Jeudi (Thursday) has come and gone, and I’m glad that this week of classes is over. It seems that even if I go to bed at 11 pm I am still deathly tired when my alarm rings in the morning. I am excited to sleep in semi-late tomorrow since I don’t have class, but I must meet some friends at the train station at 1:30 pm for our voyage to Reims. It should be quite an experience, as Louise was very disapproving of our going there, she claims there is nothing to see, but then again this is coming from someone who uses scratchy Mexican blankets as acceptable means of warmth in the bed. Anna and I are now determined to find something really grand to tell her about upon our return to prove that we are interested in pretty much any part of France, or Europe for that matter. We hope to visit a champagne factory (I don’t know what the word for the place where champagne is made), although most places insist that you schedule your visit ahead of time.
Apparently today is an international day of celebrating women. No one from the U.S. with whom I’ve spoken has heard of such a thing, but everyone in my classes from different countries know about it and share their country’s celebrations with the group. Louise even attended a conference this evening, where I believe there were speakers and discussion panels and the like. I think, in France, it’s called “le jour des femmes.” I’m not positive, we were discussing it in my français écrit class, during which I was once again distracted by the nuns. I guess because I’ve never been to Catholic school, or any type of private school, it’s remarkable to me that they take classes with common folk and act like it’s normal. I think there is some sort of rank though because the professor addresses one as “ma sœur” (“my sister”) and the other as her regular name that sounds Portuguese. Also in that class is a very Japanese man who insists on going by the name Pierre. Just thought you might like to know that. In my langue française class I was feeling particularly sassy and brought up UFOs (we are encouraged to ask questions about anything, as long as we’re speaking French) and asked if there have been any sightings in France throughout the years…evidently there has not, or at least none that my slightly strange but super nice knows of. There have, however, been rumors of ogres who eat children. I’m not sure which is more ridiculous. On another note, I find it interesting the way that the professors have certain expectations about American students, and enjoy making fun of our accents while speaking French, and treat us with a bit more cynicism than the other students. I don’t think that there are more Americans than Japanese at the school, but they don’t really say much to the Japanese, maybe because they know we can take it and laugh about our ignorance as a whole but the Japanese would get embarrassed? I don’t know if that makes any sense.
Since Louise wasn’t around for dinner, Anna and I got to do our favorite thing- prepare dinner for ourselves which usually entails heating up a flammekouche (thin cheesy pizza-esque specialty from Alscace which I think I’ve metioned before), sharing a fresh baguette, drinking some wine, and relaxing. It’s way less tense since we can say what we want to say in English rather than having to think about it first slash sitting in silence until Louise asks a question/starts a conversation. That’s not to say that it’s always silent when L is there, often once we get a convo going, it’s not bad, but at the end of a long day it can be a bit taxing. I made my first visit to the boulangerie that is directly across the street from our apartment and purchased a fresh, soft yet crusty baguette. It was amazing and I don’t think I’ll be able to go back to American bread ever again. In other food news, I had an éclair today that had coffee-flavored filling and icing, obviously delicious. Off to Reims until Saturday evening.
P.S. It is now 11:41 am on Friday and Louise is downstairs making very strange noises in the kitchen...
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