nic

After a few days of reflecting and taking on some hard courses I am reflecting on the past few day’s events. First of all having the internet just makes things a lot more easy and accessible, seeing that I don’t have to pay an excess amount of money. The 10€ monthy paid on th 5th of every month seems fine for me and therefore I never have to worry about it anymore! I am still getting a million and a half emails from Mt. A and I don’t really know why. Why do they send 10+ a day when none of them are even relavant to anything in daily life.

As a little side note, classes on Monday were fine but Mme. Sauvagé assigned us to do a synthèse, which is a collection of articles, and she talks to us as if we are 5 year olds. I think she would take a heart attack if she knew that I’ve written 10 page French papers, and did very well on them too. Dispite all this I will write my ¼ page paper and get a good mark because it’s easy.

As another side note, my literature teacher who assined us 10 pages to read today and thought it was too much, would also shit a brick when he finds out that we read ‘Les Trois Mousquetaires’ last year. Oh literature, and them thinking that we are completely oblivious to everything that goes on in the world. I’m thinking that I will read a Maupassant novel for my study, but I’m not sure. I might even do some Camus, since I like his writing style.

On Monday my classes were okay and quite interseting; I am starting to like my History professor as he’s easy to understand, except the rain is putting a dampar on most of my happy moments and such. I had to recharge my CROUS card since I ate all of my meals, so I went today to fill it up after my morning grammar class. We talked about ‘faire la bise’ which is something very foreign and weird to me. I’ve only had it happen 3 times to me so far, but it’s been disturbing each time as to me I don’t like being touched and things like that. So the idea of having someone come at my face with theirs randomly doesn’t really strike me as being nice; but he explained it pretty well about how and why people do it.

Tuesday classes are brutal becasue I have more or less all of them, but my philosophy class left me with warm fuzzies and an intense feeling inside. Our professor is so good at explaining and is so passionate about what he talks about; that even after being 30 minutes late for class he still is able to give amazing lectures and leaves us enlightened and educated at the same time.

We went to dinner and Nic invited us over for a movie night. Only Ginette and I ended up going, but I made sure to bring my whale since he called me to tell me it’s a PJ party. I serisouly almost crashed on his floor to sleep because I was so tired after watching a Bosnian film. His host mother was so interested in Canada and Sweden since her daughter studies in Montréal, so I think that she really likes me, and she kept getting mad at Nic for not having the French subtitles on. I think she really is trying to help him learn French a lot, and pretty sure I think we are going to be speaking French in our groups. Ginette and I were talking French for dinner and the time between classes for practice and I think that by mid October I will be speaking more and more, becoming more comfortable with it.

Right now I’m tired, but I have to make comments about French people sleeping habits. They go to bed early and wake up mid morning, and they never seem to be tired looking or have bags under their eyes. Everyone in North America has them since life is so busy, so I think that as of tomorrow I am going to be more Frenchlike and go to bed at 23.00 everynight (but weekends) so that I can become me healthy (or something like that).

Over-and-out

Waking up early on Sundays sucks, because of the obviousness that there is nothing open, to do, or to see. If I had some DVDs in my room I would have watched them, but I coudln’t sleep because the God Forsaken Cathedral and churches were ringing their bells all morning: literally. It should be sacrelidge or something along those lines, but I guess it doesn’t matter becasue most French people are devoutly religious (at least a little bit), and the rest are students that are at home and therefore aren’t bothered by church bells ringing all bloody day.

So what did I do? I layed and existed for about 1 hour until I couldn’t take it anymore and I resigned myself to the fact that I had to do my homework and I might as well do it since all my bloody classes are on Monday & Tuesday. First was the grammar stuff, which was easy as anything since it’s just relative pronouns so I just have to fill in the blanks, but one of the exercises was completely pointless and I am going to ask my professor about it since I don’t understand the purpose or meaning of any of the sentances. A sentance like: “Vous trouvez cette jeune fille charmante dont la gaiété et la bonne heumeur vous séuisent” means as much to me as “Don’t drink your glass too quickly of which weight would be added to me for walking downtown.” The latter means absolutely nothing to me, but it’s the translation of one of the setnances. Note to self: question teacher about what the hell it means and why it’s so pointless.

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Another fight against Germany, but this time it was more of a Franco-Germanic alliace against me. I woke up early after going to sleep early (in the realm of 22.30 or so) but I decided to sleep in a bit longer and I ended up being much more tired than I originally was, so I was a bit upset about that. After rolling out of bed I SMSed Nic to see if he wanted to go see the Luxembourgoise Philharmonic Orchestra tonight, and he said sure, so I decided to go over to the Palais de Musique et de Congrès but alas they were closed and my feet hurt. I felt so waisted at this point since I walked the entire length of the city and was in a suburb, but I took the tram back to Observatoire so that I could go to Kehl to do some grocery shopping.

The bus there was alright, despite the French-Moroccan students that were hoarding around me while at the bus, and were speaking in some weird dialect of French that I couldn’t understand. It was gross too since they were putting their faces on the windows (how unsanitary), and apparently some schools go on during the weekends; but luckily not me.

So I get to Kehl in no time, and then I walk down the main street to the market, and go to a Woolworths to get some stuff. I bought a cheap toaster, hangers, and a laundry basket (finally!) and then had to struggle with communication with the cashier who didn’t understand what I was saying in English or French. Sigh; life goes on. After that I went to the discount grocery store where I buy groceries, and struggling to find yoghurt and such since everything is only in German and no translations at all. It’s really difficult to figure out what I needed and wanted, but everything is cheap so I don’t think I really cared.

After struggling to carry all the groceries back to the bus stop I got onto the crowded bus and realized that there was gonna be no way I get back to Observatoire without people bitching at me about my laundry basket, so I got to Point de Rhin which is in France and began walking home (also since the bus was to arrive in another 20 mins). So I get lost following the signs to Esplanade, but eventually recognize something and see the N°2 bus go in the opposite direction so I knew I was in the right path. Meanwhile all the temperature signs say it’s 32°C which amazed me, but not really cause I was fucking hot. Apart from that crazy French people are wearing pants and sweaters, what the..!

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After today I am at a loss for words with many things. I frankly just don’t know what to think or feel about hobos anymore. I’ve had good experiences, I’ve had bad experiences, but all in all the experiences have been more eye-opening than anything. Hobos are in every major city, and even in smaller towns. A hobo, by unofficial definition (at least for me) is someone who wanders or lives on the street and dresses (generally) poorly, and begs for money or food. There is a fine line between a beggar and a hobo, but I don’t really want to get into a debate about it all at this point in my life.

Anyways, the day started at 06.00 becasue I had to get an early start on doing the laundry. I was surprised to find out that people were doing laundry before me. What are they crazy? I thought I was crazy waking up at that hour when the garbage men aren’t even out, but especially on a Friday when all French students go home to their parent’s house, and I would assume could take their laundry home with them. Apparently I’m wrong, but no matter, I was able to purchase a ticket for 4€ bloody much money! The woman was in a bitchy mood as always, but I think I made he smile when I couldn’t figure out how to start the machine. I had to ask her to help and after a huge sigh like it was the end of the world to get off her fat ass, she said “Ugh, Je viens” and then came and showed me. So I went back to bed and set the timer on my mobile so that I could wake up, and then Í ran down to put into the dryer which was a bit more straight forward. but by this time we were getting close to my 10.30 class, so I was panicing. Eventually I took it out at about 20 past 10.00 and threw it in my room and ran to class (and was still late).

Class was interesting as we had oral presentations, and I was clearly the best as most people can’t even pronouce the words. I wish I could be moved up in a group or something, but at the same time I like the people in my group as they are really funny, and generally really nice. I got to pretend that I was some Swiss Francophone guy named Nils who is torn between being French speaking, living in Alcase where they only speak German. It was interesting, but my masculine / feminine forms was the only problem, Alain (my teacher) told me. I don’t understand why he insists we call him Alain, but still insists on vous-voyezing each other for ‘practice.’ I don’t need practice for that as I’m always vous-voyezing everyone anyways, so it’s just the rest of the world that’s screwed up. Anyways, he’s really just like a student who speaks French really well, but he’s been wearing the same outfit all week, which is a bit weird, but who notices besides me?!

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After classes on Tuesday, which lasts forever we met this guy Nic from California who seemed interested to hang out with us, and after Ginette rode his bike home, and we were talking about how we were going to a theater presentation thing, he joined us. I think he might have even been fishing for an invitation, and then took the invitation as an invitation to a date, because when he showed up he was dressed to the nines and looked to kill. No matter, we all had fun, and the next day I had off so I went to the mall and did some other stuff. This Nic character seems to be popping up all the time, because we were walking back from the bookstore and he called my mobile asking if I wanted to go to the mall, which was eerie becasue I was going there anyways. So Beckie and I met up with him and we went over to the mall, and once again he was dressed like he had something to prove for some reason.

No matter, Beckie was being indecicive and annoying so I ditched her after she felt guilty, and I went to H&M with Nic to buy socks, only socks, and he insists they are from H&M. I didn’t ask, and then he went to buy his Speedo for swimming reasons (or something along those lines), and again I didn’t ask. He’s a bit odd, but he’s super nice and cool to have around. Then on top of that, he asks if I wanna go dancing to the Salamander that night, and I said sure cause I was bored senseless and I didn’t have any homework at all. So I called Ginette and she reluctantly agreeded, but I told her that I wasn’t going if she wasn’t because I didn’t want to get ditched, which I knew I would be.

So we were supposed to meet Nic outside our residence at 22.00 but Ginette was making plans to go to Greece, and I was being a loser and showering getting ready for going out, and as soon as I walk out of the shower Nic sends me an SMS telling me he’s downstairs waiting for me. I literally yell out ‘MERDE’ and run into my room to get dressed and ready. So I prepared myself, but I realized my jeans were having a ‘wardrobe malfunction’ and for some reason I really wanted to look half decent, so I somehow managed to get it into control and then I ran downstairs to meet him. Ginette calls me and tells me she will be 45 mins, so I tell that to Nic and he rides around on Buddy Eli’s longboard for the next while and I tell him that I’ll ‘brb’ and run back upstairs to reapply all clothing and get it sorted. All in all, jeans are too big and too long and I need to shrink them. Apparently size 28 isn’t small enough, which in my opinion is sick, but oh welll. In any case, pins, belt, and a little bit of tape kept the outfit together for the evening and frankly I looked hot. Nice jeans, a nice new black shirt I bought, and I was totally hot. Anyways, I run back downstairs and feel sooo guilty for keeping him, but he seemed amused with his stuff, and then Ginette comes out and we get lost going to the disco.

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