Its been a month since I've written in here. I've been really busy. We moved. Enough said.
School:
School is going great. My french is so much better. I can have fairly complex conversations with people, slowly, with some stuttering, but confidently. When I'm speaking English sometimes I replace English words with French ones, not on purpose, but because it just comes to mind before the English word. I have to say, whoever made up the rules to the French language, I'd like to punch them, they are so confusing sometimes. My non English speaking friends say that English was much easier to learn than french.
I'm sad there's only 3 weeks of class left. Its way too expensive to continue. I've made lots of friends. Its sad that when I get back from my 2 months in the US, most of my friends will be gone because they were only here for the school year or semester.
Moving:
So before I got here, Adam and I decided that his 250 sq ft studio would be too small for 2 people. Its quite difficult to find an apartment here, I sent about 15 emails to apts on France's version of Craigslist and got only a couple replies. So we really didn't have much choice so jumped on the first/only apartment we looked at. We now have 400 sq ft and a separate bedroom. we downgraded in other ways though, the kitchen is smaller, has only 2 stove spots and no oven. The shower head doesn't have a thing to hold it to the wall so I have to hold it myself, which is extremely annoying. But that's normal here. And we're not in the busy hypercenter of the city anymore, which I liked. We did get a washing machine, that's a plus. But the French don't like dryers so the extra space we have is constantly cluttered with drying racks full of clothes that take over 24 hrs to dry. We finally got it completely unpacked and organised yesterday and I'm starting to like it much more.
We previously lived on the 3rd floor, no elevator, with a narrow spiral staircase, on a pedestrian only street. We got a code for access to the road luckily. Moving the furniture wasn't as hard as I expected, we got help from Adam's friends. Except for when we locked ourselves out half way through the process and Adam's friend had to break in for us. Who knew an old knee x-ray would come in handy for breaking into apartments, but it works very well.
Living in France
Another mishap, which i posted on facebook, I left my wristlet on the tram when I was going to class. It contained my credit card, student card, tram pass, 25 euro in cash, my french cell phone, and my house keys. I've heard stories of things being stolen here all the time so I gave up on finding it almost immediately after realizing I lost it. But I went to the tram office monday morning and it was there and every single thing was inside and I've never been more relieved or surprised or happy
The french are very secure online, especially with banking. I'm not complaining 100% because its a good thing to be secure about. But its extremely annoying to log into my account. I need all kinds of passwords and security questions, then I need one of those secure key passwords that lasts 30 seconds (which i need a password to get). Then they want only certain parts of my password, like, the 2nd, 4th, and 8th letters only. Or you have to play a game to match the word with the pictures, Or type in numbers that are scrambled. this is not only for bank accounts, which is the most complex, but for any online account logins too. But I'm sure their rate of fraud less.
The French, and I think most Europeans, like to wear things that have something American sounding on them, but they never quite make sense... I've seen:
"California Redskins,"
"Redskins New York,"
"Florida Dolphins" with "Miami" on the sleeves
"Detroid Speedway," (yes, a D at the end)
"sparkly love"
a sweatshirt supposed to look like a university that said "North State"
and my all time favorite, a t-shirt that said "Authentic Seaman"
Its 2015, Americans live in Europe, they should be able to easily verify with an American before printing these shirts.
I got a small little job. I am tutoring a 3 year old little girl. She's been getting english lessons since she was 2. She knows basic vocab now she needs to start making sentences. I'm not good with kids. I usually avoid them at all costs. I don't know how to interact with them. I researched all kinds of ideas for games to teach with, lost sleep thinking of ideas. I've done one lesson so far. Its difficult. 3 year olds are all over the place. Its really hard to get her to speak in English, she just goes on and on in French. Luckily I understand but I dont know how to get her to do what I say. If anyone has advice, I need all I can get!
Of course French business hours continue to get the best of me, its so inconvenient and by far the hardest thing to get used to, coming from the US where things are always open and everything is always convenient
I also just posted pics from our little road trip to southern france. We stayed in Montpellier and explored towns around there. The weather was perfect and warm and sunny, finally. Just what we needed after a week of moving and unpacking. I now want to move to Nimes, France, The prettiest little town I've ever seen. If anyone is ever in southern france, go there.
