EuroDisney , Belgian Waffles, and Belgian chocolate; what more could a girl ask for?!
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: Trip to Euro-Disney

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^This is supposed to be the entrance of Disneyland. Just tell me if it doesn't come up.

In the first week of October, I left the Dor family to go visit the Fauqueniot family. (Laurie's family back in Belgium) Oh they are sooo great!Pascal and Crystal took me and their two sons to Disneyland in Paris on Saturday and we spent the entire day there, going on all the really cooooool rides and watching the parade at 4 to celebrate the coming of Halloween! I got lots of pictures but I havne't had time to load them yet because it is hard finding an open computer in the "mediatheque" that has a CD rom drive or whatever! Frustrating! But anyways... Then on Sunday morning Pascal took me to a "small" WWI monument in the town of Ploegsteert. I call it small because even though it wasnt, It was much smaller than the one we visited later in the town of Ypres. In Ploegsteert there are two big statues of lions infront of the monument and someday I will upload the pictures of me with them and everything. When we went to Ypres I saw the grand cathedral in the center of the "town" and the really really really big WWI memorial sight. There we took some photos and went then went for breakfast. I finally got to try the Belgian waffles. Yes, they are everything I hoped they would be!! :-D!!! I've never tasted anything better in my entire life!!!!!

"It made me think about how love makes us crazy and that we would do anything just to stay together." (9-15-04 Cliff Gardner)
Mood:  crushed out
On Saturday night I got a phonecall from Cliff! "Hello?" "Hey babe." *faints* <-- yeah it was almost like that. I smiled so much my cheek muscles hurt after I hung up the phone!! Oh he loves me he loves me he loves me! I'm sooo happy! Next week, and probably the week after that, he is going to have to call his family, but maybe in 3 weeks or so I will recieve another phone call! Wow that really made my weekend! And if I wasn't dancing on clouds already, when monday rolled around, I got his letters! YIPPIE!! Monday was a holiday for my school so I was home when the mail was delivered and Noemie came running into the kitchen: "Its from Cleeford" in that funny french accent she has when she speaks english. I was half expecting her to hand me the phone, but then I realized that it wasn't possible for me to recieve two phone calls so soon. :-( <-- But I was only like that for like .02 seconds, cuz then she handed me the letters and I was like this again--> :-D HEHE! SO HAPPY!! "bonheur" <-- French for HAPPINESS. He thinks...maybe...just maybe, he will be able to come visit for Christmas!! Oh that would be the GREATEST prestent in the world! Everyone here is dying to meet him, I've showed them all the pictures I have of him and they all say, "hez beautiful!" Oh yeah everyone here says Beautiful, not hansom, or gorgeous, or anything, but its cool.
Well I'm off for now, going to go study some French, ok probably not. I'll probably end up writing a letter to Cliff! Oh and by the way if you're a friend of Cliff's and you don't have his address in bootcamp, e-mail me and I'll give it to you.

1 month +
Mood:  party time!

can you see that? ^ Its a picture of me and Jodi after we got our hair cut...or its supposed to be... I've been trying forever to get pictures to load on this website and I think thats the first one that worked...if it didn't then someone let me know...

Wednesday was the 22nd, which means that I have been here for a month and now being the 24th, its one month plus 2 days... It was Adriana's one month marker too so we went and celebrated... well ok it wasnt the best celebration I've ever had, but it was a change! Pierre and Necola took us out to the Cabere which is the community of bars in my city. (Honestly, it is two whole streets of just bars) It was fun. We didn't drink very much because we've heard horror stories about exchange students who get drunk and its better to play it safe. I had a blanch "cherry" and something else but I didn't catch the name of the second drink. That was it for drinking... Then we walked around a lot, got a really big sandwich for only 3 euros! Let me explain: here we don't go to the store and buy a loaf of bread, it is much more complicated. You go to a boulangerie which is like a bakery,(yeah like the ones Mrs. Bintliff talked about in French class!! They really do exist!) and buy whatever kind of bread you want, (they are all freshly made right there) and then you have to go out and get what you want in it an a different place, or you can just go to a sandwich shop and look at their list of 500+ sandwiches, order in perfect French, and get a sandwich that way...*deep breath.* That was Wednesday. That night I stayed at Adriana's house and went to school with her family on Thursday. Unlike my host family, hers takes the bus and mine drives me. It was kind of a hassle because it was raining as it does all the time here!

Well school gets over here soon so I'll sign off!

*Chow*

Nothing here works!
Mood:  accident prone
It seems as soon as I touch something, it breaks. This is the second computer I had to use today because the software I was trying to use wasn't working on the other one... Yesterday I tried 3 different computers (by the way, I'm at school) because they all kept freezing on me. I look around... and everyone is just buzzing away on theirs...and me? I have the computer I'm at, plus the ones on each side of me, with flashing blue screens. I decided to get out of there as soon as possible! Now class is almost over and all I've acomplished is checking my e-mail and typing this entry. EEERRRRR

Well, Adriana came over yesterday after school at 12 (because Wednesdays are 1/2 days) and we had lunch with my host family. (Well my host grandparents because both Corinne and Stephane were working.) They were all upset with me because they didn't know how she was going to get home. Rotary students arn't allowed to take a bus alone evidently, so they said no she couldn't take a bus home like she had origionally planned... But she isn't a ROTARY student! And it was hard to explain because the more upset they got, the faster and louder they talked IN FRENCH...hello over here... neither of us speak french! Finally we got it squared away, but man it was a mess! After lunch we looked over our scrapbook stuff. Adriana scrapbooks also and for now we are in search of a Scrapbooking store so we can get Noemie a scrapbook too. No one here has ever heard of it, so it is difficult to explain, and scrapbook supplies and stores are sooooo RAAARE.

Well class is over now and I have break! Chow!

Wednesday Half Days
Mood:  not sure
Yesterday I learned "bonheur" happiness. Awwwwww :-)

Today, and every Wednesday, is a half a day. So I get to go home at 12!!! I only have 4 classes today too.. or well, 4 blocks, but the first two classes are "Etude" or Study hall, then I have "Anglais" and "francais" English and French. Not too difficult! I think Adriana is coming back with me after school but I'm not sure because she has to call her host family first. If she does, it will be the first friend I have had over since I got here!

I have been studying my French like no tomorrow. Not much improvement yet, but its getting there... On the 23 of this month I am expected to make a presentation to my host rotary club IN FRENCH about where I come from, Maine, and my family. Wow talk about some stress! Once that is done and over with, I get to go canoeing with the other inbounds on the 25 if I can find the paper that needs to be signed by about 25 hundred ppl! No, no stress here!

Last night my host mom, Corinne, bought me a clock for my room! I was so excited! My favorite color is green, so she got me a little green one to put by my bed! Awwwwww. :-)

Tae-bo lessons were going to start on Mondays but not enough people signed up, so they canceled them! "Dommage!" Darn! But thats alright I guess, because classes are 130 dollars American money and 99 EUROS. "Tres cher" very expensive! But now I can take Graffiti lessons instead! :-D It's like 15 dollars American money a class, but REALLY FUN!!! So if I dont come back to America knowing how to kick some butt, at least I will know how to properly vandalise stuff! *phew* I'm not a complete failure!

Soon I will have my photos developed, so I can scan them and put them on my website. No, I don't have the luxury of a digital camera here with me, but the disposable ones will have to do. On and my Mom just got me a video camera and its in the mail as I speak! She is also sending me Grahmcrackers and marshmallows because here they don't have ones like they do in America. They are marshmallow wannabies... marshmallow posers. It is difficult to make smores without marshmallows or grahmcrackers. Try it some time. So I had to compensate and use some cake crackers and pink and white sugar things for the marshmallows and grahmcrackers... It wasn't pretty.