Fake School and Stupid Trains

This entry is not nearly as exciting as the last one, just a couple stories about today.

I bought a ticket for the RER train for the week, but even though I got to metro with 45 minutes before my very first APA “class” started, the trains ran late and I almost wasn’t on time. Can’t wait to do that everyday – but then again at least I’m desperately late in Paris, right?

Today was the first day of orientation classes. We began with a really hard dictée and French comprehension test to place us in our language class, followed by lunch at Le Cercle with friends (a place in the Luxembourg I have been before – very good Croque Madame) and a desperate attempt to walk it off in the Luxembourg gardens.

All of our “classes” today were held at a place called the Foyer International des Etudiants Etrangers (or something like that), which has served as a school and boarding house for international students since like 1920 – so the whole building is very old and the classrooms are very old school. I kept thinking I was in Au Revoir, Les Enfants.

Next, one of the directors, Nicole, gave everyone a very large packet of information about cultural and sporting events around Paris, which I ended up carrying around all day long. Last, we made our way to the Biblioteque Nationale de Francois Mitterand, which is basically a tremendous library-skyscraper-space station looking building, equipped with café, bookstore, garden, and movie theatre. There, we all got library cards with hideous pictures. Leah, Kate, and I got hopelessly lost on the metro (again! I have now counted that as my 6th time being lost in Paris) looking for the Monoprix (read: Target). Unsuccessfully, we went home.

Now I’m exhausted (not unusual lately) and it’s going to storm badly in just a few minutes. It’s also gotten very cold here.

One last thought – at the metro Kate and I bought a bunch of weird candy to try at a little shop we found. All of it was delicious except this one long stick-like candy that we decided looked sort of like a crumby donut and tasted like old cake batter. Definitely not American and very strange.

That’s all for now. More later. Love you guys!

Update: Dinner tonight was awesome. Rice, chicken, carrots in vinegrette, cheese and bread. My host mom Francoise has asked me many times what I usually eat at home and I'm not sure they understand the concept of "Lean Cuisine".