Ti amo

I have a new love. The name: Italy. It is amazing here. I don't want to leave already. The people are sooo friendly, the food is incredible, and the whole atmosphere is just fun. It's rained almost the entire trip but it doesn't even matter. Turin was good, but I don't think I'd go if it wasn't for the Olympics, Florence was fantastic, Rome was interesting, and Venice is probably my favorite so far, mostly because it's Carneval and the atmosphere is unlike anything I've seen before, plus all the canals and everything are great.

Last night in Italy, headed to Austria tonight on a night train. I guess next time it's Guten tag!!

Olympics and Caulk

First off, a very happy birthday to my "sis" Linzi! Love ya!

Tonight I'll be on a train to Amiens, getting ready to fly to Italy bright and early tomorrow morning! The plan: I start in Torino with my friend Steph, who managed to get us an apartment in Torino, as opposed to our previous plan to stay in Milan, two hours away. Fantastic. We have tickets to a preliminary round men's hockey game, US-Sweden on Feb. 19 (in case you want to watch along with me!) Then we're off to Florence for a few days, brief stop in Pisa to see the tower ;), followed by Rome, and then Venice in time to catch the end of Carneval. From there we head to Vienna, and wrap up in Prague. Busy two weeks, but it should be fun times!!

This past week has been a week of preparation and anticipation-we've been planning this trip since July, so it's seems weird that it's actually here. I've watched more Olympics this week than probably the rest of my life combined, I guess because I have the time but also because I'm going, which makes it that much cooler. Last night was the men's free skate commentated (is that the right verb?) by the guys who have become my favorite French announcer duo, Philippe Candeloro and Nelson Monfort. I don't know why I like them so much, but I do. They're nicer than some other announcers, who get all excited when someone from another country messes up because that means the French competitors could pull ahead. They still get excited for the Frenchies, but they also cheer for the other athletes. Last night they were all excited for everyone and I don't know how many times I heard "Magnifique," "Super," etc. Plus they make me laugh-at one point Phillipe said "I'm going to have to leave for a minute because I have to pee," and Nelson said "No, I'm keeping you here," and Phillipe responded "But I have to go now or I'll miss Brian Joubert (the French skater)." I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to say that kind of stuff as an announcer, but it made me laugh, especially since the French say "faire pipi," which I think is funny anyway. Then toward the end of the night, they were talking about how no program had been flawless, and how some skaters took some hard falls, and Phillipe said "The cafeteria food must have been bad at Olympic Village today." That was followed by some banter, and Nelson finally said, "Phillipe, je vous adore." Oh man, me too.

Today I have to get home to meet my landlord who's coming to try to fix my kitchen sink, which isn't draining. Oh, funny story. A few weeks ago he came to caulk my shower because it was leaking. As he was walking into the bathroom, he held up the caulk ("la silicone," in French) and said "Caulk, en anglais," (caulk in English) except I heard "Caulk dans le nez!" (Caulk in the nose!) and since he was holding it by my face I thought, "What the heck, this guy's gonna put caulk in my nose??" It wasn't until after he left that I figured out what he actually said.

Ok, that's all. Viva Italia!

Still here!

There's seems to be some general confusion about when I leave for my break, but don't worry, I'm in France until next Friday, the 17th. Biding out the time with my last week but watching the Olympics non-stop and getting pumped for my trip.

I spent last weekend in Caen and had a fantastic time with my crazy friends there. Friday Jen and I met up with Kristina and Charlie to go out to dinner for Charlie's birthday. We went to a crepe place downtown and it was amazing! Of course, we all had a dinner crepe followed by a dessert crepe-mmm, add that to the list of reasons I love this country. After we went back to Kristina and Charlie's place to play rummy and watch the opening ceremony to the Olympics. My favorite part was the people in the white suits on the net who formed a dove at the end-hopefully you all got to see it, cause it was really cool!

Saturday Jen left to go to a friend's tae-boxing match in Rouen, so I was on my own for a bit. The day started off with a haircut, since my hair has been driving me nuts lately. I got a cut at the same place, recommended by my friend Karina, in November, and it all went well even though I was a bit nervous. This time it went fine too, but although I went in for a trim I came out with something completely different. She looked so innocent with her scissors, but I swear they never stopped moving the whole time I was in the chair. I seriously have about 1/4 of the hair I went in with. So now I'm trying to learn to like my Frenchie cut, although I have to say my mind's not made up yet. The haircut was followed by a Carrefour trip with Karina, and then a night of taco salad and vegging at her place along with the usual suspects Shannon, Natalie, and Jen. After spending a day with no one but French boys, Jen was a little loopy and got us all going, but it resulted in some fun pictures that I'll be posting soon.

Sunday it was back here to start my marathon sleeping, teaching, Olympic watching week. Can't wait to leave on Friday!! Hope everyone's around someone they love today-Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

Getaway

So here it is another Wednesday and I'm once again in the computer room with Yasmin. It's become something of a ritual since this is the only time during the week that we can be assured of having the computers to ourselves, as there aren't any classes on Wednesday afternoons. It still seems like there's never enough time to do everything I want to do online! Let's see, what else have I been up to...

Last weekend, after a tentative attempt to go to Paris didn't work out, I decided that I still wanted to get out of Normandy. After going back and forth for awhile, I finally decided, at noon on Friday, that I was going to go to Brittany once again. I wanted to go somewhere but didn't want to go through Paris to get there, and since Brittany is about the only place I can go without doing that, that pretty much settled it. By five p.m. that night, I was on the train and headed to St. Brieuc. After looking at other places in Brittany and having problems with lodging, train schedules, and other things, I decided it would be fun to see the Pink Granite Coast, an area in the north of Brittany that is supposed to have a pretty coastline. Initially, I thought I would stay in Lannion, close to the water, but at the last minute decided that St. Brieuc was a better choice because it's a bigger city but still decently close to the coastline. I arrived in St. Brieuc about 9 pm that night, only to find out that there weren't any more buses running to take me to the hostel. I caught a taxi and we started our drive out to the outskirts of St. Brieuc-guess I should have done some more research to know that the hostel was a 40 minute walk out of town in the middle of a park. In any case, got to the hostel, checked into my very clean, very plain room, and crashed for the night.

The next day I was up decently early and, after some difficulty, managed to catch a bus to town. Wandered around and made it to the tourist office to find out about getting to the coast, and started for the train station armed with schedules and maps and the like. By the time my train arrived in Lannion, though, I realized that if I took the last bus to the coast and back I would miss the last train back to St. Brieuc, and since I hadn't listened to a little voice that told me to stay in Lannion the second night, I ended up just staying in Lannion for a few hours. I climbed up some stairs to a church that gave me a nice view over the city, took a nice stroll on a path along the river. I intended to make it to the beach but didn't have quite enough time, but the scenery reminded me of Michigan and I was pretty content nonetheless. When I arrived back in St. Brieuc, I headed back to the hostel early on the last bus of the night, made some phone calls home, and called it a night.

So, all in all, an enjoyable weekend, although it would have been better if I had listened to my first instinct and stayed in Lannion, where I could have easily caught a bus, and where the hostel was right downtown. I was worried about it not having much to do, but really it had more character than St. Brieuc, a town several times its size. I guess, if I didn't know before, my weekend was a reminder to plan instead of trying to wing it!

This weekend I'm headed to Caen to see some friends, and then only one more week until I leave for my Italian/Austrian/Czech Republican adventure!