November

The beginning of november was the end of my fall vacation, so I spent a lot of time in paris.  I went to the Pantheon once, saw a film about the alps in the 'Geode,' it's kind of like an imax theatre, but it is more of a dome, i think the screen is 360°.  I ate wonderful felafel in one of the many Jewish districts, and had crepes with nutella almost every time i went to paris :)  I also did a lot of meeting rotary friends to hang out.  Paris, I have discovered is all in all a beautiful city, but in the winter, unless you want to sit in a cafe all day, or play dominoes in the louvre ;) there is really not too much to do.  It is too cold to be outside all day, and it is a little difficult to be with a group of teenagers in a museum all afternoon, because although some of us like them, it just never works too well :)  So, i do love paris despite the winteriness, however, i will be more than happy when spring comes!
November 4-5 were exciting for me here, I followed the election closely, and even altered my sleep schedule to watch :) i think i went to sleep around 7 pm so that i could wake up at 2 am to watch the polls close and get results.  It was an exciting morning, even though I had to go to school.  Everyone that knows me at school was congratulating me and so happy that Obama had won, it was a nice week to be an American :)  That Wednesday we had a picnic in Paris to celebrate...

Me sitting on a plastic bag due to the eternal Paris dampness

Curtis, he is from Stratford, Canada

Bek, she is from Sydney, Australia

Les Halles Fountain

So continuing, after vacation was over i had to start school again, which was not the easiest thing to do.  The time between the fall vacation and the one for christmas is the longest in the whole school year, so I am glad that's over with!  Anyway, November was kind of a blur, it went really fast because by that time, i had really established a routine.  I mostly just went to school, with trips to Paris on weekends and occasionally one on a wednesday afternoon (those i try to avoid because i can't use my train/metro pass :( ). 

One Saturday, Marie, my host mom, and I went to Provins, a village about an hour away.  It is a well preserved medieval town, famous for the faires it would have for merchants from Italy and wherever else they came from.  We visited the building that housed all the merchants when they would come for the faire and where they stored all their goods, it was built in the 13th century, all the doorways were super tiny :)  Anyway, Provins was the most important place for trade during that time, it was all run by the Counts of Champagne or something...

In mid-November i had a district conference with all the other exchange students from 1770, which was rather boring i must say because we just sat all day and listened to people talk.  At one point all of us had to present ourselves to the audience, saying our names, where we come from and who we are hosted by.  It all went well, everyone made it through :)

As November began to wind-down, we started to prepare for our French-style Thanksgiving dinner.  My host mom invited two families, I had already met everyone because my host family and the two others are all friends.  We had the dinner on the Saturday after Thanksgiving, seeing as it is impossible to do anything during the week when dealing with French work and school schedules.  That Saturday I cooked all day with my host mom, and Curtis and John came to 'help'/play guitar hero all afternoon.  We prepared a salad, a sweet potato soup, creamed corn, mashed potatoes, and a 7.5 kilo turkey with lots of stuffing, all in all i think it was the tastiest Thanksgiving i have ever had.  For dessert we had a Cheesecake that i made, a pecan pie from Curtis, and a pumpkin pie that one of our guests brought over.  Our tiny house was stuffed with 16 people, but everyone seemed to enjoy themselves, so it was a good evening.  It didn't really feel like Thanksgiving because i wasn't with family, or in the US, or on vacation for a few days, but it was fun nonetheless :)

What was left of the cheesecake at the end of the night

Eric, my host dad, holding up the wine from 1990

fooooooood!

Our fatty dinde, it cost 110 euros, and was sooo tasty

Our table setting, thanks mom :)

So anyway, November was a good month, and I hope after all these posts that you are sick of reading about my life here in France, because I am getting a bit sick of writing about it! Nevertheless, i hope you enjoyed the news!

love to all my family and friends :)

Siri Ellen