Wow I have changed

So I have been in Germany now for less than a day, but already I cannot believe how much I have changed from my time abroad and it took leaving my comfort zone of Paris to figure it out.

My trip to Germany was going fairly well until I missed a stop and subsequently missed my train. I am thus without Andy's phone number or a way to get to her town. I expected full out tears and hyperventillating. None of it came. I was so relaxed about it all I amazed myself. That is not to say I wasn't worrying a bit, for heaven's sake I might not have had a place to sleep! The kind German on the train with me helped me get back to where I needed to be and told me a cab would take me. The kind cab man did take me, for 56 euros!! It was worth not sleeping outside though. Everything ended up fine I met up with Andy and we made it to her place without any more events. I just really was amazed at how calmly I took it. HUGE change...

Germany seems so much different then France. The people are more friendly and less indifferent. They will strike up conversations without a problem, and they look at you! In France you don't really look at people, more you look through them. It is so much more like the United States here that I really enjoy it...or maybe it's more like Nebraska. I'm not in some huge city. People have houses and lawns and drive ways. I really enjoy seeing that again. By all means I love Paris, but I prefer smaller cities and towns I think. And here they have decorated some for Halloween, that makes me feel so much better! So I'm not quite done with my trip but I wanted to share my changes. It still is incredible how much more independent I'm becoming and how much more calm I am. Everything (almost) is fixable, taking everything in stride makes life much less stressful!!

I am taking tons of pictures and will upload them when I get back to Paris...so strange but I do miss it and I've hardly been away!


Love and miss everyone

8 weeks in, 8 weeks left

I am officially about halfway through my trip! I cannot, and almost refuse, to believe it! There is still way to much to do! Thus, I am sorry for my lack of updates so this one will be incredibly long with tons of pictures to make up for it. So get ready...Here we goooooooooooooooooo

Okay so when I left you it was a couple weeks ago! I will try to update as best as possible. I went to Marseille and Aix-En-Provence shortly after my last post. They are both in the south of France and both absolutely beautiful!!! I preferred Aix because it was more of a small town feeling to it. In Marseille we saw the old part of the town and I took tons of pictures. In Aix I went to the market and it was beautiful. The fruits and vegetables almost looked fake I couldn't believe it. It was overall a wonderful weekend.

Following that wonderful trip I had classes, tutoring, Salsa lessons and more classes. The best thing that happened last week was we went to the National Archives of France. If any of you have seen the movie Marie Antoinette, I got to stand in the same room where some of that film was made!! I then, amazingly, got to see so many wonderfully amazing things. I got to see the last will and testament of Louis the 14th and Napoleon! It was so incredible. The coolest though was seeing the playing cards of Louis the 16th! On his cards he would write who he wanted to see that night in the card room. We also saw his hunting journal where on Bastille day, he wrote that nothing happened! He had no idea what was going on, none at all! Last, and by far the most impressive for me, was we got to see Marie Antoinette's final letter before she was killed. It was so sad but we could actually read some of it! Now when I say we saw these, he pulled them out of a locked vault and had them simply laying ina folder in front of us. No glass, no security. It was incredible. The picture below is of him closing one of the 3 huge doors he had to open in order to get to the relics.

The Friday of last week I climbed the Eiffel tower with a friend. You can only reach the 2nd level this way but it is incredibly cheaper and quite the exercise. I really had fun but it was sooo tiring!! Later that night I went out with some friends and enjoyed the evening.

I spent the next day at a flea market looking at incredibly cool stuff and then went to Victor Hugo's house. It was really neat to walk through it and see some of his old things including first drafts of Les Miserables. Before I made it to his house though there was a "manifestation" or a demonstration in the streets. It was really neat to see. I think it had something to do with immigration rights and problems. Following that it was a pretty relaxed day. Place Voges which is a park by Victor Hugo's house is beautiful and so very French!

Sunday I went to do my homework in the Luxembourg gardens and ran across...another manifestation!! This one was about teacher's and their wages and the fact that there are not enough teachers these days because the government is cutting spending. So since the gardens were not at peaceful as I had hoped I gave up that endeavor and went back to the dorm to work.

This past week has been good. I babysat for the first time. It was definately an experience. The teens are 11 and 15 and really don't need a sitter, save for the fact that they would beat each other up if no one was there. The 11 year old was extremely helpful with dinner which was a blessing because I'd never prepared a French dinner. The 15 year old was not as helpful or as kind. He seemed very put off that I was there, though I'm not sure I blame him! However, it was a nice way to make some extra cash for the week.

My roommate and I are finally seeing each other bit by bit. She is really nice and I love that she is so patient. We spent a couple hours Friday talking and she taught me some French sayings to be aware of because they are popular. We talked about everything from our families to Christmas and it was really incredible. Those types of experiences are what make me believe I am really learning French. Yesterday, Saturday, I went to another flea market which I didn't really like as much. After that I went and bought some boots and did some grocery shopping. My roommate and I went to see Vicky, Christina, Barcelona which was a decent movie but not my favorite. After that we both crashed and benefited from the time change last night! Today, as she told me yesterday, was our day for homework. I still have some more to do but I am currently taking a break! She is really helping and I am so glad I got so lucky!!

Thanks to my wonderful grandparents and parents I head out to Germany Tuesday for a 4 day trip! I am so excited and I can not thank you all enough !!

Pictures:

1. Me in front of the Eiffel Tower

2. Me and Notre Dame

3. View from the 2nd level of the Eiffel Tower

4. Me in Mareseille

5. The national archives and the crazy doors!

6. Those beautiful strawberries from Aix-En-Provence!!

Love and miss EVERYONE!!!!!!!!!

Week 2

I promise to try to get photos up soon..but with no easy access to internet there's no telling when I'll get around to it! Things have been good this week and crazy busy. It was the second week of classes which are still pretty easy for now. Monday I started my tutoring for English. It is going to be hard because the teenagers here speak very, very quickly and it is harder to understand them then the adults. Last night was my first Salsa dance class! It wasn't horribly embarassing and I laughed a lot (mostly at my awful skills!) When the guys know what they are doing I'm fine..I can usually stumble through it easily, but when the guy gets lost so do I! It is fun though and I can understand most of what the dance teacher says. He is from Portugal though so it is a little more difficult to understand his French :)

I went to the Basilique St-Denis last night with our class. It is where all the kings and queens of France are buried. It was pretty but we didn't get a lot of time so I hope to go back again, maybe with my family! It is fairly facinating.

I went shopping today and bought some much needed winter weather stuff. A couple scarves, a hat (which is really cute and not so winter friendly..but that's okay!) and some gloves :). I also bought a pretty sweater because I was getting tired of my clothes. I definately don't have enough. The only thing that looks decent is my black skirt from Banana Republic which is a size 6..everything else is HUGE. I talked to my director about a tailor, she says it will cost as much as a new pair of pants so..I will be getting a new pair of pants and having my jeans hemmed. Seems like a decent solution! My next thing to tackle will be some flat shoes that are comfortable and maybe some heels...but that's for another time! I went into Galleries Lafayette (some good shopping Kelsey) and stumbled upon the floor with all of the name brands. I mean, Prada, Dolce and Gabana and heaven knows what other names! It was absolutely insane!

It still amazes me that I can walk down the street and see the Eiffel Tower or Notre Dame. It is so unreal! The city is just beautiful. My shopping today was so much fun because I kept stumbling upon different historic churches or sites in Paris and I just kept taking pictures! I went to Place de Concord today, which is near the American Embassy, and the French are celebrating 100 years of aviation so they had some fighter planes being shown. I took some pictures for Josh and I hope they are decent but there were soooooo many people!!

I had my first dream in French which was pretty cool! The person I was talking to was speaking English and I was trying to speak French. It made me feel like I am finally learning. I still don't have a roommate which makes speaking French outside of class time a little hard but hopefully she shows up this weekend.

I really will try to post some pictures after this weekend. We are going to Marseille and it should be nice and warm! I found some people to go to Normandy with so I am looking forward to the trip. I'm hoping to plan it toward the end of November (the weekend before my birthday!) I am still hoping to go to Germany for fall break, but the Monday of fall break I am going to EURO DISNEY!! YAY! Yes I am a dork, but some other girls were going and I decided to join them. The park is doing some Halloween themed stuff so it should be amazing!

I love and miss everyone!!

First Week

The first week in France has been incredibly busy! I have signed up for a Salsa Dancing class and I start my community service on Monday which is tutoring English. Both of which I am very excited for and hope that it will get me out meeting lots of people.

The dorm is nice. There isn't much of a fridge so it is hard to buy enough food for the weekend. I am also working on acquring pots so that I can cook during the weekends. It is so much different than Tours. I definately miss the meal plan concept of food 7 days a week at school.

Nuit Blanche was last night. It wasn't as big as I thought it would be and I seemed to have missed a lot of different things going on. It would have been nice if it took place a few weeks after being here.

I've been doing a lot of walking around seeing different things in the city which has been nice. The weather has been cold so I think I've caught a cold. Otherwise I'm enjoying myself and the city. There is just so much to do I have no idea how to do it all with the little time I've been given!

Love and miss