Feeling a little homesick...

I'm beginning to feel a little homesick. I'm just so exhausted all the time and I would really enjoy my bed at home. I'd also like so McDonalds haha.

I think I'm exhausted all the time because it's exhausting speaking another language. It's exhausting having to pay so close attention to everything that everyone says just so you can understand.

I've realized over the past week that I'm like the only one here who is at such a low level. I've only had two years of French while other people have had more than 5. I feel like everyone just thinks I'm stupid because I don't talk very much, when really I'm just trying to keep up with the conversation. They don't understand why I'm so quiet. I'm trying to just not care, I know why, so who cares what these people think.

I'm really wanting to come home. A lot. But that's okay.

A couple of days ago we went to the beach. That was pretty fun. I actually enjoyed that day because it went so fast. When time goes fast I'm a happy person.

It's getting hotter here now. The first few days I was cold, but not now. It's 90 degrees but there's not air conditioner. And so when the wind isn't blowing, it's hot.

I had my first test today. I think that I actually did pretty well. I was surprised, because it was on about 100 pages of information. I read what I could but it's difficult to read that much in French in such a short amount of time. But it seemed to work nonetheless.

I really don't like my classes very much. My photography one is just difficult, so I can handle that, but the grammar one is retarded. We read poems and analyse them alot. I don't really see what that has to do with grammar. Like, she makes us talk about what the poems mean to us and stuff. And she doesn't have things very planned out. We spent 45 minutes of the 1.5 hour class time playing a charade like game because she didn't know what else to do. That was a little ridiculous to me.

Anyways, I don't really have a lot to say. I miss home. The end.

I love eating outside.

Okay, so Sunday afternoon we met our parents. They came to the hotel to pick us up. I ended up rooming with another IES student and I didn't know that was going to happen, but that's okay. My mother was the one that came and picked us up. Her name is Farida. She's really nice but she talks fast and it's hard for me to understand a lot of things. I really hope that part gets easier, and quickly. After she picked us up she took us to her house. It's such a cute house and I love my room. We have a dog and it likes to come lay on my bed with me.

After we got here me and Rachel, my roomate, went to lunch with our neighbors, who are also hosting a student. That was really not a good experience for me. First I had to eat fish, which wasn't too incredibly bad, I just definitely wouldn't have chose it. They were also serving wine and they looked at me really funny when I said I didn't want any. So then they started talking about how religious people are weird and stuff, and how no one should be a virgin after the age of 14. It was probably the most I've ever been made fun of for being a christian. But that's okay. I survived.

I love eating here because we almost always eat outside. I've only eaten inside at the hotel and at one of the cafes we went to. The weather is perfect. Sunday night we ate dinner with our family. At the beginning there were 6 places set at the table, then my "brother" called and he wasn't coming, and then my "father" called and he couldn't come either. I didn't even meet one of my brothers until last night. But we ate chicken and carrots for dinner and it was very very good.

My classes are good. I just have a lot of problems understanding. And I hate that. It's so hard for me to keep up. But, it'll get better I think.

I don't really have a lot to say right now because I'm so exhuasted.

au revoir.

Orientation

Orientation started with a bunch of nervous chatter from all of the students. We waited anxiously in the lobby wondering what was to come. We talked about simple things, our names, colleges, where we were from, what our major was. Then a lady walked in announcing her presence by singing "bonjour, bonjour, bonjour bonjour bonjour." We laughed uncomfortably and then she starts talking to us very quickly in French. We all looked around having no clue what she was saying. Then she turned around and left the room! Someone said, she said sortie, and she said ensemble. That means to leave and together, so we followed, not sure what else to do. She walked into the "street." I say that because all of the streets are alleys. They really aren't big enough for cars but somehow cars squeeze through them occasionally. After a few moments of us talking to each other she turns around and says, "Il y a trop bruit." There is too much noise. "Maintenant, il n'y a pas l'anglais, seul francais." Now, there will be no english, only French. It's amazing how quiet it was the rest of the way.

Those first few minutes of silence were the worst because we were all wondering what we got ourselves into. But, once we started talking in French, it was easy to continue. We went to a building where our classes will be held. She talked a lot, most of which we didn't pay attention too because we were all so exhausted from our flights in. But then we fianlly got to eat. Pizza. I thought it was funny that our first meal in France was pizza.

Speaking of the pizza, who in the world puts unpitted olives on a pizza. I thought my tooth was going to fall out after biting down hard on that. It's good now though, no worries.

Yesterday started with a tour of Arles. While this was interesting to see, no one could understand Bertrand because it was windy and we couldn't understand his deep French accent. To me it is so much harder to understand males because they emphasize the throaty sound even more then the women. He took us to a cell phone store after a while and told us to buy our cell phones there. But then he left, leaving us alone and helpless with our little bit of French. After someone got the courage to start the conversation we were all able to make it work. However, I still don't have a cell phone because the guy was really slow and we didn't have time to wait. But that's okay. I'll get it Monday.

Yesterday afternoon was long and exhuasting. We sat through 3 hours of orientation about safety policies, what are classes would be like, and how to treat our families. It was amazing to us the stereotype that French people have of Americans. Bertrand talked for a long time on how we can't binge drink here because it's not Spring Break. I'm pretty sure that he's never even been to America. We also found out that only 10 percent of the population of Arles speaks English. That's such a small number.

After orientation we went to a house that was in the Alpinnes. It was a beautiful house with a pool and an amazing view of the mountatins. We all "swam" for the 2 hours they gave us to swim. I sat on the edge of the pool for a bit and then got to cold and had to change back into my real clothes. We ate dinner there. Chicken, that still had feathers on it. I'd never even seen that before, but I just pulled the skin of and ate it anyways. I also ate tomato with mozarella on it. Apparently that's a really big thing here. Oh and i forgot to tell you what I had for lunch yesterday. It was salad with hot goat cheese on the top. Haha. It acutally wasn't too bad.

Today is Sunday now and we are all just waiting around to meet our families. I believe they are supposed to be here around 11:30 ish and then we move in at noon. Around then. But I have to be out of my room within the next 15 minutes. So I really should probably go. I'll tell you all about my family and house in the next post.

And so it begins

I just thought I would start a blog so whoever wants to know what I'm doing can know.

It's been such a long day/two days. They all run together when you have an 8 hour flight and a 7 hour time change. So if I ramble on and on and make no sense, it's because I haven't slept in two days.

Thursday morning I got up and boarded an 11:30 flight from Tulsa to Chicago. That flight went smoothly but then I had a 4 hour layover. Which sucked. I absolutely hate flying, so sitting on a bench for 4 hours waiting for an 8 hour flight is kind of like getting teeth pulled. Haha. And what a fun flight it was, let me tell you. For the first half of the flight the baby behind me was screaming at the top of his lungs, while his mother sat across the aisle not even trying to comfort him. I say baby, but really he was like 3. Old enough to know how to behave on a plane, or at least try to. After four hours of baby screaming I was exhuasted and annoyed. I wanted to turn around and pick up the kid myself. But the baby finally settled down about when it got dark.

This darkness was the weirdest part of the trip. You saw the sunset behind you and then about an hour later you could see the sun coming over the horizon. It's weird when 15 hours goes by in 8. This plane ride, while the longest, was probably the easiest I've been on. I had zero nauseau, probably because I continuously ate, and I had some okay seat mates. One was a french guy who could speak English, but the one thing he said to me was, "Zut, no ordinateur, no job." It was just funny because he tried to sleep the whole time the baby was crying, with many moans of unhappiness. And then as soon as he pulls his laptop out to work his computer dies. The girl on my right was just kind of crazy. She was obviously used to flying in more prestigious airlines in a much higher class. She just continually talked AA down. Oh well. She didn't even buy her plane ticket so she needs to get over it.

Landing in Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris, France was just like landing in any other airport. Except this time, there was a little guy in a cubicle shoving our passports back through the window after we handed them to him. Although this sounds unexciting, I'd never been through customs before and I thought it was neat that I got a stamp on my passport.

The trains were the most complicated thing. Our whole group sat at the wrong terminal for 3 hours before realizing 10 mintues before our train left that we needed to be way on the other side. Talk about stressful. But that was nothing compared to when our train got to Avignon. There are two different train stations in Avignon and we had to go from one to the other to get our trains. It was complicated, and confusing, and the bus driver just said 1 euro 20 over and over again. But that's not what we were asking haha.

Eventually we got to our hotel. After much walking and stress and exhaustion. And I'll tell you all about orienation tomorrow or some other time. Peace out.