The kids and I took a lovely walk to center of the "old" downtown Montpellier on 1/17/11 and thought it was so beautiful and cool that we had to go back on the 18th to take pictures! Here is one of the pix - you can find some of the others on our facebook sites, it takes a VERY LONG time to upload them to this site and a lot of times I get a security message and the pix doesn't load at all. Adam asked me the other day why the sidewalks don't have squares like ours do - I told him it's because they are hundreds of years old - people didn't use "square concrete" back then! The red stone and cobblestone just verify how truly old this part of France is. The only familiar store we've seen here is...of course McDonalds - I told the kids that there is no way we were buying Grande Macs in France! On our walk, we encountered a nice pile of dog *&^% and Emma said "look out for the dog crap!" - a few seconds later, a nice young man (who looked very french in his multi colored beret type hat) said "are you American French students?" -- since we have heard very little english here, I whirled around and said - "no, we are visiting! are you a student??" and we had a nice talk with him - he is here for three weeks from Baltimore, Maryland studying linguistics. He took us down to the Place de la Comedie - where a lot of the pictures were taken.
I must say, I am truly out of fashion and feel like a real dowdy person here. Everyone is dressed in black tights, black pantyhose, or cool jeans with boots. Our friend, Katie, who took us to the airport in North Canton, made a comment about our new white sneakers that we bought since we knew we would be doing a lot of walking, and how they were going to scream "we are American!!!" in Europe - She was absolutely correct! I see very few people with sneakers on, however, the only other pairs of shoes I brought are my black dress shoes and black dress boots - my sneakers are the most comfy to walk in - so, I guess I will look like a dowdy American tourist - ugh. More later!!
Hey Beth,
ReplyDeleteI am loving your blog. Thank you for taking the time to write and post pix.
I definitely felt like an American tourist in Iceland since I wasn't dressed head-to-toe in black nor did I have funky European glasses. Connie loved them so much, she ended up buying a pair of frames in an optical shop there and had her lenses made to fit back at home.
Love and miss you,
Tracey
Hi Beth,
ReplyDeleteBeen following the blog and loving your adventure. Glad to hear everything is good thus far. I'm pretending to be at a bistro having a croissant and glass of wine with you instead of looking at freezing fog in Ohio. lol How's the house? keep bloggin....
Love ya,
Lucy
Bon jour, Beth, Andrew, Nathan, Emma, Adam:
ReplyDeleteSo glad to hear everything is turning out well. All the photos are beautiful. Looking forward to hearing about all your adventures.
Love from the New York Davis family plus Scottie and Marc
Beth, try to buy some Earth Spirit shoes online if you can't find them in any shops. They are trendy (black) and very comfortable to walk in.
ReplyDeleteBonjour MM Burns....I have bought a very comfortable pair of black boots for our trip over...they were a little pricey but I wanted something that was comfy and attractive...they are Uggs (not the big fluffy ones)...you can buy them online if you find that your white sneakers are a bit to "american"....I've been wearing them a bit so that they are broken in and they are very comfortable since the leather is so soft. Dear Girl..you should have consulted with me before your purchase...oh well...sa la vie...as they say in France! Love and miss you!
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