Hello once again everybody! I'm sorry that I haven't written in over a month but,
comme d'habitude (like usual), I am SUPER busy! And I've also been neglecting my own personal journal, SO...I need to get on that as well!
Well I'm just going to summarize the past month and a half! The week before my Christmas break started was absolutely hilarious/typically French. I didn't have school on Wednesday, nor Thursday because there were student protests and we were blockaded from entering the building. VIVE LA GRÈVE!
For the first 5 days of my Christmas break I went to Strasbourg on the border of Germany to visit my friend Carolyn (Caroline) who was in Elkhart Lake last year with AFS. Needless to say it was very bizarre to speak in French with her but we managed ;). Strasbourg is the Christmas capital of Europe and so it was so amazing to be there just until Christmas Eve! The first ever decorated Christmas tree, from where the custom comes, was mounted in Strasbourg and so in the city square there was a HUGE Christmas tree all lit up and absolutely beautiful! I also saw, briefly, the European Parliament which is also located in Strasbourg. I met a bunch of Carolyn's awesome friends and they were so cool! I missed them already when I got on the train to come back to Châtellerault!
Once back, I spend Christmas with my host family. The kids loved all of their gifts and my host family got me an awesome book of aerial pictures of the region and an awesome plume with "J'écris, donc je suis" (I write, therefore I am) written on it ^^. The day after Christmas I went to visit Jean-François' side of the family. I think there were 22 people it was insane! We seriously sat down at the table at noon and didn't really get up until we went to bed. Insane.
Then, the day after we got back we left again, only this time we drove about seven hours to the NORTH of France (Nord Pas-de-Calais) to spend a week with Lucie's side of the family. I saw all of the rural farms, the English Channel, Lille, and I spend the New Years with two of my host cousins at a huge 80's party! It was so cool! And oh boy was the champagne good!
The first week back to school after Christmas vacation was also really funny! It SNOWED!!! It snowed, I believe, two inches maximum, and the French would have had you believe that the sky was falling. ALL traffic was stopped, I had two, not one, TWO snow days, and everything was closed. Like I said...two inches. AND, above all, I was told that it hadn't snowed like that for THIRTY years! Within a few days the temperature returned to well over the freezing point and there have even been days that weren't cold with a sweatshirt on. Quite a contrast to January in Wisconsin (especially this year)!
As of late I haven't done anything much that is noteworthy, except that last weekend I went to Poitiers, the capital of the region which is about 20 minutes away by train, to attend a going-away party for a German girl named Annika. She's here for a six month program, so she will be returning to Germany this Saturday. It was sad to see her for the last time, but I had a really fun night with all of the other exchange students and host siblings that came as well! And this weekend I will back in Poitiers, to practice for a local show that I will be performing in. It's a medieval dinner that we put on the Saturday and Sunday nights of the Easter weekend. We're going to sing, dance, and put on little skits such as sword fighting and other typical medieval stunts.
Well, I have to be off and I realize that this post isn't the longest I have written, but I'll hopefully keep you all better informed this coming month ^_^
Au revoir et bonne année! Goodbye and have a good New Year!
