Originally Written July 9, 2011
Its way past time for me to write about how amazing and wonderful
Dijon is. I feel like I’ve written about a lot of negative aspects, but
the city really is amazing.
Its about an eight minute bus ride from our campus to the Place de la
Liberation, which I’ve shown in one of my pictures. Five streets spread
out from this oval shaped gathering place, each looking stereotypically
French. Many of my friends have remarked at least once that even the
ugliest alleys or back streets in Dijon would be considered gorgeous in
Columbus. There are cute little bookstores, pattisseries, boulangeries,
and clothing stores everywhere. One of my favorite stores is a chain
called “Paul”, and you get a pretty cheap meal for six euros (sandwich,
drink, dessert) or just a baguette with chocolate in it for 1.25. Its
pretty hard for me to remember to say “bonjour” every time I walk in a
store, but I’m slowly getting it! Today I started talking to someone
without any preamble, and he kindly reminded me “bonjour”.
A couple of nights ago, we had dinner on this square that overlooks
the Dijon market, which was built by Gustave Eiffel. Later, we ended up
at Flannery’s Irish Pub, which was really relaxing. I definitely like
just being able to go to a bar, sit outside with my friends, and just
talk. I think we’re actually going back tonight, because Flannery’s has
pretty cheap drinks (for Dijon, which is an expensive city). The wine I
was drinking was 2.30 euro a glass and considered a good deal (une bonne
marche) if that tells you anything. But it was still delicious! It was a
local wine - Borgogne Aligote, I think it was called.
Every street that I walk down in Dijon seems to be right out of a
painting. Its just so cute and quintessentially French. The other day, I
just walked around with some friends and we went to the Jardin Darcy,
which has a massive polar bear sculpture, and a couple cathedrals.
Yesterday, we went to the Musee des Beaux Arts, which is in what used to
be the palace of the dukes of Burgundy and then walked around a bit. I
got a crepe too, which was delicious.
We were intending to go to Lake Kir today, which is a man made lake
about twenty minutes away and has a beach. Due to rainy and cool
weather, however, we just walked around window shopping and doing a
little actual shopping. Everything is marked down really cheaply because
they are in the middle of a giant sale, so there were shoes for around 5
euro, and dresses for as cheap as 10. It was amazing!
One thing that we have yet to do in Dijon that I’m really excited
about is renting bikes. There are these silver bikes that are parked in
groups all around the city, and you can rent them and ride around on
them. I can’t wait to try it!
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