Episode 20 - Friendsgiving 🦃

Lovely coffees, Amharic, and the best company in Paris :)

Nov 29, 2023

I FaceTimed my friend Sanketh recently and had quite the realization — this blog has resulted in me buying far fewer souvenirs over the last few months. Sanketh was telling me that I would appreciate having such a detailed blog 2, 5, 10, 20 years in the future, when my exchange and college years are a distant memory of the past.

I had to agree.

Yet I looked back and realized that in the process of documenting my experiences through words and pictures, there is no longer a need for physical objects or trinkets from my travels. Unless they have a useful purpose, they simply lie around and gather dust. I now fondly remember my trips and good times by reading past blogs, not by looking at objects and remembering where I got them.

It seems that this blog is helping alleviate my materialistic desires.

Why need physical things when you have pictures? Why carry around physical objects when I can read my blog, anytime and anywhere?

It seems this project has become something truly special for me. I thank you all for joining me on this great adventure. :)

Monday 11/20/2023

I made it back to my apartment from the Berlin-Hamburg adventure around 10 am. I promptly showered, unpacked for a little bit, and then fell asleep for around 6 hours.

At 3:30 pm, I calmly rose and chilled for a bit, reading a lovely book that Emma had lent me a few days before. Called A Secret History, it’s basically about a strange friend group studying Classics in the northeast that murders their friend.

What else did you expect?

I finished unpacking and cleaned up my apartment, and then proceeded with the most important task of the day: getting a new phone.

I have frequently visited the Champs-Elysees and Saint-Germaine Apple Stores but realized that I had not yet visited the Operá Apple Store.

Naturally, that is where I went to get a new phone.

I quickly vélibed over and proceeded to be absolutely wowed by Apple for the next 30 minutes. The ease at which they processed my order, put on the screen protector, and charged my credit card was amazing. The entire process was so seamless and smooth that any doubt I had about why Apple is the most valuable company in the world was erased.

I biked home carefully with my new phone and quickly set it up using the iCloud backup I had from my previous iPhone (which is still chilling in Berlin lol). The new phone backed up in about 30 minutes, and it was like I had my old phone all over again, except newer, shinier, and green.

I am so completely amazed by the Apple user experience from this phone ordeal. Wow.

Steve Jobs, well done.

Gibs and Ben came over a short while later to interview me.

Me, getting interviewed? Wow!

Gibs, with her videography prowess, is making a documentary for the end-of-semester Christmas dinner we are having on December 8th, and she is interviewing everyone in the Paree group for it! I was the second one to be interviewed after Ben, and it was quite exciting. Except for the fact that Ben kept playing meme sounds that annoyed the shit out of Gibbles and kept making me laugh.

Amazing!

Afterward, we all headed to my beloved Urban Grill to meet up with Emma and Joe for kebabs. Emma had a wonderful weekend with her Dutch friend, and Ben and his friend were successfully able to get into the Musee d’Orsay using my Sciences Po ID card. Turns out they were at Bouillon at the same time but didn’t see each other. Lovely.

Urban Grill was amazing as always, and I waited until that moment to take the first picture on my new phone!

And smile, Ben! That’s why we have teeth.

I headed back to my apartment afterward to figure out stuff with UCLA Housing. There was a small fiasco where I couldn’t log into my account because I needed 2-factor authentication with my phone, but my phone was stolen, and to add a new phone, I had to use my old phone.

A chicken and an egg problem, that is.

After all that, I am ending up back on the Hill (dorms) because the apartment plans with the guys I met a few weeks ago fell through.

To say I was disappointed would be a dramatic understatement. I was honestly so devastated because I was getting really excited about living with the guys. Oh well. Next year, I guess!

On the bright side, I get to eat the #1 campus dining food in the country for another 2 quarters. That is nothing to sneeze at, for sure.

Random note, but this OpenAI thing is insane. I can’t believe I am alive to witness it, this will be a major turning point looking back for sure in Microsoft’s world dominance.

Tuesday 11/21

I woke up early and successfully made it to my trade class. I was actually able to pay attention and understand what was happening, and it was actually quite interesting! We’re learning about exchange and interest rates and how they affect each other. It’s pretty cool stuff.

After class, I headed over to the languages building because they have the best coffee machine (in my opinion). There are actually plenty of coffee machines like it across Sciences Po, but this one never has a line so I like it the most. Plus, there are a couple great study rooms there overlooking the street and the studying vibes there are phenomenal.

I wrote my blog for Berlin, listened to some great music, drank the delicious, and ate 2 pain au chocolats. That’s a successful morning in my book!

Joe was apparently studying in an adjacent building, so I stopped by to chat and work with him for a bit as well. He was being very loud (ok we all know it was actually me that was super loud) so we left downstairs and met up with Emma. The Interrailing gang, back together!

After 15 minutes of talking, I dipped to go to the Louvre, as I had wanted to check out some paintings.

I forgot that it was Tuesday, so the Louvre was closed. I walked around the entire building looking at all the statues instead, then headed over to the Pantheon to grab a catch-up coffee with Anna Dimalovely.

And lovely, it was! Amazing coffee shop, amazing conversation, and an even more amazing stroll back across Paris from the Pantheon back to Sciences Po.

French class today went spectacularly — my questions were amazing, I was chatting in French with classmates, and I had an all-around fantastic time. We learned about idioms, and then we had to make a presentation about a classmate using the personality and physical characteristic attributes we learned that day in class.

I went the extra mile (1.6 kilometers) and decided to make a presentation about Joe, since several of the idioms applied to him. Joe is “blonde as wheat” and is “skinny as a nail”. He is also vegan, and I told everyone that he is probably skinny as a nail because he’s vegan.

That drew laughs from the entire class! They especially loved the pictures I added of him for the presentation too.

This is the last week before exams, and I am feeling quite stellarly going into them at this rate. The teacher told me my French was improving dramatically and was very happy to see the progression from the beginning of the semester.

On another note, I love my classmate Guy (from Israel). He is literally so funny and happy all the time and just an all-around legend. We’re planning on getting dinner and a pint next week! I was telling him about the Jewish Museum in Berlin and how they had an exhibit about the Hebrew language. I then proceeded to tell Guy that I thought it was the coolest thing ever that he could read and write Hebrew, since out of all the languages I had ever seen before, Hebrew is the one that seems the craziest to me (literally like scribbles).

Jordan, my classmate behind me, then proceeded to tell us about Amharic, an African language from Ethiopia. And I thought Hebrew was crazy! In comparison, Hebrew looks completely understandable to me. This is Amharic:

The fact that a human mind can distinguish between these characters is amazing.

After French class, I walked over to where Emma and Joe were still studying from earlier in the day (those writing-intensive courses are brutal). I find it funny that they measure the amount of writing they have to do in words (“I have 10,000 words to write by next week” -Verbeek), whereas I measure in days.

This blog is no joke.

I also met Lisa along the way! Lisa, Joe, and I proceeded to have an amazing conversation for the next 20 minutes where we basically shit-talked each other and laughed so hard.

We’re talking about a conversation so good that a random graduate student from Toronto interrupted us just to say how it was the best conversation she had ever heard in her entire life. She even subscribed to this blog! (I didn’t catch your name, but it was so nice to meet you!)

Unfortunately, I had to leave that conversation earlier than desired to go home, cook and eat dinner, shower, and prepare for a pint date with Sara in northern Paris.

The pint date went well, and Sara was telling me about her great trip to Dublin the previous weekend.

And I got to practice dramatically retelling my story about post-Boiler Room Berlin, which I know I will be retelling many times back in California.

Though the conversation was great and I enjoyed the date, there was not much chemistry there. It was a great conversation, but nothing more. Nevertheless, I am happy I went!

I then walked to Emma’s apartment not too far away, where she and Joe were waiting with tea and chocolates.

And let me tell you, hanging out with Joe and Emma was heavenly. I will miss you both so dearly!

Joe left around 11, then I proceeded to laugh at YouTube comedy videos on Emma’s couch until midnight, at which point I walked home and went to bed.

Emma, meanwhile, was writing her papers the entire time. Those 10,000 words won’t write themselves.

Wednesday 11/22

I woke up at 11, cleaned my apartment, and chilled for a bit before biking north to Eliana’s.

The weather today was absolutely fantastic — sunny, cloudless skies, crisp, brisk air. What a lovely autumn day. We decided to go to the park today because the weather was so nice, and Eliana’s dad was telling me about these large animals that the park has. He didn’t know the English word, so settled with describing them as “large rats”.

I was not trying to go to the park after that description, but he translated from French on his phone, and turns out it was just beavers.

I can deal with beavers.

Eliana and I proceeded to slide on the very nice slides for the next 2 hours. The park was actually quite modern and nice in comparison to the other parks I’ve seen in Paris that are old and falling apart. We played a lot of tag as well, and accidentally ran on a super muddy field.

Oof.

After the park, we drove back to the apartment, had snacktime (hooray!), and played with PlayDoh. I made a pretty cool snail and mushroom, and Eliana copied pretty much everything I made herself. She even made us rings and bracelets with PlayDoh. It was quite fun!

I will be quite sad to leave her in a few weeks, but her dad was telling me that they already found a replacement tutor for the week after I head back to Califronia. She’s from England, and I’m meeting with her next weekend to basically tell her Eliana likes paper airplanes and talks shit when playing Uno.

Eliana’s dad also invited me to dinner with their family next week to thank me for the last 2 months. And I remind you that Eliana made me a PlayDoh ring.

We might as well get married at this point.

After the tutoring session, I biked back to my apartment on the crisp evening, made my lovely dinner, then got to volleyball early because I was late the previous week. Verbeek was playing pretty well today, too, based on my limited watching of the girls’ practice. No Elisa at practice, but she did pull up later dressed nicely. Apparently she had a bank networking session and had to miss practice. I respect the grind.

During our practice, I played some of the best volleyball of my entire life. Fantastic passing and I was blocking pretty much everything. I was shit talking my heart out. Mattias did not want those blocks that I gave him, but the exhiliration I felt after every block was insane. This is good stuff.

My serves were so good that even the coach gave me a smile and nod of the head. That was probably the first time I had ever seen him smile. I got a couple of aces too and compliments from the other players.

I will miss my teammates. This is crazy that I’m leaving so soon!

I don’t typically grab pints with my teammates after practice because I have an 8 am the next morning, but decided that I should today because it was my second-to-last practice with them ever.

That was a great idea! The pint was lovely (strange pour though, see below) and I loved the company at the bar. The bar lets people write things on the wall, so I wrote my favorite Russian phrase along the lines of “wanting it to be better, but it happening like it always does”. It sounds way better in Russian, I promise. I also told everyone a happy early Thanksgiving. My favorite holiday is approaching!

After the bar, I quickly biked to the Tracedero to watch Gibbles basque! She was singing in front of the Eiffel Tower and it was so exciting! She sings so beautifully, and it was lovely hearing all the songs. :)

I helped Gibs pack up after so that no creepy dudes would approach her (there were a lot of them) and then took the metro home with her. At my apartment, I bought my plane tickets to Morocco and Twickenham (I’m so excited to go!) for the end of the semester. I cannot wait!

I also bought my plane ticket back home to California. Not too excited about that. :(

Thursday 11/23

OMG THANKSGIVING!! BEST HOLIDAY EVER!!

I woke up at 7:15 on the best holiday ever because Joe was coming over for interviews at 7:30. Joe is a legal wizard and had a bunch of law interviews today, and needed my apartment because

My apartment is a great place to take interviews. Many interviews were already taken there by me.
My apartment has lightning fast WiFi. Joe’s doesn’t have any at all.

But I have to say that when Joe came over at 7:40 am, he did not look particularly alive nor ready for law interviews.

We had a great breakfast together, talked for about 20 minutes, then I dipped for my French class that had started “15 minutes ago”.

In French, we reviewed for the final exam next week (already, where did the time go?!) and learned about how to ask for and tell time in French.

We really should’ve learned that sooner than the last class before the final, but oh well!

After class, I hit up a boulangerie, blogged for a bit, and did my International Finance homework. I then checked it against the answer key, just to find that pretty much all my work was wrong.

That is not good news, I reckon.

For the upcoming Friendsgiving dinner, I was assigned desserts with Ben, so I biked over to a patisserie to get a nice cake. I got a lovely apple cake of some sort, and the lady working there asked if I wanted the slice.

Nope! The whole thing, please!

She was quite confused, so I helpfully said, “Aujourd’hui c’est Thanksgiving!”

She smiled and understood I was American.

I walked over to my apartment with the delicate cargo and met up with Joe for a quick lunch break. I did some work there and chatted some more with Joe. He looked a lot more ready for law interviews now!

I pulled up to my international finance class an hour late (maybe that’s why the problem set went so poorly lol), then called Tatiana to catch up and get updates about why she quit her fraudulent VC. At least she got good experience!

I’m happy to report that Tatiana was pissed off on my behalf about the apartment housing situation falling through. It’s nice to be able to outsource my disappointment to her.

History class was interesting, and I once again served as the punching bag for the US. He did have to praise America a few times and was physically ill afterward.

It was hilarious.

He did get a tremendous amount of satisfaction when I walked into class with a baguette and commented that I was becoming French.

We were learning about guerilla fighters during decolinization and I asked the professor where in the world the fighters were getting their guns and heavy artillery from.

Prof: “I don’t know, Dennis, where would you go get a gun.”

Me: “I’d probably just walk down the street and buy one at the store.“

Stunned silence, then laughter from everyone in the class. The first joke I made that successfully made the entire class laugh! I am so happy and proud of myself!

Surprisngly, the corporate governance class was quite interesting as well. We learned about network effects, where basically the value of a network grows as its size does. For example, email is useless if you are the only one using it, but it is tremendously useful because billions use it today. The value of a network grows at a rate of n^2 for small n, and n log n for large n.

Once I do some private readings about networks next week, I will be all ready for the final exam on Thursday!

I left class a bit early for our volleyball game at 7 in northern Paris, and took the metro there. It spit me out right next to the modern tribunal skyscraper that houses all the Parisian courts. Nice!

I warmed up in the nice gym with my teammates and then 1-v-1ed the other team’s opposite hitter in basketball, with a volleyball. He was super good, though we both kept overshooting because the ball was so light.

I didn’t play much in the game because I’m the second string opposite hitter, but I was carrying the cheering and chanting on the bench. Paul, the starting opposite, kept blocking line instead of the diagonal and angering the coach, so I subbed in his stead.

I got some minutes after all!

And when I kept blocking line myself for some reason, I was replaced myself, back with Paul. Lol!

I bid everyone farewell and Happy Thanksgiving after the game and quickly departed back into the metro to pick up my apple cake pie thing and head over to Emma’s for Friendsgiving!! I AM SO EXCITED!

Joe met me at my apartment to grab his things, I grabbed the cake, and we biked over to Emma’s extremely carefully.

Friendsgiving was absolutely magical. The table was beautifully set up, everyone was dressed very nicely, and Anna had made her world-famous, famous-recipe guacamole. Gibs made everyone really sweet thank-you letters, and we all said our thanks around the table.

The dinner was a 3-course meal, which was very unusual for me. I’m used to one big course, where the turkey, stuffing, and all the sides are put on the table at once and we all eat together.

And then have dessert.

Here at the Friendsgiving, I was already in a food coma after all the cheese, wine, and family-recipe guac of the first course, and had to take a quick break with Ben and Gibs.