Okay, so this past weekend I enjoyed happy hour crêpes and went to Sète, a cool fishing village 15 minutes away by train, but since the internet here is quite awful I can’t upload any photos now. I realize that I'm sounding quite like a broken record, but they will come! Promise! So you’ll find out about Sète as soon as I can. Maintenant, here’s how my week’s been so far.
I am apparently miraculously accident prone. Within five days, I injured both somebody else and myself. How do I accomplish this? I don't know, but I find it rather amusing. It's a good conversation topic, though, I find. I mean, I was absolutely mortified when, while I was dancing up a storm one night at la soiree latina, my ring apparently hit my partner's hand at just the right angle to cut it. Yes, I made a guy bleed. I'm dangerous, man. Stay away from me. Of course I can laugh about it now (the guys I were hanging out with find it amusing to me moquer about it, all in good fun of course), but at the time it was quite the embarrassment. I'm glad I didn't count how many times I apologized. Combined with the fact that my French comprehension is garbage in clubs, it was all one big, hilarious mess! How do I get myself into these strange situations? More important, I suppose, is that I always manage to goof my way out somehow.
So what else is new? Ah, yes. Since I've been here, France has had not one, not two, but three (!!!) national grèves (strikes). The stereotypes are true, people. They don't typically bother me since I'm pretty chill and have a bicycle, but it's constantly amusing to learn exactly who decides to take the day off in which administrative positions. Can a doctor really go on strike? Apparently so, I've been told! But what interested me most was as I was bike riding to the Comédie to take care of business and buy my youth train card (cuts all your train prices in half! Oh happy day!!), I found myself facing down hundreds- yes, hundreds- of people. It was overwhelming. There was singing, chanting, drumming, and tons of people walking who knows where. Apparently they were such a big crowd that for a little while they actually halted the few trams that were still running. Fight the power, man. Me, I think I'll leave the demonstrating to the activists. Something about a crowd of demonstrators that big with all the noise frightened me a bit, so I gawked very briefly and silently wished them well as I slinked through the crowd to do my shopping. Really, it's hard to describe in words. Quite a sight. I've never seen anything like it in my sleepy Alabama town. Love it or hate it, it's very much a part of French culture to demonstrate about just about anything semi-regularly.
I've adapted surprisingly easily to constant, unexpected inconveniences. For example, through random chance, I find out while on the way to the latin party tonight that it's canceled. Having waited 20 minutes for this tram (strike, remember?), I wasn't keen to get off. So, we ended up meeting for a drink at a hole in the wall bar and had some excellent conversation as well as a cassis-flavored beer. So, I know actually know what cassis is: it's the French word for blackcurrant (thank you, Wikipedia), a tangy berry that made my drink quite fruity. I felt so feminine drinking it in comparison to everything else I've had here, but it was amazing. On a side note, I've seen beer here with 11.9% alcohol content. I think I'd have to pass on such an adventure, but talk about something that'll put hair on your chest, eh? If it tells you anything, the beer was Dutch. They must have some really hairy chests.
So, after that? As is typical of the centre ville, at the tram station while waiting another 15 minutes/indeterminate amount of time, we ran into some more friends who were also on their way home. These fabulous ladies happened to be from the same crowd who typically goes out dancing Tuesday nights as well, so we said hello, ont fait des bisous (kisses on the cheek!), and suddenly we were instant friends and laughing about this one slightly crazy but harmless gentleman singing on the tram. Nothing says bonding like giggling in bemusement over the characters you meet in this town. Two of the girls live at Vert-Bois, so I had more company on the way home. We jammed to some tunes on one's Blackberry, and the evening ended marvelously. To top it all off, I got high praise from my expression orale professor on my exposé today, which made me happy since I practiced a lot to make it sound coherent and clear in front of the class. So give me some credit, here. I am working. =P
Until next time, sorry for the absurdly long post of nothing but words!
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