Not the best day ever.

First day of classes today.

Which inevitably meant a few little blunders.

First traumatic experience (I exaggerate, it wasn't that traumatic): I'm sitting in a class called Langue Francaise (one of our two courses here in Tours), and I'm towards the back of the room right next to the AC. The teacher notices it's 1000 degrees in the room, so she asks me to stand up and turn on the AC. Pas de probleme, I'm thinking. She says "juste a droite," so I'm like, okay, on the right. There are lots of buttons on this little AC box, but only one on the right, so I put my finger on it and turn to her to make sure that's what she meant. She replies "Non!" At that point, I start to mentally panic, thinking I somehow got my left and right mixed up. She then starts spouting random directions like "en bas" and "a droite" again, until she's just too frustrated and asks someone else to do it. The guy who comes over to "help" me presses the first button I had my finger on......! I was just like, are you serious? It was the first time when I really didn't understand...even though I really did and she just thought I didn't. Essentially, I was made to look stupid for something that I got right the first time. I was pretty frustrated about it.

Second instance: Lunch at Place Plume. After looking for a cheap place to get something for lunch, we finally settle on a small cafe just outside the square. Trois euros quatre-vingt. For some unexplainable reason my head translates that to 3,40. WRONG. So that was mildly embarrassing, and I believe the first time that someone has switched to English while speaking to me. She waved my 50 cent coin around and explained, in English, how much I owed. Faillll.

Third instance: My hostess made fun of me for cutting up my spaghetti with a fork and knife rather than using a spoon and wrapping it around my fork. She then proceeded to tell me how she once had a student stay with her who also did what I did: "J'avais une autre etudiante qui a aussi coupe le spaghetti comme ca. Une autre petite Americaine. Elle ne savait rien manger." Translation: "I had another student who also cut her spaghetti like that. Another little American girl. She didn't know how to eat anything." OK so she called me American, which I guess is forgivable. But I'm pretty sure she was in a way mocking me, telling me my way of eating spaghetti (and maybe inadvertently other foods as well) was wrong. Well, I didn't really care, I just cut up my pasta, ate it with ease, and watched on as Tara and Mme struggled with their falling noodles. Tant pis pour eux. Even if it's not culturally appropriate, I don't see anything wrong with cutting up spaghetti. Personally, I'd rather not look Italian than get spaghetti sauce all over myself.

So it wasn't the best day. The good news, though, is that I finally acquired a cell phone. I managed to complete that transaction in comprehensible although not perfect French. I feel like my confidence took a few hits today, but I can't let it get to me. In order to keep practicing and using my French, I have to remain confident in my abilities....otherwise one mistake will inevitably cause another, which will cause another, etc. When practicing/learning a language, I think you're so much better off if you're positive and sure of yourself....from what I've learned (at least of myself), I don't do nearly as well if I'm anxious, nervous, or insecure. So I'll keep trying. :)

le samedi

On Saturday, Tara and I got to sleep in and then have the biggest brunch of all time: yogurt, toast, tea, juice, cereal, pizza, and pain au chocolat. We didn't quite finish our pain so we decided to take it with us on our group trip to Amboise.

The whole group took a train together, and we were unfortunately the last ones to get on it...oops. The walk that our hostess (who is assez vieille) said would take 10 minutes took us 20....and we were walking at a very brisk pace. Mme V must be a marathoner or something.

Anyway, so we took the train and then walked in the oppressive heat (yes, it was that hot) about 30 minutes to the city's center. There, we visited Le Clos Lucé, where Leonardo da Vinci spent his last 3 years. It was pretty interesting, and they had models of many of his inventions on display with short descriptions of what they were used for. I still left feeling like the da Vinci exposition in Atlanta a few years ago was much more informative and interesting. Oh well.

Then, we walked back to the Chateau and had ice cream before our tour. The Chateau d'Amboise itself was very beautiful, and we took lots of amazing photos (which probably all look the same).

As we were leaving to walk back to the train, one of the directors told me there is another Finnish student in the program. I of course got really excited and decided I had to meet her ASAP. Well, the director introduced us about 5 seconds later, and once we realized that we both speak Finnish, we switched to our native language and talked all the way back to the train station and to Tours. It was really interesting to see someone else who is practically in the same situation as I (speaks Finnish, lives in the US, visits Finland every summer), and we had a great time talking about our favorite things about Finland. I have to say though, it was somewhat confusing to be speaking Finnish in France on an American program. When I was spoken to in French afterwards, I had to think for a while about what language to respond in. Oh the difficulties of multi-lingualism (just kidding, don't hate me). Anyway it was really really cool and basically just a HUGE coincidence that we're both on this program. :)

Day 2 et beaucoup mieux!

My French is already getting better! I feel so much more comfortable speaking, even to people at stores and restaurants and stuff (read: real French people). It helps a lot that everyone here is very friendly and understanding of les américains. I'm afraid this will not be the case in Paris...but we will see in a few weeks.

Today was quite the eventful day. Tara and I woke up at 9.30 am for le petit déjeuner, which consisted of plain yogurt (not our favorite, but okay), Frosted Flakes which came disguised in a Muesli box (didn't ask about that one), toast with butter/jam, juice, and tea. It basically felt like I was having breakfast at my grandma's house...it was nice.

Afterwards, we decided to explore Tours a bit. We walked along the Loire, which is right by where we live. It was beautiful--so many pretty bridges, buildings, etc. After that, we decided to check out a Jardin close-by. It was pretty, but not as large as we had imagined. We also passed tons of picturesque fountains and old buildings...we stopped to take pictures about every 5 minutes.

As we were making our way home, we ran into Adam and Charlie who are both in our program. We decided to grab lunch with them at a place called Au Bureau (at the office? yeah I don't know.) It was good, we split 2 pizzas and I had my first legal drink!--an apple cider that was very very delicious.

Thennn we were off to an informational meeting which was fairly boring.

Apres, we went to get cell phones. A few days ago, I was telling my family, "There is no way in hell that I'll be able to explain to a French person what kind of cell phone/plan I need, etc." And then I got there, told the lady what I wanted, and that was it. Easy peasy lemon squeezy. Unfortunately, doing so only put me on a waiting list, and we had to go to a little program get-together before my name was called, but hey, at least I'm fully prepared for next time. I feel like I'm maybe a bit more comfortable speaking French at this point than some of the other students, which completely surprises me, seeing as yesterday I was essentially mute. Today I think I asked at least 3 different people for directions, and 1 person if I could take a chair that wasn't being used from her table. Sweeeeeeet.

I'm getting tired of writing...ok so the get-together we went to was basically everyone from the program at a café (Au Bureau....surprise!), and the directors bought us free drinks. Yippeeee. I had a glass of champagne and some extremely sweet white wine. I thought I would like it more the sweeter it was, but it was too sweet! Still not bad, though.

Then we came home, had dinner (spinach, salmon, and toast w/paté), then went out with other JYF kids. It was cool, but kind of hard to find places we wanted to go slash find people we wanted to hang out with. We stayed for quite a while though, came back around 2 am. I like that Tours is an extremely safe city--I'm usually extremely paranoid about getting robbed/kidnapped/molested/etc. but even walking back at night, I felt really safe. There are people out in the streets even late at night. It also helps that I have Tara to walk with, of course. I'm sure if I were alone I wouldn't feel half as safe.

A tout a l'heure :)

First day in Tours

So finally I have arrived in the quaint, adorable little city called Tours. The trip was long. It wasn't so much the flight itself as it was everything around it--administrative stuff, buses, meetings, etc. This is pretty much how it went:

Fly to Washington, D.C.

Go to hotel, wait for an hour

Go to meeting at hotel

Take bus back to airport

Get on plane to Paris

Go through immigration

Wait for bags for an hour

Get on a bus to Tours

Stop for "lunch" at 10 am

Arrive...approximately 24 hours after start of journey

Seeing as I find it incredibly difficult to sleep when sitting, I was only able to sleep for about 45 minutes on the D.C.-Paris flight. Then they served dinner, which woke me up. Lame.

I was still so out of it when they came around with the drink carts, that I couldn't think to say anything other than "water, please." I didn't realize until a bit later that they were also serving wine and champagne for FREE and that they actually would have given it to me, no questions asked. Welcome to AirFrance. Most everyone around me got their own personal wine bottle, so I felt a little lame. That's when I also started getting nervous and thinking--"I don't even drink wine! What am I going to do with myself in France?!" That was my first little inner-panic-moment...sure there will be more to come. Anyway, I'll try to give wine my best shot while I'm here.

When we got to Tours, we all stood in a courtyard by the Institut de Touraine (where we will be taking classes) as the host families started arriving. They then called out names of families and students and matched them up. Tara (my roommate) and I were matched up with Mme Veyssiere, after which we took a taxi to her apartment.

When we got inside, Mme V explained a few things to us, switching between French and English depending on how confused we looked. I was really focusing on trying to understand, but I guess I was so tired that some of the things she said just flew right past me. Those times, I would kind of just smile and nod, which I'm pretty sure is very obviously code for "yeah, okay, I have no idea what you're saying." Since then, I've been trying to be more straightforward and just tell her when I don't understand. Maybe that way I can learn something new.

After that, it was about 1 pm, and I decided to lay down. On my big, comfortable bed. Then I slept for 5-6 hours. It was glorious. I woke up, showered, and had my first dinner with our little "host family." It was really nice, although the conversation was somewhat fragmented, and I felt really bad for Mme V because she kept picking everything up for us, serving us, etc. even though she hurt her leg yesterday and has been limping.

Well, it's about 11 pm now, and Mme V requested we wake up at 9.30 am for le petit déjeuner. Lets hope I'm able to fall asleep even after my obnoxiously long nap. :)

3 weeks on the dot...!

Leaving for Paris on the 26th of August...

Countdown: 21 days.

Annnnnd cue the nerves.

Oh and the last-minute shopping for appropriate Paris-in-Fall clothing.

Oh shit I'm so nervous!

But happy. :)