Pardon My French

Houston weather often “forgets” that there are seasons, especially when it comes to fall and winter, so the recent chilly days over here have been true breaths of fresh air. It actually feels like fall today. It’s definitely putting me in a Paris state of mind (I’m always partly in a Paris state of mind, though) because coupled with the amazing, breezy, fall weather, I’ve been getting into Garance Doré’s fairly recent “Pardon my French” videos about her time at Paris’ Fashion Week this fall (fall in Paris is what I wish on Houston everyday..). Her site is a treat: a visual diary of her weekend inspirations, things she likes at the moment, interviews she conducts with fashion greats.

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Eighteen Was Simply a Teaser

I’ve come to understand just how young we are when in college, and how the ranges of maturity definitely vary amongst the people here. When I came to Rice at 16, I don’t think I’d ever heard so many people tout their ages: “Oh yeah, I’m 18, almost 19..”, “I’m finally 20…” The college set (perhaps the later high-school set too) seems to always be the first to talk about their ages, chucking out their late-teens/early-20s age with pride, as often as possible. Continue reading

Metamorphosis

I decided to change a few things about my blog’s direction, mainly because I don’t want to make a new one, but also because nostalgia from Paris is forthcoming, yet I’d really like to still write about current thoughts on my mind that may not have to do with France or Paris, but simply with life in general.

Stay with me, please! Hopefully the new changes will happen in a couple weeks, probably just with appearance, and more frequent posts.

L’Avenir

L’avenir: it’s one of the French words that means “in the future,” not as in the future tense of a verb, but rather in terms of past, present, and the future. It doesn’t necessarily describe a specific amount of time in the future, or exactly when it will be, but it describes the future in a way that seems far removed from where one resides figuratively at the present moment. L’avenir represents a time in days or years yet to come, when one will be in a certain place, doing a certain thing. “I will be in medical school, à l’avenir. I will hopefully work in international medicine, à l’avenir.” It’s a state of mind, a state of being in your life that so quickly comes and goes, just as easily as the present turns into the past, like a passing breath in cold, winter air. That’s the sort of sense that this word evokes for me, at least whenever I use it. I used it a lot while in Paris, and it means so much now more than ever, as I look forward to future plans and life beyond Rice.  Continue reading

TRE v. RER

This summer, I take the TRE train into Dallas every morning to work in my research lab. The first thing I remembered as I stepped onto that train the morning I began my summer commute was its similarity to Paris’ RER. The way that I could take in the Dallas skyline as the train slowly pulled away from the station brought back memories of staring at the saturated yellow-green wistfulness of the French countryside as my friends and I went into Zone 1, 2, 3, 4… until we were in the 5th zone for a beautiful night at Disneyland Paris.  Continue reading