C'est Parti

Last Saturday night Cecile and I went and saw Xavier Rudd (Australian - but no relation to Kevin I'm guessing) at Elysee Montmatre with two of Cecile's friends, Dorothy and Gregoire. As you can see Xavier was the sole person on stage. He played drums, guitars, didgeridoo, harmonica, all at the same time. It was pretty darn impressive! It was interesting to see a Parisian audience at work. They are much more encouraging than Australian audiences. They have a "I've come to have fun so let's party" attitude rather than the australian "look mate we could all do that so don't expect me to clap or anything". Xavier would drop the word Paris into one of his songs and everyone went berserk. It was classic. (By contrast, I remember a Dave Matthews band concert I was at in Sydney where the bass guitarist impro'd his way into the Australian national anthem and everybody went silent and sort of looked at each other awkwardly.) It was also interesting hearing Xavier trying to explain the significance of the particular didgeridoo he was playing to about 2000 Parisians... All in all it was a great night though with a lot of foot stamping, yelping and much peace and love.

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I took this photo one morning before going off to French classes from our bathroom window... Also, just wanted to mention that I've changed the settings on this blog so that you don't have to be a member to leave a comment (i always find that sort of thing annoying) so feel free to go ahead and say g'day.

ps: don't dispair, i have a lot more interesting stories to come than "this is the view from my bathroom"... but for some reason the blog is having problems so will post more later...

First Week in Paris - 21 October

This is just a quick note to let you know I've arrived. As you can see it's still sunny here in Paris. Fortunately however, photos don't show temperature, because although it looks (left) like a barmy Australian summer's afternoon, an afternoon on which you might expect to hear Jim Maxwell describe the shadows lengthening across the MCG as Terry Alderman runs in to complete the final over of the day, gently swinging it away from Graham Gooch, who watches the ball thump into the Ian Healy's gloves before walking off towards the member pavilion, it is in fact about 10 degrees.

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The photo on the right is my street. The person standing next to the three red cars is Cecile (possibly not the best portrait ever, still working on my depth and shade). Anyway, if you go directly up from her to the very top of the building, that is our apartment. Below is the start of the stair case up to the 6th floor which I have to climb and descend everyday, then a view from the bottom up the staircase from the outside(once again, you can see Cecile in the first window, think I've got the shade part down pat but still working on that depth from camera), and lastly the view from our window (if you stick your head out and look right). The beacon like object is the Eiffel tower.

Anyways, going to see Xavier Rudd (Australian?) tonight in Montmatre... so will update you all on how that goes soon. Looking forward to it. Until next week.

James

Welcome - Plans for this blog (it's not rocket surgery!)

Hello and welcome to my blog. My life for the next year is roughly something like this:

• I arrive in Paris the 16th October, start language classes at Alliance Francaise until Christmas.
  
• Spend Christmas holidays with Cecile's family, maybe even sneak in some skiing in the alps (yeah I know - très cool)
• Head off to The Hague in Holland to start an internship at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia on the 8th of January.
  
• Return the Paris the start of April.

I plan to post a couple of photos once a week to give you a snap shot of my life. So the best thing to do is, if you're keen, just check this site once a week when you have a spare moment and you can keep up to date with what's happening in my life.

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You can leave comments telling me what you think, or just generally what's going on in your life, or what you've been thinking about recently. Or, alternatively, send me an email at japender82@hotmail.com

Cheers, and remember, keep smiling, there's undoubtedly someone worse off than you.

James