had visitors for an entire week, we went to Disneyland, The Eiffel Tower, Versailles amongst other things.It was lovely seeing some friends from Canterbury and doing some very touristy things during my Vacances d'Hiver. Though I felt exhausted at the end of the week.  We were blessed with beautiful weather, even going as far as not taking a coat out!  (This however, would not last the two weeks of my holiday).
Once they had left, I took a few days to rest up, boy oh boy did I need it. Almost 8 full days of walking around had taken their toll, I was exhausted! Then came Tuesday. By far the most eventful day of the holiday.  It snowed. Again.

It wasn't too bad actually, we've had worse snow.  However, I got stranded. And had to go from Marne-la-Vallee to Paris, Paris to Meaux to get home! And I was on one of the last trains to make it out of Paris.  Lucky me huh?
The rest of the week, I devoted to getting my year abroad essay research into a 800 word summary to submit.  Whilst I think my research is at an 'ok' level, my summary was pretty poor and I'm not expecting a good feedback piece on it.  But I write my essays by doing all my research first, then all my writing. It's how I work best, I'm not changing it for this piece of work.  Especially this piece of work.
Then came the weekend, on Saturday I was visited by my Grandma and Auntie who I met at Gare du Nord at lunchtime, we had lunch, saw the Waterlilies painting at the Orangerie gallery at the Jardin des Tuileries, then had dinner.  The next bit is sort of strange, we went to the Moulin Rouge. This was something I'd never really considered doing, but turned out to be pretty great actually.  Once you look past the obvious, the costumes and the choreography were top notch. As was the atmosphere. Would I go again? Yes! I laughed, was amazed and entertained for a few hours.  It was a great night, ruined by surprise engineering works on my line. It seemed to caught us all out as I went from Paris to Marne-la-Vallée and then caught the 01:20 bus with a full bus of other people. (No photos, sorry folks. Cameras are banned from the Moulin Rouge).

The next day was St. Patricks day, now me not being Irish, I don't really care too much for it. But upon hearing their were some Irish cultural performances and fireworks at Disney, I decided to pop along. I was not disappointed. Well, if you were Irish you'd have noticed their 'pipe band' were actually Scottish, but let's look beyond that! I saw some Irish dancing and stuff like that. I was very entertained by their Leprechauns (who were French of course) who went and turned a mans jacket the wrong way round as his lining was green. 'C'est vert, C'EST SAINT PATRICK HEIN?'. The day had a sour note when I had to argue with a person (in French), as I had to tell them off for pushing in front of me who had been waiting for something for 25 mins, as opposed to their turn up half way through tactic. I had a lovely meal in a restaurant

In short, I had a brilliant day, topped off with some amazing fireworks, followed immediately after by even more amazing fireworks.

The next week, I was back at work having a busy week, but I managed to see two movies during the 'Printemps du Cinéma' (Which is basically where every single cinema place is €3,50). Jappeloup and 20 ans d'écart.  I wanted to see French movies to see how much I understood.  A good amount, I came out satisfied with my understanding in each film.  Jappeloup was very good though, if you are in France, try and see it! I also saw The Place beyond the Pines with my extension vouchers I won through the BNP Paribas facebook page.

A busy, busy month. I'll post more hopefully very soon, as there is always much more to tell. I'll leave you with a photo of me meeting Irish Mickey and Minnie (I couldn't resist).

French basketball is actually pretty good.

In the newspaper a while back there was an advert for the Disneyland Paris leaders cup. What is the Leaders Cup I hear you ask? It's a mid-season basketball tournament organised by the LNB (Ligue nationale de Basket) replacing the semaine des As. So I grabbed a ticket for the final, and thought it would be something quite fun to go see.  Turns out, I was hooked throughout the entire 3 day competition.  So essentially it's a tournament which begins on Friday with quarter finals, then on sunday moves to a semi-final stage before the final on the sunday. It's pretty intense and lends itself to who is the best at recovering after a game.

Upon discovering the teams invited (Le Mans, Roanne, Gravelines-Dunkerque, Lyon-Villeurbanne, Strasbourg, Orléans, Paris-Levallois and Chalon-Saone) I took to Paris being a local team. They did pretty well but got knocked out in the semi-final round. The matchup I would be seeing was Gravelines-Dunkerque vs Strasbourg.

I arrived nice and early to the Disney Event Arena (where the competition would be taking place), and pretty quickly discovered that directly behind my seat was the buzzer. Everytime it went off, I would be getting gradually going deaf. Hurray! Second thing I noticed, the angle of seating was very strange. If the person in front of you stood up, you'd be seeing diddly squat.

I then happened to be sat behind Strasbourg supporters, who had those wacky party hooter things. 40-50 of those going off near you hurts your ears. To be honest, I wasn't cheering for anyone especially, but I went for the slight connection of Dunkerque being the closest team to where I am from.

A few notes about the event: Whilst it was being held at Disneyland, it wasn't overly Disney. They played the parade music a little bit, and the half time show was High School Musical dance troops.  But other than that, pretty normal. The match was not as competitive as the final scoreline would suggest. Dunkerque was always the better side, at half time it was already looking like the result was decided. Credit to Strasbourg for never giving up, or their supporters (Ear ache). Dunkerque took the early points, extended an early lead and then whenever Strasbourg scored a point, Dunkerque reacted with the same.


Conclusion: French basketball is highly competitive with an enthusiastic crowd. I had a great time and I reckon I'll probably attempt to go see a Paris-Levallois game before the end of the year.

Creating unexpected magical memories

It's rare that something happens and I feel the need to write it down right away, but tonight that happened. I realise that this little story might not interest anyone but me, but it's my blog.

During the year so far I've made plenty of memories.  Memories that will stick with me for a life time. Most of the things I do are planned, but today I didn't plan anything, and today perhaps I've made my favourite memory of the year. But what constitutes as a magical moment? That depends on the person I would say. To me, a magical moment is a feeling you get. Every magical moment may feel different, but when it happens you just know. I felt it during the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. I felt it as Bradley Wiggins won his Tour de France, and I felt it at my first university summer ball. 

This afternoon I had planned an afternoon browsing the sales at the Val d'europe shopping centre, and that happened. Then I thought I'd browse the sales at Disney Village (they are pretty poor by the way!).  Then I randomly popped into the Walt Disney Studios park and got taught how to draw. I can't draw.



But, I did make this: 

I had dinner, then saw the time. 18:30. I had time to wait for the bus. So I thought at that moment I would go into Disneyland park and ride Big Thunder Mountain (One of my favourite rides). I arrived at the ride at 18:40 and saw a 15 minute queue sign. Perfect, enough time to ride it and get out the park and get the bus at just gone 7. The queue was not 15 minutes, they had begun the process of shutting down the ride. I eventually boarded at 19:02. Disney Dreams (the nighttime spectacular had already started). The train leaves the station. This is where it begins, I saw the fireworks coming from the castle in the distance as my train whirled around the mountain. Brilliant! We arrived back, there were people waiting for the front and back carriages only. 'Mesdames and monsieurs, vous pouvez faire une deuxieme tour'.
Lesson 1:  big thunder mountain is one of disneys most popular rides. It's fast, family friendly and beautifully themed.
Lesson 2: You NEVER get invited to go again on a Disney ride.

So the train left the station again. This time even more fireworks, the fireworks in Disney dreams are colourful and rather beautiful. So seeing these in the distance was a real treat. You may never experience this, so you'll have to trust me, it's an image ill never ever forget. As we arrived in the station people changed 'RETOUR RETOUR'. We didn't get a third go, but the woman came over the announcement system wishing us a 'très très Bon soirée'. I then walked down liberty arcade serenaded by a beautiful song from the film Tangled. I arrived at the bottom of a deserted Main Street and I didn't leave as intended. I stayed to watch the end of dreams. I was surrounded by about 15 other people all spaced out. And as I ended I just felt a strange feeling. I smiled and did that almost cry but not cry thing. It's a beautiful show, but nothing will compare to how I saw it tonight. Thank you Disney.

How do we mark memories? Since the Olympic Games got awarded to London I've been caught in the pin collection craze. I have all the x years to go countdown pins. But they say we can attach memories to pins. Indeed we can. About 70% of my Olympic pins have various memories of the games attached to them. Disney parks also have a pin collection craze. I can attach memories to all my pins. Tonight I bought a big thunder mountain pin badge. And the story you have just read is the memory attached to it.

Bon weekend!