My Weekend

I want to apologize for the number of mistakes which I know are present in most of my blogs. Sometimes I go back and look at them, egotistically enough, and I cringe to see some of the garbled sentences and words I came up with. Today however, I finally had the bright idea of typing my blogs out in a Microsoft word document rather than directly on the site. The font may look a little different because of this, but hopefully the new presence of spellcheck will make a difference for both of us.

Now I do have a test in History tomorrow so I can’t stay up too late typing this; even if my grades don’t count this year, I’m still putting up a good effort in class for three main reasons: 1) It helps my French immensely, 2) I would be bored out of my mind all day if I didn’t, and 3) it’s hard to break a habit that I’ve had since kindergarten.

However, I thought that you would want to hear about my weekend! Saturday commenced with the usually two hours of class, making my Saturday feel surreally like another weekday and a weekend day mashed into one. After class I missed my bus, and read my book while I waited for the next one. I picked out La Maison de Papier from the school library, and I’m enjoying it even if it is more challenging to read than the last book I was working on. I actually enjoy my bus rides, even my 40 minute Friday bus ride to Rugby practice, because it carves a section out of my day where I get to read. The last few years I’ve found that it’s too easy to get swept up in the business of school, leaving whatever book I’m reading sitting lonely on the table. Since I not only have time on the bus, but also usually arrive early to wherever I’m going due to the bus schedule, it makes for the perfect time out of my day to get lost in a book.

But to get back to my Saturday, after I caught another bus home and had lunch with my host family, I went back into town to meet up with the other American exchange student who is with Rotary. There is one other Rotary exchange student from Taiwan, Joseph, but he couldn’t make it. The two of them go to another school, so this was the first time that I’ve seen another American (or native English speaker) since the Rotary Paris weekend. It was great to see Hana and we spent the time taking all the touristy pictures that we can’t take when we’re with our unimpressed French family and friends. Next time I’m hoping to get all the exchange students we can together, whether they’re with Rotary or not.

After our long walk we met up with two of my friends from class who were in town, and while I had to leave early (I wasn’t about to miss two busses in one day) it was really fun to spend time with them before I had to go. It may not sound very impressive, to say that it was fun, but for me to be able to casually meet up with classmates and not feel uncomfortable due to the pressure to try to imitate or conjugate correctly is a very fundamental breakthrough, which I’ve been really enjoying for the last few weeks.

That evening I visited my second host family’s house for the first time. They also live in St Doulchard, but a little bit closer into town. The daughter is a year younger than me and the son a few years older though I’m not sure exactly how many. The house is a vine-covered abode, stately for not being too large. We spent a few hours talking about nothing of great importance, but I left feeling that I will be as excited to live there as I will be sad to leave my currently host family.

Since I was gone all Friday (my rugby practice makes for a long day, since it take place in St Florent, which is located outside of Bourges and I have the take the bus directly there after school) and most of Saturday, I spent today home with my host family. I made marble cake for the first time with their help, and in honor of their older daughter’s birthday, she and her boyfriend come over for a big family lunch. Otherwise, today was spent with little excitement beyond that usual of living in France.