Last Post of the Year

Must...report on things done...before too overwhelmed.....

Christmas.
Eve was spent at my host uncle's house, with all of my host family. Eating and drinking (wine and champagne are allowed with the families) and enjoying the night. Foie Gras is tasty, but very rich. I don't think I could eat it more than a few times a year. Also cruel to geese. Seafood is apparently traditional, which is a bit strange, but not a bad thing. Escargot, Shrimp, Salmon, all are tasty things. In an landlocked province it's a bit scary to think where these things are coming from and how fresh they are, but m'inquiete pas. It was fresh enough to be healthy. Dinner was a Rabbit/Goose (not sure, one of those) with sauce as well as potatoes and brocoli.
I also recieved presents, which was very nice.
Christmas I walked out to Nela's host-grandma's(was late...ugh) and spent some time with her family. All are great people. I enjoyed talking with them and eating lunch (more seafood). A nice long french (ergo, 2 hours) lunch, followed by going back to Nela's house and watching Tarzan. The original. in French. It was cool.
And again, making Ecuadorian food, the green banana's(which are not banana's). Very simple. I have two recipes now. Multinational chef. Yahoo.

The next few days were spent in the house, sleeping. And talking to family. So most of the people reading the blog know that.

Then Sunday it was Hana's goodbye party. The film Australia is a decent movie, bloody long, but none the worse because of it. I would recommend seeing it. After that, we went out to eat pizzas and just have a dinner. Always a nice thing. It really was an enjoyable night.

Yesterday Max came into town and we hung around for a bit. Saw the film Le Bon, Le Brute, Le Cinglé (The Good, The Bad, The wierd). GOOD movie. Eastern western. It was a winner at the Cannes film festival, see it if you get the chance. You will not regret it.

And finally, today, we went down to Mulhouse. A decent place during the day. They have a nicer mall than us in Stras. Drug capital of France though. Don't go out after dark. But we went to see the Car Museum, biggest in the world apparently. It was a nice place, cool and interesting looking cars. Didn't really learn much, but wasn't really trying to. Just enjoying the sights. Took a decent amount of pictures, but don't expect to see them for a bit. Stupid Camera.

Tomorrow, New Years. So I'll talk about that in a bit.
Happy New Year Everyone.

Swedish Treats and Last weekend

I'm behind, Christmas update will come when I have it recorded myself.

So Last wednesday(not Christmas Eve, before that) Anna came up from Selestat and we all had a grand old time at the Ikea in town. I guess because lots of people speak english here I really don't know what it's like to miss my language, but she freaked. A nice lunch of Swedish meatballs was eating, filled with comments about how Anna could make them better. But give them a break, they're French, not Swedes.
After lunch, we went to the grocery store they have and searched for gingerbread cookie dough. For to make houses. It was all missing, and we were very sad. There may be an attempt to make it by hand soon, and I am looking forward to that.

Then on the weekend, we just had a nice chill time. Hanging around the city, wandering into metal cds stores, and just really enjoying the Marché. It was a pretty fun time.

Monday came with sadness though. It was the mast time Em is going to see Hana for a while. By a while, I mean until we have a reunion in a few years. There was no tears on either side that I saw, but you never know what happens on the train and bus after you leave. I'm glad that I'm gonna see her two more times before she goes. But I still don't wanna think about it. Especially about Adam leaving the 8th, and the dinner party we're having on the 7th.

This year sucks so much, and is the most incredible experience ever. Rotary is a cruel organization, making us so close with each other then forcing us to say goodbye.

Médiathèque

Oh mas...

Took a little trip into the local Médiathèque, it's lika a Bibliothèque, but on crack and LGH (Library Growth Hormone). For just 12,50€ I'm allowed 8 books, 6 CDS, 2 DVDS+VHS+Computer Discs for a month. This, is incredible. Especially as it's France and they seem to have everything. For the moment I've taken out Lovecraft (in English) as vell as some books that are billingual (English on one page, French on the reverse. GREAT for learning the language.) as well as some CDs and 2 movies(Jurassic Park and a Godzilla movie). They have The Thing From The Black Lagoon, in french. I LOVE this place. They also have TVs and Stereos there, so I can just go hang out and watch a movie(Old horror movies anyone?) or listen to music....God I love this place. They have a really cheap Café too, so I may hang out there lots in the coming months.

Thank you Titu for showing me this place.

Sadness

This year is full of saying goodbye, and I just had my first one since leaving.

Imke, our German friend, is leaving thursday because her exchange is over. A party was had on Saturday, where I discovered I'm still rather horrible at Bowling and have very slow reflexes. Also, there was a game, kind of like Monopoly, which was difficult to understand at the beginning. Needless to say, while she's not leaving until Thursday, it was still very sad.

On the plus side, I've discovered that I've made well progress in French since the beginning. Still not enough, but I'm working on it.

Je suis TROP fatigué....

Oh god...

It was fun, but why did we stay up so late? Or early...
Taking a group of exchange students to wasselone was fun. The pool was a bit sucky (only banana hammocks, and I will not wear those) but we spent our time in the sauna and that was cool. Met a cool French guy that we had a few conversations with. Sauna destroyed me though.

After that, we ate Emeralds cookies. I have since decided that she is some form of cookie goddess, and will put much energy into stealing her recipes, as they are incredible.

I also made the couscous salad I figured out last year. Everyone who tried it seemed to like it. Adam enjoyed it, and he hates chick peas, so it must have turned out all right.

Monty Python and Movies, Rrrrrrrrr is hilarious, although no one will ever watch it with me at home. Stupid people who speak not the french...

Oh, right. It turns out Me, Adam, Emerald and Anna are stupid. After watching Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring (Frodon...wtf....) and the girls(OTHER girls, Emerald and Anna are girls) went to bed, we decided ve vere hungry. Ate for about an hour, just manging and laughing about the stupidest shit, we finally got to sleep around....7h this morning. Hana woke us up at 9 because she had a bus at 10, which she didn't even take. The hell man.... but we went right back to sleep and didn't vake up until midday.

C'était un très bon weekend, mais franchement...Je suis fatigué.

I'm a nice person

Amazing the amount of Touriste in this city right now.

I was just walking along when suddenly I hear a bunch of people, obviously english speakers(they were speaking English, one can only assume...) asking in horrible French, "Excuse-ay Moi Madaam. where can we find the Catheedraal?"
Naturally, being the nice person I am(Screw you France, no matter how hard you try to get rid of them I'm KEEPING the Canadian aspects of my personality.) I told the lady they were asking that I could help them and that she could go on with her day. Naturally, she got defensive, claiming that I was just a child and my english couldn't possibly be better than hers. I responded with "Je viens du Canada, madame." THAT shut her up.

Kids were from Northern Ireland. They were EXTREMELY grateful to find an english speaker who could speak french. walked around with them for a bit, then had to go back to school. Cool kids. Shame about their total lack of French though...

Marché de Noël

It's Christmas time in Strasbourg.

The lights are beautiful, and completely overwhelming. They've really gone all out. I haven't visited the actual market yet, but I've walked past it a few times and it completely blows me away. I'm trying to take as many pictures as I can. It really is incredible. They call this the Christmas Capital of Europe for a reason.

Yesterday we went down to Colmar to see Jess, and the city. A really nice place, quite tranquil and very pretty. All the normal Christmas stuff (normal for Europe, NOT for home) was around. Including Santa. He had a donkey. It was wierd. He made us sing, but then gave us candy. Apparently there's a really nice Museum down there too. No idea what it's for, but I'll try and see it the next time I'm down there.

French seems to be getting worse. I've started doing boring Vocab and Conjugation work to combat this. Hopefully it's helping, because I'd hate to be this mind-numbingly bored for no reason....

Starting to think simple sentences in french though. Hopefully that's a good sign..