Oh, the temptation to turn in three pages of Baroque Cycle fanfiction.

[tenlittlebullets]

Seriously annoyed with the professor of our Ancien Régime course, who keeps assigning three-page single-spaced essays due on Mondays. Dude, it's an orientation course, the whole orientation is only worth two credits and your course is only a quarter of it. I want to be out exploring the city my first few weekends in Paris, not writing essays entitled "Louis XIV and the Transformation of the Monarchy" for a half-credit orientation class. And yes, I know assigning essays over the weekend is exactly the kind of stunt that professors at French universities are apt to pull, which is why I want a few weekends free of that bullshit while I get my feet on the ground.

On the other hand, the words "half-credit orientation class" do rather put things in perspective. That perspective being "fuck this, I'm gonna commandeer a table in a pretty little café in Montmartre, bring my laptop, and half-ass the essay while sucking down delicious espresso and watching the passerby."

Went to a HUGE GODDAMN FIREWORKS SHOW in Versailles last night. It was both really cool and really weird. Really cool because it was an outdoor amphitheatre in the gardens, surrounding an immense fountain, and it wasn't just fireworks--it was a giant spectacle with music and lights and jets of water and fireworks and... interpretive dance. That was the weird part. The theme was Cyrano de Bergerac IN SPACE, and since it was too dark to see anyone down below all the performers were wearing what looked like suits made of Christmas lights. They spent a lot of the show dangling from wires doing midair acrobatics, which was neat because you couldn't see the wires and they looked like they were floating in space, but... there was a lot of WTF. A LOT of WTF. But there were also huge fireworks displays and fireballs so huge I could feel the heat on my face in the back row of the amphitheatre, and it was generally awesome.

Next week I have an oral presentation on places in Paris related to Les Misérables, which I picked because hey I already have the research done! But it reminds me that I am failing in my duties towards the fandom. Aside from figuring out my own personal trips to London and Lausanne this month, I need to get the Barricade Day 2010 website up and ask the Théâtre du Châtelet about group rates. Their website says it's possible for groups of 10+ people, there's a 10-20% reduction in ticket price, and it has to be reserved and paid at least a month before the show. I'll try to stop by the theatre this weekend and ask about availability for June 5 and 6.

Comments

[mmejavert.livejournal.com]

Oh wow, 10+ people is way better than US theatres; most of them require 15-20+. That's pretty awesome. :D It should be way easier for us to get 10+ people for a group than 20+, that's for sure. Especially since there are at least two dozen people who are expressing solid interest in being there.

[brittlesmile.livejournal.com]

The theme was Cyrano de Bergerac IN SPACE

I lol'd.

[smartamy15.livejournal.com]

Cyrano de Bergerac IN SPACE OH DEAR LORD, WHAT WILL THE FRENCH THINK OF NEXT?!

The Palace of Versailles is awesome and horrible at the same time. I went and thought, "Well, now I know why they had a revolution." Dear God, monarchs have no sense of architecture. ANyway, I'm guessing the performance was in the city, not at the palace. :P

Lastly, I wish I could go to barricade day. It makes me sad everytime you post on it.

[10littlebullets.livejournal.com]

One of our teachers explained that Cyrano de Bergerac was a real person who wrote some of the earliest works of science fiction. So it's slightly less WTF-y.

You know what's even worse? The Opéra Garnier. I mean, Versailles is a splendid exercise in wretched excess, but at least it has a particular style. The Opéra, aside from being giant pastiche of everything Garnier thought was pretty, gives the impression that he looked at Versailles and went "You know what would make this even better? MORE GOLD LEAF."

[smartamy15.livejournal.com]

Hmm, that's interesting about Cyrano! I never would've known or even guessed.

And oh dear lord, the Garnier. lolz.

[nowgoesquickly.livejournal.com]

I'm glad that you're enjoying yourself, but I'm also terribly jealous that you're off having a glorious romp around Paris while I am stuck here in Buttfuck, Washington. Alas.

Also—Cyrano de Bergerac in space?

[10littlebullets.livejournal.com]

Okay, Cyrano de Bergerac in space makes slightly more sense now that one of our teachers has explained that Cyrano de Bergerac was a real person, he didn't have much to do with the Edmond Rostand play, and he wrote 17th century science fiction. It was still really weird though.

[nowgoesquickly.livejournal.com]

Ah. Yes, that is a little less bizarre than it first sounded.