Well after a long journey I am finally starting to get settled in to my new room and apartment. I guess my total travel time turned out to be around 32 hours (!!!). This is including the 1.5 hours before my flight in San Diego, the 4 hours I had to wait in Houston, and the 7.5 hours I had to wait at the airport in Paris for my train to Bordeaux. That was pretty ridic, they don't heat the airport!!! There is only certain areas where there is heating...wtf is that!? Needless to say that wasn't so awesome.
My landlord (Elizabeth) picked me up at the train station on the 4th with one of my roommates (Ann-Sophie) and we drove through some of the city on the way back to our house/apartment situation. I haven't taken a picture of the front of the house yet but it's really cute and European and really 18th century. I love it. I am going to go on a photo journey soon, once I get my bearings a little more. I ate dinner with Elizabeth, Ann-Sophie and roommate 2, Mark. They were very talkative, and I tried to keep up, but was passing out mostly. I slept until 1 pm the next day. Elizabeth then toured me around the neighborhood and showed me the bank and post office and a few other shops as well as the super market, "Simply." I was mostly overwhelmed here and didn't buy much so I have to go back tomorrow, but they did have the biggest selection of yogurt that I have ever seen, EVER. It was insane! There was an entire aisle, both sides with various types of yogurt. Out of control.
Today my "parin" (godfather), Simon (don't pronounce the "n," it's a boy!) picked me up and drove me to campus for our welcome meeting. He would have shown me the way by bus/tram, but it was snowing! He was really nice and excitable, and loves Berkeley because he studied there last summer. He was also a bad driver, but that might have just been because of the rain. I met a girl from Santa Cruz who I originally thought was a French student but she had just been here for fall, so that made me feel awesome in terms of being able to learn more French, haha. Right now it's ok, but there are still quite a few basic vocab words you would think you would know, but then you don't. They placed me in the intermediate language group and we start class tomorrow bright and early at 830am, meaning I have to leave for school between 7-730 to make sure I have enough time to get there (40 min journey). Siiiiiickkk. I did learn how to get home by myself (sort of) today from Rue St. Catherine, where I did some shopping with some other Cali peepz, so that was cool. "Les Soldes" started today, which is the government regulated sales on consumer items. It lasts for 2 weeks and gets progressively cheaper. Totally awesome. Gon' get me some boots! Also all the French beezies love cowboy boots, and today we saw a French girl wearing a "Don't Mess with Texas" shirt. Nice one. I wonder how that made it in the French culture, considering it is such a joke in ours... Aww, poor Frenchies getting roflpwnt by U.S. culture. So lol.
Well that's about it right now, hopefully I will eat something other than cheese and baguettes tomorrow. Or maybe not.
