Lists

A number of my friends have been doing this on facebook, and I found it intriguing.  I guess probably most of the people who read this blog regularly have facebook, but I feel like this blog was a more permanent way to post this list.  And it gives me the opportunity to expand it, and maybe come back and use some of them as inspiration for future bloggy introspections.

1. If I could have any superpower, it would be the ability to speak and understand all languages. 
2. I'm starting to regret ditching Spanish after 7th grade (même si je ne peux pas imaginer ma vie sans français)
3. I have a really strong need to do things for the people I care about, and I often forget to take care of myself.
4. A year ago I lost one of the most influential people in my life, but I still have a hard time convincing myself that that loss was real. 
5. I'm really afraid of not living up to my own expectations and those of the people around me, and sometimes I feel like the bar is set SO high, but the thought of trying to lower it is too much like giving up.
5. I am a huge grammar and spelling Nazi. Finding stupid errors in peoples' writing is one of the most annoying things EVER. But the only person I will accept editing or criticism about my own grammar from is my mother.
6. I plan and make lists because doing so gives me a sense of control over my life that I can't give up.
7. I really want to travel and go on adventures, but the thought of doing those things spontaneously is horrifying to me.
8. Dancing makes me really happy. It's incredibly therapeutic and probably my biggest turn-on. I especially love just letting go of myself at a concert or a club.
9. I wish that music just radiated from my body so that it would always be there.
10. Hearing my sister's voice on the phone makes me feel warm inside.
11. I feel like an outsider everywhere I go, and that makes me kind of hate who I am--the color of my skin, my heritage, where I come from, what I've done in my life, etc.
12. My two favorite views are the Sandias at sunset and just after sunrise, and looking up the Rhône from Pont Gallieni in the evening or at night. They make me feel at home.
13. I'm a huge over-achiever and teacher's pet. Doing well in school is one of the things that I feel gives me worth.
14. My parent's wouldn't agree with this, but I'm really obsessive about cleaning things. But only if I know I can get my space to an acceptable state of cleanliness.
15. I feel like a huge hypocrite about these because they're really bad for the environment, but I LOVE driving my car just for the sake of driving it, and just standing under a hot shower.
16. I always need something to do--I fill my life up with school, work, meetings, and other activities because I don't like to have too much time to myself. I'm scared both of feeling like I'm wasting time and of being left too long to my own thoughts.

Also, I've decided to add a couple more...

17. I can't seem to stay in one place, which is exciting at times, but it really messes up my prospects for love and romance, and it impedes on my friendships. I feel like I'm constantly having to say goodbye.

18. My friends are some of the most amazing people ever.

19. I get really frustrated because my relationships are really spread out across both geographical and social space, and it's probably impossible to have all the people I care about together at once.

20. I have a really strange memory.  I remember faces and places and stories really well, but as soon as I finish a test, paper, or presentation, I forget everything.  This is true of books and movies as well.  I have to reread even my favorite books regularly or I forget what happens in them.

21. I can't use drunkenness as an excuse for most of the silly things I do when I'm drunk, because I'm usually cognizant that they are out of the norm for me, and even kind of stupid...I just don't care.

22. I can't imagine myself really becoming an adult or growing old.  I don't plan my wedding, I can't imagine myself pregnant, I can't see myself with grey hair and a cane.  Even though I know that I will probably have arthritis and a messed up body from figure skating, I can't imagine ever not being able to dance.  Sometimes I feel like my future doesn't exist.

23. I don't actually like to share my feelings with people, but I love to listen to theirs.  Still, I sometimes feel really selfish when people only talk about themselves and I can't talk about me.

Ok, that's enough for now.  I think I like this exercise because I love listing things.  It's a nice way of giving some organization to my random trains of thought.

A little down and out

Surrounded, drowning, lost...that's how I feel right now.  Death and loss and sadness seem to be rampant around me these past couple of days.  I'm dealing with the anniversary of my own loss, and meanwhile my mom tells me about a family friend who is quickly fading from cancer, a friend of a friend whose father just passed away, a good friend whose grandfather is not doing well at all...a number of my friends are in these weird funks for various reasons...and then there's the global turmoil and all of the deaths in Mumbai, that feels so far away, and yet so close.  Everyone around me is lost in the fog that is deadweek and finals preparation for finals.  I spent the last two nights in the library until the wee hours of the morning working on papers, and thankfully, today, I was able to sit and have a therapeutic cup of tea with an amazing friend, and then come home and drown myself a little bit.  Not so much in a bad way, just let myself face the things that are causing all this pain.  I still don't have any answers and I'm not over it, but at least I wrote some of them down and shed some serious tears and let the stress go for a night.  Hopefully it's enough to get me through to next Thursday when I get to go home.  And at least maybe escape the oppressive cloudcover bearing down on Eugene and making me feel really trapped.  I definitely need a change of scenery.

I hate to leave this on a down note, but that's kind of where I'm at and I need to get some sleep because I'm STILL sick and haven't been getting much sleep at all.  There's still a long haul to get through, too.  

Bisous. 

Sickkkk

I can't stop coughing, which might be the worst thing ever.  And what makes it worse is that I more or less feel fine, but I hate going places cuz I have these loud outbursts of coughing and I can't stop.  It is lame.  And I sound like a smoker...even though I'm not.  My lungs are not big fans of me right now.

This weekend is basically my last weekend here before dead week (and then it's finals, and then HOME!), which is scary cuz it means I really need to get to work on all the stuff thats due right before or after Thanksgiving, as I pretty much won't be able to work on them any other weekend.  Library, here I come!  Huzzah.

Bisous!!  

It never ceases to amaze me how some people can express my feelings before I even know I feel that way.  Maybe it's just me projecting myself into their words, but I really feel like I constantly come across songs or blogs or stories where I know just exactly what the speaker is going through.  Or, I think I do.  It doesn't so much surprise me that people, during their lifetimes, often have similar experiences and thoughts, but that I come across those similar things in such a timely manner.

During my sophomore year, I would read my friend's blog a lot and was always so amazed at the emotions she would express.  In retrospect, I think a lot of what drew me was the way she was able to express herself...very flowy and beautiful, in comparison to my much more technical way of expressing myself.  My desire to find a reflection in her words was strong enough that I managed to always do it.  That and we both have a strong sense of connection to home, and are pretty far away from home, so often the homesickness present in her writing was equally present within me.

More often than not, there are a number of songs that I get obsessed with at a given time, and that I can't stop listening to because they are so pertinent to me.  

Lately I've come across an old friend from high school that I don't actually know all that well.  As it went in my high school, we all thought we knew each other and had interactions with each other on some personal level, but that doesn't necessarily mean we actually knew each other all that well.  She posts a lot of notes on facebook that I've found myself really drawn to.  Sometimes I'm simply fascinated by the things she says and the way she says them, but there are moments when what she says reaches out and grabs me and wont let me go because it's so totally what is going on in my head.

I could go on, but I should get back to work.  I just needed to express my unceasing moments of shock at how well other people can, unknowingly, tap into my own feelings through theirs.

Bisous.

(A little) less bittersweet

I feel like the sun should be shining, but I'm in Oregon and, luckily, global warming has not gotten THAT disastrous, yet.  Last night was amazing.  It was so good to be with a bunch of my friends celebrating the great change that has come to this country.  And it was amazing to watch New Mexico's results come in.  Udall, Obama, Heinrich, Lujan, Teague(, Toulouse...even though county clerk wasn't on KOAT's website).  I'm SO proud to be from a state that elected an amazing democratic delegation to send to Congress.  Young and inexperienced as they may be.  

It's kind of ironic that my home state, an historically red state (although, despite our voting in the presidential elections, I like to think that, within New Mexico, we aren't as red as you might guess) elected all these new blue senators and representatives, while true blue states like Oregon and California kind of fell off in some ways.  I mean, Yay!  They were blue on the presidential map, but I'm disappointed to see how close the Senate race between Merkley and Smith still is.  Maybe we'll have a third Udall cousin in the Senate after all, although I'm glad Smith wont really tarnish the Udall name, since few people know about his family ties.  It's also too bad that Kitty lost the mayoral election here in Eugene.  And then there's Prop 8 in California (and similar ballot measures passing in Arizona, Arkansas, and Florida).  Really?!?!?  I can't believe how much good change there has been in the past 24 hours, and yet how much change was stopped in its tracks.  Thank goodness for Michigan voting for stem cell research (and medical marijuana), and Colorado not voting for an amendment that would define life as starting at the moment of conception, and California and S Dakota not instituting abortion limits, or I might really lose faith.  

I sincerely hope that, with a new democratic government, and a great, strong-willed president, we can overcome these kinds of ignorant decisions.  I have to keep telling myself that Prop 8 is not indefinite, that it is subject to change when people wake up and stop trying to control each other's lives.

We've come so far and so much good has come of this election.  I really hope people don't become complacent and let that good momentum go to waste.  There are still important things to fight for!  At the same time, though, it's important not to lose faith because of some losses.  Great things are happening and we are living them.  Don't waste that!  Own it!

Dear you...

First, to all of the people I can't be with to hug and celebrate with, I love you SO much!!!  For all the lost elections we've been together for, this is one for the books, and I wish I could celebrate with you!  You guys mean more to me than I can say and I miss you so much!

But most of all, to the person that isn't here to see this.  I can't imagine what it would have meant to you to celebrate this with us and I can only believe that you are here with me.  You made it possible for me to be the person I am today and you would have been so happy to vote for the first black president of the US.  Knowing what this would mean to you makes it that much more important to me.  I love you so much and I miss you more than I can say.  What a way to come near the anniversary I've been dreading.  I know you are here and, as Devika says, I know you are dancing amongst your unabridged copies of Les Mis (which are here with me now!!!).  And I'm glad that, at least, I can know how proud you would be to see Obama and Udall and Heinrich, and so many other amazing people win this election. 

To everyone who worked their butts off on this election and to everyone who voted for the first time (myself included...for president at least!!), or voted at all, you are amazing!

All my love,

~~Terra~~

Epic Fail

I have not done homework all week.  I don't technically have anything due, but I do have 3 big project/papers due in the next few weeks, an online class that I'm behind in, and 3 midterms next week.  AHH.  I think we should get time off for Halloween.  I feel like it's the holiday season and I should be celebrating, not doing homework.  And something about the weather turning all gloomy makes me want to cuddle up and read.  And I'm getting sick.  And one of my roommates just lent me "A Year in the Merde" and the other two "Merde" books, and all I want to do is read them, even though they make me kind of homesick for France.  Basically, I have a million things to do that are infinitely better than school.

Also, I want to go home for GOTV/E-Day because I don't feel all that invested in Oregon politics, plus E-Day is not as exciting as it is back home because everyone mails in their ballots.  I'm feeling very disconnected from the whole thing...I'm still really excited, but it's different for some reason.  I think I'm just using it as an outlet for my homesickness...if that makes any sense at all...

Um, there was something I was thinking about this morning that I really wanted to write about, but I can't for the life of me remember what...oh well...I have to go try to salvage pumpkins pretty soon anyway.  We are carving them tonight and I'm EXCITED!  I haven't carved pumpkins in ages, and one of the girls from Lyon who is studying here this year is coming and seems pretty excited.  And Sarah and I are going to try to make pumpkin pie.  YAY!

BIZ

Blank

I've been going back and forth in my mind as to whether or not to post this.  I hate emo blog posts, because they always end up being pity parties...so, disclaimer: I'm not doing this for attention, I'm doing it because I'm trying to find my mind right now.  And, hypocritically, I do look forward to that elusive comment that whips my whole perception of the universe around and back on track.  

I've been feeling fairly brain-dead lately.  Unmotivated, uninspired, undetermined, unenthused, unmoved.  A lot of it is that my classes are fairly unengaging in a lot of ways.  And yet I'm entirely consumed by homework and the hundreds of pages of reading I am expected to do every week (with the looming threat of failing some stupid reading quiz...France really jaded me to tedious work like that).

There has been this looming sense of fatality and exasperation with complexly simple social structures that I can't seem to shake.  It all kind of came to a head for me tonight, after not enough sleep last night, a relatively uneventful day, and the promise of pages and pages of reading awaiting me at home.  Instead, I went to my friend's house for a cup of tea, which usually has a way of settling my thoughts.

But not so much tonight.  Tonight, I ended up lying on the floor while my two friends discussed boys and crushes and existentialism and nihilism and Dostoyevsky.  And I had nothing to say.  There are no crushes in my life right now (I know...it blows my mind, too), and existentialism and Russian literature are so beyond my capacity to care.  I am far too hands-on and realistic to see the point of philosophy, I think.  It simply holds no interest for me whatsoever.

So, I'm lying there and my mind was completely blank...and not like good zen clear-mindedness, but like this horrible void.  And it's kind of the worst thing ever for me right now.  I can't seem to care about anything my teachers or friends have to say, and my lingering desire to be involved in things and to have something to give a shit about keeps getting let down and snuffed out in some way or another.

It's an awful feeling.  And so, riding home tonight, I was thinking about the email I need to write to my host-mom from France.  In her last email to me, she was telling me about the girl living in their house now.  Apparently she barely speaks French and seems very disassociated from the heavy stuff--politics, humanism, the stuff that usually keeps me going.  So, Florence told me it's really hard because she misses having someone to talk to about that stuff.

As I was thinking about what to tell her, I realized how much I missed our conversations.  I really took for granted having someone to talk to who had a very different worldview from my own.  And not just Florence, but Wei-Ching and Lionel and Camille and Flo and Romain and the other people from my classes.  That became normal for me, having someone take my thoughts, look at them from a different angle, and send them back, always tweaked.

I miss that.  And when I think about my family, friends, classes--my world right now, I realize that, while there are slightly different points of view, our general way of looking at things is painfully similar.  And, now that I've been spoiled, going back leaves me incredibly bored with it all.  I don't want to talk about big issues, because no one has a significantly different view than I do, and no one asks me sincere questions that are shocking in their simplicity.

I realize that I live in a liberal bubble, but the fact remains that, as much as I am loathe to associate myself with "The Right," we really aren't all that different, and, despite the economic crisis, we are all actually in relatively safe places right now (I mean, people are still driving around Eugene in giant trucks, so it can't be that bad...).  And the effect of that is exacerbated by this liberal bubble around my life.

A memory from this summer just flashed in my head.  Some of my friends got in this huge fight one night.  At the base of the argument was the fact that there were two different ways of thinking and experiencing the world clashing.  It was crazy at the time, and had a heightened ridiculosity from the show tunes we had just been belting out, but the conflict was so visceral and irreparable because the two sides of the argument were irresolvable with each other.

I don't want a scream fest with best friends, but I feel like I need to be reminded that the world is not all homework and boys and coffee and Obama and McCain and consumption and rain and cleaning and frustration.  That there are so many perspectives to look from and so many different filters that people use and so many past experiences that color our perceptions.  And there's my reminder...

And now sleep so I can get up in the morning and put the veil back on and read monotonous pages and sit in class and hope that I can escape this funk sooner rather than later.

What's up with that?

My textbook for my NEPA class is all kinds of whack.  There are more pages of appendices than there are pages of actual chapters.  Kinda blows my mind.

An awkward threshold

It's pretty amazing how much work can be piled on in such a short amount of time.  It kind of feels like I've been in school for several weeks, not just two.  Part of the problem is that I spent a year in France, where the assigned homework is relatively minimal, and now I'm back in a different system that seems to thrive off of tedious exercises designed to test your ability to do tedious exercises more than your understanding of the subject at hand.

Meanwhile, my mind seems to ever be elsewhere.  Right now I keep going over a 5 minute "speech" I'm supposed to be doing on Monday for Indigenous day.  I'm really kind of freaking out about this, actually.  So I'm going to write down my thoughts so I can go away and come back to them Sunday night and hopefully know what the hell I'm doing when I stand up on Monday.

When I was asked to speak, it was at a Coalition Against Environmental Racism meeting.  My friend, who was desperate to find speakers for Monday's Indigenous Day celebration, suggested that we could talk about an EJ issue.  Basically she just wanted some speakers and some representation of allies.  I'm an ally, I thought, and I know quite a bit about the cultural, environmental, and social impacts of mining on Indian reservations.  Why not?  But I decided I didn't really want to talk about environmental justice and list a bunch of numbers and facts about the impact of snowmaking on the 13 tribes who consider the San Francisco Peaks sacred land.  I had no idea what I wanted to talk about, but for some reason, it wasn't any of the issues that I have stockpiled information about for papers and CAER presentations.

My friend's reaction when I told her that I was doing this was ironically, and almost painfully, appropriate: she burst out laughing, saying it was the last thing she expected me to say.  And why not?  If you look at me and my family background, you see middle class white girl whose ancestors are all white Europeans.  

That is never more apparent to me than when I go to a Powwow or the Zuni Pueblo Dances or a Native rights activism event.  It's equally obvious to me when I participate in the LGBTQ or Chicano rights movements.  I'm forever an ally, forever an outsider, and forever wondering if I should really be there.

But, despite my ancestry, there's a lot that you wouldn't know by looking at me.  For instance, I probably wouldn't exist if my parents, who come from very different places and backgrounds, didn't share a common desire to fight for Navajo land rights...to fight for families whose land had been taken away from them, and to stop mining on Native land.  To look at me, you might not guess that I grew up considering my best friend and his family, who are Navajo, to be my family.  You certainly wouldn't know that I called mutton and fry bread "grandma food," and constantly sought to get away from my vegetarian father to eat it.  I have vivid childhood memories of celebrations at Hopi mesa, sitting on a rooftop with a bunch of other kids catching candy thrown by the clown kachinas.

None of this makes the Native movement mine.  I don't suffer from any of the litany of injustices wrought on Native peoples, nor do I lay claim to any of their demands.  But it's important for me to be an ally, because Native culture is a part of who I am and Native rights are important to me.  

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I'm not sure that I can say all that in the five minute time period they are having people speak for, especially if I listen to the little "mom voice" in my head, telling me not to talk so fast, and to enunciate.  I don't know what to say really, but those are the things that come to mind when I think about what I want to say.  My frustration at my outsider status has been a growing thing inside me, making me second-guess myself constantly.  It's one thing to say that to my mom, or write it in my blog, but I'm not sure I want to announce it to the world.  Can I say all that without sounding pretentious or like I can, indeed, stake my claim to indigenous rights without actually being indigenous?  It's a difficult position to try to be PC in.  And difficult to not come off as a privileged white girl trying to make a point about not being a privileged white girl.

Urgh!  I should NOT be stressing about this 5 minute speech when I have about a million years worth of homework, but for whatever reason, it's important to me to assert myself as a legit ally without trying to be someone I'm not.

Finding It

I'm not entirely certain what "it" is, and I'm fairly certain I wont find it any time soon...or ever, really, but I do feel that today led me in a good direction.  I've been feeling pretty lackluster lately...a combination of back to work, homesickness, and this repetitive outsider mentality that I haven't been able to shake for a while, but right now I feel quite a bit better about things.

As much as I hate doing this, I feel like I need to share a run-down of my day.

I slept in, which is always a double-edged sword for me, because it's nice, but my first thoughts were of time wasted that could have been spent doing more important things.  Then I cleaned up some of the scattered leftovers of unpacking and the first week of school, which was badly needed.  My room wasn't so much messy as unfinished, which had been bothering me all week.  It's still not really finished to the extent that I would like it to be, but it's a little more comfortable.

I then spent the afternoon doing homework with some friends.  Which is slightly depressing, as it was the first Saturday of school (as my friend said, I hope that by "homework party," you mean you're sitting around talking about how you should be doing homework but you're not).  On the other hand, it was almost nice to feel accomplished and make some progress.  I know I'm a total nerd.  I've accepted it and moved on.  Please do the same.

I had very lofty goals of being a social butterfly and making mojitos with a friend and then going to a concert and then going salsa dancing and then possibly even going out and doing the college student thing and hanging at a bar, all of which would have been fun, but I'm SO much happier with what happened instead.  With the exception of missing out on Rogue Wave, which I was really looking forward to.  Alas, after a prolonged conversation with my mom, we were kind of pressed for time to get to the concert, so we skipped mojitos.  Then, while taking a little pause at a friends house to say hi, we found out that Rogue Wave had cancelled and the concert was just some local bands.  We decided to stay and drink tea and chat with Devika, which turned into a too-much-time-spent-doing-homework induced giggle-fest on the part of April and I, which was slightly contagious, ending in all of us being sort of exhausted and pathetic, filled with pained, tired, crampy, sicky-ness and hunger.

After being whiny and pathetic about wanting to get food, but not knowing what we wanted or what was open, we finally went out in search of sushi, but ended up eating terrible pretend-tious mexican food.  I ended up going back to Devika's to have a bowl of ice cream to clean my palette of the unfortunate experience that was Qdoba (I'm pretty passionate about how disappointing the food was, if you can't tell), and the bowl of ice cream turned into three hours of amazing conversation.  Some of you may be aware of a frustration I was feeling at the end of this summer about this intense lack of interesting conversation in parts of my life, a strong yearning for the unique interaction that is hours of talking about everything.  My mom pointed out to me that I will never be happy with a person that I can't connect to in a fairly vocal, interactive way...someone that I can really talk to, and that comment has really stuck with me and I continuously notice how true that statement is.  She said it regarding romantic relationships, but I think it's fairly true of all of my other relationships as well.  I really thrive off of a good conversation--one in which you discuss everything from romance to foreign policy to religion to travel to anthropology to sociology to school to sex to music to whatever else comes to mind in a given moment.  Every time I come home from something like tonight, I feel like I just drank 4 cups of coffee and ate chocolate and danced to amazing live music and got some amazing hugs.  It's just so much good and so energizing.

Half of me feels like expounding on some of what we talked about.  But I feel like it's more personal for some reason.  Like I need to process it all to myself rather than out loud.  Plus, I'm finally starting to feel tired (funny how pajamas and a comfy bed can bring on sleepiness.  So, goodnight!

Bisous.

Back 2 Skool

Today was my first day as a senior in college (!!), which is really kind of overwhelming for me.  On the one hand, Im excited to be almost done with school, but as I told my friend the other day, I'm not quite sure I'm done with academia.  There are always a million classes I want to take and I hate having to choose the ones that go best with my major over the ones that just sound cool.  I pretty much never want to stop learning.  I realize that I will continue to learn through my experiences, but I kind of enjoy the classroom setting and the opportunity to sit before an expert and have them relate their knowledge to me.  That and, like most people my age, I'm not entirely sure what I want to do with myself once forced to join that ominous proverbial Real World that looms over us, promising difficulty in finding jobs and lack of parental support and freedom to live as we please.

And so, like so many others, I remain hidden at least partially behind my veil of college student denial, pretending that my responsibilities are minimal...even though they are at the back of my mind, making themselves known at those times that I let my guard down.

Beyond that constant train of thought, when I am able to just sort of be in the moment, things are going pretty well.  I took a week-long road trip with one of my good Oregon friends, who flew down to ABQ, hung out with me and my friends for a couple of days, and then kept me company while I drove to Eugene.  It was SO fun!  I love introducing people to my crazy mix of friends, and I think she quite enjoyed the experience that is my friends (and she didn't even see anyone in drag!).  Some of my friends threw me a little going away party, which was a lot of fun and may have gotten a little out of hand...lets just say it's a really good thing we did it two nights before I had to drive to AZ and not the night before :-P

After doing the NM thing, we drove to Flagstaff and hung out with my dad and little sister, which was really good.  April loves kids, so she had a blast with Sofi, and I just plain adore Sofi to pieces and am so happy when I get to see her.  And it was good to spend some time with my dad, too, since I hardly got to see him this year.  

Well rested after a weekend in Flagstaff, we hit the road again and drove to San Francisco.  This was the only part of the drive I was worried about because it was about 11 hours and I was doing all the driving myself.  Thank god for Macy's coffee and Taco Bell and April, because I never once got very tired.  In Sanfran, we stayed with a friend's mom (as our friend was already back in Oregon), and mostly did a LOT of shopping.  It was insane, but how often are you in a place with Sephora and H&M across the street from each other?  And then Express and the Body Shop were having sales.  *sigh*

The last two days of the road trip were spent driving up the California coast and trying to visit my old roommate's parents (which was, sadly, unsuccessful) and hanging out on the beach, and watching the sunset, and seeing the Redwoods, etc.  I really love the drive between San Francisco and Crescent City because you get to see beauty in so many different forms.

Finally, I had a weekend to get settled and see my friends and prepare myself for going back to school in the states, which is overwhelming after the somewhat experience of the french system (not to say that I didn't have any work, I just didn't feel nearly as stressed in the first week as I do here).  I spent the weekend doing more shopping for necessities for my room and groceries, spending as much time with my friends that I hadn't seen in far too long, and decorating my room to give it the feeling that I live there.  I thing I did a pretty darn good job considering a relatively short time frame.  It's still a little messy because there are a few things I'm not quite sure what to do with and because there is a ton of cardboard waiting to be recycled being stored in my room.  There are still some things I would like to improve, but I'm pretty happy with the place.

On the school front, I actually only had one class today: Environmental Management.  It's looking like it will be an interesting class, but I'm a little overwhelmed because we are supposed to have at least a vague proposal for our environmental plan project by Wednesday.  Eek.  Tomorrow is my busiest day, and I would really like to get a few things out of the way over the next couple of days, but I also kind of want to just hang out a little bit more.  Today, despite knowing that I should have been working, I hung with half of my roommates.  We ran a couple errands and then Andy made mac n cheese, which was delicious, and then I helped Alexa with her French homework, which made me miss France and speaking French SO much (which I had already been doing after emails to Wei and my host family, and looking at Gaby's pics from France).

Ok, I need to send a couple emails, do a little more reading, and then go to bed!

Bisous!

Overdue...as usual

I recently wrote in an email to a friend that the hectic, somewhat spontaneous nature of my summer, while bringing a lot of fun and excitement, has left me feeling like I'm missing something.  Or a lot of somethings, really.  My plans of keeping up the blogging have been unsuccessful (and it's not for a lack of things to say, let me tell you).  I haven't done nearly as good of a job at keeping up with people as I had hoped...both people here and abroad.  I haven't had time to read as many books as I would like (or as I have bought this summer).  I definitely have a sense of absence of quite a few things in my life right now.  Although I think part of that is something that comes with nearing the end of something...as I look toward heading back up to Oregon here in a couple weeks.

That being said, I've been incredibly busy and done so many wonderful things and met a lot of really great people.  There have been ups and downs, but a lot of memories have been made.  I'm not even going to try to sum it all up, because I know I'll forget something, and I know that a lot of what I've done falls into the category of "you kinda had to be there".  I think the big things that really stand out are the great concerts (I really think live music is quite possibly my favorite thing ever), cleaning out my grandpa's house (which has played a part in so many of the ups and the downs of my summer), and, of course, the nights at "Terrorist Gardens" (my friend's apartment building, which has come to be the definitive location of my summers).

Most recently, though, I drove up to Denver for the Democratic National Convention last week.  It was definitely a spontaneous thing...I invited myself along with some friends two days before they were leaving and just kind of inserted myself into the trip, and I have to say they are amazing for accommodating me and pulling some strings to fit me into their plans...particularly calling in some favors to get me into Invesco stadium for Obama's speech on Thursday.  

My political involvement has been at a minimum this year, which is sad considering what an important year it is.  A big part of that, I just realized, is that Napoleon, my political mentor of sorts, isn't doing the campaign thing this year, so my main connect into campaign life isn't there.  I do have other friends that are working in politics, but not as much in capacities to pull me in.  And since LCV isn't running a field campaign in ABQ this year, I don't have that to compel me either.  I also kind of have this sense (which I know rationally isn't a correct one) that there is a lot of hype about this election and therefore enough people campaigning that I'm not as badly needed.  I've gotten the sense from friends that Defenders of Wildlife (who have kind of filled LCV's spot) isn't scrounging for volunteers, and a canvasser from Obama's campaign told me they were doing pretty good also.  I do know that the election is going to be close and I want to be a part of that, but something keeps stopping me.  I really hope I can get over that when I get up to Oregon, although in a way it will be harder there because politics is such an insider sport, and I'm much more of an insider in NM than in Oregon.

Going up to Denver was one of those things that left me feeling more inspired and motivated, though, at the same time as it actually left me feeling like I could have definitely experienced it more.  We ended up not making it to any of the caucuses for a couple reasons, and I think I spent more time looking at t-shirts and buttons than actually talking politics.  But in the end, the energy there definitely reminded me why I want to be a politico.  There's something about the inspiration, confusion, conflict, compassion, gossip, alcoholism, silliness, change, solidarity, struggle, intelligence, passion, insiderness, etc of politics that has a very strong appeal to the crazy schizo in me...while equally kind of making me want to run and hide and get a nice, stable job in an office or something.

Well, I think that's enough for now.  I would really like to say I'll be better at keeping up with this, but I don't like to make empty promises.  I will try, though.  I'm constantly telling myself that the reason I get so caught up in my thoughts is because I never take the time to let them out, but somehow I don't do much to fix that...and meanwhile both my journal and my blog are collecting dust and cobwebs...le sigh

In summation...it's not that simple

Well, I'm back in hot (but not humid, yay!) New Mexico.  I think I'm having a hard time really accepting the fact that the goodbyes I spent last week saying are as final as they are.  I mean, I guess they aren't necessarily final, because I will definitely be seeing some people, and I know I will keep in touch with the really important people.  But at the same time, there's so much uncertainty...and the fear of falling out of touch scares me.  

But things end...that's something we must all get used to.

I can't really sum up my study abroad experience.  It was really great...although I feel that great (and amazing and fantastic and wonderful) are such cheesy terms that don't really even mean anything, really.  It was also incredibly difficult in so many ways...being away from home and my friends, and especially going through the loss of my grandfather from across the Atlantic; having to deal with my work situation; getting used to, and accepting, the differences in the french education system; etc.  I also learned SO much about the world and about myself and all that good stuff.  

And, I think most of all, I met some really amazing people that have all made quite the impacts on my life.  My roommate and my host-family were amazing...I couldn't have asked for a better situation or more wonderful people to have had in my life every day for the past 9 months.  Flo and Claudine, my two best frenchie girlfriends made my experience so fun..it was nice to have people that I could just hang out and be a girl with.  Even the other americans that I got to know...people from Oregon and Penn and California and SLU, people who were sharing my experience, and people that I will continue to share that experience with in the future, because we will go through France withdrawals together.  All of these people and more that I had to say goodbye to...or rather, à la prochaine or TTFN (ta ta for now) because I hate the term goodbye.  And I hope to see them all again.

The last few weeks of my experience in France were really very intense.  My friend Andrea came to visit, and I had finals, and Cassy came, and we did some traveling, and I was trying to spend time with my friends, especially ones I had just started hanging out with, and we discovered bedbugs in my apartment, and I had to pack up my life, and meanwhile my computer and my ipod both decided they hated me...it was almost too much for me to handle.  But I made it and came home, and made it with all my luggage and apparently didn't look nearly as exhausted or stressed or sad as I was feeling when my mom and two good friends picked me up at the airport.

It's been pretty non-stop since I've been home.  I haven't really had time to think about all the hard stuff.  This weekend was Pride, so I did some volunteering, went to the parade, and spent the day running around the fairgrounds and being fabulous.  And then I slept.  For like 15 hours.  I was completely burned out by Saturday afternoon that all I could do was sleep.  Which was actually kind of sad because it meant I didn't get to go out and do the evening Pride stuff, even though this is the first year I could have done all that.  But I desperately needed the sleep, so it worked out. And then yesterday I spent the day cleaning/unpacking.  I had to rewash all my clothes and carefully unpack everything to make sure I hadn't brought the bedbugs back.  On top of that, since I was house-sitting for most of last summer, I never really unpacked or dealt with my own space, so as I've been unpacking, I've also been trying to clean everything and get rid of stuff.  One bag of trash, one bag of paper recycling, one bag of stuff to send to goodwill, and three loads of laundry later, I'm nowhere near being finished.  And I need a bigger closet, more hangars, and more bookshelf space.  Hmmm.  

Anyway, I have to go take care of my car and get groceries.  I'm going to try to keep up this blog business, but I'm not sure where I want to go with it, so I don't promise to be terribly regular about updating, but feel free to check back every once in a while.  I may need to use it to debrief after all the time that will be spent cleaning out my grandpa's house, and I also have a long list of books to read this summer, so maybe I'll do some book reviews.  Who knows?

Consequences

So as it turns out, when you've been a vegetarian for 6 years, eating meat isn't such a good idea.  Especially ham, which you didn't eat much before you became a vegetarian.  Last night, I was invited to have dinner with one of the other teachers from work.  I had forgotten to tell her I'm a vegetarian, and didn't think of it until we were at her house and she was putting things together.  Not wanting to cause a scene and make life difficult for her, I decided I would just shut my mouth and deal with it just this once.  She was making quenelles (a very lyonnais sort of dish) that had ham and chicken (or some other sort of fowl) in them.  Quenelles are kind of like giant pasta balls...like giant gnocci in fact, only they have meat mixed into the dough.  Quite often they are made with fish and occasionally you can find them without meat, and they are one of my favorite things ever, but it is not easy to eat around the meat, so I just went for it and figured my conscience could handle it.  Unfortunately, my stomach, not so much.  I was SO queasy in the car on the way back to Lyon and then just kind of felt icky until I fell asleep and then all day today I've been feeling kind of yucky.  A feeling which was worsened by the fact that Florence was cleaning the floors with some harsh chemicals.  Sigh.  

I told myself I was going to run a bunch of errands today, but by the time I finished running, showering, and doing laundry, all I wanted to do was curl up in a ball and feel sicky.  So I did that for a while and cleaned and whatnot and before I knew it it was like 5:30.  Then got an email from a friend of Wei-Ching's who wanted me to edit a paper she wrote in english.  I did that right quick because she wanted to come over tonight to go over the revisions with me.  And now that's done and the day is over and my tummy still feels kind of gross and I didn't get my errands done.  Bah.  On the bright side, though, my room is clean for when my good friend Sandwich gets here on Sun night and my clothes are all washed and I'm 21 euro richer.  I guess we take what we can get right?

So to completely change the subject, I just have to say that I really should have sucked it up and talked to the schools I work at sooner.  Suddenly I actually enjoy the job a lot more...just in time for it to be almost over.  In the morning school yesterday, one of the girls gave me flowers, which was sweet.  And then in the afternoon 2 of my classes were on a field trip, so I read some stories to the preschoolers and then had my normal 1/2 grade class and then with the kindergardeners I made peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and played duck duck goose.  Which was awesome.  I love working with kids, but the pressure of having to introduce them to a new language with no experience was a stressful thing that made it not fun.  But now that some of the pressure is off, I really like it.  Anyhoo, after school, I hung out while Isabelle (the kindergarden teacher) was in a meeting, and I worked on making menus for an activity for next week, and then Isabelle took me to her house to get ready for dinner.  

We ended up having a decent amount of time before dinner, so we went to Perrouges, which is this little medieval village, and wandering around.  We went in this gallery where there was some hand-made jewelry on display, and the guy who makes it started telling us all about it.  His inspiration for the different pieces was really interesting and it was cool to hear him talk about the stuff.  Plus the necklaces were really cool.  As Isabelle said, "I would have been really happy if they had been just a little bit less expensive."  It was a cool thing, though, and it was nice to take a little walk before dinner.

Dinner was pretty interesting.  Lots of questions about the US and politics and music and all sorts of good things.  Isabelle's husband was really one of the first frenchies, not including my host family, to really interrogate me (not in a bad way) about issues in the US and whatnot.  I always get simple questions, like what's different and whatnot, but I think a lot of times people don't want to put us on the spot, but he had no problem with asking about the tough issues like 9/11 conspiracy theories and other Bush administration business, Katrina, health care, elections, religion, etc.  It was interesting and forced me to think about that stuff in a different way than I usually do.  This was all broken up, of course, with talk of music and more fun things.  Isabelle's daughter is quite infatuated with english and has amazing taste in music and movies.  She was cool and fun to talk to, as well.  Overall, despite my meat/tummy fiasco, it was really interesting and fun to eat with them and discuss things.  My only regret is that I didn't do it sooner.  I feel that that's a line from a song, but I can't think of which one.  

So anyways, before this gets overwhelmingly long, I shall say adieu and get ready for bed methinks.

ps, because I have this lovely countdown on my wall thanks to my dear friend, GG, I would just like to say, 28 days until I go home! AH!!!!

Bisous.

What a lovely long weekend

Ah, this weekend is a long weekend because Thursday there was no school because it was the anniversary of the end of WWII, and tomorrow there is no school because it's Pentecost...I think.  Anyway, a lot of people had Friday off too, because the french like to do this thing called "faire le pont" or "do the bridge," wherein if Tuesday or Thursday are holidays, then you get Monday or Friday off, respectively.  Unfortunately, my teachers decided not to faire le pont, so I had class.  But it wasn't really all that bad because it was capoeira and portuguese.  I thought about just ditching (about half of my portuguese class actually showed up because a lot of people go on vacation), but it was my last capoeira class of the year, which is really sad.  But, because my teacher is awesome, he said we can come take classes at the studio for free until the end of the school year.  Which is definitely a bonus as I was just considering paying to go take some classes there.  And some of us were talking about getting together at the park and doing some capoeira on our own, which would be pretty sweet indeed.

Anyhoo, besides that little educational detour, it's been a pretty crazy weekend.  Week in general I suppose if you include the fact that we had a Cinco de Mayo dinner fiesta at Silly Thing and Fortune Cookie's house on Monday.  But the fun really started Thursday when those two and I went to this lake called Miribel and had a picnic in the grass and stood in the water a little bit.  That was SO nice and it was amazingly beautiful out and I was so happy.  I had to leave them a little early, tho, to take a train to meet Flo in Bourgoin-Jailleu, which is a town east of Lyon, where nothing but the cafés were open, so we ended up just heading to her house and hanging out listening to music.  And then we had a BBQ and watched some TV/a movie, which pretty much everyone was falling asleep during.  It was so fun to hang out with her and Claudine, a friend of hers who I totally adore (just in case, Flo is the girl I met in the TOEFL class who was hoping to study in Oregon, but instead she's studying in Ontario.  She's and Cladine are also the people I spent New Year's Eve with).  It was really fun to do that and have a girly sleepover and whatnot. 

Friday morning, we hung out and chatted before Flo had to give me a ride to the tram so I could make the trek to school.  That was very long.  Then I had class, bla bla bla, did some grocery shopping, and headed over to ST and FC's house to hang out.  We ended up waiting around quite a while for our other friends to show up and then proceeded to get silly and do things like climb on the neighbor's roof and then have a different neighbor call the cops on us for being too loud.  Who would have thought that 6 people could get that crazy?  Anyhoo, there was some drama and ridiculousness which I shall not go into, but overall the night was a success...I kind of slept through a lot of it because I was really exhausted, though.

Saturday I went home and was lazy for a little while before going to the market (I think I've said this, but I'll say it again: I'm going to miss my Sat morning market SO much) and came home and made fruit salad and lemonade from the tasty things I had bought, and then FC came over after taking an exam and we had lunch and then walked to Place des Terreaux to buy tix for les Nuits Sonores, which I will explain a little later.  There was supposed to be a march/celebration thing of the end of slavery in France, but I realized I had severely misunderstood the time, and about when we were sick of sitting outside, was when it was starting, so FC went home and I headed to where the march was supposed to start.  I feel really strange that I always end up at these kinds of cultural events by myself.  I don't really get the sense that my friends are all that interested in them, but I feel like I'll regret if I don't go.  In the end, I wasn't really alone because all the Senzala (capoeira) people were there and I ended up hanging out with them, but it was still kind of weird to go by myself.  Chao, my teacher, was like, "so where are all the Americans?"  I didn't really know how to respond to that without making it sound like they really just didn't care, which is kind of true, but I feel like it's so stereotypically American.  We ended up deciding that it was because it was too hot for them.   It really was stifling hot, especially as we were marching at like 2 feet an hour and all huddled close together.  But the whole even was pretty cool and it was nice to feel more or less like I was a part of the group and to be able to joke around with everyone.  And lots of bises all around, which, as I have said in the past, is kind of something that makes you feel like you are accepted.  

That went a lot later than I had expected, so I ran home, quickly ate some food, and headed off to meet people for les Nuits Sonores, which is this music festival that has been going on in Lyon for like 7 or 8 years.  It's a lot of elctro/techno-y music, but also indie and rock and other kinds of music.  Last night was the last night, and I went with FC and ST and then our friends, the Sleeper and Touf (a couple of frenchie boys who are friends of Katie's host brother).  Katie was also there with Lauren, another girl from Penn, but they ended up meeting up with some other friends and we got separated from them a lot.  It was a really cool thing to go to, because it was in a slightly fixed up abandoned warehouse with three different areas, each with a different kind of music (Rock, Electro, and Dub).  We kind of wandered in and out of the different rooms for a while.  Unfortunately, we were all really tired from lack of sleep, hangovers, and being out in the sun ALL afternoon (that one was just me), so FC, ST, and I ended up leaving around 1am, which was right around when things were really starting to pick up.  I'm definitely glad I went, though.

Then today I slept in a little before meeting up with FC, ST, and the Grim Reaper and going to Ile-de-Barbe, which is this little island in the river on the north side of Lyon.  We had a little picnic there and then chilled enjoying the sun for a while.  Then we walked around a bit, but as it turns out, there really wasn't much to see, so we came home.  And now I'm back feeling sleepy and being sad because I think it might rain.  I've been so enjoying being able to run around and enjoy the sunshine lately.  I hope it is nice at least tomorrow because we were thinking of getting a bigger group together and going back to Miribel, the lake, to enjoy the last day of our long weekend before we have to go back to thinking about school.  Sigh.

Anyway, things are really good right now and I've really been enjoying myself (despite recent tensions among my friends and awkward/dramatic situations that have been coming up a lot).  I have a hard time with things like this because I really try to avoid these kind of dramas, but it's hard when what ends up happening is two of my friends are not getting along.  I don't like to take sides, but sometimes I end up doing just that inadvertently or because I sympathize with one party more than another.  Basically it's just this kind of tension that sometimes hangs in the air, and it's frustrating because I'm more or less outside of the whole thing and, not being involved, can see how ridiculous it all is, but then I can also put my feet in different people's shoes and understand at least a little bit where they are coming from.  Long story short, things are sort of socially weird, but at the same time really good.  It's hard to explain, but let's just say it's not always easy being Switzerland, but that doesn't mean you can't have a good time.

Ok, I think I shall go now.  Sorry I keep writing such long posts.  I go for days and days being too busy to write much, and then I try to recap everything and it's a little overwhelming.

Bisous.

PS.  To my mommy and my grandma, even though I will talk to you later, HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!!!!

Relief

After a week of stress and 4 days of work, I am done with my 10 page paper for my Humanitarian aid work class.  Well, basically done.  I still need to reread it and do some editing, but I'm going to do that tomorrow...give my brain a break before I reread it.  

I've also more or less recovered from my little panic attack last week.  Getting this paper out of the way was a big weight off my shoulders, and my teacher in my lit class decided to gice the foreign students an out of class essay instead of an in-class one, which means I don't have a final tomorrow, and I have some time to write the essay (although i would really be a happy camper if he would send us the topic already).  I talked with various people at the schools I've been working at about my issues with the teaching job, and they were surprisingly understanding about it all.  I guess I should have done it sooner.  I think that a lot of the things I was upset about were related to various misunderstandings and lack of comprehension within the system of what my job entailed.  And then I managed to talk the whole death thing out with various people, so while I'm still upset, I'm more ok.  In talking to my mom, she reminded me that I'm going to be pretty vulnerable over the next 6 weeks because I'm emotionally preparing to leave France (AH!).  So I guess maybe I'll have to get used to panicking every once in a while.

On the plus side, the sun has been out for several days now.  I've missed most of it because I've been huddled in my little hole working or in class...and having a nocturnal Friday night and being exhausted all day yesterday...I swear if I wake up tomorrow morning to rain, I very well might cry.  I have time tomorrow to go sit in a park or an outside café (and do reading homework...I guess it's better than my room though) and go running if my foot is done being lame (I think I sprained it or something in capoeira...it hurt like hell to walk yesterday, another reason I stayed in my room mostly).  Things I haven't done in a while.  

It's funny to think that less than a week ago I was such an upset mess.  Right now I'm actually feeling really good.  I mean, I'm still a little stressed, and of course always freaking out a little inside about how much I have to do in 6 weeks, but other than that I really have had a great couple of days.  And I'm feeling good about things.  Especially if I things work out for going to Grenada next weekend.

Some highlights from this week include writing a 4 page (single spaced) paper on Wednesday and celebrating over some Belgian souvenirs and pizza and watching Napoleon Dynamite with my girlies, who we shall call Fortune Cookie and Silly Thing, which was really good.  Then on Friday night the same girls and "the guys," who are Katie's host brother and his friends.  Fortune Cookie and Silly Thing had brought the guys presents from Amsterdam, so we all ended up getting together and hanging out sans dormir until like 7am.  Well...Silly Thing slept a little and Fortune Cookie kept falling asleep in her chair while we waited for the metro to start running again (and then for croissants and pain au chocolat).  Somehow I was wide awake.  I guess that probably has something to do with the fact that all the guys had to drink were energy drinks and then we randomly decided to make coffee at like 3 am.  I was having quite a good time, though, just chatting with the everyone and laughing at their silliness and chillin.  Good times.  And so then yesterday I got home at 7am or so and then tried to work on my paper cuz my head was still awake from the caffeine, but my body wasn't having it, so I slept for maybe two hours and then got up and went to the market.  I haven't gone to my Saturday market in AGES.  I had forgotten how much I like it, and was happy that my vendors hadn't all forgotten me.  I really do love that the neighborhood market is like a community.  People stand around and chat and get to know each other and it's just so great!  I'm really gonna miss that a lot.

Um, I guess that's about it for now.  Life is good.  La vie est belle.

Venting

I am supposed to be in class right now but I am having a really strange day and have barely been able to stop crying for like 5 hours (except for the hour and a half that I was close to falling asleep in my literature class, which I feel horrible about).  Maybe I will calm down by writing some and then I can go around the halfway point when there is a break.  Or I will just upset myself more...I guess we shall see.

I don't know what is up with me today.  Actually I think I kind of do...like a million different things that are upsetting and frustrating and stressful.  I'm sorry to everyone who is reading this...if you are looking for a happy, here is my life and I just went on an amazing vacation (which I did, but that will have to wait until I am more stable) sort of post, this is not it and feel free not to read this...but I guess most of the things that are bugging me are part of my experience studying abroad and therefore are the kind of thing that I'm trying to chronicle in this blog.

First of all, I got back late last night from 9 days of traveling in Italy and Belgium and I am absolutely exhausted.  The trip was amazing, but I think it was that much more tiring for that fact.  Plus I think I'm kind of having travel with-drawls or something.

While on my trip, I was visiting a friend who is studying in Florence, Italy.  She's a friend from high school who I absolutely adore and it was so good to spend time with her, but it kinda made me more homesick.  We talked a lot about going home and made lots of fun plans for this summer, which was really cool, but it made me wish that summer were here already.  And I was a little jealous that she's going home in like 3 weeks.  On the other hand, there's also the fact that as much as I want to be home, I'll be leaving France in about 7 weeks, and that's kind of scary because I can't help but think of the things I haven't done and the things I'll miss.  So all of that is on my mind. 

On top of all that, I had to get up for an 8am class this morning and confront the fact that there are 5 weeks left of school and I have a zillion things to do and am starting to stress about some of my classes.  Some of this stress is my normal, "oh shit I've been procrastinating and now I have to deal with the consequences" sort of stress, but I'm also facing the stress of exams and a real distress about the French system and not knowing what to expect and therefore worrying about my grades.  I know grades aren't everything, and I have dropped the bar for myself a little knowing that it's a lot harder to be a straight-a exchange student in France than to be a straight-a student at U of O.  The problem for some of my classes is that, while I'm pretty certain I understand the material, I have this fear that the ONE essay question that appears on the ONE exam will not be one I can't address...or that I won't be able to answer it the way the teachers expect.  I know that teachers will grade my exams slightly easier being a foreign student, but that is usually a language thing, which I'm honestly not concerned about.  What I'm afraid of is that the French have a different way of looking at things and expect very specific things (organized in a very specific way) and that's what is hard for me.  But I feel like if I can express myself fine in the language, they will expect me to be able to understand the question perfectly and be able to answer it the way they expect.  And in one of my classes I'm the only foreign student, so there won't be any comparison except for the french students' work, and in another the professor is doing an oral exam, but because I'm doing the normal assignment for another class with the same professor, she expects me to do the same for this class.  So basically I'm the only foreign student taking the exam.  Why can't I suck at french?

I talked to Laurie about it today, and she understood and said we can work something out and possibly do a pass-fail thing depending on my grade, since I can't gauge myself since there are no grades but the final exam, and that helped a lot but it was also kind of upsetting because I don't like being an exception in that way.  I don't like being held to different standards, even if it's necessary and fair and all that.  It goes against my perfectionism, and is completely irrational and I can't help it.

While I was talking to Laurie, I also kind of vented to her about my teaching assistant job and all of the problems I've been having with it.  I honestly wish I had quit when I had the chance.  Or talked to someone that wasn't my mother (not that you didn't help, mom...but I mean someone more official).  Laurie was really surprised by most of my complaints and said that I was completely justified in them (something I wasn't really sure about because I wasn't entirely clear on what was expected of me...one of my many complaints about the job in general).  She told me to contact this guy who's in charge of the english assistants (or all the assistants, I'm not sure), but made it sound kind of like there probably wasn't a whole lot I could do with only 5 weeks left on my contract.  So I just finished writing him this long email, which was really upsetting because it reminded me of how much I dread that job and the fact that I have to go tomorrow and invent activities for 5 hours of classes that I am supposed to be ASSISTING teachers in, not teaching.  I hate hating my job.

And then, this whole crying session started when I came across something that I knew about, but hadn't really dealt with or confronted in my mind, which was worsened by some news from a friend.  This kid that I have known forever passed away recently totally mysteriously and out of the blue.  I had heard about it from a friend about two weeks ago, but was so caught up in everything that I couldn't deal with it.  But today I found myself looking at his myspace page, where his family had written a little note about his death and a bunch of his friends had written messages about him.  He is someone that was in my sort of extended "Flagstaff family" growing up and was the little brother of a guy who was about my age.  His dad and my dad are really good friends and I have a lot of memories of spending time with his family growing up.  I really didn't know him that well, though, because he was still pretty young when I stopped spending as much time in Flagstaff and that community dissipated in a lot of ways.  But I always remember him being a really happy and great kid.  And I've seen him occasionally over the years and know people that were really close to him and from what I do know he remained a really happy, great kid and was a wonderful musician and one of those people that no one could say anything bad about.  And then one day he just didn't wake up and from what I have heard, no one really knows why.  And that's so heartbreaking.  

This happened this afternoon, while I was thinking about a good friend who just lost her uncle and someone from my high school who went missing in February and I just felt this heavy sadness drape over me.  Sadness for those losses, but especially sadness for my friends who are affected a lot more than me by them.  After my experience losing my grandpa and being so far from the people I needed to support me through it, I hate the thought that I can't be with the people I love when they are going through a similar loss.  I know that they have support systems around them and are not as isolated as I think maybe I was, but I don't want anyone to have to feel that sense of isolation that I felt at the time when you really need every once of support you can get.  And if my apathy weren't hard enough, I kind of drifted back into my own pain that I've been keeping at bay for the most part since I went home and had some closure.  

So all of these things and the fact that I've spent most of the last 9 days in the sun only to come home to rain and ugly and no food and homework that I'd been procrastinating on are all just too much for me and I can't stop crying and I want to curl up in bed but I know I should go to my class because if I don't I'll be even more stressed when exams roll around but I'm a little nervous that sitting in class trying to concentrate and take notes will be too much for me and I won't be able to stop myself from crying.  It's really kind of a lose-lose situation.  Which doesn't help my mood at all.

Well, either way, I will stop venting, because I think I've exhausted my complaints.

Much love and gros bisous and I promise that I will have some much happier posts about my wonderful travels soon (because we all know I love a reason to procrastinate).

Nerdy study abroad victory moment

So for one of my classes we have to do an in-class presentation and I'm doing it with this guy Romain next week.  He had given me his email address and whatnot (on the back of an unused metro ticket...how considerate of him in case I ever forget my metro card and only have my planner) a couple weeks ago, and I finally sat down an emailed him a couple of days ago with the times I was available to work on our presentation.  So today, I asked him about when would work, etc...bla bla bla...and then he was like, oh btw you are really good at the email abbreviations and whatnot in french (I'm paraphrasing, clearly, because unfortunately I don't know how to say whatnot in french).  It was one of those little victories, like being on the bise level with someone.  Ok maybe not that cool.  But still...

thoughts

So, it turns out there are some downsides to my new hobby, jogging.  Namely that you are very exposed to the elements.  For example, running into the wind is not a very pleasant experience, nor is running in the rain.  Actually, that might almost be bearable if it weren't terribly blustery or pouring.  To add insult to injury...or maybe injury to insult, while running in the wind it is not uncommon to get flying debris in your eye, and that sucks a lot.  Plus I feel like people, especially french ones, give you even stranger looks than they do when they see you running in normal weather.  Lastly, keeping up this new hobby over the smoldering NM summer is a challenge.  I know.  I've tried.  It's a good thing I actually enjoy jogging when I'm able to get over the unpleasantness of the process.  

I'm not sure it's terribly good for the bronchitis or whatever my latest sickness is.  Basically I don't feel all that sick except for the smoker cough plaguing my lungs.

On a completely other train of thought, I learned last night that it's probably a good thing I chose not to go to McGill, because the Quebecois accent is a sound that makes me want to punch babies (please, someone, appreciate the Dane Cook reference and don't think I'm a psycho).  I went to a play with some of the other oregonians.  It was a really interesting play, except that it was set partially in Canada and one of the main characters had this ridiculous accent.  Some of the other actors had the same accent, but hers was especially painful and difficult to understand.  Although more painful than difficult, I think.  Beyond that, it was a four hour play, which meant four whole hours of this accent.  

I complain a lot.  I'm  sorry.  I actually really enjoy jogging and the play was very good.  And life in general is going well.  There was another brazilian night at the marquise on Sunday night, which I ended up going to alone because Katie is sickie.  Actually, a couple of my friends showed up after a while, but they wouldn't dance to the live music because they didn't know the steps, which I tried to teach them cuz it's super easy.  Luckily, while I was standing around awkwardly in the corner, my capoeira teacher showed up and got me to dance with him.  Not only is he a good lead (ie I don't actually have to think about what I'm doing), but he's goofy and will bust into silly dance moves randomly.  I also danced with this guy who was a bad lead and kept changing the steps and running me into people.  It's amazing how big of a difference a guy's dance skillz have on a girl's dancing experience.  

I've also got all my plans set up for my April break that's in a little over a week.  I'm riding with the host fam to Pisa (about a day's drive), hanging out there for a day and seeing the sights, taking a train to Florence and spending a few days with my friend Erin, flying to Brussels, taking a train to Bruges and hanging out there for a couple days with some friends, and then coming back to Lyon...and getting back to work.  Yay traveling!

Ok, need to shower and concentrate for like an hour to finish some homework so that I can go print some stuff out and try to do more homework.  Doing homework has gotten so hard for me!  I'm even more of a master procrastinator than I used to be.  OH!  But exciting news, I FINALLY got my grade for my constitutional law class, and I kicked butt.  My grade was based entirely on a 10-page paper on the topic of my choice, as long as it had to do with constitutional law.  So I wrote mine on environmental protections in the Constitution, mostly focusing on the french Constitution, but also the lack of environmental protection in the U.S. Constitution.  I really didn't know what to expect in terms of a grade, so that was a happy surprise the other day.

And on that note, I should probably get to work on doing well in my classes this semester...

Biz.

sick...AGAIN?!?

So...I definitely had a sore throat last night but I assumed it was from yelling over the little kids at work yesterday, because I pretty much have a sore throat every Tuesday night.  But then this morning it was worse and more in my chest and then I went running and that didn't help so much.  Then I decided to take a nap and slept for like 4 hours and still have no energy and keep coughing.  This seriously is NOT fair.  I can't go two weeks in this country without getting sick.  And I had all these high hopes for getting a bunch of homework done today and failed miserably.  Boo.

On the bright side, though, lots of happy stuff has been going on lately, too.  On Friday night, my friends and I went out...we were trying to go to this one club because my friend had seen a flier saying they were having a hip-hop/funk night.  This was really exciting to me because part of the reason I don't go out all that much is because I can't stand techno for more than 15 minutes and the french just happen to love it a lot.  I don't know why...it's terrible dance music unless you are doing tektonik (quite the euro-fad...youtube it and know the ridiculousness).  Anyhoo, we get to the place it was supposed to be and they were having a jazz festival...which would have been cool except that two of my friends were very drunk and we were all quite ready to get our groove on.   So we headed next door to the Sirius, a place I am a pretty big fan of...they were playing kind of horrible electro-jazz, but we decided to stick it out, figuring it was still early and it would get better soon (nothing really gets going til close to midnight usually).

And it's a good thing we waited, because the DJ was joined by this other DJ (who was a bit of a cutie), who's first song was by the Arcade Fire, who I LOVE.  He continued to play amazing music: the Libertines, the Beach Boys, Beasite Boys, Nirvana, Arctic Monkeys (upon my request), andI even enjoyed a little Daft Punk...techno is ok in moderation, I guess.  We danced forever and it was so good.  I think I might be in love...

So after staying out until 2:30 am and not getting to sleep til like 3:30 because I had to shower and I was all adrenaline-y from dancing, I caught a train at 7 am to Strasbourg with my friend Margot.  It was a totally last minute decision for me to go, but I've been kind of stressing about getting out of town and seeing things since I only have a little over two months left here.  So we wandered around Strasbourg and climbed 66m up to the top of the tower of the main cathedral (which was interesting because I was already sore from capoeira).  We also did a lot of window shopping and enjoying the cute little alsatian buildings that are very colorful and pretty.  Thankfully, the weather was BEAUTIFUL.  On Sunday we sat outside and ate ice cream in short sleeves and soaked up some sun.  And there was a parade and tons of kids running around in costumes (not sure exactly what the occasion was).  Basically is was really really fun.

Then we came back to the rain of Lyon.  Oh joy.  Seriously, I wish the weather would make up it's mind.  Last Tuesday, we were talking about weather.  The class knows "wind," "rain," "snow," "cloud," and "sun," and I'll usually ask them what the weather is like...for example, "is it sunny?" or "is it rainy?"  Basically their answers were yes to all of the questions.  It had snowed that morning, and then it rained, and it was partly cloudy, but during lunch time the sun came out and it was windy.  Seriously...I don't know what to think. Or do with myself.  I get really excited because it's sunny and warm and by the time I make it outside it's raining and cold again.  

Um, I think that basically has me caught up.  I've been working on my travel plans for my break in 2 and a half weeks, and I'm going to ride with my host family to Florence to visit my friend who is studying there, and then fly to Bruges, Belgium and meet up with some friends.  Yay!  

Ok, I might try to do some homework before going back to bed...I can't believe how tired I am...

Bis.

Catching up is hard to do...

...but I'm here to do my best. There is a good chance this will be really long. There's my disclaimer. Commence at your own risk.

From a big picture perspective, I feel like not ALL that much has been going on in my life. School really is keeping me very busy (not entirely sure what I was thinking taking on 7 classes, but I'm ridiculous and I've come to accept that about myself), and I don't have a lot of free time, so I've been trying to take advantage of what little time I do have, so I've had some concentrated pockets of excitement scattered amongst long streaks of boring going to class and doing homework.

I guess I'll start where I left off with my last blog...I ended up going to see Made in L.A. which was an interesting documentary, and I had planned on going to see a Portuguese movie (The Year My Parents Left on Vacation) and a Brazilian movie (I Am From Brazil..although I'm sure it could be more eloquently translated..), but then there was dancing that weekend, which, in my life, pretty much always wins out over everything. It was all sort of loosely tied to the film festival, though, so it works out. That Friday night, there was a Brazilian night, which I ended up going to alone, and I was really nervous that I would end up in a corner being lame, but there were a couple guys from my capoeira class there, and I worked up the nerve to go sit with them. Then, there was a capoeira demonstration and they wanted to get people from the audience to participate, so they started with people they knew were taking classes, so I did that (turn out it's much less successful in jeans and sans hair-tie, but whatever), and then they taught everyone forro, which is a Brazilian dance similar to salsa and we danced a lot. There was also a demonstration of gafieira, which is another dance that is kind of like argentine tango and looked really cool. Much to my happiness, they announced a dance workshop the next day, which was going to be an hour and a half of gafieira and an hour and a half of capoeira. So clearly I went to that and it was so much fun! Then, on Sunday, there was a Brazilian soirée and this club which is on a péniche (a big boat) called the Marquise. Katie came with me and we danced for like 3 hours straight and it was wonderful. There was live samba for a while, and then a DJ playing Brazilian funk and then more live samba.  Seriously a lot of fun.  My feet hated me afterward because I was wearing heels, but I totally didn't even care cuz I was so happy.  My life also hated me a little bit after because I didn't make it to sleep til about 2am and I had an 8 am class, but I had some coffee and survived.

That weekend I also had dinner with some girls for my friend Molly's bday and then went to a party at this guy, Sofiane's house.  He's one of the frenchies who is going to be studying in Eugene next year.  It was a fun party and it was cool to go to a party at his apartment, because it was kind of like house parties back in the states, which I've kinda missed since being here.  Unfortunately, he lives ridiculously far away, so we had to leave at midnight so as not to miss the last metro, but maybe there will be more of that another time.  Basically, it was a really crazy weekend.  Oh!  The sun also peeked out that weekend, which was exciting, but it was gone about as quickly as it came.

Then there was a lot of school and work until this past weekend, which was another kind of crazy one.  On Friday Katie had a party at her apartment, which was an attempt to get to know her host brother and his friends better.  He's 18 and most of his friends are about 20 and they come over a lot, but they always hang out in Antoine's room playing computer games, so Katie was basically like, "Hey Antoine!  Your friends.  My friends.  Here.  Friday."  And so that's what we did.  And it ended up being really fabulous.  We all meshed quite well together, and all of Katie's suppositions about Antoine and his friends were true (they are into RPGs, they smoke weed, and they are all pretty much awesome).  So we had a silly fun night just kinda chillin in the apartment.  I had to leave early because I had told a friend of mine that she could stay at my apt that night because we had to leave super early in the morning for a trip and she lives a way out of town, and of course the most exciting aspects of the night (namely breaking into an abandoned building and hanging out on the roof) took place after I left, but since everything went so well, there are already plans for a remix of the party in the works.  And this one I won't miss.

Last but not least, our trip to Dordogne, which was organized by the Centre Oregon for all the people in my program.  We left at 7:30 am on Saturday and spent 6 hours on a bus en route to Sarlat, which is one of the most well-preserved medieval villages in France.  While there we had some yummy lunch and then toured around the town before heading to our hotel in Montignac (ps. Maja, it was called Le Manoir du Chambon), where we played charades and then were served a ridiculously huge dinner, and then I pretty much crashed out.  Traveling around in buses (cars too, but less so) has the unfortunate effect on me of making me car sick, which really exhausts me.  The next day we had a fresh start with a nice breakfast before heading to see some chateaux in the area.  We were supposed to go on a boat tour along the Dordogne river, but apparently the river was too high, so it got cancelled, which was pretty lame, but we wandered around the village, parts of which were build into the cliffs, so that was pretty cool, despite the cold and almost raininess.  I think the best part was the break dance party we had in the middle of the street and rocking "All Star" (which may be the ultimate song on the soundtrack of my generation) on our way back to the bus.  We also had a big fancy delicious lunch...basically there was WAY too much amazing food over the course of the trip...I'm definitely going running tomorrow.  Once we got back to the hotel, there was more food and then there was a sort of dance party, which my friends and I opted out for because we were exhausted, so we played Apples to Apples in our PJs for a while before going to bed.  

The next day (aka Monday, aka yesterday), we hit the road early and went to Lascaux II, which is a facsimile of Lascaux, which are some of the oldest and largest prehistoric cave paintings.  The actual cave was severely damaged because of all of the tourists and the introduction of carbon monoxide and oxygen and molds and fungi, so they closed it in the 60s and created Lascaux II, which opened in the 80s.  It's kind of lame because you know you are looking at relatively recent paintings, but they did a really good job of recreating that cavey feeling, so it was actually a really cool experience.  At least I really enjoyed it and was thoroughly impressed by these massive paintings of different animals that show a distinct artistic organization and it's quite clear that they are there pretty much simply for their artistic value and not so much as a means of communication or some other utilitarian reason.  The only thing that was kind of unfortunate is that I got the sense that quite a few people in the group were like, "why are we here?  This is lame."  The sentiment is understandable because we had to leave the hotel at 8:45 am and then we got there and ended up having to stand in the cold for like 30 minutes because of some apparent miscommunication, and then on top of that I think a lot of people were having trouble following the guide's explanations in French.  Whatever, though, I thought it was really amazing.  So there.  After Lascaux we went to the Prehistory museum (aptly described as "a lot of rocks" by this guy Clément) and then hit the road for another ridiculously long bus trek back to Lyon.  

Oh, and somewhere in there there was Easter.  The extent of my Easter celebration this year was saying "happy Easter" to Kate, the girl I was sharing a room with, eating some chocolate eggs, and spying on little kids on a chasse aux oeufs from the chateau we were at in the afternoon, through binoculars, to a chateau on the other side of the river, where we had been that morning, which is very gardeny, so it was a good place for an egg hunt.

And now it's Tuesday night and I really should be trying to get ahead in my homework because I have quite a few things that need doing over the next week or so, but I think I'm going to go to bed so that I can get up and go running in the morning and maybe do some grocery shopping and then buckle down for the afternoon and make a concerted effort to get some stuff done.  Especially since my friend and I are thinking abut a short weekend trip somewhere this weekend.

Tada!  Hope you aren't bored to death...or overwhelmed by my crazy nonstop lifestyle.  I'll not to go 2 weeks before I update this business again.

Gros bisous et Joyeuses Pâques (Happy Easter!) à tous!  (ok, a little belated, but I was sending out the Happy Easter love on Sunday too).

Not too much is new

I've come to the conclusion that three hours is simple TOO LONG for a class. Seriously...I cannot concentrate on one person talking for that long. I have one class a week that is three hours and two that are 2 and a half hours and I really tend to block out the lecture by the last 30 mins/hour.

That's kind of the extent of my life lately...spending lots of time in class. And doing a lot of reading for my classes. I really don't have any exciting stories to share at this point. One exciting thing, though, is that I've taken up jogging. And so far (a whole week), I'm actually sticking to it. The reactions to that fact have included to "barf"s and this guy that I barely know sending me an email that essentially said, was that you the crazy girl running in the fucking rain on Saturday morning? In my defense, it wasn't actually raining. Is it really that crazy? To be perfectly honest, with the exception of the reminder of how out of shape I am, I really enjoy jogging. It's a good time to think...and if you really get into your thoughts, the physical exertion part kind of gets lost and you get into a flow. I think it's had a very calming effect on me, which I'm hoping will translate into spending less time worrying about all the stuff I need to do and more time just doing that stuff. And if I need to agonize (and organize and prioritize), I can do that while I'm running.

I've also been going to kind of a lot of movies. I went to a movie called The Notebook last Friday. No, not the cheesy love story. It's an Iranian movie about this little girl and her attempt to go to school. Then I went to There Will be Blood on Saturday. And this week is the festival of Iberian and Latin American cinema, so I went to see The Devil's Backbone on Tuesday, I'm going to see Made in L.A. today, and I think I'm gonna go see The Week that my Parents went on Vacation on Saturday. It's kind of craziness. Oh, and this weekend is also the weekend of cinema and most of the theaters in town are only charging 3,50 for movies. Wow. but I was talking to Florence about it and she said she doesn't usually go cuz it's SO crowded. But I' might try to catch a movie with Flo if we get enough homework done on Saturday (hahaha).

And there you go a little update. Sorry I haven't really been blogging all that much...I feel like there's not much to say.

Biz.

Some social commentary and my inner-gangsta makes a cameo

So, this has nothing to do with my study abroad experience whatsoever, but I was perusing YouTube vids and found this little slice of wonderful, which I like to call, How I Will Meet the Man of My Dreams:



Actually, that brings me to a sort of social commentary on the study abroad experience that some friends and I were talking about today. Especially with the advent of the internet, and the ease of access to it. Pretty much everyone in my program has a computer and access to the web, and SO many people I know hang out at home watching pirated american TV shows. Including myself...which is sad because I kind of pride myself on the fact that I don't watch that much TV, but I'm kind of over the feeling of self-loathing for it already, especially because I think I've limited myself to halfway decent programs. I mean, I'm not sitting around watching reality TV or anything. But enough of me trying to justify myself. Basically, I just find it interesting that, as Katie said earlier, "so much of the study abroad experience is watching american shows." Or something like that, I'm paraphrasing. But we actually sat by the fountain at Place des Terreaux eating our sandwiches and discussing the dramatic intricacies of Weeds and The L Word. And while walking around the artisan's market, we were discussing our favorite episodes of Psych. Ugh.

Of course, it doesn't help that I spent Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday miserably sick and even Wednesday and Thursday all I wanted to do when I wasn't in class was lay in bed feeling miserable. So, I watched TV. Because that's what sick people do. On the bright side, I'm feeling a lot better, although still kinda stuffy. And tired a lot. Although that may or may not have something to do with the fact that the weather makes me want to stay in bed and just look out the window. Really, every morning I look outside and think, YAY! The sun is shining! Today will be pretty. And then I go outside and the wind is blowing a billion miles an hour (broke Wei-Ching's umbrella and tried to steal my hat) and it's freezing. It would make anyone want to curl up inside and wait for summer.

Other than that, thing's haven't been all that eventful lately. Mostly school and hangin with the homies. You know how I be.

Ok, I need to go. My episode of The L Word has finished loading and is calling my name.

Biz.

NOT fair...

NOW I get the flu? Seriously, what the hell? I worked so hard at fighting it off before I went home, when I was surrounded by sickies, and now, when everyone else is better, I get the flu...boo. Friday and yesterday I was thinking I was just still jet-lagged and sore from capoeira, but then yesterday I started feeling snuffly and then I realized that, even after my first day of capoeira, I wasn't sore all over, just sore in certain areas. But this sore was sore all over...and then last night I couldn't sleep because I couldn't breathe and then today I stayed in bed all day feeling crappy and watching episodes of Phsych online. And now I feel horribly unproductive and still tired.

Sorry, I'm feeling just a little bit negative about things right now. I'm sure it will get better when I can move without pain and go outside and enjoy the sunshine (it was SO beautiful out today!). And if I ever get back into the rhythm of school, which I'm still having troubles with.

Anyway, think healthy thoughts for me! :-P

Biz.

Enchiladas

When I went home, I brought back a suitcase-full of green chile and tortillas, so today I made enchiladas (red and green) with beans and spanish rice for my host family and for Wei-Ching, so we had a nice relaxing afternoon of yumminess (after kind of a crazy morning of shopping and cooking for me cuz I woke up very late and hadn't bought cheddar cheese yet...). The whole thing was a grand success. Mathias wasn't a big fan, but I kind of expected as much since he is 4 and at 4 I wouldn't have eaten it, and I've grown up around that kind of food. paul was a little overwhelmed by the spicy...which I think he was partially imagining just because I said it had chile...I used mild! Anyway, it was nice to be able to share that with them.

Also, unbeknownst to me, we were also apparently celebrating my birthday, so I got presents, which is always fun. Florence got me a really cute purse and Wei-Ching got me fun earrings and a headband.

Aside from the fact that I'm sore and have blisters from capoeira and I'm getting sick, it's been a very good day...and a good time back in France in general.

Last night, we had a potluck for the Oregon students and also the French students who are going to Oregon next year, so that we could meet them and so that they could meet us and find out about Oregon and all that good stuff. It was a lot of fun. The funny thing was that I don't think I heard any of them speaking english. They are all really shy about it. I guess they'll have to get over that pretty quickly when they get to the states, though. I mean, we did, and pretty much everyone here speaks at least of few words of english. Which is not so much the case in Oregon for french. It seems like a really cool group of people, even though I'm kinda sad that Flo wont be among them :-( They all seem really excited about coming and I think it will be nice to be in contact with them and to hang out with them and help them out if they need it while they are in the states. And it will be cool to have people to speak french with sometimes :-P

Anyhoo, there's a little update for ya...and now I should probably be productive or something...

Biz.