Recent happenings

Last weekend we took a trip to Les Baux de Provence. It was really awesome. We walked around an old medieval village and then toured a Chateau. The Chateau had the most amazing view of olive groves and vinyards. I tried to load my pictures again but it's not working very well. If I had unlimited use of internet time it would be much easier but sadly I don't.

After the Chateau we went to a super cool "museum" show called Coleurs de Cezanne. The artwork is projected onto the walls of an old cathedral and everyone walks around in the dark and admires the works, which change during the visit (at one point all the pictures are of apples, and during another part the pictures change from the sketch to a drawing to the actual painting). There is also music that accompanies the show which adds to the coolness. After that we went to another wine tasting (this wine was not so good).

That was my whole Saturday and Sunday was spent lounging around. It's the first day in awhile that I didn't have anything to do. After brunch (my favorite meal at the college) we headed down to the beach (that's right...the beach...in October!!!). We were there for almost 3 hours and then we decided that we might be getting sunburned so we should go in and get homework done.

I haven't had a lot of homework with my classes. Our French class (which I get 8 credits for) moves fairly quickly because we are in France and they expect us to understand it much faster that way. We are learning things that I didn't learn in Spanish until my second or third year (different tenses and pronouns). We are also learning things that they think are useful but that I haven't needed yet (how to make a phone call and leave a message).

My art history class is ok, I wish that it was taught differently because it's really hard to understand the completely oral class when you're a visual learner. This is the first time that this lady has taught (she's only qualified because of her art history major) and she's only 25 so she tries to be our friend which makes things difficult at times. She also seems to struggle with the information that she is talking about; at times I feel like she just googled the painting and is saying what other people have said about it. But the class isn't too hard and it is in English.

My French Civ class is one of my favorites now that we're getting into the actual French government system and their ways of doing things. Before we were just talking about the declaration and other historical stuff. The teacher is French and the class is in English so there are times when I struggle to understand her English or she struggles to come up with a word. Some people think that the class moves in circles and we just keep learning the same stuff but I think that the teacher is sweet and the subject gets more and more interesting every day.

My other class is theatre and it's a VERY interesting class. My part has been changed from an old lady to a snobby British lady from the Croisette. By Thursday we have to have our lines memorized (it's been 2 weeks since we've started and the play is in 4). I am not struggling to memorize the lines but to say things with the right inflection; also my Spanish accent (which I didn't know that I had) is getting in the way. I think that's why the director (who is also the director of the school) has me say things in a very humorous, drawn out, over done way. I can't wait to perform it for other people (although no one will understand it) it's definitely been a fun experience.

This weekend I'm planning on doing some more traveling. This time I am headed to Blois, in the Loire Valley. Cody, Amy and I are going to do some chateau sightseeing. There's not much else to do in the region so we should see quite a few. We leave Friday afternoon and get back on Monday morning again. It's hard to do that too much but it's fun to have the experience and this time we got a sleeper car for the ride home so we should be fairly well rested.