Sunday, July 21, 2013

my france trip

My trip to
            France! 
On July 6th , the Oxford Ballet School and I went to France for eight days. We visited the Eiffel tower.  We took a tour and watched a performance at the Paris Opera Ballet.  We took classes the Ecole de Danse la Cite in St. Malo.  We went to Versailles. It was huge and beautiful. On the last day it was my teacher, Ms. Genevieve’s, birthday.

We went the Eiffel tower on the first day in Paris. I went to the very top. I took lots of pictures from all the way up there.  The hard part about it was that we had to walk down all the stairs. But we did go up the elevator to the top. I saw a couple places we visited. We saw Notre dame and I got violet ice cream.  It was delicious. I also saw a huge silver ball that people were pushing around. I thought I’d be scared of heights, but it wasn’t scary. there was lots of people at the Eiffel tower selling things so I bought eight miniature Eiffel Towers for one euro  I thought it was very tiring, though .

On the second day we went to the Paris Opera Ballet. It was very beautiful and graceful, but I didn’t get to take pictures of the show.  I was pretty disappointed. I did get a coin and post card from there gift shop and I was going to get a tiny point shoe but I didn’t get it. Before the performance a lady gave us a tour around the opera house. On the tour, we went backstage. It was humungous. It looked like one million people could fit back there. I forgot to take pictures.  She also took us in the audience when it wasn’t filled with people. It was also huge. Everything was so large. I loved it there. I loved the Paris Opera ballet it was very the beautiful.

From the third to the fifth day in St. Malo, we took ballet classes at the Ecole de Danse la Cite. There was a huge window in the studio and I could see lots and lots of dogs walking past.  There was an enormous, red Tibetan mastiff walking by.  I had never seen one in real life.  We took intermediate classes, contemporary classes, point, jazz, and modern, I felt very sore from not dancing in the last couple weeks. We met some of the French girls Pola, Elice and Maxine they were really nice, but they couldn’t speak a lot of English.  After ballet we went to the park to eat lunch. We wrote what we wanted on a big piece of paper and a lady bought it for us and when we got what we ordered we paid her five euros.

After we went to the classes we went to Versailles. It was amazing, massive and beautiful. We rented bikes and rode all around Versailles. While we were riding bikes I saw the Queen’s Villagers Village and the Queen’s private pond. There’s a map inside of the scrap book. I had bread and cheese for lunch that day.  There was a lady who squeezed fresh oranges for drinks.   She added ice cubes and it was delicious.

The last day in St. Malo was the best. It was Ms. Genevieve’s birthday. It was also Bastille Day!  We went to a restaurant and ate tomatoes with mozzarella balls for the first course.  The second course was pasta with cheese sauce.  For desert we had cheesecake with strawberries. Everyone in the restaurant sang happy birthday in French and English. Outside of the restaurant there were lots of painters so we got to walk in around and look at art. After we walked we saw the Eiffel Tower glow and sparkle from a distance and we saw fireworks.  Visiting France was the best week I ever had.  Hopefully I can do it again another year.     
  
here are all the pictures theres lot




























                            by: jena                                    

                                                

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

Visiting Pontotoc Ridge Blueberry Farm


On July 8th, our group visited Pontotoc Ridge Blueberry Farm.  It is a very nice family run farm owned by the Holifields.  We had a hay ride out to the fields, talked to one of the farmers, and each picked a pint of blueberries.  Then we enjoyed blueberry muffins and punch made for us by the farmers!  They were a very sweet family.  Afterwards we all picnicked and the kids enjoyed the brand new play area.  It was lots of fun.



Having fun at the play area




"We picked really yummy blueberries and I had fun with my friends."--Nisa Koltai
"I learned that red blueberries and white blueberries are not yummy."--Yeshaiah Koltai


--The Koltais


Tuesday, July 9, 2013

Summer Nationals

On July 4th I went to summer nationals .Unfortunately I didn't place but it was really fun .The place where I fenced was really big and there was lots of shops and gift shops there. Lots of people were running around  and walking around. The hardest to fence was  Lauren Scruggs (a.k.a. red shoes).  The place where I fenced was just a big metal room about the size of three Walmarts and they put metal fencing strips out. It was a lot of fun.  I fence through USFA (US Fencing Association).






Ashni