Demain, une aventure

Tomorrow, I am going to Paris. Let me rephrase that. Tomorrow, I am going to Paris! I can't wait. Paris for one night, Barcelona for three, and the Paris again for two more. All this week and last my four other friends and I have been facebooking our lives away to plan our trip: the trains, the planes, the hostels, the couches. Yes, couches. There is in fact a large, somewhat comical possibility that I will be couchsurfing. Yep, this girl right here.

I say it's only a possibility, because, well, we don't know yet. We haven't nailed down the last two nights of our trip. A little bit scary? Yes, but hey, it'll work out. I think. Word of advice: don't try this at home/European country of choice. Get together with your friends in person and just work out all your lodgings in advance. It will free up the night before to work out your packing situation.

Speaking of, we are flying with a cheap company that only lets you bring one free sac à main (carry-on) of a very small size. For a girl who thinks it's normal to take an-almost-50-pound suitcase for one week of travel, this is a little bit crazy. It's going to be good for me, because the bare essentials are really all I need anyway. Right?
No matter how skeptical I sound, I'm obviously super excited. The Eiffel Tower is only like my favorite manmade thing in the world, and even though I don't know a thing about Barcelona, the pictures on Google look like warm weather.

These random pictures throughout this blog are from the past few weeks. IES took us to Mont St. Michel and St. Malo, a cool little island abbey and beach town. I toured the St. Nicolas Basilica in Nantes, which was beautiful. And we also got some great snow; that's our little snowman named Michel. Can't wait to update about my travels! I'm sure there will be lots of things to say. . .

Un Petit Peu

So I really want to blog right now, but I have homework for Madame de Pous. All I will say is that I went to a French circus today and had a blast baking chocolate melting cake with my homestay sisters (and cousin). Still can't believe I'm in France. Incroyable.

La vie est beau, errr, belle

Well, this is a tad bit in retrospect, but the week before this last week was a little rough. If I gave names to my weeks, I would name it "Yes, the Sign on my Forehead is Correct, I am American." Frankly, it was just the week of mistakes and awkward situations.

One day, I went to three tabacs to attempt to buy a pack of tram tickets, (tabacs are places where you're supposed to be able to buy packs of tram tickets). The first one looked at me like I was crazy, and the second one politely threw in a bonus self-confidence booster with "Oh. You don't speak French, do you?" Oh, that's right, I wasn't trying to speak French. I was actually speaking Portuguese. Oops.

Some of my other mistakes included: 1) running out of tram tickets multiple times; 2) missing my tram and having to wait/walk in the cold for 15 minutes; 3) having to walk in the cold to buy a tram ticket, only to realize I was walking the wrong way; 4) missing my tram stop 5) knocking over an entire box of cereal; 6) accidentally stealing a song pamphlet from my homestay family's church;  7) leaving my gloves on the bus and forcing the driver to run across the street to give them to me [who says French people aren't nice?!!]; 8) accidentally locking my booksack in the IES center over the weekend; 9) showing up way early to Agape and having to stand in the cold for a bit until some nice old people let me into the church. . .


But the cool thing about all this was that for the most part I never really got super stressed. God's given me this comfort of knowing He's in control with everything, even the little things. And that comfort allowed me to enjoy the moment in all its imperfection, finding the bright side of things. Like the night I showed up early to Agape-- I got to meet some really sweet elderly people... Including a couple from Kentucky. Who speak French. With the thickest southern accent I have ever heard. So. Cute.

Now of course there were moments when I did get stressed, moments when I refused to let go of my worries, trying desperately to hold on to control. But God is God, and he holds my sinful, silly self in his hand for some reason; so if I can just take the second to remember that, I realize I can trust him. While being in a foreign country is difficult, and being me in a foreign country is difficult, I can't let this little stuff get in the way of my purpose or ruin my experience. In fact, it's part of the experience. I mean hey-- if I can write a blog about it, it's good, right? :)

Petit à petit . . .

Whew. What a week! Lots and lots of orientation. Lots and lots of tours. Lots and lots of grammar. Lots and lots of French. It’s been good, though. I’ve experienced some of the famous Nantes weather: pretty cold with an almost-constant mist-like rain. Not. Good. For. The. Hair. Haha oh well.

I’ve also experienced some really pretty days, like when we took a tour through the historic cites in the city. It bothers me just a tad that I couldn’t understand everything our French tour guide said, not because that means my French isn’t good, but because that means I missed a lot of awesome information! Shout out to Sarah Rose here; she’s probably laughing to herself. Haha we’re such nerds.

I’ve also had some great food this week! A French-American organization invited IES to a galettes des rois tasting. Galettes des rois are kind of like King Cakes. I found the little clown—they’re not always babies here—so I was the queen! I think that cake won for the best dessert I’ve tasted so far. These cakes are usually made with a kind of almond paste filling, and the cake-part is like a thick crêpe. I probably just butchered that description, but trust me, it’s delicious. With my host family, I had a dessert called the roses du sable—the roses of the sand. It was basically a lot of fudge-like chocolate and corn flakes, but it was amazing! And it was made by my petites soeurs d’accueil, the 11 and 15 year-old girls in the family—pretty cool.

 

Saturday I hit the big sales with some friends from IES; les soldes are kind of like Black Friday in the U.S., but for a whole month! Woohoo!! Later that day, I went to the movie theater with my French parents and the two youngest girls, where we saw Les collines aux coquelicots, an animé film. I usually don’t really like animé, but this one was really cute! My ticket was only 4,50 euros with my student ID card, which is cheaper than Tinseltown. I’ll take that!

Sunday morning, my friend Éowyn and I went to church! I was super excited to find out last week that Éowyn was a believer, but I wasn’t super surprised. God always brings just the right people into our lives. The church is only about a 10 minute tram ride from my house; it’s a pretty simple place with a small congregation, one of the only Protestant churches in Nantes, I think. I thought the preacher was really good, though. He read from Ecclesiastes and demonstrated Solomon’s “chasing after wind” as a little kid who blows bubbles and tries to catch them in vain. It was a good message to hear; while I’m striving to learn a language and blend in with a culture, it’s important to stay centered on the thing that will never disappear, the thing that will always fulfill. Got to keep the Main Thing the main thing.

p.s. Classes have started!! ahhh!!! I’ll update on that later . . . haha

Photos from the Weekend

A tower at the chateau and dunjon of Loches.



                                                  The chapel at the chateau de Blois.

And Chambord, my favorite!!!

Alors! Je suis à Nantes!

Bonjour!! I'm finally getting around to writing this blog! I couldn't get the password for the Wifi to work last week, and then my computer died, and then I realized my charger doesn't fit into my adaptor... But voila!! my lovely friend Hannah had an extra connector! And so, here am I.

Note: I promise that the rest of my posts won't be this long, or at least I hope not. If you get bored, just stop reading or skip to the end or just look at pictures haha, whatevs!

I've been having an amazing time. Nantes is great; I'm starting to feel like I actually live here, which is good--because I do! I haven't had much time to explore as of yet though, because on Friday we left for a visit to the chateaux of the Loire valley. But I'll back up and start at the beginning...

With the plane from Monroe, the wonderful day in DFW spent with my friends Sarah and Katie (whom I will miss very, very much), the flight to Paris, and the train to Nantes, it was about 26 hours of travelling. And jet lag is real. I had trouble sleeping because I'd be really tired in the afternoon but wide awake at night. And it didn't help that I had a million exciting things to think about!

My host family is simply amazing. There are six children, but only four (ha--only four) live in the house; the other two are in college.  The three girls are 8, 11, and 15 (as of today!), and the boy is 16. The whole family is so nice and helpful, and dinner time is hilarious! My petite soeur d'accueil (host family sister), who is only 11, often says to the others, "Slower! Slower! Rachel can not understand you!". It's so true. I never dreamed the French would speak this fast; the first few days, I probably missed 70% of what they said. They all like to talk at the same time, too. It's crazy, but I absolutely love it!

And now for the important stuff... my room is super cute. Hehe. Everything is a pretty yellow and I love it! Ok--maybe not the most important thing, but it makes me feel at home for sure!

After two days in Nantes with preliminary info sessions and language tests, all of IES Nantes took off for the city of Tours and the chateaux around it. We saw Blois, Chambord, Loches, and Chenonceau. Chambord was my favorite because it was beautiful and impossibly massive. I cannot imagine what it was like to actually live there. The trip helped us all to get to know each other really quickly; I think we're going to be really good friends.

Today, there was more orientation sessions and a walking tour of Nantes to get familiar with the practical things like post offices, stores, pharmacies, and transportation. I hope I can get the hang of this whole map thing!

All in all, I'm having an amazing time. I'm so glad I came; I know I'm going to learn so much. Not just the language--although I've already learned an unbelievable amount--but about the differences between cultures, about the country, and about life. I can't believe how blessed I am to have this opportunity, and I pray God uses it in a big way. I'll post pictures soon!