3 Months In France!

WOW it's December already!! It feels so strange to say that I've been in France for 3 months now, since I never really felt like I truly accepted that I'm here!

So in my determination to improve in the language rapidly for christmas and also my school trip to Belgium in January (so I can talk and have fun with my class!), about a month ago I decided to stop speaking with friends and family in New Zealand so much as I was doing that almost everyday. By speaking with them everyday it got me habituated to speaking English again and it seemed like i'd taken a step back with all of the improvement and flow of the French language i'd made. I haven't really noticed if I've improved faster, but I definitely don't have so many moments where i make silly mistakes or just speak in English without even realising it.

At the same time, not talking to my family and friends so regularly made me feel like I was even further away from them and sometimes like I wasn't even a part of their lives anymore. I wont lie, this was and still is hard to get used to. But I've become closer with people here because of it, which at the end of the day is what I want- a life and friends here.
I realised that I hadn't skyped my dad in about one month and a half, so last night we skyped for about 30 minutes (a lot shorter than the usual 2 hours haha) but it was soo good to talk to him. It left me feeling so happy and just like I had spent some time with him at home. I don't think i'll ever forget that and how much it meant to me.

It's really such a relief now to understand almost everything that people say to me, now it's mainly just French expressions that i'm getting my head around. I once said to my host mum 'I feel like a drink' directly translated into French, she looked at me strangely and then I realised how silly I must have sounded- that i literally felt like i was a drink! They just say 'I'm thirsty' so i've remembered that ever since haha.

I have some REALLY exciting news: one of my best friends, Florence, from New Zealand is moving to England in 8 days now and she will be spending New Years with me here in France!!!
Right through my AFS application, the interviews, the unsure moments whether i'd be going, and when I finally knew I was going to France.. Florence was there for me. The dull moments at school when we both wanted more, we talked about her future life in England and mine in France, how many experiences we were going to have. During my exchange so far I've shared SO many things with her and she has too as she's counting down the time until she leaves. I remember our conversations about one day we'll be in France together, i'd buy her a croissant at a café and we'd talk about everything. I can't believe it's going to happen in 27 days!!! I think i'll be so overwhelmed with happiness that i'll cry when I see her! Haha
This will be my first Christmas and New Years away from my family, so with Florence coming I think it will really help me to be not so nostalgic. And after my exchange i'm hoping to spend some time in England with her too! 

I've almost hit 2000 pageviews!!! They're from all over the world too! So thank you for reading, I hope you've gained something from be blabbing! haha. Have a lovely day wherever you are in the world, don't forget to take a look around you and realise the things you're thankful for! :) 

Bisous xxxx

Weekend with my favourite AFSer Holly!

Holly and I had another super fun weekend together, this time she came to my place.
With this being our 5th sleepover I think we can say we have traditions now! There's always clothes shopping, we stock up on lots of clothes and don't buy more until we're with each other again. That's not really intentional but I guess we get too busy to go shopping more often. At the end of the day we always stop at a supermarket and buy lots of unhealthy but so good French food to eat at night time. I don't feel so guilty about that because I never buy that stuff without her! Plus we can be fat together at the returnee camp in New Zealand next year ;).
At night time we always skype other New Zealand AFS students (who we met on the amazing orientation camp we had before leaving). I want to make a shout out to Graeme in Sweden, Hugo in Spain, Austin in France and Hugh in USA! You're all awesome.

During the weekend with Holly we did exactly that among other things. It's so funny walking through malls together speaking English, everyone turns around and stares at us (not descretely at all) haha. We think we're becoming accustomed to getting so much attention, what will we do back in New Zealand where we're normal?! Maybe we'll have to walk around speaking French hahah. After spending 5 hours in the mall, laughing so much and seeming like crazy foreigners, we went back to my place and I dyed and cut her hair that night! She says she loves it, i'm so relieved haha.
We got to sleep at around 3:30am, and the next day after skyping some more people my host mum took us about 20 minutes south into the mountains (Pyrénées) where everything is covered in snow!! We've had a bit of snow here where I live but nothing like in the Mountains, some places I stood it almost went up to my knees!

That was Holly's first time seeing snow up close as she's from Auckland! We had SO much fun making snow angels, having snowball fights, sledding and just running around and posing for the camera haha. We also spoke a lot of French to each other that day and proved to ourselves that we could do it. It was really nice of my host mum to take us there, it was defnitely a moment i'll never forget!!

Holly has 2 more months left in France, i'll be so sad when she leaves! It'll be sad not having our weekends together in Pau and here at my place every month or so. I hope we can skype or something and talk about everything! 

Holly so excited :p

Toulouse and life of the late!

Bonjour tout le monde!
A dream of mine ever since I arrived 79 days ago was to go to Toulouse, and guess what.. it came true last weekend!
After actually missing 2 trains in Tarbes, long story I wont go into detail why but some advice to you.. whenever travelling in France always take identification with you! Haha. So I eventually caught a train to Toulouse by myself, where I got to look out the window at the Pyrenees mountains all breathtakingly covered in snow, and arrived about an hour and a half later. My host sister Loany met me at the train station and from there we went back to her apartment (where I was going to be staying). Being all French, we made Gratin which is a Potato and cheese dish, however her microwave oven actually burnt everything we tried to make.. even cookies! That was so disappointing and I swear we could have died from the toxic fumes they were releasing into her small apartment! Ahah.
Later we took the metro (yes, metro!) into the centre of Toulouse to go shopping. I must say that was such an exciting moment of my life, taking the metro for the first time.. another Frenchy thing to tick of my list! ;)

Toulouse was magical- the streets were full of people, everyone wrapped up in coats and scarves as Autumn here is proving to be extremely cold.. I can't wait to see what winter will be like haha. There were also crepe stalls, a Carousel and Christmas decorations going up already but not being lit yet. Loany and I have planned that I'm going to go back just before Christmas to see all the lights and the markets they have out front of the Capitole -which I saw! (I'll put a picture below). We did lots of shopping and walked around the streets, there I confirmed my thoughts that I can never go back to shopping in the Dunedin clothing stores after France, they have got nothing on them here!
The next day I had my second AFS chapter function, where all of us exchange students and a few sending students had lunch and went to a museum together. Seeing the other exchange students again was really nice, people who understand exactly what it means to be an exchange student and often have the same thoughts and feelings as you. Surprisingly we all spoke in French practically the whole time although all of us know English! That was a little difficult to do at our camp in Lyron 1 month ago, so our improvement in the language is definitely evident! Kato, my friend from Belgium on her exchange here, is sadly finishing her exchange in one week! I'm going to miss her a lot, we were all a little emotional that it would maybe be the last time we would see her. We've all been a part of each other's lives since we first arrived in Paris for the beginning of our exchanges as we all shared a room together. I didn't know that in coming to France I'd get to make not only friends from here, but also from all over the world. And I have AFS to thank for that!

So the day before I left for Toulouse I said goodbye to my host brother who'll be living in Lyon, about 6 hours away I believe. I already miss him a lot, he's so cheerful and fun and he's always been there when I've needed someone! But with him being there, maybe that will give me a reason to see Lyon too!! Thankfully one of my host sisters has been here recently and we've been having fun baking Macarons and Eclairs, so I'm not like an only child just yet. I'm thinking it'll be strange, I've never been an only child before! But I've got a lot of support from my host parents and we have a lot of fun too so I think it won't bad, just different.

Update on how the language is going lately: About a week ago some of my friends were talking beside me as we were walking to the cantine. Usually I don't bother trying to understand because with the noise of cars and other people it was almost impossible for me to. But this time, without even putting thought into it I understood their whole conversation! That was such an amazing moment for me, one of those eureka moments when you realise how far you've come!
It's also really wonderful to see that it's not only me who's benefiting from my exchange, but also others are too..some of my friends here often speak in English to me, I correct them and respond in French. In doing this I've seen them improve a lot over 2 and a half months and one of my good friends, Sarah, told me she can even understand everything that I write on my blog! (I'm so proud of you petite fleur!)

Like my host mum and I were talking about today, when us exchange students talk with others in our host country, it's like we're giving them the opportunity to travel themselves. We open their mind to what life is like from where we come from and probably give them something to laugh about with our accent! :p I never really thought about this but it's so true. I love that I'm able to give people the opportunity to have a connection to the other side of the world, the exotic and mysterious Islands of New Zealand ;).

But basically my life here, I'm loving it. I have days where I'm not so enthusiastic or thrilled about my school timetable (3 and a half hours of maths, but also the same of economics in one day!), and this gets me a little down. But the good outweighs the bad, I have a family, friends, hobbies, things to look forward to like Belgium in January, Spain at one point, seeing Florence and Holly, skiing in winter and experiencing a French Christmas! And also a new 'French' life here which always surprises me with more exciting new things. At the same time, I have amazing support from friends and family in New Zealand who I love so much! I've really been given such an incredible opportunity, so thank you again to everyone who's made it possible for me!

Bisous <3

Making Macarons!

The museum

A Kiwi in France.. ;)

Kato! Haha

War memorial

Toulouse view from Loany's apartment!

Capitole!!

Didn't buy one but they looked gooodd!

The metro aha ;)

She may kill me for putting this up, do it for the fans Loany ;)

2 MONTHS!

2 months ago today I left New Zealand to create a new life in France immersed into their culture. I guess I should delve into my feelings about my whole experience and share them with you since today is a pretty significant day for me!

The first word that comes into mind is 'wow'. Looking back now at the person that I was 2 months ago, what I was expecting for my life to be like, and how limited my French was, I can see that I've already grown and learnt so many new things already.
I don't mean I've grown as in height, I'm still short, also I haven't put on any weight! Haha, But my mind has definitely grown. Coming to France has opened my eyes to what the world is like beyond the little isolated and safe Islands of New Zealand. France is such a significant country in the world, even just thinking that I'm in the same country that PARIS is in, almost everyone's dream place to visit one day, makes me realise that I'm now living in a country that people at least know exists and where it's located! (unlike New Zealand). That reminds me, so many people I've met thought that New Zealand was a part of Asia, just below China or one of the tiny islands above Australia haha what..

Over the past 2 months I've become habituated to French culture. Now kissing people on the cheek when greeting them (la bise), baguettes with everything,  a cheese course and yoghurt after every meal and many other things are normal. I've even become used to all of the smoking here, I no longer look at them astonished like before because it's just so normal here. Although, I'd never ever do it myself. It's funny to think back to New Zealand and how smoking is a rare thing these days, when I tell people that at my school they can't believe it.

I remember how the French language sounded to me when I first arrived, I could pick out key words but a lot of things like the tense I would totally miss. It sounded like all the words had been fused together into one very long mumbled word. Class was a nightmare, I would try to hide my face so the teachers wouldn't see me falling asleep because I couldn't understand anything. Economics and Philosophy would have had to be the worst classes as I'd never taken them before and the teachers mostly talk the whole time. But just today I had Economics and for one whole hour I listened to the teacher and actually understood what she was saying! That was like a milestone for me, I think the next one will be understanding movies and television series properly, and then after that understanding my host dad when he talks to me! He talks very fast haha. I have Philosophy tomorrow morning for 2 hours, I'm hoping it will be similar to my experience in Economics today..

During the holidays I spoke a lot of English with Loany and Holly. It made me feel a little guilty like I was cheating myself, and I even thought I'd forgotten some French. So once the holidays finished and the month of November had begun I made a plan to avoid speaking English for this whole month in order to improve a lot more (writing English doesn't count haha). It's already been a few days and I'm surprised at how easy it's been.. I'm still able to have big conversations with people. Most of the time it's pretty easy but when I get a little stuck they are always willing to help me despite how annoying it must be :p. Something I've loved the most about being here in France is all of the people I've been able to meet. I've never experienced so much hospitality, everyone that I've talked to is so welcoming and they think New Zealand is just the coolest. That's helped me realise how awesome my country is, when I return home I wont take it for granted any more. There's going to be a rugby match between New Zealand and France soon, it's funny because when I was home I would support France (mainly just to annoy my brother), but this time I'll be country proud and support New Zealand who I'm pretty sure will win anyway ;).

à bientot! <3

Les Vacances! (Holidays)

Hey everyone!

Wow it's been a while since I wrote on my blog, so now i'll fill you in on some of the things I spent my holidays doing!

The last day at school before my 2 weeks of holidays was so awesome, I started to feel like I belonged there because of the activities I'm involving myself in and the friends I've made. So I was a little sad to go on holidays, most of my closest friends here were going away and I thought I'd be stuck in the house bored, but I wasn't!..

During the first week Loany my host sister came to stay. Her and I have SO much fun together. We're always laughing, being crazy and I feel like there's nothing that we haven't talked about! It's our mission to do really fun things together, some activities we're looking forward to doing are skiing, horse riding, mountain climbing and l'accrobranche (a confidence course thing high up in the trees).
Her and I went indoor rock climbing, she'd never done it before so it was a really funny experience but seeing her trying to work the rope underneath me I must admit made me a little scared for my life haha. But after that she did so well! She looked like a little monkey, you couldn't even tell it was her first time. I really enjoyed it, it uses so many muscles of your body and it's actually a pretty good workout. I'm thinking of doing it as a club at school! The man working there showed us other things like climbing up a wall which then turned horizontal, without harnesses or any help! So we attempted to do that too, but we laughed so much so it was difficult to keep my strength up!
Other things we did were shopping, a photo shoot ;), watched movies, went out for a big lunch with all the extended family too, and on lazy days at home we painted while talking and listening to music.

The day that Loany left Holly came to stay at mine and the day after I caught the train with her to stay at her place! Our time together consisted of shopping, so much talking and laughing, Skyping with other New Zealand AFSers on their exchanges, and definitely a lot of eating not so healthy French food. But I've been exercising almost every day here (my brother will be proud :p) and i've only got 8 months left so I should experience as much of the French culture as I can (within reason) haha. Oh and we rode a carousel! What a funny experience, people were watching us and giggling because It was for little kids but with the fact that we're foreign we feel like we have an excuse to do weird and crazy things :p.
Having Holly just a 20 minute train ride away is such a highlight of my exchange, I can't believe I didn't know her very well until we were both in France catching the train together down from Paris to meet our host families. It was on that train that I realised what an awesome person she is, I'm glad she's living so close and we're already organising things to do next time we hang out!

Haha Loany! See my glass? That's a family joke to fill someone's glass right up. They got me..

We had a family lunch here, so picturesque!

Lunch

Me and Loany

Tarbes with Holly

Pau with Holly :)

Pau

Not the Carousel we rode sadly, but still cute!