Yesterday afternoon Dad went home but we managed to squeeze in lunch with my godfather Bernard who happened to be in Paris at the same time as Dad was! It was funny all being together in Paris because Bernard and Dad lived together in Paris when they were starting their own business (I think?) so it was like being back where everything had started. Bernard lives in Alabama, USA now so it was really nice to see him because we don't get to that often.

We walked through the Jardins du Luxembourg and I really should have taken some pictures because it was absolutely beautiful but I didn't so I'll have to go back and do that. We went for lunch in a brasserie and I had my first Parisian hotdog (which I also didn't photograph) and which was amazing. I swear I put on 3 stone in the 3 days that Dad was in Paris! 

Here is a photo of us three musketeers:

You have to laugh because both Dad and Bernard have on what they have called the "50 year old man uniform", e.g. jeans, dark v-neck jumpers and white shirts. If you're male and 50 and you're not wearing that then what are you doing?? It is Paris Fashion Week after all. 
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When I first moved into my apartment the lady I am renting it off recommended a local french restaurant just around the corner from where I live and so Dad and I decided to try it for dinner on Monday night. Being a Monday we were a little worried that we might be the only people in there but we were so wrong! It was packed full of what seemed like locals enjoy good home-cooked french food. 

The restaurant has a menu in which you choose a starter, main course and desert for €24.90. Dad chose the pâté for his starter and they literally bought the whole block of pâté for him to help himself, it was pretty impressive, and it was delicious. I didn't think I really liked pâté but I think now I do. The photo isn't great and doesn't do it justice but you get the idea. I had the saucisson du montagne and it was also delicious. 

For main course Dad has the lapin à la moutarde and I chose the côte de veau (see below). Mine was seriously good. I have tried to make a creamy mushroom sauce before and it tasted nothing like this. It was just really tasty, very french, cooking and I couldn't fault it. The tiramisu I had for desert was delicious as well and I was already completely stuffed by that point! I will definitely be taking Mum there when she comes as she would love it. By the end of the year I might even be considered a regular. 

On Monday morning I have a lecture at 8am which is never fun so I left Dad in bed and went off to my lecture. He came and met me after and I gave him a quick tour of uni so he could see where I am spending my days. Dad then suggested we head over to La Défense to see some new Paris for a change and he also wanted to see whether it seemed to be 'buzzing' in a business sense. It was another absolutely beautiful day weather-wise and so the views from the Arch straight down to the Arc de Triomphe were amazing. It was also nice to see some modern architecture for a change. I instagrammed a picture of it and then had my sister ask me how I had suddenly ended up in America! Paris and its old Hausmannien architecture is beautiful but it made a nice change to see the sun reflecting off of the huge glass buildings and to see big open spaces instead of narrow traffic-filled streets. 

We also discovered a Chipotle for lunch, so that is another reason to love La Défense. 

,On Sunday, Paris had it's first "Journée sans voitures" which means day without cars. This didn't apply to the entire city, but certain areas where restricted to only taxis and buses and some areas vehicles were banned entirely. Dad and I decided to start the day in the east of Paris and then cycle all the way along the Seine to the Eiffel Tower, making the most of the limited number of cars on the roads. 

We began down towards Quai de la Gare and the national library which is hyper cool, stark modern building which features this huge urban forest right in the middle of it. It felt very futuristic, especially on such a bright clear day. (The weather, by the way, has been absolutely amazing these past few days!)

From here we cycled along the edge of the Seine all the way to Saint Germain where we stopped for a spot of lunch in famous Les Deux Magots. I walk  past this everyday on the way to/from uni and I can see everyone enjoying these amazing lunches so it was really nice that I finally got to try it with Dad. It might be just about the most expensive brasserie ever (an Orangina for example is €6.50) but it was delicious and you pay for the name, the street-side sunshine spot, the traditional french service. 

 Following a delicious lunch we got back on our Velibs and headed towards the Champs- Élysées. This was completely closed off to any vehicles and I have never ever seen anything like it. The whole of Paris seemed to have descended on the Champs-Élysées on bike, foot, skateboard, rollerblades.. it was amazing! I really think they should do this more often because it became so much more than just a long street with cars and people could really enjoy and appreciate it. I tried to take some photos of the scale of people there but it doesn't come across. This BBC news article has some video footage which gives you an idea of what it was like: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-34374125

So if there was a vote for this day to happen every week then I would definitely be voting yes. It's so nice to be on the roads and cycling without having to worry about angry french drivers beeping at you and wanting to run you over every 5 minutes!
Below is a photo of me being french and on a bike. All in all a really great way to spend a perfectly sunny Sunday! 

On Saturday Dad arrived in Paris, my first visitor! On saturday night it was the England VS Wales rugby world cup game, which is a huge game and so we decided to go and watch it in a pub called The Frog and Ros Bif, which was born in Paris about the same time as I was! They brew their own beer and serve amazing burgers (see below).

​There was an incredible atmosphere in the pub with a real mix of English fans, Welsh fans, and french people supporting Wales. The game was ridiculously tense and England looked set to win for pretty much the entire game until the nail-biting final 10 minutes in which Wales managed to take and then sustain a lead. I've got Wales in our family world cup sweepstakes and a boyfriend who is their biggest fan so England's loss didn't really bother me that much. I really enjoyed the game though and the atmosphere, food and beers in the Frog and Ros Bif are great so I would definitely recommend it if you're in Paris and want to watch a sports match. They even bring the beers to your table, you don't even have to go to the bar to order another one! 

I'm sorry I've been a little slow in updating this past week but I seem to have been really busy and haven't found the time. I am in the midst of beginning my search for an Internship and writing cover letters (good ones!) in French takes up a lot of time. Also Dad has been here this weekend and so we were doing of lots of fun things that kept me pretty busy. 

I recently attended a really interesting Paris Startup Job Fair. There were loads of great startups there from some much larger ones e.g. Uber, to smaller ones that I hadn't heard of before hand. 

I spoke to some really interesting companies and am pursuing internship opportunities further with some of these. On Friday I had a meeting with Lefty, a company who have created a search engine for user generated content on Instagram allowing businesses to utilise this content. They seem like a really great team and a super interesting company so a really intriguing opportunity. 

It was great to see so many different startups in one place and to see so many people there interested in working for these startups! I wanted to give out business cards so that people would visit my website but I didn't have time to get any proper ones printed so I decided to improvise and make my own using playing cards! They were actually really successful and I had loads of comments and compliments on the unique idea.

So we're now nearing the end of my 3rd week of uni. It's crazy how fast it seems to be going, and how busy things have got very quickly. I wanted to update you on some of my latest news, on some of my lessons, and my weekend plans. 

Pompoms Sciences Po
I had no idea that cheer existed in Paris or that Sciences Po would have a cheer team and I didn't know what other sport I would be able to do but I wanted to be able to meet people and stay fit, so imagine my excitement on discovering that there is a cheer team! I immediately sent an over-enthusiastic email with an embarrassing selfie of me from a competition last year and then did the tryouts on Friday and I made the team! I'm super excited to carry on with cheer and everyone seems so nice I'm also excited to practise my french. There is a canadian girl on our team who is a proper cheer professional and she coaches teams for Worlds. I can't remember the name of the team she cheers for but this in an example of the kind of standard she coaches/competes at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKJExDfS3_U  She is going to teach us how to stunt so hopefully by Christmas I will be at this standard too (lol). Cheer trains twice a week and some Sundays which is a lot more than at Warwick but I think it will be fun. I won't be able to the main competitions which are next term but i'm still excited to be a part of cheer and to get to wear one of these uniforms (not around campus though, this isn't an American teen movie).

l'Ivresse 
This is the Sciences Po fashion society and another reason for me to get excited. I'm going to be involved in the creative production of promotional material for their events, etc. I also want to make them a killer video and some flyers to hand out in order to get the society some great exposure and get more people interested in what we do. They've got some great ideas for coming up as well, we're hoping to have Alber Elbaz of Lanvin come and do a speech (which would be incredible) and apparently they can get some fashion week seats too which is even more exciting! There should be some good opportunities for networking and speaking to some people about internship opportunities so this is also great news. 

Classes
My lectures are going ok. I'm definitely getting more used to hearing the french and its getting a bit easier to make notes in lectures (if I focus really hard) but I haven't done a lot of speaking yet. We're not put on the spot and asked to give opinions/answers really which is kind of good because that would be scary but at the same time it makes it very easy to sit there listening and letting others speak, especially in a bigger, more intimidating class.

I've got my first presentation for Management d'Entreprise on Monday which is with a group and so I think should be fine. It's also a kind of factual presentation on Volkswagen so I'm less nervous about that but on Wednesday I have my first individual exposé for Innovation Numérique and that I am nervous about. Although it's on the idea of "design thinking" and I chose the topic because it was one I did a module in last year and find really interesting. I really want to do a good exposé though and I even got some books out of the library for it today which I have never done at Warwick!! 

I watched a TED talk , by Tim Brown who is founder of IDEO, the design and innovation consulting agency. about the importance of design and the history of where this notion of design thinking came from which relates to my exposé. It's interesting how when we think of design we automatically think about aesthetics, style, but there is so much more to it and its more about creatively and innovatively responding to needs/pains of customers. He also wrote one of the books that I have got out of the library. 

Anyway, this week I had to write another summary for my Espace Mondiale conférence and again it wasn't selected to be marked (Grrrr!). I seem to be pretty busy with work on the whole though. There is this article to read every week, group presentations, exposés, revue de presses, on-going business project work (although we have not got very far beyond just ideas in both my modules that I have do this for). I have something due in or some presentation to do in all the weeks coming up. I also have Dad coming next weekend and then Tom coming the weekend after so i'm trying to get as much done in these weeks so that I can have the weekends free to explore Paris. 

Weekend plans
This weekend I'm heading to a Paris startup jobs fair which should be interesting and there are some great companies there and some really interesting ones who I'm looking forward to talking to about internship opportunities. This was one of the reasons for moving my blog here to my website. I wanted potential employers or contacts to be able to view my blog, CV, creative work, info about me, all in the same place. I really want to get some little business cards printed with a QR code to my website (e.g. below right) but I don't have time to get this done before Saturday.  

Also this weekend is "les journées des patrimoines" which means that lots of buildings are open for free which are either normally paid for or sometimes not even normally open to the public. I am planning to go to the Fondation Louis Vuitton which is over in the west of Paris and also probably one of the huge buildings like l'Assemblée Nationale or Invalides. So i'm definitely going to make the most of the weekend and see as much as possible. 

Oh, and I have my 9 am Sunday running class. 

So its New York Fashion Week and Kanye West decided "at the last" minute to show his latest 'Yeezy' collection, this time not in collaboration with Adidas. I like Kanye's music, some of it, for partying to, but I am hardly a die-hard Yeezus fan and to be honest his forays in to fashion just wind me up. Yes he knows enough people to put together a hugely star-studded front row - but the clothes just don't say anything interesting to me. 

Behold his collection (below). This to me looks like a collection of baggy sweatshirts and leggings in a horrible shade of camel that when worn that tightly flatters no one, especially not his huge pregnant wife Kimmy K, who I personally think looks awful in this get up. She looks like she has her thermals on ready to go skiing but hasn't yet put on her ski trousers or jacket!

I think what is frustrating is knowing that there is so much good, fresh, young design talent out there who are creating far more interesting, visually exciting and intellectual collections but they just don't have the opportunity for this kind of exposure that they truly deserve. Whereas Kanye is a rapper with more money than sense to know what to do with it. A few weeks ago he was running for president and now he wants to be in charge of fashion - I think he should just stick to what he knows and is good at and leave the fashion to those who know about that. 

Apparently his models had to sign $10million non-disclosure agreements so that no one would know about the show... When did fashion stop being about actual fashion and become huge PR stunts trying to gain the most press possible and the actual clothes not even mattering??  This collection doesn't evoke any kind of cultural or creative response,  it looks like unwashed gym clothing or loungewear that I just no one can really be impressed by or excited about. I dread to think the extortionate prices he's going to be asking for it and the show was apparently 45 minutes late starting too, which to be honest is just unprofessional! I really wish there was more opportunities for exciting design talent to showcase their work, to show what fashion is really about, and that fashion shows weren't just about who's sitting on the front row but actually about the collections and the inspirations and meanings behind them. 

Here are a few pieces from the Central St Martin's degree show this year:

While I understand these are not necessarily the most wearable pieces (but to be honest I wouldn't wear any of Kanye's collection even if I could afford it), they have something to say. I see Japanese influences in the far right, art influences in the far left, the second from right to me looks like some kind of juxtaposition between the growth and life of the coloured flowers and then also the deconstruction of the fabric which perhaps reflects the idea that beauty is finite, the flowers decay? I don't know these are just my random thoughts but this to me is so much more interesting than any collection Kanye has ever turned out. However no one will know the names of these designers (yet) and there certainly wouldn't have been an a-list front row at their degree show. This has to change, and if I am ever head of the British Fashion Council then I am going to sort it out. 

Ok, rant over. 

Last night I watched the film Midnight in Paris, an american film about a writer in Paris who every night goes back in time to the 1920s. He is in love with Paris and it's beauty and even more so Paris in the rain. I don't think Paris is that much more beautiful in the rain, at least not when it rains in the day. Everything loses its colour, all the buildings become grey, the Eiffel Tower disappears behind the clouds and you just get soaked. I got caught in the rain on Saturday (after my walk along the Seine) and I had to take refuge in a McDonalds.  Maybe at night with all the lights reflecting in the wet streets it could be picturesque?

I do love how the bright colours of umbrellas stand out against the grey rain though. Although I would still rather it was sunny. I think everything is better when its sunny. 

When it rains in Paris it seems to rain all day. Showers don't exist here. But when it eventually does stop raining you get this beautiful golden light coming through the clouds and then suddenly everything has it's magic glow back. 

Also, how amazing are these gates? I wish I could cover the door to my apartment building in gold. This looks like Versailles. I want to live wherever this. (I think it's probably some kind of government building so not really any option)

On Saturday it rained basically all day. I spent the day inside working on a group presentation that I have next week whilst outside it just poured. By about 16.30 I was bored of work and the rain had pretty much stopped so I decided to head to the Seine and do some exploring. I had wanted to see the new Hermes exhibition pop-up "Dans l'oeil de flaneûr", but it turns out it's in the middle of being built and doesn't open until the 17th, oops! 

There seems to be a lot going on along the left bank of the Seine between Invalides and the Musée d'Orsay though. There are temporary structures and lots of random things painted onto the pavements, and tipis, etc. I'm not really sure I understand what it's all for but it's very modern and urban VS the back drop of Paris. 

I have actually signed myself up for a free beginner's running class with a friend next Sunday at 9am. Not sure how great an idea i'll think it is when my alarm goes off but I did say I wanted to start running and maybe if someone is running a session I will be more motivated! I'll let you know.