Change

When I was a little kid, I wanted to be older. I desperately wanted to drive, to own a debit card, to watch grown-up movies, to go to high school, to have a job, to go places without the undermining supervision of my parental units. I wanted the hour hand to turn faster. I wanted the days to pass by like the seconds did. I wanted to grow up. To BE a grown-up.
Of course, here I am now, and I still can't wrap my mind around the fact that I am seventeen. I am eleven and a half months away from being that "grown-up", and in some ways, I already am.
The ironic part is, now that I'm grown up, I wish that time would slow down. I wish I had time to breathe, time to sleep, or just time to sit back and watch the world. I spent my whole life wondering why time seems to fly by. François says that it's not the time that goes by, it's the changes we make that make time have the illusion of flying by. When we grow old, we have more stuff to occupy our time. Because we have more stuff to do, the time, of course, flies. Alors... it's not the time that changes. Time is, indeed, a constant. It's us humans that change.
I am changing families in 16 days. A part of me is really excited! It'll be a new and completely different experience- filled with new adventures, new challenges, new loop-de-loops. I get to view France from another set of eyes! I get to meet more people and try new things! Plus, I'm incredibly excited to live with another INCREDIBLY AWESOME family! I seriously couldn't have asked for a sweeter set of families! That is why, as much as I am excited, I'm also a little sad! I've gotten so used to being around this host family. They were such wonderful teachers. I seriously wouldn't be nearly as amazing in French without them teaching me things. They introduced me to so many good french foods, cheeses, and traditions, and François and Véronique always had the right thing to say when I was sad or confused. As different as my host family is from my family at home, I still feel like I have a "family" here! I felt like I had a place there, and I really hope they felt that way too!
We cannot stop the world from turning. Things change whether we want them to or not! People change. We get older, bigger, wiser... Part of me still wants to be that little kid on her swing set, laughing and screaming out of sheer joy and happiness, with all the time the world had to offer. But, at the same time, I couldn't ask for a better place to be right now. I mean, what is life without change, really?

So on Wednesday, Kate and I went to the most amazing pizzeria, and then afterwards, we ate the most AMAZING ice cream/tiramisu EVER. It's crazy, I can't believe it's been over 2 months since the day I met her, and we've already changed so much! We used to be those awkward Americans. Now, as crazy as it is, we are becoming more and more like "one of the French". As "American" as we still are, things are changing! A part of me wants things to stay the same. But then, a bigger part of me just wants to let go and see where the world takes me! Exchange really is like a roller coaster... and here I am, holding on for the ride of a lifetime!

So, world... turn! I'm ready.

"Enfin! Audrey A Écrit Quelque Chose!"

Hey guys! Long time no see!

Anyway, I cannot even begin to describe how amazing these past few months have been. It's incredible how fast I'm learning French here! Just two months ago, I would honestly be able to say I didn't understand a word of French class. Or SVT. Or History. Or lunch. Or GYM for heaven's sake! I could only participate in "small talk", and I felt like hardly anything more than an awkward foreigner, completely out of place with everyone else, sticking out like a third leg or a sore thumb or a broken pinkie toe.

I hit it off pretty well the first week! It's so great how nice everyone in my class is! I couldn't have asked for a better one. Things started getting EVEN BETTER when I met Kate. She's one of the closest friends I've made this whole exchange, and it isn't just because she's American. She's just one of the most amazing people ever! Whenever I'm lonely or sad, or just need to say SOMETHING and I have no clue how to say it to anyone else, she's always there for me. We get each other through the ups and downs of exchange. Without her around, exchange would have been so different. I'm never going to forget our Wednesday afternoons. Our coffee breaks. Our baguette light saber duel. Staying up late filling each other in on our lives before exchange. Eating peanut butter and nutella sandwiches. Being obnoxious. Being American. Being Exchange Students. I hope you know how much I adore you and your incredible awesomeness. You always have a way of making my day even when it seems completely messed up. You listen when no one else does. I can't thank you enough! Je t'aime- je ne t'oublierai jamais!

These past few weeks have been a little rough. It's not even because last week was my birthday or the week before was Thanksgiving or Christmas is coming up. In fact, I don't feel really homesick at the moment. I just feel a little down. The celebration the night before my birthday was really something special though! All my host families and my host club counselor came over for a big "Birthday/Thanksgiving Feast". I prepared the turkey and the stuffing (the turkey turned out really good, but the stuffing was a little too dry! Darn... better luck next time!). My host family bought all my favorite cheeses, and I got to try some new ones, too! That wasn't the best part, though. For my birthday, I got these drawings called "Les Images d'Epinal" from Véronique and François, and they are just gorgeous! One of them is of the Eiffel Tower, and the other one is a collage of a bunch of significant yet incredibly poignant events in currant American History, with the Statue of Liberty at the center. They are just beautiful, and the way that people can draw things like that just blows my mind. I also got a really cute turquoise scarf from my second host family, and these really awesome mugs from my third family! Even the presents, though, weren't the best part. The best part was having a family. Having people around a table, talking, laughing, and eating like we had known each other for ages. I would say this encounter was a lot like the little get-together we had in the fall, but it was so many times better than that. I could actually understand (almost) everything people said to me. It was awesome being able to mess around with my host brothers! It felt like coming home. 

Winter time is really beginning here in France!! The first real snow fall, the escargots... even my host parents have started up the wood stove! I'm absolutely loving being here, especially in the winter time!

Although... I always hated how short days got during winter. At the beginning, I hated it even more here because I ended up leaving the house to go to school when it was still pitch black. Normally, that wouldn't bother me too much. However, when you return home in the same conditions, it can get kind of old. It takes me a whole hour to return home from school, and sometimes, it takes longer because the buses after six are just stupid and unpredictable. I couldn't stand waiting at a bus stop in the freezing rain for thirty minutes, just because my bus is a little less popular than the one that goes to the mall...

About a week ago, that miserable feeling completely lifted away. The Christmas season has officially taken off here in the city, and the lights are already spectacular. Pretty strings of white lights and glowing snowflakes hang off street signs and in between buildings. The giant Christmas tree in centre ville is glowing in the most magical way, and the shops are adorned with all their own decorations, too! The Christmas markets are going to be starting soon, and there are already some stands set up! I can't walk down the streets anymore without seeing the Roasted Chestnut Man with his chestnut roaster thing, smelling the nutella crepes in the air, or hearing Christmas music, in all kinds of languages (mostly English), blaring from the nearby shops. Tis The Season, and I am SO EXCITED.

Okay, and now for some little things:

~In gym, we are doing an acrobatics unit. Crazy, huh? XD

Serhat and Barbara in gym class! :D

~Escargots are actually REALLY good!
~I joined theater class here! One of the best decisions I've ever made.
~With school work: everyone is SO NEAT, organizing everything by using different colors, rulers, cutting, pasting... Given the fact that I haven't used a glue stick for normal class activities since the fourth grade, I was a little surprised! It's fun though! In a way, it makes me strive to be more organized!
~I don't need to be in school until 10 on Wednesdays. I come like 30 minutes early to hang out with some of the other kids in my class :D It's GREAT having one class on Wednesday!!
~I can't leave for lunch :c but I bet you anything the food I eat is still better than yours ;)
~(I totally stole this observation from Kate's blog, but it's something that TOTALLY needs to be shared) People in France DO take showers, shave, and smell good.

Friends Forever <3
From L2R: Lucie, Me, Kate, Manon, Marie, Amélie

 Le Bonheur n'est pas une destination...

                          

                   mais une façon de voyager

The Roller Coaster

Exchange really is like a roller coaster. The fear and excitement of going while waiting in line. The dramatic climb. The fall. The loop de loop. The adrenaline. The feeling you get in the pit of your stomach. The fear. The memory. The laughter. And then, at the end, you're so sad that it went by so fast, when the wait seemed like forever. You want to do it again.

I don't even know where to begin! So much has happened in the past few weeks that I can barely find a decent place to start. Therefore I'll start at the beginning. The first day of high school.
I had no real clue what was going on that day. Real french hit me like a smack across the face. History was just an awful way to start off my day. There is just so many vocabulary words. Once someone explains the definition of those words to me, there's a word in the definition that I didn't understand. In that class it's a never-ending circle of miscomprehention. But that's okay! After that we had life and earth science (again, another class I don't understand... which is incredibly sad because it's one of my favorite topics in school). Then, finally, we had chem. I absolutely love chemistry here. I understand everything, and our teacher is really engaging! I thought I would dread taking chem again, but it's actually really useful. I can focus more on learning the language in that class and less on the busy work. It's the same thing with math class- I know all the material, so now all I have to do is learn the words! I miss the arts though... a lot. I am working on getting involved in the theater here though. It's hard though because it requires me to get my schedule changed (I didn't even know we could choose electives)!! So they instead put me in the most boring thing possible. I would love to be in an actual art class, but instead they put me in a class where I learn about old artifacts, architecture, and culture. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind the class! It's small and we goof around a lot. I just wish I had other options. It would be so cool to be in a French play, though!
I've been making a lot of friends, too, which is an absolute relief! I was so paranoid that after CLA, coming in a month into the year would be difficult! It really hasn't been that hard, though. It's fun hanging out with everyone in my class- they're all so hilarious! I've been "clique jumping" a lot- meaning I eat lunch with certain people, I spend recess with other people, and I spend before school with yet another group of people. It's not bad- I clique jump because I want to! It's hard to explain in words, but I think I just REALLY REALLY want everyone to like me! And I don't just want to know what the jocks talk about. I also want to know what the girly girls talk about, what the geeks talk about, what the music lovers talk about. It's great seeing the world from a French person's perspective, but I want to get more specific than that. It's fun hanging out with my guy friends before school, eating lunch with one group of girls, spending recess with another, and then hanging out with my American friend, too! It's fun being able to have an English conversation every once and awhile with someone who is going through the same thing as me! It helps so much!

Me and Kate, the 2 Americans :)

It's really funny when the people in my class make fun of my accent, too (or try to imitate it). I have a friend that calls me by my full name, all the time, in the most American way he can possibly say it (a very awkward Franco-American-British accent). It's great! Helping them all out with their English makes me feel so special- and in return, they help me learn French! I was sad I wasn't there at the beginning of the year for picture day... but here's the class picture all the same! :D

From Left to right:
Top Row: Valentin, Emersson, Lucas, Serhat, Nathan, Thomas
Middle: Gaëtan, Maxence, Aurélien, Alexandre, Octavie, Barbara, Léa, Our History teacher M. Mairey
Bottom: Timothée, Julie, Pauline, Manon, Valentine, Camille, Claudia, Elyse

I just can't get over how sweet everyone is! :) It's been making this whole high school transition that much easier! I understand more and more every day, and I'm almost positive I'll come home fluent. SCORE!
Last Wednesday, I spent the whole afternoon walking around Centre Ville with Kate, Amandine, and Lucie. It was a lot of fun! Kate and I practiced our French (I love how incredibly patient everyone is with us), and we visited my favorite Patisserie! Mmmm.

And then, the Wednesday before that, I went to the movies with my guy friends, and we saw Taken 2 dubbed in French. That was pretty amazing. :D I can't believe how much I could understand! It's good though. If you haven't seen it... you totally should (although I'm sure it came out forever ago in the states).

Then, last weekend, I had a ROTARY WEEKEND!! :D it was so great to see all the exchange students again! We have so much fun whenever we are all together, and we go to a lot of interesting places! On Saturday, we spent the afternoon in Stratsbourg. We went into the cathedral there, and it was absolutely amazing to be in a building that was so beautiful, so magnificent, and yet, SO OLD! Then, we had a little "party" thing at the hostel, where everyone sang, danced, locked people in the ping pong room, and played their instruments! The next day, we went to a potters workshop and learned how pottery was made. We all thought it would be really boring, but it was actually such an interesting thing to watch! Then, we went to the Shoenenbourg Fortress, which was basically this giant underground system that they used in the second world war. It was so cool to see things like that, things you would never find in the states! We went really REALLY far underground. The tunnel system was KILOMETERS long, and there was working electricity. It was incredible for the time period in which it was built! Then, we tasted CHOCOLATE at a real Chocolatier! Everything was so rich and so amazing, but afterwards we all felt so obnoxiously full from all the chocolate!

The Cathedral in Stratsbourg

We locked Zack in the ping pong room... :)

Arashi and Kat played a trombone-guitar duet of "Let it Be" by the Beatles!

I just thought this picture was really funny... XD "AND... WITH THIS CLAY... I CAN CONTROL THE WONDERS OF THE UNIVERSE!!!"

It's amazing how talented these people are!

Me, Gustavo, and Kat :D

There were train tracks inside the fortress that were used for transporting food, ammunition and weaponry from one end to the other.

A secret escape hatch!

This is how the hatch worked: there was a "wall" up the ladder, and there was a method to push down the wall to get to the other ladder (an area filled with dirt). once you pushed the wall, the dirt would fall down that hole in the ground to give the soldiers access to the ladder out. Clever, huh? 

Hello????

"Who's taller???"

There was a period of time when there was no fighting going on! During these few months, the soldiers were really bored. One of them was a really good artist, and he painted these paintings on the walls of the fortress!

An ELECTRIC POTATO PEELER?!

So many chocolates... :D

Some kind of chocolate spread. One of them was almond, the other was hazelnut. Mmmmmmm!

I feel like the climb is over. The anticipation is done. The nail-biting fear of what is going to happen next is gone. All I have yet to do is hold on for the ride!

Anyway, I have to go write a French essay (in English first... then I shall translate it. That way I can compile my words a little easier). But first, I'll leave you with a few "little things"

-Movies in France come out on Wednesday
-Everybody takes vacations at the same time, for the most part. All of the schools have days off at the same time.
-Halloween is definitely not as commercialized as it is in America. They don't really celebrate it here.
-School is a little more like college. I don't have the same classes every day, the order and the length of classes change, too! Some days I might have chem, others I might have history. It depends on the day of the week.
-We don't have class when the teacher isn't there. We need to go in a study room where a monitor watches us... urgh
-The French strictly believe in eating 5 fruits and/or veggies every day and a milk product with every meal (cheese or yogurt generally)
-It's perfectly okay to wear the same outfit two or three days in a row.
-I have to get up at 6 AM every day (except Wednesday) to catch a bus at 7, catch another bus at 7h20, to arrive at school at 7h40 to start school at 8. Yup, my morning is busy before it really even begins.
-School buses don't exist here. It's no big deal, though. The public transportation is really safe!

Another cute cat picture: Sleeping on the porch on a cold autumn morning

Aprés la Pluie, le Beau Temps

A lot of sad things happened last week- I ran out of my favorite body wash, I got stung (twice) by a wasp while riding the tallest roller coaster in Europe, and, to top it all off, it's been raining. Great.
But lately... I've been thinking a lot about this French proverb, the proverb I decided to use as the title for this blog post (THANK YOU MS BARBER FOR TEACHING IT TO US). The literal translation is "After the rain, good weather." Which could figuratively mean, you have to go through tough times to get through to the good times. I think this applies SO MUCH to every exchange student in one way or another. We all go through difficult or sad times- learning the language, the occasional pang of homesickness, making friends, making mistakes... but through all this hard work, we are going to have the best year of our lives- a year that will stick out in our memories forever.
These past few days have been amazing, and yet, incredibly sad at the same time. Who knew such contrasting emotions could occur at exactly the same time? Anyway, on Wednesday, I went to a Brasserie with a few of my friends from CLA. It took us about 30 minutes to search downtown for a restaurant that served dinner as early as 5:30 (I KNOW! Crazy right?). It was an insane amount of fun! I love how easily we all became friends. I remember the first day of class when I met Mana, Tomo, and Enrico, and how hard it was to speak to each other in a language so different from our own. And now, we may not be fluent, but I really think we've improved! We can (more) easily associate with waiters (it's harder than one would think!), and we can have a conversation without constantly asking to repeat what the other said or ask for the meaning of a word. Learning French is a slow and painful process, but I'm definitely getting better!

Tote, Tomoyuki, and Enrico :)

Anyway, back to Wednesday. I had the most AMAZING steak ever... with (GASP) FRENCH FRIES. "French Rare" steak (basically they put it on for like 5 minutes and it is done) is actually REALLY GOOD. It's so juicy that marinade is almost unnecessary! Loved it. Then, after our fantastic meal, the guys-Enrico, Tote (a really awesome Thai person who lives in thesame host family as Tomo), David, and Tomo, all walked Mana and me to the bus stop. It was so sweet- they waited the whole 30 minutes it took for our buses to come, in the pouring rain, after dark. It was so incredible being able to make such amazing friends after such a short time here. I'm planning on visiting Enrico and Tomo on Wednesday (I have a HALF DAY every week! SCORE!), but it's still going to be so sad without Mana there (she is going back to Japan after a week in Paris). We spent so much time together after school- going to cafés and patisseries and, yes, practicing our French. I hope that I make more friends at the high school, too, as amazing as my CLA friends are!

I had this amazing idea a few days ago. My sketchbook was completely empty, so I decided to use it as a way my friends could write a little message inside so I could remember each of them after exchange (even though I'm sure I'll remember them all anyway). Enrico wrote me the sweetest poem IN ITALIAN! It made me tear up just a little bit...

TRANSLATION:
 Like the swallows have migrated
you fly from world to world
this trip is fruitful
for you, for those you love

be careful while walking
the flame is never extinguished
there is color in your day
in your heart there is love

cheep cheep the Swallows always sing
but your songs are the most beautiful
a new friend, Voila!
I hope one day we will meet again!

I'm going to miss them so much! However, like my host dad said (in French), "you can't fall every time you take a step. You have to keep walking or you won't experience everything." I loved that. It's like this song that I've had stuck in my head this week: "may your past be the sound of your feet upon the ground, carry on". I can't wait to see more things, meet more people, and live my life in the shoes of a French person. This journey is fantastic, and it is only going to get better. There may be rain and tough times, but after the rain, there will always be good weather ahead.

The tallest roller coaster in Europe! The first drop is all the way on the right (this shot was taken from the parking lot)

Looking French Already!

"Aprés la pluie, le beau temps"

Random things:
-Riz Pilaf: do we have that in America?
-their standard pillows are square shaped.
-Pharmacies are as abundant as Starbucks in NYC
-They DO sell jeans with holes in them at your average store!
-It is polite to have both hands on the table while eating.
-They listen to English music here!
-Buses are used by EVERYBODY, not just bums. It's actually looked upon as a good thing- saving gas, etc. Plus, there are no school buses here so all the kids use the bus to go to school
-Figs are SO GOOD. Seriously.
-There are NO SUVs here... there are mini vans and tractor trailers, but no SUVs...
-Their cop cars look like ambulances. They make a different sound too, that is SO HORRIBLY ANNOYING.

Nîmes!

All of the inbounds and rebounds at our integration weekend at Vescemont. This is gonna be a good year <3

 Things here are happening so fast! It's so hard to write about everything that's happened, because every day, I seem to learn and see so much! When I think I've seen everything in this city, I find something else, I taste something else, I meet someone else... It's all so exciting! I can tell this is going to be a really great year.

Last weekend, I traveled on a TGV (a really really FAST train- 300 km/hour) to Nîmes, a city in the south of France. It is really well-known for its Roman architecture. I even saw an arena! It looks just like the Colosseum in Rome, really. It's crazy- I never knew there were other arenas like that! We went this weekend for 2 reasons: First, this weekend was the "Feria des Vendanges". This marks the end of the BULL FIGHTING season, and it's a huge three day festival. Throughout the whole city, there is this huge party, with music of every kind, tents with all types of food, and, of course, bulls. Saturday night, Véronique, Colombine (my host sister who is in college in Nîmes), Aurélien (Colombine's boyfriend), and I watched bulls run through the streets. They put up these fences, and the horses surround the bull to make sure the bull doesn't get away. Then, when the bull comes out of the trailer, a bunch of guys chase the bull down the street! It is such an interesting tradition! We also watched a competition where young men will try to grab the bull's horns for money. It was so exciting! The guys would jump over the fence to escape the bull, and sometimes the bull would get out of the center ring! It was so funny watching the officials try to lour the bull into the center.

A bunch of people wearing authentic regional costumes! The stilts were so the shepherds could watch over their sheep!

The second reason why we went to Nîmes this weekend was the "Journées du Patrimoine". This is a special weekend, throughout the whole country, where people can get into museums and other historical sites for free. It's a really great concept! We took a day trip to Arles on Saturday to visit the museums. There was another Roman arena there too!

An old gravestone! There were at least a hundred like this at the museum. They were all found in the same old cemetery!

A marble coffin! There were also a bunch of these, too! They were all so perfectly preserved- I couldn't believe it!

Roman Mosaics!

AQUEDUCTS! It was so neat to see these in person. They were things we talked about a lot in history class... but I had never actually seen them!

The streets were so adorable, too! The divot in the middle is so that water can flow out of the street!

The arena in Arles

The Rhone River! It was so pretty!

We had a REALLY AWESOME lunch on Sunday, too! It was calamari, with a really yummy salad. It tasted really great! I have only had calamari fried before. If you like that, you will like this at least eighty times better. I LOVE LOVE LOVED it! Then, for dessert, we had strawberries with whipped cream. This wasn't ordinary whipped cream. This was homemade whipped cream we bought at the market that morning. It was most certainly a whipped cream that put all whipped creams you THOUGHT were good in the dust. SO GOOD.

Whew, I have to go do my homework and be a good student and all that jazz. I'm still in CLA for another week and a half. After that, I begin my high school year! I am so nervous!
Here are a couple more quick things:
~Yes, peanut butter does exist here. It's not Jiff... but yes, It exists.
~Euro coins have different designs on the back, based on what country they're from! Colombine collects them like some people in the US collect quarters!
~It's true: clothes here are REALLY expensive.
~Their cups of coffee are really tiny, but the caffeine content is the same as our's.
~Always keep both hands on the table while eating your dinner!

And now... here's a song from the sixties that has been stuck in my head all day:

Bonne journée! :)