Kimille is Back and Better Than Ever!

Family Visit part deux!!

Ok So we have a lot of catching up to do!!! Where did I leave off? Oh yes!
Day 1 in Nantes
So Dad, Kelsea and I headed to Nantes early Saturday afternoon (talk about an interesting train ride) and we were lucky enough to catch the parade for the Carnavale which happens one week in spring every year. I was so glad because some of the students from my internship made a float for the parade and I got to see it. The city was nuts! There were children every where with their parents dressed up like it was Halloween and throwing bombs of confetti and silly string every where. I got so much in my hair while watching the parade. The floats and the people on them were COVERED with confetti! It was so cool though! The theme was things in space (the title was something more eloquent but I dunno what it was) and there were 4 or 5 different divisions of the parade. They had a lot of floats from movies, books and bande-dessine (graphic novels/comics) which were cool. There was a float for Gremlins, Star Wars, Around the World in 80 Days, Le Petit Prince, and the 5th Element (the one made by students from my internship). It was all very creative and fun! There was loud music playing, and most of it was in English which I found really funny. After the parade, I took dad and Kels to my favorite kebab resto in Nantes and they loved it! We caught up and had good times. Then I took them to the Machine de I'ile where we saw the elephant but it was finished walking for the day. We checked out the exhibit and Kelsea and I got on the little ship that I road last time. It was really funny! My dad even got on one of mechanical animals. It was a fish that goes in the air- actually this one was for kids but there weren't any kids there. I couldn't believe it! Because my dad is an engineer, I'm pretty sure he loved the exhibit- at leas I hope he did. We did a lot of walking that day, so we rested on a bench by the Loire River and just enjoyed the sun (at 7:30 in the evening!! haha) As we walked along the river back to the hotel, a man who spoke English started talking to my dad and went on and on about his travels and Obama and the government in the states. It was interesting at first but then we got trapped in one of those awkward conversations that you wish would just end so that you can move on with your life- you know what I'm talking about. Kelsea and I amused ourselves by taking silly pictures, but eventually we escaped and went back to their hotel. I grabbed my things and went on home.

Day 2
The next day, I showed them my school at the IES building and the Passage de Pommeraye . Then we had lunch at their very first creperie. They loved it of course! I mean who wouldn't! It was the perfect first for them! We went to the Chateau de Duc de Bretagne and learned so much. I had to do a lot of translating, but we managed to go through all 42 rooms in the museum! We walked around the chateau a bit and checked out the Cathedral. We didn't get to see the good view from the back because carnival rides were in the space directly behind the cathedral. It was so weird! They had rides with Disney characters on them and competitive games with boom boxes and dvd players as prizes. It was like a mini state fair. On our way back to their hotel we saw this women hold her little girl while she peed in a grate! It was crazy!! We didn't know how to respond! Ahh the French. That night was THE night.... The night when my real family met my faux family! It went so well, and I was very happy. My host brothers were adorable with my lil sis ( it was funny to watch them give the bisous on each cheek to her!) and it was adorable/bizarre to hear my host family speak in English. I was impressed with my host mom! She understands much more english than I thought she did. Thomas is the best of course. We had an apperatif, dad gave them the gifts they bought from Indiana (which my family loved!) and we ate a good dinner. I realize in retrospect that I reverted back to french during the meal and talked to my bros but I'm pretty sure Kels and dad were fine chatting with my host 'rents. After the table was cleared, dad played the piano for us, upon my request. My host fam was really impressed! The said the piano had never been played like that before. It was such a cute moment- us all exchanging smiles and listening to the music, like something out of a 1940s add for coca-cola or something. After dad played, they tried to get me to play , but I diverted attention away from myself by encouraging Thomas to play the song from Amelie that I always have him play for me. I think dad and Kelsea were really impressed despite the minor mistakes he made. Afterward, Thibaud jumped to the piano and played a 5 second little ditty with his pointer finger just for a laugh. We finished of the evening with another song by dad (after his many attempts to play "Take Five" by David Brubek). We took several pictures which I can wait to frame in my room, and we said bonne nuit. It was a fantastic night that I'll never forget. My faux family and my real family melanged so well!

Day 3
Tuesdays and Thursdays I have my teaching internship, and the teacher in charge said that I could bring Kelsea with me, so she sat in on my second class (because dad forgot to wake up to bring her to my first one) and it was really interesting. Kelsea was shy, the boys barely had any questions to ask her, and I ended up discussion God knows what! (I'll have to ask Kelsea to remind me later). Anyway, my boys were goofy as usually, and i was glad that Kels got to meet my favorite class. Kels went to the centre ville with me and we met up with dad and my friend Megan at one of my favorite restaurants in Nante, Brioche Doree, for lunch. We had a good chat and a good meal but I couldn't linger because I had to head to class. After 3 grueling hours of school, I met up with Dad and Kels and we went to the L'ile de Versailles! We had so much fun exploring the little Asian inspired garden. Dad took pictures as Kelsea and I roamed the many different pathways and played on the playground (on briefly). We sat and absorbed the beauty and peacefulness of the space for a little bit before walking back to the centre ville along the River Erdre. Dad just gushed about the city and its architecture! It was a perfect, beautiful day. We dropped Dad of at an SNCF boutique to inquire about trains to Normandie, and Kelsea came with me to my phonetics class. It wasn't that invigorating but she heard a lot of French! :) That evening we roamed Place Royal until 7 o'clock when restos opened and had dinner at Heb Ken- a creperie close to my school. It was a bit disappointing but it did the job of nourrishing us.

Day 4
Dad, Kels and I went to Atlantis - escaping the resonating Carneval where the streets were filled with kids in costumes and candy vendors. The streets were still covered in confetti. We got to check out a different side of Nantes on the epically long tram ride to the mall but once we got there, dad got excited at the sight of IKEA. I took them to my favorite creperie in the whole world- Tant Yvette- and we went all out! It was definitely the best meal out we'd had so far! Cidre, a galette -Lardon,Jambon, Oeuf, fromage and a crepe with baked apples, chantilly and vanilla ice cream. It was a meal to end all meals! That day I ate with my host family because i had work to do and I had to get ready for spring break so after Atlantis, we parted ways for the day.

Day 5
Our final day together :( Kelsea and I were going to go to my African dance class together, but I needed time to pack, so she just came home with me and hung out. We went to my internship that afternoon, but the teacher I was supposed to have class with bailed with out telling me because her dad died which was so sad, but I was disappointed that Kelsea wouldn't get to meet my other favorite class. One of the teachers tried to find us another class to work with but it was no use. On our way out, we noticed a little cutout space in the courtyard of the school with urinals along the walls. And then we noticed a male student beginning to relieve himself at one of the urnials. We had quite a shock! How strange France is! Did you know that girls and boys use the same bathroom at schools? I was in the bathroom with a boy once!!!! Not ok!! Anyway, that afternoon we had lunch at the first creperie I took dad and Kels to. It was extra good and we were all content/happy. After a brief stint at the post office that turned out to be a bit more than brief, it was time to say our farewells. I took them to the train station where we hugged for a while before I got on the tram to get ready for spring break. It was so nice having the chance to share my French home with my family. I feel like they really got a chance to see the majority of the good stuff. I'm especially happy that they met my host family. I hope my host fam takes up my dad's offer and comes to visit us one day! It would be wild! I was a bit sad to part with dad and Kels, but I had to go back to "normal in Nantes" someday! Besides I'll be seeing them in May. Plus I had to get ready for the most incredible spring break experience of my life. To avoid making this post painfully long, I am going to leave you with some tidbits of things to come: Athens, Acropolis, Gyros, Ekmek, squashed tomatoes, Santorini, stray cats and dogs, Rome, gelato, the Colosseum, The Pope, and me getting hit by a car. I hope that whets your appetites!

To be continued...

My visit with the fam! Part un

Hello my lovlies!!! So these past two weeks have been amazing!! In short, the first week was great because I had some awesome times with my host family and my students at my teaching internship are hilarious/I want to keep them!! We played this game that I sort of made up/sort of borrowed from the improv group at my university where you list different places ad different people and I pick two students, assign them a character and a scene and they play it out in english. I was dying of laughter and they loved it. One scene was between a boyfriend and grilfriend arguing over seeing Gran Torino or LOL at the movies. One boy put his hands in his shirt to make boobs. It was ridiculous. And the boyfriend was like "LOL is a pink film and you like Clint Eastwood. You told me you though he was sexy." I was cracking up!!!

Ok so now on to my weekend in Paris with the fam. So my dad and sister's plane was delayed by a day and I was freaking out!!! I called my friend Alvaro several times, emailed him, and texted him but couldn't get a hold of him. I got a hold of the British guy, Matt, through facebook and he called me offereing to hang out later that friday which was great. There were three other girls from IES on the same train with me so I didn't feel totally alone. I hung out with Melanie on the train and she invited me to hang out with her and her friend in Paris which was awesome. Her friend is from Georgetown University and he is studying at Oxford for the whole year. He actually knows a few guys from my high school who go to Georgetown. One of them is actually with him in Oxford! He has a 6 week spring break! How nuts is that! So we went to the Tuileries Garden and the courtyards of the Louvre to take pictures and hang out which was nice. It was a beautiful day with the sun shining and couples out showing off their right to PDA anywhere and everywhere and every age (and I mean EVERY age!) Then we went back to the train station to meet Daphne, another IES student, and got lost looking for their hotel. Matt called and invited me to go with him to the Louvre which is free for students after 6 on Friday nights so we met up and I saw the Mona Lisa! Talk about tiny! I guess I was expecting it to be much bigger but nope! I didn't get up close because their was a crowd and I had limited time, but it was cool to be able to say I've been there, I've seen it! We saw many other paintings that I've studied in Art history class and I got so excited! Now those were so much bigger than I expected! They took up entire walls!! It was incredible. I explained to Matt the importance of the few that I could remember and made up crazy stories about the others. It was fun! We talked about the differences between our cultures and our lifestyles and our slangs. It was so fun! He's really cool to hang out with. So we just promenaded through the Louvre and covered maybe 30% of it but I had a good time! Afterwards Matt walked me to an RER station and I made my journey to the hotel.

Saturday, dad and Kelsea arrived bright and early and gave me the massive hugs I needed. Then dad gave me all the stuff he brought for me including HSM 3, Twilight, Australia, and reese's cups!! After a brief rest, we headed to the Eiffel Tower!!! It was massive and beautiful, if you can call a huge metal structure beautiful. We couldnt believe we were there! We took loads of photos around the outside. It was perfect! The sun was shining and the skies were nearly clear. There were 4 lines in to the Eiffel Tower, one at each leg. We didn't know if there was a difference so we chose the shortest one. It was a 45 minute wait and we chose to take the stairs to the 2nd level and then do the lift all the way to the top. The stairs were a bit brutal, but we made it- dad barely made it but we were patient. On the first level there is a lot of historical information on the creation of the Eiffel Tower and of all the famous structures in Paris that you can see. Did you know that there is a mini Statue of Liberty on a small island in the middle of the Seine! It was a gift from us to France because Gustave Eiffel also made the Statue of Liberty for us. So we spent a lot of time walking around the first floor learning about everything including the fact that a man tightrope walked from the first floor of the Eiffel Tower to a garden on the other side of the Seine! Isn't that intense!!! So after about an hour of walking around, we headed up to the next floor and it started to rain!!!!! It rain on and off again for the rest of our time there! The second floor was painful because it was freezing and wet and it started to hail too!!! Who would have thought that it would hail on our way to the top!!! The sun poked its head out every 20 minutes or so giving us a chance to take good photos. We met a cute old British couple that took our family photo and we chatted with them for a long while. They were really nice. The line for the elevator to the top was ridiculously long and a guy started smoking in front of us (fun times!) Finally we made it to the top at the perfect moment- when the sun was shining and the skies began to warm up a teeny tiny bit. The view was incredible! We could see everything: Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame, The Louvre, the Arc de Triomph, everything. It was gorgeous! I couldn't believe I was there! I finally made it to the top! We took hundreds of photos and I explained the importance of many things. We also saw a man propose to his fiance on the top, it was so cute! There wasn't a lot of space, and it was extremely crowded. Finally after we froze our feet off, we headed back down. When we got back to the bottm- about 20 minutes later- it started to poor! So we waited under the Tower until another pocket of clear skies headed our way. It didn't take long, and we went along to Tokyo Place across the Seine to take photos from the best view of the Tour Eiffel. It was great!!! There were a lot of shady guys every where trying to seel Eiffel Tower trinkets and what not, but we just blew them off and enjoyed the view. You have to see it first hand before you die- all of you. Having lived and never seen Paris is like never having teeth (best analogy of my life!) What's the point of life if you stay in one country the whole time! There's so much to learn and discover!!! Well, I must be going. I'm off to Athens, Santorini and Rome for SB 09, but I will continue the rest of this story later.

Bisous mes amies!!