but anyways, let me backtrack:
Friday, despite the jetlag, I had to wake up at 7am to get ready and go to school for orientation. My hostmom printed out a travel itinerary for me so i would know what metro (subway) stops to take-- i had to transfer 3 times, but it was actually WAY easier than chicago. It's like the eL is useless, no signs anywhere! Here, however, it's so clear, so no problems there. When I got off at the stop for my school, I definitely wandered around for a halfhour not knowing where I was. Like a big girl, I pulled out my map and figured it out. A little late to orientation, but hey, it's the first day, they were lenient. Orientation was long and boring, apparently the more "interesting" stuff will happen next week? We'll see if that's true. I got home around 2 or 3 after getting lunch with some friends from school and my hostmom took me around our neighborhood to show me everything. After walking for about 40 minutes (in circles and up and down different places) she was like "well, i'm off to the dentist! think you can find your way back?" uhhh...sure? haha talk about immersion. I was proud of myself though, did it no problem, made 2 friends on the street (long story short they asked me for a lighter for cigarettes, i didn't have one, but we ended up talking and they didn't believe i was American blahblahblah) and came home, relaxed a bit, and had dinner with the family. The host student from last year came over for dinner because she's visiting here for a few weeks so it was cool to get her take on things. I wanted to go out with my American friends but I was too tired, so I just relaxed in my room and went to bed early.
Saturday - still jetlagged. We got a free touristbus pass from school, so i met up with a bunch of girls at the Eiffel Tower and we all took the bus together. It was suuuuper cold! (we sat on the roof seats) but definitely worth it because we drove past a majority of the major landmarks and got to take pictures. We ended up splitting ways and I stuck with 3 girls from DePaul and another girl from North Carolina who's actually staying in the same house as my DePaul friend Laura, and we all got lunch together and decided to do more exploring. We got on the metro and found our way to Montmartre, the part of the city where Moulin Rouge is, and went to this beautiful church called Sacré Coeur, where a man on the steps was playing "Fast Car" by Tracy Chapman and singing along, which made me smile. and then we basically wandered streets and looked at buildings and people watched for about 2 hours. An artist asked us to do draw a portrait and we said no, and that was when he told us in english "you speak french like chickens!" We continued to wander, and for those of you that have seen the movie Amélie, remember the restaurant she worked at, Les Deux Moulins? We found it!!! We're definitely going back to eat one day, to soak it all in ;). We all decided to go home, I ran into my "two friends" as i was walking out of the metro station, they were coming out of a store so they walked me back towards my area of the neighborhood. They were gonna come out tonight, but decided not to at last minute. I, however, ate dinner with the host sister Lucie and her 2 friends who had come over for food before they went to a friend's party. It was my "parents" anniversary tonight so they went out together.
Around 9 i met up with a girl named Jocelyn who lives one street behind me and we went to the metro to meet up with my DePaul friends. The "metro police" were checking everyone's tickets because i guess they've had problems lately with people sneaking on the train without paying. Unlike chicago, it's not a card pass. You actually get small tickets that you cannot reuse, a stamp shows up on the back. So Jocelyn threw hers away after we got into the station (i probably would have done the same thing! who knew?) but the police came up and when she didn't have a ticket to present, she got charged a fine of 25 Euro. =( Kind of a downer to start the night, but at least now we know! We took the metro to this area called Oberkampff, which is basically a big bar area. It was fun, just required a bit too much energy on our only third night. I'm still sooooo tired! We left at 12 and Jocelyn and I took the train together and walked each other home. Our friends were staying out later, but they all kind of live together so they have each other to depend on. She and I, since we're living in a suburb, have further to go, so we decided it was best to leave. Unlike my family told me, the metro is actually really crowded at night and I definitely didn't feel uncomfortable or unsafe at all. It seemed no different from Chicago. I went to put my ticket through the machine and it kept saying they were "invalid" -- i'm not sure why! I just bought them today, because we cannot buy a monthlong pass until February starts. So i bought a package deal of 10 tickets and none of them were working! just as my friend Katie was gonna hand me one of her tickets to use, some random guy came up and said in english "no no, don't use her ticket, stop, i'll help" and he swiped his month pass in for me and let me get through! It was the nicest thing, i couldn't believe it, talk about a good Samaritan! =) So Jocelyn and I made it home safe and sound. It's time for bed for me, I'm still so wiped outttt. Luckily tomorrow I get to sleep in and catch up on my rest before another full week of school stuff to do. It will be a nice lazy day, which you all know i adore. ;)
Sooo there's my novel for the night! Unfortunately I forgot my camera cord at home (hopefully Dad mailed it to me already!) and so for the moment, the only way to get pictures up is by putting my memory card in on the family's main computer. I'll try and do that tomorrow, so stay in tune! goodnight everyone, i miss you all terribly, and God bless. =)
No comments:
Post a Comment