Well I changed host families!! It's really weird changing families. I packed up my entire bedroom into 3 suitcases... and a little more too (I have no idea how I will get home).
My new family is awesome! My first day here, we went for a walk on the beach and it was so beautiful! Love the beach! Then we had a Galette de Roi for dessert and I was the Queen! For those of you who don't know, a Galette de Roi is a cake with apple or something extremely sweet and somewhere in the cake is a tiny figurine or some sort. One person puts their head under the table and another serves the cake by saying "And this piece here is for..." and the person under the table yells out a name. The person to find the figurine in the cake is the King (or Queen)!
There are 3 people in this house, Christophe, my host dad, Coralline, 14 year old host sister and Thibault, 20-something year old host brother. Sometimes we play Mario Cart on the TV downstairs, other times I'll play guess the song games with Coralline or she'll show me music and funny videos. After school, Coralline watches this TV show called "Les Frères Scott" or "The Scott Brothers". It's an American TV show... still not too sure what it's about but the cast is full of outrageously good looking people who, lets be honest here, are very aware of their beauty factor. I like watching it though because a) it's actually got some good, slightly cheesy, soap opera content in it, and b) it's fairly easy to understand. If I don't understand something, Coralline eagerly explains it to me anyway! It has become a daily routine to come home from school, get a cup of hot chocolate and sit on the couch to watch "Les Frères Scott".
Speaking of routine, my daily routine at my new house. I'm always the first to wake up. My alarm goes off at 5:55 am but out of habit for some bizarre reason I wake up on my own about 5:30 am. I usually lie in bed procrastinating getting up for about 10 to 15 minutes deciding if I really need to have a morning shower or not, usually I decide that I do, then I enter the truly freezing bathroom and shower, get dressed, do my hair, and make up and then around 6:40 I go to eat breakfast. I'm still the sole person in the house that is awake at this point and so I try to be quiet. I eat some toast (which I manage to burn half the time *insert sad face*) and a mandarin or a yoghurt, some juice... mostly what I feel like and at about 6:55 am or so I go back up stairs, brush my teeth, put together my bag, turn the heating off in the room and put on my sweaters and jackets, and then I leave the house around 7:08 for the bus. The bus stop is just down the road about 3 minutes and the bus comes every morning exactly at 7:13. Pretty perfect, eh? It's nice, there are usually several guys there and we all bisous good morning then stand awkwardly in silence. Okay so it's not that nice but it's still friendlier than my last bus stop in which I'm sure that I was the oldest one there and everyone just ignored me, then people would literally push and shove you out of the way to get on the bus first... I have never understood why they do that.
The bus ride is nice in the mornings. It's about 40 minutes long and I'm usually half-sleep. The bus ride in the evenings isn't too different. I spent the first week quite terrified of the bus though, scared I would take the wrong bus, or miss my stop but thanks to some friendly people who took care of me and sat with me and talked with me, I am no longer afraid of my bus (although this past Wednesday I did get on the wrong bus and as the bus was pulling away, I saw one of the people on my bus... not on the same bus as me and so I ran to the bus driver and asked him to let me off. When I did get off, my friend was just laughing at me. I have now decided to never be the first person I know to get on the bus, I'll just follow others.)Like I said before, I get home, I make hot chocolate and watch "Les Frères Scott" and then I usually go to my bedroom and attempt to keep it clean. I have started watching a TV Series, "How I Met Your Mother [HIMYM]" and I realize it's bad for my French but at the end of the day I'm tired and the TV Show is really funny! I go downstairs to eat dinner at 8 and I hang out down there a bit with Coralline and sometimes Thibault. That is when we listen to music or play Mario Cart. Then around 9 or 9:30 I go back to my room and I get ready for bed. Sometimes I'll Skype someone then or watch some more HIMYM or read. I've been trying to read this large book I have in French called Specials. It's the third in a series I read in English back in Canada and I decided to tackle it. It's difficult but I'm doing it! It's a large book though, I think I may trade it in for a smaller one. It's much more rewarding to finish a book than to just make progress with it.
Here are some pictures of the house... I didn't take them though. They were emailed to me last year!
I have had 3 Rotary gatherings since I last spoke to you all. The first was a Rotary meeting in which I had to do a presentation on my first 4 months here in France! I put together about 20 pictures and decided to wing it! And it worked!! My pictures started all out of order and I just talked and smiled my great big Rotary smile and I believe everyone enjoyed it! I know that my French isn't anywhere near being perfect but everyone complimented me saying that I spoke it well and had improved. That is the best compliment you can give an exchange student, a compliment on their language.
The second meeting was an explanatory meeting with the future exchange students from Lannion. I just so happen to be friends with everyone who was there and it was so nice to see them all so excited about leaving! One boy, Pierre-Marie, will go to Brazil which clearly had Lais very, extremely excited! Another girl, Agatha, will go to the US, her first option. She found Lais and I in the hallways (well the staircase really) and starting screaming and jumping up and down in excitement. The US was her dream place, her goal in looking for an exchange and she wanted to go there more than anything. I am so happy for her! The third girl, Josephine, still doesn't know where she will go but her choices I believe are the US, Argentina and Taiwan. I am very excited for all of them! I know that for them, their next year abroad must seem so foreign and strange. I still feel like that sometimes. Like, this is my life here and it seems normal to me but when I remember what it was like last year before I left and how much work and preparation I put into this year, and now here I am, it still seems surreal!
Third meeting was just last night. Lais and I attended a Rotary dinner to meet the Rotary Governor. We were separated at tables which was really good for our French. I got to speak with people at my table and I felt like it went really well and really nicely.
This past week, Christophe has been in Miami, Florida visiting his daughter Mailys. He brought me back a t-shirt that says Miami on it! He had an amazing time and I loved seeing all his photos from it. So beautiful. He's all tanned now which makes me jealous too! While he was away, it snowed! Don't get me wrong, I love the snow and school was cancelled. The problem was that it didn't snow in Trebeurden, only in Lannion and not even that much. A very, very thin layer of snow covered the ground and was mostly gone by afternoon and then it was just cold and wet. I also waited for 20 minutes for a bus that never came... wasn't so bad though, I got to speak with a boy who used to live in Canada. He is nice.
While Christophe was away, we had the grandmother stay with us, Mami Colette. Oh, she is just wonderful! So sweet, so gentile, so smiley! I had a lot of long conversations with her about life, well her life and my commentaire and occasional story. I was sick last week too... didn't go to school on Thursday (day before the snow). I really should have stayed home on Tuesday, I woke up feeling ill with a headache and nausea but it was the first day that Christophe had left and Mami Colette hadn't arrived yet and so I felt it was an inappropriate first time to miss school at my new home.
Wednesday, I should have stayed home too as I woke up with the same symptoms as yesterday and spent the whole first hour of school with my head on the desk fighting off the stinging pain in my head. But once again, it was only a half day and I felt it inappropriate to stay home on Mami Colette's first day in the house. At this point, I also had a runny nose and a bad cough too. I probably shouldn't have gone on that walk through Trebeurden with Coralline but she was eager to show me around and we had a nice time!
Thursday, I did feel a little bit better but I just had that gut feeling that I really needed to stay home and take a day to recoup. And so I did, and good thing too! When I woke up again, I had no voice! At school that day, the music teacher reassigned solos to people and she gave me one (on one condition, I have to practice to make my voice stronger/louder). If I had gone to school, I wouldn't have sung it well and I wouldn't have gotten the solo!
That weekend was Constance's birthday. I went to Sandrine's house on Friday and we drove to Vessey, beside the Mont St. Michel and celebrated with Lais and the grandparents, cousins and friends. It was a really nice weekend! We had a snow ball fight, watched Paranormal Activity 2 & 3, Lais and I watched HIMYM and it was really very nice and relaxed. We ate flambie :) I also loved getting to see everybody again! I love it at the grandparent's house. It's so cozy (et pour tout le monde qui était la pour le déjeuner sur samedi, je suis toujours certain que Mami est ma préfèré!) At lunch everyone decided that one of my eyes is smaller than the other and teased me but Mami assured me that I am perfectly normal and my eyes are beautiful <3 MERCI MAMI :) Vous êtes vraiment gentille. (Pour le record, cette une blague et c’était tellement marrant à la table).
This week has gone rather calmly. Not too much has happened, I am not at school right now due to the fact that there was a big test today for all the French kids, similar to a Provincial I suppose. Either way, as an exchange student, it wasn't necessary for me to write it and so I stayed home! Later tonight I will start tennis here in Trebeurden. Other news, Maik, my german friend from school is leaving! He skipped too much school and got kicked out. Lais and I have decided that this is becoming survival of the exchange students at our school. I will be sad to see Maik leave. School won't be the same without him :'(. He was one of our really good friends. It's still not certain where he will go, but someone told me he will leave in a couple weeks.
There is some stuff going on at home right now, and so I'd just like my Canadian family to know that my heart and thoughts are with you all right now you are in my prayers. I am missing you all a lot. Be strong, everyone! Be happy and smile! It's the only way to make it through a rough patch. <3 I love you.
