Sorry I've been absent for a little while! As the semester winds down, I'm really getting busy!
Last weekend I was in London again to celebrate Thanksgiving. Stephen's family invited me to their family dinner and I really couldn't refuse a turkey dinner for the holiday! In general, the French have strange reactions to Thanksgiving which vary from polite disinterest to flat out disbelief. My host family was pretty low key about the whole thing. They've had American students before so they get the general idea, but, as they don't really have an equivalent, I think they had trouble understanding exactly how important it is. To them, it's a minor holiday, on par with Halloween or something. When I explained that it's important to be with friends and family, that it's about celebrating relationships and being thankful, they smiled and nodded. Other students' host families had slightly funnier reactions. One of my friends explained the story of Thanksgiving to her host family (Indians teaching the pilgrims to farm and then sharing a meal together). Their reaction: That can't be a true story. If they taught you how to farm, why did you slaughter them all a hundred years later? So, needless to say, I was very happy to be able to spend the holiday in a family setting. Stephen's aunt had flown in from Austin and his cousin flew back from school in Austin so it ended up being really great. The food was delicious and they were very gracious hosts.
The next day, they treated me to a day of sightseeing! We started out the day at the Tour of London, ate lunch at a hip burger restaurant, took a flight on the London Eye and saw a show at the Old Vic staring Kevin Spacey! Afterward, we even got to meet him! All in all, it was a great day.
Saturday I hopped a train to Oxford to visit Phoebe. I had such an amazing time. First of all, it really does look like Hogwarts. Students even wear robes (for real). The town is also super cute. We walked around for a bit, ate at a café in the vaults of a 12th or 13th century church and generally had a good time. That night was a college bop: a huge party hosted by the college. This time the theme was "anything but cloths" so Phoebe and I made dresses out of plastic Thanksgiving tablecloths and had a great time.
The next day I hopped a train back to London. Unfortunately, however, Stephen's computer broke so we spent a good majority of the day running around trying to find an Apple Store that with an opening in the next 4 weeks. I was tired and London was experiencing lovely November weather (freezing rain), so I was grateful when we finally made it to his family's house for dinner.
Now I'm back in Paris and working on finishing up my final assignments! I have a paper to write for my literature class that's driving me crazy. The paper itself shouldn't be too bad, and I know that my professor is a lenient grader, but, the tutor that Sweet Briar hired to assist us in our classes is a huge pain. He's just not very nice (he told one girl that her problem isn't the language barrier, it's just that she's not very intelligent and must have that problem in English too). I have my second consultation with him tomorrow and honestly, he's adding to the stress rather than helping with it. His rude, brusque attitude just doesn't motivate me to do anything he asks me to! I just have to stay positive and remember that he does have helpful things to say, even if he isn't very tactful in his phrasing.
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