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!