A Late Start

Bonjour a tous! I meant to get this thing going right when I set foot in Paris, but of course, it didn't happen...i still have a while to go, so I thought I'd give it a shot now...better late than never! I'll try to retrace and give a summary of my days leading up to current time, and all of the things that have happened in between. Read it if you want to, read it if you're bored and feel free to leave a comment every once in a while to let me know what's going on in your world:)

I arrived in Paris Sunday, January 28th. I flew Air India to Paris- yeah, at first I was like Air India? I went with it however because it was the cheapest and they happen to make a pit stop in Paris before heading out to Mumbai. The ride itself was interesting, as I arrived to the terminal, I saw a massive flood of Indian people pushing their way to the check in area...I was thinking to myself 'what the hell? Don't they call out seating by rows?'...later I found out that apparently in India, everyone is used to rushing to the front when it comes to transportation, as it is often a first come first serve. At any rate, I didn't know what to expect for dinner, but funny enough, I was served chicken curry! I didn't get the memo however about the people laying down across the entire row if nobody happens to be sitting next to you (it was a huge airplane, big rows), it was fine though, my neighbor was nice. Upon arrival however, my luggage didn't arrive at the correct terminal, so I was left with the simple back pack I had taken as my carry on, and I was really nervous that my luggage would end up in the Ganges River! Fortunately however, they arrived a day later, apparently they were lost in the airport. Overall it wasn't bad however.

The next two days, my program set us up in a hotel as we reviewed logistics, room assignments etc... We had a really nice dinner the fist night at a fancy restaurant: 3 course meal, cheeses, dessert...and that would be the nicest (most expensive dinner) I would have in a while, courtesy of the program. The next day, we visited the great Notre Dame Cathedral and were given a really informative tour by a tour guide...unfortunately with the jet lag and time change, I was falling asleep standing up in the cathedral...really embarrassing, I don't even remember a third of what she said, although I'm sure it was interesting. We also went down to the Seine River and took a boat tour...it was nice, but not extremely exciting. Finally on the third day we were up bright and early to take our French placement exam and move into our housing for the semester. I am one of the lucky ones who scored a room at the Cite Universitaire...it is a campus of about 40 dorms, each one a different nationality (we're segregated if you think about it...funny I know). The campus is beautiful and oh convenient: it has a cafeteria, cafe, bank, library, post office, and overall a really nice landscape. Ok, I think this is enough for today, as I don't want to bore you out of your minds! I'll post some more later!