Today was a busy day as we completed two exciting activities. We started our journey visiting one of the principal markets of Paris, “Rungis International Market,” located at 1 Rue de la Tour, 94150 Rungis. The market is the second largest wholesale food market in the world, and we learned a lot about their products. We separated into two groups to avoid any accidents as people were working and transporting their products in large quantity via small cars. Philipe was our tour guide, and he was great at describing every area of the market. Rungis Market is important for Parisians because they value spending money on food and recipes and enjoy cooking. The market opened 54 years ago in 1969. It imports products from different parts of the world like seafood from Greece, vegetables and fruits from Brazil, Peru, and Colombia, and meats from Uruguay, Argentina, and Japan. Twenty five different companies exist within the marketplace. To place an order, a customer must talk to the owner and negotiate. An interesting fact we learned from the tour that some chickens alive for 120 before going to the market other chickens deemed red label chickens are alive for at least 75 days before going to the market in boxes. Also, during Covid, there were some restaurants inside the market that remained open and were considered essential, unlike other restaurants in the area. Something I noticed on the tour was that there weren’t many females working in the area. Overall I had a great experience and found it interesting to see how Parisian restaurants get their fresh products. After the tour, we returned to the hotel to rest before continuing our journey to visit the Hotel Paris Bastille Boutet-MGallery. The hotel was located at 22 24 Rue Faidherbe in the heart of the authentic Bastille district and near Marais, a new 5-star hotel. The Hotel Paris Bastille Boutet-MGallery lies within a historical building, the Maison Boutet. From wood manufacturing to a chocolaterie, it has all of its original charm. The hotel is exclusive and one-of-a-kind with 80 rooms and suites and 10 terraces showcasing its unique character. Its spa has two treatment rooms, a swimming pool, sauna, and a fitness room. The bar offers light meals and chocolate treats.

Today we visit Aligre Market in district 12. It was a hot summer day. We enjoyed market with the fresh fruits and and vegetable. Learned about the cheese and bread culture of France.

On this bright and sunny day, the school provided for a us a shuttle bus to Champagne and visited to two sites, Champagne Mercier and Champagne Geoffroy. Overall, we enjoyed this new experience. It is very different reading it and watching videos then for you to be there your self.

Our day began at 11:00 AM , we all headed to the lobby to meet Professor Abreu and Professor Zinder to begin our day for 3 hour walking tour led by Professor Zinder.

Just like that our walking tour was over. Once we were dismissed some of us went back to the hotel and the rest of us went to grab a food.We went to this restaurant called “Dinand par Fardi “located in the 8th arrondissement . The food was amazing and we decided that we would definitely be coming back again next time before our trip ends.

We then started heading to the Galaries Lafayette in hopes of going up to the rooftop to enjoy the view of the city,unfortunately it was a fail because we couldn’t find where the rooftop was.

We then made the decision to continue our adventure by heading to the The Seine River .

We bought tickets to the Seine River Cruise purchase of 15 euros which was incredibly worthwhile until it started raining.

Just like that our second day in Paris came to an end .Overall todays tour was great and we had the opportunity to visit many places.What a better way to start our adventure for the remaining days.

Today, June 7th, was our last day of Immersion class with Prof Duchamp! 

We practiced lots of french phrases, watched videos on pick-pockets, and role played ordering in a restaurant. 

We had lots of fun practicing this new language and getting used to French culture! Looking forward to this experience!!

See you all in Paris on Saturday!

A plus!!

Today we had the pleasure of meeting Professor Duchamp. As a French native and New York native, we learned about the good and not so good things about Paris from his perspective and experience. We learned how to say a few basic French phrases while getting to know each other better with the fun of throwing fish across the room. Professor Duchamp taught us how to navigate the Metro and RER map for Paris and it was pretty simple for us native New Yorkers. We were also introduced to basic items used in everyday life in France that were very new to us.

A few days left until we are living the life in Paris! See you all tomorrow at our last immersion class before we take off!

-Elaine

Today, June 5th, was our third day of Immersion class! We discussed some of the rules/regulations, mentioned some helpful tips for reflecting, and got into groups to do some research on the places we will be visiting while in Paris. The groups got together to make a list of ten interesting facts on each of the locations to share with the rest of the class. This got us very excited and pumped to see these places in person in the next few weeks!

Looking forward to our language immersion classes à demain!!  

See you all tomorrow at 9:30am!