Once again running desperately to the metro, I arrived barely in time for a rendez-vous with the group to Versailles. We packed onto a double-deck RER and chugged west on the Seine and then though some of the suburbs of Paris, seeing actual houses and old apartment buildings, gardens alongside the tracks, everything a lot older and clearly more medieval in origin than absolutely anything in the United States. Drizzling slightly, we made our way to then through the chateau, those lucky enough to be sardined alongside a professor being treated to supplementary material, the others forcibly jammed through doorways alternately wondering at the decor and about the whereabouts of everyone else. Through sweating hordes of sneaker-sporting fish, I oscillated between the two; equally as interesting as the various apartments and their trappings, and the new, temporary exhibit of different cultures' thrones that did wonders to obstruct the arteries of the tours and was confusingly introduced by a series of buddhas and other deities out of place in an opulent, clearly European antechamber, were the people to me, this time, their faces, their clothing, their coping skills, and I enjoyed the visit.
Losing only one person out of our group of twenty-two [who found us forty minutes later anyways, no big deal], we went out to the gardens and ate lunch on the steps overlooking the main thoroughfare of the garden, and afterwards spilt up into our individual cliques. The one I attached myself to took a zagging path down the hedged lanes of the gardens alongside the main stretch, brushing slowly past the signs of civilization at the foot of the main fountain, then wound its way back up to the gift shop. I stopped at the highly artificial lake for a while to talk to the fish in, but for the most part stuck with them, and it was fine.
Back in Paris, we walked the Tuileries a bit on our way to an apparently well-known cafe called Angelinas, where we sat in an obstructive group of seven on matchwood chairs and had hot chocolate and split pastries and mostly just discussed Life. Afterwards, we went into a next door bookstore that was neat for having a lemon tree in it, then split up. I drew in the parc for a bit, had dinner, accidentally missed a rendez-vous with the others and ended up doing a postcard and walking west along the Seine for the evening :)
I made Maria [my host mother, if you'll recall] actually cry last night when I mistranslated and accidentally call her husband an 'asshole.' Thankfully he wasn't there, but two of his children were, so doubtless it's gotten back to him by now somehow.
Sadly, I forgot my camera, and have no photos, just so you know. Think opulence and overcast-ness. These I took later, and are today's Weird Things About France:
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