Bonjour!

It's almost the holidays and I personally am excited to get a break from school. It's weird because I see on facebook that peopla are studying for semester tests and I admit that we don't have them here. The French school system runs in tri-mesters so I am also glad for that at the moment too.=) Another thing that comes with the season is the special foods eaten around the holiday. There are a couple interesting ones like foie gras which actually sounds really disgusting. So basically its something to do with the liver of a duck that people personally over feed and I heard that it's illegal in the states because of how they treat the ducks, but I am not sure if it being illegal is true or not. Just incase I want to try it well either way I will because I haven't before. Also around the holidays escargots(snails) seem to be popular, and I got the chance to try them at a marche de noel. I can't believe I'm saying this but they were actually really good. Usually they are seved with lots of butter and garlic and I could hardly taste the meat, but it was good. I think one time is enough though because I can't get past the idea of eating snails. It took three of us exchange students to get together and count to three and all try it at the same time to even eat the first one. Then another thing is boudin(that might be mispelled) or blood sausage which I haven't gotten around to trying yet either and I am not sure if I'll have the chance or not because everyone in my host family hates it. As for desserts there's the bouche de noel or a type of roll cake that I love and pain d'epices which I find is really similar to gingerbread though everyone insists that it's completely different. So I have a couple more things to try while I'm here.

Another thing that comes with this time here is first a lot of strikes for the trains and teachers. I've heard that it's the season in winter because it's cold and no one would have a reaosn to complain in the nice wheather. I am not quite sure how the whaether changes anything for the teachers, but okay. The final thing is calenders. It seems like everyone sells calenders at the end of the year. The people who collect your trash, students, firefighters, etc.. And my host mom says that it's almost obligatory to buy a calender to be polite. Therfore we have about 6 calenders here around the house from the various people who come to your door and sell them. It's sad to think that I only have about a month and maybe a week left here. It will fly even faster with the holidays too. Until next time everyone=)

St. Nicholas

Hello Everyone=)

So Just a couple of random things that happened in this last week and a half. First, it started snowing! And alot at that, it hasn't stopped snowing for one full day since and the one day it was close it rained and hailed most of the day too...I hate winter and being in another country won't change that. On the bright side because it's winter that means we only have two and a half more weeks till Chistmas break.=) One thing I did learn about the winter holidays here is that here in the Lorraine region of France there is a special holiday near the first or second Saturday in December called the "Jour de St. Nicholas" which is about an old folklore that isn't exactly the most pleasant, so I am warning you ahead of time. So the story in brief says that during this period of famine this butcher kidnapped three children and took them to his shop where he murdered them and sold their remains off as ham(I told you it wasn't pretty). Then one day St. Nicholas came to the town and saw through the butchers plans and what had really happened and through his prayers he saved them and brought them back to life. At least it has a somewhat happy ending. Anyway during the holiday there's a parade in most major cities in the Lorraine region of France and all the children get candy and small amounts of money and other things like that. Then instead of being able to buy chocolate santas you can buy chocolate St. Nicholas's with the three children. It's not a huge huge holiday but it's very popular where I live here and you hear about it alot. Even all year round you can find statues of the saint and the three children. I should mention that yes Santa exists as well during Christmas and is called the "Pere Noel" instead. I am also notincing little differences in our tradtions as well. For example, I learned here that only in America do people hang Christmas stockings over the fire place. As always I love these little differences=)

As for other things this week, our class in SES(something with economics) the teacher asked every student what we would do if we magically gained $10,000 dollars. He went around and asked everyone and I was suprised by most of the responses. Everyone either said they would buy clothes, cigerettes, jewelry or save it for a car...except me. I just said I would save most of it for collage which I guess for them isn't a problem because in France you don't pay to go to a university if it's in the same region in France as where you currently live. How I wish that was true when I think about how long it will take me to pay it off. Another thing with collage is that the people here don't have to be accepted in to collage, they choose where they want to go and unless it's a private school they just go and enter. Personally I think it's nice that way, but then again I guess some universities would be more crowded then others and what not. As for my only other school response is that we had the "conseil de classe" this week where our 2 class delegates that we voted for maybe a month or two ago go and meet with all of our teachers to discuss grades, and evaluate and see where each student is. Then in my AP class(no not advanced placement, I am sorry to say that I don't actually know what it stands for but it's kind of like advisment for us in Ankeny) the delegates talk to the class and read through the evalutations and such. I am happy to report that all of my teacher are really proud of me and how hard I have been working=) but for those of you that know me well there shouldn't be any suprise there. Finally for school this week there is a "BAC Blanc" or a practice test for the BAC, the largest highschool test in the lives of french teenagers, for French class. I am not excited because the test is four hours long and you have to analyze and prepare a number of documents. This should be interesting.

Finally, just a quick word on what I have been doing. This past week-end I went to Metz again for a little AFS day. We toured the Museum Pompidou, the cathederal, theater and I went shopping and things with my friend Celine who also stayed the weekend. I love meeting up with all of these other people and talking about our adventures(in french and sometime english if no one knew how to say what we wanted in french). All in all it was good there=) then I have a Marche de Noel in a city in another region of France with Ceiline and Eriko which is pretty much a Christmas market and other fun activities. I am looking forward to it! I hope everyone there isn't feezing like it is here. Hope everyone is well!!!

English,Names and Updates

So I have been in France for about three months and still some things never cease to amaze me. First, I have no idea why I was thinking about this today,but I realised that for some reason people here never find it wierd to use some random words in english. For example, instead of saying the french word for stop most people will literally say, "Stop" in english. And the road signs here are still stop signs and not "arreter" (to stop) signs. When I tried asking my host mom about it she said she wasn't exactly sure why things are like this but they are. Oh well not all signs are like that the exit signs say "sortie"(exit) and things like that. I just found it interesting though i am not exactly sure why I was thinking about it today and not two months ago.

Then at school today I was also thinking about why the teachers here don't bother to learn all of their students names. We have been in school for more then one trimester (we don't go by semesters here) and still most of the teachers look at the list of names and seating charts almost every time they call on a students name. Or at least it's for the students who don't go an cause trouble or drill holes in their desk all the time(no seriously some kids here do that). Also while I am thinking about it the students here don't seem as motivated about school. I thought with the BAC(the huge test at the end of high school for those of you who don't know much about the french school system) everyone would be studying harder, and I have heard that my class seems to be the only one where that isn't true, but I am not so sure. Most of the time instead of raising their hand to ask a question a student will just say "Madame" or whatever title fits. I personally find it a little annoying because it makes things more difficult to understand the teacher, but oh well.

Then if I haven't said so before. I hate my two hours of sports here. I have been running outside in 0 degree weather, and one of the times it was raining and the teacher said, "You have to adapt to the weather because I am not changing my plan just because it's raining or cold." On the bright side,  I think by the time I return to the states I will hardly ever be cold or complain about going outside in PE.

Finally, this past weekend I went to a concert in Strasbourg for a female vocalist named Veronic Dicare, who is a Canadian imatater. So we heard songs normally sung by many well known French, American,and Canadian singers. Personally I liked it and she was actually very good at imatating and half the time I could have said it was like the real thing. The other half I normally had never heard the song before so I wouldn't be able to say or not. And then lastly Happy Thanksgiving this week everyone! I hope your vacation is good(I am still stuck going to school)! I will attempt to create some sort of Thanksgiving meal for my family here so I am hoping that it turns out decent at the least.

Last week of Break

Okay just a really quick update since I have to go to school again tomarrow after our two week break. This past week I spent with another AFS host family who were all really nice. They took me to Trier(Treve) Germany the first day so we could explore the history, and I got to see the old cathederals and buildings there which was awsome. I also thought it was wierd and I don't know if I've said it before, but immediatly when you drive through the boarder you are pretty much over whelmed with german(which personally I don't understand at all). But it was really cool, and luckily for me and my family they speak english really well, so I got a little break from french.=) Then the next day we went to Metz(prounounced mess) which is the capital of the Lorraine region of France. we just took a little tour of the city and talked about the history and when we got to the cathedral it was HUGE! And the french seemed really proud that one of the Popes came to visit it at one point. But it was a  beautiful builing that was constructed from the start of the 14th century and up to the early 19th century. What also suprised me about it was that they clean it all year round because by the time they clean the whole thing they have to start over again. Then we went to Thionville and out to a movie called the Plan Parfait (Perfect Plan) that featured a well known french comedian Dany Boon, and for my fellow classmates, yes the same person we saw in one of our french films last year. And I am proud to say that I understood most of it=). Then finally we spent the last day in Luxembourg in the city of Luxembourg. It was great. I don't have much to say about the city itself, but we saw the Grand Dukes palace and went shopping in three or four different districts/neighborhoods. All in all a good week and I start bright and early tomarrow with two hours of running outside in the cold for P.E. because apparently it's normal to run in winter here and not when it's nice outside. Oh well=)

Hi everyone,

First, I want to say that I am sorry I still don't have pictures...the website is not liking me alot at the moment, so I will put most of them up on facebook, and I sincerly apologize to those of me who arn't friends their. I will try my best to get it to work soon.

Secondly, there's only one more week of break and I am excited. I will be heading to Germany and Luxembourg with another host family from AFS because my host parents work the whole time and thought it would be boring to sit at home alone all week. It's a little wierd though seeing as I just got back from Germany for the day yesterday because we drove two hours to go to a huge indoor heated pool resort called Titisse Neustadt. It was really cool because it's a new facility and there are three completely different pools. One of them is pretty much a sauna, the second you feel like you're on some tropical island, and lastly my favorite was an amusmant one with 21 different waterslides, a giant wave pool, diving boards...well you get the point. I have to say the whole thing was really cool, but the one part I thought was the wierdest about my day yesterday was that as soon as you drove over the bridge boarder between France and Germany(for some reason there was no customs either) was that you were overwhelmed with German, and I am proud to say that I understood nothing=) But it was really cool, and everyone we talked to were really nice and spoke in English for us, so I had to translate for my family. All in all it was a good day.

Lastly, the beginning of this last week I was in another city in France spending the week with one of my best friends Eriko, a Japanese girl also with AFS. And because her host mother is a EPS teacher we had a lot of outdoor activities. Every morning we would go hiking in the mountains when it was snowing, and we always climbed to the summit, and let me just say the views wre amazing! And it was actually alot of fun, and I don't think either of us were cold. I am also now proud to say that I climbed more then 300 meters up a mountain in two hours more then once.=) Excercise for vacation finished...Just kidding=) What was even better was at the top of the summit you could see the German boarder and the Alps mountains in the distance. We had  a lot of fun. When we wern't hiking, we practiced our french, I learned a little Japanese, and we made desserts like brioche(this really good sweet french bread) and crumbles (the same type of crumble that we have in the U.S.).

Well still hoping everyone there is good. And sadly like you guys I think I can say I am sick of all the U.S. election things. It's following me here too!! Something new on the elections is on the news every night and I get asked about what I think almost everyday. Not to mention there's even posters and some advertisements in the cities...I hate politics=p well that's all for now...
I have talked enough.

La Greve

So I first want to say  to Madame Lund that you were completly right when you told me that I would most likely experiance a time when the French went on strike. The next two days here in my region of France at least there's a train stike so only one train runs in the morning and only 2 or 3 at night which is both good and bad for me because I take the train to school and back every day, so I get to sleep in a little more because the train in the morning is later then my normal one and my school understands and doesn't count me late or absent. I do have to say though it's a little annoying that I have only one or two to choose from when coming home since I finish at a different time every day of the week. Oh well my host mom told me that winter seems to be the season for stikes( Le greve) and my host family jokes around saying it's similar to a sport for the three groups of people who go on stike most often.(Teachers, the trains/public transportation and doctors suprisingly) So I will probably get to experiance more then one.

Also the second thing here is that this past Sunday my family took me to what they called a "fois" in a town nearby called Mirecourt and basically its a lot of little shop/stall things similar to what we have at the state fair with slightly different foods and it's more like shops rather then activities. I am not quite sure how to explain it, but Pascaline said that for some reason it's really popular for kids around my age though I wasn't too thrilled about it so I am not exactly sure why...Oh well it was an interesting experiance, but maybe I didn't like it so much because I stood for an hour at this one place and we had some guy talking really fast and he just gave away the most random stuff for around the house. For example, I got a notebook and my host mom got a new pan and other things for around the house and my host dad got a new tie and such...you get the point. Oh well it's just different=)

 And finally, since it's Wednesday today the week is half way done and that means I have a two week vacation starting after school Friday!!! I'm excited because I will spend part of it at my friend Erikos house(another exchange student with AFS) and for the second week I will be staying with a different family to go see Luxembourg and Germany=) Other then that there's not many new or interesting things here, but that mean I may be getting more used to life in France and luckily for me I think my language skills are finally improving a bit.

AFS Weekend=)

So this past weekend I had my first of 2 AFS weekends and all I have to say is that it was awsome! We went up to a log cabbin in the forest to go hiking and meet with all of the other AFSers in the area. It was great meeting with my friends Eriko(from Japan) and Celine(from Austria) who I met in Paris.( and hopefully on the two week vacation coming up at the end of the month I will be able to stay with them to hang out more) And when we all went hiking I have to say luckily for us the weather was great but it was wierd at the same time because everytime on of the adults in our group saw a mushroom we all had to stop walking, look at it, and maybe take a picture or 2 after talking about it. I don't know if it's a French thing to like mushrooms alot because my host mother loves them too but I get a lot of mushroom things here, but I have to say that it's not a bad thing. Then the food was great too and what else was great is that there were mini meetings for each student with our mentor to discuss any problems or concerns. But I have to say that it was nice to know that they let me tell them when things go wrong and to know that they are there for me=)

Another thing this past week was our school delegate elections. We had people in our class volunteer to represent our class similar to how the student council works in the United States and we just wrote the names of the person we wanted to be elected on a piece of paper. And we voted about 3 times till one group had the majority and then we have two different people who will help the teachers with grades and tell the administration any concerns and things our class has that they would like to fix. other then that there's not many new things in France except I went to the theater for the first time to see Taken 2 and I was feeling really proud of myself because I understood almost the whole film=) I actually find it easier to understand movies then normal conversation. I am not sure if thats because the movie has an actual story and the conversation isnt just random and about what ever or if it's because my french has just improved that much. Oh well last thing is that I want to apologize for not writing as often as I would like. I keep telling myself I will do it tomarrow but then I never have time and tell myself Ill do it the next day and the cycle starts over=p Oh well I hope everyone in the states is well. I miss you guys.

Random update

Hello everyone!!!

So in about two or three days I will have officioally been in France for about one month.=) Wait one month!?!?!? what happened during that month and how did I only find time to write like three messages? i was planning on writing more often i guess I am just always busy.

So this past weekend was interesting. My family and I went searching for little stars. Yes you heard right little stars. During the day in the liddle of a field. It was actually really entertaining. So basically what it is is that there is a huge field where these minerals grow that are literally star shaped and they arnt huge so you really have to search. And so we went looking for this mineral and I can now say I have like 30 little stars in a jar in my room=)  and yes that is a picture of me looking for stars=)  (and again i want to apologiwe because I have like twenty photos I want to put on but that seems to be the only one thats working because I didnt take the photo. why is it technology doesnt want to work only when I am involved?) 

Other than that, school is going well I and i am still noticing little differences such as the fact that every student has to stand up behind their desk before class until the teacher says that we can have a seat. and and all of the test scores and assignment scores are out of 20 and all weighted about the same (not that i am doing too too well on them since I dont understand everything) but its going alot better.  And guess what? I found two exchange students from another program who talk to me at lunch and we talk every once in awhile and its great sharing experiances. I just cant believe its over in about four months. anyway i hope all of you back at home are well=)

So yet another couple days done...not much to say but just a comment on how different some things at school are. So first of all there are days when you will have school till around 6 o'clock and others where you are done at noon because the schedule is set up sollage style except you stay with the same group of people all day. Today I was done at noon. Why? Because my latin teacher decided to not come to school today.. So I got to go home early after walking around Epinal(the city my school is located in). which I can't really complain about. But theres also the fact that every time you have a class the room where the class its located in is different. But i think one of the most interesting things about school is that our class picks two representitives and at the end of each trimester those two people will helps the teachers determine our final grade for the semester. We have the voting sometime in the next two weeks and lets just say I hope it turns out to be a good difference.=)

Sports Day!!!

Hello everyone,

Here in France I had an awsome day at school. The entire school got together to play sports pretty much all day for some sort of friendly competition. Our class was our team and each student was chosen to be in one of many activities...somehow I got stuck in Course D'Orientation, the only activity I should say that I can't really say should be considered a sport. So basically there is a group of four to six people from your class who have to do a couple things. The first part of the activity was like a scavanger hunt where you had three maps and went around the school looking for different hints to words that ended up being some sort of phrase. the second was locating more objects using a compass and directions like a treasure hunt. And I cant say they werent fun because they were but I am wondering how its a sport...Anyway the last activity was the most different; So the teacher brought our group out to the forest and then gave one person a compass and longitude and latitude of the school and where you were. Then the teacher left and expected you to find your way back to the school on your own with just those two things. All I have to say about this was that it was interesting and rather entertaining to try to go in the same direction when everyone thought it was a different way. Anyway ahile I was stuck in the forest all day the other kids inmy class played normal sports like soccer and basketball. At the end of the day We all met back in the gymnasium and after the results my class got Fourth place which I have to say isnt bad. Anyway interesting and fun day=)

Welcome to France

Hey everyone!

So sorry I dont have as much internet out here as I though to write to you guys, but it is alot of fun I have tried so many different types of foods and half the time I have no clue as to what exactly I am eating but it has all been amazing! As for my travels my fellow AFSers and I flew by ourselves in a group of six on the plane to Paris and it was fun and we arived saely to Paris where we lived the next three days for pretty much non-stop orientations and last minute preparations before starting our adventures with our host families=) Then sunday we all went our seperate ways by train and it was a bit sad because we are all really close after practically living with each other for a week. But we also really liked meeting people from all over the world and litening to different stereotypes and what was true and not and we diidnt talk much about those of us americans but there were some interesting ones for example I was talking to a girl from Australia and about kangeroos and apparently they are so common and everywhere that they get hit by cars more than deer... but the rest of those are a whole other story.

I also started school yesterday (finally) and it was really easy because the schools are set up collage style except you stay with the same group of people for every class. And schools for Juniors and Seniors are specialized into different categories like S Class which focuses on math and science and ES Class for History and language I think and also L for the more literature and performing arts type of thing. But the wierd thing about my first day wasnt the fact that I didnt seem to understand practically anything in history class which is sad considering I took AP Euro last year but the fact that I really didnt have school yesterday since we finished at noon and I lived off capmus half the morning because I didnt have class. Oh and I did have an english class which was interesting because they speak a little differently then we do;;;and its not always correct. For example who says "who had his tattooed names on his back?" or something like that??? Oh well its been fun so far and my host familly is great and I was planning to post pictures but my computer is being stupid so I will update those when it decides to work! Until next time=)