Missing my internet...

This morning I slept in almost until 10. I woke up as I usually do on the days I can sleep in at exactly 8 o clock when the construction starts. Then I run to the bathroom and close my windows. Which is really quite the task for being half asleep. The way that my windows work is that there is the shutters on the outside, then a little foot big space, then the windows. Then a middle curtain and two side curtains. The problem is that when I sleep I have the shutters closed but the windows open and the curtains holding the windows open so that I don’t get super hot. But then I have to throw the curtains over the windows to close the doors… So that is a problem!

I slept really well last night though. I woke up today and went and put my journal up at school. My internet is still not working here. I learned that Jean-Claudes internet isn’t going to be installed until November 5^th… That’s like a long time… There is a pass I can buy for 5 days of internet which is always good for 15 euros for 5 days. It is not the best deal… But It would work. I might try it if my internet doesn’t come back soon. But I mean if I buy it, I would only have to buy it 3 times for the month because I have fall break starting the 25^th when I got to Barcelona and then Paris. And then I wouldn’t need it for a week and a half. But that still is a lot of money… I dunno. I am thinking about it but I do have internet at my school it just doesn’t make it convenient at ALL to Skype anyone because they are all asleep in the hours that I can be at school, because we get kicked out about 6:30-7 each day. So that is sucky. I haven’t Skyped Thad since like Friday. It feels like FOREVER. I am not liking that… Not one bit…

I went to class and talked to mom a bit when she was up at like 2 your time and then told her to go to bed. In class we talked about the Second Republic of France. We also turned in our papers and he was telling us how he just got done grading some French students papers and only half of them had gotten better than a C. :-S That was exactly what I wanted to hear from the professor who is going to be grading my paper and my test tomorrow! NOT! But hopefully because we are Americans he will grade us a lot nicer. Hopefully? We will see. But I don’t need to do well, I just need to pass! That is the name of the game this term!

After class I climbed all the stairs to find no mail. :-/ Then I remembered I hadn’t done my little homework assignment for next class so I quickly did that between classes. I also ate a PB&J and some pretzels. I ate a lot of fruit for breakfast and accidentally exploded my applesauce on me while trying to disconnect it from the other ones. Whoops! Oh well it was comical.

In Literature we talked more about The Angel Esmeralda. I am starting to like it more but I still don’t find it nearly as interesting as a lot of other things that I have read. We didn’t even get to me to talk about the little assignment so really it didn’t matter that I had forgotten and done it right before. But oops! On Thursday we are getting a take home midterm paper to write. I like that a lot better than a midterm in class. We are also going to start watching a movie in class soon so I wont have reading homework. But I need to start the Brothers Karamazov or else I know I will fall behind. But also I need to finish Game of Thrones first. Maybe I can tempt myself to finish the Brothers K by saying once I finish it I can buy the fourth book. Hmmm that might just work!

After class I went to the cave to study for my test tomorrow. How it is going to work is that he gave us 20 images from things that we have studied in class and from those 20 he is going to pick 3 and then we have the class period 1h20 to write on all three giving as much detail as possible. We have to give the name, date, artist, affiliation, what it is, the importance of it, and all the other things in the world about it. We have to use lots of vocabulary too which is pretty difficult I think. I have been also really unmotivated to study but have been forcing myself all day. I talked to Mary and Sally a bit about it and then studied more and then Patrick came down and we talked about it again. I also put up more pictures of my trips on Facebook. I forgot to do the slideshows so shoot me an email if you want me to do that and I will be more than happy to it doesn’t take much effort from me but it takes a while to upload. But I can do that tomorrow. 

After a while Patrick went home and I stayed around until they kicked me out, mostly because I didn’t know if Paul would be there and then I would get nothing done. Luckily when I got home though no one was home so I studied some more. I also ate 4 packs of 2 cookies each of Speculoos. Those need to exist in the states or I will go through withdrawals… And then when Madame came up to make dinner she was like oh you are working hard and I was like yeah I have a test tomorrow in my French monuments class and she offered to help me study after dinner. I said sure. We had pasta and zucchini and ham for dinner. It was simple but fast and good. Cheese and bread of course! After that we had pudding which is more runny here than at home but also more rich. 

After that Madame quizzed me on the monuments and was pretty impressed with me. She was like dang this is hard I wouldn’t know this stuff and be able to remember it! I still am not clear on years and names but… Well… I dunno I will go over them right before the test and then those will be fresh and I can just regurgitate them right off the bat. Then we talked about cruises, internet, buying cell phones and how much of a pain it is, which phone she wants to buy, how I have different free apps on my iPod, finally how it is not a phone(!), and also about how the milk here is so different. She found that interesting. She also told me she hasn’t asked the vet yet but she is very glad I told her that in the states you can get a cats claws removed. She thinks that is the coolest and wants to do it. Beebow eats the weirdest stuff. He eat ham, chicken, fish, corn, melon, pudding, and mushrooms so far that I have seen. How weird are some of those? Bizarre. Cats are weird.

After that we watched a show about cruises and Madame started falling asleep. I think I will head to bed soon too because I want to wake up a bit early tomorrow to study at school. Overall today wasn’t too bad except for all the studying. I could have really done without that J Also Cassandra paid me for part of our Munich trip so I don’t have to withdraw money this week which is cool. Though they are all 20’s so they suck to break…

Bisous! Bonne nuit!

Also some girl was singing this song in an apartment when I walked by: Travelin Soldier Dixie Chicks

Fun fact. When I was in sixth grade I really wanted to play the piccolo. Also this was my favorite song for like a year and dad would let me play it all the time on the way home from school :-) Now it makes me think of my dad whenever I hear it. Plus she was singing in English which I found a bit strange but awesome.Also i'm not the biggest country fan. Sad song. But good.

Chocolate and Tests

Today I was so reluctant to wake up that when I did I ate breakfast and then slept until I absolutely HAD to leave. I was so tired. These past two days took a lot out of me. But I suppose that means that I have also been taking advantage of my time. I went to class and was totally lost the first twenty minutes but then figured out what was going on after that. We talked about the Amphitheaters in the Roman and Gauloise civilizations. It was kind of interesting. For the longest time I didn’t understand a picture because I wasn’t seeing it in the right way. That was awkward.

After class I went downstairs to try and put up my blogs. It was working rather horribly as well so maybe all the internet is being terrible… It is really annoying though. I wish I had not terrible internet. It makes it really hard to talk to anyone… But I finally got just the text up. Then I went to the other building to put up my pictures. I went and got a baguette and some candy for lunch. Super healthy I know but I had a test later. And nothing helps a test go better but chocolate! Plus I only had a twenty so I had to buy something more than a baguette or they would have really hated me. So I also bought some more granola bars.

I went back and put up my pictures for my blog and also studied for my test. Actually that is mostly what I did today was study. I put flashcards in an app on my iPod and just mostly studied. I corrected my paper for history and printed it out. I really didn’t do much. I talked to a few people on facebook but that was about it. Mostly it was a boring day.

I did well on the test though and that is what mattered. The first part I didn’t do so hot on but the second part I gave 39 answers for a 15 point question. So I think I am in the clear! But I guess I will see on Wednesday after my second test… On like literally at least 200 verbs and 200 adjectives all having to do with the five senses… That will be not so good. I have another test that morning too so it is just all going to be crazy. I am already tired of it and it really hasn’t even started. The rest of the class was good we translated a poem and then started another but we ran out of time. After class I facebooked a bit and then that was the end of that.

I came home and played with Paul a bit. He is staying the night tonight. He is being typically himself. He called me fat again… I feel like I should have a talk with him about that but I am not sure that the word he uses carries the same like negative connotation but yeah…. Not the best feeling…

We have been watching Scooby Doo and I have been writing this. Pretty soon is bed time and I am happy to comply. For dinner we had some sort of meat with mushrooms and crème sauce as well as potatoes and green beans. It was okay not really my favorite but I was glad for the green beans. She gave me too much so I wanted to not eat it all but then she gave Paul the starving children in Africa speech to get him to eat so I was pretty sure I was obligated. Which is fine it just was a lot and the meat was really tough so it took me a long time to get through it all because I had to chew it so much. But it was okay.

Mostly I am homesick and tired and nothing of much excitement happened today. Not feelin super great but such is life sometimes.

Monaco and Monte-Carlo

This morning came too early after the craziness yesterday. I slept like a rock though even through the storm. I felt weird sleeping without putting my blog up or being able to say hi to anyone in the world back at home. My internet is NOT liking it here right now so I don’t know if because of the storms something is off or what but it is really annoying! I woke up and had breakfast and then left. It was a pretty easy get out the door day but once I started walking I decided to take a more educated short cut to the hotel where the buses meet at. It still was not shorter. Note to self: stop doing that. Not to Self: Actually listen next time to the last Note to Self! But I still got there with plenty of time which was good.

We got on the buses and I was a bit worried Cassandra wasn’t there yet because I hadn’t seen her. There were a lot less IAU kids on this trip and I’m not really sure why. Maybe because everyone went farther away for the weekend? I don’t really know. Cassandra showed up after a bit though.

The bus ride there was pretty quick considering I let myself sleep the way there with my noise cancelling headphones and iPod. Usually I don’t listen to my iPod because I use it to take pictures and then it dies really quickly because of the iOS 7 update. I should have never done that… Maybe I can go back. But it really kills my battery super fast. But I was like nope I need to sleep. I brought Thads camera as a backup but the thing is so annoying. It thinks all of my pictures are blurry and says do you want to take another so I’m like sure and then it says it is blurry again. I cannot figure out how to take a non-blurry picture! So I gave up on that pretty quickly but just tried to take less pictures and try and save the battery more on my iPod. Beggers can’t be choosers though.

Monaco is the second smallest country in the world next to the Vatican City. It has 35,000 inhabitant (Because everyone tours and it is expensive) and they are ruled by a Prince sort of. Princes Grace is buried in the Cathedral who I guess is Grace Kelly and was in some movies or something? And then died driving her car off of a cliff in town that the bus was on today? I don’t really know much about her.

We got to Monaco at about 11:30 and then had until 1:30 to walk around the Palace, Cathedral, and Museum area. This is in like the real Monaco part of town not the Monte-Carlo part of town. We first got there and everyone was hunting for the bathrooms. Luckily my group found them first so we didn’t have to wait in line. But it was pretty comical for everyone to be looking. The sign said they were on that floor but they were like in the parking garage section of the building and not in the interior part so everyone was like running around.

After we went to the bathroom Cassandra and I tried to find our way out of the garage part and into the town part which was a lot harder than anticipated. We ended up going in a big circle first. We eventually found our way out, a bunch of stairs later. Why so many hills and stairs? WHY!? France, well I guess today Monaco, must hate me! But we got out. We looked at the museum from the outside and then walked through the garden area to get to the Cathedral. It was a pretty gorgeous view and all of the building in Monaco are really pretty. We went by the Catherdal at first because there was a wedding going on (I would so get married there. If I was Catholic.) and went on to see the Palace. We got there right before the changing of the guards so we got to see the little ceremony. It was pretty cool. I don’t really know how to describe it other than being very military like. I kind of thought it was a bit silly… But that’s only because I think having guards who walk around is weird when you also have police who do the same thing. It must be a tradition thing.

After we watched that we went to go look for some lunch. We walked down these very narrow streets and along the way I found a cool gift for someone. I think she will like it. Then we bought paninis. Or rather Kean and I did but Cassandra wouldn’t like step up to the counter to be helped but just like waited for the guy to notice her in a group of like ten people standing in front of this sandwich place so she just gave up. I was like just go up there and she was like no my mom would kill me if I did that, and I was like well she isn’t here and that’s how they do it here. So she didn’t get one but she had a sandwich in her bag that she ate.

We ate in front of the Cathedral and then split up because Kean wanted a picture in front of the Palace and I wanted to explore the Cathedral in depth so we split. I really like going through the Cathedrals. They are really pretty and usually have some cool art of sculptures. This one was no different. They had like tombs though in the floor in this one which I found interesting. Some had flowers so I think that those were for the most recent Prince and Princess. It was cool but I finished before Kelan and Cassandra came back so I decided to go look in the tourist shops. I found couple things and now I have crossed off a few people on my gift list which is good. I looked at a polo shirt for dad but then decided it was cheap and would probably shrink or be weird so I said eh. Sorry dad I will find you something.

I was in one shop debating between a gift or not when Kelan and Cassandra came in. They were like oh hey that worked out well and I was like yeah I figured you would look here so we were good. After that we were pretty much out of time so we headed back to the buses via the garden but took a different path this time. I was cool and we stopped and took pictures. When we got back to the bus we were right on time! We climbed on and were waiting to leave. Usually these trips with George are really prompt about when we leave. I noticed though that with more IAU kids they don’t listen to George or anyone else in charge when they say “don’t switch buses”. How hard is that? Hey stay on the same bus how hard is that? Apparently too hard to grasp. So we all had to wait for fifteen minutes for some idiot to first come forward that he switched and then get in a tantrum argument with the person in charge. I was like really we are doing this now? How old are you? And of course there is the fact that he is holding up everyone else for this and we can’t leave to go to the next place until he sits down and shuts up on the correct bus. I feel like some people are so inconsiderate.

After that finally happened, we went and to Monte-Carlo! It was pretty cool. It was also a very expensive part of town/country so they had told us not to buy anything. Really 5 bucks for a can of soda? I thought I should buy that! Just kidding. But we walked up a bunch more stairs to get to the famous Casino. We had been told on the bus that to go into the casino was 10 euros and then you had to be 21 to gamble. The other bus was told you had to be 18 so we went to go check it out. It turned out that they were doing like a special or something so two of the rooms were free to go in and you only had to be 18! So of course we went in!

We walked around and we couldn’t take pictures but it was seriously like a museum or something! The walls and ceilings were seriously gorgeous with gold and ivory and big rocks and it was just really awesome. Probably the most swanky place I have ever/will be in. I was surprised by how few like machines that they had in it for how famous it is. I thought it would be more machines but it is like more swanky machines instead and just everything more swank. All of the machines were like 3d and the chairs were like memory foam. They were a bit expensive but for that fancy of a place I am not surprised. Kelan and I decided we wanted to do 5 Euros of slots just to say that we did. So we did. I totally lost but I played a few different machines. Each was like 40 cents each. I won a few times but never more than the game cost. But Kelan actually WON and won 5 Euros more than he had originally bet! WOW! That was pretty cool so he was like yep quitting while I’m ahead. I said I must have my mother’s casino luck where I just lose all the time. But that’s okay it goes to like helping Monaco or something, right? Yeah probably not.

We went to the bathrooms while we were there and it was weird because there was like a lady in charge and you were supposed to like tip her for pointing you to one of the two stalls. I was like umm I have no money and all you are doing is telling me where I was already going to go sooo…. Yep. It was awkward. Also the toilet had like an automatic toilet seat cleaner thing so that was a bit odd. After that we went and sat and just watched one of the guys we know play Blackjack at a table. He like bet 100 Euros and ended up winning like 200. So that is cool for him but I would not be able to just walk in and bet that much money. I would definitely lose it. We were watching and then this like little Asian lady like literally pushed me out of the way. Which I found kind of rude because she didn’t even like say anything because then I would have moved. But no okay whatever! After we got bored of blackjack we went and sat on the edge of the room on a bench and just looked at the room. It was pretty gorgeous. We were talking and this like Lady next to us who was probably in her 50’s started talking to us. She was from Paris and stays for vacations in Nice which isn’t far up the road. We actually passed it and Eze on the way to Monaco. They are pretty close together. But she was cool and we just talked about school and Americans and stuff like that. She was nice.

After that we had about 45 minutes until we needed to be on the bus. So we headed outside to see what was in the world. We walked through another little park thing and then walked by the Chanel and Louis Vuitton swanky places. Oh also there were some swanky cars outside of the casino. I guess there was a lot more to the Casino than we saw but it is mostly like private rooms. It definitely would not have surprised me though if there were like people there in private rooms betting millions of dollars. It felt like that fancy of a place.

We walked back toward the bus and ran into a Japanese Garden in the middle of like nowhere in particular. We decided to waste the rest of our time there. It was really pretty and the Koi fish were HUGE! Probably as big as my arm! There were also ducks and bridges and waterfalls and it was just very pretty. I wouldn’t mind going to Japan sometime as long as I don’t have to eat fish. It was pretty and I liked taking pictures of it.

Before we got back on the bus i bought an orange juice out of an orange juice squeezer machine it was soe dang good orange juice! After that we got back on the bus to go home. Someone had taken our seats near the front so we had to sit further in the back. We soon figured out why. The English girls behind us were talking SO loud and there were people playing music without earphones. The English girls though… I had my noise cancelling headphones in and playing music pretty loudly and on the way here I was able to block out an entire airplane worth of noise. But this girl was like so loud that I could still hear her. I thought about turning around to tell her to be quieter. Inside voice but I didn’t. I feel like some people are so inconsiderate.

I read and slept and listened to my iPod. Cassandra slept the whole time I though. When we were abut an hour out it got stormy outside and the lightning started. It was pretty cool. There is a lot of lightening here. And then Cassandra woke me up to show me a rainbow. I was like great we get them all the time in Oregon. But it was cool against such a dark sky. When we were about to get off of the bus Cassandra told me the guys behind us had been stereotypically American and then complaining about how everyone has American stereotypes. She was annoyed, I said yeah but that girl and she was like seriously be quiet! It was funny and we laughed.

We got back and parted ways. I came home and Madame was on the phone. I uploaded all of my photos and had to pretty much delete almost all of the ones from the camera because they were blurry. But I did get a few good ones from it and my iPod worked the whole way home so I accomplished my goal! Madame got off the phone and I showed her my pictures. We had dinner of sausages and mashed potatoes and zucchini, as well as bread and cheese and ice cream. It was very good and I was definitely starving for it. After that she did laundry and I did homework until I gave up and started writing this. We talked about different things and I told hr about how you can get a cats claws removed and she was like elated at the idea and had never heard of that. Beebow scratches at everything and it drives her nuts. She told me that Paul is going to stay the night tomorrow because his parents are going somewhere so that will be interesting.

I have a test tomorrow in Translations on parts of the body and some other vocab. I am a bit nervous so I will have to do lots of flashcards tomorrow and then I have another in that class on Wednesday with even harder vocabs of the different verbs for all five senses and the nuances between them. Eek! Also I have to turn in my paper on Tuesday and I have a test in Monuments on Wednesday. Busy week ahead! And not really looking forward to it… Probably I won’t be able to put this online tonight with the internet we have been having but I will sort of try!

Goodnight!

Cassis

Oh man where to begin today. I woke up and had breakfast and then learned that we would be swimming so for a second day I skipped washing my hair. I left the house and realized that the new contact I had put in was not in. And already being one down because I dropped on somewhere once, it was a big deal. Luckily I had given myself extra time and went back and found it on the floor right whre I had apparently not ut it in but though that I did. Then I went and met Julia and Lauren and Kelan at the Cezanne Statue and then they showed me the way to the bus. We met up with two other girls from our school who were also going to Cassis so we decided to join forces. I think it was thought of last night but I’m not really sure. So we met up with them and then went and found the bus to take us to Aubagne which we would transfer there to Cassis. They all have these cool cards that give them each bus ride for 2 euros. I learned I need to get one. My trip costed about 9 euros there and the card is free so now that I know about it I should do that.

So we got on the bus and started our day. The first trip took about an hour and we were all pretty tired. We then transferred pretty easily to the 68 bus to Cassis. We were following directions for which stop to get off by a friend of ours who had gone there before. So when the train said that stop we ran and pushed the stop button. But unluckily for us it stopped at the stop before that one that it had announced previously and not at the one it said was next. So we were obligated to get out. This wasn’t so bad because it wasn’t very far from the city and it was all downhill. So we descended and then arrived at the harbor.

We decided to get some coffee and tea at a café to wake ourselves up and then Kelan and I wanted to go swimming. We sat down at this place called Le Golfe and it was pretty great service. The tea was pretty freakin’ hot so I didn’t drink it until the girls who had coffee had finished theirs and I felt obligated to drink mine. But Kelan did the same so it wasn’t so bad. Then we used the restrooms that weren’t too gross and I changed into my swim suit. I guess the other little like room/stall was really ghetto Kelan said so we used the one I was in after that. The waiters were really nice even though we had lots of change to give them but they were cool. After that we made a plan to split up so that people who wanted to go to the beach could to swim and those who didn’t want to swim could go walk around. I obviously chose to swim.

We walked a bit uphill to get to the beach that we knew of. It was really cool. It was a rock beach but the rcks were super cool. There was also like a plateau out that you could see the light house and stuff. It was pretty cool. We took a bunch of pictures including one where I “fell” off a cliff which I will post once Kelan puts his pictures up. It was a bit stormy in the morning so a lot of those pictures are cloudier than later. For a while we had one of us swimmers watching our stuff but then we decided that where we put it was kind of out of sight and w could see it from the beach. There weren’t a lot of people so we weren’t too worried. The water was a bit cool but refreshing. The other thought it was a bit too cold, but again I go in the Pacific until I go numb. After that I collected a few cool rocks and then we got dressed skillfully with towels because we didn’t have a bathroom and then went to meet up with the others.

We went and got sandwiches at a cheeper place. I got a grapefruit soda which was really good. Schwepps Augrum it was called I think. It was really good. I had a steak frite sandwich on a half of a baguette. It was reeeeeallly good with ketchup AH-mazing! Then we left to go look at times for some boats. They had found a boat tour of some of the Calaques (sp?) which are like inlets of water in the middle of like cliffs. They are supposedly really cool and special. You could see 3 for 10 euros or 5 for 15 or 10 for 20. I wanted to do that but everyone wanted to walk to them. So we tried to go to the tourism office but it was closed. In the meantime, we went and got ice cream and I bought postcards. We went and found the way easierly accessed sand beach and looked at the water while we waited ten minutes for the tourism office to open.  I was still on board with the boat option myself… Just because of cliffs meaning hills and hills meaning Vocal cord problems…. But they got a map and the lady said it was easy to get to. So we decided to try after hitting up the self-cleaning public bathrooms. Note to anyone ever using these. Let the person in front of you shut the door. Then it cleans, then you go in. One of the girls was telling us how she had gotten stuck in one because she didn’t let the door close and she had gotten caught in it while it was cleaning. And they literally spray water EVERYWHERE.

We ended up going past the first rock beach that we had gone to and went up further up hill… I started to feel it but then we got to this big hill and I was just like yeah no way that is happening without some serious pain or without taking half an hour. I had stopped to guage my level and they were already like almost half way up. I said nope and then called one of the girls and told them to go on ahead and I would se them when they came back and that I would go to the beach. They said okay and left. I walked really defeatedly back down the hill. It took me about 2 5 minutes to get back to town and the whole time I was just thinking how much it sucks that I have to deal with this. And not only that but like that I miss having someone who knows me here that like takes me seriously when I say yeah I am not sure I will be able to do that can we do the boats instead. I just know that had I said that to any of my friends we would have worked around it or decided to do something else. But here that isn’t the case… And that makes me sad but I also understand other people wanting to do what they want. But I feel like if someone had told me that I would have taken it more seriously and like… offered to go back with them or something? I dunno. Not a big deal but it was a moment where I missed having someone that I knew…

So when I got back to town I was almost run over by a little tourist bus thing that drives you around the city. I said Hey I got probably an hour and a half to kill I should do that! So I did. It was 7 Euros for a 45 minute trip. It was pretty cool. I tried to record the commentary but I am not sure how well that worked. But I tried!  Also it took me literally the same route as my group took so I passed them on the train when they were sitting looking at one of the Calaquages or however they are spelled. I waved and they were very confused. We went up a little further and stopped on this like plateau thing and took some pictures. Some nice older ladies asked me to take their pictures which I of course did. Then we got back on the train and went back down. It was cool but I didn’t get the greatest view of the inlet things but that is okay. I still had a good time. After I got back into town I was still killing time so I bought a big water at the casino and then walked around a bit. There was a clothing market but everything was SUPER expensive especially for a market! I walked around a tourist store looking at different things and then decided to sit and just people watch for a while. I saw a very adorable little girl eat a two scoop ice cream and when I say eat I mean of course drip and make a mess everywhere.

After a while longer we all met back up in town and I could tell everyone was VERY cranky. (Maybe good thing I wasn’t on the walk!) I guess they had take a wrong turn and hiked up and down a huge hill when they could have gone straight because someone read the map wrong. So everyone was grumpy and trying to find the bus station for the bus that was leaving at 5. So I tried to gently help find us on the map but the map was horrible and had none of the streets we were near on it and instead a big cartoon picture covering up our location. Helpful! Especially for the tourists looking at the map made for tourists! So that was not so good. So then people were cranky and mad at each other over directions. I decided to just be one less voice and go with the flow.

We eventually found out where we were and going and started like booking it there. Which I wasn’t really sure why because we had twenty minutes… But okay. On the way I asked one of the girls what had happened and she told me about the direction mishap with the big hill. She was nice. I had seen her around in some of my classes but never really talked to her. Now I did! When we got to the bus we learned SURPRISE! There is no 5 o’clock bus! The next one is at 5:40! So we sat around and everyone took a much needed break. We were sitting and they were complaining how we weren’t going to be back by 6 or 6:30. I was like eh I didn’t really have plans for today so makes no difference to me… I found a chenille (caterpillar, go read yesterdays blog if you didn’t know that!) crossing the sidewalk. I pointed him out to Julia and then slowly everyone saw and we started watching waiting for him to get stepped on since he blended in o well. Luckily he didn’t because I probably would have been sad… But he made it and then we watched him try to climb the sidewalk ramp. He eventually got there. Then someone had the smart idea to look at the bus schedule for our connector bus. There was one at 6:15 and then the next one was at 7:25. We were hoping to not have to sit around an hour and make the 6:15.

Unfortunately for us though our bus was 15 minutes late! So once we got on it became apparent that we were going to have to wait. So we were hoping when we got to the Aubagne station that we would be able to run and catch it if maybe it was late also.

Nope. So then we started looking at the schedule and we were wrong and the next bus wasn’t until 8:15… Soooo We said we have over an hour and a half and are stuck here. We went and looked at the train station to see what it was and we found we could go from Marseille to Aix. But to go to Marseille as out of the way and would only get us back 20 minutes faster. We decided to not and to go find dinner in Aubagne. We walked around and found the populous and not deserted part of town and sat down at a place that wasn’t too expensive to find out they hadn’t started serving dinner yet as it wasn’t past 8 yet. So we decided to leave and go to a sushi place. Luckily they had non-sushi / fish stuff. I was prepared to get a vegetable sushi thing but then they had a chicken teriyaki on special so I chose that. I t was a nice little place and the people were really nice. Though to be completely honest it was a bit strange to see an Asian heritage looking person speaking French… Not that they can’t or shouldn’t by any means but it was very odd for my American brain. But they were nice. We got free water which is not always a thing. At lunch water people had to pay 2.50 Euros for a plain bottle of water! OUCH!

But it was good. The food was super good and we got to use the bathrooms that weren’t very sketch. Then someone was like oh what’s over in that tank a turtle? I of course immediately went and looked. Nope not a turtle. TWO TURTLES!!!! They were so cool! When you walked over they would come over to see you in the tank. One like jumped on top of the other to get a closer look! They were really cool. Their tank was so small I wanted to steal them and bring them home. But I was good and did not do that. Even though I did want to… They were SO cool! Now I really want not one but two! So they can be friends! My day was made and I didn’t care about our bizarre travels back home anymore.

So then we got back to the bus station and looked and were waiting around. We bought some food from the vending machine in the station to eat on the bus. While we were munching before the bus got there Kelan suddenly decided to make sure we were waiting in the right spot. Well we were. But the girls had read the schedule wrong and the 6:15 train had been the last train of the night back to Aix… Sooo that was a problem… So we were like well CRAP. NOW WHAT?!

So we decided to go ask the train station guy what he knew even though the buses and trains have no connection. We decided to go ask and see what we should do now. I noted that their machine to take bills for tickets was out of order when we walked by. We got to the guy and he was like there is a bus RIGHT NOW that is going to Marseille that you could use to get to Aix. And we were like oh great when does it leave and he was like well NOW. And we were like wait what when is the next one? And he was like well I think this is the last one. WHAT. So we were like where do we buy tickets can we buy them on the train like what do we do and he was like yeah maybe you would have to ask the conductor. So of course we literally had to BOOK it up probably 5 regular floors of stairs and then across this elevated hallway and then back down the stairs to even get TO the train. Then Kelan like ran and asked if we could pay on the train and the guy was like yeah but get on quick right now. And literally we hadn’t even sat down before the train started moving. It was not even ten seconds that we had been on the train. Yeah that close. No exaggeration. So we were VERY relieved!

The conductors came by and were like freaking out that they had to sell us 6 tickets. Everyone on the train was staring at us because we looked pretty freakin’ American at that point. We didn’t really care though after how much travel troubles we had been having it was 3 hours later and we were finally getting started towards home 2 hours later than we had intended to BE there. We finally got paid and figured out and then we all started to breathe again. I drank water and got my vocal cords under control which took a minute and ten we all took a deep breath. Kelan and I had sat ourselves down next to this college aged guy who thought we were pretty funny as we had created quite a spectacle of getting to the train. He goes to school in Marseille and was like yeah good thing that you guys were buying tickets and stuff because I didn’t. Hm. I guess they don’t really check? But whatever I like having a clear conscience. But yeah. The bus ride felt really short because we went to Marseille. Once we got there (same train station for Lyon, Cassidy) we took a bus that one of the girls knew back to Aix. It was crazy.

When we finally got here we were so relieved and like the whole thing was so crazy that Kean and Julia and I decided to go grab a quick shot at Wohoo before Julia went to go drink at a friend of hers place that has an apartment and Kelan and I went home. I was exhausted but wanted to be social. It was fine and done pretty quick. I had a shot of Lemonello which wasn’t too strong feeling so that was nice. I didn’t really notice any alcoholic effects probably because dinner just diluted it but that was okay with me. I bet it will still help me sleep well tonight. Though after this day that isn’t too hard!

I came home and told Madame what all had happened and she got a kick out of it. Making memories she said and that was the same take that I took on it. None of us were too upset about the travel situation we all just kind of laughed at it so that was better than freaking out.

I asked Madame if I could take a shower tonight or tomorrow morning and she was like ehhhh it would be better tonight but you need to go fast. So I literally MAYBE used 2 minutes of water. I did the Drum Corps shower when the water is freezing but I did it with hot water. Washed everything too. Win. Thanks Drum Corps you taught me something useful!

Then we watched the end of Fort Boyard and the group did really well tonight. Then I wrote this, quickly posted it and now I want to go to sleep because I still have a full and jam-packed day of Monaco tomorrow!