Week 5: Traveling, exploring, and studying, oh my!

This week was full of more adventures, big and small. Not only did I find my way through a couple of navigation challenges, but also I made it through another week of classes in French, and I also did lots of traveling on the weekend!

To start off with some day-to-day things, in my Teaching French as a Foreign Language class on Monday, we analyzed a listening exercise focused on a song that I absolutely love – “Paris,” sung by Souad Massi and Marc Lavoine. That was just the gem of that day for me, and classes went well throughout the week. I’m finding that I’m liking my translation classes more and more, and so I will definitely be looking into translation opportunities in the future, especially literary translation. My 17^th Century French Literature course was also a highlight in academics of the week – I loved how the professor pulled apart the text of the play (“Cinna” by Corneille) word for word, and deeply analyzed their significance. Finally, I started my French as a Foreign Language class (in the second highest level!) on Thursday, and the professor was the same lady I had had in my pre-semester intensive French course, and so at the very least, Thursday nights with that class will make it a great semester. So this week in academics went pretty well!

Monday night was pretty low-key, but I did splurge on some familiar ingredients and made my favorite salad from home, with spinach, chicken, toasted walnuts, goat cheese, pears, craisins, and honey-vinegar dressing. I shared my salad with some friends who made some pasta, and we made a meal out of it. It was a nice evening.

My favorite salad! Plus some pasta, and some pomegranate juice. Bon appétit!

On Wednesday I finally got my bank card, and ever since I have been trying to get a French SIM card for my phone, but I keep running into problems like the company wanting you to already have a French phone number to get a French phone number (thank you very much Virgin Mobile France)… but nevertheless, the struggle continues, and I hope to have a SIM card from either Virgin Mobile or Free Mobile by next week at the absolute latest. I cannot reiterate enough for students planning to study abroad in France in the future, for getting a bank account and then getting a SIM card right away to be two of your biggest and first priorities after getting here.

Tuesday and Wednesday also held my navigation challenges in store! After figuring out during the first few weeks that I’m not as good at navigation as I thought, and especially on foot, I had a friend challenge me to get to different places and take pictures as proof. Although it ended up only being two places to go to, I already feel more confident traveling and navigating on my own. Thanks Rob for the challenge – I think I won! J

Navigation challenge, day 1: the Gare Saint-Sauveur, an old train station that's now a modern art museum. Unfortunately it was closed when I got there, but I did make it there, and in pretty good time too! No Google Maps for me! :)

Navigation challenge, day 2: an address in Fives, one of the suburbs of Lille. This is a statue in the town, right off the metro station. It was my first time taking the metro alone!

Thursday was a fun night, partying with some Slovaks I had met before. It’s amazing how many Slovaks I have met here – almost more Slovaks than Americans! Friday was a nice night in, to make sure that I could get up for an early morning on Saturday, because…

…Katherine and I went to Mont Saint-Michel and two other cities in the north of France over the weekend! We booked the trip through a company called Cice Voyages, which offers students deals on trips to popular places like Bruges and Brussels, Amsterdam, and Berlin, to name a few. On Saturday we traveled by bus to the famous Mont Saint-Michel in the region of Normandy, and we got to see some pretty incredible views!

Our first stop on Saturday (as seen from the bus): the Normandy Bridge (Pont de Normandie).

Katherine and I on a bridge a little bit away from Mont St Michel. The actual island and abbey is the tiny thing on the left! 

One of the many gorgeous views looking out from Mont St Michel!

After all that walking around and all the picturesque views, we had a picnic dinner on a flowery bovine bench.
(They sure love their cows and sheep in Normandy...)

Then on Sunday, to make a good weekend out of it, they took us to Honfleur and Étretat, two cities in the north of France where a bunch of Impressionist painters like Monet and Boudin painted the gorgeous seascapes found there, and we had fun walking around the scenic port in Honfleur and hiking up the cliffs in Étretat. What a beautifully magnificent weekend!

The postcard-worthy port in Honfleur. What a charming little town!

Even France can't live without Ben & Jerry's!

My first official French macaroon, from Honfleur!

The rocky beach and famed cliffs of Étretat. It was a beautiful day, to put the cherry on top of a marvelous weekend!

At the top of one side of the cliffs and beach, looking out at another cliff.

The cliffs on the other side of the beach. Living life on the edge!

A war memorial in Étretat. What with visiting Dunkerque, Honfleur, and Étretat, we seem to be hitting up all the D-Day beach towns... or at least towns with war memorials. It is cool to see this part of history in person.

Nutella ice cream! :)

To top off the weekend, I won a panda pillow in a raffle on the bus! :)

So, overall, this week has been pretty fantastic. I would of course be remiss if I didn’t congratulate the Packers on a crushing victory against the Bears! J I’m excited to have taken such an opportunity to travel and enjoy myself, and can’t wait to do so again in two weeks at Disneyland in Paris! Other than traveling, we'll see what France has in store for me during the next week. À bientôt!