Adventures in France: Les Miserables

Day Twenty-One

Yesterday had my first sessions of the cultural classes. I chose French News/Media and Francophone Studies. The first one is with my actual teacher, Ludvine, and she is amazing. BUT!!! Everyone in the class has to give a 10-15 minute oral presentation on a news article when it's their turn and then the class will participate in a debate. That's going to be terrifying when my time comes around. That's a long time to present a news article in English--let alone FRENCH! But, that's a worry for another day. After classes Dave and I had a meeting with the directrice of the French language immersion program for the university and we finalized the dates on when we'll be spending a week doing some training with the French military. Also, she asked us how things are going and such. She's very sweet and everyone in the office is very helpful and friendly. Unfortunately, as much as I wanted to impress her with my French, of course I made a fool of myself by answering questions she apparently never asked, lol. But like I said, she was nice about it. But jeez, way to get yourself to feel like an idiot lol. Afterwards, met up with two classmates and found a restaurant in Vieux Lyon with an entree, plat, and dessert for 14 euros--great deal. Unfortunately, this place wasn't impressive. The side dishes were bland. The best part was the salad, bread, and dessert haha.

Yesterday I woke up at 7 to meet up with Katie and run at the local park. I took my camera to take some pictures of parts of it. That was really good and what kept me running and motivated was knowing that I was going to buy a pastry I had seen in the window of a local boulangerie on my way back to the apartment, lol. By the time I got there, my hands were frozen because it is FREEZING to run that early with the drabby, windy weather and the man behind the counter was unimpressed with my cold hands and enthusiasm for what I was buying...oh well. I'd rather find a boulangerie with a friendly owner next time, hopefully make a habit of it too. I'd love to actually have a place where I could become a "regular." That's such a foreign concept to me, lol but I've always dreamed of it! Cleaned up, had a really good breakfast, and did my devotional before meeting up with Amelia to go out for lunch. We went back to the brioche sandwich place and for 4 euros I had a fresh sandwich, cookie, and drink. Sweet deal. Then had class and unfortunatley, it got pretty dry at the end. But we went over French etiquette for the table and discussed food today. Made me hungry for my plans after class. I met up with Sakura and Emi for dinner. Sakura took us to a pretty famous place that was really reasonable and had a great atmosphere. Their specialty is a tartine which is essentially half a toasted baguette with various specialty topppings. I had a complete lapse of common sense and ordered the tartine trois fromages et poires, which is 3 cheeses and pears. Unfortunately, I could only eat one section of my tartine because two of the cheeses were goat cheese and bleu cheese. I feel like the only cheese that is tolerable for my taste buds is cow cheese. Everything else smells so bad and tastes so distinct/strong, my senses just find it revolting. I could smell it from other people's plates as well. That was pretty unfortunate. Sakura was so sweet and took my blue cheese section in exchange for part of hers which was cow cheese with some kind of syrup and pralines. That was really good. We had yummy soup and dessert as well. I could eat French dessert forever...and ever. I was so close to getting a tarte framboise (raspberry tart) but I decided to get their dessert du jour which was a homemade cheese cake and it was....marvelous!! Afterwards, we met up with Mina to watch Les Miserbales! After Pride and Prejudice, it is definitely my favorite movie. The music is absolutely beautiful. I caught myself wanting to sing along numerous times. It's ridiculous (and wonderful) how music and lyrics evoke such emotion--that's why I LOVE IT! It was very cool to read French subtitles. Learned some new vocabulary from it tonight :) Tomorrow will be a long day and then Saturday I leave for a ski vacation with my host family and their extended family in ....THE ALPS!! Then after that, I'm on vacation and headed to...ITALY!! Don't worry, I'm giving thanks every second of every day for the amazing opportunity that this semester is offering me.