9-26-12...

Today was not the best day. Not in terms of feelings, but in terms of the actual day. It started out with me missing my alarm and getting up 10 minutes before I had to leave for the bus. I didn't know what to wear, I didn't have anything to eat, and I was super tired. It was a warm morning so I wore a short sleeve shirt, light weight jacket, jeans, and Toms. I took a mini chocolate croissant to go. I went to the bus, and went to school. When I got off the bus at school, it cooled off quite a bit. It wasn't cold yet, but it definitly cool. I went to my first class, French, which was 2 hours. That was the only class of the day for me, so at 10, Camila (Brazil), Joao (Brazil), Camille, Loriane, and I decided that we would go to the foyer (the room where you hang out if you don't have classes). It was really cold by that time, and it even started to drizzle a little. In The Room (what the exchange students call it), I had to finish my science notes, because I can't copy them down as fast as the teacher talks. I didn't finish, but Joao wanted to go to the supermarket to get something to eat. It was raining then, at about 10:15. We walked down the street to the market, and got some chips. Then, we walked back. It was about 10:40/10:50 by the time we were back at the school. It was raining a little harder. Camille and I wanted to go to National Street, the road with all the little boutiques and cafés, and get some paninis to eat. The others wanted to wait until it stopped raining. I mean, it's just rain! We waited 10 minutes, and it was just raining harder and harder. We decided to just go (FINALLY!). There were 3 umbrellas, and 5 people. So, Camila and Camille shared, I shared with Loriane, and Joao had his own. We started walking, and Joao thought it would be good if Loriane had her own because she had a cold. So I shared with Joao. We were only at the front of the school when Camille decided she didn't like umbrellas. I was already wet because Joao is a tall person and the umbrella was too high for me to stay dry. So in the end, Camila, Joao, and Loriane had their own umbrellas, and Camille and I were walking in the rain. It was fun for a bit because Camille and I had a water fight to see who could splash the other more with the water from the puddles. We both ended up soaked. We got to the panini place and ordered. We were there for about an hour I think. We left at 11:50ish. Camille and I were still walking without umbrellas, and it was still pouring. We got to the school and all of us was soaking wet. I mean everything. Our jeans, our shoes (my Toms), our jackets (my shirt stayed dry!), and our hair. We were also freezing to death. I mean we were cold. Like icecubes cold. I'm not exaggerating. At all. Camila and Joao went on to wait for the buses outside (STUPID!), while Loriane went to go do sign up for swimming, and Camille and I went to The Room. It was actually warm; For about 10 minutes, and then a teacher told us she was closing the room. We went out into the hallway, and it was cold again. It was finally 12:45 when the gate opened and we went out to wait for our buses. That's when we found Loriane. There were a whole slew of buses, and Camila and Camille's bus left, and Loriane and I were waiting for our bus. We waited for half an hour in the freezing rain! The bus finally got there, and we loaded on. I finally got to my house, took a loooong hot shower, drank some hot chocolate, and here I am. It was a very cold, wet, dreary, gloomy, no good, very bad day. The morning lied.

Ramasser Les Raisins (Picking Grapes), and Other... :)

3 Weeks In!

So it's been three weeks since I got to France! I'm having sooo much fun! I just picked blueberries today with Camila (Brazilian), Joao (Brazilian), Elias (Venezuelan), and Cullen and Karlin (both American). It was soo much fun! There were a lot of other people there too. It was with this wine place. We picked three huge crates of blueberries!!! I think I picked over 300 bundles of blueberries, it was crazy! It was fun, but I also got some nasty scratches on my legs, and a lot of blueberry juice in my hair. That was not so much fun :/ . Anyway, I took a loooong hot shower when I got back and had to wash my legs, arms and hair twice to get all the juice and dirt off. It felt good, but would've been better if I could've just stood under the water instead of scrubbing my scalp and skin. All and all though, it was a good day :) . I can't believe I'm saying this, but I actually like school here! I can't understand my teachers (and what I can understand, I can't write down because I can't write as fast as they talk), but I like the french students! They are not even close to as mean as we americans think they are. All of them looove to practice english with me! (Yes mom, I tell them I can't speak english too much :|) They're all really nice! They invited me to go swimming today, but I couldn't because i was blueberry picking with Rotary :( . Luckily they said they would try to do something when I don't have somewhere I need to be. I LOVE FRANCE! I can tell my french is getting better too. Not too fast, but just enough that I'm totally freaking out that'll I'll never understand. Some things still have to be repeated, but I expected that much for a while. My blazer is all but overflowing in the front already! I bought a french patch and pin in Lyon when I was there with Rotary. Now I can show my pride for both of the countries I love! For my classes, it's sooo different then the schedule in America! Here they have three different sets of classes you can take. S (sciences), E.S. (Economical Sciences), and L (Literature). Then, there are première, deuxième, and terminale. Those are like 10th, 11th, and 12th grades in America. 9th grade is at what America calls Middleschool (It's College here). I have Première L. So, I have History and Geography, French (America's english), English Literature, French Literature, English, Spanish, and Gym. Then I have other classes that are either only one semester, or every other week. Class Life, Life and Earth Sciences, Chemistry and Physics, Civil Liberties, and classes to get ready for the BAC (French version of the SAT test basically). I then have another class that meets once a thursday for 1 hour, just for exchange students (I think) and it's to make sure we understand everything (......HA!......) Then, I have Music. This was hard to come by because at first I had L'Art Plastiques. I could choose between Math (hahaha!), Music, or Plastic Arts. I chose plastic arts because I thought it was just like art class here. I was really wrong. What it is, is really just a Art History class with a little drawing thrown in. Not what I expected. So, I asked to change into Music. Well, here, it is A LOT harder to change classes than it is in America. A lot harder. Our schedules aren't per block, per semester. They're like two or three times a week, all year. I'll upload a picture of my classes later, but It's really different. I kinda like it though :D . Anyway, it was really hard to change my class from Plastic Arts to Music. I finally did it, but not until Friday. The end of the second week of school. My English Lit. teacher is really nice, and she brought Elias, Camila, and Me up to the front of the class to talk to the students about ourselves in English. It was really awkward, but it seemed that the students were happy to know more about us. At the beginning, the teacher asked the students if they knew anything about us. When the students answered something right, we would smile at them, and they were happy and proud that they knew something about the cool foreigners. It was really funny because they were raising their hands like crazy trying to out eachother in what they knew about us. I have two really good french friends already, and one of them is my neighboor, so they won, but it was funny to see the class 'fight' for knowledge of us. The teacher was pretty cool too. When we had a worksheet about books authors from America or another English speaking country, the two students in front of Camila and I would always ask me for the answer (it was a teamwork worksheet mom) and I didn't know!! I haven't ever takin a class before that was solely for English Lit, and the people that know me know that I don't really read books that would be in one of those classes. So, it was really awkward because the only ones I knew were Harry Potter, Winnie the Pooh, and Pride & Prejudice (and that one only because I saw a movie that had something about that in it). It was so weird! Enough with class though. The two friends that I was talking about earlier are Loriane and Camille. Loriane is my neighboor and Camille is her best friend. They're those people who are friendly with mostly everyone. That's really nice because I don't know anybody. There close group of friends are really nice. It was really funny! We were playing a card game after school in the park the other day, and supposedly the french don't know how to shuffle properly, they just do the  mix the cards in your hands thing. It was my turn to shuffle, and being taught how to suffle like a pro at a young age :P , I did the shuffle thing and then the bridge thing. I did that a couple times without looking up, and when I was finished, everyone was staring at me like I just performed heart surgery or something!!! It was hilarious!!! Anyway, after that, when it was someone's turn, they tried to shuffle the way I do, they couldn't, and everyone laughed and it was really funny :) . Anyway, I'm getting tired of typing so maybe I'll post again in the next week, maybe I won't, or maybe I'll post only pictures. Any which way, I'm done with this post so Seeya! Wouldn't wanna be ya! (honestly I like where I am very much thank you :P )

More Pictures!!!