School, Food and the City

This past week has been a little more uneventful than most. I did a lot, but it was nothing much out of the ordinary. Like most weekends I went out to downtown Rennes and walked around with Eliza. The weather has been pretty cold and it's been raining a lot but at least for those three hours it was pretty nice out! Sunday wasn't that fun of a day. I ate a good breakfast then we went to my host dad's mother's house for lunch. Her cooking was amazing so that made me feel a little better but after lunch my host parents left somewhere so I was stuck in a room with my two host siblings until almost 5 o'clock in a room watching American Dad in french and eating candy. Remember when I told you how they ate? Yeah, so not the best time. I didn't even have wifi so I spent that time organizing all the pictures in my phone into files. I have 217 pictures of Pim and I've taken 233 pictures here in France so far. I wanted to take a picture of my friend Saku and I today because we were both wearing very similar flannel shirts! I really enjoy all the people in my class. Unlike most of the other classes, everyone in my class is very open and very willing to help me when I have even the stupidest of questions. They help me with my school work too, but not so much to where I don't do anything. For example; I had to make a presentation with a friend about solar energy. She made me research and write my whole presentation and then she went over it with me and corrected it for me! I didn't have to present it today and I don't have that class (SVT) for another two weeks so we will see how that goes. Another thing at school that's new is that there are four kids from Nebraska, they are only here for about five days though. They leave on Wednesday. It's weird though, I felt like an elder in a tribe talking to foreigners. Explaining the way of life in France. None of their french speaking skills were good enough to ask a francophone, so my class asked me to just answer their questions in English which was kinda really nice feeling useful and not like a burden to my classmates, which was a new experience for me. I guess that's isn't totally true. I tried to help my friend Emma, whom I became pretty close to, with her French. She's from Ireland and was only here for five weeks, I wish she was here for longer because we clicked so well. We will probably stay in touch though. I forgot to mention that Wednesday, since it was a half day, that Eliza, Alyssa and Emma and me all went shopping and got snacks and just had so much fun roaming downtown. That's what I think I'm going to miss the most when I leave here in June, the feeling of just walking around in such a beautiful city and getting lost in the cobblestone streets is just a feeling I'm not sure I can find in America. I guess that means I have to come back someday!
My English teacher wants me to start helping "teach" the class in someway, she doesn't know how she wants me to help yet but when she figures it out I'm sure I can handle it!
I forgot to mention that the week before last there was an eclipse but the teachers made everyone stay in the classrooms because they didn't want the student during their eyes. It was a very cloudy day so one could not see the eclipse until the end of the whole thing so I didn't miss much there.
I'm now starting to really watch what I eat and I'm trying to at least do some sit-ups every day. I'm not ashamed that I've gained a little extra on the sides because, hey, I'm in France! It would be more weird if I didn't gain! So I went to a healthy store and made some trail mix that I eat for breakfast, then now at lunch I don't get a baguette sandwich, instead I'll just get a salad. For dinner our food is always home cooks and not very unhealthy but I'm still cutting my potions down a little bit. I'm taking this more as a challenge than a chore. Yet another thing that I have to overcome and once I achieve my goal it will feel so awesome! Also, it makes me feel less guilty knowing I've been eating small, healthy meals when I cheat and eat two too many churros... they were so good though... sorry, Mom I know you don't approve of that kind of behavior.
Sorry my blog posts are all over the place, I will work on that next week!

Actually Doin' Stuff Now

This past week has been quite interesting! For the second half of Monday, all of Tuesday, and the first half of Wednesday, the high schoolers had to the Epreures communes. Which is their big standardize test, or at least something like that. Me, not being fluent in the language, had to sit in the library with three other exchange students during that time. Monday we took some sort of test about child soldiers and how these organizations are trying to help free them and then we had to write a 150 word essay on a good and bad thing that has happened in our country sometime in the past 30 years. I'm just going to say that my test overall probably was not great and leave it at that! Tuesday, we had to create presentations about the differences and similarities between our high schools in our home countries and the high school here. It was pretty cool because the other exchange students are from Ireland, Canada and Australia so all of our presentations are at least a little different. We all had to make our presentations with zero guidelines besides what I previously stated. They all made powerpoints with all of their speech on that but I made a powerpoint just of pictures (Mountain Vista has some great pictures on google images of our student section at sports games). We were all finished and had nothing to do for about two and a half hours so we left to go sit in the sun and take pictures of the school, we were told just to not leave the campus. The colors all over my school are so crazy. One classroom is purple and a neon-ish yellow. I didn't get any pictures of the classrooms because they were either locked or had a class going on inside, but I got pictures of the hallways and I'll try to put them on my shutterfly (which I've been having trouble with lately so be patient with my lack of tech skills) and you'll get the gist of what I'm talking about when you see those! Then Wednesday we just hung out and talked and then went to downtown to get some sushi and candy to eat in a really pretty park that I had gone to a few weeks back. Wednesdays are only half days for most all students so we just had to wait three hours before we could leave. Thursday and Friday went by pretty fast! Nothing too special happened. My host brother did leave for London this morning and he will be there for a week with his school so thats really exciting for him! He really wants to learn English and so even though he has a long way to go, his accent is more understandable than a lot of other students even in my grade. After Wednesday though, the temperature has been decreasing and the amount of clouds have been increasing. Saturday, I did go on a forty minute run because I got lost, but thankfully it was pretty sunny most for most of it! Then today I went on about an hour and a half walk with my host mom and we just talked and she showed me around town which, besides the little square of the bank, post office, a few restaurants and a grocery store, is just houses. We did get to the edge of Thoriné-Fouillard and it was a lot of, very pretty, open fields and old stone houses. I'll get more pictures in the weeks to come. I'm so scared I'll forget a lot of what I'm experiencing, but at the same time what I'm experiencing is so cool I don't think I could ever forget this even if I wanted to.
Fun things that happened to me today! I signed up for a 5K Color Me Rad Run Rennes for the weekend after my birthday! I'm so excited about it! Probably more excited about it than I should be but I don't even care! I love that I have something to look forward to. Also, I'm in the process of finding a place I can volunteer at but it's proving a little more difficult than I thought it would be but hopefully in the weeks to come I'll get it all sorted out!

Classic High Schooler's Life of School and Fun... But in France

As I write this, I have to admit I am quite tired. I've been getting back into my night owl nature and just not getting enough sleep. If I have learned one thing in these past two months, it is that french is a much more enjoyable language to the brain when your brain is not yelling at you to get to a quiet place to sleep. I did have a very busy week last week so my lack of sleep was not just thanks to reading and watching YouTube (vlogbrothers are great by the way). Last Tuesday I had to wake up at six o'clock a.m. to catch an early bus to get to school thirty minutes early so that I could go on a day trip to Nantes with about forty other students from various art classes within my school. It was about a two hour bus ride to spend the morning walking around, learning about the public art and interesting architecture within the city. Then we sat in a park for lunch and had a classic french lunch which consisted of an apple, a little thing of cheese, some sort of sugary bread thing, a water bottle, potato chips, and a baguette sandwich which only had butter and ham on it. I really love the simplicity of most of the meals here, even the ones my host dad serves at my house. I do, however, really want Chick-fil-a, basically all the time. Paige if you're reading this, be prepared to see me at work a LOT this summer (For those of you who don't know Paige, she is my friend who works at Chick-fil-a). Anyways, for the second part of the day we went to this kind of odd place with a lot of old robot animal machines in which you could ride and I found it a bit strange to be honest. It did have some cool elements and I'm glad I saw it anyway even though it wasn't really my kind of art. The bus ride back was fun. I introduced my french, australian, and japanese friend to my guilty pleasure of putting peanut butter on oreos! Everyone thought it was going to be extremely disgusting for some reason but once they all tried it they quickly changed their minds. We got back to the school at about 18:00 which is one hour and twenty minutes later than the usual time I am finished with school on Tuesdays. Mondays and Thursdays are my toughest days because I am at school from 8:05 (9:05 on Mondays) until 17:40! Which is 5:40 p.m. for all of you who don't know. I don't know why the school day is so long. Not only that, but the classes are mainly all just lectures on whatever we are learning. It is painfully boring. Sometimes I'll try to write down some thoughts in class but most of the teachers are very strict and won't allow phones, food, books, or even water! Yes, you heard me! I am not even allowed to stay hydrated during class. I really don't understand why but oh well, the teacher has to look at the board at some point. I try not to fight the system too much, but I have to say, they make it so darn tempting. I've given up trying to ask because I've never received a satisfactory answer. I'm just going to leave it at I really miss Vista and I'm going to really try my hardest to never complain about it! Even though things here in France have never been better and my more carefree attitude has been helping an enormous amount with my overall mental health, I still miss my friends and family a lot. I just wish they were here with me. I feel like I might be saying that a bit often here in my blog posts but well it's what's on my heart a lot. However, going out with friends and getting closer to people here is what makes my homesickness practically disappear. On Friday I went out to get dinner in downtown Rennes with my friend, Joel. Seeing the city at night was a whole new experience, all the shops were closed and the streets with the restaurants and bars were lit up and there were a ton of college students and young adults. It was so lively! Definitely a fun experience! Next weekend, all of the exchange students at my school were going to go together to a popular city by the ocean (I forgot the name), but our local ordinator canceled it because he was too busy to take us. I was really looking forward to it too. That means I'll probably just go exploring in the city again with a friend! I need to get out next weekend, because with the exception of Friday night and my run on Sunday, I didn't get out of the house at all this last weekend! I got a lot done still but my family was surprised because I usually go to the store or to downtown almost every Saturday. Until next week! Bisou!

Day 61! What?!

It's still weird to think how incredibly far away I am from all my loved ones. It never hits me until I actually see a map and think, "Wow, if I want to go home I would have a lot of swimming to do."  Thankfully, I am starting to really enjoy my life here and I'm even getting a little nervous that the next 111 days won't be enough time! However, at the same time I look back and realize how much I've learned, how much I've grown and how many new things I've done! Just this past week I tried mussels! I have never eaten so much seafood in my whole life as I have in these past two months. All the fish and different things from the sea that I've eaten, I usually like the taste. It's just the texture that I can't seem to enjoy. I'm sure when I come back to Colorado I will be begging my mom to cook me up some mussels though. Another thing about food, I've decided I'm going to ship all my clothes back in boxes and just fill my suitcase, carry on, and backpack with all my new favorite foods and snacks... not sure if even that will be enough room. Sorry mom, but when I come back you will have to help me control my sweet tooth. I'm pretty sure gaining a little extra on the sides is just something that comes along with studying abroad in France. I don't know any exchange kids that didn't gain a few pounds their first few months here. For all I know this could be my first and last time eating all this delicious food so I'm going to shamelessly enjoy it for at least a little while! I'm still jogging about twice a week and swimming for a two hour P.E. class on Fridays (which is something I will bring back and do when I return because I really enjoy it!) and then doing exercises in my room almost everyday. So I'm still taking care of myself, don't worry parents. Eliza (my Australian friend) and me have decided that on our half way mark in France is when we will actually start making an effort to eat more healthy and we will keep each other accountable for working out and getting healthy food at lunch. Until then I will enjoy my baguettes. Yesterday Eliza and me walked in the city for about 4 hours and got hamburgers and candy from our favorite candy shop named Magic Pills. It seriously has the coolest candy. I think I will fill my backpack with that next June. Anyways, we walked around and got lost (of course) and found this really awesome market that was very crowded with every kind of fresh food you could ask for! We also stumbled upon this park with a bird house and tons of flowers and fountains. Everytime I go walking in the city I become even more enchanted. I will post pictures to my shutterfly today so you all can see what I'm talking about. Not only was it one of the best city adventures I've had thus far, it was also the warmest and sunniest day I've had living here! I was very happy to be able to leave the house without having to wear a heavy jacket or my raincoat. Even though I love the city and taking the twenty minute bus ride, it still is expensive to eat out and buy snacks and little things here and there. Advice to anyone reading this who is thinking of doing an exchange: You shouldn't have to stress a crazy amount about money and the best way to do this is to become organized. I need to get better about that but I do have an allowance that I try my best to stick to and I've found the best way to stick to it is to make a shopping list and not stray from it, and put in account for eating out and school stuff and extra expenses which, for me, march has been bringing a lot of. I'm really excited for this month because I have so much going on and I'm going out with my friends more which is such a blessing! I just need to not have a shopping spree every time I step into a mall. Which only happened once, calm down, Dad. :)
Random updates: I talked to my counselor and we picked out my classes for next year, even though it's going to be a lot, I couldn't be more excited for my senior year! My family is great! I've been getting closer with my host parents and are more open to them. Also, I weirdly miss doing my own laundry, here I put my laundry down a shoot (which is really cool, I have to say) but I could get it back in one or even five days. I miss knowing I'll have my socks back that night. I don't miss doing my own laundry nearly as much as I miss my friends and family. It's hard not having them here but I'm also glad I'm proving to myself that I am my own person that doesn't need any others to prove that I can happy in my own skin. I think for the first time in my life I'm fairly happy with my mind. I have a theory that you need to eat two kinds of food. Food to make your body happy (i.e. fruits and veggies) and food to make your mind and soul happy (i.e. sugar, carbs and everything nice). I have been eating enough of both and I'm giving my theory credit to my at least a little part of my newfound happiness.
I don't have much on the schedule for this next coming week, but after I get through this week I have a lot planned! I know my life here is getting more exciting because of how sore my feet and mind are by the end of the day. I should probably get some better walking shoes and more advil!