The rantings of a Nanyéen

I have been a little sick this past week. I am sorry for the lack of blogs this week but, given the option to sleep or try to write a creative, witty, and informative summary/analysis of my life on the other side of the world, I have chosen the option to recooperate. Thinking, eating, breathing, and just functioning in french is absolutely exhausting. Having a runny nose and a fever also do not help the exhaustion at all either. I am feeling better now though. My nose has stopped excercising (i think that it is the only body part that likes to run lol) and I have started to become me again.

This past weekend was absolutely amazing! I have to go to school on Saturday mornings (ick!) so my weekend doesn't officially start until 12:05. I have two classes in the morning, math and history/geography. Math is sooooo stupid. We are learning percentages. I think that percentage is one word butI could be wrong? It is really easy. We have been working on the same worksheet (that only has 6 questions) for 2 weeks now. It is absolutely pathetic.

So after my completly wasted morning of school, I took the bus home and ate some lunch with Prune and Marie (who is now sick thanks to me!). Then, I packed my carpet bag and we left the city. We headed to St.-Marie-du-Lac and picked up Amélia, Claire, and Johan and we went to an obstacle course park in the middle of the woods. We harnessed up and started our adventure. It was really really fun! "Acrobranche" consists of rope ladders and swings, tight ropes, ziplines, and tarzan ropes that are between 25 and 35 feet off the ground. It was a little intimidating at first but, after almost falling like, 3 times, it was so amazing! I guess that acrobranche is all the rage here in France. Keeping in mind the size of the country of France, There are over 500 acrobranche courses here! I wish that we had more things like that in the US.

I feel a little bad and I need to get something off my chest. I have started to kinda make fun of Americans with some of my friends and my host family. I know, I know, it's horrible. It all started with the acrobranche and how there really isn't very many things like that in Ohio. Then, I made the horrible, horrible joke with Prune that the only way that we would have something like this in the US was if everyone could ride in recliners and have a tv remote to say stop. While I am ashamed to make fun of the American culture, it was a little exhilerating to be able to make fun of it at the same time. Every day I become a little more french.

After the acrobranche(at 7 pm), We raced home to change into some party clothes and we headed to Amélia's house to party it up! It was a lot of fun. This party wasn't really a "party party" due to the fact that I was there with my host parents and a bunch of adults. It was fun though. We arrived around 8 and we left about 2:30 AM. I was exhausted but it was great.

After sleeping in on Sunday, I was woken by the voices of little children. My host half-sister and her kids came over. Eléa is absolutely adorable. She's 8 years old and a doll. Antoine is 4 and cute as a button too. I played the wii with Antoine. He's actually pretty good. I am the master at wii tennis though. So what if a 4 year old beat me at baseball and bowling. I still won at tennis. Then, I went outside to see what Eléa was doing and ended up picking raspberries with her in the gorgeous automn sunshine.



Then, we ate lunch (a yummy homemade lasgana) and Eléa insisted to sit beside me. After lunch, the two of us went for a walk along the lake. We ended up becoming explorers and models at the same time. It was a really great afternoon. I love spending time with her. She's absolutely adorable. Prune and Nathalie (my half host sister) kept apologizing about her following me but I told them that I love kids and that it's not a chore for me at all to be around them. Actually, I love being around kids and that's one of the things I miss most here. I talk to my family a lot and am not very homesick for them yet (believe me, I know it's coming though) but, I don't get to talk to my girls or see them on the webcam. It's sad for me. I miss Syd.



***Don't worry Syd, I'll be back before you know it and we'll have a date to go and feed the ducks =)

Included in this blog is a few pictures of my adventures. Again, sorry for the limited number of blogs. I will try not to let it happen again.