my secret lunch place

I saw this billboard when I was exploring down a random street and it made me laugh. Do you speak Wall Street English? bahaha.

Let's see...where have I left off..

Friday night I had an excellent night of rest. I woke up feeling refreshed and went to Volume 7 with Lindsey and Jen for lunch. It's become our new secret lunch cafe (although now a bunch of other people have found out about it and so I'm not sure how secret it is anymore.) It's a very tiny cafe off of Place Plume and has delicious, inexpensive sandwiches, and the owners are so nice. A man named Frank owns it with his wife, and they live above the cafe. They have a little girl, and another one on the way (and can I mention how CUTE it is when little kids speak french?). While I like exploring the city and finding new cafes, I think it's better to become a regular in France because then you can sit and chat with the owners during your lunch or have a coffee with them, and develop more of a relationship with people who live here.

The really funny part about this cafe is the fact that when we order our sandwiches, Frank says, "Ah bon. Let me go get some bread." And he literally walks out of the cafe and goes to the little market nearby to buy our baguettes for our sandwiches. And if while he is gone someone wants to pay, another regular at the cafe will just get up and ring the person up. No questions asked. The simplicity and good-natured vibes in the place are great. I wish we had more small establishments like that in Brighton, instead of the rush and go restaurant scene.

We also went back to hang out there last night and I sat at the bar talking with Frank about music since he plays really cool 60s and 70s hits. I asked him if he had heard of Simon and Garfunkel and he said yes, but he doesn't have any cds. So I'm going to make a cd of some good music and give it to him to play in the cafe.

By the way, the Maroon 5 concert was good. Jen is obsessed with them so she was definitely out of control and we kept pushing our way up closer and closer to the stage until we were practically 3 rows away from the stage. Very cool. Before Maroon 5 went on, a popular French techno-ish group played. Hahah, it was so funny. A lot of the songs were in English and we were listening to the lyrics thinking, "What? Do they know what they are singing?" But it was a cool experience. We met a couple girls at the concert and hung out at Place Plume afterwards with others.
Very big crowd of frenchies.
hahahahaha. A crazy guy dancing to Maroon 5 who was REALLY into the music. I just had to add this in.
We were so close to the stage!


Today I ventured to another part of the city and sat in a beautiful garden and did some reading. I felt like I went back in time or something though, like suddenly I was in 1920s. Haha. There was a symphony band playing music in the gazebo in the middle, and a group of jugglers practicing in one area. I felt like there should have been a good 'ol ball game going on in one corner of the garden. Lots of people were out promenading, with kids, lovers, and dogs, some were biking, and one kid rolled out of the bushes suddenly where we were sitting and I almost peed my pants laughing so hard, it was so random. I mean, there was just suddenly a kid catapulted out with a burst through the leaves and branches. Why, I do not know. OH, and the orchestra was playing all these old American war marches, as well as music from the Godfather movies. HAHAHA. The French are so crazy. Needless to say, I was really distracted from my reading and homework between listening to the stumbling orchestra play Godfather music, kids exploding out of bushes, and French lovers getting crazy on benches.

The food is still really delicious. Today I had some french fries though with Lindsey at this little dive of a cafe, and ooh did the grease hurt my stomach. Haha. I'm going to have to wean my appetite back to normal before I eat Red Robin at home again.