It took me a moment to figure out how to add a new post...

Well, I made it! It literally was planes, trains, and autmobiles getting here (two planes, two trains, and a gray minivan) but I'm comfortably "installée" in my little host family here. First, I would just like to say what a great travel day I had. It was albeit long, but I had a few perks hit me throughout. First, I attempted to use my government issued ID that I had to get to work at sheplers to cut in line at security. It worked; I literally had to wait two minutes.   :D  Then, before I left Detroit I successfully changed my seat from an aisle seat in the middle section to a window seat. This made it so much easier to sleep during the flight w/ the help of a sleeping pill provided by mom. Thanks mom!

Anyways, 22 hours after a tearful goodbye to my mom and grandma, I was picked up by the head of the english department at the school I'm going to be teaching in. She has three kids Nicolas, ~16 Simon, ~14 and Elvira who is 8. She is probably the cutest 8 year old I've ever met. She never stops talking and has to take huge breaths all the time b/c she talks so fast that she probably makes herself dizzy. Marie-Agnes is so nice and will probably help me with anything I need. (Apart from free room and board while I look for an apartment) My French is pretty rusty and I stumble alot, but M-A just complemented me on how good my French is. Holler! I also can't really understand a word of what the kids say, partly because they talk so fast and partly because the northern accent is quite different from the Grenoblois one. But I haven't had to resort to much English so far, so yay for me! That 100 Euros Albion paid for me to take that french proficiency test is really paying off!

Ironically, my first meal when I got to my host family was french fries and hot dogs...what the french, toast? But it was fine because they had been working all morning moving Marie's husband to or from an apartment where he works...never really caught that whole situation...   But tonight's dinner was duck and beets followed by my all time favorite-stinky stinky camembert! So the food situation is definitely looking up. I never realized all of the things I missed about France. Well, I knew I missed the cheese...but people speaking french all the time, the ease of transportation, their cute little road signs w/ their cute little cars and their cute little roundabouts. It's been an emotional last couple weeks, but I'm so relieved to have gotten here and just be so pumped about living the European life again. I can't wait to start school, meet some sweet people, and just start traveling to visit all my friends! Although, I should probably first buy a cell phone and find a place to live...

That's all for now (yeah right, I just wrote a book) Hope everything is going well stateside!

Well, hello

Hey everyone,

I decided to make a blog of all of my travels to make it easier for everyone to keep up with me. I can't promise I'll make regular updates, but I promise to try. I leave in 4 days and right now I'm just running around trying to get everything ready...shopping and packing...two things I hate most in this world. Right now my line of thought is, I must have been crazy to think this was a good idea.

A few things about my upcoming trip: I'm going to be an english teaching assistant at Lycee Voltaire, a technical high school in Wingles, France. I'm hopefully going to be living in a nearby city called Lens. (In case anyone needs a travel destination.) Once I get there I have a nightmare of paperwork so that I can legally reside in, get paid, and have health insurance in France. Also, I have to buy a cell phone, open up a bank account, and find an appartment...which I haven't really done before (thanks alot
Albion for preparing me for the real world) much less in French. So it should be lots of fun. I will be staying with the head of the English department at my school, a woman named Marie-Agnes so hopefully she can help me a bit.

Well, that's all for now, considering I'm currently in Hartland, MI which is probably the most boring place in the world. I'll try to write back in the next week when I have a hot second.