First things first: I started school this week. NOOOOOO wake me up from this nightmare! Talk about the reality check of all reality checks being forced to realize that the actual reason I'm even in France is to go to school and STUDY. I was definitely in denial. I am so French already I could not bring myself to believe that French people actually go to school and actually have jobs and actually do something with their lives. Because they don't. So seeing students walking around campus in their fashion forward scarves and trendy winter coats (cos mind you, the high is now 50°F ! Get me out of here !) was definitely a strange sight to see. I have made a few friends at school - two gay boys from the Netherlands that I'm doing a project with, two girls from Ireland who have the cutest accents ever, a boy from Italy and a boy from Spain all of whom speak close to perfect English (well I guess that's expected with the Irish). Talking with people from different cultures is fascinating and I hope to become better friends with all these people as the year progresses, but I am however regretting my decision to go to the university I'm attending. I chose this school because it has the strongest program for foreign students and I didn't want to immediately jump right into a standard French university and end up committing academic suicide. However, the classes I'm taking are beyond easy, I speak just as good of French as everyone in all of my classes if not better than most, and I'm realizing that I definitely could have and should have gone to another school. I definitely underestimated myself and am kicking myself for that now but hey, hindsight is 20/20, right? So I'll use this semester to improve my French ten-fold without having to suffer through 3 twenty page papers and 3 eight page papers like my roommate has to do. Ha, I guess it won't be all so bad. ;)
In other breaking news I officially went on my first date with a French boy! Ooh la la ! His name is Anthony (Ahn - toe - knee') and he is a coiffeur or hairdresser for you anglophones. My life is too ridiculous to take seriously sometimes. I have a gay French friend who does my nails, a gay French friend who does my make up, and now I have a straight French boy to do my hair? Could my life BE anymore cliché ? I think not. Anyway, he's super friendly, really funny and totally obsessed with the fact that I'm American (but really, who's not obsessed with that already?). The only thing is, he's kind of short. Like only an inch taller than me and when I imagined my French boyfriend he was PERFECT. And part of perfect requires being the perfect height as well so we'll see how far this actually goes.
Fishing way back into the archives about exactly a month ago was my trip out to the French countryside to visit Jonas. I knew he lived in a "tout petit village" just outside of Vesoul but nothing could have prepared me for this. There were meadows and fields and cows and animals that stretched on for miles and miles (or rather kilometres and kilometres) and I have never seen anything like it. Jonas' house was 200+ years old and his parents Édith and Jean-Claude were the nicest most generous people I have ever met. They showed me a style of French living that I never would have believed existed had I not seen it with my own two eyes. It was beautiful. So relaxed and slow-paced. Nothing like Paris, not in the slightest. They took me around the neighboring villages and one of the nights Jonas and I went out to the movies with some of his friends then after to a bar and the next night we all went to the one and only night club in the area (which was surprisingly fun especially considering how small and isolated everything was). This little trip to the countryside could not have come at a more perfect time. Subconsciously I was starting to get homesick. I never realized it because I was always kept so busy in Paris but being in a family atmosphere with no obligations and just being able to relax made me realize how much I missed my family. And being around Jonas and his group of friends barely being able to keep up with conversation made me realize how much I missed my friends. Only hours before I was supposed to get on my train to head back to Paris I actually started crying to Jonas' mom. I broke down telling her how alone I am in Paris and how hard it is making friends and how difficult it is being so far from my parents and all the typical emotions that everyone assumes you would feel when you move halfway across the world at age 19. But sometimes you just have to let it all out before you can move on. And moms really are the best people to do that with. Nobody listens better or knows how to instantly calm you down better than a mother and even though she wasn't my mom, she knew what she was doing, and it felt just as reassuring. So Édith called the train station and pushed my train back a few hours so I could spend an extra day with them so she could be sure that I was okay before returning back to Paris. It's nice having a family here that cares about me to kind of serve as my French family. I'll be going back to spend the holidays with them but maybe I'll go back even sooner!
Which leads me to my next important topic . . . I FINALLY have started to make a solid group of friends. Half American and half French which is perfect for right now. Two of Jonas' girlfriends from Vesoul moved out to Paris a week or two after I left Vesoul and since they have been here we have basically been inseparable. It's so much fun having French girlfriends because they know stores that I never would have gone to otherwise, they teach me drinking games, explain words or phrases to me, and just spend time with me! I had my first party over this past weekend with about 12 people most of whom were French and it's so refreshing finally being able to see that I am making a dent in this city and things are coming together.
Before I started this blog post I went back and re-read some of my older ones just to refresh my memory a little bit about what I have been doing. And it was such a weird feeling reading how I felt a month or two ago and realizing that my feelings have changed completely. A month ago I was worried that I would never become fluent, and here I am a month later on the verge of fluency. My french friends are constantly telling me how well I speak French and some have even called me bilingual. That was the best compliment I have ever received in all of my life. I also saw Antoine again last weekend and one of the first things he told me was that my French has already gotten so much better which was weird to hear because I don't notice that my French gets better. It just happens little by little but when someone doesn't talk to me for a while it must become super evident how much progress I have made.
Oooh Paris. Your little wonders never cease to amaze me. I never cease to surprise myself with how completely dedicated I have become to this place. Well, I guess I also fell in love with Germany this month, and German beer, and Germans in lederhosens . . . but that is a whole other story . . .
