Comment on dit frites en anglais?

We are on our toussaints vacation right now, it lasts about two weeks. The first half of the vacation SYA took us to tour Loire Valley and all it's magical chateaus. It's hard to believe that it's been so long since I arrived. I remember sitting in my apartment in DC counting down the days until France, and now it seems that the days are counting to the end. Obviously we still have 7 months left, but almost 2 months have past. I feel like I've only just arrived. I hate that the time goes by so fast.

Back to the vacation. We took a long bus ride to tour chateau after chateau. After this well-educated vacation, I have come to the conclusion that I need a chateau. Here are some pictures of our fun adventures:

For each of these trips we stay at an Ibis, which is basically the French equivalent of a Holiday

Inn. My friend Crispin told me that he was going to start watching a movie with his roomie, I wanted to join. So, I went to his room and went to collapse on the bed with a graceful leap.Graceful, it was not. I missed the center of the bed entirely and unfortunately landed only on the beam. It snapped. I was laying on the floor with splinters in my self-esteem laughing. How is it that I break a bed?? Needless to say, the profs were having difficulty figuring out this anomaly as well. The beds are really tiny and cheap and another student had already broken one too. The profs were already very angry because the other students were begin very loud. So, me telling them of my accident did not help their attitudes. The sad thing was that before my

mishap, I was sitting quietly in my room reading.

Enough of that, I'm in Amsterdam now!!! My host sister goes to school here and my family wanted to take me to see it! My host family left Saturday before my school trip, so I had to spend a couple nigths with my friends because I didn't want to stay home alone. I went on the school trip and when we got back on Wednesday, I stayed at my Math prof's house. Thursday morning I got up super early to catch my train to Paris! I arrived there just in time. I had to run a grab a taxi because my train to Amsterdam was at a completely different station. I got in a

taxis, and I was really tempted to tell him to take the scenic tour through Paris, so I could atleast soak up some of it. But I didn't need to. The train station was rigth in the heart of Paris

and when we pulled out of the parking garage, the Eiffel Tower was right in front of me. My heart literally skipped a beat. The sad thing is, I could have cried. This city has such an impact on me. I really wouldn't have minded if I missed my train an had to stay in Paris. The taxis ride was amazing. I drove through so many little Parisian streets and witnessed the life of the people

who inhabit that amazing city. It was amazing. When we arrived at the next train station, I paid my driver and hopped on the train to Amsterdam. It was a long ride, but I finally made it! And the apartment that my host family rented is beautiful!!

The cool thing is that everyone in Amsterdam speak English, so the first thing I had to do for my host family was ordered them some French Fries because they didn't know what to say. It was really fun.. I feel so cool being able to understand two different languages!!

I'll post again soon!

xx

L'école

I guess I never really explained my classes and how school works.

Basically there are like 60+ students in the entire program, and we all took placement tests to determine our level in French and math. They are 2 levels of French I and II. Level I is for the meilleur éleves and they study a lot more Literature and work less on learning grammar. Level II, were I am, is dedicated to expanding our vocabulary and speaking skills. Level II still takes Litt. but not as often as level I.

So, the school day is created for each individual student and group. Each level is divided evenly into groups--IA, IB and IIA, IIB--for scheduling purposes. I'm IIA, so all of my classes are with the rest of the people in IIA. Except for math, math gets mixed up according to math skill. I'm in pre-calcI and there is a pre-calcII and a pre-calchonours as well as ABCalc and BCCalc.

Classes are:
CESF(culture et société Françaises-Taught in French)- which is us just learning everything we need to know about France and it's culture..... the prof is hilarious.

Histoire(Taught in FRench- French history... I'm really surprised by how much I love this class, our prof is crazy.

Histoire de l'art(French)- Art and architecture... I love this class the prof is so funny!!

Litterature(French)- French literature

English(English)- Is just a basic English class.... the prof is so smart and crazy, I really enjoy this class

Langue(French)- grammar class..... I love speaking French

TPL(French)- it's a pronunciation class, each group has it once a week

Math(English)- I love our teacher, she is so young and smart and she's super fun

C'est tout! Je vais faire mes devoirs!

PS below is me reciting my first essay in French. We were supposed to do it in class, but they prof only chose certain people to recite. I worked really hard on it, so I wanted to share it with you! Excuse my pronunciation... I was reading too fast.

xx

I Miss Hugs.

These should be the last of my attempt to show Taylor my outfit for the first month.

Since it's been awhile since I posted (sorry!), this is going to be a fairly long and choppy post. I'm just going to write all the experiences in short paragraphs.

I swear, these people here think we have amazing stories to write about. For English we have to write an anecdote that we think helped shape us into the person we are today. And if writing that in English isn't hard enough, French Litt. wants us to write a extremely funny or extremely dramatic story (en français) that has happened to us while we've been in France... I have plenty of stories to write about for Litt, but the prof has extraordinarily high expectations AND she wants us to present it in class.
Her requirements:

-5 minute long presentation.
I don't think any of my stories are long enough!

-Must speak flawless French, the grammar and the accent.
....

-We cannot use "Il y a (there), faire (to do), ça (that) or chose (things)"
That's been easy so far.

I'm just going to ask my host family to just sit with me and help me write this, because writing and speaking is going to extremely difficult. As for English, I thought it was going to be easy because it only has to be 500 words, but my story is finished with only 286 words. I have nothing else to say, so I'm just going to create another draft and see how that goes. Anyways, for English, I'm writing about my near-death experience in Germany and for Litt. I'm going to write about the strange day I had shopping with Eilidh (one of my SYA friends) and some old man.

I'll post both stories when they are completed.

I just wanted to show off my amazing note taking skills IN FRENCH. I was never a big fan of history, but I love history this year, my prof is so funny. I love him.

I made a few French friends! Finally!! SYA had signups for this meet-and-greet at a French school. So, I signed up for it, and while I was there I talked to this one guy and we exchanged numbers and we've been texting ever since!!!!!! We haven't been able to meet up because he is always extraordinarily busy with basket ball (yes, he's athletic). But what I love the most is that he speaks French!! And all 125 messages that we've exchanged are in French!!!

So, I went out yesterday with my friend Crispin and I only had 10E on me, so I decided to go to an ATM and get some cash. So, I found a BNP, which is the sister bank of BOA, and went to the ATM and put my card in, typed in my pin and chose the amount of money I wanted to withdraw. Well, instead of giving my money, the ATM decides to "withhold my card at the request of the bank". Like, what?! J'étais tellement en colère. I called my dad and he called the bank a million times and worked it out, so I'm getting an emergency replacement card ASAP. THANKS DADDY, LOVE YOU!!!!! But, the not-so-funny-but-ironic thing is that was the exact same ATM that my friend used last Saturday to withdraw money and guess what? It took his card too. Oh la vache... I thought it was safe to use because he walked away from the ATM for a while, so I just assumed it took his card because he left it unattended. Stupid machine.

I bought new shoes, a new shirt and two new pants for under 50E! All of it is so cute!

<--These are maxi pain au chocolats... so.good. Eilidh and i both had one they are literally bigger than my face.


Oh, I realised that I don't really miss the US all that much. But the thing I do miss are hugs. I was never a touchy-feely person so, I didn't give very many hugs... but now that I'm in a country that never hugs, all I want to do is hug people. I just want to walk down the streets of Rennes with a sign that says "Free Hugs" just so that people will hug me. Maybe, I can make France realise that hugs are awesome!

On Friday my adviser had a little advisory party at her apartment. It was ridiculously fun. She's only like 28, so she's really easy to talk to and she's so funny. The entire school is trying to find someone to hook her up with because she doesn't have friends yet because she doesn't speak French. She was with SYA: Vietnam last year, so this is her first time in Rennes. She's just as new to the city as we are. But, at her apartment, we all basically ate junk food for about 3 straight hours, then we had epic heart to hearts. She's the math teacher and I swear, she's like the smartest person ever. I never would have imagined that she was that amazing at math. She's a great teacher!

Also, as of Wednesday, I have been here for a month. 8 more months to go. I don't like that. I want to stay here forever. I love everything about Rennes. I have yet to be homesick or sad in anyway.


This post is awful, I'm sorry! I need to start posting regularly so this doesn't happen again.

xx

J'adore Ma Famille d'Accueil.

I really cannot explain how much I love my host family. Ils sont très amusant et incroyable. They are just so understanding. We will be at the dinner table and I am stumbling trying to speak decently (I'm sure I sound like Tarzan though: "Me. Eat. Now." "You.No.Like?"), but they understand easily and help me say it right. C'est bizarre parce que I am more comfortable speaking French with them than I am with my other friends who are on the same level as me. I'm not embarrassed to jump into a conversation and fall on my face trying to explain difficult things. Everynight, without fail, I go downstairs and sit at the table in the kitchen and do my homework while my host dad cooks, and I tell him about my day and he helps me with my French homework and I help him peel potatoes or carrots. It's really fun, it's my favourite time of the day. And when Valerie comes down to eat we will talk for hours! It really is the best.

Anyways, I just had to say a quick something about them. They are truly amazing.

Also, I had a very exciting experience talking to a random stranger. I was walking down the ally that my school is on and this woman was walking towards me and she asked "est-ce que tu habites ici?" and I immediately understood and without even thinking answered "Oh, non, je vais à l'école", she mumbled something about needing a toilet and walked away. I know it doesn't sound that impressive because it was such a petite conversation....but je ne pensais pas en anglais. I understood her French, I didn't do any translating an when I answered I didn't think about conjugation or word placement.... I just said it.

I have noticed that I understand French better when I'm not trying to translate everything, I just have to learn the words. For example, when someone says "je pars" I don't think in my head "(Je=I) + (pars=partir=to leave) = I am leaving" I simply think of the action of leaving like I do in English. It's difficult to explain, but easiest way to say it is I am beginning to really comprehend the language.

I'm sorry, I've been so bust lately I haven't been able to post. I'm going to post about the first school trip this weekend.

xx

PS Remember the clock I bought? Well, I was messing with it today and it does, in fact, have an alarm! So, it wasn't a waste of money!