experience: the 2nd e-mail i sent home

Bonjour!

First, answers to your questions!


--> I have class Monday, Wednesday, and Friday from 1:00-3:30 in the afternoon.


--> I don't have a roommate. We all have individual rooms. And they're super great. A maid comes in to clean every day, which I think is weird... but cool, I suppose.


--> Nobody can text or call me unless I call AT&T and tell them I want to accept international phone calls/texts. So we're safe. So many of the kids in my program have spent SO MUCH MONEY on temporary phone plans while they're here, which I find absolutely uncecessary and silly. Who the heck wants to be tied down by a phone when you're gallavanting through Europe?! [And who in their right mind can afford to?!]


--> They provide no meals. We are totally on our own. It isn't structured like a "summer program" at all... it's very much a "here's a place to stay, make sure you go to class, here's some money, see ya back in the country in a month." NOT kidding. LOVE IT.


--> I will e-mail pictures when I can. IT WILL COST ME 80 EURO TO BUY A EUROPEAN CAMERA CHARGER. Which I seriously can't afford. So I probably can't use my nice camera. =( ...meaning I'll have to just post photos from friends' cameras...

--> The computer is grand/perfect.


--> It is GOOOOORGEOUS. I seriously don't even like travelling with people here because I do not want to be put on a schedule... I want the absolute freedom to just wander and stare at a gorgeous building for fifteen minutes just for the sake of staring at a gorgeous building for fiteen minutes. Luckily, such freedom is available. =] Every crevice of this city is beautiful. Seriously. I sometimes want to stand on a car in the middle of the street and SCREAM OUT TO EVERYONE to look around and realize what an amazing place this is! I feel so many people just brush by things that are absolutely incredible. But I'm easily amused, which I have to remind myself...

Today was GRAAAND! Some friends and I went to the Parisian Catacombs--an unfathomably huge system of underground tunnels full of the remnants from hundreds of European cemeteries. In the 1700s, the cemeteries were getting too full, so they started digging up all of the graves and placing the bodies in the catacombs. IT IS ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE. It is seriously just a never ending series of tunnels stacked on either side with bones, skulls, and skeletons. It sounds morbid, but it isn't. It's done in a very orderly, even artistic, way. You just walk through endles tunnels looking at stacks of skeletons of REAL PEOPLE who lived hundreds and hundreds of years ago. YOU WOULD ALL LOVE IT. It's seriously amazing. And SOOOOO deep under the ground. The staircase going down there was seemingly infinite. And it only cost me 4 euros! =]


After that, I just explored the city for the afternoon/evening. My friends and I found a really fantastic outdoor shopping market... really inexpensive european clothing, which was REALLY exciting because everything is so stinkin' expensive otherwise. We ate at this great little sushi place in a cute little neighborhood. The sushi was wondeful! (I'm eating the left overs now, in fact...)

Tomorrow we are renting bicycles and biking all over the city! Actually, we don't even have to rent them because this amazing French lady who works for the Metro [who owns the bikes] told us how to ride them without having to pay [you don't have to pay for the first half hour on any bike... so we'll just ride a half hour, get a new bike, and keep riding! The bike stops are all over the city, so we'll always be near a replacement bike... =] We don't have class... so we're just gonna go all day long! We'll probably ride to the Louve and spend at least a few hours there. I also want to make it a habit of watching the sun set behind the eiffel tower at least two or three times a week. [Seriously though... !!!]

The place where I live is called the International City University of Paris. However, it isn't actually a university. Instead, it is just a huge, gorgeous campus full of living spaces/dorms. No classes are taught here and no students attend classes here. It is just this amazing place where people from all over the world come to live while studying elsewhere in France [affordable living for internationl students, essentially]. Consequently, there is a ridiculous myriad of cultures and languages everywhere. I think I already told you about my Slavakian friend, Petra. I love to play "Spot the American" around the city... because you can ALWAYS tell when someone is American! I can't figure out what specifically makes someone look American, but I'll figure it out.

Friday is going to be great. Our professor is taking us to a royal chateau, complete with an evening of wine and cheese tasting. You have NO IDEA how much money I'm saving by by not drinking. =] I'm a big cheese fan though, so I'm totally stoked about that. THE FRENCH LOVE THEIR WINE.

Anyway, I'm going to head off to bed... or something.

HAPPY, HAPPY THURSDAY!!! [Unless it's still Wednesday when you read this... then, HAPPY WEDNESDAY!]

=D

[m]