Third Annual Twenty-first Birthday (reprise)

Saturday morning, after months of volleying emails, I met up with the grandson of Dr. Rosefsky, Doug. For those of you that didn't know, I won a scholarship to study abroad (two years ago) that Dr. Rosefsky founded. Doug now lives and works in Paris, and it was great to get to meet him! He showed me some other paintings that his grandfather had done (I really liked them) and also some great quotes that his grandfather had on a sheet -- My favorite was 'To me, old age is always fifteen years older than I am.'

Because I was afraid of the hard time I'd be given on Saturday if I did nothing to celebrate on the actual day of my birthday, I arranged a hasty gathering. I insisted that it had to begin on the very tip of Ile de la Cité (not the Notre Dame end, the other end which literally forms a point). I wanted to make bazookas in the middle of the Seine, in March, SO WE DID!

I'd had picnics there with friends in the past, and it's a really neat location because you're literally in the middle of the Seine, with boats going by on both sides and everything.

Except I probably almost killed us all with frostbite, because the WIND was unbelievable. We lasted for quite awhile (including my cousin, Melissa, who had just arrived in Paris, from Virginia). Right when we decided death was imminent and got up to go find a bar, my friend Justine showed up with her friend that I'd never met, and we ended up being invited back to her friend's house. Awesome! So she invited her friends, and a group of ten of my friends and I all celebrated until the wee hours of the morning! Lots of fun :)

This, however, is the only picture that I took the entire night. I, of course, brought jars for bazooka making, and you can just see the edge of Ile de la Cité with some of the lights on the water beyond it. I clearly missed my calling in artsy photography ...

Then Monday was the first day back to school. When we were making our passports, I had told all of my students my birthday, but the kicker is that a few of them actually remembered! One little girl in Aurélie's class brought me this vase, which I intend to make the focal point of my future home decorating.

It was so sweet of her, especially since I only see each class of these kids for 45 minutes per week!

Then yesterday another little girl, in the school I like considerably less than the others, who sees me even less because I'm not even in her class every week (long story), got me this, and a box of chocolates! I was so flattered and touched that these little second graders had gotten me birthday presents, it was adorable.

I had the self-discipline, at least, to leave the box of chocolates out to share in the teachers' room of the school where I work after-school, because I knew that bringing it home meant I would eat the whole thing singlehandedly.

This little fairy girl accompanied the box of chocolates, although it weighs like 12 lbs and I think it might be made out of lead, so if I end up with lead poisoning please tell the doctors what happened.

Then last night, as had been planned, Guillaume and I held a joint birthday party (he turned 24 of the 4th, and I of course 23 on the 6th). He has spent his whole life in Paris, so I let him do the location hunting, and he succeeded brilliantly with a pub called Saint Patrick's in the 11e. It's huge, particularly by Parisian standards, and very comfortable and chill (although there were matches on, and it was particularly empty I'm told). At any rate we had a pretty sizable group of people going on, and it was great to see everyone.

Also funny because it was more or less a 50/50 split between Americans and Français, so I sat in the middle and tried not to let the language switching blow my mind :) At least school has put me in the habit of going back and forth at the drop of a hat.