Lot's of Ups and Downs

First week in my new life is complete! It went by really slowly but that's normal according to the other exchange kids at my school. There are quite a few other exchange kids and only two in my class and one leaves in a month so that's kinda a bummer and my two other exchange friends in the class above me leave next week so that's even more of a bummer. I still have one good exchange friend. His name is Saku and he is from Japan. He's in my class. Here, I am in year 2nd 5 which is the equivalent to being a sophomore. So I've already learned most of the material, I now just have to learn the language! Besides me not being able to understand 90% of what the teachers are talking about, I actually don't hate my school. I think it used to be an old monastery or something because it's old and has stain glass windows and religious things here and there on the roofs and what not. The class schedule is very difficult to memorize. We don't have period 1 then period 2.. we just have classes scattered during the week. I can't seem to find a pattern either. And I only have my art class once a week and PE for over 2 hours on Fridays. Also, guess what! The teachers don't even have their own classroom! I have math in one room one day and then every other day it's in a different room across campus! I don't understand how that is more efficient but oh well the campus is not very large at all. At least the teachers for the classes stay the same, and my classmates stay the same because in my whole grade there are twenty students. so the class sizes are very manageable. With my class I got very lucky because (unlike the class above me) I haven't talked to one classmate who hasn't been open or hasn't not tried to talk to me just because of the language barrier. I even made a few friends I went shopping with after school and we bought cookies! I got a chocolate orange cookie. Wasn't the best and it wasn't the worst, I'm glad I tried it because I am here in a new culture and I'll be damned if I don't take every opportunity to try something new, even if it is just a cookie. There are exceptions to my "try new things" rule. Smoking for instance. You know how people say everyone smokes in France? Well, that really is not far off from the truth! At my school I have not met one student that doesn't smoke on the daily. However, God is good and there are 6 people I have become friends with who don't smoke and continuously ask me why I don't smoke or tell me to try it. They are my three exchange friends (who I mentioned that two of them were leaving next week) and the three girls I went to buy the cookies with. So there were definitely lows to my week but there were also some good highs :) I can't wait to explore the city of Rennes more, become better friends with the people I met this past week and of course improve my French skills. Even though I get really home sick I'm happy I'm here and I can't wait to see what these next 5 months will bring me.