La boum: mon histoire

Bonjour, tous ceux qui lisent ce blog! C'est Sandrine, et je vais vous dire mon histoire. La boum? C’était assez bon. 
Yeah, so it wasn't like the dance was the best thing that ever happened to me or anything, but it was okay. I will say that I was a little put off when Chrissa requested the song "Dancing Queen" by ABBA (she said it was her "theme song") and began dancing wildly on a chair. There was no need for her to show off like that!

Also, I felt extremely copied off because I told Chrissa that "Dancing Queen" was MY theme song. Her "theme song" was something completely different, but of course, she had to change her mind out of her obsession to be like me or whatever. She's just so obsessed with wanting to be "French" that she thinks being like me or doing what I do will make her "French". Um, no. It will just make her annoying. Chrissa is supposed to be my friend, too, so I told her how I felt in a calm and collected manner...just like my psychologist back in France suggested. She just nodded and said she didn't know what she did, when I'm sure she did, but she was probably one of those people who lived in denial when confronted.

After letting Chrissa know how I felt, I stood in a corner with Malorie. I was very impressed with how I put her together. I made sure to dress her in one of the Edwards girls' Polo Ralph Lauren dresses because I feel that the preppy look does Malorie justice. The dress also looks phenomenal against her coloring!
I let Malorie know that Chrissa was getting on my nerves, but she seemed too distracted by other stuff. "Sandrine, remember when I told you I had something important to tell you?" She told me. She nervously played with her hands and twirled her hair- two pet peeves of mine. Nervous habits annoyed me.
"Yeah, Malorie! Can't it wait until after the dance?" I snapped, clearly forgetting the advice my old psychologist gave me.
Malorie lowered her head. "I guess it can. I mean, I waited this long! I guess I could just wait even longer. It's been months."
"D'accord...well, tell me later," I shrugged. "Let's go talk to Chrissa and distract her from boosting her ego."

"I just really wish you'd stop being so dismissive," Malorie whispered nervously as we walked towards Chrissa. "It's important."
I snapped again. "Define 'important', Malorie! I said it can wait!"
"'Important' means that what I need to say involves you!" Malorie exclaimed.
"If it was so important, you could have just told me when it happened!"
Malorie frowned. "I didn't want to upset you at that point. You seemed in a fragile mindset, and I just wanted to let you rest. Forget it. I don't want to talk about it anymore."
"Great idea, Malorie. Great idea," I said haughtily.
That was when I realized that my problems were coming back. It wasn't doing me any good to be away from my psychologist. I could have found a new psychologist, but I thought I was fine! I thought being away from France- from my past- would help me! I didn't think I'd need constant therapy, but I guess I did. Ha, looks like all of us surprise ourselves once in awhile.

To top it all off,  Micki approached me. It looked like she was on her way back from flirting with Julien or something. Why she would give him the time of day, I do not know. Whatever. It wasn't my problem.
"Why are you wearing that dress?" Micki scoffed. "It's summer and 95 degrees outside! I hope you have a heat stroke!"

Without thinking about my actions, I shoved Micki aside. "I could ask you the same thing about your sweater. Or, I could ask you why you stole my dress from my room. However, I just really want you to get out of my way. Bye."
Micki didn't say anything. She just gaped. I then thought about my psychologist once more and how he'd tell me to write down the crazy things I did in my behavior journal. I laughed to myself. What was that going to help? I already determined that I was going to take care of my own problems, but one could say that I was doing a pretty lousy job at that. I just shrugged it off. I guess I got too caught up in the moment, and I'd have to remind myself not to do that again.

We then met up with Chrissa.
"Hey, would you like to take that group photo by la Tour Eiffel now?" Malorie asked.
Chrissa giggled. "Hey! You know the French word for it!"
That surprised me, too, considering Malorie took Spanish and the only French words she knew involved dance.
"Oh, and Sandrine?" Chrissa told me. "I'm sorry about earlier."
"Okay," I grumbled. "Let's just go take that picture."

Unlike Sabine and her friends, my friends and I DID get our picture taken by la tour.

 

Oh, and Malorie did finally tell me what she was hiding, and I almost couldn't believe it. That was only the beginning...

Bisous,
Sandrine

LMPT: Mon nounours! Il est vivant!

Salut, tous ceux qui lisent ce blog! Encore, c'est Sandrine! 
I'm not going to lie. Round 5 of LMPT, titled Anything Goes, was a little difficult for me. I could have done a photo of me shopping, doing Malorie's make-up, practicing ballet, and more. However, Sabine's friend's weirdness gave me a brilliant idea.
I normally don't acknowledge Lilly because she is completely obnoxious. She never calms down, and she doesn't have an off switch. I've never really talked to her before for many reasons, but yesterday, I talked to her.
Lilly and Sabine saw a movie called Ted, and it is about how a young boy's beloved teddy bear comes to life and becomes his best friend into adulthood. Lilly thought it was the funniest movie ever, and I'm sure it was amusing (though I never saw it), but she was driving me crazy with how she repeated lines from it. Even though I was annoyed, a light bulb went off in my head. I was going to use the movie as inspiration for Round 5. I took a deep breath and asked Lilly about the film, and the following is the photo Lilly helped to create. We didn't have any beer, so we improvised and used a bottle of wine instead.

That, tout le monde, was my final photo. I'm now anticipating seeing the final results. Until then, enjoy these additional photos of me from this photo shoot:

Bisous,
Sandrine

La boum

Salut, tout le monde! C'est moi, Sabine, et je vais vous dire que je détestais la boum.

I never have much luck with school dances or teen dances sponsored by community centers. It's not that I don't like dances. I would like them if somebody didn't always have to ruin them for me! There were two people this time that made leave early, and you'll see why. Hopefully, you'll understand why I left. I was just so finished. I mean, I am SO finished with those two.

Of course, one of the people who HAD to ruin my time was Chrissa. When you first walked into the dance, you could see Chrissa dancing on a chair to whatever crappy song was playing at the time. I ignored her at first, and that was easy to do because she was just keeping to herself and showing off her dance moves- which I would show off, too, if I were her! I may not be her biggest fan, but I can give her credit- she's an excellent dancer!

I met up with Lilly and Melanie, and Melanie was being a complete loner. Dances really aren't Melanie's thing...at all. She'd rather be in her room playing one of her instruments. She told me that she always feels awkward at dances because she is so shy and doesn't know what to do other than follow her friends around. Following friends around didn't seem too awkward to me. Unless you were one of the people in the huge mosh pit/dancing crowd, everybody just followed their buddies and had shouting conversations because the music was too loud for anything else.

Lilly noticed Chrissa and said, "What the heck is that? Who does that?!?! Let's be real!" Melanie and I died laughing.

"I'd be a little embarrassed," Melanie said in a hushed voice that one could barely hear over the terrible song that was vibrating in everyone's ears. 

"Me too, Melanie," I said. "I sometimes wish I could be as outgoing and bold as her, but I'd be too embarrassed to make a fool out of myself in public."

Lilly interjected, "No, Sabine! You wish you could be as bold and outgoing as ME! I have no shame! I'll dance until my feet hurt. I'll even dance my tush off! What am I afraid of? YOLO!"

"YOLO" was Lilly's new phrase. It meant, "you only live once", in case you didn't know. I thought it sounded silly, but Lilly was obsessed with it. She used it as an excuse for every time she did something stupid or crazy, and her imitations of Chrissa's dance moves were just those things.

Melanie still looked mortified, and her look basically told me that she wanted to leave the party. To make matters worse, Lilly decided that Melanie needed to "live a little" (Lilly's words), so Lilly grabbed her hands and began dancing. Melanie blushed, and I almost felt sorry for her. I liked Melanie and all, but I sometimes wished she'd be a little more social and have some fun.

I could tell that Melanie looked upset with Lilly, so I wanted to stay out of it. Otherwise, I might have ended up laughing because they did look funny. I wandered over to Julien, and I caught him off guard.

"Sabine! Je ne t'ai pas vu!" He exclaimed.

"Regarde-moi," I laughed. "Tu me vois maintenant."

A slower song began to play, and he then extended a hand. "Tu veux danser?"

For a moment, I understood how Melanie was feeling. I wasn't one for dancing, either, but it was Julien. He was my best friend, and I didn't want to say "non", so I hesitantly grabbed his hand, and we took off. The only downfall of this was that my classmates would for sure say that we are dating, but we aren't! I mean, sure. It does sound silly to slow dance with somebody under the title of "just friends", but that was what I planned on doing.

I actually had a good time, and as he moved me across the slick floor, I felt like I was flying. I felt free, and I didn't worry about what my classmates might think. I did this for me. As we were dancing, I began to wonder if I actually did have feelings for Julien that went past "just friends", but I wasn't sure. I didn't want to be more than friends, and if I wasn't sure, I thought it was safe going with my first thought- I didn't have feelings for him beyond friendship.

As usual, all good things have to come to an end. Chrissa had to shout, "JULIANNE!!!!" Julien and I paused mid-dance, and I told him just to go and see what she wanted. I promised to come with him, since Chrissa intimidates him just a bit.

"Julianne," Chrissa said in her terrible French accent. "I saw the way you danced with Sabine, and I was wondering if we could dance like that. It would be so much fun! Do you mind Sabine? Would you care? If it would hurt your feelings, I won't do it, but I am DYING to dance with a French boy! I saw the way he danced with you! So ROMANTIC! I want that! It's so much more dreamy than how my ex-boyfriends used to dance with me. They were just classless Americans!"

Before I could lose control of my temper and shout, "Then what are you? You certainly don't have much class, either!", Micki entered the picture, which only made matters worse. 

"Chrissa, don't be stupid. He wants to dance with me."

Chrissa then came after Micki. "He is my man, Micki! I'm the one who deserves a Frenchman here!"

Micki scoffed. "I lived in Belgium for ten years. I understand Europeans more than you do. He doesn't want someone like you."

"What makes you so sure? Huh?" Chrissa said bitterly.

I had enough. Micki was wearing my dress, and she didn't even ask! Of course she'd "borrow" it- it's short, and she obviously is insecure and wants Julien's attention! Lucky for me, Julien isn't attracted to trashiness. I was tired of Chrissa, and I didn't even want to know what she'd say to Micki or Julien next. I wanted to get out of any potential bad situation before it started, so I grabbed Lilly's and Melanie's hands and said, "Let's go. We're out of here." 

Sabine

Toutes celles qui portent la frange à la Malorie B...

...ça m'énerve!
Des joggings sont laids et dégoûtants- ah, ouais!
Ça m'énerve!
Toutes celles qui rentrent dans le débardeur en taille 42
Ça m'énerve!
 Ça m'énerve que Malorie s'en fiche que ses vêtements sont effroyables!!!

Eh, bonsoir, tous ceux qui lisent ce blog. C'est Sandrine! Désolée que j’ai écrit une petite chanson. C’était une parodie de “Ça m’énerve”, une chanson d’Helmut Fritz que j’aime un peu.

Sorry about my little French rant/parody of a Helmut Fritz song. Although the dance that we have been talking about was on the 14^th, la fête nationale française, I’m just getting around to blogging about it now. You Americans might know la fête nationale française (or le quatorze juillet) as Bastille Day, but that’s just a name given to our national holiday by English speakers. We don’t call it that in France. Basically, what the day celebrates is three years later, after the storming of the Bastille, la fête de la fédération- or the day France became a new republic. Vive la république française!

That’s enough about la fête nationale. You can read more about it on the website that I linked you to. I have more important things to worry about than my country's history.

My friend Malorie isn't very into clothes or her appearance. The only time she truly wears make-up is when she is performing. She sometimes wears eyeshadow, mascara, and lip gloss to school, but that's it. She is also rather lazy when it comes to her outfits. Malorie has always been serious about dance. She has attended the Pittsburgh Ballet Theatre School since she was a young child, and as she became more serious about dance, she began to take online classes instead of attending regular school so she could focus on dance. What a nice life- I wish my parents were more accepting! Anyway, this has lead Malorie to love sweatpants. When she puts herself together, she actually looks nice! When she doesn't, however, she tends to look sloppy. Malorie wanted to wear sweats and hoodie to the dance, and I screamed in horror! Instead, I told her that I'd choose an outfit for her as well as do her hair and make-up.

The first thing I did was take her hair out of that high ponytail. I understand why she likes to wear her hair up. I think it's a dancer thing. I can't stand it hanging in my face. However, unless the high ponytail is for a performance, it isn't cool to wear in public. So yes, I yanked that hair elastic from her hair as hard as I could! I wanted to pin her bangs aside like she does for performances, but it was too much of a hassle. Bangs are pains-in-the-butt. I don't know how anybody can tolerate them! Feeling that hair on my forehead would bug me to no end. I wouldn't mind the upkeep and styling involved with bangs, seeing that styling hair is one of my favorite pastimes. Like I said, I just don't want hair in my face!!!

I then decided to to Malorie's make-up.

*MAKE-UP TIP #1: To make brown eyes pop, wear colors that are opposites of browns (like blues, purples, greens, etc)*

However, Malorie doesn't have brown eyes, and the only things I had in my personal make-up bag were blue and purple eyeliners.

*MAKE-UP TIP #2: If you have blue eyes, colors such as golds, browns, and coppers will help show off those baby blues! Think in colors that are opposites of blues*

I couldn't find any browns, but I found that blue eyeliner that is a darker shade of blue than the eyes can also look good. Many make-up sites confirmed this, too. I decided to use the best, darkest blue eye pencil that I had.

I basically made a mess out of this, but whatever. Doing make-up is so much fun! I wanted to curl Malorie's hair, too, but her hair is too straight to curl without applying heat. Not cool. Oh, and of course, somebody took my curling iron! As mad as that made me, I took it as a compliment because it was an expensive one my parents bought me for Christmas one year.

I applied the finishing touches, and as I was doing so, Malorie's voice quavered with fear. "Sandrine, we need to talk. I've been keeping something from you for months."

I paused, almost dropping the eyeliner and making a mess. "What do you mean? What do you need to tell me?"

Malorie gulped. "It's about your friend...the one who disappeared."

I sighed. Whatever it was, it probably wasn't too important. If it were a major crisis, I was certain Malorie would have told me earlier. Oh, well. My priority at the moment was the dance.

Gros bisous,

Sandrine <3

LMPT: La reine de la danse

Bonjour, tous ceux qui lisent ce blog! C'est moi, Sandrine, et aujourd'hui, je vais parler de LMPT. 
This post is all about Round 4- Solo. I decided to take the term "solo" personally and do a jazz solo. Here is the photo that I ended up entering:

 

Why a jazz solo? I don't have any beautiful ballet costumes/tutus currently with me in the dorms. I mean, I do take jazz classes, too, but I don't like it as much as I like ballet (even though I do love jazz). Malorie told me that with my training and good grasp on basic technique, I can succeed at any type of dance I do. That meant a lot coming from her, seeing as she doesn't complement other dancers very often. I'm open to trying other types of dance. I really wanted to audition for the Rockette Summer Intensive, but I couldn't because I already had a commitment to the summer intensive in Pittsburgh. It's sad because I was even old enough and had the experience for the Rockette intensive! That's not the type of dance I want to do professionally, but I still think it would have been an awesome learning experience! I want to visit NYC so badly, too.

Here is another photo that was in contention, but I didn't like the angle:

I liked this photo, but I liked the lighting of the first one more:

....aaaand here's a close-up of me:

Stay tuned for round 5: the final round of LMPT. I hope you enjoyed!

Bisous,
Sandrine

Une bonne action

Salut, tout le monde! Pour noël, j'ai donné à Christelle une poupée, et elle était un peu fâchée. Hier, j'ai trouvé le cadeau parfait...

Before the dance, I found Christelle standing alone in a corner. I felt that would be the perfect time to surprise her with the small gift that I recently purchased. She looked sad and alone, as she usually did, and I thought that maybe a present would help cheer her up.

"Quoi, Sabine? Qu'est-ce que tu fais?" Christelle said angrily. Christelle and I have never had the best relationship, and that oftentimes confused people, particularly the American students. They thought that Christelle and I would be friends because we are French, but they were definitely wrong. Just because we're French doesn't mean that we're going to be instant best friends. I tried explaining it to some of the Americans like this: you don't like all the other Americans. It's the same for me. Christelle and I don't have much in common, and that's why we aren't friends. Plus, she isn't that friendly. She's just so miserable here in the States that she can't see past that.
Instead of letting Christelle's attitude get to me, I said, "Je vais te donner un cadeau."

I presented it to her with a smile, and at first, she didn't know what to think of it, but when she saw it close-up, a small smile spread across her face.

It was a small box with la Tour Eiffel on it. I thought it would remind her of her hometown, and she could put jewelery and other small trinkets in it.

"Merci, Sabine," Christelle said, unsure of what to really say. She took it from my hand and softly added, "Je l'aime."

She certainly seemed to like this gift more than the doll, and I don't blame her. I wouldn't know what to do with a doll if somebody bought one for me, either. Plus, I'm not really a toy person, and she's not, either. That's understandable. However, as she walked away, I smiled to myself, thinking that I can still make a difference and make somebody's day brighter with just a little, random act of kindness.

My next blog post will be about the dance, so be on the lookout for it! :)
-Sabine

LMPT: Tout près des étoiles

Bonjour, tous ceux qui lit ce blog!
I'm back to tell you all about Round 3 of LMPT- "Out of this World". Instead of taking the theme of this round too literally and doing something involving outer space, I decided to take a more figurative approach.

As most of you may know, I would love to dance for the ballet de l'Opéra National de Paris someday and eventually be promoted to étoile, or principal dancer. In everyday French, étoile means "star". Normally, the French use the English word "star" to describe celebrities, but in the ballet world...? No. If you're a principal dancer, you're an étoile.

Like a star in the night sky, dancers come alive on stage. The spotlight shines on them while the backdrop tends to be darkened. The dancers are the stars; the stage is their sky. For this round of LMPT, I wanted to showcase the image of a young dancer who is illuminated by the spotlight when she performs. To her, dancing in front of renowned audiences is her chance to be amongst the stars.

To get the look of a dancer being in the spotlight, I used a large flashlight with many books and boxes as a platform. The light still hit below my face, but I didn't feel like gathering anymore boxes. For the backdrop, I used a black shirt and some stars made out of tin foil.

 

Coming up with my outfit was the trickiest part. I decided on wearing the dress I wore to 8th grade graduation, but taking the photo so that it looked like the bodice of a fancy tutu. I also borrowed Alyson's tiara. I was going to place a rhinestone bobby pin on each side of my head instead, but I felt the tiara looked nicer.

Here are some of the outtakes from the shoot. I will share an explanation of why I didn't choose them for my entry.
I liked the fact that my bun was showing in this photo, but too much of my dress showed. It didn't look like merely the bodice of a tutu like I wanted. The trick didn't work in this shot.

This photo was going to be the one that I entered, but I decided I liked the angle of the one I entered better.

Again, I wasn't too fond of the angle of this photo.

I really loved this photo, but I thought a vertical shot worked better than a horizontal shot because I looked as if I were naked in this picture!

Here is the photo that I decided to enter. I liked the lighting best, and I particularly liked the angle at which this photo was taken. I thought it had a magical, dream-like quality to it, especially since my eyes were closed.

Here it is in black and white:

Round 4 will be next! Before I finish this post, I'd like to share a photo of what my hair looked like after removing all those darn bobby pins. Buns might be the death of me.

Bisous,
Sandrine

Le plus heureux garçon

"Devine qui!"
I shouted that when I spotted her. A smile spread across her face.
"Julien, qu'est-ce que tu fais là?" Sabine asked me, still shocked at my arrival.
I sighed. This one would be hard to explain. "Mon père."
"Tu détestes ton père!" Sabine, who was now also shocked by my statement, declared.
"Je vais éxpliquer plus tard," I replied quickly. Sabine nodded, though she still looked uneasy.

I'm a very private person, which is why I don't blog as much as I probably should. I don't think I have ever gone in-depth about my family or relationships with my family members. To put it to you this way, my parents are divorced. My sister and I live with our mom and visit our dad sometimes...correction- my sister visits our dad. I stopped because I want nothing to do with him. I really don't feel like going into details, but there you have the summarized version. Sabine was shocked that I was in America because of my dad. This is the first time I have done anything with my dad in a year, and let me tell you, it is not easy to be with him now. While he is in the state for something business-related, he reluctantly allowed me to visit Sabine. There's another thing I cannot stand about my dad: he hates Sabine. He thinks she is bad influence and that my mom should have ended the friendship between us a long time ago. I understand that she might seem too wild for him, but he doesn't understand how much I need her in my life. She's the person that I go to for everything, and without her, I'd have nobody to share my feelings or secrets with. She knows what a jerk my dad is, so she didn't take too much offense. She was the one who suggested I stop visiting him in the first place, so of course she is shocked I'd want anything to do with him. Sabine especially cannot stand him after he swore at her over the phone one evening years ago...

On a happier note, I asked Sabine what she has been up to, and she mentioned that she's been busy decorating for the end-of-the-school-year dance. I told her that I thought it sounded like fun, and if she needed somebody to go with, I'd be more than happy to go with her.

I was very nervous asking her that, but I figured that I'd be around and that I might as well try to have some fun. I was afraid of being rejected, but I apparently had nothing to be worried about because she squealed "oui" with much delight. She then laughed and added, "Chrissa sera jalouse!"

Chrissa will be jealous, true, but that wasn't my main concern. I hoped that this would be the start of something so much more than a beautiful friendship...

-JH