Vegan Voyager: Rachel and Josh Arrive and Getting to Tokushima

So, I know it's been a bit of time since I last wrote, and for this I am sorry. Especially since I had a 2 week vacation during which Rachel and Josh visited, and we did many awesome things. So there's lots to write about! :-)

So, Shikoku is up there as being one of the most amazing and amazingly beautiful places I have ever been, even if getting there wasn't so easy.
As I said last time, Rachel and Josh's flight was delayed by 6 hours (during which they sat in the airplane on the runway). They ended up having to spend the night in Tokyo, and we met up at the Nagoya airport the next morning for our flight. They got there JUST IN TIME to make the flight.
We flew to Tokushima, and when we got there, they informed us that the weather was bad so we were going to have to fly around for a little while waiting for it to get better.
We did this for about an hour before finally turning around and heading back to Nagoya.
Poor Rachel and Josh.

All of the rest of the flights to Tokushima that day were canceled, so we got our refund and headed to the Nagoya station. From there, we took a Shinkansen to Kobe where we quickly transferred onto a bus which took us all the way to Tokushima.
While it was long and we (especially Rachel and Josh) were tired, the upside of this is that we got to see the Naruto Whirlpools, which are sometimes thought of as one of the greatest natural wonders of the world, from this bus window. And, because it was SO STORMY and it just so happened to be the high tide, they were at their best. And let me tell you, it was a sight to see. They were absolutely AMAZING! I am SO glad that we got to see them. Unfortunately, also due of the ridiculousness of the storm, we weren't really able to get any good pictures. :-( Believe me when I say they are a sight to behold.

Pretty much all of the pictures take from the window looked something like this. Josh might have a better one - I'll post it later if so.


We finally arrived in Tokushima, surrounded by a thick shroud of fog and rain, at around 7:50 PM, and the place from which we had rented the car closed at 8. So, we hopped in a cab and called them to let them know we were on our way.
Our cab driver was NOT your typical nice, subdued Japanese man. He kept literally SCREAMING at us these things that we did NOT understand, and when we acted confused, he would just scream them LOUDER (even though we were already covering our ears in pain). He then proceeded to pull into this abandoned back alley, turn of the meter, and scream at us to get out of the car (in Japanese that I actually did understand). Needless to say, we were frightened.

Luckily, I have some minimal Japanese now, and I was able to explain to him that we were trying to rent a car and that we were obviously in the wrong place since the scary back alley was not a car dealership. I called the car dealership and stuck the phone in his face and told him to talk. He got directions, and we eventually made it to rent our car.

And FINALLY our luck started to change. They stayed open a little late for us, and we were thus able to rent the car. We had seen an Indian restaurant on our way in, so we decided to go see if they had some vegan food. They did, and it was DELICIOUS!



Rachel and Josh FINALLY settled in the restaurant!


We ate dahl and eggplant and vegetable curry and samosas, and it was DELICIOUS! I do love me some Indian food! :-)

From the restaurant, I called the hostel at which we were supposed to be staying that night. It was about a two hour drive away, and they informed us that they are located on an intense mountain and that, with the storm (which, admittedly, was raging), there was no way we would be able to get there. We were actually slightly relieved, as it was about a 2 hour drive from where we were, and Josh did NOT want his first time driving on the left side of the road to be in that horrendous weather. So I called a hostel in Tokushima and luckily, they had space!



us FINALLY relaxing in the hostel


I think we all slept as if we had never slept before (well, I know I did, and Rachel and Josh MUST have been far more exhausted than I was). The next morning we bought early our train tickets for the trip to Kyoto a few days later and then were on our way.

And since this is already so long (who would have thought that I could write so much about just GETTING somewhere) and since I have a festival to attend, Shikoku awesomeness will be for next time. That will give me time to go through my pictures, too! Yay! I've got some really awesome ones, so definitely be looking forward to that! :-)

おわり

So, I'm on break right now, and I have been having a FABULOUS time traveling around a bit with Rachel and Josh, who are here visiting. But I will get to that in a while.

The last week of the term was actually sort-of sad. On Wednesday, we had our very last day of dance classs.

Jenny-Lyn, me, and Jin Han with our last group of dance class teachers

I'm so sad that it's over. Despite being a completely awkward, totally uncoordinated human being, I had a totally great time. Now I've got to take up something else, and I'm thinking maybe kendo.

On Thursday, we took our final test. The listening part was actually quite difficult. I ended up doing pretty good (94% if I recall correctly), but for once I wasn't SURE that I was going to. On the writing part, I made a few stupid mistakes, but I still got a 98%, so ROCK! :-)

After class, Alexis, Martin, and I went and hung out with Jenny-Lyn down at the river. She's leaving, headed to Australia, and not coming back for next term, so it was sort-of our Jenny-Lyn goodbye get-together, since it was the last time Martin would see her. So sad! :-( Jenny-Lyn, you will be missed!


Martin, Jenny-Lyn, Alexis, me!


Then, Andrea from our class is also leaving, heading back to Italy, so Alexis and I went and met up with him and a bunch of people from our class for Andrea's goodbye dinner.


Andrea, me, Alexis

I had a great time, actually, despite the fact that pretty much everyone was drunk wheen we got there and well, let's just say, being a non-drinker and observing, I felt sorry for the waitress.


John, Ii, and (a falling asleep) Ken

Still, it was great fun. I really do love hanging out with the people in my class. I'm really curious as to who will end up being in my class next term. I kind of wish I could know already!

On Friday, we had the going away ceremony, and everyone that was leaving had to give a speech. I really only knew two of the people leaving (and sort-of knew a third), but, me being me, when we got into the speeches of the upper class people, most of whom had been here for quite a long time, I found myself getting all teary eyed. Because some of them were teary eyed and obviously not wanting to leave, and so I just felt so sad for them! The empathy thing, yknow. . .

After the speeches, we went out with Suzuki-sensei and Sakakibara-sensei, our two main teachers from class. I ended up sitting at a table with Suzuki-sensei, Martin, and Andrea, and I talked a lot (in 日本語, of course) to Suzuki-sensei, and I discovered that I actually really like her. Right at the end when she will no longer be my teacher - perfect timing, right?

On Friday night, I went to Jenny-Lyn's actual goodbye get-togeter at Zig Zag, the school bar. I had a great time; we met a bunch of people and played cards for a super long time, which made me super happy, as I love playing cards and yet I never get to because no one ever wants to (and in any case, I can never rememeber how to play any of the games I like).


Unfortunately, I was also sort-of stressed, because Rachel and Josh were supposed to be coming in, but their flight had been delayed by 6 hours, and I was waiting for their call to see if they were going to get in on time for us to make our flight into Tokushima the next morning.
They finally called at around midnight; they were having to sleep in Tokyo and would theoretically be getting in the next morning with just enough time to make our connecting flight.

And that is another story for another time. Now, I'm headed to Tokyo to finish up the awesomeness of this vacation thing! :-) I'll be sure to write all about it when I get back!

Vegan Voyager: Neuchatel, Switzerland

I've been so caught up with my book blog and reading and writing and preparing for NaNoWriMo that I haven't updated this blog in a very long time. SORRY! I am once again behind!

So, a few weekends ago, I took the very last vacation of what ended up being my extraordinarly LONG vacation time.

Guillaume, some of his friends, and I headed over to Neuchatel, Switzerland, which is right across the border from France, to celebrate La Fete des Vendanges with one of his friends that lives there.

Lovely view from their house

La Fete des Vendanges is basically a festival to celebrate the fact that grapes are harvestable for making wine. Which in no way whatsoever means that people sit around together and drink wine. The opposite almost.

Neuchatel, population approximately 33,000, is a very small city. It closes down it's streets for three whole days and has a sort of fair. There are booths everywhere in which you can find every type of alcohol (although I don't think I ever once saw any wine available) and every type of food (except for maybe vegan food) available. There are all sorts of rides and fair games and lots of cute little tents selling fun things (like at a street fair). During the day there are parades and at night there are random float things that drive around shooting balls of confetti everywhere.


We are covered in confetti!!!!

And, because Neuchatel is so small and people come in from all over Switzerland and all over France, it ends up being COMPLETE CHAOS!!!!

During the day, it was fun. We walked around by the lake and watched a cool parade and got to experience the city. There were far too many people, but it was survivable.


A couple parade pictures!

The night, however, was not my cup of tea. We were there for two nights - the first night we went down to the festival, and I left after about an hour or two because it was just too claustrophobic. There were SO MANY PEOPLE everywhere that I could barely breathe, and most of them were drunk and over half of them were smoking. I tried to have fun, occasionally stopping to dance to the music with the others. But there was just too much cigarette and too many lame drunk people and not enough space to move, much less breathe.

Needless to say, I did not return the next night when they all went out, instead opting to stay in and enjoy the much more Audreyesque activity of reading. I had a great time, they had a great time, all was well.

So, even though I wasn't the hugest fan of the festival, I had a great time, and the part of Switzerland we were in was BEAUTIFUL! I am really glad that we decided to go. I could definitely see myself living in a cute little small place like that. (except that it is so small that no matter where you live, you tend to live right by the train track, which I wouldn't love).

On the drive back, we got to stop in Besancon for a bit to say hi to Guillaume's grandmother. It was lovely.
All in all, the weekend was a success!

Rachel and Josh (and then Josh arrives)!

NOTE: ALL PICTURES TAKEN BY EITHER RACHEL OR JOSH
(except the very last one)

So, after the graveyard, we headed back to my apartment to wait for the imminent arrival of Josh!
Upon his arrival, we decided to take a walk over to the Bastille to get smoothies.
We went to Wanna Juice, and Josh got this weird basil smoothie that he claimed was one of the best smoothies he'd ever had.

Josh and his smoothie at La Bastille

We continued on a nice walk down the Canal St-Martin and got to see one of the boats being let down on the boat stairs thing. Very cool!


Canal St-Martin


The next day was mega touristy day! We saw Les Champs-Elysees and L'Arc de Triomphe.


Us at L'Arc de Triomphe


The we headed over to the Eiffel Tower.


Me and Josh at the Eiffel Tower



One of those Eiffel Tower pictures that just has to be taken!

Josh had been amusing himself making things look miniature, and he managed to make the Eiffel Tower look like a mere trinket.


Look how small it is!

He also was having fun with double exposures and made it look like a carousel horse was eating the Eiffel Tower.


Hilariousness!


It was really cool because there was some rollerblading thing going on right in front of it, so we got to see some awesome rollerbladers doing some awesome tricks. I was mega impressed!


How rad is this?!?


Then I left them to enjoy museums without me (as I have been to so many of the museus here so many times; I just couldn't bring myself to do it all over again).

Unfortunately, I don't have Rachel's pictures for the next two days, and Josh's pictures aren't dated. My memory is for days and times is fairly bad, so I don't really remember WHEN we did what we did.
I know that we rented bikes (Velib!) and rode over to the Marais. We got delicious (but unfortunately slightly overexpensive) falafel at L'As du Falafel. Man, I love that place!
We took a quick ride around L'Ile St-Louis and discovered some pretty cute shops.
Then we rode around the Latin Quarter = St-Michel and saw the fountain and manoeuvred our way through all of the cute little strees.


Cool miniature of Notre Dame in Notre Dame



Hanging out in the Marais with a very cool store behind us



Rachel and I rockin' it on a bench on L'Ile St-Louis while Josh ate his lime basil sorbet and took pictures!


The other day, Rachel and Josh headed over to Versailles. I had already been (twice or maybe even thrice), so I decided to skip out on this time. I ended up doing absolutely NOTHING and so probably should have gone with them.

Their last day, Josh was unfortunately not feeling so well (the day before in St-Michel we were getting smoothies and this crazy woman was coughing herself to death right in the ridiculously small store. She was getting snot all over her arm and hacking out her lungs practically in our faces. So incredibly disgusting! I am sure we all got a little sick from it), but we headed over to Sacre-Coeur/Montmarte nonetheless.


Josh and I in front of Sacre Coeur

We went up to the top (it was a LOT of stairs) and got a pretty incredible view. I don't know how I had never gone up before.


View from the top



Josh and I at the top

After we walked around a bit and got to see this cute little French band playing. Not really our style, but VERY French.

Other than that, we had fun eating in delicious restaurants (La Victiore Supreme du Coeur; La Reine Shaba = deliciously wonderful Ethiopian food that still doesn't quite replace Ras Mesfin, the place where I always go for Ethiopian food that seems to have closed down; Loving Hut; Tien Hang; and Audrey's kitchen!) and playing cards and Dr. Mario chez me.


Rachel and Josh weren't in love with my New Kids on the Block poster. :-(


And then they had to leave. And vacation was REALLY over. Sort-of. ::sadness::

Rachel and Josh Visit (the just Rachel part)!

NOTE: ALL PICTURES TAKEN BY RACHEL

Okay, so when I say that the vacation was over, it wasn't really. . . only for Guillaume. :-P
Because a week after Guillaume went back to work, Rachel and Josh came to visit!!!!

Well, actually, I guess I should say Rachel then Josh came to visit. Josh had some issues getting here, so I ended up having a full two days with Rachel before his arrival.

And very full these two days were!
On Sunday, we took a day trip out to Giverny, home of Monet. We saw

his house and



tons of beautiful flowers!


Rachel tried to take a picture of me with a plant mustache,


but it failed.



Audrey and Rachel in Giverny


On Monday, day two, we took a trip over to Senlis to see awesome Gothic architecture!


This is awesome Gothic Architecture!



The beautiful town of Senlis!

And then we headed over to the neighboring town of Chantilly to take a tour of the castle there.


The Castle

We didn't go in, though, instead just exploring the gardens, which were huge and awesome!


Audrey and Rachel in the gardens!


There was also a section of really cute little houses


Me knocking on the door of a really cute little house

right before the entry way to a really awesome maze that we almost didn't get out of - you were supposed to collect clues along the way to find codes to get through 5 doors in the maze. We didn't collect clues and had to find other creative ways to get through the doors.


Us being other people at the end of the maze

Interesting Fact: In French, one of the words used to say whipped cream is creme chantilly. I THINK that this is basically an extra rich whipped cream (I can't be sure, because I don't eat the stuff!). This word came from the fact that, supposedly, back in the day, the cows living at the castle made extra super duper awesome whipped cream. And it therefore became associated with Chantilly.
It's weird, though, because now it's like the name of the town is Whipped Cream.

Tuesday morning, Rachel and I took a morning jaunt over to check out the cimetery Pere LaChaise before Josh's arrival. We had time to take a pretty good tour of it, and I actually FINALLY got to see Oscar Wilde's grave. I'd looked for it before but, despite thinking I had already seen it, I had apparently never found it.


Oscar Wilde's Grave

You see, covered with kisses like that - I would totally remember it.

And then Josh arrived.
TBC in the next entry! Are you excited?!? I hope so!!!!

Off to La Frette and Even More Birthday!!!!

So, when we got back to France, our vacation was theoretically over, but Guillaume still had a few days before he had to head back to work, so we decided to head out to Guillaume's parents house in La Frette Sur Seine. In order to have some calm down time and, of course, to enjoy their new swimming pool.

Guillaume's parent's house is amazing!


We had a great time taking pictures of ourselves from underwater


I love that Guillaume's camera is waterproof!

And with the amazing view from his parent's swimming pool


That's the Seine behind me!


We watched movies and ate delicious food and all in all had a wonderful and relaxing time, which was just what we needed after our nonstop go vacation.

When we got back to Paris, we finally found time for the two of us to celebrate my birthday together. After some trouble, Guillaume made me a delicious cauliflower casserole for dinner, along with these potato pakora gallette things that would have been DELICIOUS had there not been too much turmeric in them. And I FINALLY got to open my presents! YAY!!!!




Good times were had, and I got some great presents. Unfortunately, the return to Paris didn't just mean getting to finally celebrate my birthday together. It also meant that Guillaume had to return to work. ::sadness:: Which indicated the end of our summer vacation.

Vegan Voyager: Budapest

So, next and last stop on our trip - Budapest!

MOST ANNOYING/INTERESTING HAPPENING(S) IN BUDAPEST:
I was really excited about Budapest, but upon arriving I became a little bit less excited. The train station we arrived at was riddled with homeless people, and the air was so thick with the smell of unshowered human and alcohol that I could barely breathe. Not to mention I could barely walk because there were so many people. And I'd say about 90% of them were smoking, and everyone knows how much I DESPISE that more than basically anything else in the world. (to the left see The train station at which I wish we had arrived)
Leaving the train station, it didn't really get better. The subways were so far underground I got dizzy and started feeling sick just from going down the escalator. Our hotel room was so small we could barely fit in it with our luggage. And the ceiling was low and slanted, and there was only one small spot in the room in which we could actually stand up. The bathroom floor was covered with wet hair, which once again made me want to throw up.

THEN, to continue on with our fabulous arrival, we go out to get falafel, we get a little bit lost, and we found ourselves on a small side road on which we see a very interesting sight. There was a woman walking towards us, arm in arm with a man, wearing a very small transparent white tank top. And that was it. No shoes, no socks, no bra, no pants, no underwear. No anything else. Just the tank top. We got a good view of, well, everything. Unfortunately, this wasn't the only time on the trip where we saw more of a woman than is appropriate.
We finally find the falafel place, and it's the WORST falafel we have ever had.
What a great first day in Budapest, eh?

The second day, I am happy to say, it got MUCH better!!!!

Great view of Buda from Pest; or wait, is it Pest from Buda?

MY FAVORITE THING ABOUT BUDAPEST:We got to see some AMAZING architecture. I know I know, I live in Paris, which is supposed to be architectorial (is this even a word?) heaven. Or something like that. But to me, the greatest thing in Paris doesn't even compare to the greatest thing in Budapest. I mean, where in Paris can you see something as amazing as this:



Or as COOL and OLD SCHOOL as this:



You might disagree, but my answer is nowhere.
I also loved all of the really cool bronze statues. There were nowhere near as many as in Bratislava,but most of them were just as awesome. The bronze bridge on which you see Guillaume (to the right) was my absolute favorite, and oh, lucky us!, it was literally right next to where we were staying (for those of you who know me well, that means it was at least a 5 minute walk).

RESTAURANTS:
Well, we once again were on vacation when the restaurants were on vacation, so we pretty much had two options: the Hummus Bar, which had some of the worst soup, the worst hummus, and the worst falafel I had ever eaten. My mouth always hurt after eating there. I definitely would NOT recommend this place to anyone.
And Napfenyes Etterem, which I would absolutely recommend to everyone. It was 100% vegan, and they had some of the BEST pizza I had ever tasted. We went back often, and each time I had a different pizza, and each time it was delicious and awesome. Guillaume got things that weren't pizza, and those were delicious and awesome as well. See me to the left, lounging and barely unable to move from how full I am from the delicious pizza.


I don't know what this picture is supposed to be, but it's funny!


So, all in all, aside from our first day fiasco, we had an absolutely FANTASTIC time in Budapest, we got used to our small room (in which we spent very little time, in any case), and we even enjoyed the day it rained. It was actually a nice change from the heat wave that we had been previously experiencing.
Click on the picture above to go directly to the whole photo album or any of the others to be directed to it through another picture.
Or you can just click the link here: Budapest Summer 2009