Sun Garden Hammamet

The name of my hotel in Hammamet was Sun Garden. It was kind of funny seeing some of the signs in Hammamet because of obvious typos in English: "Wellcom to British Bar," "Paradis Palace," etc. I can't criticize the Tunisian people on their language errors, however, because many of them at least speak French fluently in addition to their native Arabic. Then there are the individuals who have worked in the tourism industry a long time and also speak English, Italian, German or Russian, or all of those. Impressive!

My hotel wasn't on the beach, but across the street, so I had to walk through another hotel to get to the beach. The beach was really nice - long and flat with good white sand. Not the kind of beach I'm used to, like the steeper beaches in North Carolina with waves or the rockier beaches of France. The only thing that can be irritating about the beach there are the vendors that walk around trying to sell you stuff. They ask you when you arrived, tell you that it's okay if you don't have money, they'll give you a necklace or a bracelet free. In which case the French respond "gratuit jusqu'à la caisse" (free until the cash register). I'll talk a little more about getting hustled in another post. My hotel and the other hotel, Caribbean World, both had beautiful exterior pools that I never went in. It was really nice outside but not hot enough to make me want to jump into that freezing water. Instead I swam a few times in the interior pool of my hotel and in the ocean, which was chilly but nice once you got in.

The French resort clubs are organized, as I pointed out in the last post, to keep everyone entertained. There are animateurs who organize activities for the kids, or play other games with the older people to make them happy. Axel, Marine, and Caroline (my host siblings) joined the club, so I was left to make friends of my own and find things to do. I played volleyball and soccer with some kids and adults during the week, and led my petanque team to victory on Saturday! While playing ping pong with Philippe (host father) one of the first days, we were challenged by a guy around my age and his younger sister. We beat them 2 games to 1, but it was good because I was able to hang out with the guy, Guillaume, for some of the week. The following night, Tuesday, I ate dinner with Philippe, Laurence (host mother), Guillaume and his mother. Afterwards we went to get some mint tea from the café in our hotel and Guillaume saw a couple girls he had eaten lunch with in the café, so we sat down with them and smoked hookah and talked. Although hookah isn't the healthiest thing for you, drinking mint tea and smoking hookah is something purely North African that I had to try... But the point of the story is that I had a couple French gazelles - as the Tunisians call girls - who I could hang out with when I wasn't going on adventures, which was cool. Tunisia was my first real clubbing experience as well. I had a lot of fun, thinking about how amazing it was that I was clubbing with French girls and the Italian guys they made friends with on the beach, speaking English with the Italians who didn't speak French and drinking Celtia (Arab) beer while dancing to a mix of American, European, and Arabic club music. Hilarious, and something I never thought I would do. Check out the pictures of my new friends!





I will post again later in another sitting, possibly this afternoon. I still need to explain the food and the markets and all, so I hope nobody's getting tired with the blog, but I need to take a little break at least. Chao!

One week and I was missing the cheese!

There's some OK sheep's milk cheese in Tunisia, but it's not like the cheese in France. I actually kind of missed the cheese for the week that I was gone. Imagine what will happen when I get back to the U.S.! No, but really... my trip to Tunisia was awesome! It was really cool to go to another country and set foot on my third continent. Now I'm back with quite possibly the best tan of my life and getting used to my normal life once again. I'm at least lucky to get eased back into the school routine. Today I only had 4 hours of class, tomorrow I'm not going to school because of a student/teacher strike, Wednesday is the normal half day, Thursday is a holiday, and Friday I only have three hours of class.

Anyways, I should start with the last week before I move onto what I'm up to now. I'll give some of the major details now and then make a few supplementary posts so that this one is bearable for you and I. Just make sure you check out the pictures that I put up tonight and tomorrow. Here goes...

I left France on a flight from Marseille at 2:30 on Sunday afternoon, April 20th. The plane passed over Corsica and Italy before landing in Tunis, Tunisia's capital which touches the water. I didn't get to see much of Tunis leaving the airport, as our representative from Lookéa Voyages was there at the airport to receive us and the other passengers coming on the same plane. We were put on a bus and drove about an hour down to our hotel in Hammamet, which was an interesting ride. Setting my foot in Africa for the first time was an amazing experience. Driving from the airport to our hotel was kind of eye-opening for me to see the real social conditions of the country. Even for a country which is well-off for Africa, it is easy to see how much more poor it is than the United States or France. Of course I've been in certain small places in both of those countries where the social conditions might not be too terrific, but realizing that most or all of many other countries are like that is.... I don't know quite how to describe it... difficult? A couple quick things along the same lines that surprised my immediate sight of Tunisia:

• The amount of people I saw just sitting around. One person, two people, etc. just sitting around in no particularly important places doing nothing or just talking. At first I thought this might because I was arriving on a Sunday and they may not be working but then I learned that the weekly holiday is Friday rather than Sunday in Muslim countries for religious reasons. Tunisia's listed unemployment rate in travel guides is about 12%, while it's probably something more like 20-25%.
• Sheep. It's not quite the fact that I saw sheep as the fact that I saw sheep everywhere. No real herding boundaries or anything; they could have been grazing on a soccer field in between two housing complexes or on a field more in the country.
• Other small things you notice about the state of wealth of another country: the conditions of buildings, the trash easily overflowing the single dumpster, and the bottom halves of trees painted white as warning poles.

When I got to my hotel I realized that people came to the country and went to resort hotels like this so they wouldn't have to see those exact things. I've never been to a real "resorty" place like this, so it was quite a different experience. For one things, I had already paid for the plane tickets, bus from and to the airport, the hotel, and all my meals I took at the hotel. All I had to pay for was when I wanted to really leave the hotel or buy a souvenir. The hotel has a crew of young people working for it whose job is just to take care of the guests, including things like coordinating soccer, volleyball, petanque and other sports, putting on a show every night, and leading "clubs" for kids from 3-11 years and 12-17 years old. So it was immediately a little different for me in the area of family time. For one thing my French family spends much more time together than my family does, which is mainly because of the differences in the places we live and the ease of getting around in Columbia. So my vacations have always been family vacations, not vacations where people tend to get away from each other a little more than normal.

So that's a basic rundown on my first impression of the hotel and the country. I want to go to sleep now, but I'll try to post again tomorrow a little more in depth. I hope everyone is good, and keep reading!

Shalom!

I hope everyone is passing an excellent Passover! Or my Jewish readers at least.... Pretty soon you're all going to sit down to your seders, which I will definitely miss.

Tomorrow morning I leave for Tunisia, which I am PUMPED about! I think it will be amazing to experience a country with a completely different culture, religion, and basic environment. I am going to chill out on the beach and get rid of my cycling-cause mid-bicep tan lines, meet French tourists, visit the cities and the souks, and eat as much couscous and other Mahgreb specialties as I can.

I also wanted to post a little more about food. I know I write about food and cooking too often and I probably sound like a fatty, but I guess it's just France affecting me. I'm now reading a book with a self-explanatory title, called A Cook's Tour, by Anthony Bourdain. That book and the fact that I've now become addicted to a French TV-show called "Un Dîner Presque Parfait," where five people take turns during the week cooking dinner for (and getting judged by) the other four. There's a prize of a thousand bucks for the winner as well. So the moral of the story is that I'm looking forward to cooking more, even if I'm no Iron Chef. I'll cook for you sometime. You don't have to pay me a thousand bucks, either.

Anyways, I just wanted to get in a quick blog before I scramble tomorrow. Caio

A milennium of architecture in two days....

The last couple days were a lot of fun. Saturday I helped two friends of my host family, Natalie and Christophe, move from our small village (Boissières) to the slightly bigger town of Clarensac. They weren't changing for the village itself, but rather the size and style of the houses. Their house in Boissières, which was built in 1535, is in the center of the village and therefore lacks a garden, a driveway, and generally just more space. The stairs and the floors, which are incredible when you think about how many people have walked on them, are sometimes rather tilted. The only heating is the fireplace, and it's impossible to hang anything on the walls. Fast forward four and a half centuries and you find their new house, which was built in 1976. It has a gate, plenty of lawn and garden space, an awesome view of the Vaunage (our valley) from the upstairs office, and an enormous terrace behind the house. Anyways it's a big change for them and interesting for me to see two completely different houses in a day. So we loaded and unloaded two trucks two times each, and at the end sat around drinking wine and beer and eating paté, summer sausage, bread, and cheese. I think the next youngest after me was 40 years old, but whatever....

Yesterday was another change of scenery. I finally got around to riding to the Pont St. Nicolas, which I've been saying I'd do for a couple months now. The roads on the way there were beautiful and I was riding a little too quickly probably, because at the end of my ride I was dead. I was wondering why a bunch of people were watching the road in a small village, and yelling for me as I rode by, until I got passed by a few French rallye racing cars. So I rode on to the old bridge and stopped and took some pictures. The bridge was built in the beginning of the Romanesque period (end of the 10th century to the 12th century) by the Frères Pontifes, a religious brotherhood of bridge builders. Obviously the architecture of the bridge is completely different than the Pont du Gard, and so is the condition of the bridge... Not to criticize the brotherhood, but their the Roman aqueduct from 2000 years ago is in better condition! The road from the bridge back to Nîmes was very different as well. Many more cars, and I passed an army training ground, with lots of "tank crossing" signs. I rolled through Nîmes, which was busy with people out in the pretty weather, and rode slowly back, tired.

So I saw a century of architecture in a couple days, which was interesting. The weather has been pretty nice, except for a big storm last night and the first thunder I've heard here. I think that's all I have to write for the moment. I'm going to Tunisia on Sunday, so if I don't blog again before then I'll have plenty to write about and plenty of pictures afterwards. Hope everyone's well!

I'm legal!

Let me start off by saying that I am undergoing a recently discovered illness called blog envy. With this idea I think I will be the next Freud... But anyways I'm saying this because I've been reading Michael Charamella's blog and it's so interesting! Of course he's traveling all over the world and seeing so much awesome stuff, so I'll just have to step up the game...

What I just wrote about has nothing to do with the title of this blog. I've been 18 now for a year, 3 months, and 24 days. So I've been legally an adult for a little while, but what I mean by the title is my alien status. For the past seven months I've been living in France, as you all should know if you're reading this blog. However, technically you're supposed to have a residency card here after your first three months, and I didn't have one. Today I finally have my card, and I am no longer an American illegal alien living in France!

Speaking of changes, the time finally changed here last weekend. I'm now really liking seeing the sun in the sky until 8:30, which is something you might all have been used to for a few weeks. It's awesome being able to walk to the bus with plenty of sunlight and still having sun after dinner. The winter is miserable when you have to go to school and come back from school in the dark.

It is now also officially spring here, although it was already ridiculously nice weather here before. I took advantage of the sun Saturday morning and went out riding for almost three and a half hours. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, as was the French countryside, and I shoveled down plenty of pasta afterwards.

I guess the last thing I have to write about is my BAC Blanc French exam that I took the other day. At the end of the junior year, every student takes an exam in French literature called the BAC. The other subjects are taken in the senior year for the most part. Anyways, I went into a room at 4:30 Tuesday afternoon to get tested on some literature that my class had covered since the beginning of the year, and luckily had to cover Figaro's monologue in Act V, Scene 3 of The Marriage of Figaro, which I knew well. So for half an hour I read the monologue and planned my oral essay, delivered it in 10 minutes, and then discussed liberty and equality with the teacher who was questioning with me for a good half an hour. That wasn't on the schedule at all... But it went well, especially since it was my first oral presentation in French, and I got a pretty good grade.

That's all I have for the moment. I hope everyone is good, and I'll try to blog again with something amazingly interesting, unless I suffer from too much blog envy...

Assimilating into a new society

I haven't been up to a ton, so I don't have anything really new and interesting to write about. It's kind of hard keeping a blog like this going for a year because the fact is I have more of a routine now and my day-to-day life isn't necessarily very interesting. Although it may be very different to most of the people reading this blog, I don't find it interesting to write about. So I figured I would write a story about assimilating into French culture. It didn't happen to me, but Mianke (a friend of my host family who has been staying with us for the last few days).

Mianke (I hope I'm spelling his name right) is from Zaire, which is now the Democratic Republic of Congo. He came to France about 30 years ago as a political refugee. When he came to France with other refugees they went to a French restaurant in Paris and decided to eat a traditionally French dish. So they all got artichokes, and when he told me that I knew exactly how the story was going to end... They ate everything, instead of just eating the tender part of the leaves. They ate everything, and thought the French were weird for eating such a terrible thing but still reassured the waiter that it was excellent when he returned to pick up their dishes. So there's a little story about trying to assimilate into another culture... you have to educate yourself about it a little bit first.

So I'm exhausted after a long day and I need to "hit the hay," even though there's absolutely no hay involved. Good night, and I hope everybody is doing amazing. Thank you if you're still reading!

More old Roman stuff

I've talked about the Romans a decent amount as I've been learning new things about where I'm living this year, but that's because they had such an amazing effect on it. I'm writing about more Roman stuff because Saturday I visited the local "Oppidum," and today I went and took a tour of Les Arènes, the amphitheater of Nîmes. So I'll try to throw in a little history about what I saw...

Rome was a Republic under Julius Caesar, which meant that it would only expand territory for reasons of defense. This all changed after Julius Caesar was killed, Caesar Augustus took his place, and Rome was invaded by Hannibal's Carthaginian armies with their terrifying elephants! As Hannibal had crossed the Pyrenées and the Alps to get into Rome, Augustus decided it would be a good idea to conquer the Gaul territory, thereby closing the dangerous route into the Empire (which Rome became under Augustus). He also decided to conquer Egypt, which he did with two of his royal legions. These legions were to inhabit Nîmes after their military service was over, and were given land in the surrounding area to cultivate. The legions' experience in conquering the Nile region is the reason for Nîmes's symbol of a crocodile chained to a palm tree.

Anyways now I'll finally get to the infrastructure of Nîmes. As Augustus didn't want a bunch of violent old soldiers hanging out in Rome all the time, he gave each of his legions a city in the Empire. However, these legions would note really like to live in their new cities without the infrastructure (baths, theaters, arena, etc.) that a life in Rome offered. So Augustus made sure all of his cities were equipped with things that could keep the soldiers entertained. An interesting fact I recently learned is that Nîmes had a sufficient amount of drinking water before Augustus constructed the Pont du Gard. (I know what you're probably thinking, as well - how could Augustus have conquered France, the Nile, and build the Pont du Gard in the same lifetime? I don't know, but he was a busy guy!) He build the Pont du Gard to supply Nîmes with enough water for the Roman baths that were in the ancient Jardin de la Fontaine and surrounding the Maison Carrée.

Finally for a little something about the amphitheater. The word amphitheater comes from Latin, and means a theater that is built up on both sides instead of the traditional Greek theater, which was only built on one side, usually sitting on a hill. People also call amphitheaters "arenas," which apparently comes from Egyptian or something and referred to the sand that coated the bottom of the ring and soaked up the blood of animals and gladiators. So the amphitheater in Nîmes was built in the somewhere around the year 0. (I believe, and I also believe I'm beginning to use too many parentheses) and of course wasn't initially used for the modern-day ferias. Instead there were many more wild spectacles, including fights between two gladiators, two beasts, one man and a beast such as a lion, a bear, or a bull, and even mock sea battles where the ring would be filled with water and men in small versions of Egyptian boats would fight each other. Oh, and I forgot the public executions, which usually involved a lion or some sort of wild beast and served as intermissions. After the gladiator fights went down in popularity as a result of the Catholic church's opposition, the amphitheater fell into a cultural slump. However, during the Visigoth invasion of France and much other of the violent Middle Ages, it was turned into a fortified castle and was under siege a number of times, with thousands of people taking shelter within. Now it serves as the bull-fighting center of France, and lets musicians like Radiohead (June 14,15 2008) play cool concerts within.

Okay, this has been a little long so I'll try to make it a little shorter now. Or I will just make it shorter naturally because I don't really know anything about the Oppidum, except that it is an old Roman settlement set on the hillside of the neighboring town of Nages. You can go there and see many foundations of houses and small walls that are still standing, which is pretty cool. Check out my pictures link for the Oppidum and Les Arènes! I hope you're more enlightened now, and have a good rest of your week!

Little town, big day

Sunday was the date of municipal elections in France. That means every town, village, and city elected a mayor and a counsel. I got to experience it a little because my host father Philippe was on one of the "lists," or the election cards. Every town in France has these election lists to determine the new counsel, and the length (number of running members) on the lists depend on the size of the list. Boissières, as it is so small with less than 400 eligible voters, has only 11 counsel members including the mayor.

So I went to check out the reading of the election results on Sunday night, which was kind of interesting. It was kind of amusing to me, even though I've never voted in the enormous area that I come from, to see the two curtained voting booths and the small glass box of enveloped ballots. Voters would come in, take both the lists and circle who they wanted, or write another name or two if they wanted someone else in office. So I stuck around for about an hour listening to votes being read off and watching how they marked them down, and how the two people marking who were candidates from the opposite parties would say out loud every time another candidate got to a multiple of 10 votes. But after seeing how it worked for a while I got bored, and didn't really feel like sticking around to see my host father lose, so I left. He jokes now about how demoralizing it is, but it was still good that he got 123 votes out of 319 for being a relatively unknown man in the village (if you can believe being unknown in such a small place). But anyways my dad and I told him to make him feel better that he was like Al Gore in the fact that the better candidate doesn't always win!


Other than that I haven't been up to a ton. I've had some work to do with a group research project being done this week. So unfortunately I didn't get to ride my bike today, but I am going to try to ride this weekend and take some pictures of some pretty things around me - the old Roman settlement on a hillside in the nearby town of Nages and the Pont de St. Nicolas, a Romanesque bridge. I can't promise but I'll try! Goodnight

Becoming a Franco-American

So the weather has been really nice here, which has actually made we lazier. Not like I've been sitting around doing absolutely nothing, but I haven't been going out on bike rides nearly enough. Instead I've been enjoying sitting in the sun reading, playing badminton, and other things to enjoy my 70-degree February and March days. Philippe joked that it was the south of France affecting me, and a family friend said now I was really becoming French!

To go along with the becoming French thing, I've realized lately that I've progressed a ton in the language. I've noticed this because every once in a while as I'm talking to a family member or friend on Skype I start saying something in French, and I've been able to quickly respond whenever another student asks me a for a translation into English. I also realized a month or so ago that, although I never remember my dreams very well, I was dreaming a little in French, which is kind of an interesting feeling. Finally, what's proved it to me more than anything is that I forget words in English occasionally... which isn't good, but when I had to think five minutes to remember the word "rainbow" I realized how much more French I speak than English at the moment and hoped my vocab wouldn't suffer too much for college.

Sitting in the sun reading has also gotten me more motivated to read. Last year I was really busy with school and work and hanging out with friends and all, and I didn't have a ton of reading time. This year is completely different in the fact that I don't have a ton of stuff I have to do, so I've been reading a lot more. In the past month I've read two French plays, a French novel, and I just read Roland Smith's climbing novel Peak in three days. It's made me realize how much I've missed reading. I'm sure I'll have plenty of it to do in school next year though...

I went back to school Monday after our nice long vacation. The weather was gorgeous Monday and alright yesterday, but today isn't quite as nice. It is sunny and beautiful out, but the wind has been blowing about 60 miles per hour since last night! I guess it's getting into Mistral season?

Oh yeah, check out the Spanish ham someone gave us! Intimidating kind of.... That's all I got for now, check in again soon!

OOPS!

Apparently I made a mistake and posted the same video twice, so don't bother watching both. That's what I get for trying to be a real, up-to-date blogger!

La fierté de Marseille

So I went to Marseille on Sunday. I actually went to the suburb Marseille, which technically isn't in the city of 800,000 - 900,000 people, but the surrounding area of 1,4 million-ish people. While in La Gavotte at my host father Philippe's uncle's house and touring a little bit of Marseille afterwards, I learned a few things about the city.

First of, as I actually already knew, Marseille (and La Gavotte itself) is famous for bringing the amazing retired and the young prodigy soccer players Zinedine Zidane and Samir Nasri, respectively. Marseille is a city that really lives soccer. There are sand lots all over the city where kids and adults play, or they'll just play in the street. Olympique Marseille soccer fans are some of the crazier ones you'll ever meet, and as is said in Marseille "There are 900,000 people that live here, and 900,000 coaches as well." And I have to add that their bitter rivals are Paris Saint-Germain, who are not good at all this season. That might be a result of Marseille being the old capital/port and the idealogical capital of the south of France, whereas Paris is that of the north (and all, technically).

To go along with the fact of Marseille being a sort of capital, I have to add in that it has a very long history. It has been a major trading port for quite some time, even before the setting of Le Comte de Monte Cristo with Gerard Depardieu. It also has quite a long history of being against the government. Throughout all the governments in the history of France, such as the Orléans and Bourbon monarchies, Marseille has often been where lots of trouble was stirred up.


There's Gerard Depardieu emerging from the sea in front of the supposed Chateua d'If, which was the island prison of the future Count of Monte Cristo.

And any true "Marseilleais" can tell you that and more about the history of their city, which goes along with the title of this blog: the pride of Marseille. Philippe's uncle, who has lived in Marseille for 42 years now after fleeing Algeria during the war in 1965, can tell you plenty about the buildings, the history, the next soccer game, etc. I also wanted to add in that Marseille has a very diverse community, as most large cities. There are thousands among thousands of Arabs living there who have moved from Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco, among other places, and their culture has affected Marseille amazingly. The important thing to note here is that there aren't nearly as many racial problems between whites and Arabs in Marseille as in Paris. It might be the sea, it might be the soccer, or it might be Marseille's famous licorice-flavored pastis liquor that does it, but everyone is a lot more chill in Marseille and the south of France in general. So chill that traffic rules apply even less in Marseille than the rest of France. There was a guy stopped in front of a bakery in the only lane of a fairly busy road at 7:30 as we were leaving La Gavotte!

"Jonah, you know it's still winter?"

That's what my host father Philippe told me after lunch today when he came home from playing golf and found me in shorts, a t-shirt, and flip-flops. On a side note, flip-flops are called klackettes in French because of the noise them make when you walk. I was clothed like that because it was 70-75 degrees Fahrenheit for a while. So after sitting in the sun reading Le Gloire de Mon Pere by Marcel Pagnol and then eating leftover raclette, I played tennis in the back yard with Caroline.

The weather was also magnificent yesterday so my friend and I Benjamin rode down to Le Grau du Roi on the Mediterranean. We hung out on the beach for a bit, ate mussels and fries and rode back. With that and riding Thursday I'm more motivated to ride now, and my knee hasn't been hurting me like it was before. Maybe I can still get in good enough shape to climb Mont Ventoux before I leave!

Other than that I haven't been up to a ton this vacation. Reading, cooking a little bit, and doing a little bit of housework. I've been spackling, sanding, and painting a little bit in my room as well as putting up some plumbing stuff for the future bathroom. Today I made some donuts which turned out pretty good. Just trying to keep myself occupied. I'm going to Marseille tomorrow and skiing another day later in the week, so I'll post again soon, and hopefully with pictures! Now I'm exhausted, so goodnight.

Happy Belated Valentine's Day!

I celebrated my Valentine's Day by wearing red... I didn't actually wear red clothes, but I fell into a really prickly bush when I went mountain biking with Benjamin on Thursday afternoon, and I have long scrapes all over my legs. My left thigh looks like I got attacked by a lion. Excuse the gory picture.

After getting "home" from mountain biking and taking my shower to wash off my wounds, Marine and her friend Benedicte came home from school with a rose for me. An English class at our school sold roses to raise money for their trip to the U.S. in the spring, and apparently somebody sent me one. So I got interrogated during dinner on Thursday about who it might be, and now my police officer host father Philippe is threatening to launch an investigation... I honestly don't know who sent it to me though, je le jure!

I also should announce the end of the strike at my school. Well it's not really over, but at least the teachers are agreeing to give us our grades now. After struggling to convince other teacher's unions to join their cause and looking ridiculous as the only school in France withholding grades, they've turned to other methods. Hilariously, they tried to take hostage of the school principal's office on Valentine's day, but found they had been locked out in anticipation. So instead they ate lunch in front of the school administration building! Now that's what I call striking!

That's about all I got right now, except for cooking news. I made corn fritters today, which went alright. I might try to move on to some New Orleans cuisine soon and try to make some jambalaya or po' boy sandwiches. I should have plenty of time, because I'm on a two week vacation after my really easy "entrée" week of school. So maybe I'll have a lot to write about too, we'll see. Chao!

Hot Weather and Hot Food

Well, the weather is pretty nice now here. It's cold in the mornings, then heats up to the point where I can wear just a t-shirt in the afternoon. Well, pants too but you know what I mean.... I've been taking care of the good weather by working on my badminton skills with my host siblings. The other part of the title refers to Saturday night, when I made chili for my host family and another family of friends. I made two batches - a normal batch and a spicy batch - because I knew that the other family (and myself) likes eating a little spicier than my host family here. So of course they all chose to eat the spicy chili, but it didn't turn out exactly as they thought. The mother changed to the regular chili after a few spoonfuls, the father and one of the kids were sweating, and the other kid was drinking milk and looked like he wanted to jump in the pool. Apparently we have different ideas of spicy, because I considered it only an alarm-2 or alarm-3 chili. So it made for an amusing meal, anyways, and not a bad one with the chili, cornbread, and blondies. And a hint for anyone who might want to make cornbread in a foreign country (not that this will apply to many people or anyone at all, so I don't know why I'm writing it) is that fine-grained polenta is the same thing as corn meal if you can find that in a grocery store.

In other news, school is going pretty easy this week. I didn't go to school at all today because none of my teachers were there for whatever reasons. My math teacher isn't there the rest of the week either, so tomorrow I finish classes at one o'clock, and i only have three hours on Friday. I might try to go to the movie theater one of the days and see the film "Into the Wild" that a number of people here have told me is really good. All in all it should be a really nice end of the week and a sort of appetizer to the two week vacation I have starting Saturday.

This past weekend I went with Philippe to hit a bucket of balls at the practice range of his golf club. He tried to give me some tips about relaxing and not trying to force too much strength and all, but I really just wanted to hit the ball. I did my best to stick in a few Caddyshack and Happy Gilmore impressions as well. That's about it for now, I need to go and watch Marseille vs. Moscow. A la prochaine!

Obama for President!

Okay, that's my only plug. I'm done now. But the title does still go along with the subject of this blog: the difference in presidential elections between the United States and France and the perception of those elections. So now some of you might want to stop reading, but don't! I'll try to make it interesting.

I decided I wanted to write about this after the last week or so as the U.S. presidential race has been gaining momentum. In the past I was asked by a few kids who I preferred ( *cough* Obama *cough*), but in the last couple days, as a result of "Super Mardi," I've gotten a lot more questions. Today I was actually asked to explain the United States presidential election process in my class ECJS - Civic, Judicial, and Social Education. Which was kind of difficult for me to do, and although I explained the process pretty well, it still confused the kids in my class. I don't blame them, and here's why:

France hasn't had nearly as stable of a government as the United States. Since 1789 and the first French revolution, there have been five republics, two empires, and one return to monarchy. That means that there have been five different democratic constitutions among the other authoritarian periods, and with all this, lot of change in the election process. And because of all these changes there have never been amazingly powerful political parties, like the Democrat and Republican parties. Instead of being obliged to run under a large party like this with an incredibly long primary election process, presidential hopefuls can run and try to get enough votes in the first election. In the first election, the two candidates with the most votes move onto a second election a month later, which gives voters enough time to decide who they would like to vote for finally. Another large difference in the election processes is the presence of delegates. When the constitution was created and for a long time after, with the enormous size of the United States it of course made sense to have delegates to bring votes to be counted. Electronic voting hasn't existed for a little while....

So hopefully I made some sense of that, but the main point I wanted to make was the perception of these processes. After being asked by numerous kids and plenty of adults as well, I've realized that the U.S. elections are watched much more carefully than the French elections. The only reason I knew who the new French president before I came here was because I knew I was coming here. I've determined that it's both of a result of the very long process and the fact that it's the United States that gathers so much attention. The United States is the most powerful country on the world scale (even if the economy is suffering at the moment), and of course the next president will be a relief to the world no matter who it is...

Alright, that's it. I'm making chili Saturday night, and I'll say it's in honor of the last year, and the best year, of Bush's presidency. I'm celebrating with some Tex-Mex. I'll try to post again before a week is up. Hope everyone is good, and of course go out and vote if you haven't already and have the chance. Chao

Apparently I'm like her...

I gave blood today for the first time. This morning I saw the Etablissement Francais du Sang (French Blood Establishment) setting up, so after an hour of English class I went back and donated. I've always wanted to give blood, but was never able to in the United States because the only time the American Red Cross came to my high school I had a cross country race in the afternoon. I think if I did that if would be called "anti-doping."

This weekend was also the first time for a few other things for me - riding a motorcycle being the first. My host father drove us to my host sister Marine's basketball game for some of the first half and the whole second half. Then I had another first experience - fixing a motorcycle. Unfortunately Philippe forgot to remove the lock on his disc brake and started driving, which stopped us within a couple feet. In stopping us it bent the disc brake, so Philippe rode the motorcycle back slowly while I rode back in the car. Luckily motorcycles are just like heavy bikes, so I was able to remove the disc and "cold press" it back into place. Cold pressing is a more discreet way of saying "pounding with a heavy hammer," or "squeezing in a vice." So the disc brake is temporarily fixed, but a new one needs to be bought soon...

There's more news about the teacher's strike, also. They are still striking, but not in the traditional not-working and walking-in-a-circle-holding-signs way. Instead, they're not giving grades. That means that any assignments I get back with have comments like "Good," "Exactly," or "Completely Wrong" on them, but will not be graded. Nor will I have my average at the end of the trimester. I understand the teachers position and their strike, but it is pissing a lot of students off because it affects really only them. However, by affecting the students the strike also gets to their parents, who are also obviously the voters. In conclusion, I'm not real sure about what I think of all this, but we'll see how it turns out.

Est-ce que tu t'ennuies?

Benjamin asked me that Tuesday afternoon on the bus, which in English translates "Do you get bored?" He was asking me because I had been talking about school and work. That stuff, plus the fact that he knows I live in a suburb that is much less isolated than our relatively small towns, and that American kids can get their driving licenses when they're 16 years old. He was wondering if I'm ever really bored here, as my life back in Maryland seems so much more exciting.

For one thing, I have to say I never found my Columbia life extraordinarily exciting, but that might just be because I was so used to it. It's true that there's a lot more hustle and bustle than my tiny town, but it's also nothing like a city. But before I draw this out too long talking about the D.C.-Baltimore 'burbs, the answer to Benjamin's question is "No." True, compared to all the things I was doing last year I do a lot more sitting around here. But besides the fact of learning another language, this year is an experience. I observe another culture, learn new customs, traditions, and outlooks, and see a lot of new things. As of yet I haven't been especially bored. And anyways, a year of relaxation is nice before I go to College Park next year and work really hard and do much more balancing of my life than I'm doing this year.

What else is going on? Today there was a teacher's strike, so I only had two hours of class from eight to 10 in the morning. Tomorrow is my easy Friday where I only have three hours of class, so I'm getting a nice start to my weekend. During the weekend I'm probably going to finish Water For Elephants, a book by Sara Gruen that my mom left me and I'm sprinting through cause I think it's really good. Anywho, that's all I have to write for now and I'm going to go read some more and get to bed. I also forgot to mention that I'm reading some Asterix comic books, which is a French comic about a French Gaul in the year 50 BC. They're really amusing stories, so if you can get your hands on them give them a little read. Bonne nuit!

A beautiful spring weekend - for Maryland...

I think the weather is pretty good in general in my real hometown of Columbia, Maryland. Of course my brother and sister think differently when they come up from North Carolina during winter, but I've always preferred the North myself. Even though Maryland is south of the Mason Dixon line, but whatever. Anyways, the weather here this weekend was gorgeous. I remember last winter in Maryland we had a couple nice days thanks ironically to global warming. Today and yesterday were in the 60's-70's here and sunny all day. I think, but I'm not real sure because I think in Celsius now and I'm too lazy to convert it. Really beautiful and excellent for bike riding!

So yesterday I woke up and decided to ride. I did a relatively short ride, but made it a little harder with a few of the "climbs" that are around me, with the main purpose of checking out the views. It was amazingly clear out, and awesome to see all the way around me: the flat plains to the south of me, the snow-capped Cevennes mountains to the north-west, etc.

Today I went out for a ride after lunch, but unfortunately had to turn around early because my knee was killing me. It was actually hurting a bit the night before, but I didn't really think anything about it then. I think my ilio-tibial band is inflamed, and it'll just go away if I stretch more. I have a bad habit of not stretching nearly enough, but now I guess I need to change that!

Other than the bad knee things are going pretty good. There is supposed to be a teacher's strike on Thursday, so hopefully I'll get most of my day off from school. It's happening because of the Pecresse Law that I spoke of before. The French President Nicolas Sarkozy is changing the education system a lot, and it means there will be nine less jobs for teachers at my school next year, including two in the French department. For the French department alone that means 35 hours or so of teaching will have to be made up and split around through the other teachers.

That's about all my news for now. My dad sent me a link to the pictures he took when he and my mom were visiting. If you'd like to check them out, go here. Hope everything's going well, thanks for reading, and I'll write again soon!

Another birthday and I still can't buy alcohol in the United States...

I'm not an alcoholic or anything, I swear! I just think it's kind of ridiculous...

Where was I? I think I left off before my parents' last full day here, which was Wednesday the 9th. On Wednesday it was kind of crappy weather again. It was pretty unfortunate that the week they came it was such bad weather, as it's almost always beautiful and sunny here. Almost two weeks of rain and clouds in Barcelona, France, and London can be a little depressing I think... But it could be worse if I lived in Washington state I guess.

Anyways, Wednesday we hung out around Nimes to see some of the monuments there. We walked around the Jardin de la Fontaine that I've previously mentioned, and then down to the Maison Carree, which we didn't go into because we weren't sure if we had enough time before we were supposed to have lunch with my host family, plus my host mother's uncle, aunt, and cousin. Instead we went to another popular building in Nimes - La Coupole - the mall, where my parents got me a Laguiole knife for my birthday. Thanks Mom and Dad! After a long lunch we went back to Nimes and tried to tour Les Arenes, the amphitheater, but unfortunately couldn't. In the winter it closes at 4:30 in the afternoon and they stop selling tickets at 4:00. We arrived at 4:08, so, BUMMER, we didn't get to see more than the outside. Instead we walked around the Centre Ville/shopping area and then went back to the house to hang out for the last evening.

Thursday was a mixed day for me. I had to say goodbye to my parents in the morning because I finally had to go to school on the day they were leaving. So that was a bummer, and kinda hard to say goodbye to them again as I won't see anyone again until June. So I went to school and got birthday wishes from a bunch of people, and had a long day with eight hours of class. Nothing special happened, as we had celebrated my birthday the night before with chocolate pistachio cake and dessert wine, and I realized that 19 feels exactly the same as 18.

Yesterday Benjamin invited me to go riding with his mountain biking club, which normally would be pretty difficult as I don't have a mountain bike. However, since the weather has been so crappy lately and the trails were muddy, they were going on a road ride, so I could come along. There were seven of us and we rode for a while and joked around.

That's about all I had to say. I wanted to catch up to where I was and what my parents and I did, and I finished that so for now I'm going to get off, read some more of This House of Sky by Ivan Doig and then go to sleep. I'll write again soon with some more thoughts and hopefully something interesting that happened. Chao

Enfin!

Alright everyone, I'm back! I'm sure there haven't been that many people anxiously waiting, but I'm finally making my next blog post! Sorry it's been a little while, I've been away or busy the last week or so. And warning - THIS POST MIGHT BE A LITTLE BIT LONGGGGG.

New Year's Eve at 11 AM I left on the train from Nîmes to Port Bou, Spain, where I had a little time to wait before going to Barcelona. On a side note, I've just learned that AM means "ante-meridian," which in Latin simply means the sun hasn't crossed the Prime Meridian yet, and PM is of course after the sun has crossed the Prime Meridian. Which means that neither AM nor PM hold any relevance unless you're exactly on the Prime Meridian, in Greenwich, England. So from now on I'll just say "in the morning," "in the afternoon," "in the evening," "at night," or "long after I should have been asleep." Anyways, as I didn't pay very much for my train tickets (32 Euros), the trains were slow and stopped just about everywhere between Nîmes and Barcelona. I had almost two hours in Port Bou, which is entirely too long to be there with nothing to do, as there's just about nothing to see. The train to Barcelona was packed with people going to party in Figeres or Barcelona.

On getting there (at the Estacio Sants) I noticed immediately how nice the metro system was, which I took to the Placa Catalunya. I found the Hosteria Grau, our room number and entered the room to see my parents for the first time in four months, which was awesome. New Years Eve we spent walking around checking out the city and looking for some place to eat, which was hard as most places either has a specially expensive New Years Eve menu or were packed. Eventually we found a tapas bar farther from the popular part of the city, and sat down to eat tapas and drink cerveza. Now I have to take the time to mention how it is to be able to order alcohol in restaurants with my parents. I'm actually not going to take that long to talk about it, it was just weird at the beginning. And now I appreciate Europe even more for giving me a right I think I should have along with the right to die in a war if I were drafted, which is obligatory. Enough said. So we finished eating at around 11:45 in the night, long after my tired parents who had traveled a long way should have been asleep. But no, because we stayed out for a little bit to see people lighting fireworks off all over the place in the streets and spraying cava (Spanish champagne) once midnight hit. But soon after we hit the sheets, and although that was relatively early for New Years Eve, didn't get up until 11:30 in the morning on New Years day.

That day a lot of monuments were closed, so it was spent doing a lot of walking and looking around. We went to the Park Guell, a park commissioned by a man named Eusebi Guell and designed mainly by Antoni Guadi, like many other things in Barcelona. Really cool mosaic benches and other things, which you can see if you check out my picture page. Afterwards, we walked around the waterfront and then returned to the hotel before dinner to open the bottle of wine that I brought for my parents, which was given to me by my friend Benjamin's grandfather.

January 2nd we started the morning by going out to breakfast in a cafe near the hotel. The highlight of that was when my dad ordered hot chocolate and it turned out to be exactly that; it was as if they took a bar of dark chocolate and heated it up on the stove, adding maybe a spoonful of water. After that we took the metro up to the Montjuic area and looked around the Poble Espanyol, which is a walled artisan village built for the 1929 World's Fair to show the various styles of houses in the different regions of Spain and to show/sell art. Then a quick look at the old Olympic stadium and an exhibit of paintings and sculptures by Joan Miro. We returned to the hotel a little earlier, then went out to a longer and very conversational dinner.

January 3rd was our last day in Barcelona and a rainy one, so we did some more stuff inside. We toured the Palau de la Musica Catalana, a music house that was built in 1908 and is really beautiful. Then we passed by the Sagrada Familia, a gigantic church that I believe was started by Gaudi and is still being built today. Then, something that no real soccer fan can miss in Barcelona - Camp Nou, the stadium of FC Barcelona. My dad and I went and took the tour of the stadium and the museum there. It's kind of ironic I took a picture of the chapel inside the Barcelona stadium but not the famous Sagrada Familia. Oh well... We finally got out of the rain and had our last dinner in Spain of struggling with the language barrier, although many people in Barcelona did speak English.

The 4th of January we woke up a little earlier and caught a cab (two cabs actually, as the first ripped us off and dropped us off at the wrong place on purpose) to the train station. A train up to Perpignan, where I was relieved to be, because I can communicate a million times better in French than Spanish. We rented a car there and attempted to drive to Carcassonne via the Port de Pailheres, which is a major Tour de France climb, and was unfortunately closed due to too much snow. But we eventually got to Carcassonne and our small bed and breakfast (Le Grand Puits) inside the old, beautiful fortified city. Because it is not exactly heavy tourist season now, we were some of the few people there and it was really nice to walk around the city at night when it was lit up and there was almost nobody else. My dad has the nicer pictures of the city at night, which I'll post when I get a hold of.

We drove back to Boissieres on the 5th, and my American family met my French family. We went out to dinner that night, which took about three hours with all the eating and conversation. Sunday was another rainy day, and we hung out close to my home here, touring my small village and the towns of Calvisson, Sommieres, and Villevielle. Yesterday was slightly nicer, so we went south to the town of Aigues Mortes that I've already written about, then through the Camargue marshes to Saints Marie de la Mer, which is a town with an annual gypsy migration festival of about 50,000, and the city of Arles, where Van Gogh lived and painted for many years. Arles also has a Roman amphitheater, which is bigger but less well-maintained than the one in Nîmes that we will see tomorrow. Today I showed my parents the Pont du Gard, after which we went to Avignon. Avignon is special because it was once the home of Christianity in Europe for cause of political turmoil. The popes moved there around the early 14th century and built an enormous palace, which is a cool thing to tour. Then to the neighboring town of Villeneuve les Avignons to see a view of the Palais de Papes and have a coffee before the drive back.

So now here I am, tired after writing all this and ready to go to sleep. Long enough for ya?

Done eating until 2008

The day after I posted my last blog I wished I had waited another day so I could write about something a little bit more interesting. Sunday I went and hung out with my friend Benjamin for the day. In the morning we went riding so I could buy my host sister a Christmas present (a little late). Then I checked out a weekly market in Benjamin's town. There you can find clothes, crafts, fossils, cheese, sausage, and rotisserie chicken that smells amazing when you're walking past it, hungry. Afterwards I ate lunch at Benjamin's house and watched an old classic movie, "La Tatoué," with the French actor Louis de Funès.

Then after lunch I did something that I think is necessary for my French experience - I toured a winery. It's owned by Benjamin's grandparents, and although I didn't learn much as Benjamin was my guide and he doesn't know that much about how it is made, it was still cool to see everything. If you ever get the chance to yell inside of an empty wine-fermenting tank, do it! It sounds awesome. Benjamin's grandparents also gave me six bottles of wine, which was incredibly nice of them. Therefore it is my job to promote their wine and their "cause." The name of their winery is "Domaine de Tavernel," although they don't export their wine to the U.S. However, I can help them out in promoting biologically produced wine, which is what they make.

Now, moving on to Christmas... Christmas Eve (the "Reveillant," "waking up" in French) we started eating at around 7:30. Small appetizers with an aperitif wine, then the dinner started. Raw oysters, shrimp, salmon, and mussels with butter, parsley, and garlic with white wine. After that everyone had of course eaten pretty well, so we took a break and opened presents. Then more dinner of roasted salmon with Camargian rice (a mixture of white and brown rice from the local Camargue marshes). And finally, for dessert there was a ice cream "log" of vanilla and chocolate ice cream with a layer of chocolate. That, along with champagne, lychees, almonds, walnuts, hazelnuts, chocolate truffles, and fruit as you please.

Christmas day was a little different, as we had already opened the presents. Also, one of the presents the night before was a foosball table for the family, so we built it and played until at least 2:30 AM. Then next morning I woke up at 11 and didn't eat anything, as the next big meal was coming after noon. Again small appetizers, then the meal of red wine, foie gras (fattened duck liver, which is highly acclaimed but I didn't find that special), escargots with the same persillade sauce that the mussels had, which I actually liked a lot and ate about a dozen of. I really don't know how this
turns into something yummy, but it does! After the escargots, there was quail with parsnips and garlic, another ice cream log and all the other dessert items.

So my long story about the food and all is done. I'm leaving for Barcelona the 31st to meet my parents, which I'm really excited about. I'm not sure if I'll post a blog before I leave or if I'll wait until I get back here January 5th with pictures. Happy New Years!

Noel is approaching!

Well Christmas (Noel en francais) is approaching and it's definitely going to be a different one for me this year. Thursday we had the Christmas meal at school, which wasn't really anything special except that they gave us bags of chocolate including a chocolate Santa, snowman (bonhomme de neige), and a couple small chocolate Christmas ornaments. Basically I got stuffed and then had a couple extra hours without class that I could do nothing with. Other than that not much is going on. My "host grandfather" came last night and he is staying a little bit past Christmas. I don't have much more to say on the subject of Christmas, but I'll be sure to post a little more about my experience here after it happens.

In other news, I realized that I've come a long way in speaking French. Yesterday I had to go and ask a secretary in my school if a teacher was there so I could go and talk to him about a class that he marked me absent for, and I think I talked really well. Plus the fact that I spoke well with my host grandfather last night, responding to his questions quickly and without confusion. I've actually realized for a while now that I understand people when they speak much more quickly, however I'm still not near what I consider fluent while speaking. I've found that speaking a new language is much more difficult to do compared to understanding one.

Now I don't have much going on. Today is the first day of vacation, and as the weather isn't very nice I spent it playing some board games with my host father, brother, and sister. I dominated Risk but my 11 year-old host sister won Clue. Tomorrow I'm going to my friend Benjamin's house for lunch, a little hanging out and possibly bike riding.

Anyways, I hope everyone who is now at my house for the Hanukkah party has an awesome time, I wish I could be there with you all. And I also hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas! Until the next post...

Il neige!

Last night my friend Benajmin's dad said it was going to snow while he was driving us back from bowling. I said "Here, no!!!" (in French of course) but sure enough it snowed today. See picture above of my back yard. That was at about 11 o'clock. Now it's 4 and the snow is completely gone because of sun, rain, and temperates of about four degrees Celsius, above freezing.

Bowling also went pretty well, after I "warmed up." Which means that I sucked at the beginning but ended the first game alright and won the second! So it turns out I can do something other than "evasion sports"...cycling and running.

I can't think of a title...

I figured I should post now, as it's been almost a week since my last post. Unfortunately not much has happened, as I've been sick most of the week. I went to school Monday, and stayed home Tuesday, yesterday, and today. However, tomorrow I'm going to school for a couple few reasons:

1. I'm feeling more or less better.
2. There's a rule here that if I miss more than three days of school I need a note from a doctor.
3. To escape my younger host sister, Caroline. She's sick too, and she's been driving me absolutely crazy because I'm around her all day and she loves to get on my nerves.

There's actually a fourth reason, but I'm going to write about that separately. December 22nd is my host sister Marine's birthday, but as that is the start of the Winter vacation, she's going to celebrate it tomorrow. After school five of her girl friends are coming home with her, hanging out, and eating dinner here. Then them, me, and some guys in our class are going bowling in Nimes. Hopefully I don't embarrass myself too bad with the bowling.

I also thought I would write a little more about French school, even if I haven't gone most of the week. When I came here I immediately noticed that the teachers weren't quite as discrete as American teachers when talking about students' grades. For example, my math teacher hands everyone their tests after saying out loud their grade, and, from time to time, what kind of stupid mistakes they made. Now she's a little bit of an extreme, but still I think that aspect of the French school system is quite different, and may be a reason for French students seeming more serious about the studies - in general - than American students. But that also might be because they decide on their career paths much earlier. In Premiere (junior year) they choose a category: "Economics," "Science," or "Literature." Then, in Terminale (senior year) they choose a specification. For example, students in Science choose between Physics/Chemistry, Math, or SVT, which is a mix of biology and geology.

Okay, that's it. I need to go shave, as I haven't needed to look presentable the past few days so I'm a bit scruffy, but I do need to look presentable tomorrow. Take care everyone!

How do you spell Hanukkah.... in French?

"Hanouka," apparently. I'm not celebrating quite like I usually do. No menorah, no Hanukkah parties with the neighbors or family, and actually very few Jewish people around me. However, I did manage to make latkes tonight, which my French family liked. Thanks for the recipe Mom, and I can see why making latkes for 30 people is such a pain...

Other than that my week has passed pretty normally. Tuesday I had my class "conseil," which is when the class delegates, two students elected to represent the class, meet with all the teachers and get every student's average. My average was a 13.5, which was really good. The averages fall into categories, indicating more or less on what level you are working. I was on the "compliments" level, which is quite good , although my teachers have been easier on me than the French kids in most subjects.

Tomorrow my host father's parents are coming for lunch. After, I'm going to watch the basketball game of my younger host sister and walking around the village she's playing in, which is named Aigues-Mortes (Aigues pronounced "Egg"). It's an old town, the old section of which is enclosed by tall ramparts. It was where an old French King left with ships for one of the Crusades, although I don't know many details. I think it was somewhere around the 10th century. Anyways, I should have some interesting photos to put up this weekend, so be sure to check up.

Happy Hanukkah everyone! Here's some music I found out about, if you want to get in the mood: The LeeVees.

Incroyable!

So it's been an interesting week since I posted my last blog. Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday consisted of more student manifestations. That means that I went to two hours of class on Tuesday, didn't go at all on Wednesday (which is a half day anyways), and went to all my classes on Thursday even though they were quite small. At the left is a picture of a ton of students from other lycees in Nimes blocking the front entrance to my school on Friday. The block was still going on at Camargue, another school in Nimes, so they came to recruit students from our school to help. I didn't go, but it was interesting to see anyways.

Today I woke up early and got out the door on my bike before eight o'clock. I rode to my friends Benjamin's house, and we left there at about 8:15 for the Pont du Gard. The Pont du Gard is a famous aqueduct built by the Romans probably in the middle of the first century A.D. It was originally quite long (about 50 km) and brought water from a spring in Uzes to Nimes. Now only a small portion stands, but it really is a magnificent thing to see. I can't even imagine how hard it was to create such a monstrous thing without modern materials or machines, especially for the length of time it has stood and will stand. To give you an idea of the amount of water here when it rains and the strength of the Pont du Gard, take a look at one of the pictures of the aqueduct. When it rains quite a lot here the water level if much above the first level or arches, and the aqueduct stands quite strong still.

The system of the aqueduct actually wasn't completely quite as extravagant as this. At the slightly higher elevations it was simply a canal that ran along the ground. There is a drop in elevation from Uzes to Nimes, which helped the water move along. On top of the Pont du Gard is a small canal. You can take a look at the pictures and see that there's a roof over most of the upper level, which was put there to prevent the water from being polluted by bird crap or leaves or whatever might get in there.

Besides the Pont du Gard, it was quite a good day. We rode almost 5 hours with getting there and returning home. Eating lunch sitting on the rocks in the sun next to the aqueduct was pretty awesome. If you ever get to the south of France make sure you check this out. And now, after a weekend of good riding, I'm tired and I'm going to go to sleep. I hope everyone's well and thanks for keeping up with the blog. Bonne nuit!

A week of bloquée and soirée.

I'm sure that title looks like gibberish to most of you, but I'll explain it. Thursday was quite an interesting day because there was a student "manifestation" at my school. They've been happening all over France in lycées (high schools) and universities in response to what is being called the "loi Pecresse," or the Pecresse law. The law will do a few things, including:

• privatizing universities, which will increase price for French students. Universities are either free or nearly free here, which means you just need to pay for somewhere to live, food to eat, and books.
• increasing class size to a minimum of 35 students in lycées, and
• taking away "demi-classe" hours, which are hours during the week that the class is split into two. This allows the teachers to get to know the students a little better, which is of course better for education if the students take advantage of it.

As a result of this law, these manifestations or strikes have been happening a bit. They've taken the form mostly of "bloquées," where the students block the entries to academic campuses or buildings. That's what happened at my school on Thursday morning, which meant I missed a couple hours of class. The manifestations will probably resume Tuesday, although that is not certain as I do not know the result of the vote that was taken Friday on whether or not to carry on with it. Also, most of the students that are leading the manifestation, not just the ones who were participating to get out of class, are members of the Young Communist Party.

As for the soirée (party) part of the title, I celebrated Thanksgiving here yesterday. So last week I wrote that I was cooking for 10 people, which was true then. However, the night after I wrote my blog my host mother told me that it had exploded up to 20 people. When I heard that the first time we just started laughing because if I had been nervous before, I didn't know what I was going to be when the amount of people doubled.

But it actually turned out pretty well. I woke up pretty early and got started on two apple pies and two pumpkin pies, all before lunch (thanks for the recipes Grampy). That was especially interesting because I used a real pumpkin to make the pumpkin pies, as they do not have canned pumpkin here. After lunch I made the sweet potatoes, roasted the seeds from the pumpkin, and got to relax a little bit. My host mother and I collaborated on the turkey, while she made the stuffing and the green beans and I made the gravy. It was a little different than the Thanksgiving that I'm used to, as we didn't start dinner until after 10 and finished dessert at about one o'clock. Everyone had an excellent time and gave good feedback on the food, which might have been helped by the amount of Beaujolais wine and Armagnac that was consumed. So I survived and had a pretty good time too. I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving as well!

Chestnuts really roasting over an open fire

So yesterday I went to St. Ambroix, which is a town in the very north of Le Gard, almost in the region of Cevennes. We went to some friends' house for lunch, and then after took a small tour of the surrounding area. Their house was absolutely beautiful, mainly because it was just such a change for me. Build in the early 17th century, it was actually originally two small houses with a few other tiny apartments. Now all of that is connected, so it has a very tall gap in the middle that used to provide light to a small alley/courtyard in the middle. Anyways, now all of that is closed in and is their house. Since those Centre-Ville French houses are so tall, it has three floors with small verandas looking out on the Plaza of St. Ambroix. Plus the fact that the man used to work for some kind of French foreign services and the European Union, so he has all kinds of interesting pictures, masks, weaves, etc.

After eating lunch we drove north into Cevennes. Besides the beautiful mountainous scenery, we checked out something that I definitely wouldn't have know about if I were just a tourist here: la Clede, which is a small place a guy makes chestnut flour and shows the history of how it is/was made. Here's a link to check out some information about the chataignes, or chestnuts, if you would like.

Tomorrow I'm not going to school again, as there is another strike. Tomorrow is a one-day strike for teachers who choose to do so. The strike for train drivers is still going on, as well. Instead of going to school I'm going to do my Thanksgiving grocery shopping, among other things. I'm getting all geared up, but still nervous to cook a huge meal for 10 people. Hope everyone has an awesome holiday!

Il fait froid!

I haven't been able to translate "I'm freezing my ass off!" into French yet. I think if I said that in French it wouldn't come out right at all. But anyways, I was freezing my ass off today. Five degrees Celsius isn't that bad, but when the wind starts going it can be kind of cold.

I'm trying to think of other things to write, but right now I'm really distracted. I just discovered the massive amount of good music on the NPR World Cafe website, so right now I'm streaming a whole concert of Nickel Creek (which a lot of you might not think is good music, but I like listening to bluegrass in France). So what's going on, anyways?

This has been a pretty tiring week. Having 8 hours of class Tuesdays and every 7 Thursday (8 every other Thursday) can be really tiring. Plus I leave for school in the dark and get home in the dark. But fortunately tomorrow won't be too bad - two hours of a math test from 9 to 11 and then one hour of history from 1 to 2. The other thing I've noticed about school is the number of people who's hands I shake or who I do the French "bisous" with every day. It's not so much the amount of people as the amount of people who's names I don't know or don't remember. This is because of two things: 1) I'm horrible remembering names when I'm meeting a lot of people and I'm not around them a lot, and 2) people remember me a lot easier because I'm American, I'm easy to tell apart by my bad accent and my different style. Oh well, maybe I'll get the hang of it eventually.

In other news, I am about to start riding with my neighbor and the cycling club he rides with. I can't wait to do that, because it means more, and faster people to ride with. Plus they go out for days of 200 kilometers, so I should be in real good shape when I get back to the States next year, and the French bread won't affect me quite so much. I can't wait to ride some real mountains! The little "collines" around here and nice and all, but riding the Massif Centrale in the spring should be pretty sick.

Other than school and the daily stuff, I'm planning for when my parents come here December 31st. I of course can not wait to see them, and I wish I could see everyone. I've been here for just about two and a half months now, and I definitely miss everyone. But it's going to be the long haul after they leave in January! Anyways, love you all, talk to some of you on Thanksgiving and for anyone I don't talk to enjoy your feast. I'm going to struggle to cook my first Thanksgiving for ten people on Saturday the 24th, because I have class until 5 on the 22nd...

Bisous!

Ah, dommage!

I never wanted it to come, but the end of vacation was yesterday morning. And I could barely stand these two days of school after nearly two weeks off, but here the weekend is! And I also realized that it's been a week since I posted, so it was about time.

Sunday I actually went to La Gavotte, which is right next to Marseille. I again ate a lot of awesome food, which this time was a warm Spanish gaspacho. I enjoyed watching it be made as much as eating it. Basically the man who cooked it took this huge pan and set it over a grill. He cooked these small steaks and pieces of chicken in a little oil and then took them off. After he poured on a ton of onion, peppers, and tomato pulp, added the meat back in and seasoned it with salt and pepper. Then threw in a bunch of small pieces of soft bread. Entertaining and delicious, a real French meal.

The other entertainment was listening to my host father's large family debate soccer. As he said, there are 900,000 people living in Marseille, and 900,000 coaches. It cracked me up listening to my siblings' great aunt saying "Cisse est nul, Cisse est la merde!"

The rest of the week was spent avoiding homework and riding my bike. Wednesday morning I got up at 6:30 so I could start riding when the sun came up. I rode a good route to Uzes, but had to take a detour on the way back because some rocks had fallen from a cliff, and I think might have actually killed some people. Needless to say, the road was blocked and my ride, with the detour and my first puncture ever on my road bike (I've been lucky) the ride took a little longer than I wanted. 115 kilometers, I finally got back home at 12:45 and scarfed down some ravioli.

In other news, Thanksgiving is approaching and I think I'm actually going to cook for it. Except we'll celebrate Thanksgiving during the weekend, because I have class until 5 on Thursday. I'm definitely going to cook the turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, green beans, and a couple pies; possibly more if more people are coming over. If anyone has any cooking suggestions or serious dishes I'm leaving out please send them my way. That's all I think. Take it easy.

Buenos Días!

Yeah, that picture basically summed up the last few days. Everyone here kept saying that I was going to gain 4 kilos in 4 days, and although it wasn't quite that much it might not have been far off.

Tuesday afternoon we left here, Nîmes, and went to Philippe's parents' house in Sainte Marie la Mer, a town close to Perpignan. It is right next to the Mediterranean, and in the summer it explodes to a relatively quiet town of 4,000 to an enormous 50,000! There's sort of two halves of the town - the side that is inhabited year-round and is really the heart of the village, and the other half, which is actually much bigger than half, which is much more resort-style.

Wednesday morning we went to a town on the Spanish border called Le Perthus, where, once you get to a certain point, one side of the main street is France and the other half is Spanish. I got a haircut on the Spanish side for 8 Euros, which was nice with the climbing exchange rate. After looking around the town there for a little while we went to another town, which I don't remember the name of but is close to Figueres. That's where we ate the monsters you see above, brochettes. I got a bruqeta mixta, which is the long skewer with grilled meat and peppers and onions hanging above a plate of fries and two small plates of salads. That along with calamari, bread, sangria, and espresso filled me up rather well for the day! That afternoon we went and looked around Cadaques, a town on the Spanish Costa Brava that hosts a museum to Salvador Dali.

Thursday morning I got some reading done and looked around the town of Sainte Marie a little bit. After lunch four of us went to the French town of Colloiure (difficult name is Catalan, not French). It was incredibly busy, and I can't imagine it in the tourist season. There's also a small training center there for the French version of Navy Seals, so I got to see a couple interesting exercises they were doing. There a took some really good pictures, too, so make sure you check those out on the pictures link. Many artists have painted or sculpted the church tower in Colloiure, it's really beautiful with the colors and the very blue Mediterranean.

This morning I went and checked out the garden that Philippe's parents keep in Sainte Marie. I thought it was quite awesome, as I'm now enjoying their produce. Their garden is amazing, they grow just about everything there, including apples, peaches, lemons, tomatoes, potatoes, sweet potatoes, watermelon, honeydew, eggplant, zucchini, pumpkins, strawberries, peppers, almonds, and some fruit that I don't remember the name of but is delicious, sweet, and looks like a tomato except it grows on a tree. Plus they have trees at their house for oranges and kumquats, figs, and possibly a couple other things. Anyways, I thought that was wicked...

That's it for now. It's not almost 2 AM here and I've had a long day, so it's time for me to go to sleep. I'm going to Marseille on Sunday for the day, so I might come back with some more stories or pictures. A bientot

Perpignan and a Spanish haircut

Hello all! I'm writing a little sooner than I have been because I'm leaving this afternoon for Perpignan, where my host father's parents live. Perpignan is a Catalan city close to the border with Spain. Apparently Salvador Dali once said that the train station in Perpignan was the center of the universe, because he got his best ideas there. He even painted a picture of the Iberian Peninsula rotating around Perpignan, which is now there on the left. I'm not quite sure how that shows what I just wrote, but apparently that's what it means. However, I'm not quite the art guru.

Anyways, my point of writing all that is that I'm going to be away from the computer for a few days, but hopefully I'll come back with some good pictures for you all to look at. I'm also going to get a haircut in Spain while I'm staying in Perpignan, because apparently haircuts are cheaper there.

I went to a market yesterday morning. It wasn't a market for produce, mainly clothes and some other products. It was on one side of the stadium for the soccer team Nimes Olympique, which is in the Ligue Nationale, two leagues below Olympique Marseille or Olympique Lyonnais, two teams that you might see on TV playing in Ligue 1 or the Champions League. On the other side of the stadium was a huge market for flowers. I bought a sweatshirt at the market, and now I'm going to stop myself from buying much more than a t-shirt, because if I don't I won't be able to close my suitcase in June. There are weekly markets for produce in the surrounding towns, although I don't have much of a need to go to those because I'm not buying my own fruits and vegetables.

I'm much more settled in here now. Last night when my local coordinator and his British wife came to check up on my I caught myself talking French accidentally every once in a while in the middle of a conversation in English. I also have to keep catching myself from saying "Oui" or "Quoi?" when I'm talking to people on Skype. I've been really enjoying riding here. On Saturday I rode 100 kilometers by myself. It would have been nice to ride with someone else, but at the same time I was happy I was alone cause I had some really awesome moments where I was happy it was quiet. Just me winding up that valley, then rolling along in the sun and smelling really good bread baking, an old French guy clapping for me right after climbing the "colline" at St. Comes, etc. It was awesome...

Bisous

The title is the hardest part...

So it's been about a week and now I have a few things to write. I have more time to be on the internet tonight because I'm waking up late tomorrow. Being on the internet means writing this blog and watching interviews with presidential candidates on the Daily Show website, my new method of narrowing down the Democratic candidates. It's weird having to actually make a decision for voting now that I can. But anyways, I'm waking up later tomorrow because I only have one hour of class! I'm actually not sure if I'm going to go, because the class is from 1 to 2 and going all the way to Nimes for that is kind of worthless. So I think I will start my vacation early.

HUZZAH!!! Vacation! The way French school works is there are about 7 to 8 weeks of school followed by a vacation. So I have one that starts tomorrow afternoon, I have the winter vacation, another "ski" vacation in February, and the spring vacation in April before school ends in the middle of June. During vacation I plan on getting to some more of the local sights and taking some pictures for everyone to see, riding my bike a ton, hopefully cooking some, reading, and of course learning French.

And speaking of school, there were two interesting things that happened this morning. For one, all the students bags were looked in when they entered the school and they were told nobody was allowed to leave the campus before noon, which is usually not the case. This was because yesterday someone lit a firework, threw it in a room, closed the door and ran away. The other thing at school this morning was a field trip close to the town of Rochefort du Gard, which is in between Nimes and Avignon. It was a geology lesson, and while I froze my ass off and tried to understand the other students took lots of notes on the age of the rocks and the chemical compositions on the rocks around. I understood a little better when we were allowed to go search for fossils...

I saw my first match of European handball last weekend. My host brother Axel plays on a team in a nearby town, and I got to see them play a team from Nimes. They won, which was good, and it was interesting to see it cause it's kind of a mix of basketball and lacrosse and hockey to me. I also cooked jerk chicken and New-Orleans style fried potatoes last weekend. The jerk chicken didn't come out as well as I wanted, and it was way too spicy for the kids here. Not sure what I'll get around to cooking this weekend/vacation, but we'll see. I'm also riding a lot more now. I'm trying to do at least 100 miles a week for now. Unfortunately I don't have many people to ride with and the wind here can be strong at times, but it's better than nothing. Plus other people get impatient if I want to stop and take a few pictures, which I will try to do on my next ride so you can see more of my route.

A prochain!