Back to Class

For the first I as I sit down to write this I can think of nothing to say. I suppose that means that I’m finally really accustomed to my life here. In fact, the first two days back in school after the vacation were nice in terms of getting back into the routine. (Not so nice in terms of having to wake up 6:30 again…) The one thing that has changed is because my day was so long today, from 8:00 to 6:00, with a 20min bus ride on either end, daylight savings time has made it so that I left the house before the sun rose and it had already set when I got out of school. That’s a first for me, but luckily the high school campus has enough outdoors space between buildings that you get to see daylight during the day. Especially considering that in the last two days I’ve had three teachers be absent from their classes resulting in unexpected two hour breaks in my day.

What else is there to talk about? Well, if you’re wondering if I managed to complete my goals over break I’ll give you a quick run summary:

1)      Spend time with friends- check. I think I wrote about ice skating, and I was also able to go into town with Dora and had lunch at her host family’s house. They were very welcoming and funny, cracking jokes and teasing each other. We also played an online geography quiz with her younger host sister, at which Dora absolutely crushed. Between her near fluency in English and geographic prowess, I’m wondering what other miracles are worked by the Icelandic educational system.

2)      Read assigned texts- check. Almost. I read one out of four, which is pretty good considering that they were all in French. Luckily, it’s the one book we’re working on right now, Caligula by Albert Camus. I also finished The Princess Diaries in French, though that wasn’t exactly assigned by my Literature teacher.

3)      Winter coat and shoes- check. I very much appreciated having them when I caught the bus this morning.

4)      Skype home- check. It was great to see all of you!

5)      Homework- well, I did everything that was due right away. I still have that essay on a text I don’t understand… but I’m sure there will be time to decode it over the weekend.

6)      Cupcakes- no, but I did make some very delicious cookies.

7)      Visit my third host family- yes, and I’m absolutely looking forward to living with them.

8)      Review French- yes, though I barely made a dent in reviewing the list of irregular verbs I made. French has a lot of irregular verbs, which are especially horrific in the subjunctive. I deeply dislike the subjunctive.

9)      Sleep- check. It was wonderful.

So as of Wednesday my vacation was over and I’m back in school. I had badminton today, and slowly continue to improve. On my way home from the bus stop I bought a delicious pastry which was a type of apple tart/pie and very good. However my favorite discovery so far as French pastries go is the religieuse. Two round, chocolate, cream-filled pastries are stacked on top of each other with a white collar of icing in between. The pastry together forms an abstract figure of a religieuse, French for nun!