best. weekend. ever.

And by weekend, I mean Thursday through Sunday. You know how I roll.

Thursday: after rehearsal, Harry and I rolled over to Taylor's to get ready for clubbing. Laura met us there and we oohed and aahed over Taylor's incredible Eiffel Tower view for the millionth time. (You see the tower up close and personal out of their living room window. Like, very up close and personal. It's kind of intimidating.) During our endless taxi search I made a new friend - a Snickers! He was outside an art gallery, and looked exactly like our lab at home - pink nose and wriggles and everything. His owner was quite tickled by my excitement, and invited us into the gallery for the opening party they were having. We really wanted to go in (especially since there were costumed revelers inside), but we had to make it to the club before they started charging entry. I'm totally not a club person, but it was a blast! We went to Mix because a) Thursday nights are Erasmus nights, and b) Martin Solveig, a DJ Harry likes, was playing. It was packed and bouncing and there were crazy lights and ahhhh it was overwhelming. I want to go back. Eventually. And again for free.

Friday: reading and West Wing and sleep. Beautiful, beautiful sleep.

Friday night: reading and West Wing and sleep. Beautiful, beautiful sleep.

Saturday: reading and baking - exactly what God made Saturdays for.

Saturday night: Nellie's 21st birthday! A bunch of us met at the wine bar around the corner from our apartment - Nellie, Alyssa, Taylor, Laura, Rob (a friend from Columbia who's doing a full year at Science Po), Harry, and three of Harry's French friends. (I've found a new home in this wine bar, by the way; it's not too expensive, and while the dynamic has been different every time I've gone, it's always been warm and friendly and fun.) From there we moved to the Valentine's Day bar (it has a real name, but I can't remember it and so will call it from here on out "the Valentine's Day bar") to really celebrate. Nellie celebrated so much, in fact, that by midnight she had started playing the piano. It was kind of amazing. Here's a photo of us roomies from Saturday night:

Sunday: AmCath, obviously. Daylight savings time... not so obviously. I arrived at the church exactly an hour late, just as the service was about to begin. It had to happen to me eventually, I guess. After the service, I threw a brunch for Suzanne, the soprano I love who's leaving for the States on Wednesday. It was a total hit, if I do say so myself. We had all my baked yummies (banana bread, chocolate cake, apple pie, raisin scones, and brie en croute), plus some other goodies and lots of champagne and orange juice. There were about 12 of us, mostly of the younger crowd, and a core of about 5 stayed past 4. We ate and talked and laughed and salsaed (yes, there was dancing) and sang along to everything from the Beatles to Beyoncé to Big and Rich. It was so much fun. I love that I've made friends in the choir... I had missed the St. Michael's dynamic! Tonight some of us are going out for Thai, again to fête Suzanne. I don't know what we're going to do when she leaves; we're going to have to find a new excuse to party.

what's in a name?

I've been going by Elizabeth here when I meet new people because the French can't pronounce Betsy properly. I'm quite taken with the change, and am considering being Elizabeth when I finish college. Thoughts?

mercy and kindness

I've really been enjoying all the "WHO IS K?" emails I've been getting.

However, I think I'm enjoying them too much. I'm starting to feel sadistic. So I'll tell you a little bit - but K will retain his air of mystery.

K is a good friend here in Paris, a Franco-American, who doesn't like to be identified online. He's pretty much my hero. Blessing of blessings, he'll be in New York City next year (although this will probably be to the absolute detriment of my academic record).

Tonight we're going to some party for Girls at Work in the 8th. (From the email invite: Girls at Work, labo de création féminine, mène une réflexion sur la féminité au travers de l’expression artistique des femmes, en traitant de différents thèmes.) Last night was kind of nuts - Taylor, Laura, Harry, and I went to an internation night thing at a club in Monparnasse - so this will have to be low-key. Well... hopefully.

Tomorrow: reading like Guy Montag after he flips out, cleaning the apartment, and baking lots and lots of yummies.

etcetera

Turned in my first fac exposé for my Belle Époque class on Monday. Was supposed to present it orally, but kind of freaked out beforehand and the professor took mercy on me. It went something like this:
Betsy: I am so scared and I feel terribly unprepared.
Mme: Are you American?
Betsy: Yes.
Mme: Email me the paper after class.
Betsy: Vive la France.
So that made me life a lot easier. Unfortunately, I have another due on April 2nd - and I won't be able to wriggle out of that one. (It's for the medieval class, and will be on cities in France in the early 13th century. Exciting. Like, actually.)

Made Jed watch "Gigi" with me the other night. I love the movie, but Lerner and Lowe really were predictable. We spent most of the two hours gushing over the clothes; why don't men dress like that anymore? For that matter, why don't women? I'm not advocating corsets or anything, but turn-of-the-century evening gowns are stunning. For example: http://www.imdb.com/gallery/mptv/1337/Mptv/1337/1629_0002.jpg?path=gallery&path_key=0051658

I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills

Before we talk about the concert, we have to talk briefly about Sunday morning's service. You see, you must understand what happened at 11am in order to understand the state of absolute mental terror I was experiencing. It's actually not a very interesting story; Ned gave me a solo in a 60 second piece (that everyone knew expect for me) and I totally croaked in the first two bars. The rest of the solo bit was fine, and everyone was really nice about it, but it was unbearably embarrassing.

Okay. Now. The concert. There's this rhyme my dad used to repeat to me all the time: "There once was a girl with a little curl / right in the middle of her forehead. / When she was good she was very very good, / and when she was bad she was horrid." That's pretty much how our concert went.

We opened by processing to psalm 121 - and when I say "we opened," what I really mean is "I opened." At the dress rehearsal the night before (!), Ned was like, "Hey, Betsy, you do this." So... okay. I totally fudged it when we were practicing just before the concert, but I pulled it off during the actual thing. (It was actually really cool; the acoustics in St. Sulpice are incredibly welcoming, which helped me a ton.)

We only did really well on a couple pieces. The harder ones, the ones we had performed beautifully (more or less) at the rehearsal the night before, we bombed. I'm still kind of upset about it, so I'm going to mostly just write about the screw-ups.

a) Allegri's "Misereri Mei"
First of all, the guest woman who sang the soprano 1 solo was a mess. She scooped up the the C, and sounded like she was screaming. Also, somehow the sop 1s entered on the wrong note on the very first verse, and it took them like 5 measures to fix the tuning. A lot of people came to the concert expressly for this piece...les pauvres.

b) Davy's "Stabat Mater"
This work is really, really, really hard - mostly for the 5 people in the semi-chorus. Regardless, the reason you're picked to be in the semi-chorus is because you're up to the job, right? Hypothetically. So... yeah.

c) Howell's "Like as the Hart"
Actually, we were pretty good on this one. I'm listing it because I did the soprano solo at the end and got a little extemporaneous. Oops. (Doubt anyone who didn't know the piece noticed, though)

We sang about 90 minutes of music, so obviously there was a lot more that we did wrong, and some things we did right that I'm not mentioning. I don't really want to write any more, though, because it was a really frustrating experience.

The highlight of the thing was that Nellie, Laura, Jed, and K came. It meant so much to see my friends in the audience! (Plus, K brought me flowers, which was sweet.) The four of us, plus Harry, a new boy in the choir, went out for champagne after the concert. Jed had tons of work to do, so he left after the drinks, but the rest of us trekked to my apartment for dinner. It was an absolute blast.

I had spent about 45 minutes roaming an outdoor market on Saturday morning, and found some beautiful cheeses (including époisse, a stinky cheese from Bourgogne) and a lovely pork loin. Rather than buying random wine, as I usually do, I actually went to a cave and asked for recommendations. The woman suggested two Beaujolaises that would go well with the orange glaze I was making. (Dinner: roast pork loin with orange glaze, cousous, and brussel sprouts.) We sat around for nearly 5 hours eating and drinking and, in Nellie's case, putting on a fashion show. I was really impressed that Harry stayed the whole time; I thought for sure we would scare him away by, you know, just being ourselves, but he totally gave as good as he got. So I guess that's something good that came out of that disastrous concert: we made a new friend.

best. pickup line. ever.

"Franchement, les Français sont magnifiques à faire l'amour."

I don't know from where I found the strength to walk away.

Handel rocks.

Last night's outing was amazing. We were way up in the nosebleeds, and couldn't really see anything, so after the first act we moved up to the empty boxes right above our seats. We couldn't see any better - well, most of us couldn't; K, on the other hand, almost killed himself by leaning way out of the box, as did one of the Germans - but it felt like an adventure. The music was stunning. I pretty much stopped paying attention to the story as soon as we settled into the boxes and just closed my eyes and listened. There wasn't much acting, although there were some trippy interpretive dance sections where Handel wrote ballet music, so I didn't miss anything. (I know everyone else who did watch was confused, though, because the two main male parts were written for castrati but were sung by women, the result of which was that 4 out of the 7 people on stage looked exactly alike.) My favorite was Dalinda, the princess' maid; her voice was so clear and crisp. The first aria she did, "Apri le luci," was breaktaking; unfortunately for me (and all of you who'll be peer-pressured into coming to my senior recital next spring), however, the role is sung by a coloratura, which I absolutely am not. The King, a bass, was also amazing. The mezzo who played Ariodante was a little... ornmental; I wasn't a huge fan. All in all, though, it was a wonderful performance.

We then went to a Moroccan restaurant in the area; as it was nearly midnight, we had the first floor of the place to ourselves. I don't know why, but I'm kind of obsessed with North African food right now.

Tutored at the buttcrack of dawn today (okay, 9am), and wussed out of quitting. I just couldn't do it! Armelle is so sweet and so eager, I just couldn't tell her I didn't have the time to sing "head, shoulders, knees and toes," and to make paper dolls. I set up a few alternate times with her mother for the next few weeks - I'm reminding myself that I have fun when I'm actually there, it's good money, and I have spring break in three weeks.

Wait a minute... I have spring break in three weeks!

apologies

a) The last post was embarassingly badly written. I'm going to change it, but if you read the original version... sorry.
b) I got the cream pot phrase totally wrong. It's actually "pendre de crémaillaire," and a crémaillaire is not a cream pot but one of those big iron hooks you hang in the fireplace to warm soup or stews or whatever.
c) I'm a bad speller.

da weekend

This is going to be one of those amazing, busy, wonderful weekends. What's that? You want me to tell you about it? Well, okay!

Tonight K and I are going to the Theatre des Champs Elysées with two of his friends (whom I met last weekend at his brunch) to see Handel's "Ariodante." Handel operas are rarely performed - I doubt most people are even aware that he wrote any - so I'm really excited. We won't really be able to see from our seats, but the tickets were only 12€ and we'll be able to hear sublimely.

Tomorrow morning, at 9am (blergh), I have to tutor. Hopefully it'll be the last session - I tried to make it clear to Armelle's mother over the phone that I really don't have time to tutor now the the semester has reached its cruising altitude, but I think she thought I meant that I couldn't do the normal time anymore. I enjoy tutoring, and the girl is a total sweetheart, but my plate is just too full. Am not looking forward to clearing this up. In the afternoon, though, Nellie and I are going to go on a date. I haven't spent much time at home lately and therefore haven't seen her much, so we're going to try to grab coffee or a movie or something. Then in the evening the choir has a 3 hour dress rehearsal for our Sunday concert.

Sunday... what else would I be doing?
10-12h30: service
14h-16h: rehearsal
16h-18h: concert

Am SO EXCITED for this concert; we're doing some really amazing music. (I'll put up the program Monday or Tuesday when I report on how it went.) I've got a little solo in a Howells piece, which is nice cause I'm the newest soprano. We're doing the Allegri "Misereri Mei," too. I'm singing first soprano for most of the concert, and I was almost kept on first for that, which would have made me cry because my self-worth is totally tied up in being a second on that piece, but Ned moved me back to second, thank God. Have strong-armed some friends into coming to the concert; unfortunately, several will be out of town, but those who aren't have promised to be there. I love it when I can share this music with my friends... concerts like this usually make them understand why I've sold my soul to Jesus.

sunny and 60

Don't hate me too much, east coasters.

On second thought, you're entirely alllowed to hate me; this is where I go to school: