classes

still sick... but here's what my schedule currently looks like

I still need to get a french class. They dropped my other one (I was in the wrong level) but they haven't replaced it yet. So I guess that's what I'll be doing on monday!

Pray that my sore throat goes away!

On tuesday (mardi) I have Social Policies in Europe and international history of the 20th century (wohoo!)

Wednesday (mercredi) I have the recitation for my history class

Thursday (Jeudi) I have European Economic Constitution. 

Hopefully I'll get a french class that meets on tuesday and thursday so then I have 3 days of classes and 4 days of weekend. (i'd be okay with wednesday and friday morning too I guess) 

But with the french class I should get 14 Georgia Tech credit hours. They wanted us to take somewhere around 22 GT hours and I was like-I know at tech that's pretty much suicide I don't think that it being in french would make it any easier! 

So I have some "interesting" courses. Basically they have a dumb registration system and have really small class sizes (only 25 students in each class) so all the classes were full when I got to register. So that's what I got- at least they will count for something.

sick.

I'm sick. Sore throat. And tonight was the big party for back to school- at least I was able to sell my ticket!

but here's some pictures that I didn't post yet.

They have an orangey flavor of schweppes, not as good as raspberry-but they don't have that.

My ticket... that I'm not using... lame. Sorry it's all backwards.

Food=Friends

tip of the day:

If you need to make friends, involve food! Cooking not only impresses people but it also feeds them and gives you a reason to talk- because being silent while eating a meal at the same table is just plain strange in almost every country.  My advice is learn at least one easy recipe very well, then when you cook it will taste amazing and everyone will love you! 

I made  couple friends on the hall because I made some four cheese stuffed pasta shells. When you're at a dorm or anywhere away from "home" then a "home-cooked" meal goes a long way.

(it helps if it has a very pleasant and strong aroma because people will be like OOh what are YOU cooking) 

Yesterday marked the last week of the welcome program. AKA week of pointless loads of course work to "prepare" you for Sciences-po- I'll let you know how prepared I actually am...

But this is exciting and scary because next week my work will actually count towards something. and scary because next week my work will actually count for something.

Tonight I went to a dinner with my group and the 2 other groups (about 15 people each but only about 20 people showed up) and our professors to dinner. It was a lot of fun! I had some amazing duck and mashed potato plate. (mmm mashed potatoes). 

One of my teachers is crazy. somehow the topic of meeting french guys was brought up and the prof. couldn't hear the girl asking the question and so a guy at the table relayed it to the professor and he was like (to the guy) "What you want a french boyfriend... you go that way?"

and the guy was like "NO nO girls."  

Prof; "no girls?"

guy: "no no I like girls"

Prof: "as friends."

guy: "no I don't want to date a guy"

this went on for about 5 minutes.

I also witnessed my first strike today. Or rather 2! Unfortunately one involves RER-B the one that takes you to the airport, but also the one that is right next to the Cité-U. So I have to walk a lot farther to reach the now SUPER crowded metro. I've never wanted to stand so close to this many people at one time! The other strike is about the privatization of the postal service. So I hope that I don't have anything coming in the mail from the bank or agency.

Photos from top to bottom: 1.) Typical classroom at Sciences-po. Huge windows pretty small can only fit less than 30 people-that's squeezing in-but there's some more desks that you can't see.

2.) Me and Ayu (Japanesee) and Yi chun (Taiwanese) at the dinner de conférence

3.) Mara (Canadian) and Mariana (Portuguese)  in the computer lab printing off some more stupid forms that we have to fill out! Stupid Bureaucratic system! (This one was 8 pages!)

4.) Yi Chun (Taiwanese) Mariana (Portuguese) and Mika (Japanese)

The long walk and Being a an American

This afternoon I had to work on another group project, this time a plan for a dissertation.  Since the sciences-po and therefore sciences-po wifi was closed we decided to meet at the only place that we knew had wifi- Starbucks, once we got there we remembered that we had to pay so we went to the second place we knew had wifi- McDonalds... horay American wifi. I bought myself a frappucino at Sbux but I couldn't bring myself to eat the MickeyD's, I'm not in that drastic need of a hamburger-yet. 

Then today at the Cité U the campus was open for visitors to take walking tours around the grounds and go inside some of the buildings. So I decided that I would go on a walking tour around the campus and see what I could see. Little did I realize how big the campus was but fortunately it was such a beautiful day that I didn't really mind. 

Then the bed that I am currently sleeping on is crummy, because during the middle of the night when I am sleeping the slats on the bottom of the bed fall out from under me... so in order to somehow fix the problem I simply stuck one of my suitcases underneath it. This solves the problem for now but I can't wait until I get to sleep on a real bed in my own apartment

Here's a link to more of the pictures 

new places

this is my new home for the next week! It is the maison Franco-Brittanique and it is located at the Cité -U or International University City in Paris. You can check out their website-sorry it's in french and maybe find some pictures of the place! One is the picture of the very pretty library located in the City. (Who am I kidding there really isn't a place on the campus here that isn't pretty!) here's a link to the photo page.

The Picture with the two girls are my canadian group mates. We were making a worksheet about the powers of the French President under their current constitution (wohoo!) 

The picture out the window is the view of the garden from my seat in french  class (not during class I promise). But I promise to take some pictures of the actual university this week and post them- for once I'm not up to date on taking pictures!

And for the best news EVER! I think that we might have finally found an apartment! The agency sent us the lease and everything and we're supposed to fax it to them by tomorrow! yipee. While I am going to be living in a palace of pepto bismal pink- I know that it is better to have a place to live more than it is the color of the place in which your living! 

Last but not least- I've included an amazing video clip from a french television show. Enjoy and remember you don't have to be 20 or a washed up celebrity to compete on  reality TV dancing shows- well at least not in France.

Travel buddy

Vote on the Name of the Gnome! leave a comment or go on facebook and leave a comment on the picture of Mr. Potato-head and the gnome! He is in need of a name

Answering your questions

So many people have been asking me what my life is like in Paris I've made a blog. I cannot promise that it will always be exciting but I will most certainly try. I'll try to include some videos or photos and what not to make things entertaining.  Plus then you can know what I'm up to from day to day or week to week. 

Please Enjoy! 

I have been in paris for a week and a half now, and life is slowly becoming easier! (Yay!) 

Problems:

• I killed my computer and it didn't work for the first week- Thankfully my dad was able to send me the start up disks and the apple people were able to walk me through the recovery process over the phone- I have much respect for the phone guy, I could NEVER do his job, too many awkward silences.
• I don't have an apartment yet! This is probably the biggest set back that I'm facing currently. I can't get many things accomplished concerning transport and visas until I get an permanent address. - I thought I had found one today but apparently the agency had picked someone else to give it to instead of us. BUT the agent was nice enough to help us find a different apartment from their selection that is better than the other one we wanted- except for maybe the decoration... (pepto bismal pink walls?) There's a link to see the pictures at the bottom of the page.
• Everything is SO expensive!
• All I hear is that my school is ridiculously hard. And their reason, in the words of my methodology teacher "Because we're french"  then he precedes to mime jumping out of the window to escape the sciences-po! 
• There's probably more but i don't really want to dwell on the negative.