France Bits & Pieces

This blog is my France Bits & Pieces blog. I have collect random pictures and stories that didn't totally warrant a whole blog post of their own. So I'm putting them all together to create a delicious potluck blog.

If you haven't figured it out by now, France is my favorite country that I visited. Mostly because the time I spent there was with my brother and friends, and was the least stressful. The most stressful part was having to look down everywhere I went in France, because of less restrictive laws for dogs and their business.

These are in no particular order...

Here is the crypt under our grocery store, yes you read that right. There is a forgotten graveyard underneath our fresh produce and french cheese.

So to reiterate, France is old, older than the US, progress happens, and sometimes french "Wal-marts" happen on top of old graveyards.Speaking of grocery stores, I saw this tasty looking drink at another grocery store (non-crypt related store) and I just thought it was just a great combination of english words and celebrity sponsorship. Also please note disgustingly dirty shelves, and no joke, I saw a mouse dodge between the aisles one day.
This is from the day we decided to have a picnic at the park near the train station and then play in the fountain. Did I mention we were throwing a spoon around and playing catch in the fountain...yes this is how I wisely chose to spend my days in France.

This is when Birama and Eric decided to arm wrestle for who would marry Anne....weirdos.

I really wanted to introduce everyone to a "brownie" so I tried to over-cook some chocolate cake mix and cut it in squares like brownies, it seemed to go over well. My mom and dad sent me some cheesecake mix for my birthday, everyone liked both. This was all made for a going away party for a girl I'd only met once, someone's mom came and made fresh sushi.This picture is pretty much because I love pink & green and I passed these chairs everyday on my way to the library, so I took a picture.

Speaking of the library, here it is:

I'm glad I always have a camera with me so I can capture things like this hilarious parking job that forced Christelle to climb into her car via the passenger side door. I just thought this picture was hilariously romantic. We went to a lake one night when the sun was setting. It's two dudes, my brother and Ghennadi. 

Ok, I meant to take more pictures of this McDonald's but we got caught up planning the International Murder Mystery. I just love a restaurant that pretty much encourages obesity and then chose an olympic sports theme for the decor. Note: paddles for seat backs, pommel horses for bench style seating, starting blocks for swimming used as tall chairs, I believe there was also some sledding apparatus nearby.

Now while I didn't get to shoot any weddings over in Europe, I did get to spot a fair number of brides. Not sure why they all seem to be walking around outside all the time...Now while I didn't get to shoot any brides for real, I did have a volunteer for a photo shoot, my friend Jorge. Some of these pictures are on his facebook page and one of the comments translated was "...ooo the Latino Brad Pitt!"

My stab at an iPod commercial.

Remember in "The Lion, the Witch & the Wardrobe" when the kid is willing to sell out his entire family for Turkish delight? Well this is it! Christelle brought us back some from her trip to Turkey. I liked the shiny pink and silver box, and the candy was pretty yummy, not give up my brother tasty but you know maybe temporarily rent him out good.

Ok that was definitely a random post, but good, non?

International Murder Mystery

I have been waiting to write this blog for a very long time! I'm so excited. This all started when I showed our friend Tobias some pictures of the Murder Mystery party we had with my church in the US. He fell in love with the idea and we had to put it together for him.

Eric and I did some internet sleuthing and came up with an idea for what our Murder Mystery should be about. We decided on a "reading of the will". Most Murder Mysteries are hosted by purchasing a kit that has all the clues and story line written out for you. We had 3 problems with purchasing one: We are cheap, No one ships to France and Our party needed to be BILINGUAL. Many of our friends only spoke french. So Eric decided to write the script himself. I tried to help, at a certain point, Eric didn't want me to know who the murderer was, and he had to be the one to write it in french and english. 

Since all of our friends come from different countries, we wanted to find a way for people to dress up in traditional clothes from their countries or to dress in character. So we wrote the script like we were all one big international family that was spread across the world. I think the break down was something like this:

Eric was the American

I was Austrian (we already had a German & an American in the group)

Robin is from Germany.

Jorge is from Columbia.

Tobias is from Spain.

Ghennadi is from Russia.

William is from Scotland.

David is from France.

Coraline is from France, so Eric decided she would come from Japan. (???)

And there were a few other people invited that I didn't know as well. 

This was my "character" Beatrice CaschMoné. 

Since I couldn't do any script writing, I did what I could. I made fake euros for the participants to use when bribing each other for information...

I turned Eric into an old man using "www.yearbookyourself.com" We used the picture to create a memorial for poor murdered "Artiche Q. CaschMoné". Tobias and I found one candle and the saddest flower we could find in Limoges.

And Tobias and I prepared the food for the party. After everything was finished, I took a look around at the food and I was like "When did I start throwing parties that included red wine, baguette, paté, and french cheese? I guess I'm in France now." Tobias and I were a little nervous about our selections, being that neither one of us is actually french. We were afraid the true french would snub our selections. But it went over really well. 

Allow me now to introduce you to a few of our characters and explain the various costumes:

Let's see, this is Coraline on the left and me on the right. She was the 1st wife and I am the 2nd wife. Eric wrote into her script that she should hate me and I should keep trying to apologize to her and tell her I didn't know he was married when I married him. Nice, thanks. Coraline got a special award for how "in character" she was during the game.

William was our undercover detective. 

We tried to make him a kilt from a blanket but that picture is just too embarrassing to post.

There really weren't that many pictures of me taken until the very end because I'm usually the one taking them, but Eric got the following series of me without me noticing. I love them because the guy in the black shirt is Ghennadi (pronounced like Kennedy with a G at the beginning) and he's the murderer, Eric named him "Bob Builder". Ghennadi is Russian, speaks french, and knows just enough english to confuse me. I was trying to decide if the murderer was Robin or Ghennadi. Watch as Ghennadi talks me out of my decision, notice I start out pointing at the correct murderer. 

Now Ghennadi is talking me out of it, and I'm thinking... 

Robin's hoping I don't accuse him.

Now I'm officially confused, and Ghennadi changed my vote from him to Robin. Actually I still wanted to vote for Ghennadi as the murderer, but Eric talked me out of it when I was voting because he said 3 people guessing the murderer correctly was too many. 

Allow me to introduce you to our winners! Robin & Jorge!

Eric really enjoyed revealing who the murderer was.

And our murderer is... Ghennadi! I think he loved being the murderer, non?

I just want to thank everyone for participating, speaking english with me and for making it such a great and memorable event!

I have a few more pictures to post for my friends. Most wanted to have their picture taken with the German dress, and me of course! (Please email me if you want your own copy.)

Quick Picture Vote

Hey everyone, 

I'm interrupting the European adventures for a quick vote. Which picture should I use to update the "Meet Laura" page on my photography website? I usually disable comments because of spam, but I will enable them to allow people to make suggestions for other pictures of me.

Thanks for your help!

Current picture:

Greek blue door?

My Christian music CD album cover?

The one where I'm actually holding a camera?

Thanks so much! I will be updating the website slowly but surely over the next few weeks so keep a look out for changes. By the way voting is on the right side of the screen, you may have to use the little scroll bar to vote for your choice.

www.GallerybyLaura.com