The Catch Up Posting- Feb 12

Hey all! Below are posts I wrote the past two nights. I haven't had internet at my French home so I have to post them at school. Hence the delay.

Hope you enjoy!

Saturday Feb 10

Hi all!

I am currently alone in the apartment. So naturally I am blaring The Supremes and dancing around. :-D Aaaand now catching up my poor neglected blog. I am actually waiting for Guillome to pick me up to go to Marseille. His best friend, a girl named Perrine, lives there. He invited me to go there and hang out with some of his friends tonight. I’m excited. Isabelle is out with friends tonight and Maxime is skiing so I’m looking forward to heading out of the house.

I serenaded Liza- the evil cat- as I walked through. She scratched me earlier. She didn’t seem to appreciate my singing. I seriously cringe as I walk past her sitting on the couch. I can see her suddenly lunging at me. She randomly punched me one day. Haha I say punched because I was just sitting at the table and she took a paw and smacked my face. Luckily with claws retracted. She’s the meanest of the French that I’ve encountered thus far. She did let me pet her today. I should have known our friendship would be short lived. I now bear her claw marks in my right hand.

I never liked cats anyways.

Today I went with my photography class to Avignon. It was pretty cool. We went to see an American photographer’s exhibit at the Museum of Contemporary Art. It was… interesting. I actually had seen some of the exhibit displayed in Peoria at the Art Guild. How random is that? The photographer had a section of his work that was just portraits of Americans (which was part of what I had seen) as well as- kid you not- sections entitled “bodily fluids”, “the morgue”, and “desire items”, and “the history of sex.” It was a bit hard for me to stomach, not gonna lie. haha I can’t even blame France for this one- it was an American artist. To break it down a bit, “the morgue” contained pictures of human cadavers, “desire items” were close up pictures of guns, and as for the other two, I’ll let the imaginations run free. Lets label the exhibit “creative” and move on…

I should tell you that when we got to Avignon in the morning it was gray, cold and raining. By the time we left the museum, the sun was out and the sky was blue. Provence has yet to fail me.

Afterwards, we had time to roam the streets of Avignon. Amy and I went to go get food. We were starving, so we decided to go to this random restaurant. Not the best, but not horrible. I ate a lunch crepe and we went in search of the Palais des Papes. The “Palace of the Popes” is Avignon’s main claim to fame. It acted as the host of the Popes when there was a need for them to leave Rome. I don’t pretend to fully grasp the situation, even after listening to the tour guide phones we were given. Anyways, it was beautiful. There was a great moment where I was wondering the halls and decided that the room I was in should be documented in a picture. Haha… I wasn’t even in a heavily populated room, but after the flash went off I hear a voice yell at me in French not to take pictures. Oops- missed that sign. I wish I could accurately describe what being in the Palais des Papes was like. It was HUGE and stairwells kept winding up into different rooms. My favorite part was when we got to go up onto this lookout type thing. The view of Avignon was great. We were starting to run out of time, so we left the Palais to go find the Pont Saint-Benezet- Avignon’s famous bridge. We had to majorly book it. The bridge juts out into the Rhone River. It doesn’t lead anywhere and in my opinion is a bit random. It is very pretty though and by the time we were there, the sun was out in full force. There is this French song about people dancing on the bridge. So, naturally we danced and took photos. It was really cute because there was this group of older, British people walking the bridge and taking pictures too. The two older women in the group went into the middle of the bridge, held hands and posed as dancers. Amy and I smiled, and after seeing our amusement, they asked us to join them. So we went, held hands with British strangers and danced on the bridge of Avignon. It was a really cool moment. We all laughed.

Then Amy and I noticed that we were really late and needed desperately to get to the other side of Avignon to meet the bus. We started sprinting through the streets, dogging the French right and left. Haha We seriously ran for it! Luckily, the bus waited for us. Our photography teacher came to the back of the bus and told us about how the area used to speak its own Provincial language. He is an old Scottish man and in his shaky voice he sang to us a song he knew in that language. It was like being serenaded by a Scottish grandfather (or a very old Sean Connery). It was great- we all loved it and clapped when he was done.

We got a great view of the mountains as we drove the hour it took to get home. It was hard to stay awake though- it had been a long day.

Sorry this was the only post from this week. Not much happened- my Spain group booked our first night’s stay in Barcelona. We got a “guest house” type thing. It is supposedly not quite a hostel, but who knows. We’re very excited! If only we didn’t have school until then…

I tried using the calling cards that I was given. That was a frustration beyond belief. It didn’t work, and I need to find “access codes” for France. If anyone knows how to work one- please, enlighten me.

I keep waving. Ashley and I have decided that after habitually waving for 19 years, it is too much to ask us to stop our waving reflexes in three weeks. Perhaps with time…
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THE SUNDAY POST
Feb 11

Hey all. Today I am not doing much. Working on a paper that should have been done a while ago and going to church tonight.

Last night was fun. Guillome and I drove to Marseille. It was neat getting to see the city at night. It’s weird though. I know that France is going to be different than the States but each time I’m surprised at how different it is. I’ve heard many times that Marseille has bounced back and forth from being France’s second largest city to third largest. So when envisioning it, I pictured a big city and a skyline of a city like Chicago, St. Louis, etc. I kept waiting for the moment where the city opens up in front of you and there are a ton of lights. It’s not the same here. True, there are many buildings and there are lights but the intensity is not the same. The buildings are still very old and the lights are yellow and dim. It’s not like I’m being closed minded, but you just come to expect certain things. It took us a while to find a place to park. Europeans are crazy drivers. They zoom so fast in the narrowest, most populated streets. Driving with Guillome even in Aix I begin to pray for the safety of the pedestrians further up the street. “Please let them get out of the street… please.” Mom, as we drove on the autoroute I kept thinking about how nauseous you would be. My ears popped as we slowed back down nearing the city. They don’t take regular lefts either. There are all of these circles that you follow around to your turn. So coming from a high speed into one of those somewhat reminds me of a rollercoaster ride. I’m not trying to be dramatic, but riding with a French person driving is an experience. It’s true. Guillome laughed at me because as we were crossing the street there was a red sign to the pedestrians. A car was coming up and Guillome quickly crossed the street and I started to but then went back. Lol I didn’t think I would have time to cross. They just drive so freaking fast. I had to wait a minute before I felt I could get safely across.

Anyways, the party was ok. Yet another potentially awkward situation for me. We came in and –kiss kiss- said hello to everyone. The whole “bissou” (kissing) is still weird for me. Especially to the guys that I don’t know. I always hesitate like “Do I initiate this? Do I just go and kiss you now?” It’s random. I think that I’m supposed to say my name as we kiss because they usually tell me theirs and after I did the kiss kiss to one girl she said “Well I’m (insert name here) but I don’t know who you are.” Guillome told her my name and reminded her that I was the American. Then she smiled and was like “ok!” Perrine was awesome. So nice. When I told Guillome how much I liked her later he smiled and said “She’s not my best friend for nothing.” She spoke a mixture of English and French to me. She kept teasing Guillome and would include me in it and let me poke fun at him too. She is a journalist in Paris and both her and Guillome said that I had to go to Paris with Guillome when he goes. They told me they would take me out to where they go and let me sleep at her place. How great is that? So far, I have two different housing options in Paris- Perrine now, and Nicholas, Isabelle’s other son who lives in the heart of Paris. La vie est belle. The rest of the party went well. The three of us talked most of the night because we didn’t really know many of the other people there.

Another great moment from last night- Perrine was talking about how she used to know a lot of American students who went to the art school near her house. She called them her big sisters and Guillome said in French that he now had an American little sister. :-D


Gros Bis! Kelly

FINAL NOTE: Ashley and I went to Mass at the Cathedral tonight. We cracked up at the end because we kept trying to sing this song in French and we were butchering it. Hey, at least we tried!