París *sigh*

If ever one could fall in love with a city, I'd say I've done it. Paris makes my heart beat. I cant believe my time there is already over. The city is fabulous! Definitely my favorite place so far. And I've decided that I don't care how cliché it is to like the Eiffel Tower... cause I love it! I now understand the fascination with it... I managed to spend nearly every night hanging out around it. There's thousands of tiny lights on it, so at night time, every hour on the hour, for 9 minutes - it twinkles... it's really beautiful. The only thing I didn't do was go up to the top. **Gasp** I know, probably sounds retarded... but I figured that I've seen just about everything one can see in a weeks time in Paris and figured that I will for sure be back again one day, hopefully with my future family, and would love to have something special saved for that visit. So the Eiffel Tower it is. Maybe that will be my new criteria for dating... "So have you been to the top of the Eiffel Tower?... Oh you have? That's great... gotta go!"... or "You haven't? Me neither!" DUN dun dun.. Ok.. Completely Kidding..... moving on...

A few friends and I started the week in France early because we wanted to see Normandy the day before we met up with everyone else... And even though the bus we took there forgot to pick us back up (awesome) I'm still really glad I got to go there. I brought back some rocks and seashells from the shore... some for my Grandpa who fought in WWII and the rest for my mom who will undoubtedly find some use for them in our ongoing backyard art show. :)

The rest of our week in Paris was spent quite productively...

We went to a million museums... ok, more like 3... but they were each great. Of course the Louvre was one of them. I've always heard it's huge and that it would take months, if not years, to really give each piece it's fair share, and now i know what they mean. It's massive. And I only spent about 4 hours there, however - though short, I learned a lot! I'll elaborate.... So, I went alone, a slightly overwhelming thing in itself when one realizes how enormous it is, but I had my Mona Winks book in hand (the best European tour guide around.) Well, I was standing in the middle of the room, holding the book up, spinning in a circle, searching for a painting it was referring to... (i'm sure i looked brilliant) when low and behold, an older French man approached me and pointed me in the right direction. Well, we got to talking, and turns out - he used to give tours at the Louvre for years and ended up giving me my own personal tour!! (In English, thank God.) It was great!! :) I saw Venus de Milo, Napoleon's apartments, Leonardo da Vinci's masterpieces, and of course, the Mona Lisa.

The Louvre beat the Orsay Museum a hundred fold... especially in light of the fact that while headed up the stairs at the Orsay (once again alone) I tripped and fell flat on my face.. in front of EVERYONE, everyone except for a familiar face who could laugh w/ me. Ya, go figure. I think i'm forever cursed w/ tripping. You'd think it'd get better w/ age...

Other productive uses of our time included:
shopping on the Champs d'Élyseé.... I purposefully got lost in the biggest Sephora store I've ever seen!!
Climbing to the top of the Arc d'Triumph.. not as easy as it looks my friends. :)
Taking a day trip to Versailles, the Palace once belonging to Henry XIV... Oh my gosh... this thing is INCREDIBLE. If you're only going to see one palace/castle in all of Europe - make it this one!! Henry XIV wasn't messing around. A few of us rented bikes and rode through the gardens for a good hour and a half but probably only saw 1/5 of the gardens. They were beautiful... they seriously thought of everything! We were also fortunate enough to run into our professor who was taking a carriage ride through another part of the gardens and fountains and were invited to jump on board - to which we reluctantly - ya right - enthusiastically accepted. Then we toured the interior of the palace - wow wow wow. We finally concluded that night with worship/chapel in front of the Eiffel Tower. Not a bad day. :)

Another particularly good night in lieu of Sarahs birthday = 10 girls dressed up, pizza, French guards - under the Tour d'Eiffel, followed by dessert on a boat anchored on the Siene River facing Notre Dame..... ya, i told Sarah good luck with my next birthday.. :)

One of my favorite parts of Paris was visiting the church, Sacré Coeur (the Sacred Heart) and Montmarte. The church possibly topped Notré Dame. In fact, it did. Notre Dame was insanely gorgeous, but it was gothic and dark inside... granted, i realize that was kind of the point...but still... So Sacré Coeur is this magnificent white church. We climbed what felt like a thousand stairs to get there, but it was completely worth it. We walked inside just in time to hear the sound of the nuns singing the most beautiful acapella song that echoed through the entire church. WOW. We walked quietly around the sides of the church to the individual chapels, and had some good time to ourselves to sit, light a candle, pray, reflect - all the while listening to their worship.... it was perfect. Afterwards, we headed down the street a little bit to the artists district, Montmarte. Another highlight. This is exactly how i pictured Paris... crooked streets, cobblestone everything, cafés, and artists everywhere... some selling, some painting, some asking to draw your portrait.... we ate a late dinner here and soaked it all in. Later we walked back down the hill and saw the Moulin Rouge.... being that tickets are nearly 85 American dollars, we decided against attending... but we of course snapped away some good pictures outside as if we weren't cheap tourists. :)

So, despite the awful rumors you may hear (or possibly spread yourself) I actually didn't have any trouble with the French people... and I'd like to say it's because my highschool French really paid off - but that'd be a big fat lie... my highschool French got me nowhere, except to take a picture w/ the cute French guards underneath the Eiffel Tower. :) In my experience - the French were friendly as long as I was friendly.

Anyways, Paris is undeniably number ONE so far. Im anxious to see if anywhere else will top it... I almost hope it will just because of how great that city would have to be. :)

Everyone at home is greatly missed. Thanks for your prayers, I know God has heard them as He is blessing our time and keeping us safe. And thank you for your emails - they always make me smile.

Love, Love, Love, Melody

Ahh.. I'm so behind!

Where to start?

Im sorry I've fallen so behind... A lot has happened since Dublin, but i'll try and sum up the highlights...

Liz, Michelle, Jon, Brandon and I went to Scotland for the four days in between Dublin and London. Scotland was so beautiful!!! We toured Edinburgh castle, watched a fireworks show from their Military Tattoo, took pictures with The Scotts Monument, Shopped on Princess Street, took pictures with true blue Scottish Bagpipers, thought about buying kilts, met a really cute Australian boy... not so bright, but very pretty :) ... and visited William Wallaces monument and his home - Sterling Castle... I had plans to see Dashboard Confessionals in concert there and nearly cried when they were sold out (even though they told me a week ago they wouldnt be.. err.) Someone please watch Braveheart in honor of me... im dying to watch it again!

And now I'm at the close of my time here in London, i am truly sorry i will have to summarize everything here. We have squeezed so much in these last two weeks.
Let's see... Ive been to the British Museum twice now... (there's SO much to see) the most interesting things i saw being the Rosetta Stone and the corpse of a man they refer to as "Ginger"... an egyptian man buried in sand in 3400 B.C. who was almost perfectly preserved by the hot sand in the fetal position... so he still has skin, and a little bit of hair, and his teeth... ya, it's really disgusting, but incredible. Um, also visited the British National Gallery, saw Van Gough, Monet, Cezanne, Renoir, David, and Ingres... that was great! We went to the Tate Modern - weird museum, with lots of random "modern" displays... some were interesting, but most seemed to have a big fuss made over nothing... i.e. - the piece of wood, completely painted blue... one shade... nothing special... seriously couldve been dropped in a big bucket of paint and left to dry... and the plaque next to it said it's considered one of the most important pieces of 21st century art!!! HA! Ya... like i said, weird. Michelle and I went to a parade in Notting Hill... (Someone please watch that movie for me as well!) Yesterday, Liz, Des and I were able to help out at homeless shelter - i met some wonderful people there. i wish i could go back again before i leave. Ive seen Buckingham and Kensington Palace... both amazing! We went to Cambridge one day - wow... that University is beautiful!! We all went Punting there... it was hilarious! Picture a little boat, similar to a canoe in shape, w/ a platform on the back for one person to stand and Punt... it's steered much the same way a Gondola is - only it's not nearly as graceful. That day easily ranks as one of the best so far! Westminster Abby is gorgeous... i cant begin to describe what it's like inside... I took a tour of Parliament - saw the House of Commons and the House of Lords. Saw the Tower of London and Big Ben... Ive been to 3 musicals!!!! Les Miserables, The Woman in White ( new play by Andrew Lloyd Weber w/ Michael Crawford in it!) and Phantom of the Opera! Les Mis was another highlight of the trip so far - it made me cry 3 times. Beautiful story. See it if you never have!! There is so much to see here and so many details i wish i could include.... but all in all, everything has been great.

The taxis here are top of the line! Ive become a champ at the Underground (subway) and even the big, red, two-story buses are fun... walking is our primary transportation, but the above three choices are always easy to navigate.

The weather here has been wonderful - a rare thing according to the locals. Someone told us that we must have brought the sunshine with us and asked us to please never leave. Haha...
Ya, i think this is the last of our skirt wearing days, as the weather reports in the rest of the locations do not sound promising, but i'm keeping my fingers crossed.

Oh ya, and a tip if you're traveling here anytime soon... When someone asks where youre from, "California" provokes a much more positive response than "America." Trust me on this one. Even say "Canada" before you dare say "America" - ya, at least that's been my experience. ha.

Today is 9/11, so i'm sure there are many special events going on there today... we attempted to have our own little meeting this morning in honor of it. Wasnt too successful, but the families and friends of 9/11 victims and the leaders of our nation are especially in our prayers today. On a lighter note, today also marks the 54th anniversary of my grandparents! So excuse my shoutout, but it's definitely noteworthy!

Well, if i'm leaving anything out - i'll include it next time. Sorry for the scattered thoughts in this update... i just didnt want to let one more day pass without writing. As you can see, we've been busy... and i didnt even elaborate on my homework. Ya, that deserves its own blog. Not really. It doesnt deserve much. :) haha.. no, it's actually not too bad, there's just a lot of reading and mandatory trips.... but all in all worth it.

Tomorrow I'm taking the Chunnel across to Paris, staying there for the night, and then taking a day trip to Normandy on Monday. We'll have a week in Paris after that. I'm looking really forward to it, but dreading the idea of this being my last night in an English speaking country for the next 2 and a half months. Time to put highschool French to use! :) Please pray i forget to bring my wallet with me while shopping in Paris... i have a bad feeling im gonna go crazy. ha.

Alright, hope life has been wonderful back in the states. Thanks again for all your emails... Feel free to ask me any questions or lend me any good tips you might know of. :) All feedback is welcome. I hope this blog idea is working out better than the mass email lists. I know those get obnoxious and can be really impersonal. Its much easier to write personal emails in response to yours - so just in case youre experience "melody withdrawels" - Remember, 1 - you're not alone, and 2, all you have to do is email me ( Skrupples@aol.com ) :) haha..

Love you friends and family. Stay healthy and safe and in good spirits. I miss you all.

Love, love, love, Melody