When The Snow Falls, France Shuts Down

This past week the north region of France recieved about 3 inches of snow on Thursday. I took the train to Lille to finish up some Christmas shopping and the ride there was glorious! On the train I was listening to Christmas music and gazing out the window to the snow covered French countryside. However, since it snowed SNCF (French train company) announced that the trains will be running below high speed due to the snow. Now being from Minnesota this made me laugh out loud! While waiting for my train back to Fourmies I was watching hoards of people crowd around these heaters (there are only 4 of them in the whole station!) and I was just thinking...why aren't there more heaters!! I was freezing and shaking by the time my train arrived (later than scheduled due to snow). I read in the Lille newspaper that 25% of flights out of Paris were cancelled because of snow. Luckily the trains tend to keep running even though it snows :). Yesterday we recieved about 5-6 inches of heavy, wet snow...yay. I wouldn't've minded but I didn't bring waterproof winter boots with me which was really dumb but I was under the impression that this region didn't get much snow! Oh well. When I arrived home yesterday after an afternoon of baking failed peanut butter cookies I had to shovel my gravel walkway with a dirt shovel. To me this was insane because in Minnesota those just wouldn't work but alas I'm in France....it took me about 45-60 minutes to shovel my small, narrow walkway and I was furious after...Mainly because I don't have the proper footwear. Luckily I have 12 days until I'll be getting different ones back home. Since it snowed yesterday, Fourmies turned into a ghost town. There were hardly any cars on the road and if they were, they were stuck. On all sides of the road there were cars buried by the snow and I feel sorry for those people because they won't be going anywhere for awhile...hah. People were walking in the middle of the road to avoid having snow up to their knees. Also, there are no snow plow to be found....How do people get around?! This baffles me. Today there isn't snow falling so hopefully it's done!

Aperitif, A Duck and Chocolate Cake

Last night Krista, Nele and I were invited over to a colleague of their's at school named Valerie for dinner. Valerie picked us up at 7:30p and we all squeezed into her super tiny car...Honestly, it's amazing how these French people function with such small cars! Anyway, she lives in the neighboring town so it was a short drive. When we arrived I met her husband, Jean Michel who was very nice. Before dinner the French always have an 'aperitif' (a drink) along with some salty snacks. They whipped out about 7 or 8 different bottles of alcohol for us to choose from, talk about overwhelming! We chatted for a bit and then it was time for dinner. For dinner we had duck in a curry sauce, sliced bread, chinese noodles and of course wine. It was the smallest French dinner I've had here, I was surprised. At other people's houses there was a soup course first, then the main course, then a cheese and bread plate and then dessert with coffee or tea. After dinner twe had a choice of two desserts: a mango/coconut tarte or a molten chocolate center bundt cake. The bundt cake was freshly baked and it was heavenly! I thought I died. So delicious. After that then they served coffee or tea. Then after that (haha) we played a game called 'Times Up' . It's a type of card game where you play on teams and you are given two different actors/actresses/song writers etc on a blue or yellow side. You pick which one you want to play with. Next there are three rounds: the first one you describe the person, second you can only use one word to describe it and then lastly you act it out. It's similar to charades but better ( I think!). :) It was a fantastic night! Their house was very small and they kept all of the doors closed to all of the rooms which makes it difficult to find the bathroom.....hehe.

Only 3 more weeks until I arrive back home! Wow!

SNOW!

Today beautiful, white snow fell from the sky. It made me feel at home because it's so strange to go through November without seeing snow. I love it. It was only a light dusting though but I'll take it. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone back home. I wish I could be there. I miss the wonderful smells and the loud family and my family in general. I hope you all ate some extra turkey and pumpkin pie for me.

Gobble gobble.

22 more days.

Post Office

Two days ago I ventured out of my house to the town to mail a few important letters. I only had two of them stamped and I desperately needed stamps for other letters I would soon be writing. Upon arriving at the post office, the doors had a huge red tape X over them and there was a sign proclaiming it would be closed until DECEMBER 3rd! I almost died. How am I supposed to send letters now?? I was really upset because I do write a lot of letters and postcards AND they didn't post any notice of this closing....After this I quickly jumped to the conclusion that since the post office is closed that means mail must be stopping until the 3rd. That also sent me into rage. I know what you're thinking: 'Marie, you're overreacting, they can't close down the post office for two weeks'. Believe me, I had the same thought in my mind but then they very well could close it down...it is France we're talking about. Thankfully I have recieved a package and now I can rest easy.

Oh France. How I will miss thee and your crazy practices.

Trains, trams and doctors

Yesterday morning I had my doctors appointment in Lille. I had to go to this appointment in order to 'validate' my long stay visa. I took the train from Fourmies to Lille yesterday morning and then I took a tram into one of the suburbs of Lille to the OFII office. I arrived early at the office and I discovered that they were closed! Luckily I remembered that they are closed until 1:30p for lunch - whew. I saw a couple of other assistants that I had met at orientation so that was nice. Also, there were about 25 other assistants there doing the same thing! I was really nervous for this appointment because of the horror stories that I heard...everything from naked chest exams to the doctor poking you speaking in rapid French. Thankfully it was so much better than that. First they took a chest exam that wasn't topless (whew!) then I saw another doctor who took my height and weight and I did a mini eye exam. After that doctor I went to the last one who evaluated my x-ray (no TB for me! haha). Finally after that I got my 'stamp' which is actually a sticker saying that I'm good to stay in France. I'm so glad that's over with! All of the people there were really nice and they spoke some English which was great obviously. Hehe. As an added bonus, I got to keep my x-ray! What am I going to do with it you ask? Answer: no idea. Haha Its a good souvienr though!

Nice is Nice

SO sorry for being so behind in this blog. Two weeks ago I was in Nice/Cote d'Azur for the Toussaint break. I went there with two other assistants who work in Fourmies: Krista and Nele. Our travels started on October 24th when we had to get creative on how to get to Paris because of the major transportation strikes that were occuring all over France. Eventually we made it to Paris for our flight that was leaving the next morning. We slept at the airport which was an absolute disaster! At around 1a the cleaning people came around and one man was using a machine that had a large, blinking yellow light on it and then whenever he backed up the machine beeped! Needless to say I didn't sleep at all. I was actually really surprised at how many other people there were sleeping around us. Once 4:30a rolled around I was so happy because we could check in for our flight. After checking in and going through security we waiting for about 45 mintues until they finally started boarding us. By this time I was ready to be on that flight! We were all transferred down to a bus that took us to our plane. When the flight was all set to go they announced that we couldn't take off until 10:30a (our flight was supposed to leave at 7:55a) because of air traffic control problems. Luckily we snuck into an earlier slot and we arrive at Nice on time (8:30a). Whew! When we arrived we took the bus into the center of nice and then we walked from the train station to our hostel. Our hostel served free breakfast, had dinner every night and free internet! One night I had duck for dinner. It was actually pretty good! The day we arrived it was rainy and cold and we thought to ourselves 'we should've stayed home in Fourmies because it's the same weather!'. The hostel was so nice and we had a great experience there. It was located only 2 blocks from the beach! That day we explored Nice a little bit. The next day we went to Eze and Monaco. In Eze we toured a Medieval town and a perfume factory. Also in our group we met a girl from South Africa named Mariska who was traveling by herself so she joined us along with a girl from Austrailia named Bonnie. Both of these girls were fantastic and I'm so sad we couldn't spend more time together. In Monaco we saw Monte Carlo, walked on the famous racetrack and particpated in a carnival they were having right on the port! We also hiked up to see the royal palace. We had beautiful weather that day so once we got back to Nice we went down to the beach and watched the sunset - incredible. Words can't describe how awesome it was. The next day we went to Cannes and we walked on the beach and saw the theatre where they hold the Film Fesitval. It was really relaxing. We had to take a bus from Nice and it was only supposed to take an hour but it took almost 2!!! Oh the French... Our last day in Nice was spent by walking around and trying to soak in the last rays of the sun. The next morning Nele and I had to head out early to catch our flight back to Paris. Our flight was delayed twice and we took off about an hour later than we were supposed to. Once we arrived we had about one hour and a half until our TGV train was leaving to take us to Lille. By this time I was exhausted! We finally arrived back home in Fourmies. I was happy to be home because then I could lay around. It sounds ridiculous I know but after walking for hours for 4 days I was worn out. Overall it was a fantastic trip and I can't fully describe it. I'll try to update more often! I still don't have internet or telephone at my house...after 2 months!

Until next time...

Cote d'Azur

For the Toussaint Vacation Krista, Nele and I decided to go to Nice for 4 days. We had to spend the night in the Charles De Gaulle Airport in order to catch our 7 a.m. flight this morning. It was fun for about 2 hours but then the over-tiredness sets in and pretty soon you'd kill for a bed. Oddly enough there were a lot of people doing the same thing we were. A guy next to us snored the whole night and not to mention there were cleaning crews buzzing around us...some on machines with flashing yellow lights!! Needless to say I didn't hardly sleep. Our flight was scheduled to leave Paris at 7a.m. this morning but once we got loaded on and we were ready to go the captain said that air traffic control weren't allowing us to leave until 8:30a.m.! Fortunately we left shortly after that announcement and we arrived on time in Nice. We were happy campers! Unfortunately it rained all day today. We took a walking tour of Nice, the beach too and we checked into our hostel. Its a great hostel and I'm really happy with it. They even serve dinner and breakfast is free...score! It was an awesome day and I'm ready to go to bed but its only 3:34p.m.! Tomorrow we're headed to Eze and Monaco for the day. I have already been to both but I loved both of them. Its so odd going back to places that I was three years ago. For example, I found the same gelato place in Nice that I had visited when I was here with Providence...haha! Thats it for now. Its going to be a busy 4 days but it's nice to get out of Fourmies.

Love