I started my language classes today. It doesn't look like they'll be too bad. The point is really to correct some of the bad habits we've gotten into and review some sticky grammatical points. But today, we mostly did introductions.
There was a long break for lunch and I went with some friends for lunch. We walked to a little street one girl's host mom had recommended (Rue Colbert) where there were a lot of cafés and ethnic restaurants. We ate at a little Turkish restaurant that was very good and very inexpensive. I had never eaten Turkish food before so I decided to share a "grande assiette" with another girl. She had had Turkish food and knew what to order so I just told her to get whatever she wanted and I would try whatever she got! It ended up being very very good. Lamb sausage, two kinds of rice, a salad, french fries... tons of food!
After the break, we reconvened for orientation about our classes and host families in Paris. They gave us tons of information at once and the classroom was so hot I don't think anyone caught everything.
Tomorrow, my big adventure will be to find a curling iron. Apparently straighteners are far far far more common than curling irons here, as evidenced by my unsuccessful trip to Monoprix (the French equivalent of a Super Target). I'm getting tired of throwing my hair up in a ponytail every day!
Monday, August 31, 2009
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Bonjour de la France!
Bonjour tout le monde! I have been in France for 3 days and so far I'm in love. Right now, I'm in Tours (in the Loire Valley) for a two-week language intesive before heading off to Paris to start classes! Because I'm a little late in getting this started, I'll give you a recap of what has happened thus far.
Day 1: I got up at 4:00 in the morning Minnesota time to drive to the airport with my mommy. I hardly slept the night before because I was so excited to get going. Once there we unloaded all of my bags (110 lbs in all) and said goodbye. The flight to D.C. was uneventful until we were about to land. All of a sudden we started circling. I kept checking my watch as we circled, noting that we were now ten minutes late, now twenty... Finally the pilot came over the intercom and said that we could not land because there was a turtle on the runway. Yes, one turtle. We were reassigned to a different runway and landed 40 minutes late without crushing a single turtle.
In D.C. I met up with my group and we boarded the plane! I was hoping for a window seat, but sadly did not get one. At least I was lucky enough to be on the aisle. I didn't sleep at all on the plane so when we arrived in Paris at 5 a.m. French time, I was in a daze. We loaded the bus for Tours and everyone fell asleep almost immediately. Finally, around noon, we arrived in Tours and met our host families.
For the most part, there are two students from my program per host family and most "host families" are just older retired women with extra room in their houses. I am in a different position. I am the only student from my program staying with my host family, and I have a real family: A mother, father, two daughters (17 and 18 years) and a son (20 years). I've been having an absolute blast. The girls are very nice and very willing to show me around and help me out. They speak perfect English but everyone insists on speaking French to me. While this was a little tiring at first, I can already tell that my French has improved tremendously.
The first day I was extremely tired and couldn't wait to go to bed. But, I wanted to get on the French time schedule so I tried to tough it out and stay awake. As soon as we got back I took a shower and changed my clothes, hoping that would wake me up a little. After that, I had lunch with my host mom (Virginie), host siblings (Emilie, Victoria and Clement), and Anne-Calixte, Virginie's 3-year-old god-daughter. She was absolutely adorable. I love it when little children speak French! I think it's so much cuter than English-speaking children, but that may be because these little French babies are speaking the language better than me! For proof that French children are cuter than American children, see Capucine.
After lunch Emilie, Victoria and I went for a walk around Tours. It is absolutly beautiful here. Everything is made of white stone and looks like it came straight out of the 18th century (which it probably did), with beautiful statues and carvings. The exception is Place Plumereau, a square in the center of town with lots of bars and restaurants. All of the nightlife in Tours is at Place Plumereau. Here, the buildings date to the Renaissance, made of redbrick and exposed beams. Again, very beautiful.
After our walk I was so tired I could hardly stand so I took a short nap. Just after I woke up, another exchange student arrived! Both Emilie and Victoria studied abroad for a year, and Emilie went with a Rotary exchange program. Their parents are Rotarians so they offered to host Adrianna, a new exchange student from Mexico, for a night until her host family was ready to take her. When Adrianna arrived we went for another walk around town and had dinner. The food is absolutely wonderful and I'm sure I'm going to gain at least 50 lbs while I'm here.
After dinner, the four of us girls went down to Place Plumereau for a drink on the terrace of a cafe. It was fun just sitting and people watching but I was absolutly exhausted, having slept less than 4 hours in almost 2 days, so we headed back around midnight. I don't think I've ever slept so well!
Day 2: After breakfast, Emilie, Adrianna and I took Anne-Calixte to the park nearby to feed the ducks and play on the playground a little. Anne-Calixte is very shy but in the end she started warming up to me and asked me to hold her hand and swing her around on the way back.
When we got back to the house it was time for lunch and two of Virginie's friends came to join us. However, I had to rush through the meal a little bit because I had a meeting with my program to get to. After the meeting I had an hour and a half of downtime before we were supposed to meet up again for "Un pot de bienvenu" (A welcome drink), so I went with a big group of students to buy cell phones. The store was packed and the salesperson didn't speak a whole lot of English, which was difficult because signing up for a cell phone plan can be confusing even in one's native language. A lot of girls looked like deer in the headlights, so instead of letting my nerves get the better of me, I stepped up and tried negotiating with the salesman in French. It worked! I did a lot of translating for the others and I walked out with a cell phone with pre-payed minutes and a big boost in confidence.
From their we headed off to Place Plumereau where our program director gave us each 2 tickets to buy drinks. We sat around, talked, had a few little appitizers and then went to our respective families for dinner. When I got home, we had another exchange student! Mikah is 27 and from Japan. She came to Tours to learn French and will be staying with the family for four weeks.
Again, dinner the second night was fabulous and full of wonderful conversation. Adrianna left for her own host family after dinner and we moved to the living room for tea and talked until about 11. My host parents are very interested in my thoughts on healthcare reform in America. In France, they have a single-payer system and don't understand why many Americans are so vehemently opposed to healthcare reform. It was a good exercise in my vocabulary explaining both sides of the debate and expressing my own personal stance on the issue. All in all it was a very good day.
Day 3: Yesterday, my host parents left for a wedding in Toulouse (the southwest of France) so it was just the girls at home for the day. We slept late and just after breakfast, I went to meet up with my group at the train station for our excursion to see chateaux! We say Clos Luce and Amboise. Both were located in the town of Amboise, and were lovely. Clos Luce is the former home of Leonardo Da Vinci. He lived there for the last four years of his life and is buried in the chapel of Amboise. My favorite part of the house was the garden. It was very large and included replicas of many of his inventions. The house itself was very small (for a chateau that is).
Amboise was beautiful, but again, smaller than some of the other chateaux I have seen. I hate to sound unapprecitive but I think my favorite part of the castle was the ice cream I had before going in, which was mango flavored, delicious and refreshing on such a hot day.
I got back just in time for dinner. Emilie made pasta and invited her best friend Margaux over for dinner. Again, dinner was fabulous. After that, we went out to a club! It was fun meeting all of Emilie's French friends and dancing. I had a great time, but was exhausted when we returned.
That brings me to today! I slept in today, which was very nice. I'm on the go so much here and still adjusting to the time difference so it was nice to have a morning to relax. However, I got up a little too late so when Victoria and I biked over to the supermarket to buy notebooks (my classes start tomorrow and I don't have any school supplies), it had just closed (it's only open until 12:30 on Sundays). The bike ride was fun though and we walked around the open-air market that was going on nearby before riding home for lunch!
All in all, I'm having a wonderful time in Tours and will be very sad to leave here after 2 weeks.
Day 1: I got up at 4:00 in the morning Minnesota time to drive to the airport with my mommy. I hardly slept the night before because I was so excited to get going. Once there we unloaded all of my bags (110 lbs in all) and said goodbye. The flight to D.C. was uneventful until we were about to land. All of a sudden we started circling. I kept checking my watch as we circled, noting that we were now ten minutes late, now twenty... Finally the pilot came over the intercom and said that we could not land because there was a turtle on the runway. Yes, one turtle. We were reassigned to a different runway and landed 40 minutes late without crushing a single turtle.
In D.C. I met up with my group and we boarded the plane! I was hoping for a window seat, but sadly did not get one. At least I was lucky enough to be on the aisle. I didn't sleep at all on the plane so when we arrived in Paris at 5 a.m. French time, I was in a daze. We loaded the bus for Tours and everyone fell asleep almost immediately. Finally, around noon, we arrived in Tours and met our host families.
For the most part, there are two students from my program per host family and most "host families" are just older retired women with extra room in their houses. I am in a different position. I am the only student from my program staying with my host family, and I have a real family: A mother, father, two daughters (17 and 18 years) and a son (20 years). I've been having an absolute blast. The girls are very nice and very willing to show me around and help me out. They speak perfect English but everyone insists on speaking French to me. While this was a little tiring at first, I can already tell that my French has improved tremendously.
The first day I was extremely tired and couldn't wait to go to bed. But, I wanted to get on the French time schedule so I tried to tough it out and stay awake. As soon as we got back I took a shower and changed my clothes, hoping that would wake me up a little. After that, I had lunch with my host mom (Virginie), host siblings (Emilie, Victoria and Clement), and Anne-Calixte, Virginie's 3-year-old god-daughter. She was absolutely adorable. I love it when little children speak French! I think it's so much cuter than English-speaking children, but that may be because these little French babies are speaking the language better than me! For proof that French children are cuter than American children, see Capucine.
After lunch Emilie, Victoria and I went for a walk around Tours. It is absolutly beautiful here. Everything is made of white stone and looks like it came straight out of the 18th century (which it probably did), with beautiful statues and carvings. The exception is Place Plumereau, a square in the center of town with lots of bars and restaurants. All of the nightlife in Tours is at Place Plumereau. Here, the buildings date to the Renaissance, made of redbrick and exposed beams. Again, very beautiful.
After our walk I was so tired I could hardly stand so I took a short nap. Just after I woke up, another exchange student arrived! Both Emilie and Victoria studied abroad for a year, and Emilie went with a Rotary exchange program. Their parents are Rotarians so they offered to host Adrianna, a new exchange student from Mexico, for a night until her host family was ready to take her. When Adrianna arrived we went for another walk around town and had dinner. The food is absolutely wonderful and I'm sure I'm going to gain at least 50 lbs while I'm here.
After dinner, the four of us girls went down to Place Plumereau for a drink on the terrace of a cafe. It was fun just sitting and people watching but I was absolutly exhausted, having slept less than 4 hours in almost 2 days, so we headed back around midnight. I don't think I've ever slept so well!
Day 2: After breakfast, Emilie, Adrianna and I took Anne-Calixte to the park nearby to feed the ducks and play on the playground a little. Anne-Calixte is very shy but in the end she started warming up to me and asked me to hold her hand and swing her around on the way back.
When we got back to the house it was time for lunch and two of Virginie's friends came to join us. However, I had to rush through the meal a little bit because I had a meeting with my program to get to. After the meeting I had an hour and a half of downtime before we were supposed to meet up again for "Un pot de bienvenu" (A welcome drink), so I went with a big group of students to buy cell phones. The store was packed and the salesperson didn't speak a whole lot of English, which was difficult because signing up for a cell phone plan can be confusing even in one's native language. A lot of girls looked like deer in the headlights, so instead of letting my nerves get the better of me, I stepped up and tried negotiating with the salesman in French. It worked! I did a lot of translating for the others and I walked out with a cell phone with pre-payed minutes and a big boost in confidence.
From their we headed off to Place Plumereau where our program director gave us each 2 tickets to buy drinks. We sat around, talked, had a few little appitizers and then went to our respective families for dinner. When I got home, we had another exchange student! Mikah is 27 and from Japan. She came to Tours to learn French and will be staying with the family for four weeks.
Again, dinner the second night was fabulous and full of wonderful conversation. Adrianna left for her own host family after dinner and we moved to the living room for tea and talked until about 11. My host parents are very interested in my thoughts on healthcare reform in America. In France, they have a single-payer system and don't understand why many Americans are so vehemently opposed to healthcare reform. It was a good exercise in my vocabulary explaining both sides of the debate and expressing my own personal stance on the issue. All in all it was a very good day.
Day 3: Yesterday, my host parents left for a wedding in Toulouse (the southwest of France) so it was just the girls at home for the day. We slept late and just after breakfast, I went to meet up with my group at the train station for our excursion to see chateaux! We say Clos Luce and Amboise. Both were located in the town of Amboise, and were lovely. Clos Luce is the former home of Leonardo Da Vinci. He lived there for the last four years of his life and is buried in the chapel of Amboise. My favorite part of the house was the garden. It was very large and included replicas of many of his inventions. The house itself was very small (for a chateau that is).
Amboise was beautiful, but again, smaller than some of the other chateaux I have seen. I hate to sound unapprecitive but I think my favorite part of the castle was the ice cream I had before going in, which was mango flavored, delicious and refreshing on such a hot day.
I got back just in time for dinner. Emilie made pasta and invited her best friend Margaux over for dinner. Again, dinner was fabulous. After that, we went out to a club! It was fun meeting all of Emilie's French friends and dancing. I had a great time, but was exhausted when we returned.
That brings me to today! I slept in today, which was very nice. I'm on the go so much here and still adjusting to the time difference so it was nice to have a morning to relax. However, I got up a little too late so when Victoria and I biked over to the supermarket to buy notebooks (my classes start tomorrow and I don't have any school supplies), it had just closed (it's only open until 12:30 on Sundays). The bike ride was fun though and we walked around the open-air market that was going on nearby before riding home for lunch!
All in all, I'm having a wonderful time in Tours and will be very sad to leave here after 2 weeks.
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