And they all continue... Lost

Once upon a time, in an island far far away...

Tonight starts, in USA, the new season of one of the most intriguing/curious/sensational TV shows of the last years.

Everyone has their own favorite shows, but my "passion" for Lost started two days before I left Portugal, back in 2006. I was packing everything and suddently I looked at the TV and I saw I plane crashing.
After a few minutes I completely forgot what I was doing and I stood there, like I was being hypnotized by the TV (something like the movie "Poltergeist" but in a good way! eheh).

But I have to thank my brother, that offered gave me some DVDs with all the episodes from the 1st season, as a have-a-nice-trip-and-don't-come-back-soon (eheh, just kidding bro!).
After my arrival in France, in my first temporary apartment on the hills of Sophia-Antipolis, I didn't have many interesting things to do. So I remembered about that amazing TV show and how curious I was to know what happened to all those passengers.

It was like that I started to be a Lost fan... literally lost, because the way the story was written gave me more doubts than clues! eheheh
The creator of the show, J.J. Abrams, got all the attention for his creativity and he convinced me too, specially when he managed to deliver a good Mission: Impossible movie and a great-great Cloverfield (but this is another story).

Well, by now you all have already heard about this TV show and certainly there are good and bad things about it. Season 1 was very good, season 2 so-so, and for season 3 only the second half of the season was interesting.
In a few hours the next adventures will begin... and I can't wait to watch it too...

Hmm... I wonder... when will this new episode be available to download? In a legal, way of course! Like my brother did! O:-)

One impressive impressionist day

"One day what?" you might ask. Well, I'm not an art guy, but I like to know a litte of every possible subject. So, following a suggestion from Cristiane, we decided to visit Vincent Van Gogh's last address: Auvers-sur-Oise (around 30Km from Paris).

What started as a simple visit to Van Gogh's inspiration places, ended as a full tour around the history of Impressionism art movement. If you want to know everything about Impressionism don't go to Louvre or Orsay Museums, but try instead the Auvers Castle where you can enjoy an interactive and enjoyable tour.

From its origins in Paris, in Café Guerbois more precisely, to some of its scandals or the important role played by... the trains! eheheh
Well, but after all that culture we continue to our main objective: to visit the places which inspired Van Gogh's last paintings. Auvers-sur-Oise's city hall, the famous church and the wheat field... the same field where he shot himself.
But you don't need to know where are all these places, because the city of Auvers prepared you an itinerary. You can visit all Van Gogh's painting places and for every place you have a copy of the correspondent painting plus a small description.

To visit cemeteries and take pictures sounds a little bit morbid, but we had to visit Van Gogh's tomb to finish the epic journey. I say epic because the journey started in Arles, south of France, in 2007, when we visited the hospital where he was hospitalised. (yes, crazy places we enjoy to visit! eheh). It was also during his stay in Arles that he cut off the lower part of his own left ear lobe. (wow, the important facts I get to know! eheh)

It's not easy to be an artist :-P

Movies - Cloverfield

Don't think twice! Run! Don't wait! Go see this one in a movie theater as soon as possible.

Well, I could just write the last paragraph and leave this post as is, but I want to share with you a little bit more about this real "movie experience". Don't worry, I won't spoil it.

Many of you already live in the home cinema era or belong to the let's-download-the-movie generation... but Cloverfield lives in the movie theather tradition. Specially if it is a theater with a good sound system, wide screen... and an audience that doesn't have any idea about what they are about to watch... to experience!

The key element here is the element of surprise. Being produced by J.J. "Lost" Abrams, Cloverfield has been kept in ultra-high secrecy since its official announcement more than 6 months ago (with a previous title of "1-18-08"). A very big campaign teasing everyone, always giving clues but never facts, real images or a real trailer.

But the wait was over for us last night. We attended a special premiere, because the movie opens in France on February 6th. It was a crowded theater, but after the film started you couldn't hear a fly... and at the end everyone applauded. Even I did! eheheh

I don't want to raise your expectactions, but I hope to convince you to go watch Cloverfield in a movie theater. Tell your boss you're sick, leave your kids with the grandparents, turn off your computer and TV... and go! :)

One last recommendation: grab a seat far from the screen and stay at the very end of the final credits... because now everyone is talking about the "strange last audio message"! eheheh

See you at the movies...

What else?

Nothing better to go out with friends to places we don't know. Like this is a surprise to everyone... well, sometimes you can have bad surprises, but I like to be optimistic! Always! :)

This week we got a visit from our friends Guillaume and Dina, that are preparing to leave France for professional reasons. Dina is going back to Morocco and Guillaume is going to Singapore for one year. One year ago we were all working in Sophia-Antipolis, in the heart of the french riviera... and here we are now, in the capital, in the cold... we are just arriving, and they are just leaving! eheheh

We met them at the new Nespresso store, here in the Champs-Élysées. This store was opened last December, with George Clooney and Sharon Stone as special guests (yes, they forgot to invite me! eheh).
This modern store offers two areas for having coffee (a counter and a saloon) and a big store where you can buy all kinds of coffee (nespresso-kinds) in their new tiny capsules.

Well... a simple espresso coffee here has the symbolic price of 4 euros. What else?

Lights! Camera! ... And action!

What could we answered when someone asks if we would like to go to the Cinema Expo? "Oui", of course! :)

Last weekend the "Salon du Cinema" expo was held here in Paris, and almost everyone was there: actors, directors, stuntmen, cars, make-up crews and live animals, like the ones they use in movies, of course, like eagles, horses, snakes and Harry-Potter-like-owls! eheh

One other curious area was the filming and acting schools. We searched among the exhibitors and found out schools that have small intensive courses during the weekends for directing, scripting, digital animation, production and make-up for movies! Hmmm... now the hard part will be to choose one course, and become the next Spielberg! Yeah!

There was this one exhibitor in the show that brought a mini-scenario, that represented a small and typical street from Paris. I even used the scenario to make my own "filming" ;)

By the way, we also found out the Sylvester Stallone will be in Paris for the premiere of his latest and wild film: John Rambo! eheheh Yes, it's true... now I'll have to fight for real to get one ticket to that special event!

Restos - Les Bonnes Souers

Every region, every country have always their own traditions and characteristics. Language, music, weather, people... but the one that I always loved is the gastronomy. Typical food, wine, snacks, beers, deserts... you name it. The key word is "typical"! If it's typical I'm on it! :)
Most of my friends knows that, specially that "thing" that I have about taking pictures of everything I taste! eheheh

So I'll try to write about our experiences around the world (until the day I won't survive some crazy food! eheh)

This week we went to "Les Bonnes Souers", one small french restaurant (like most of them around here) with internacional cuisine. But from a french restaurant I won't expect anything else but typical cuisine (here's the magic key!).

Here is a small summary from our last experience:
Ouefs cocotte - baked (shirred) eggs dipped into cream sauce, onions and boiled in bain-marie (double boiler). Still don't know where it's typical from.
Pavé d'Aubrac - beef from the Aubrac region (Southeast France), which is a special kind of red beef, very tender due to the region's rich flora.
Crumble aux pommes - the typical english apple crumble. (it's not french, but it's typical! eheh)

A good restaurant with a good service. I recommend you to try the shirred eggs and the Aubrac beef.

Feel free to post your comments or corrections, because some of the times I don't know exactly the details neither the equivalents in english.

Bon apetit...

Depp, Burton, Nicholson, Freeman and me!

This was a good week for all movie fans here in Paris! Nothing more and nothing else than 5 Hollywood "heavyweights" in 2 days for everyone to see!

Tim Burton and Johnny Depp were here last Wednesday for the premiere of "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street". I didn't get any tickets, but I managed to attend to the press conference, which was... funny. Tim Burton, who was just arriving from New York, made lots of jokes around the movie and their characters. Then outside, under the rain there was a crowd... of girls, just to see Depp! :) But he was nice to the fans, gave autographs, and better, he was speaking french! eheh

Today, was the premiere of "The Bucket List", with those 2 big Hollywoord dinosaurs: Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman! Wow! It was an unique opportunity to see them both live! We waited a while before their arrival (cold and rain included! eheh) and it was worth it. The director Rob Reiner was also present, and he was the one who spent more time with the reporters.

Most of the movie premieres have tickets for public in general, but you have to be quick to get one! This time we stayed outside... but I'll have my revenge, like Sweeney Todd! eheheh

The amazing stars from Beijing Circus

Hooray, hooray, hooray! The circus is leaving town! But gladly we arrived on time! :)

Circus is not only for kids, that's why we try to get "under the tent" everytime there is a good show around! eheh Last year, we saw the International Circus Festival of Monte-Carlo, in Monaco, and it was amazing with artists from all over the world.

This year, in Paris, the Beijing Circus was in town (Les Étoiles du Cirque de Pékin) and the show was constantly being extended in time because it was always sold out. And they have reasons for that! The chinese circus is well known for the hard work demanded from their stars.

We were amazed with all those kids, guys, girls - even seniors - and their skills!
In the year that China is the host of the Olympic Games, we pay here a small tribute to the chinese circus school and their amazing stars!

One curiosity about the place where the show was held: the Cirque Phenix. This modern tent in Paris was built specifically for this kind of events and you can seat anywhere inside that you won't have those annoying poles/columns blocking the view!
It was a good opportunity to practise at taking pictures under bad light conditions! :P

In the meantime I will work out... maybe they'll let me join them! Hey, it's a good way to travel around the world! ;)

Photos & Video highlights

Movies - Gone Baby Gone

We are both big movie fans, specially when we watch them at movie theathers. So it was a good surprise when we found out we could have a "Movie Pass" with watch-all-you-can- before-your-eyes- start-to-bleed benefit! :-)

One of the last movies we watched was "Gone Baby Gone", the directorial debut of Ben Affleck (yeah, that actor guy from "Armageddon" and "Pearl Harbor").
With a story based on a book, this movie raised lots of curiosity because of the similarity with a real life story that happened in Portugal last summer: the missing of Madeleine McCann.

This movie tells the story of two young private detectives that are hired to investigate a little girl's kidnapping and soon discover that nothing is what it seems.

We highly suggest you to watch this movie. Good story, lots of twists and high caliber actors like Morgan Freeman and Ed Harris.

Oh yes... Ben Affleck should stick with directing and forget the rest! :-P

It's sales war!

And they're off! The sales-hunt season was officially opened today in France. And believe me when I say sales-hunt! People here takes sales so seriously that many of them take one day or half-day off just to go shopping!

There are 4 kinds of shoppers: occasional (the one who just visits stores without anything in mind), modest (has a specific budget to spend as better as possible), professional (already knows which products go for sales before day-0, and even hiddes products inside the store so no one else can take them) and the maniac (buys anything and everything during the first days, without realizing that some products aren't even on sale!)

Today at lunch time there was a war at Champs-Élysées Avenue! Women and men struggling for the best items. I walked inside some stores, just for fun of it... and I saw people jumping on people, buying stuff without even trying them on. Or big queues formed outside some other stores.

Well, all stores but Louis Vuitton... where everything was calm as usual, with the typical tourists inside (mostly japanese).

But I found a really good bargain at Hugo Boss store: a man's suit that cost around 1100 euros a week ago and know was just 900! Take it or leave it! :-)

King for a day!

It's "Day of the Kings"... and it doesn't mean Pelé and Elvis Day. This is how we name the Epiphany in Portugal and Brasil, a rough translation of Dia dos Reis, to celebrate the 6th January.

In Portugal we have a typical cake called... Bolo Rei (king cake), but here in France you can't escape the Galette des Rois (called Gâteau des Rois in Provence region) which should be accompanied with cider.

The tradition says that these kind of cakes should have a trinket or a bean hidden inside, and the person who gets the piece of cake with this "lucky charm" should be rewarded: in Portugal the lucky winner pays the cake, in France this same person becomes king (or queen) for a year!
I wonder if french history is based on a cake! :-P

Of course we like to follow the typical traditions, and it was with great "sacrifice" that we had a nice galette and cider. And Cris found the "lucky charm"! Oh well... I won't get the crown.

Cheers to you all! Santé!

The first video of 2008

Well, in order to post something different, we've decided to post a small video we did during New Year's celebrations.

The Eiffel Tower and a bottle of champagne. It's Paris and like George Clooney says "What else?".

A bientot

Happy 2008!

And here we are! Our first decision for 2008 was to create a blog, a place where we could share our adventures around the world (for now!).

New Year's Eve was great, although there was no fireworks in Paris. But we hope everyone out there enjoyed the party.

And this is it for our first post. See you around during the next 365 days...