Playing Mustard--uh, wrong condiment...

Things I need to take to Paris and therefore need to be gotten together before I actually write this blog:

water bottle

camera

sd card&batteries

une Bible

chapstick

antibac

clothes (2.5 sets)

toothbrush

toothpaste

facewashing stuff

three little shower bottles and scrunchie

lotion

cell phone

tickets

Ok...close enough!

Wow...this is the problem with actually doing stuff--now I have tons to write about because I missed a post!

Well, going off of glancing at my last post, the other yogurt flavor was mango and I don't recommend the experience.

Class yesterday is but a distant memory...lunch was fun even though it was completely the wrong, wrong thing (don't change your mind) (and I'm not explaining because it's NBD) (no big deal). I bought minutes for my phone and the lady at the store kindly put them on the phone for me.

Then I survived a decent afternoon of class--I love my class, that is to say my classmates. We're such good talkers. I'd love to teach us. Skipping to today for example, the prof is like, "So you would rather do speaking than listening?" and we're like, "YES." (more or less ;) and she's like, "OK, what is the most important thing in life to you?" And then we talked off that for an hour. Probably 45 minutes because she was really late. But whatevs. That's today. I'm still on yesterday. :)P

SKIPPING TO DINNER! Only not quite because yesterday was the day of what sounds like the chandler and hence it was crêpe day. So Isabelle made some and I had three halves, with honey, nutella, and jam for each. :) It's odd but I feel like crepes are a bit of an acquired taste--that is to say, I like them more and more the more I eat them. =)P

NOW SKIPPING TO DINNER! When I was getting ready I had to make an effort to remind myself that I was going to get to know these girls in my class and not to meet some really cute Chinese guy or something. *tsk tsk* It was good though because it made me focus a lot better--the silver lining of distractions. So I met them at the train station and walked easily to the buffet. It was surprisingly empty--not that many Chinese people in Tours, I guess, or a lot of restaurants to distribute them among. We were at one long table of 12ish people in three groups: Chinese people I didn't know who talked among themselves, me and two of the girls in my class, and then the other two girls with two French guys (one of whom is dating J, and his brother). So it was quite fun because me and the two girls could speak French or English as we chose and they were really good about translating "We're trying to decide how to sit/who else is coming" when there was a sudden outburst of much Chinese. KC said I have a gift for guessing =)P Body languages goes a long way.

Good news--I'm wearing the sweater that shrunk! (I got up and cleaned up a bit and got distracted). It's not actually wearable yet in real life except that it's on so I'm hoping sitting here tranquilly with it just mostly ON will stretch it in the desired directions because sometimes it's hard to tell when it's off.

OK, but anyway, dinner, it was really cool to just sit there and joke and laugh, mostly with KC and Z. We had a running joke that every time one of us would pour ourselves more water the other one (this was mostly me and Z) would say, "You need to stop drinking so much! It's unhealthy!" like we're horrible alcoholics. I explained to them about how I'm an aquaholic and then we decided that KC is both a shop- and choc-aholic and that Zi's a fun-aholic. I don't know, it was just fun. After awhile the one French guy, J's bf, started chiming in a bit, so that was fun--it was just relaxed and FUN. Like, seriously relaxed, we got there at 7:30 and I think we left at 10 or 10:30. Like, are you even allowed to DO that in American restaurants?? All I know is I kept fighting the urge to rush.

OH and there was ICE CREAM! I restrain myself: The food was good, definitely the French version of Chinese food though! And by that I mean, I've discovered that French cooking is really really good--but subtle. Flavors do not jump out at you, they just blend and build. That is to say, if it wasn't French cooking, I would call it bland. OK fine I'll say it: French cooking is somewhat bland, that is to say, subtly flavorful. =)P Am I in a hole? Am I digging myself deeper? Did I dig myself out? OK where was I going with this--yes, so the French version of Chinese food is not the oversalted, oversugared American version, and it is not spicy. It is French Chinese food: very tasty but also French because there were slices of baguette to go with and, yes I did eat one, frog legs. It was basically like chicken in frog leg form. Everything was very tasty and enjoyable. Particularly the ICE CREAM! They had COFFEE with little, like, oreo type cookie ball crunchy bits!! I got two bowls. Small ones. =)P The only thing I really didn't like was some bright yellow sugared dried fruit looking thing in the dessert section. Everything else was tasty, including the squid ring (I mean we call it an onion ring, so a squid ring, right?) and...I think that's all I really ate that was exotic. And trust me, everything becomes less exotic when it's breaded and deep fried. ^^ <=in honor of my Chinese friends. haha :)

So after a lovely evening at the restaurant, we all went to the youth hostel/student dorms (often combined here) where Z and MJ (a new acquaintance) live to play the Three Kingdoms game that I had heard them talk about. It's a Chinese, Munchkin/Magic?/Mafia kind of game where there are character cards and attack/defense cards and stuff. The French bf did a good job of explaining it to me. And I had a funny feeling this would happen, but the first game didn't finish until 1, at which point it was too late to walk back by myself, and everyone wanted to play another game, and I was way too tired to play smartly, but that was OK because Z and MJ died quickly and could direct me and I was getting the hang of it a little bit. I actually hung in there to be the last girl standing but then had fun chatting with the other girls once I died. So all in all, I didn't get back until I think like 3--

but do you know how many times I talked about Jesus last night? A whole bunch, a whole bunch. Mostly because one of the questions we tend to ask each other--here, a short outline of

Questions students at the Institut ask each other

Preliminary

1. Where are you from?

2. What level are you in?

3. Do you live with a host family?

4. How long are you staying here?

Still getting to know you but we're pretty decent acquaintances

5. What are you studying/why are you here?

6. What do you hope to do with it in the future?

7. Do you have any brothers or sisters (or cousins if they're Chinese)?

8. Do you have a boyfriend at home?

And là voilà, the question where it is very easy to introduce the fact that I don't have a boyfriend because I prefer to focus on my studies and getting to know Jesus. I'm much more comfortable saying stuff like that to non-Americans because they're like, "Oh yeah, you're American, it's not all that surprising that you're a Christian too" whereas Americans may be like, "Me too!" that is to say, I went to church when I was little and I'm not really into it now and so why are you all into this Jesus guy because we're supposed to be alike and you're weird. Yeah, I know, no one would actually say that, hence the "that is to say" which implies that it's implied. Point being, it was pretty whatever to talk about it last night except that it was so cool at the same to put that out there.

And it was a good warmup for this morning, because do you know what I answered to the question, "What is the most important thing in life to you?" ? "My relationship with Jesus." "Your what now?" <= "deaf" Alexandra. The Turkish guy was all genuinely confused and interested but Alexandra's too good of a teacher to let religion take the floor that early in class (you'll see why in a second), so first we talked about luck (which the Saudi girl picked as her thing because it's the means to all the other things everyone else was saying--family, friends, love, money), which was an interesting debate about how much is accomplished by work and how much by luck. Then we talked about just what family means and love and I was, by then, expecting a, "Oh dear we've run out of time for Jesus!" And she really did come back to me 2 minutes before class is supposed to end, 8 minutes before it normally ends, but by then the Turkish guy had left. Dommage. (Bummer). And in those last 5-8 minutes, we had gone all the way from the gospel to the fall to the Muslim version of all this and we even had the three Muslim students --ooh, I really want to use the excellent word "discuter," which is a cross between discussion and disputing. So they were discuting whether the Muslim version of the devil was a fallen angel or a fire being within like 3 minutes of starting the discussion, and I can see why Alexandra left it till later. But I still hope I get to talk to the Turkish guy about it because he's asked me about LT and he seems genuinely interested in a curious kind of way. It was interesting the one American girl's reaction--she definitely came off as, "Yes I know all about this and I've not chosen it" because she would answer "Could you elaborate on that" kind of questions when I was stuck for words in a "yeah yeah yeah" kind of tone. So that was also intriguing.

It was another fun day of class though, as far as that goes. At the beginning we had an evaluation and I can't wait till we get it back because for part of it we had to write a letter to our loved ones as if we were stranded on a desert island after a shipwreck and I'm putting it on here. =D Sorry loved friends, it's specifically to my family. haha. ANNNNND, when we were done with the evaluation, Anne-Claire pulled out a plate of crêpes and a jar of nutella and a spoon and some paper towels so I had MORE crêpes which was excellent because those things are 1,50 at the Sandwicherie and I had two just for being good and showing up to class even though I was up till 3:30! =D (Yes, this did figure into our discussion of luck when Alexandra was also really happy to have a snack).

Today for lunch we went to Eat Me--I would've been happy with less because if you go to a kebab shop you're going to eat a lot, but I got away with a veggie --kind of like the sammies at Quiznos but with naan and "Samurai" sauce, which means spicy mayo basically. I wouldn't get the mayo again but at least I found something spicy for once!

And then random of all randomness, we stopped at a bookstore that I've never really noticed and I bought a book. It glowed, and it was 8 euro, and the introduction looked fairly easy to read, so I bought it. (That's my shopping philosophy, cheap good value+glow=purchase and I don't mean literally glowing, OK? Everyone happy? Good. Let's continue.) It's called "Why then be a Christian" except that's my translation of the French title which is translated from English. Yes, I also feel that it is slightly ridiculous that I'm going to be reading a book in French that originally came from English, but from England, so I feel that it might have a bit more of a European perspective. The author is Dominican and I feel that I have now given Dad enough information that he can look it up and tell me what it's all about. Just kidding. I'm just sayin, that's the skype message I would've been expecting before I called it, but now I'm expecting a skype message about my projected skype message. =)P Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, to my life.

Did anything interesting happen this afternoon? Not really? I feel that I had a lot more to say only now I don't remember. I'm going to bed early. Like, I have nothing else to do.

OH dinner tonight--We had raclettes. Let me explain. Because up until half an hour ago, I had heard about it but wasn't really sure what it was. So let me expound on my newly acquired knowledge.

There's this cool little raclette cooker thing. The heart of a raclette meal is melted cheese, so, the purpose of the cooker thing is to melt the cheese. There are a bunch of little triangular trays and you put your cheese in and let it melt and then you scrape it out with your little wooden scraper onto your baked potato. Stéphane mashed his potato up and then made it more like cheese with potato bits in it. There were also cold cuts to go with which I avoided because I tend to make horrible scraping noises when I try to cut them with a knife and fork--hence, I ended up managing by cutting with the side of a fork American style. Is this like a mystery of why I need to be cutting this anyway? One of the peculiarities of my life right now that someone else would probably arrange differently. I tried eating it whole and it was really awkward. OK? Everyone happy? OK. It was pretty tasty and I was happy when I got the hang of it and realized you don't just take more cheese, you put it in the cooker again. Yes, 5 years from now I WILL be saying, "Even though I had had it described to me, I still took unmelted cheese and put it on my plate during my first raclette meal." Uh huh.

The dinner conversation was quite intriguing too--we started with anorexia/bulemia (no, actually we started with, "So my friend did the same thing I did awhile back and put a cast on the wrong arm! The kid got all the way home and came back in the next day!") and went on to the story of the murder that happened in the northerish of France I think that's been all over everything recently and then onto psychopaths and all the stories Stéphane (and Isabelle too actually!) has about crazy people who just want to kill people. "But how many times do you hear of it actually happening?" And I was surprised to hear that Stéphane thinks the American police are a lot tougher than French. I quickly surmised that the French police are all bark and show because they're not respected as much as we respect our not-scary-looking police officers, so they have to demand respect. Like the mom who yells a lot and makes scary faces because her kids run around doing whatever instead of the mom who gives an order quietly and politely but has it obeyed like lightning.

Well, I think that's all the new's (<=bahahaha I'm leaving that mistake because it's funny) that's fit to print. Tomorrow I go docile-ly to my classes (maybe there'll be more crepes or good discussions...), come back and grab my stuff after the morning ones, go to lunch with people I'm guessing...although maybe not because they're leaving for Paris too, actually! Ah well, I'll eat with someone, and then go to my afternoon art history and walk straight to the train station which will take me to Paris. I feel that I haven't done a great job of preparing for this trip but I also feel like Alena has and I just want to be flexible. If I see the top 5-10ish awesome things in Paris I'll be happy--I've realized that to go to 90% of all French cities, you have to go through Paris, so I'm thinking, why not just go back for a day at the Louvre? And then the Musée d'Orsay? It's only an hour, 50 euro, and no lodging if you're up for a long day. Compared to other exploring of France I could be doing, that's pretty cheap. But yes, I realize that there is more of France to see than Paris, however, do you realize how much there is to see in Paris??

OK, well, I'm not taking my laptop on this adventure, so I'll at least try to note down in my journal the things I have to write about when I get back. OK? OK. And I'll take lots of pictures. Probably. :)

PS: It's actually supposed to be 50 in Paris this weekend and I didn't freeze too badly today! It was excellent!