Tests and Museums

Bonjour a tout!

Things have been going very well here in Paris.  The weather is finally getting nicer, my classes are becoming easier to understand, and I'm becoming much more comfortable here.

My math class had our last lecture for a while.  In Paris, it seems customary to leave some time between the classes and the test.  Our test will be March 4.  This means I have almost three weeks to study for it.  This is a good thing, because a friend of mine was telling me that the typical test around here is composed of just a few problems requiring you to make heavy application of the results from class.  This is different than how most of my tests in the United States have been, which have had more of an empahsis on recalling defnintions, theorems, and proofs.  I'm looking forward to the test.  To prepare, I have finally obtained a copy of the notes from the first two weeks of class (which I missed) and will be translating them to English.  In fact, I am considering typing up the notes and organizing them somewhat differently than how he has presented the topics in class to make them easier for me to understand.  This would be a lot of work, but if I do it, I think it would solidify the content in my mind pretty strongly.

I am taking two French courses.  The grammar course is so far preetty easy because it's mostly written.  Also, the grammar is never worse than English grammar and often is better.  I am finding that having taken Latin some years ago helps a lot.  The oral comprehension and production workshop is more dificult, but the teacher recognizes that.  We listened to (I believe) an actual radio clip and the speaker was talking so fast I could catch only one word in five.  However, the teacher had us take the clip in chunks, only listening to a few seconds at a time and asking some guiding questions.  It's starting to get easier.  At some point in that class I'm going to be giving a presentation, either on my research or (if that turns out to be to hard to make accessible to a general audience) the history of mathematics.  Either one would be a lot of fun, so I'm going to be working on that soon.

I continue to ingrain myself into French society.  I now have a French bank account and French renter's insurance to go with my French apartment and French cell phone (or, I should say, "mobile").  Everyone uses direct deposit and withdrawl around here.  There seems to be less concern here about identity theft and exposed personal information than in the U.S.

Tonight I went to the Louvre Museum for the first time.  That place is huge!  I'm afraid I don't get as into art as some, but I definitely enjoyed walking through it.  I spend about two hours there, never spending more than a few minutes in each room, and I'm pretty sure I saw less than a third of the art that's held there.  I'm definitely going back, probably next week.  On Fridays, you get in free if you're a resident and under 26.  I'm also going to be checking the chedules of some of the other museums now that the weather's getting nicer.  Below I've attached a bunch of photos from my trip to the Louvre.  Still on the agenda is the Code of Hammurabi (I had no idea that was here).  What else is at the Louvre that you would like to see pictures of that I haven't posted yet?

My first view today of (part of)
the Louvre

The Mona Lisa behind several
inches of bulletproof glass

This one caught my eye- it has
an unusual amount of dynamism
for a horse painting

I need to find more portraits by this guy -
that expression is just fantastic

I actually saw this one in Crystal Bridges in Bentonville
before they loaned it to the Louvre (that's right, art from
my state is in the most famous museum in the world)

A lot of the ceilings were like this.  The building used to be a
palace, before one of the French kings said "no, this just isn't
fancy enough."

Go Hogs!  I neglected to call them in the middle of the museum.

This reminds me the movie Jason and the Argonauts.

Some ancient Greek writing.  I can sound out
the letters, but I don't know the words.

He's plotting something....

Even the ancient Greeks sometimes had
problems with their handwriting.

The Louvre at night.

The Eiffel Towel all lit up in very bright Christmas lights.

Finally Settled (Mostly)

Greetings from Paris!

First off, I'm sorry for how long it's been between entries.  Some days it jsut doesn't seem like I've done anything real interesting, and some days I've done so much it's hard to find the energy to write about it.

Last time we talked, I mentioned that I was going to go to my French Grammar class the next day.  Well, I was there, but no-one else was.  I spent a while trying to figure out whether I had the right room or not. I stumbled into a computer class, thinking it was just a student lab, and managed to get to the point where I was logging into the computer before the instructor came over and asked for my name and I realised my mistake.  That wasn't the least embarassing thing in the world.  However, I finally got my phone to connect to the school's wifi and found out that the French for Foreign Speakers course's starting date is February 4.  So let's review:  The school's official starting date for the Spring semester was January 21, but the graduate math classes start two weeks before that date and the language classes start two weeks afterward.  I wonder if French students are used to the system or whether everyone is as confused as I was.

On the 24th, my friend Shelley arrived from the U.S.  She's participating in the same program I am (though she's taking different classes).  I met her at the airport and was able to guide her through the process I had to  figure out for myself.  Since I'd been in France for a while, I was also able to help her with the language barrier, which was good.  She booked a room at the same hotel I was staying at, for convenience.

I didn't do much during the next week.  I recieved news that my great-uncle, who has been struggling with illness for some time, had died.  I didn't feel like doing a whole lot.

Last Friday was an eventful day.  That was the day that I moved out of my hotel and into my apartment.  It was also the day that Shelley left for a conference in Israel.  Unfortunately, Shelley's plane left at 8:30 in the morning, and we weren't even allowed to go pick up the keys before 9.  She had already looked into the possibility of moving in a day early, and that wasn't possible.  So, we concluded that I would take her luggage (that which she wasn't taking with her) and put it in my apartment, and then she would move it in when she got back.  What this meant for me was making seven trips through the subway system (four there, three back) on Friday in order to transfer everything over.  I tell you, that is not a fun way to move.  We considered splitting a taxi, but the fares are so high and the subway is actualy very economical, so that it didn't make sense to do so.

I am so happy to be in an apartment now rather than a hotel room.  I've got more space, a mini-fridge, a range, and closets, shelves, and a full bathroom.  I've been working on getting it set up, with sheets and blankets and so forth.  I'm not really allowed to put anything on the walls, which is a bummer, but I'll find a way to liven the place up.  I'm afraid my view isn't great, but I'm 10 minutes away from my classes, which is fantastic.  I will post pictures once I figure out what's wrong with my computer that's making it not read them.

Today I went to my first French Grammar class (for real this time).  The teacher didn't arrive until 35 minutes after class had started because of a minunderstanding about the class start time, but at least this time I wasn't the only one waiting there.  There are studetns from the Netherlands, Germany, Texas, Florida, Greece, China, Japan, and Vietnam (and perhaps other countries) in my class.  The teacher is very enthusiastic.  The class is taught entirely in French, but he knows how to enunciate and speak slowly enough that novices like me can follow the class well.  I tested into the second level of classes that they offer, and this is the second semester of the course, so we're starting off right away with Relative Pronouns (that, which, etc.)  I met a couple of people in the class who are also working on graduate degrees in math, which was quite nice.

I had a realization some time ago and simly forgot to post it before, but here we go.  Sometimes, when I'm trying to speak to someone in French, I'm trying so hard to simply form a proper sentence and convey my meaning, that I forget about the polite phrases like "please" and "thank you".  It's not at all that I'm trying to be rude, I'm jsut trying to communicate and getting caught up in the intricacies of the language.  I think that this will give me a greater patience with people who don't speak English well. A lot of the time, if he's rude, it's totally unintentional and it's because he's trying to communicate effectively.

Tomorrow I'm finally got a meeting with my professor, and so I'll be able to work out the details of the independent study I'll be doing with him.  I'll also be determining what the tests in the class are going to look like, since we may only have two or three weeks before our first one.  I've been translating my notes from class from French into English, and for the most part I've moved from struggling to understand the language to struggling to understand the math, which is a definite improvement.

I'll try to make the time before my next update less than the time before this one.

As always, thank you for reading, and God Bless.

À bientôt!