When in France...Eat Fries?

     You know those moments in life that are so completely ridiculous that you think to yourself "this can't possibly be happening right now" and thus it leaves you questioning all reality? Well...I think it's safe to say that I had quite my fill of those moments this weekend. As part of the study abroad package I guess you could call it, we are granted the opportunity to go on two different excursions. My first excursion was this past weekend and we made the trip to Monaco, Nice and the French Riviera. Let me start by saying that a 4AM wake-up call is rough, and even more so when you resemble a pack mule and it takes you over 20 minutes to walk to the bus. Once we were on the bus, everyone passed out and to be honest the 5-hour trip to Monaco flew by. We picked up our tour guide Bernadette along the way (although I swear the bus never completely stopped moving) and she pointed out some pretty cool stuff, ie: the exact spot Grace Kelly met her demise, morbid huh?  Once we were off of the bus, we also walked by a place of happier times for Grace Kelly, the Cathedral where her and Prince Rainier III of Monaco got married, and then we saw the changing of the guards. As you can imagine Monaco is absolutely stunning.

Unfortunately, we didn't have the opportunity to walk around Monte Carlo and channel the Selena Gomez movie because we were starving and lets just say it took us awhile, and by awhile I actually mean the whole time, to find a place that would serve the nine of us. BUT hey I got to eat a crepe and I mean we did get this view of it. Better than nothing, right?

    So next destination: Nice. This is where our second stop and hotel was for the night. We could not be more excited for a HOT SHOWER and French television. I immediately flipped on any channel. Ironically, the Amanda Knox lifetime movie was on, but I didn't care because it was TELEVISION and well I haven't seen that invention since I left America. It was also so so nice to be able to steam up a bathroom and have water pressure that consisted of more than a dribble. We all lied around until it was time to go to the dinner that LDM set up for us...this is where it gets good. We were told that we were going to be served a traditional French dinner, with an appetizer, entree and dessert. Being hungry college kids who have been stuck on a bus for hours, we were delighted with the prospect of promised vegetables and a free French meal. In reality the restaurant moved us all in and out within 30 minutes, our vegetables were French Fries, the wine may have actually been balsamic vinegar and the dessert was a pastry made of an ambiguous fruit (maybe pineapple? maybe mango?). It was the most absurd experience ever and our table was dumbfounded. Let me illustrate the scene for you with some pictures.

So all in all Nice was a bust and not nice at all (get it? heh). Well actually I shouldn't say that because we went to a casino and it was so pretty on the beach in the morning.

But our next stop was Saint Paul and then Cannes and I loved both especially Cannes. In Cannes, Amanda and I got separated from everyone and decided to eat at a real French restaurant and avoid any form of a french fry. Let me tell you, french fries were on every menu. Who knew they were so popular in France? I mean I know the word "french" is in the name and all but I really thought it was just an American thing, whoops. Anyway, we found this lovely restaurant called "La Plage" where everyone was so sweet. We ended up eating things I would never eat in America aka fried baby fish and sea bass (err desperate times???).

Trust me they tasted a lot better then they look (try to ignore the eyes). It was also really cool to go to the red carpet where the Cannes film festival is held. 

So afterwards we made a couple of more stops in France and then finally made our journey back to Firenze. They played "Me, Myself & Irene" for us on the bus, which I'm pretty sure is the strangest choice ever but I'm not complaining. So all in all, despite the "wtf" moments, the trip was beautiful, cold (emphasis on the cold) and something we are all going to look back on and laugh about.

Avoir!