Julien's version of Madonna's "Like A Virgin"...
(The first 45 seconds is set up)
Amazing!!!
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Julien doing Britney Spears
Here is Julien's (this year's winner of French Idol) version of Britney Spears' "Hit Me Baby, One More Time"...
My friend Aurelien turned me onto Julien this past weekend when I was in Paris.
My friend Aurelien turned me onto Julien this past weekend when I was in Paris.
Monday, June 25, 2007
Vive la France
I'm nearing the half-way point of my time here in London. The summer is really flying by!
I had another insightful and exciting internship experience last week. I was invited to witness the director and another higher-up from my office testify before the House of Lords. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the British Parliament, the House of Lords is the upper house. Members are appointed by the ruling party and their powers are quite limited. Apparently they can amend and temporarily stall bills. They also take their oversight duties quite seriously. After the two from my office testified I watched as David Miliband (Parliamentary Minister and Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs-- and one time rival to Gordon Brown for the Prime Ministership) testified. He was quite impressive. The only person who I've ever seen in person with more charisma is Bill Clinton.
On Friday evening I hopped on the Eurostar train to visit friends in Paris for the weekend.
Just over 3 hours from London to Paris.
Before you read on....please, please, please visit this link: http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/julien%2Bnouvelle%20star/video/x2azde_julien-like-a-virgin-prime-1
It's a clip of Julien, this year's winner of French Idol (they call it "Nouvelle Star"), doing a completely new take on Madonna's "Like a Virgin". This is MUCH more entertaining than anything I've seen on American Idol.
And if you liked that check out Julien's version of Britney Spears' "Hit Me Baby One More Time": http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/julien%2Bnouvelle%20star/video/x2b0k8_julien-baby-one-more-time-britney-s
The view from Oliver and Aurelien's 6th floor apartment.
On Saturday my friend Oliver and I made a trip out to the city of Reims in the heart of the Champagne region.
Passing Disneyland Paris on the way to Reims.
We toured the city of Reims for about an hour focusing mainly on the city's cathedral.
The "Chagall windows" designed by, you guessed it, Marc Chagall.
After the Cathedral, shopping, and a quick crepe we drove to one of the chamapgne "caves". The producers of champagne store the bottles underground for long periods of time before sending them to market.
Supposedly there are 18 million bottles of Champagne maturing down in these caves.
Our tour guide explaining that it takes 9 man days to stack all the bottles of wine behind her. She said much more, but I have no idea what because the whole tour was in French. Oliver translated about 10% of what she said at each stop.
My reward for listening to a French tour for an hour in a freezing cave.
Cheers!
On Saturday evening we went out for a traditional French meal with three of their friends. On Sunday, after brunch at home with some more friends, I meandered down to the Centre Pompidou for my Parisian art fix. I visited last year, but spent all of my time in the temporary exhibits. I returned to see the heart of the museum.
Centre Pompidou
Kandinsky
Picasso
Chagall's painting of a Russian Jewish wedding.
Stepping into art.
Now...I'm pretty sure I could've done this.
After the museum I met back up with Oliver and Aurelien to take their dog Duckie for a walk through the beautiful streets of Paris.
Aurelien walking Duckie.
Aurelien, Oliver, and Duckie.
Musee du Louvre
We stopped by this Patisserie so I could take home some sweet souvenirs.
Ille de la Cite
Au Revoir!
I had another insightful and exciting internship experience last week. I was invited to witness the director and another higher-up from my office testify before the House of Lords. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the British Parliament, the House of Lords is the upper house. Members are appointed by the ruling party and their powers are quite limited. Apparently they can amend and temporarily stall bills. They also take their oversight duties quite seriously. After the two from my office testified I watched as David Miliband (Parliamentary Minister and Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs-- and one time rival to Gordon Brown for the Prime Ministership) testified. He was quite impressive. The only person who I've ever seen in person with more charisma is Bill Clinton.
On Friday evening I hopped on the Eurostar train to visit friends in Paris for the weekend.
Just over 3 hours from London to Paris.
Before you read on....please, please, please visit this link: http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/julien%2Bnouvelle%20star/video/x2azde_julien-like-a-virgin-prime-1
It's a clip of Julien, this year's winner of French Idol (they call it "Nouvelle Star"), doing a completely new take on Madonna's "Like a Virgin". This is MUCH more entertaining than anything I've seen on American Idol.
And if you liked that check out Julien's version of Britney Spears' "Hit Me Baby One More Time": http://www.dailymotion.com/relevance/search/julien%2Bnouvelle%20star/video/x2b0k8_julien-baby-one-more-time-britney-s
The view from Oliver and Aurelien's 6th floor apartment.
On Saturday my friend Oliver and I made a trip out to the city of Reims in the heart of the Champagne region.
Passing Disneyland Paris on the way to Reims.
We toured the city of Reims for about an hour focusing mainly on the city's cathedral.
The "Chagall windows" designed by, you guessed it, Marc Chagall.
After the Cathedral, shopping, and a quick crepe we drove to one of the chamapgne "caves". The producers of champagne store the bottles underground for long periods of time before sending them to market.
Supposedly there are 18 million bottles of Champagne maturing down in these caves.
Our tour guide explaining that it takes 9 man days to stack all the bottles of wine behind her. She said much more, but I have no idea what because the whole tour was in French. Oliver translated about 10% of what she said at each stop.
My reward for listening to a French tour for an hour in a freezing cave.
Cheers!
On Saturday evening we went out for a traditional French meal with three of their friends. On Sunday, after brunch at home with some more friends, I meandered down to the Centre Pompidou for my Parisian art fix. I visited last year, but spent all of my time in the temporary exhibits. I returned to see the heart of the museum.
Centre Pompidou
Kandinsky
Picasso
Chagall's painting of a Russian Jewish wedding.
Stepping into art.
Now...I'm pretty sure I could've done this.
After the museum I met back up with Oliver and Aurelien to take their dog Duckie for a walk through the beautiful streets of Paris.
Aurelien walking Duckie.
Aurelien, Oliver, and Duckie.
Musee du Louvre
We stopped by this Patisserie so I could take home some sweet souvenirs.
Ille de la Cite
Au Revoir!
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
London Can Be a Drag...
One of the coolest things about my internship is that I have the opportunity to attend seminars that are put on by various departments within the UK government. Last Friday I attended a seminar hosted by the Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit. The speaker was Paul Krugman, an award-winning economist, a Princeton professor, and my favorite New York Times columnist. He gave a presentation on globalization and its effect on the well being of the United States. So cool! And I got free lunch too. :-)
The weekend that followed had a decidedly less academic feel to it. On Friday evening I meet up with Adam, a new friend, in Covent Garden for drinks and then for Indian tapas (a big trend in London dining these days).
On Saturday I headed to a hopping South London neighborhood called Clapham for an annual street festival (a sort of mini-pride). My friend Richard (pictured below) invited me to meet up with his friends for the afternoon.
Me and Richard
Richard is very sociable Welshman and knows a lot of people in London. Fortunately for me, and my wallet, he knows the organizers of the Clapham festival which meant free drinks all afternoon. :-)
Man-itude in the VIP lounge at the Clapham festival.
The entertainment mainly consisted of local drag queens. The MC, “Sandra”, took a liking to me and invited me on stage once she realized that I was American.
Fortunately, most of the jokes weren’t at my expense. At any rate I’ve become a mini-celebrity as several people have recognized me from my 10 minutes of fame.
80's One-Hit Wonder Laura Branigan sings her infamous "Gloria" Afterwards she thanks the crowd and encourages us to say hi if we see her at the supermarket.
A Britney impersonator sings "Oops, I f#cked up my life"
An impromptu viewing platform.
Mimbo
Camra flirt with the mimbo
On Sunday I met up with Richard again to go to the Royal Vauxhall Tavern for the locally infamous Dame Edna Experience. The drag queen who performs makes the real Dame Edna look quite tame. At any rate, I think I've had my fill of drag queens for a while...at least until gay pride on June 30th!
The weekend that followed had a decidedly less academic feel to it. On Friday evening I meet up with Adam, a new friend, in Covent Garden for drinks and then for Indian tapas (a big trend in London dining these days).
On Saturday I headed to a hopping South London neighborhood called Clapham for an annual street festival (a sort of mini-pride). My friend Richard (pictured below) invited me to meet up with his friends for the afternoon.
Me and Richard
Richard is very sociable Welshman and knows a lot of people in London. Fortunately for me, and my wallet, he knows the organizers of the Clapham festival which meant free drinks all afternoon. :-)
Man-itude in the VIP lounge at the Clapham festival.
The entertainment mainly consisted of local drag queens. The MC, “Sandra”, took a liking to me and invited me on stage once she realized that I was American.
Fortunately, most of the jokes weren’t at my expense. At any rate I’ve become a mini-celebrity as several people have recognized me from my 10 minutes of fame.
80's One-Hit Wonder Laura Branigan sings her infamous "Gloria" Afterwards she thanks the crowd and encourages us to say hi if we see her at the supermarket.
A Britney impersonator sings "Oops, I f#cked up my life"
An impromptu viewing platform.
Mimbo
Camra flirt with the mimbo
On Sunday I met up with Richard again to go to the Royal Vauxhall Tavern for the locally infamous Dame Edna Experience. The drag queen who performs makes the real Dame Edna look quite tame. At any rate, I think I've had my fill of drag queens for a while...at least until gay pride on June 30th!
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Visiting a Swiss Miss (and Mister)
For more photos from this post visit (hot link provided above): http://web.mac.com/dangoncher/iWeb/Site/London%20Blog.html
I traveled to Switzerland this past weekend to visit my friend Colby (from high school) and her husband Mike. They live in the city of Lausanne which is about a 40 minute train ride east of Geneva in the 'French' part of Switzerland. We spent the weekend enjoying the scenic Swiss outdoors as well as good food and drink. It was quite a nice way to spend my birthday weekend.
On Saturday we jumped on a train which took us eastward to the small city of Aigle. From Aigle we took a cog train up to the mountain village of Leysin. In Leysin we boarded a gondola to which took us to the peak of the local mountain. We then hiked back down to Leysin. The hike took about 3 hours and left us pretty drained. After returning to Lausanne and cleaning up we went to the old town of the city for a delicious Fondue Bourguignonne dinner (where pieces of beef are cooked in heated oil). Afterwards we went out for drinks to celebrate my 29th birthday. I have hazy memories of belting Cher songs at a kareoke bar. Fortunately, there's no evidence to confirm that is ever occurred.
On Sunday we went out for brunch. I then took the train to Geneva for a brief, brisk walk through the city center before jumping back on the train to catch my flight back to London.
Monday, June 11, 2007
Family Fun
I had my first visitor last weekend (June 1-3). My cousin Dana came to London before embarking on a “Contiki” tour of Europe. It was my first opportunity to play tour guide in London and I wasn't about to do it half-assed. We started our day with a walk through the Portobello Road Market in Notting Hill.
We stop for a quick sugar fix halfway through the market.
After sampling some treats and browsing through nick-nacks, old maps, antiques, and too many Everything British tourist shops blasting Beatles music we made our way over to Harrod’s for lunch.
Mmmmm......over-priced pastrami.
If you ever feel the need to empty your checking, savings, 401K, and home equity line in style I suggest you come to London and buy an item or two at Harrod’s. Dana and I enjoyed $30 deli sandwiches and $5 diet cokes in the food halls before going upstairs to browse the endless consumer labyrinth.
An opera singer serenades shoppers while they ride up and down the "Egyptian Escalators" at Harrod's.
After Harrod’s we hopped on an old-fashioned double-decker bus (the ‘routemaster’) which took us to the Tower of London and Tower Bridge.
We arrive just in time to see the drawbridge come down.
View from the top of Tower Bridge looking towards Tower of London and the 'city'.
Dana shows me just how strong she is in the engine room of Tower Bridge.
Later, after a pricy dinner in Mayfair courtesy of my Aunt and Uncle, we headed to Soho for some drinks and frivolity with members of my other ‘family.’
On Sunday we took a walk along the Thames, popped our heads into St. Paul’s cathedral, and went to see ‘Stomp.’
"Look Kids, Big Ben!" (Chevy Chase, 'National Lampoons European Vacation')
We stop for a quick sugar fix halfway through the market.
After sampling some treats and browsing through nick-nacks, old maps, antiques, and too many Everything British tourist shops blasting Beatles music we made our way over to Harrod’s for lunch.
Mmmmm......over-priced pastrami.
If you ever feel the need to empty your checking, savings, 401K, and home equity line in style I suggest you come to London and buy an item or two at Harrod’s. Dana and I enjoyed $30 deli sandwiches and $5 diet cokes in the food halls before going upstairs to browse the endless consumer labyrinth.
An opera singer serenades shoppers while they ride up and down the "Egyptian Escalators" at Harrod's.
After Harrod’s we hopped on an old-fashioned double-decker bus (the ‘routemaster’) which took us to the Tower of London and Tower Bridge.
We arrive just in time to see the drawbridge come down.
View from the top of Tower Bridge looking towards Tower of London and the 'city'.
Dana shows me just how strong she is in the engine room of Tower Bridge.
Later, after a pricy dinner in Mayfair courtesy of my Aunt and Uncle, we headed to Soho for some drinks and frivolity with members of my other ‘family.’
On Sunday we took a walk along the Thames, popped our heads into St. Paul’s cathedral, and went to see ‘Stomp.’
"Look Kids, Big Ben!" (Chevy Chase, 'National Lampoons European Vacation')
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