You know you are dressed inappropriately for class when someone honks at you at 8:45 in the morning.

Oops.

I just wanted to fit in and look like all of the beautiful French people!

Breakation Countdown

So some days, specifically Sundays, I wake up at 11:30 and sit in my room all day until I can eat dinner and go to bed. Maybe this also happens on Saturdays, Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays....ok I'm lying. That would be horrible. The point of this story is that today I did not do one single productive thing. And that is ok because it's Sunday.

Luckily for me, tomorrow marks the commencement of vacation week countdown! On Saturday, at the ungodly hour of 6:20 in the AM, I will be boarding flight 6505 to AMSTERDAM. Well, technically I'm flying to Eindhoven, it was cheaper, but a short bus ride from Amsterdam!!! I'll be blowing up the spot for 4 days before heading to Paris. Roommate reunion with my Elenkaaa. And also Nick, who counts because he will be my roommate for 4 days. In the month since I have been here, I have grown to love Aix dearly but I have underestimated the fabulosity of familiar faces. Basically, shits gonna get cray cray. In a good way, of course. What up Winter Break 2009?!

Now I must bide my time and attend class for the next 5 days. Impossible.

Just call me Grace Kelly

I apologize for the lack of updating but I promise you, by the end of this post you will know more about my life than you ever could have wanted. SO. Here we go.

Since my last post two weeks ago, I have spent a great deal of time delving into my studies here in France. I would just like to say that this block scheduling is still extremely painful after having been here for almost a month(February 21st!!). HOWEVER, I am slowly but surely learning the art of patience. When I get home, school is going to be the easiest thing ever. 50 minute classes in English. Cake. Although long, I am still finding my classes to be quite enjoyable, both due to the subject matter and my professors.

That is enough of that because the real reason I am

blogging is to make you all jealous of my recent weekend excursion to Nice and Monaco. Seriously, lifestyles of the rich and famous. I will start off with Nice because that was our first stop on this magical adventure. The Mediterranean is the most beautiful body of water, there is a reason they call it the Côte d'Azure. I would be showing you the millions of photos I took but my camera tragically decided to reformat itself and delete EVERYTHING. I will just have to content you all with stolen pictures taken by some lucky person on my program. So, for your viewing pleasure, I present to you in all its glory, Nice! 

Jealous yet? It's ok. Also, it happened to be Carnaval time so these images occurred. 

    The parade was pretty impressive, never before have I seen such detailed costumes! Some brief history: Carnaval in Nice is a 10 day festival that goes on during Mardi Gras time and each year it has a different theme. This year happened to be Masquerade hence the ridiculous fashions. Also, they throw flowers at you from the floats! The flower thrown is this yellow thing called a Mimosa and it traditionally starts growing around this time along the French Riviera. Do you guys feel smarter yet?

I spent the majority of Saturday in Nice and then piled back onto the bus and drove an hour through the mountainous countryside before reaching Monaco! The city of Monte Carlo is so unbelievable, I can't explain it in words. View these and be amazed. Real people do not live here, there is no possible way.

 

Apparently, foreigners don't have to pay taxes so I might have just found my future home?

My stint in Monaco led me to a brief afternoon in the town of Eze where I visited Galimard, a local Parfumerie. With the help of the United States government and my stafford loan, I was able to purchase a nice 35 euro bottle of legit French eau de parfum. I have been looking for a signature scent for the past two years and was finally able to find it in Journal Intime. Thank you, America.

Now I am back in Aix where dreams of summer estates and million dollars yachts have faded but at least we'll always have Monaco. 

Finally!

I HAVE FIGURED OUT HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY TRANSFER PICTURES FROM MY CAMERA TO MY COMPUTER.

Prepare ye for some mighty picture posts. Arrrgh.

The most popular girl in France

Just this morning, while I have been sleeping, in the span of 45 minutes I have received 2 wrong numbers. For real? I think the first guy was trying to find a classroom and the second guy was looking for somebody. I don't know because I can't understand French when I am still sleeping. I can't even understand English when I am still sleeping.

So please, people of France. STOP CALLING ME AT 11am ON A FRIDAY. I don't have class until 3 and I definitely would not like to be awake until then.

In other news, I'm going dancing tonight with some legit French people. At midnight!! Scandaleuse.

This is boring but I just wanted to say how amazed I am at the differences between French class in French and actual class in French.

Today I went to a theater literature class and it was the most tiring thing ever. Imagine having to pay attention to a professor shouting off facts about the life of Albert Camus while taking notes and translating it in your head into English all at the same time. 

I'm pretty sure I got confused somewhere because I have it written that he was born in 1930 and wrote Caligula in 1942. That must have been some genius 12 year old.

I am apparently front door challenged...

I was holding off updating because I wanted to post pictures of my gorgeous excursion to the countryside outside of Aix, an area called le Luberon. We went to 4 little towns which were absolutely beautiful and completely different from each other despite their close proximity. Unfortunately, my camera has decided to refuse to let me upload anything. Because it is a huge jerk.

However, I do have a nice little story that while is incredible embarrassing for me, may or may not be totally hilarious to the rest of you.

Ok. So, I had a 10 am class this morning and it only takes 15 minutes to get to school but I didn't know where the class room was so I figured I would leave at 9:30 just to be safe. Some background information: My house has some weird security situation going on. There's a gate and then a pathway up to the front door which is this HUGE wooden monster that requires a legit 1890's brass key to open it. Behind this door is a smaller one with glass windows that leads you inside of the house. It's not usually that difficult, but it is borderline a pain in my ass.

As I was leaving this morning, I got through the glass door no problem. A crisis arose when I came to the beast after it. I 100% spent 25 minutes trying to unlock this door. 9:57 rolled around and I had no choice but to wake up my roommate who did not have any class today. She opened the door in 2 minutes. I felt extremely foolish and was 20 minutes late to class where the only seat left available was 2 chairs stuck together. I ended up being about 5 inches taller than the rest of my classmates.

And tomorrow I have class at 9am...