HI HI HI!!!!!! You wanted an update so here it is :)
I'm gonna start at the beggining :)
The first weekend of school my host family went to a Rotary picnic. It was a family picnic so there were a bunch of games to play. I played darts (sometimes I was good sometimes I sucked); this game on a table where you slid little wooden pucks into different 'nets'. AND I SHOT A GUN. It was only a BB gun and I know that shooting things is nothing new in Huron County but I HAVE NEVER SHOT A GUN BEFORE. Aiden had a gun for pentathlon when I was little but I was never allowed to touch it. I actually was okay at it :) We also had some really awesome food (I FRAKIN LOVE FRENCH FOOD!!!!).
Then I had school for a week Normal long slightly boring school. However school is cool 'cause I have some really nice new friends :) Nerdy friends. French doesn't have an equivalent for the word 'nerd' but that’s my friends. We talk about Manga and Stargate and Castle and Doctor Who and Firefly and Books and all kinds of other things that I love. (A few of us may be going to a manga expo together in a few weeks :D) Also when my friends and I have a couple hours free at the same time we often go into the center of the city which is really cool cause it SUPER old and has a lot of nifty shops.
My second weekend of school was even busier. On Saturday some members of my Rotary club went grape picking. OMG THAT’S HARD WORK. You have these like mini clipper things (which can cut your fingers if you’re not careful) and you cut the grapes and then if there are any nasty ones on the clump you've just cut you gotta get them off with your clippers. We did this for like 5 hours starting at 8ish in the morning. (SIDE NOTE: at some point during the morning one Rotarian asked me if it was easier than catching salmon. I was slightly confused, I wondered if he had confused Canadians with grizzly bears or if he assumed all Canadians were fishermen. Either way I had to regrettably inform him that I have never caught salmon before.) After we had some awesome French food, with CHOCOLATE MOUSE for dessert. :) Sooooooo gooooood. Then in the evening we went and toured an old underground reservoir. It was built centuries ago so the government decided that you can't store drinking water there anymore. So no it like an underground stone igloo you can walk around in :) It was SO COOL. It is seriously ancient; Dijon was the second city in Europe, after ROME, to have running water. Then we had dinner out.
Then on Sunday my host family and I ate lunch at a friend’s. There were a bunch of people there. They kept asking me questions about Canada and my town; it was really fun to be able to tell them things. My French at the time was great but thankfully everyone has been really patient with me.
The next week/weekend was rather restful comparatively. Except Tuesday (the 20th) when I went to my first meeting with my host Rotary Club. I made a presentation on my home country and community. It was really great cause when I was presenting I showed a lot of pictures but I didn't always know the French word for it and the entire club helped me out :)
The next Tuesday (the 27th) I didn't go to Rotary however that day was the strikes. This is a scheduled day where if teachers have a problem with the school/board they can just not show up for class. I LOVE THIS COUNTRY! Only one of my teachers did it however it was my history teacher and I have two hours of history from 8-10 on Tuesdays, then I have an hour of nothing while my classmates study languages, then I have history of arts them I eat. So my history teacher not showing up meant that I had two hours to just chill with friends. Then from 10-11 one of my other friends (not in my class, therefor not in languages) had an hour off so we hang out. AWESOME!
That weekend (1 and 2 of October) was my conference with all the other exchange students in my area. There was 9 Americans, a girl from Taiwan, a girl form Ecuador and me. Out of the twelve of us there are 9 girls. It was such an amazing weekend. We toured around the country side, saw Charles De Gaulle's GIGANTIC monument, and toured a wine cellar that was built by a monk in the 11 hundreds (I think. It was something like that. OLD.) We ate French food (CREME BRULEE YUMMY) and threw one of the Rotarians in a pool. And we did a LOT of talking. It was super awesome to talk to people who understand what I'm going through. We swapped stories of what we've done while in France as well as sharing stuff about our lives back home. Everyone was awesome and I can't wait to see them again. :)
Then this week was normal. School. English and French literatures are my favourites. I dislike the sciences cause I feel stupid (I mean I suck at chemistry in English!). But thankfully they're only once a week for an hour and a half (one week is bio the next is physics/chemistry). History/geography is okay cause I understand some of the concepts from back home. My French is A LOT better now so I understand almost all of what people are saying to me. However teachers speak super-fast and they use words that I don't know. Normal everyday conversations are easier but when a teacher uses a wordback home. My French is A LOT better now so I understand almost all of what people are saying to me. However teachers speak super-fast and they use words that I don't know. Normal everyday conversations are easier but when a teacher uses a word that is never used outside a scholarly situation I'm lost. That means taking notes is hard cause I never know how to spell the words. However I usually understand the basic concept of the lecture so sometimes I end up writing small parts of my notes in English. The person who sits beside me in history actually laughed when she saw my notes. These days I write more in French (with horrible grammar and spelling) but at the time it was such a weird mixture. A couple times I started a sentence in French and ended it in English :P
That brings us to the weekend. This rainy dreary weekend. Yesterday I did a bunch of homework. Then in the afternoon me, my host mom and my host sister went into the city for a bit (I live in a town of 6000 people outside Dijon, its kinda like a suburb(St Apollinaire), but my school is like right near the center of Dijon). I sent postcards and we picked up some things. Then today we went to mass and then to a friend’s place. We ate lunch there. More delicious French food. Including some awesome shrimp. Mind you this isn't Canadian shrimp where you take it off the ring and take the tail off. These shrimp were full on shrimp. I had to remove the head the tail and its hard skin stuff (side note to any family reading this: one of them shiznited on me!) but it was so worth is cause shrimp are DELISCIOUS! We also had veggies and meat in red sauce and apple crumble with ice cream. I have to tell you though a good 80% of the time I am not entirely sure what I'm eating but it’s always delicious so I just go with it :) And usually I have a small idea. :D
Also this weekend is Thanksgiving back home so I talked with my whole family while they were at my sister’s place for dinner. It was really great :) Though Thanksgiving means that I've got a bit of a hankering for pumpkin pie.
Anyway that’s what my life’s been like the last few weeks. In short I love France, I love the food, I love how beautiful and old everything is. My host family and my new friends are awesome (me and my host sister get in so many tickle fights. Its epic, I love being the oldest). I miss people back home (especially when something reminds me of them) but I've been keeping myself busy and I wouldn't trade this for the world :)
PS. Sorry there are no picture on this one, it actually slightly difficult and time consuming to get pictures from my computer to my blog because I have to put them onto a hosting sight (cause I don't have a server just kicking around) and then I have to transfer them and it takes way longer than is necessary. And unfortunately I do not have the time for that today. I promise I will put a bunch up soon. I might to just an entire blog post of pictures or I may make a web album or something. I still have to figure that out. However if you have me on Facebook you need not wait for that and can just check out the three albums I've got on there :)
