Another message from the past and from Paris, in which I learn a valuable lesson about Mexican food:

My, this past week just flew by! Time has really started to go by quickly with classes now in full swing. When I last wrote I was preparing for my school-arranged day trip to Versailles. The trip was absolutely amazing! The sheer size of the palace was awe-inspiring, but the really incredible thing was the ornate attention to detail. Everything was decorated and, even more than that, tied in to a common theme. Our tour took us through the king’s rooms, the hall of mirrors, and the queen’s rooms. Each chamber had its own Roman god theme. Louis XIV was known as the Sun King (le Roi Soleil) because he compared himself to Apollo, the Roman god of the sun. Thus, the throne room was Apollo-themed and place in the center of the king’s other rooms, each with their god or goddess accoutrements. It was truly beautiful, and I can’t wait to go back when it’s warmer to see the Versailles gardens in bloom.

This past week in Paris brought me a particularly happy surprise. Thursday night, the UC Center here had a reception for some French students who will be studying at various UCs next year. It was really neat to get to talk to French students my age, about everything from what it’s like in California to the recent French student protests against the CPE (which, incidentally, took place just outside my door this past Tuesday). I made a particularly strong connection with a girl who’s actually a native of the Caribbean island of Martinique. She came to Paris to study and is hoping to be accepted at UCLA for next year. She’s also really interested in San Diego, so I may have a visitor for a few days when I get back to the States!

Other than those events, my week mainly consisted of school and homework. So I’ll give you the food update to finish off this message (since food happens to be a central part of life here): Friday night at a small café, I had the best escargot I’ve ever tasted. This is the second time I’ve had escargot in France, but this round was much better than the first (and yet, cheaper), and I’m definitely looking forward to going back and having it again! Also, I’ve discovered the one type of food the French don’t do well: Mexican. Since my program cohorts and I are all from California, we’ve been suffering from Mexican food withdrawal. I didn’t even realize how often I ate it until I didn’t have it anymore. Although my cravings weren’t quite as bad as those of some of my friends (I wouldn’t kill for a burrito), I had noticed a distinct lack and a certain craving for guacamole that just wouldn’t go away. Anyway, after our group Versailles trip, we managed to find a Mexican restaurant. We were so excited! We couldn’t wait to finally satisfy our cravings! Our first indication that French Mexican food might be different than California Mexican food was when our waiter was not familiar with the term “carne asada.”

Uh-oh.

In the end, our food could have been very loosely termed Mexican. Very, very loosely. For the most part, it looked like Mexican food. My quesadilla, for example, looked like a quesadilla. It was just that it didn’t taste like a quesadilla. It tasted like a lot of melted French cheese, which wasn’t a bad taste in its own right. It just wasn’t anything like the taste of Mexican cheese. The good news is that this experience pretty much took away everyone’s craving for Mexican food—or if not the actual craving, at least any desire to try to find Mexican food in France! And, in the end, we were all just laughing at the situation. The morals of this story? Californians are spoiled when it comes to Mexican food, and countries are best at making food that originates from the same continent.

And with that lesson, I shall end for now. I hope all of you are doing well, and I will write again soon.