Finally a Chance to Breathe!!!

First of all I need to say, if any of you called me I appreciate it but I obviously didn't answer, so if you could Facebook me or email me letting me know who you are (since the number is different) that way we can figure out a time for you to call back. I would really appreciate it.

Ok, now that that is out of the way. Bonjour!

Last night we made dinner with spices that Megan brought with her from Italy, and boy-oh-boy was it delicious!

Then we went and walked around the streets and ate ice cream that was shaped like a rose and was delicious!


Today was our final day of orientation, woohoo! So exciting. Last night I didn't sleep very well because there were loud gun-shot sounding noises outside our window! (Most likely not gunshots but very loud BANG BANG! like sounds) We all woke up and got ready and went to our usual breakfast place, where I got a croissant chocolat and cafe au lait. We decided to walk to school again, taking a different route referred to us by one of our on-site staff members. It took us about 40 minutes yet again, but we walked at a leisurely pace which was nice.

This is right down the street from our apartment, it's the round about where there is an Opera House.


Once we got to school we received orientation on the general rules of the school: how many absences we are allowed, where the classrooms are, textbooks, and on-site excursions. Yes, you read that correctly on-site excursions. Most of our classes have these excursions, many of them around 10-15 times throughout the semester. Basically what we will be doing is meeting at a given place at a certain time and will have class at that location. For example, I am in History of Paris Architecture. So one day we will go and have class at the Eiffel Tower, so instead of reading about it we will physically be there studying it. AMAZING RIGHT!? I'm so excited! Especially for the excursions in my Haute Couture class!
After orientation a group of us walked down the street and bought sandwiches. Salami and mozzarella toasted on a croissant, YUMMY! We then walked down another street and ate them in the park.

Isn't it gorgeous?! We were sitting on a bench underneath the tree's but then got up and stretched out on the grass :) This park is literally right down the street from my campus so I have a feeling that in between classes I will be doing a lot of homework here.
After basking in the sunlight and enjoying our delicious meal we walked back to our campus and heard Andy Steves speak. Many of you don't know who he is, but he is the son of Rick Steves who writes these books....

His son is now offering travel programs of his own. He came to talk to us about how to travel in Europe for cheap, and just the in's and out's of studying abroad. He was super nice and offered a lot of good information for all of us.

After the lecture we left and went back to the store that I told you about yesterday (where the power went out) and bought some stuff for the apartment. We then decided to ride the metro home because we were carrying our textbooks and shopping bags. When we were trying to find the metro station we ran into some really cool streets and buildings.

 

We finally found our way to the metro stop and on our way down to the train there were some guys practicing parkour.

 It was super cool to actually see it happening right there. I've never seen anyone actually run up a wall before haha.

Afterwords we took our metro ride with all our fellow Parisians.

Once we arrived at our stop we just walk right down the street to our apartment and up the spiral staircase and into our rooms. It's so nice. Tonight we are just chilling, and then later going out to a club that we heard was free to hang out and see what the average life is like for Parisians. Tomorrow we are all sleeping in (still trying to shake off the jet lag) and then going to grab breakfast and coffee by the Seine river, make our way over to Shakespeare and company, and then go lay in Luxembourg gardens and read. I can't wait!

 Au Revoir!