Haley Meets Europe: Opera Garnier

First off, I'm sorry it has been so long since my last post. I got sick last Monday, and I stayed sick for awhile so I didn't really do anything except sleep and stay in my room. I will admit I got a little homesick then - if I was just going to sit in my room why couldn't I sit in my real room with all my stuff?! But now that I'm feeling better and out and about I like Paris again. The awesome weather lately doesn't hurt a bit too. :)

So last night (Tuesday, March 13th) the Central College Abroad group went to a ballet in the Opera Garnier! This is the really fancy one, and apparently this is the opera house that the guy who wrote the Phantom of the Opera based his opera house off of. There's even a lake under the Opera Garnier! The song "The Phantom of the Opera" kept playing in my head every time I looked up at the amazing chandelier in the theater.

Honestly, I don't even know the names of the ballets we saw. One thing I found out about France is that they don't give out programs for free at events; you have to pay extra for them. So naturally, I don't buy them and then I have no idea what's going on. But at intermission I was wandering around a bit and saw a flier on the wall for the event and at least got the names. So the first ballet was called something along the lines of "Couples Dancing at a Party" in french and after intermission, there was a different ballet called "Appartment." The second one was really modern and kind of artsy, while the first one was much more your typical ballet. It actually reminded me a little bit of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" because the couples were switching their partners all the time. This first one was my favorite. The second started out a little too modern for me (flailing is not dancing), but then it grew on me as time went on. It helped that the music was really cool.