... Because when deciding between procrastination and schoolwork, procrastination always wins.

So, another week full of exciting and less-exciting adventures. First of all, I made it though my week of two tests and a new section in my art history class, although barely. We'll be spending the next four weeks on... Something to the effect of iconology/iconography (there's actually a difference, who'd a thunk?) of Renaissance painting. Sounds like a blast in theory, but in reality, she's hard to follow and has this bad habit of assuming that all the students are in her other class as well... Yeah. That'll be interesting. Academics in general seem to be gearing up a bit, which is pretty terrifying. It's not that a ton of stuff needs to be done so much as what does need to be done is either very poorly explained and thus daunting, or is worth a huge percentage (say... 100) of our grade. Yikes.

So, on Wednesday, Sealia and I had our first cooking class! Getting there was an adventure, as it was pouring rain and windy to boot, so by the time we got there, we were soaked, despite the umbrellas and rain jackets. So, it was with a lady by the name of Mme Mousseron, who's rather adorable. So, we spent about 2 hours with front-row seats at a cooking show. We helped out a bit, but (at least I) did a lot of sitting and watching. We made: gratin aux endives, truit aux amandes, un "cake" et un "crumble," which was all wonderful, with perhaps the exception of the endives.

"LAAA!"
General immaturity, what can I say?
Also, I'm not sure I realized that fish have rather sharp teeth. And really silly looking tongues.










Grapefruit and kiwi. Do you have any idea how hard it is to cut and peel grapefruit like that? Well, hard!!! Looks pretty, though.











"Look what I made, ma!" Sealia showing off the truit aux amandes.

p.s. MHC, we're onto your scheme. You attract the brightest and most motivated women, then send them away to to foreign countries to "broaden their horizons" and turn them into housewives!!






Le "cake." Really, that's what she called it. It was basically a cheese/veggie loaf of bread which was really good, minus the olives.















Fishies! Mmm... They made fun of me for how I ate it, though, which I would consider a "I'd like to avoid getting fish bones stuck in my throat" manner, but they just thought was funny.














Apple crumble! And a rather satisfied cook :)

















As for the rest of the week... Nothing too eventful until Friday evening, when I headed back t Fitzpatrick's, the Irish pub, to listen to the jam session. Turns out that I got there early and had time to kill before they started, so I ended up just sort of attaching myself to a group of Irish students and hanging out with them for a while. It was a bit awkward, but I was damn proud of myself anyways :) On Saturday I finally went and found a ballet studio and took class! It was a really good class, just the right level, and a lot of fun. It really is interesting how little ballet seems to change around the world, though--same words, same order, even a similar "ballet mistress" attitude. The thing that amuses me, though, is the fact that in English, the words "tendue," "pirouette," "pencher," all sound so beautiful and elegant, whereas in French, it just means, "stretch," "twirl," and "tilt." Much less interesting. Saturday evening found me with a babysitting job, of a 2-year old and a 4-year old, the kids of my friend Lawrence who owns the English bookshop just down the street. It was an eventful evening--Finding Nemo, then train tracks (I love those things!), then paper-towel confetti, then books (written in French, and read outloud in English... Let's just say it wasn't pretty), and then bedtime, which took some persuasion. Whew.

Monday was a rather excellent day, overall, including such things as massive grocery shopping trips, cooking a really good dinner for myself (I CAN COOK!) and then having my first Irish fiddle lesson, from one of the guys who played at the pub. It was a good lesson, overall, but, as first lessons are wont to be, a bit disorganized and an overload of information. Ah well. At any rate, I have a good number of bad habits that need fixing toute suite, including some of the most basic elements, which is frustrating. Oh well. And... So starts another week. Oh, and random important information--I will most definitely be coming home for Christmas break, which is about between Dec. 18 and Jan. 20, so put that on your calendars!

Hi! So, it's been a busy week. It was really nice to see my parents again, albeit a tiny bit odd to have them here. I guess that's to be expected, though. So, on Thursday we went to the opera (Magic Flute, take two) which was a lot of fun. I had been nervous about figuring out how to get our tickets, but it worked out just fine. We were in a box nearly at the center, but something like 6 levels up, which was intense. I thought we were going to need oxygen tanks, from the sheer altitude. It was a really good show, a bit more polished that when I last saw it.

Friday was our trip to the Camargue! It's a region about an hour east of Montpellier, and reminded me rather oddly of Mexico or something. Hm. So our first destination was a city called Aigues-Morts (no, I don't know what that means--the only translation I can do comes out to something like "dead high pitched notes" which isn't especially logical). We happened to get there at the best time possibly possible, as in we were on the main street for about 5 minutes when we realized that the city was in the midst of their Bull Festival! As we were figuring this out, a herd of black bulls comes charging down the street and were kept in line by a few Camarguian cowboys on their white horses. I wish I had pictures, but it happened so fast that I didn't have time. Oh well, plenty of other good photos! Must admit, though, that it did make me appreciate Brattleboro's Strolling of the Heifers a bit more...

The street along which the bulls had run. Pretty huh? Actually, one of the horses threw a shoe, which of course I had to keep as a souvenir.











They let a bull out into the arena and just let him run around and charge at anyone and anything he felt like. People kept on jumping into the arena to catch his attention and then jump to safety. As Becca said, it's good to know that there are idiots in every country. It was cool to watch, though.








They had the cowboys (I'm not sure if there's a specific term for them or not) herding the bulls around in the ring which was pretty cool to watch. Pretty white horses...










The arena was right outside the wall that surrounds the city (which was later went into and walked around in).











Moat!! I want a moat...













I couldn't help myself.













Manifestations Taurines!!!













View of the city from the top of the wall. Cool, huh? I wonder if you could get across the city just on the rooftops... Seems like something in a James Bond movie.










It's times like this that I feel a whole lot better about my French.













Film of one of the bulls running around the arena (and no, your computer isn't broken, there's just no sound). No worries, no bulls were harmed in the making of this movie. No promises about the guys who were running around in the arena, though...

So, that was the excursion to Aigues-Morts. After that, we went to a town called Saintes-Maries-de-la-Mer which is the capital of the Camargue and walked along the beach. But man, it was cold! I feel like we jumped right from summer to winter. Brrr. The highlight of the second town was, of course, the humongous crepe that I ate before we left. Oh man. After getting back to Montpellier, I headed out to the pub Fitzpatrick's to check out the Irish jam session I had heard about. I got there around 10, ended up watching about 45 minutes of a rugby game (it makes football look like a game of pattycake) and then finally the session started up. It was great music, and I ended up talking with the fiddle (who's Irish) about lessons... I hope something pans out.


Sunday found me hiking yet again, but this time in a. five layers, a hat and gloves and b. proper hiking boots! (Which gave me giant blisters... Ow) The hike was "les cascades d'orgon" which was a really nice hike, except for the last part, which was basically straight up. Not so fun.

It was ridiculously pretty, though, and actually looked kinda Vermont-ey. *sigh*






Sunday was brought to a close with me going to a real, live French dinner party :) I still can't get over the fact that I was invited by my friend Magali. It was fun, even though I understood about 3% of the conversation, and involved wine, good people and lots of food. I'm still getting used to the French method of greeting, aka three kisses (in Montpellier, it's always three, Paris is four) even if it's someone you've never met before. It still kinda cracks me up, though, when I kiss someone especially manly looking, who probably wouldn't be caught dead doing such a thing in America. Oh, the Europeans...

So, that's it for now. I have a busy week this week what with some tests, a new professor for my art history class, and a good deal of catching up, too. Also, I have my first cooking class tomorrow morning! I'm really excited.
Hope everyone's well!

Hello all! Well, I'm happy to say that the last week has actually had fewer adventures than previous weeks, which might mean less interesting reading, but a relatively more sane Emily which is always good. On Wednesday we had our medical exams which was the last step in the process to get our "cartes de sejour" aka residence cards. I had been pretty happy that my exam was at 8:30 am because I figured that things would be more or less on time and I could be in and out quickly. Alas, I forgot that this is France. So, it happened in three parts. Part 1 was my chest x-ray which was relatively painless, although cold metal on bare chest is not very pleasant. I was then given my x-ray to hang on to. Part 2 was when the x-ray was looked at, and I was asked a. if I was pregnant b. smoked and c. if I often threw up blood. Um... No. If I was throwing up blood, I don't think I'd be calmly sitting in the office, but in a hospital trying not to die. Turns out that I don't have tuberculosis! Who'd a thunk? Then waited around until Part 3 which consisted of me getting my carte de sejour! It's this giant yellow, shiny sticker in my passport with my picture on

it. Yes, I'm official! So, that was that, and took a mere 2.5 hours (not including having to go back to the office half an hour later because I had walked off with the wrong x-ray... Oops).

Thursday marked the official beginning of fall, in that there was a freaking Monsoon. Seriously, it was absurd. It drizzled for the morning, and then in the afternoon poured until there were rivers going down the streets, and even with an umbrella (which I was sharing with this French guy who seemed wetter than I) I got soaked. I'm told that fall isn't usually like that, which I'm hoping is true, because I really don't want to invest in scuba gear. The power actually went out at one point, but luckily came on a few minutes later, just when Muoyo and I were about to go ask Mme Cesari for candles.


Friday was Mountain Day--Montpellier style! For those of you who don't know, MHC has one day every fall when classes are canceled first thing in the morning, and everyone goes and climbs Skinner mountains and generally enjoys the fall weather. So, obviously we can't just cut classes here, but we did have a nice afternoon trip to this little Chateau on the outskirts of Montpellier.

Chateau! It was pretty small, but had this really nice garden.












On the roof, directly about the door was a dove which was just about perfectly placed. Good job, dove, very artistic.











I'm honestly not quite sure what this is supposed to be, but there were a few signs like it. Hedgehog? Wild boar? I'm hoping for the former.











Wandering the paths around the chateau. It was very quiet, and peaceful with no one else around, and made me remember why I like living in the country. As much as I love Montpellier, I'm a VT girl.









A lily in the little pond in front of the chateau.













On Saturday, there was an outing avec les filles, to dinner and then... skating? Yes! Apparently there's a year-round ice skating rink here. Wow. So, that was fun, although a lot harder than I remembered it being. I'm going to blame the dull skates, I think... There was this one point when I was trying to demonstrate proper stopping technique to some of the other less-sure girls--you can probably guess the rest. The fall was spectacular, and I think may have included a somersault. I think I deserve points for style. Also, it was really nice to breathe cold air for once.

The rest of the weekend was less eventful, and more centered around cleaning, laundry and homework, in preparation for my parents to visit me! They came this afternoon! I was waiting for them outside the train station, and thought that I was early, and then all of a sudden my dad's in front of me! Thought I'd have a heart attack. So, there was a good deal of waiting around for my dad to find the car that they rented, and then a rather long and much too eventful drive from the station to their hotel (Distance: about half a mile. Time: over an hour. Years shorter that my life is going to be: about 25). Let's just say that Montpellier is not a driver-friendly city. But, we made it through the tram-dodging, construction-avoiding, and one-way-street-avoiding and wound up at the hotel, at which point I collected the thing my parent shad brought for me (!) and staggered off to my apartment. We later met up for dinner which was fun. Looks like they'll be going to Saint Guilhem le Desert tomorrow, as everyone should, and then we'll meet up for dinner again. Hopefully I'll be able to go on a few excursions with them in the next week.

So now it is time to accept the fact that it is time to sleep, so I can live through my Tuesday from hell. Goodnight!

Sorry that it's been so long since my last post--life has a way of getting in the way of things, doesn't it? So, at this point, I have a full two weeks of classes under my belt and am getting a little more used to it all. My Francophone lit class is going well, although we're absolutely flying through our first novel, called L'Enfant Noir, and the man who teaches the lecture class is pretty tough to follow most of the time, although at least he's not using the microphone anymore. The mosaics class is a little less overwhelming, although he still goes really fast--he'll she a slide just long enough to write down the place, country and date, and then he's onto the next. Whew. The grammar class, while a subject that manages to both be dull but impossible to fully comprehend, is going well because the prof is pretty wonderful--the feistiest 60-year old woman I've ever met. And, phonetics is still putting me to sleep, and I still can't really tell the different between [y] and [u]. Damn you, French.

Last weekend was pretty full of adventures. On Sunday I went out with the hiking club. We met at 10:00 (it was a big group, a bit over 40) and then all piled into cars to head off to... wherever it was that we went, I honestly have no idea. I turns out that my car was full of four other 'oldies' which was both nice because they were telling me about everything, but also intimidating because they were all good friends. Also, fast-spoken French still goes totally over my head. Holy crap. So, after a. getting a bit lost and b. losing one of the cars in the convoy, we made it to the mountain, which we proceeded to climb... Obviously. Although everyone was referring to it as a "randonette" (une randonée is a hike, so randonette is a cute little baby hike), I was more or less ready to fall over when we got to the top. We had lunch and hung out for a bit (I chatted for a while with a Mexican guy (yes! Someone from my continent!) which was fun, and an exercise in really close listening). Also, peeing in the bushes = not so much fun, especially when said bushes all have prickers. I still have scratches all over my legs. So, that was interesting, at any rate. Unfortunately, the group was a little older (as in, not in college) than I had been hoping, but I'll definitely go back at least once and see how it goes.

Sunday night was the beginning of Yom Kippur, so (after a good deal of persuasion by my dear sister) I hunted down a synagogue to go to. So, I finally get there, and go up to the door and asked the man standing there if that was the way in. He said yes, and then proceeded to ask me a few questions about who I was (the last on which being "tu est juive?" Um... Nah, not Jewish, I just felt like crashing services. Seriously?) Of course, to make this more interesting, he had a really bad stutter, so... yeah. It was hilarious in a slightly awful sort of way. So, I eventually got inside, and mae my way upstairs to to woman's section. Oh my. So, the women don't get one side of the synagogue, they get stuck on the balcony, so unless you're in the front row, you have no idea what's going on. So weird. So, I stayed for about an hour and a half, 'course I didn't understand one bit of what was going on. At the end, though, there was this little old lady who saw that I was alone and must've figured out from my accent that I was American, and she said something to the effect of "have a good holiday, and I wish you a sweet and healthy new year" and kissed me, which was pretty much the cutest thing ever. It actually made me really happy :) I love nice people.

Monday's adventure was finding the Irish dancing studio which I had found out about at the foire des associations and had been really looking forward to taking a class at. So, I left an hour before class, which I thought would be enough time to get there. Hah. So, I took the tram to the end of the line, which is the suburbs of Montpellier, and proceeded to walk the three wrong ways (including along a bloody highway, which was sketchy as hell) before finding the right way. Turns out that the studio isn't even in Montpellier, but Juvignac, the next town over. Yikes. So, I eventually got there, half an hour late, and took the second half of class which was the tap part. It was fun, but not amazing. I dunno, if I'll go back or not. Luckily a woman offered to drive me back to the tram stop, because it would have been really, really, scary to have to walk all the way back. Yikes. Something about doing other types of dancing, though, always makes me want to go back to ballet, and I really need to go find this "studio Skouratoff" that I've been hearing about.

The last adventure I can think of included neither getting lost, French, nor new people, but a dead chicken. So, I found this great recipe for "poulet jardinier" in my microwave cookbook, and it called for a chicken, so goshdarnit, that's what I got. It was ridiculously cheap, too, only 4 euro. Cool. So, I cut up all my veggies, then the recipe says to add the chicken and I say... Oh crap. What do I do with it? So, I spent about half an hour wrestling with the bloody (literally--there were organs in it, too. Mmm-mm.) thing and stabbing it with a knife, and trying not to be too squeamish about cracking bones with my bare hands. Ick. Well, eventually I got 2 legs, 2 breasts, and 2 wings, so I figured that that was good enough. Emily: 1 Chicken: 0 So, anyways, the dish came out great, and it'll last for a while. Awesome. I love cooking full meals, so I can cook one thing and just add bread and be done with it. Also--I've decided that this whole "study abroad" thing is really just housewife training in disguise. Seriously. I'm ironing, planning meals, cooking, cleaning my bathroom every week, washing dishes... etc. It's sort of ridiculous how much work it takes, though, to take care of just you and your place. I can't imagine taking care of kids. Guess that's what the husband is for?

Let's see, anything else? Last night was Sophie's surprise birthday party, which was a lot of fun. We managed to totally surprise her! Remind me to never try and plan one, though, just thinking about it made my head hurt. We ended the night at Australia which was really fun. Also, I broke out my black leather boots for the first time in France which was awesome. Tomorrow I'm going hiking again, and the rest of the weekend will probably be spent cozying up with my homework. Well, that's what I'm hoping will happen, I'm not sure what the reality will be. Also, my parents are coming to visit in just over a week, which is pretty crazy. It was always this distant visit, and now it's almost here! Wow. I totally have plans to have them take me out to all the restaurants I've been eyeing for the last 6 weeks... Very sneaky.

Alright, I think that's all for now. Hope everyone's well!