Monte Carlo, Monaco and Lyon, France

Thursday night, Theo and I jumped on a plane to Lyon, France! The hour long flight flew by (literally) because I napped the whole way. We got in at about 8:30 pm, and stopped to pick up our rental car. There, we met a very nice lady named Joanne who was kind enough to tell us that we accidentally reserved an electric car. So, after about an hour, we managed to work together to find a car that worked for all of us! And we were off! Almost five hours later and with a possible speeding ticket picked up on the way, we finally made it to Monte Carlo, Monaco! We put on our fancy clothes and headed inside the famous Monte Carlo casino. Let’s just say, it was not at all what I expected. Yes, it was beautiful, but it was very small, and there were about 10 other people there. Plus, the tables had just closed, so we had to just play slot machines. Kind of a let down, since we had been looking forward to it the whole night. Maybe it was for the better, since we really only lost about 30 euro each before they kicked us out for the night.

That night, since it was already going to be such a short night, we slept in the car on the ritziest shopping street in Monaco. In the morning, we drove around a little to check everything out during the day. After accidentally driving the wrong way down a one-way street, we got a nice visit from the control police. Mister policeman was quite scary, and he was not thrilled that Theo didn’t have an international driver’s license, but he let us go. We quickly decided to park and walk around instead. At about 10 am, we jumped back in the car to head back to Lyon. The drive back was absolutely gorgeous. Southern France has so many hills, trees, and cool castles along the highway. We dropped our car off (in one piece) and headed for our hotel!

The Monte Carlo casino! (With fake snow in the background)

Friday and Saturday night were spent at the Fete Des Lumieres. It’s one of France’s biggest festivals, bringing almost 4 million tourists to Lyon every year for this weekend! The festival was so cool, and I had no clue what to expect, which made it even cooler. We walked around the city, stopping in each little square to watch a different light shows. On Saturday we climbed to the top of the hill where the city cathedral is located and could see the whole city!

The is the view from the Cathedral. There was a show playing on the ferris wheel! 

            This video isn't very good, but all my good ones are too long to be posted on here. Sorry!

One of my favorite parts of the weekend was the food. Most of our meals consisted of street food like Nutella crepes, hotdogs, hot chocolate, and French fries (of course). Saturday’s lunch was really the only sit down meal we had! We went to a restaurant called Le Table (real creative, I know), thinking we would be able to read the menu a little bit. Wrong! The menu didn’t seem to have any sort of organization, so they had to have a waiter come over and try to translate for us. What tourists we were! He was very kind, but the only words we were able to make out were fish, pork, duck, and rabbit. I went with fish. He went with pork. They seemed safe enough. Before our food came though, we were brought out this orange pudding thing served in a shot glass. We stared at it for the longest time before trying it. It was incredibly salty. Not my favorite, but hey, I still don’t even know what it is. When our food came, it was beautifully presented (like, the sauces made a pretty picture on the plate). Fancy stuff. I looked down at my plate, noticed the delicious looking filet of fish, and then BAM! Little, black things on my plate. Yes folks, there were snails. I guess I would have been naïve to think I could go to France and order fish without getting a healthy side of snails. I toughened up and ate half of them. And guess what? I still don’t like them… After our fancy lunch we went to one of the most famous chocolate shops in Lyon and bought some macaroons! (We brought some home too!)

Snails. Ew.

Sunday, we headed back to the airport, ate some Pizza Hut, and jumped on our flight back to good ole Roma! The rest of the day was spent “studying”. Yeah right, I took a nap. But I did go study for a little bit with the boys later that night!

Monday night, one of the apartments of girls held an AIFS Christmas party! They made hot chocolate, warm wine, and desserts! Every other apartment was in charge of making appetizers. My apartment brought a cheese and crackers tray. How creative, right? But the night was so much fun. Everyone dressed up in their holiday gear and had a Secret Santa gift exchange. And don’t worry! I didn’t get caught under the mistletoe! Unfortunately, the night ended early for a lot of us because it is finals week, but it was fun nonetheless.

Today, I had my Cinema final. I thought it went pretty well, so yay! Tonight is going to be the killer though with Rome Through the Ages tomorrow. Wish me luck!