So here I am looking ahead to only 2 weeks left of this madness that is study abroad. But before I can look ahead, I've got a lot of catching up to do. I know I know I've been bad about this whole blog thing this semester. So here is the past month....
Exactly one month ago I had no idea how I was going to make it until the end of the semester. Classes sucked, I was fighting with Jason (always a bad sign) and everything seemed to remind me of home and the fact that I wasn't there. It's been gorgeous out, but that most certainly did not help my productivity. At this point I realized that no matter how much I like traveling (or rather being in new places as actually traveling stresses me out), I am not at all happy without my friends and family. And Jason. It may sound cliche and stupid, but he makes it incredibly difficult to be here and not there.
So now I have ruled out a few career paths.
1.) Peace corps. It's never gonna happen. After the village in Morocco and after not even a full year abroad all signs point to me hating it.
2.) Any job that requires me to live too far from family. I start to hate myself for not being able to be there for them. Maybe I'm not selfish enough (never thought I'd say that) but when I miss things or can't help out with family issues I get angry, then sad, then disappointed, then mad at Jason for one reason or another, then sad again. No bueno
So after these reflections and 2 weeks of classes, we had a 2 week vacation for Easter. My host mom went to Montreal to visit their son who lives there so she, host dad and host sister went to Paris on Friday evening. I had the house completely to myself for Friday and Saturday so I naturally had a couple friends over and did what I always do... I baked. Friday I cooked rice and beans and Katy made lemon bars. Then Saturday I spent the entire day reading and sitting out in the sun. My older host sister surprised me by showing up and told me that we were going to have a bbq on sunday so I was only kind of surprised when Marine and Michel (my host dad and sister) showed up at 2am from Paris on Saturday night. But before they came back, I had done a TON of baking and made more lemon bars, carrot cake and chocolate chip cookies. Sunday I went to church with Ashley, which was great, then came back, hung out and had a nice lunch with the host fam. It was me, Marine, Michel, Annaise and her wife Charlotte. The bbq was not your every day bbq. Maybe it's just me, but I don't normally drink champagne at a bbq and I don't think I've ever had eggplant from a grill... it was awesome! After we just sat out, then the girls ended up starting a water fight. This is gonna sound really weird, but I was actually really happy when Annaise threw water at me. I know that they aren't over the moon about having a foreign student in the house, but it was like a sign of inclusion. I thought it was even better because just after she threw it, before she saw the look on my face (which I was already laughing as soon as I saw it coming) she said "laugh, laugh," as though she had no idea how I was going to react to it. She took a chance by including me, the risk that i'd be pissed that she dumped freezing cold water at me. I was actually impressed. But then again I could be over analyzing it.
In any case, I went to my friend's house and hung out with her for a little while until it was around dinner time. I came home and prepared for a VERY early Monday morning.
5:30am. That's when I got up, threw my clothes on, ate breakfast, ready to leave the house by 6. The train left at 7am, and Kathryn, Liza and I were happily settled by the time we pulled out of Rennes. A train switch and 8 1/2 hours later, we were safely in Nice and it took us another hour of walking to find the hotel but we were finally there. Kyriakos, a friend of my friend Meri who is studying in Montpelier, met us there and the first night we just got some pizza and hung out. The next day we set off for Monaco.
Monaco, just a 1 euro hour long bus ride, is absolutely gorgeous! The gardens, the flowers and the fountains! There were statues everywhere, the water was the bluest blue and the Monte Carlo Casino was magnifique! After exploring the outside of the casino we went to the beach and Kyriakos and I went for a swim, me in my dress, him in his boxers. Liza got her hair wet, and Kathryn put her feet in as she had quite a few blisters already. We waited until we were almost all dry again before hiking back up to the bus stop and got back to Nice. Just in time to get paninis from our now favorite place from the nicest guy.
Day 3 we woke up pretty early and declared it beach day. We were on the beach from 9am til about 4 when some nasty clouds showed up. By this time though the damage had already been done. Kathryn and I were pretty red. I'm still peeling. lol. But the sun pretty much drained us so we hung out in the room, then Liza Kyriakos and I walked around Nice for a while before going to bed.
Day 4 we got up early again and did some hiking in the old destroyed chateau, went to the market then checked out of the hotel. We left our baggage there so that we could wander around for a few hours, but we didn't want to wander too far. Liza and Kyriakos went and took some pictures while Kathryn and I sat in a park and read. I wish I had recorded it, but there were these 2 guys in the grass trying to teach each other break dancing tricks. It was freakin hilarious. When the other 2 got back, we went to a cafe and hung out until Kyriakos had to go get his train. We took our time getting our stuff, then we too left for the train station. We got to Toulon fine, found the port with only a few bumps in the road, and saw the boat right away. We had no issues with tickets and got on with time to spare. Liza decided to get a room as it was an overnight ride, but Kathryn and I didn't so we decided to venture through the boat to find a place to sleep for the night... and to be continued! I'll finish the story tomorrow!
Exactly one month ago I had no idea how I was going to make it until the end of the semester. Classes sucked, I was fighting with Jason (always a bad sign) and everything seemed to remind me of home and the fact that I wasn't there. It's been gorgeous out, but that most certainly did not help my productivity. At this point I realized that no matter how much I like traveling (or rather being in new places as actually traveling stresses me out), I am not at all happy without my friends and family. And Jason. It may sound cliche and stupid, but he makes it incredibly difficult to be here and not there.
So now I have ruled out a few career paths.
1.) Peace corps. It's never gonna happen. After the village in Morocco and after not even a full year abroad all signs point to me hating it.
2.) Any job that requires me to live too far from family. I start to hate myself for not being able to be there for them. Maybe I'm not selfish enough (never thought I'd say that) but when I miss things or can't help out with family issues I get angry, then sad, then disappointed, then mad at Jason for one reason or another, then sad again. No bueno
So after these reflections and 2 weeks of classes, we had a 2 week vacation for Easter. My host mom went to Montreal to visit their son who lives there so she, host dad and host sister went to Paris on Friday evening. I had the house completely to myself for Friday and Saturday so I naturally had a couple friends over and did what I always do... I baked. Friday I cooked rice and beans and Katy made lemon bars. Then Saturday I spent the entire day reading and sitting out in the sun. My older host sister surprised me by showing up and told me that we were going to have a bbq on sunday so I was only kind of surprised when Marine and Michel (my host dad and sister) showed up at 2am from Paris on Saturday night. But before they came back, I had done a TON of baking and made more lemon bars, carrot cake and chocolate chip cookies. Sunday I went to church with Ashley, which was great, then came back, hung out and had a nice lunch with the host fam. It was me, Marine, Michel, Annaise and her wife Charlotte. The bbq was not your every day bbq. Maybe it's just me, but I don't normally drink champagne at a bbq and I don't think I've ever had eggplant from a grill... it was awesome! After we just sat out, then the girls ended up starting a water fight. This is gonna sound really weird, but I was actually really happy when Annaise threw water at me. I know that they aren't over the moon about having a foreign student in the house, but it was like a sign of inclusion. I thought it was even better because just after she threw it, before she saw the look on my face (which I was already laughing as soon as I saw it coming) she said "laugh, laugh," as though she had no idea how I was going to react to it. She took a chance by including me, the risk that i'd be pissed that she dumped freezing cold water at me. I was actually impressed. But then again I could be over analyzing it.
In any case, I went to my friend's house and hung out with her for a little while until it was around dinner time. I came home and prepared for a VERY early Monday morning.
5:30am. That's when I got up, threw my clothes on, ate breakfast, ready to leave the house by 6. The train left at 7am, and Kathryn, Liza and I were happily settled by the time we pulled out of Rennes. A train switch and 8 1/2 hours later, we were safely in Nice and it took us another hour of walking to find the hotel but we were finally there. Kyriakos, a friend of my friend Meri who is studying in Montpelier, met us there and the first night we just got some pizza and hung out. The next day we set off for Monaco.
Monaco, just a 1 euro hour long bus ride, is absolutely gorgeous! The gardens, the flowers and the fountains! There were statues everywhere, the water was the bluest blue and the Monte Carlo Casino was magnifique! After exploring the outside of the casino we went to the beach and Kyriakos and I went for a swim, me in my dress, him in his boxers. Liza got her hair wet, and Kathryn put her feet in as she had quite a few blisters already. We waited until we were almost all dry again before hiking back up to the bus stop and got back to Nice. Just in time to get paninis from our now favorite place from the nicest guy.
Day 3 we woke up pretty early and declared it beach day. We were on the beach from 9am til about 4 when some nasty clouds showed up. By this time though the damage had already been done. Kathryn and I were pretty red. I'm still peeling. lol. But the sun pretty much drained us so we hung out in the room, then Liza Kyriakos and I walked around Nice for a while before going to bed.
Day 4 we got up early again and did some hiking in the old destroyed chateau, went to the market then checked out of the hotel. We left our baggage there so that we could wander around for a few hours, but we didn't want to wander too far. Liza and Kyriakos went and took some pictures while Kathryn and I sat in a park and read. I wish I had recorded it, but there were these 2 guys in the grass trying to teach each other break dancing tricks. It was freakin hilarious. When the other 2 got back, we went to a cafe and hung out until Kyriakos had to go get his train. We took our time getting our stuff, then we too left for the train station. We got to Toulon fine, found the port with only a few bumps in the road, and saw the boat right away. We had no issues with tickets and got on with time to spare. Liza decided to get a room as it was an overnight ride, but Kathryn and I didn't so we decided to venture through the boat to find a place to sleep for the night... and to be continued! I'll finish the story tomorrow!
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