Well, the first chapter of my Nantais story is finished and I'm back on American soil. Quite jetlagged, mind you, but back. I went to bed at nine thirty last night, but then woke up at 6 am today...ah well.
I'm so pleased, by the way, to have gotten over 1400 hits on this blog. I'm well aware that a lot of them are repeats (hah myself included, when I update/check for comments!) but still...it's pretty exciting to see that big a number =D I'll continue updating when I get back to French soil on the 16th of Janvier, but for now I'm going to enjoy being back in the States with my REAL family and all my American friends =)
Joyeux Noël et Bonne Année à tout le monde!
23 December 2007
18 December 2007
SOOOOO close to the end...
I have officially taken all 3 exams and handed in two papers. I have one more paper to hand in tommorrow morning to M Zonza and then after that...I'm FREE! but technically, I've finished the paper, so in a way I'm already free =D this past week and a half has been utterly exhausting. and I realized that in the past 3 weeks I have written 23 pages en français. Four different topics, mind you, but still. that's the equivalent of the junior IS I'll have to write next semester. no wonder I'm so burnt out...
so. time for some funny anectdotes of my life (please forgive my spelling errors, I can no longer write/speak/think properly in english!):
I seem to have caught the Cinderella Syndrome...I have a pair of shoes that used to have straps on them (notice the used to...) and while they are still wearable, they're sometimes difficult to keep on my feet. Case and point? I was sitting on the big steps at the fac waiting for class...well, when I got up to go, I started walking down the stairs - and walked right out of my shoe, leaving it two steps above me! hence...the cinderella syndrome (especially since I was in a dress when it happened!!)
Over the weekend there was a Christmas parade..."pour les enfants" (for the children) but goodness knows everyone went!! once the parade was over, there was a pretty fabulous mad rush of people trying to find their ways to whereever they were going...and lots of strollers. Lots and LOTS of strollers. In my attempt to avoid getting trampled by said strollers, I stepped quickly to the left - not realizing there was this random...thing sticking out of the ground. It's like a road block thing that retracts into the ground...at any rate, I defintely fell flat on my face, got the wind knocked out of me, and because of the inability to breathe, I couldn't respond when all the concerned french people were asking me "ça va?" (it goes? you okay?) oh, and I'm sporting a pretty fantastic bruise on my hip bone, too =D
and the adorableness of the weekend...Sunday was Christmas Pagent Sunday at my church!! All the little gamins (kids) led worship...they'd act out the bible stories (the one where God tells abram and sarai that their ancestors will number greater than the stars) and they all had stars around their necks...and the music. oh wow...the music. We sang Christmas carols - including the French versions of "Oh come all ye faithful," "silent night," "when the saints go marching in" and a jewish song (that one was fun!!) as well as a couple of hymns that were verbal gymnastics for us foreigners...and all of this music was accompagnied by an accordian and a tuba and a saxaphonish type thing...traditional french accompagniement!! it was so cool...all of us IES students were freaking out it was so cute and so fun...we kept squealing and cooing and laughing. at one point the lady in front of us turned and sort of chuckled...Derek said "pardonnez-nous" to which she replied "non...non c'est parfait!" it made me really happy. ("excuse us...no, no it's perfect).
okay. time to go to IES to print off my Fables paper so that I can be officially practically done!!
à +
(T-3 DAYS!!)
so. time for some funny anectdotes of my life (please forgive my spelling errors, I can no longer write/speak/think properly in english!):
I seem to have caught the Cinderella Syndrome...I have a pair of shoes that used to have straps on them (notice the used to...) and while they are still wearable, they're sometimes difficult to keep on my feet. Case and point? I was sitting on the big steps at the fac waiting for class...well, when I got up to go, I started walking down the stairs - and walked right out of my shoe, leaving it two steps above me! hence...the cinderella syndrome (especially since I was in a dress when it happened!!)
Over the weekend there was a Christmas parade..."pour les enfants" (for the children) but goodness knows everyone went!! once the parade was over, there was a pretty fabulous mad rush of people trying to find their ways to whereever they were going...and lots of strollers. Lots and LOTS of strollers. In my attempt to avoid getting trampled by said strollers, I stepped quickly to the left - not realizing there was this random...thing sticking out of the ground. It's like a road block thing that retracts into the ground...at any rate, I defintely fell flat on my face, got the wind knocked out of me, and because of the inability to breathe, I couldn't respond when all the concerned french people were asking me "ça va?" (it goes? you okay?) oh, and I'm sporting a pretty fantastic bruise on my hip bone, too =D
and the adorableness of the weekend...Sunday was Christmas Pagent Sunday at my church!! All the little gamins (kids) led worship...they'd act out the bible stories (the one where God tells abram and sarai that their ancestors will number greater than the stars) and they all had stars around their necks...and the music. oh wow...the music. We sang Christmas carols - including the French versions of "Oh come all ye faithful," "silent night," "when the saints go marching in" and a jewish song (that one was fun!!) as well as a couple of hymns that were verbal gymnastics for us foreigners...and all of this music was accompagnied by an accordian and a tuba and a saxaphonish type thing...traditional french accompagniement!! it was so cool...all of us IES students were freaking out it was so cute and so fun...we kept squealing and cooing and laughing. at one point the lady in front of us turned and sort of chuckled...Derek said "pardonnez-nous" to which she replied "non...non c'est parfait!" it made me really happy. ("excuse us...no, no it's perfect).
okay. time to go to IES to print off my Fables paper so that I can be officially practically done!!
à +
(T-3 DAYS!!)
13 December 2007
ooooooof...
okay. life = SO CHAOTIC right now. I have a grammar final tomorrow, my french writers final monday, france and the atlantic world final tuesday, and I have to hand in my Liaisons Dangereuses paper tuesday and Fables de la Fontaine paper on wednesday. THEN I can breathe. and then come home next friday!!!
recap of my Parisian weekend:
exhausting
hilarious! we even got a french man to burst out laughing =O
emotionally overwhelming
WET...though we did come up with a term to describe the rainy days in France: Reject Nanny Rain. you know, in Mary Poppins, when Mary shows up and all of the other nannies' umbrellas flip inside out and they blow away? yep, Alyce and I became the reject nannies.
just plain amazing.
as for what we did/saw?
Friday: Moulin Rouge, café des 2 moulins (IE THE CAFE IN WHICH AMELIE WAS FILMED!!), Le Sacre Coeur, Montmartre, Champs Elysées, the Ferris Wheel
Saturday: Eiffel Tower, Starbucks (yes, that counts. when you're as much of a coffee addict as Alyce, it's almost as exciting as any of the famous monuments!), lunch with Alex, Notre Dame de Paris, MUSEE D'ORSAY!!, Ce Soir, Je Dors Chez Toi (a really cute french chick flick), haagen daaz ice cream =D
Sunday: Church, Arc de Triomphe, Opéra Garnier (because I'm a good little Phantom Phan!), Galeries Lafayette, attempted to go to Père Lachaise (the famous people graveyard - featured in the FANTASTIC film Paris, Je T'aime)
and then since we were utterly exhausted and in so much pain from walking all over Paris, we crashed at the gare and waited for our train.
was it the perfect last trip of the semester? you better believe it.
and while I haven't had a chance to upload Paris pics, I did update the "nonfacebookpeoples" album, the "Ma Vie en France" album, and a new one: Ma Vie en France: la deuxième partie
...hopefully once finals are done I can write one more REAL post before I get on the plane to come home...in 8 days!!
à+
recap of my Parisian weekend:
exhausting
hilarious! we even got a french man to burst out laughing =O
emotionally overwhelming
WET...though we did come up with a term to describe the rainy days in France: Reject Nanny Rain. you know, in Mary Poppins, when Mary shows up and all of the other nannies' umbrellas flip inside out and they blow away? yep, Alyce and I became the reject nannies.
just plain amazing.
as for what we did/saw?
Friday: Moulin Rouge, café des 2 moulins (IE THE CAFE IN WHICH AMELIE WAS FILMED!!), Le Sacre Coeur, Montmartre, Champs Elysées, the Ferris Wheel
Saturday: Eiffel Tower, Starbucks (yes, that counts. when you're as much of a coffee addict as Alyce, it's almost as exciting as any of the famous monuments!), lunch with Alex, Notre Dame de Paris, MUSEE D'ORSAY!!, Ce Soir, Je Dors Chez Toi (a really cute french chick flick), haagen daaz ice cream =D
Sunday: Church, Arc de Triomphe, Opéra Garnier (because I'm a good little Phantom Phan!), Galeries Lafayette, attempted to go to Père Lachaise (the famous people graveyard - featured in the FANTASTIC film Paris, Je T'aime)
and then since we were utterly exhausted and in so much pain from walking all over Paris, we crashed at the gare and waited for our train.
was it the perfect last trip of the semester? you better believe it.
and while I haven't had a chance to upload Paris pics, I did update the "nonfacebookpeoples" album, the "Ma Vie en France" album, and a new one: Ma Vie en France: la deuxième partie
...hopefully once finals are done I can write one more REAL post before I get on the plane to come home...in 8 days!!
à+
06 December 2007
oh it's a jolly holiday with (er...without) Mary!
Last weekend was so much fun...it was a very Mary Poppins kind of a weekend! It started with the resident chalk artist of Nantes doing a mural of Jesus (Alyce: why is Jesus smoking a joint?! Me: erm...Alyce that's a candle!! ...oh). Then, we bought ourselves candy apples at the Marché de Noël. Of course, that wasn't enough - we rode the carousel with said candy apples! We were laughing and eating our candy apples and being loud americans on a carousel meant, of course, for children. The french people started gathering around and laughing at us and snapping pictures with their camera phones, but it was no skin off our noses! You KNOW they'll never forget those crazy american girls...and the best part was when Nicole and Lauren stumbled upon the scene...and Nicole started running AROUND the carousel trying to get pictures of us! it was pretty much hilarious and it made me so happy =D and the final part of our very Mary day was when we went to the Jardin des Plantes. It's absolutely gorgeous...I'm going to spend a lot of time there next semester, I think. We were walking around and saw this man feeding pigeons, so we wander over. All of a sudden, he pours the feed into his hand - and the pigeons fly up and perched on his hand eating out of his palm! we were pretty much amazed...and then he held out his hand to me. He poured the feed into my hand...and next thing I know, a snow white pigeon flies up and clings to my fingers as it pecks at the food in my hand. I was very Beauty and the Beast, as well as 'feed the birds, tuppence a bag...' (except that we didn't have to pay a tuppence!) it was such a fun, random afternoon...the sort of weekend you miss if you travel every single weekend like so many of my classmates do...
and speaking of travel, I'm headed to Paris tomorrow! I can't wait...Paris is beautiful enough as is, but I can only imagine it all decked out for Christmas! It'll hopefully be a nice, relaxing weekend - malgré que (despite that) I finished the awful beast of a paper, I still have three more to write within the next week and a half - all of them for the classes at the fac that I haven't had since the first week of november, of course! but one is done - well, in need of editing, but done - and another has been started...and the third will be EASY. The topic is "women in Les Liaisons Dangereuses" - c'mon, I'm a Women's Studies major...I can write a paper like that in my sleep!
also - the facebook photo album of pics that my friends took has been updated...I'll get my own pics up after the Parisian weekend.
and a weather update: raining, as always. but that's because it's currently 13 degrees...Celsius. which makes it about 56 F =D but I hope there'll be snow when I come home...in 15 days!
à + !
and speaking of travel, I'm headed to Paris tomorrow! I can't wait...Paris is beautiful enough as is, but I can only imagine it all decked out for Christmas! It'll hopefully be a nice, relaxing weekend - malgré que (despite that) I finished the awful beast of a paper, I still have three more to write within the next week and a half - all of them for the classes at the fac that I haven't had since the first week of november, of course! but one is done - well, in need of editing, but done - and another has been started...and the third will be EASY. The topic is "women in Les Liaisons Dangereuses" - c'mon, I'm a Women's Studies major...I can write a paper like that in my sleep!
also - the facebook photo album of pics that my friends took has been updated...I'll get my own pics up after the Parisian weekend.
and a weather update: raining, as always. but that's because it's currently 13 degrees...Celsius. which makes it about 56 F =D but I hope there'll be snow when I come home...in 15 days!
à + !
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)