Nice & Monaco

 I've just recently taken a little trip to Nice and Monaco for a couple of days.
Seeing the ever translucent and transcendent Mediterranean once again made my heart skip a beat,
The Côte d'Azur is aptly named, and it rolls off the tongue like a jewel dropping into the sea.
Although Nice and Monaco are both summer cities, 

they proved just as radiant and colorful in the mild french winter.
I preferred Nice, where me and my new-found American companions wondered about,
climbing and searching and laughing,
absorbing this strange new world that I am beginning to understand.
 We sat by the sea for a while, with spirits high, just lingering,
and for the first time since I've been here,
I felt an intense and overwhelming awareness
of being alive,
like sipping water for the first time,
leaving me all at once satisfied and thirsting for more.