Pre-Departure

So as part of going abroad with Western I have to post to a separate blog each week. I think it makes sense for the class that I do this but I can't help but find it a bit annoying that I have to post each week to a separate blog and then make comments on other students posts that are in totally different countries than I am. It seems a bit stupid to me... But the most annoying part is that each week I have to meet certain grading criteria. What? I thought this was supposed to be about my experience and I am supposed to write about it. But no I have to meet criteria... Okay grumbling over. So each week if a post seems a but repetitive or odd it is because I just copied it over from the other blog. But it will be all the same information, or with more on this blog. :-)

I'm getting ready to leave for my term abroad on Thursday this week, and I have to say that I can't help but be nervous. I have heard a lot of things about the French that both are exciting to me and a little scary.

I am very nervous to leave because I have fears that my fluency level is not high enough to really be able to express myself in French. I know that many people at my college will be able to speak English but I am scared of not being able to articulate myself. I know that this is a normal fear for most foreign language students but I can't help but feel a bit nervous. I'm excited to be going to a less touristy part of France to do my semester. Aix is much smaller than Paris and I think that because of that I will be more accepted as a foreigner than I might be in a larger city like Paris or Lyon. I hope that because it is a bit more remote that I will be able to assimilate faster and easier into the culture. 

One of the things I am most excited about is the open markets that happen during certain days of the week. These markets sound to be a great way to get fresh and local produce from farmers in the area. I really enjoy supporting those that produce things close to where I live in Oregon, and I am excited to be able to do the same in France. In addition to food, there are also flower markets. I hope that I will be arriving in a time that flowers will still be around and in season. I think that going to a French flower market would be really beautiful and I would love to be able to experience the smells of all the flowers and to see all the colors together.

I have also heard that the French drink a lot of wine and mineral water. I am not a very big fan of either, but I would like to be able to go there and experience them as any French person would. While I am not twenty-one yet, alcohol is not illegal for me in France. I have heard that because of this when a lot of students go abroad they have a tendency to go crazy and drink a lot. I really don't want to follow suit in this. While I think that I will indulge in wine at dinner or the like as with the normal French customs I don't want to be drinking all the time nor do I want that to be the goal of my trip. I hope to enjoy the customs and culture as it is.

It is to my understanding that most drinks don't come with ice in Europe. I know for some of my friends that use ice constantly in their drinks this would be a problem. But I don't usually tend to put ice in my beverages. So I think that I will be okay with this custom. 

As far as getting ready to leave I haven't started packing yet. I leave in four days and mostly I have just been making piles of things that I think I want to bring which I am sure will be twice as much as what I really will bring. I have been buying a few last minute things recently. I went on a mission to find a boring black purse that will be boring enough to not tempt anyone to mug me.  I think I have a small fear of that happening. Today a friend of mine bought me luggage tags as a going away gift. I still feel like there are so many things that I have to get done even though my to do list is dwindling. 

The past few days I have been almost apathetic about leaving. I haven't been excited or nervous but rather "whatever" about the whole thing. It hasn't been until today when I started cleaning and putting some personal things in boxes in my bedroom that I am beginning to feel sad to leave my friends and family. I had a small party with my friends last night as a way to see everyone before going away. It was hard to say goodbye to them and also many of my family members the last couple days. I know that I have a lot of support to leave but it doesn't make it any easier to know that I won't see them for quite a while.

I am also nervous that I haven't gotten any information about my host family other than their address and an email. I sent them a letter about myself a week ago and haven't gotten a response back yet. I was hoping to know if I was staying with a family with brothers and sisters or just the single woman whose name I was given. So it has been a little disheartening to wake up every morning to check my email and find nothing... I know it will not be a big deal once I am there but I think I would feel better if I knew a little bit more about the situation I was walking flying into. 

I am happy to be going and I don't want to make it sound like I am not excited, but I can't say that I am not going to be sad to leave my family and friends. It does help to know that I have support for this trip, and that if I need anything there are people I could Skype call. 

Overall, I have some last minute things to do... like pack. But I know that when the time comes to get on the plane on Thursday I will be ready and excited to start my life changing experience!

Location location location!

I just got an email that told me where I will be living! I got the address and name of the WOMAN that I will be living with. SO that is like WOW! Now I need to write a good letter. But I did what I' sure everyone else did and Google Earthed where it is! AND WOW AM I CLOSE!!!!

See look at that! That is like 5 minutes away! WOW! How lucky am I! I wonder if because I mentioned my vocal cord thing that reacts to exercise if they moved me close by. But I am A OKAY with that! The email said most people are 15-35 minutes away. Not me! I am a lucky duck!

My address is going to be:

3 rue du 11 Novembre
13100 Aix en Provence

But DON'T send anything there until at least after I leave. That would be super awkward for my family. But the funny thing is that the name of the street is roughly #3 street of the 11ths of November. Interesting? I think so! Maybe there is a story there! I am really excited now!!!! Ahhh!!! Hopefully I can find someone to proof read a letter for me so that it isn't full of crappy grammar things! Ahhh!!!! So happy!!!!

Bye Fish!

It has been a bit since I last posted... The reason being that I have sort of been busy/ too nervous to really be wanting to say anything. I had to get rid of my fish last week... This was a bit sad. I have had fish for 2 1/2 years now so it has definitely been bitter sweet. Every time I pass by a Petco I think, “Oh I should get a few more fish!” Nope... But they went to my friend Sam who is apparently going to use them in fish races at a bar in Portland? I guess they will be having fun! But she has had fish before so I decided they would be safe with her :-)

I just got back from our group trip to Disneyland so I haven't had France on the mind to much... But now I have no more distractions before I leave. I should be getting my housing assignment here soon. They say that they send them out two weeks before the program starts. Whether that is two weeks BEFORE the early program or not? I don’t know. But I hope I have the chance to at least send an email of introduction or something… Or vice versa. :-/

I’m going to be concentrating more on my trip now so stay tuned!

Packingish List

I posted a Packing list on the right. It is by NO means everything that I am bringing but are some of the things that I could remember off the top of my head that I have purchased for France so far. I still need a few things but have kind of hit the pre- and post-wedding wall where I basically have forgotten all about my trip. But that just means that I'm probably trying to ignore it because I am scared... It's kind of hit me that this is a pretttttty long trip. Four months is a pretttty long time... Also I have expended my financial resources which isn't surprising being that I have been surviving off of my money back from the school from Spring and didn't get money for Summer. And I had to pay rent and stuff but I'm not too concerned. That's what happens when you don't have a summer job. But oh wells. That's okay. My parents keep telling me that I need to save my money but if I'm buying things for my trip I figure it is okay...

Yeah so that list isn't everything that I am taking but it is some of the things I want to have to take. I think that as we get closer I will be getting more prepared. But as of this moment right now I am nervous and a little freaked. I try not to think about it late at night because I wind up keeping myself up freakin' out about the whole thing... But it will be okay.

Things I Need/Want:

Non-tennis shoes

Flat sole boots

Tanktop/Camis

Plain basic T shirts

Good Jacket

New Jeans (Thanks Roz for shopping with me!)

Nice summery dresses

Conservatively colored socks

Suit case

Over the ear Noise cancelling headphones

Digital Camera(?) (Could use iPod)

Swimsuit

Prescripts (enough for entire time) NOT ALLERGY YET

Outlet converters

Scarves

Watch

Alarm Clock

In less than 2 Months...

It hit me really hard coming out of the PDX airport that the next time that I leave that airport I will be returning back from France. WOW. And I will be leaving via that airport in LESS than 2 months. LESS than 2 months. If i doubled the time that I have left in the USA I would have less than the amount of time I will be in France. Now that is crazy.

But leaving the airport I got overcome by this feeling that I am really going to go there. I'm really doing this. It isn't some far off experience but it is approaching. And FAST. Pretty soon I will be really packing and leaving and living and aix-periencing ;-). But it just has seemed so surreal.

When I come back so much is going to be different. Spegan will be living someplace on their own and a lot of my friends from school will be almost graduating and finishing their masters degrees. And that seems crazy to me. And it seems crazy that I will come back and everything won’t have stopped while I was away. I mean of course the world doesn’t revolve around me but it just seems like I will have more of a disconnect to life here while I am there. Which is normal… But it doesn’t stop it from being crazy and weird. Walking out through those PDX doors I will be home after so long of not being home and not seeing my family. And I can just tell how emotional of an experience that will be for me which is why it must have hit me so hard. There are a lot of people that I am going to miss while I am gone… But knowing that they will be there to support me when I get back makes it not so bad.

 I think it is finally becoming a realization that this is all happening…

Classes!

So I got my official classes for France. I originally put in for like 8 classes and then the program decides what classes they are actually offering and stuff. The program enrolls you in 5 classes and each class will transfer back as 5 credits. So currently I am actually taking what will come back as 25 credits to WOU. But Western doesn’t really like that because it is more than the normal credit hours for a term. But since it is semester credits the time is spent more. I would rather take 5 or 4 classes and get more credit and have the experience than not take as many. I mean either way I will have time to explore. So without further ado the classes I am taking are:

Lit 373 World Literature Classics

The Great Books of World Literature from Homer to the present day.

A course that explores the art of storytelling at its finest in diverse cultural contexts, where the truths of the human spirit are revealed through the narrative imagination. Sophocles, Shakespeare, and Dostoyevsky are just a few of the major voices studied in this seminar. See syllabus for more details. Each semester we will focus on a selection of works.

HIS 301European History: 1870–1918

Major social, economic, political, and diplomatic developments in European history from 1870 to 1918.

HIS/FRE328 (in French) Provencal History and Culture through its Monuments

Introduction to the History of Provence and a study of its most exemplary monuments. Typically includes excursions to sites in Provence

FRE 401 Translation and Stylistics I

Translation from English to French and French to English of literary texts, with constant reference to technical and

theoretical considerations

FRE/FLM 355 France as seen through its Movies, post WWII to the 1970’s

Study of the different facets of France from literary imagination to social issues, from the 1980’s to today

The best part of this schedule is that I won’t have class on Fridays!!! So every weekend in France will be a three day weekend which will open me up to be able to go on trips and stuff! YAY! Here is what my schedule will look like:

I may decide to drop the translation class but I haven’t really decided because that class sounds cool. But I am happy! I was really excited to get into the Provencal Culture and Monuments class, that one sounds really cool!

San Francisco

So last Tuesday I flew down to San Francisco to apply for my Visa in person which you have to do if you are staying for a while. So my flight left at 6 and I got there around 8:30 am. But that meant leaving St. Helens at 4:45ish. This was not very good considering I had a bad time sleeping that night... But I groggily walked through security and the airport to get to my flight. I sat next to some guy and fell asleep and read Clash of Kings for most of the time. When I got to Oakland where I flew into I figured out how to get onto the BART system which is a subway system that runs through the area. I almost accidentally bought a $20 ticket but I eventually figured out how to get to work the machine. I then rode for 20 minutes to the stop I needed to get off at.

Knowing that I would get lost my mom was really helpful and made me a map! Unfortunately she blew it up so big that I had no idea where to go because the McDonalds that I was supposed to be walking away from was literally right across the street. So figuring out which direction to go in was a problem. So because I was so overwhelmed and culture shocked just from getting out of the station I decided to have some pancakes at this said McDonalds and figure out my next step. After Breakfast I decided the best way to figure out where to go was to walk around. Why not right I was only 2 and a half hours early. So I walked until I found the street I knew the place was on. I grabbed a soda at a 7-11 and continued for a while until I said to myself “Hey I must be getting close right? Where am I?” just in time to see 77 Kearney St. on a building. So I said hey I wonder what number I need. Oh look 77. WIN! SO I inadvertently and without knowing it found the building. So I went in and was in an elevator with a little girl and her mom who spoke French. The little girl was incredibly adorable and it was fun to see someone so young speaking French. I bet it was her first language.

The consulate was in the 6^th floor in a random nondescript building that had close to 40 floors so it was cool that I was with people speaking French. So I rode the elevator up and was told by the security guy that I was too early to check in. So I went back downstairs and to the nearest corner. When I looked down the road I noticed that there was a flower stand that looked suspiciously like the one that was next to the subway stop. So I walked down the block. And it WAS the same flower stand. So now I vaguely knew where I was. I decided to go find some coffee in a café that I could chill out in for two hours before I tried going back for my appointment. I ended up stumbling into a Capital One café that had chocolate croissant and free wifi to customers of Capital One. Not being a customer of capital one I took the time to enjoy my book and the closeness of the café to the building and just chilled out.

When it was close o my time I headed back over and up the elevator to the 6^th floor. I had to go through security. Which was some poor security guy sitting there with a metal detector that basically just made sure you didn’t have any guns? He looked super bored but I guess he had to be there because it was officially French territory, which was cool! Technically I have now been to French Territory!!! From security I walked 5 yards in the same room to sit down until a teller was ready for me. There was just one other guy there so I pretty much got called right up. They have a glass screen between you and the other person and they talk to you with a microphone and you slide things under the glass like at a bank. It was a pretty scary process because They were like okay “this form now this and this and a copy of this and give me the originals and a copy of these and one of these” and you know that if you don’t have something then you have to make a new appointment and come back again. This would have been a BIG pain. But luckily I had what I needed. So then they took my picture and fingerprints and said okay you should get it in 10-21 days. YES!!! The process took not even ten minutes. But they were not very personable but rather really efficient. They were a little thrown by my middle name because they didn’t know whether to do it as MLynn or M’Lynn. So they had to double check. But other than that I made it through easily and painlessly.

After my appointment I called my cousin Chris’s girlfriend Melissa who lives in the Bay area and we met for lunch. I used my ipod Maps app to figure out how to get where I needed to. It was pretty cool to see someone I knew. We went to a Vietnamese food place that was pretty full when we got there and because she was on her lunch break from work we didn’t have a ton of time to hang out but it was still nice to see her and see someone I knew. Also on the way there I found a pair of sunglasses on the ground that someone must have dropped but there was no one around to ask so I gave them to Megan when I got home. (Payback for when she found some and gave them to me.) But after I had lunch, My plane didn’t get to leave until 5:20 pm so I was bored and went shopping to kill time. I went to Target, Ross, Old Navy, and Burlington. I found some things but stupid California has sales tax so that was a bit annoying. But overall it was good. I made it back to the airport still super early. But I entertained myself by trying to find the cheapest sandwich in the airport which was actually at Starbucks for $8:50. Then on the way back through the airport I looked for the cheapest fruit cup which was $4:50. Airplane food is ridiculously expensive. But oh well. I didn’t buy those things I was just bored. Also my plane was delayed an hour so that was sucky. But overall it was a pretty good trip! A bit unnecessary I think for just a visa but it was good that I got it done early.

My visa is actually here! It arrived today in the mail! In under a week so that is very nice! Also apparently you aren't allowed to smile for the picture!