For dinner, we had another green soup that was a little broth-y-er than usually and had some tiny spaghetti noodles in it. After that, Christine re-heated the very last of that yummy quiche just for me! The main course tonight was very unique: basically it was a ton of spaghetti noodles. The way I dressed my noodles was to smear a knife-full of pesto paste on top, pour olive oil over the whole thing, salt it, and mix. It was surprisingly tasty! I had a slice of ham on the side and cut that up to eat with the pasta. For dessert, the epic fromage blanc with raspberry preserves.
I got to talk to my family tonight (minus Sabrina because she was already at school for the day) and that is always fun. The rest of my evening basically just consisted of talking with them, taking a shower, and going to bed. I'm liking having all of this time on my hands to do simple things in a very relaxed manner.
Thursday: I decided to finally have coffee with breakfast this morning instead of tea... an excellent decision! I've been avoiding it because sometimes having such an acidy drink in the morning makes me feel sick. But I just can't resist the chicorée coffee the Desroys' have (that's the name of the coffee we usually have after lunch and which Lionel and Christine both drink a bowl of every morning). I tried the fig preserves today for my second piece of bread instead of the raspberry (the first piece just has to be Nutella) and it was very good. All in all, an excellent breakfast and I felt comfortably awake all through my first class!
After lunch we were supposed to finish the rest of the presentations but our class took an interesting turn instead.... First, it's important to remember that all conversation in class (with the teacher, with other students, etc) must all be done in french; which is difficult because french is a language we are learning. Second, you should picture our class as being pretty fun and light-hearted feeling because there's only 14 of us and we're getting pretty used to each other's sense of humor. Third, class expectations are very different in France when it comes to participation. Teachers in America demand participation just like French professors but the difference is that if you don't participate in class in the States, you usually just get a lower grade in the class. In France, though, non-participation will not fly. Unfortunately for us, we're all used to paying attention in class without speaking up and we all seemed to simultaneously forget what class we were in today. So, after lunch Mme Baudry walked us through an activity that should have taken 20 minutes but took at least an hour to complete. This is due mainly to the fact that only 3 or 4 students talked during the activity. Well, that light-hearted mood our class usually has went away like someone flipped a switch when our teacher let us know that this was completely unacceptable. Mostly she told us just that; there was no yelling or anything. But people get pretty nervous when they are being confronted and scolded. Also, she gave us this talking-to just after asking one student to leave the classroom because he was laughing while she was talking (which was a bit of a shock for all of us in itself because she has not done this yet, this guy participates a lot in class, she didn't give him a warning or anything, and she had JUST told us to take a five minute break). THEN- as we're already quivering a bit in our seats- she asks the one Basque student in our class why he didn't participate in the activity (he is one of the more natural french-speakers in our class and always has something to say). Not only did he go off on her for the next 15 minutes but he couldn't do it well enough in french so went off in spanish- which, if you remember rule number one, is an insult in itself. Yikes! It was a tense class this afternoon. The mood recovered by the end but I think we're all still nervous thinking about what happened. Hopefully tomorrow will be better...
Roshanna and I decided to walk to Le Clerc after class to shake off the nerves and hang out a little bit. We both bought a sweet treat at a little pâtisserie and then sat at a nearby café for a little coffee. I bought a delicious bread that I cannot quite describe to you: it was like a croissant on the outside but had an almost fried-egg texture on the inside. And all over it were pockets of clumped-together chocolate chips. OMG was this so worth the 1 euro it cost me. Whenever any of us foreign students buy coffee here we just get café au lait (coffee and milk) because it's the only thing we actually recognize. Well I went bold today and got something different- can't remember the name but it had vanilla in it- for 1.90£. Unfortunately that ended up being a teeny tiny vanilla-flavored shot of espresso, but I drank it gladly knowing I was having a truly French snack with my friend. Roshanna and I finished our homework at her dorm room, then, and I made the trek home after that.
Got home in time to kick around on the computer a bit and then Emma arrived with her boyfriend Guillaume ("William" in english). I guess she has a long weekend so she came home for a few days. We had true broccoli and cheese soup tonight and then Pasta Bolognese, which was very good and reminded me of when we have spaghetti at home. A little salad after that and then dessert: a chocolate mousse topped with whipped cream. :)
I'm probably going to talk with my family here pretty soon so time to go. I'll update you all on my friday tomorrow and then you get to hear about my amazing adventure in Bordeaux on saturday!
Goodnight and thanks for reading!
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