Liz la toulousainne

la dernière poste

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 15:38:00 +0000

BONJOUR

SO... It looks like I've made it near the end the year. Bravo!
The last week was pretty eventful, with a Facebook scandal forcing 2 people to get kicked out of Ozenne, if you want details, ask me in e-mail or something. These 2 weeks of summer have been blisfsul and hot. I'm sunburt and have been swimming and wakboarding twice. I accomplished my goal and made it to the 3rd turn of the lake! Hopefully I'll go again before I leave (July 8th). Things are going pretty well, last Rotary meeting tonight. My host sister and I get along really well, her boyfriend is staying now for a month. Sometimes it's annoying to be the third wheel, but my host mom is getting back from Greece soon. It's frustrating trying to fit in everything you want to do with your friends when you all leave at different times.

Fête de la musique is the most amazing holiday in the whole wide world. A whole night dedicated to music for free and having fun. It might've been the most fun night the whole year. It was also hot and summery.

This post is really pitiful, but I'm in at an internet café and in a hurry.
Talk to you on the other side of Illinois!!!!!!

BISOUS POUR TOUT LE MONDE
je ne veux pas partir de la France! C'était plus que je pouvais jamais imaginer. J'ai fait des super amis et participer dans des actions and des activités qui m'ont changés.

PEACE

2 weeks later

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Mon, 09 Jun 2008 14:24:00 +0000

Coucou
2 weeks later and things have calmed down a bit. 2 weeks of school (this is the last week) have been uneventful, reading poems by Apollinaire and laering about France's role in WWII, la Résistance! Last Saturday we had a party at our house, my host sister invited like 7 friends over and we hung out and it was pretty fun, they are all really nice. Last Wednesday to Friday I visited my friend Robyn the Canadian in Saverdun, a little town about 40 min South of Toulouse. She lives in a really nice house, and we spent the whole time lounging around and watching movies, it was brilliant. Also learned a tektonik dance from her 12 year old host sister. She's going back to Canada on Thursday. This past Saturday my host sister got a scooter (moped), you don't really need any training to get one, you just buy it. Her summer job is a bartender at the casino, and my host mom wasn't too keen on going to pick her up at 4am freaquently, so voilà. In the evening I went to my first Stade Toulousain game, they are #1 in France, and a little more successfull than the TFC, they beat Bourgoin, 57-15. Sunday was nice and relaxing, hanging out and cleaning my room, watching Nadal win his 4th Roland Garros. This is the best time of the year to be in Europe for a soccer lover....EURO 2008!!! It started on the 7th and goes to the 29th. I'm rooting for France, Portugal and Sweden. Portugal are favorites to win and have Ronaldo, and I'm for Sweden because Elmander plays on it.
Things are going well, not sure what I'm going to do for 3 weeks of vacation. Today at school I had a lot of my classmates sign my Frenh flag, kind of like a yearbook.
There's a strike tomorrow....and ready to finish my last week of high school in any country!!!

Bisous,
Liz

CRAZY

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Mon, 26 May 2008 12:27:00 +0000

WOW
time has really flown by!!! I'm on a computer at school right now, so this is gonna be a speedy update of, I guess, the last almost 2 months...
April 14 à 18: Band camp in Seix. Fun..played lots of music from films and made friends. Roomated with some girls I never met before so it was interesting. All French. All week.
April 24 à May 5: Europe bus trip with Rotary. 60 students all together...majority were American, Canadian, and Mexican. Stops included Paris, Reims, Strasbourg, Munich, Innsbruck, Verona, Venice, San Remo, Monaco, Fréjus, Cassis, Marseille, Avignon, Lyon, Annecy, Geneva, and Dijon. You win a prize if you tell me which country all of those are in. There were others from my district, but most of the people were from the North of France and had met eachother before. But it was fun and I made friends.
April 11: switch host families. I now live in an appartment in part of Toulouse, not exactly the middle,but that's ok. I live with the Gilmore Girls, basically. Host sister is 3 months older than me, went to Japan last year, SUPER nice and is studying law. Mom is in her early forties and is really nice too. Place has 2 bedrooms, so I get the office..practicing dorm room living because it's so small. Guess I get a good location in place of a omputer. I am limited to at school and interet cafés. That also means that no pictures will be on here (on facebook) till July. Oh well. Well, they both have computers but for like work/school only and haven't offered for me to use them yet. Oh well, I'll probably get more sleep now.
May 9 à 24: Parents here. Yaaaaay!!! We went to Barcelona right when they got here, and Figueres too. Learned tons about Dali and Gaudi and Picasso. Cool stuff. We also visted a bit in the region some, like Albu and Corbes-sur-ciel, the Montagne Noire area and lots of Cathares castels. So cool! Then we went to Grenoble and my dad worked with his collegues. Driving across France is pretty and fun.
So basically I haven't exactly been at my host families house too much..but now it's settled down.
May 24 à 25: Last Rotary weekend. We went to Collioure on Saturday and walked around..it started hailing! Then we went to Canet-Plage and we to Le Brésilien, a "camping". That means bungalows and nice pools and a restaurant and bar and little shops. SO NICE! Us 5 girls were in a bungalow and it was so much fun. We went swimming in the Mediterrenean Sea in the evening and then had dinner with everyone. The whole place tries to be like a family summer camp type atmosphere so there was a cabaret show where we voted on people lip synching .... Sunday was supposed to incdlude a pétanques/boules tounrament, but it was raining, so instead we had a trivia quiz. My team won and I was the captain so I won a tshirt and place mat..woohoo. The questions were about art and flags and music from movies and tv-shows. Yay scholastic bowl! We also got certificates that says we completed this year..so then we were joking that if we got sent home this week we still had the certificate that we were an offical Rotary Ambassador for a year. We also got silly Rotary t-shirts and hats. Usual XXL size. Then in the afternoon we had a walking tour or Perpignan.
School news: Well in the last 3 weeks I've only gone to school on Wednesdays and Fridays, since I was got the monday and tuesday with my parents and Thursdays there's been holidays and strikes. But in swimming in PE class I'm the fastest! hooray! abother 20/20! But I keep missing science so today she told me I had 4/20. Well..maybe they even eachother out.
There are lots of striked right now, which I guess is commin in May, people don't want to work. Makes sense. Mostly against Sarkozy's elimination of 9000 jobs. But last week was all "fonctionnaires". This is the last week of normalish school. All my friends are going on their Eurio trip this weekend, so then it'll just be me at school. Till June 13. But I'm gonna go and visit some friends. On friday Maroon 5 is playing for free in Toulouse! And the rugby team just lost in the championship of Europe. And I don't play soccer anymore here. That's a long story... call me if you want to know.

Anyways..got to go to english now.

Bisous, Liz

thurssdaysss

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Thu, 03 Apr 2008 21:06:00 +0000

Heya!

I thought I should update y'all...not anything super cool has been happening, but quand même a little update never hurts. The following pictures should have been added previously, but they weren't. There's Natalie (march 11) at Cité de l'Espace, the premium air and space museum in France, Abbey and I (march 19) and a view of the canal in Narbonne (march 16).

Since last Tuesday..what happened..hmm. Last Wednesday I played against the official U16 team of the Midi-Pyrenées region, that's the game I went to. It was chilly and horizontal rain and kind of cold, and the score was 2-2. Half of the girls play at TFC so I recongnized them. Then on Sunday I went with the 2nd team all the way to Nîmes and played a club called Redesson (I think it's a town outside of Nîmes), we lost 4 - 1 and it was kinda of a disaster, and it was their home field and they had lots of fans. But I played defense in the 2nd half, here's the link if you wanna read what the coach thought (and you can see my name!) : http://www.tfc.info/fr/Actualite/101002/Dernieres_news/38730/D3_Feminines_Redessan_TFC
hahah he put a é in my last name! How French! It was a bit fun, the 13 girls were the best ones, and the 4 hour bus ride was alright, we had lunch in Montpellier before the game. It was raining on the ride home on sunday, so I rode an hour on my bike 3 times in the rain last week, ugh. The time change this weekend has brought much welcomed warmth and sunshine, so that's good. Last Saturday the weather was absolutely gorgeous here, like in the 70s and people out having fun around the city, I guess it'd been about a month since I had been in the middle of town on a Saturday afternoon, definitely changes than the normal school day crowd.
In history class at the moment we are learning about totalitariansim, and 3 regimes, stalinisme, fascisme in Italie and nazisme. So today I wrote 4 pages about stalinisme for a test. Then that's all the class I had because all the other teachers were gone for some reason. In the afternoon I went to the jeunesse communiste révolutionnaire march, never been to one before, pretty interesting. Hundreds of ppl my age in the place du capitole chanting and marching around. quel manifestation!
So I'm switching host familes next friday at 5:30pm. Kind of excited and sad at the same time. My new house acutally has a Toulouse adress (woah!!) and is faster to get to. But as soon as I move there, I know that the rest of the time in France will just zooom by. Band camp for a week, the the 11 day Euro rotary bus trip, then my parents come, then last rotary weekend. I won't be alone with them till June! Oh well, this is the best time of the year and won't miss out on any oppurtunity.
Here are some more pics:
Montpellier
On the île de ferou (sp). The was one of the windiest situations I've ever been in!!
An obelisque in Marseille that was next to our hotel
the sign at school that was recently put up that says that no food or drinks are allowed. I don't know why I took a picture of it, but I did.

Sarah and I and our chubby faces in the mall last saturday. We discovered new bus routes in our quest to go to H&M! Be proud!
So yesterday was Day 1 of swimming in PE class. Guess who was number 1 in volleyball and got 20 out of 20? the oh so unattainable grade?? ME! Thank you for the American school system and Edison 8th grade volleyball for making me sufficiently coordianted in many things! I felt bad, but the teacher actually ranked everyone in the class to give out grades. Number one baby! USA #2 was #2. Swimming was actually really fun and a bondin experience, everyone changing into suits together. Only 13 out of the class of 23 actually did it, everyone else had "excuses". We didn't swim for that long, but we got divided into groups and swam laps until the time was up. PE is part of the Bac, so you pick sports you are good at, so your grade out of 20 is actually based upon how fast you can swim 3 different 50s of different strokes, crazy. Then we had a bac blanc of SVT and physiques. Tuesday night was our 2nd conseil de classe, where the delegates and teachers discuss each student and the grades and the class. Our class is apparantly too lazy and doesn't work hard enough, and complains too much. The next morning they read who got appreciations for being a good student etc., and it was apparent which students were told that they would have to do première again, only 2 in my class. That's too bad. For my last weekend here, my host mom is letting me have my friends over to spend the night! It should be fun.

Time to go to bed!
Bisous!
Liz

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 21:50:00 +0000

some updates:

Tonight at soccer like 3 girls had my same cleats, all brand new. I guess they're the ones to get now. Hey, at least I'm with the style in one thing in France. :)
Guess who is the head of the class in PE? me! The teacher actually ranked the class in order of goodness in volleyball, #1 with the unreachable 20/20!! boo ya. 8th grade vball skills come in handy! The teacher made a limit that I was only allowed to serve 3 times in a row, because one game started off 15-0. (...)
Spent a fun 3 days with my sister in Marseille. Pretty city and had fun staying in a hostel and meeting all sorts of people. Went to an island off of Marseille and hiked around and looked at ruins from the 1820's, of hospitals and buildings. The ferry to the other island, with the prison made famous by The Count of Monte Cristo, was closed due to the very windy conditions. We seriously thought the ferry boat was going to tip over on the way to the island. We spent 3.5 hours walking around, and talking. It was fun. Then saw a movie friday night. On the way there I visited Montpellier by myself, SO BEAUTIFUL!! Visit there if you get the chance!
Spent a very un-Easter like Sunday and Monday. I ate every farm object possible in chocolate, and the chocolate was about the only Easter like activity that happened. Sunday and Monday consisted of lazing around and watching movies and tv with the host sibs.
Found out I got a scholarship that I applied for at Beloit. Happy news :) Save the parents money.
This week will be foot charged, game tomorrow afternoon and possibly one in Montpellier and Nimes this weekend. But I don't know.
7 months here!! :( Time is just gonna fly bye from now on.

There are probably things I forgot, and I'll add pictures later.

ciao

march

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Tue, 18 Mar 2008 22:51:00 +0000

Hey all.

I thought I should write some, give some updates about these last 2 weeks. Time seems to fly by faster now without doing much.
- not in Terminale, still in my première class. I went for the first day and everything, got a call at lunch from the vice principal saying that I didn't have the right to stay in T. The class is too big. I didn't really catch all of it, but oh well. I can still go to soccer this way. We saw a cool version of Alice in Wonderland last week with our class, at the national theatre in Toulouse. Hard to describe in words, but it was esentially a white box and then the whole time there were projections from all around, to create the scenery. And only one actor: Alice. It was awesome. Last week was also cinéma week, so 3 mornings we went to the movie theatre right by the school and saw Danton (French/Polish) , Land and Freedom (English), and April Captains (a Portugese film). The theme was revolution. The second two were very good. Watch them if you can. Then in french and history class we discussed the history behind te films and it was all very interesting. I liked it. Land and Freedom was the same time as Pan's Labrynth, and it was cool to see a movie from the otherside's point of view.
- Last weekend was the distict conference in Perpignan. Fun exchange student times. Woot. We spent all day listening to Rotariens give speechs about how great Rotary is etc. This district is the largest in France, yet we only have 11 ex. students. Then we had to hold our flag and say our name, age, where we came from, and who out host club was. I made the US go last, and Sarah held the flag. I only mildly tripped while walking up on stage. The whole day was all professional etc. and the lunch was delic. I have a lot of work to do in being assertive, so my sister and I didn't get to stay alone on Sat. night. I didn't quite understand why, but I'm also so freaking passive that I didn't really ask why. So Natalie and I stayed with my counselor at a rotaract member's apartment Sat. night, and tagged along with them to a restaurant and to a club. I don't think very many ex. students can say that they went out with their counselor. I guess I'm special because she's young and I'm over 18. I'm so glad I am, Rotary rules are so strict for minors, it's so nice to go out and do things, less Rotary rules. I realize that she kind of exaggerates everything, she said that they were all really excited that we were coming out with them. Ummm, nooone talked to us besides a girl that lived in the US last year. She was friendly. At the club, noone was talking to one of the members, so I just asked him what he did for a living, to start conversation....it sounded like noone had really chatted with him in a while, he went on and on, pretty interesting guy though. Romanian and business owner at 26, just got French nationality because of his high income, something like that. But it was alright, Natalie and I discussed french cultury things, why noone talked to us. There was a English guy, he was nice. I guess we were a little unit.
- French doesn't seem like a foreign language anymore, but now sometimes I realize that I can just ignore it, like it's just noise. And I think I know why. My host family's favorite pastime in arguing, every night, well every day, all the time. Just about silly things, how much the phone rings and who's gonna do what chore's etc, but it's a lot of yelling, so now I can just ignore it. I relaized this tonight at soccer because people were actually talking to me but I didn't hear them, although they were right next to me. I guess I don't try to understand and translate everything I hear anymore. Practice today was alright. I got to play some center mid so that was fun. But I got kicked in the nose and rolled my ankle too. But when I arrived at the stadium on my bike it wasn't completely dark like usual, so that made me excited for spring and changes. Also the trees around the fields had little leaves on them! The place actually really changes when it's not dark.
-Sister is here! Yay! She came last week and is in Switzerland now, and then on Thursday we are gonna meet in Montpellier and take a little trip to Marseille together. Last week we visited tons of museums and walked around Toulouse a lot. We had dinner with my counselor one night and my first host parents another night. That was fun. I'm so glad she's here, nice break from everydayness.
The rest of the year has many things planned, mostly end of April and like all of May. I basically won't be at school in May. Then June not so much planned, and then leaving July 8. Let's not think about it.
Chloé and I made chocolate cake, it was good. I also made it through a tough text messaging inquiry with her. Things sound so much meaner in French! She switched to English at the end and she sounded so much nicer! She accused me of something that wasn't really my fault. But things are good now. Still friends. She's just the kind of person that doesn't hide her feelings or what she thinks about you at all. Unlike me. I never would have asked my host sister about something like this. Maybe I should work on that for future scenarios in life.

here are some pics. Sarah's a genious and forgot to wear her blazer for the weekend. I'm proud of mine! It's all full and pretty. Tons of stuff on it! The flag patch is good too, there were some other Americans there doing the Group Study Exchange program, it's part of Rotary. They were from Houston and their leader saw my patch and came over to say hi. Wow. Only speaking to Sarah and Liza this year had made my ears only open to our accents. This guy's Texas accent was so thick I could barely understand him. But he was super nice. When he had to speak French it sounded real funny. But the effort is all that counts. So bravo.

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 23:09:00 +0000

one more thing!
look I made it online!
http://www.tfc.info/fr/Actualite/101002/Dernieres_news/38056/Division_3_Feminines
That's the game from my birthday, I'm the sub! wooooot!

Break is fun !

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 18:49:00 +0000

Hallo !!
The past week and a half have been crazy and busy, but really fun. Birthday festivities and then a week in Germany, I got back today at noon. So my birthday was really fun, can't believe I'm 19...we made a crazy cake on Saturday then had dinner together, then took advantage of some of the nightlife in Toulouse. Here's me with my cool cake...it was supposed to me 2 layered chocolate, but technical difficulties arose...I'm pretty proud of the final result, it looks more like for a 6 year olds bday party, but hey, it tasted pretty good. Chocolate. And 19 candles. (I don't know why this is underlined)

Here's everyone eating in the kitchen, my host mom made yummy chicken:

Here's us ready to go out:

I didn't get much sleep before I had to be at the stadium for my game at 1:30, it was a beautiful day and I was happy when I got there because the pro men's team was leaving and I stood for a couple minutes like only a couple feet away from the pro players...you can tell when they are there because the parking lot is full of luxury cars. Johan Elmander ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johan_Elmander , and check out his picture...he is wearing the EXACT same jacket as I have bc we are in the same club, obivously. cool, eh? isn't he hott!!) is Swedish and he's the star and he doesn't speak French and he was standing and talking about the game of the night before like 2 feet away from me! He's was so tall and cute! We played Olympique Lyonnais, lost 3-0, they are the best in the league, in every division. I took a self portrait in this uniform because I never know if I'll play in another game...no, I was not goalie, the uniform is really pink, and black shorts and pink socks! The purple stripes were more striking but this one was pretty comfy!

Then no one came to watch so I walked to the metro station 20 min away and waited for the bus home. Here's a picture from the walk...pretty day! The stadium is on an island in the river (La Garonne), so you must cross a bridge.

I came home and hung out till we had dinner. In my fashion of taking pictures of food, here's the cake my host mom got from the patisserie...pretty, eh? A bit different than the one I made haha. I was layered strawberry and apricot mousse and had candied fruits on top and says Joyeux Anniversaire Liz. They spoiled me with presents, I got some keychains and candy and then J'adore fragrence by Dior..oh la la!

Tuesday I went to my first host family's house for a birthday lunch. Here's Nadine and I with the champagne they opened for me:

Then with my cake...again different..a raspberry tart:

I would say that I mastered how to take some good food pictures with my camera...mm raspberries:

Then the next day I took a 2-hour flight to Hamburg. Yay vacation! I love travelling! After a minor delay, Svea and her dad greeted me at the airport. I was so happy to see her! I missed her so much! It was like a bit of Champaign in Europe! Thursday I went to school with her...pretty different that French lycée, and American HS. Here's a pic of the outside of her school:

The architecture of the place was pretty cool, kind of like a ship. So different than French lycée! They have 7 periods from 8am to 2pm, with breaks inbetween, but no lunch. Major snacking action happens in and out of class, then everyone goes home at 2 and has a pretty big, hot meal with their family. I like it. You are in class the same amount as in France (and US) but it feels a whole lot shorter. I guess it's just so much part of the French culture to stay in school till freaking 5 or 6pm everyday. It is a big part to have out big meal at the cantine everyday, I'm not complaining about it...it's just so interesting that it's SO different. This trip made me game for a contrasting cultural conversation..anyone? France and Germany are neighbors, yet lots of things were really different. Soooo interesting. I'll add more about this at the end. So Friday we went to Hamburg..such a beacutiful city, I want to learn about like mideval history in Germany, the architecture was so interesting and different than mideval and renaissance things in France and Italy. It seems like when we study "Europe" in that time in the US we only cover like France and Italy....never the rest. Friday Svea and I took the train to Hamburg, went shopping in the morning and too a sight-seeing tour in the afternoon...lucked out bc that's when it started raining. The city was really becautiful, and more Americanized than Toulouse with KFCs and Starbucks and bagels (got one..first bagel in 6 months!). I generally found that Germany was more like the US than France, opposite of what I expected. Here is the townhall, pretty striking square and building. So different that in France, I find that so interesting.

Here is one picture from the bus...it was raining so they are all kinda bad, it's of the Speicherstadt, which, as much as I understood, was originally built for storage, but it was so striking, near the port, all these buildings that are identical, built in the river, with canals going inbetween them. Kind of looked like a humungeous prison. Google it if you want better pictures:

We came back in time to have some supper then go to a birthday party of a couple girls in Svea's school. Pretty interesting and fun. The least I can say is that German teenagers do like to drink, and that made for some pretty interesting conversations with them trying to speak English to me.
Svea and I:

One of her best friends, Dominique, another boy, and her cousin (and me)

It was fun, they played Spice Girls and we danced crazy. It's interesting which American hit songs all of them knew by heart, mostly from a couple years ago, but I didn't know all the words to them. I think different ones were big hits in France. Interesting.
So Saturday was Svea's 18th birthday! Happy birthday! In Germany you pass your driver's test when you are 17, then automatically on your birthday you can drive, then you go and pick up the actual card during the following week. So nice not having to spend you birthday sitting in the DMV, or equivelant, as so many Americans did/do (myself included). We go to sleep in a bit, then had a big breakfast, which included hard boiled eggs, yummy rolls with lots of different things you could put on it, meat or cheese or jam or nutella. Then we drove like an hour to Bremen. The cutest city ever! Here we are on top of the statues of the fable of the streetmusicians of Bremen...you know it..where the animals get on top of eachother to look in.

The streets were all narrow and cute and my pictures do not do them justice. Here's a pretty building, I think it was a museum, but it was built in the 1500s!

Here is the group in front of a statue...unfortunately you cannot see the statue, it rises vertically. That's Svea's mom on the right, brother on the left, and boyfriend behind her.

Here's us on a bridge:

Then Svea got to pick what we had for dinner, so we went to a Mexican restaurant! First Mexican food in 6 months! I love Germany! There are no Mexican restaurants in France (ok, I know that's a generalization, but still...) It was so delicious, and so different how I've been eating the whole year, like using your hands, that wouldn't happen at a restaurant in France. I think my stomach was in shock. The food was so good and filling, and you eat so much at one time and quickly. Saturday night we went back to Bremen and we benefited that everyone was now over 18, here's a pic of her and her friends, Svea bought us leis to wear for her birthday!

Sunday started by playing volleyball with a mixt team with kids from her school, who only had 3 players, so they needed 3 more. It was really fun and I've now played in a German volleyball game! Then we relaxed the rest of the day, her relatives came over for the birthday and we ate lots of cake and drank coffee. Monday we went to school, I learned how to high jump in PE, and ten I went to badmiton practice with her. Now I can say I've been to a badmiton practice! It was pretty fun and I learned a lot! Tuesday I went to school again and then we had a big meal when we got home then went out and went a bought some pens and got my hair cut a little, now I have some bangs! I guess I'll always remember my trip to Germany like that...and this morning I flew back to Toulouse. I can speak to people! For the last week I was just in my little world of just speaking to Svea. I want to learn German in college and go study abroad there when I'm a junior.
So...observations... I felt like I was more in the US there than in France, I guess a lot of our culture is taken from Germany, at least in the Midwest. I mean the majority of the settlers were German, right? Like the houses looked similar to houses in Champaign, and they were normal with front yards and little fences and driveways and made of wood and brick. I didn't notice until I left France and came back how different it is. Every house here is made of cement and sometimes brick, with a large wall around the front. My host family saw pics of my house in C-U and asked if I was scared bc we didn't have a wall...noo.. So yeah, that was nice. And the food is similar, I guess mostly bread. Actual loaves of bread, whole grain, no more baguettes and little brioche white bread. Yummy whole grain bread. And more cakes and less tartes. I guess bc she didn't live in a big city like I do, since she drove to school everyday it felt more like Central, their school had a parking lot and trips to McDonald's in the their cars during the free hours. The kids in her class were so nice and dressed normally, not all fashiony like at Ozenne. And since the girls play sports, in PE they were dressed normally with shorts and t-shirts and tennis shoes, not it all crazy sport clothes and wearing converse for PE. One of the funniest things is when I said I live in France, their reactions. And likewise to the French ppl who I told I was going to Germany. It's like they're still rivals, when I described things in each of the countries, like school and food and houses etc., noone said really "oh, how interesting", most "well that's weird". I think that's funny. Everyone in my family here said that they had no interest in going to Germany for a vacation, I think that's funny.

So yea.

Here's a cultural link....remember that tecktonik dancing I was talking about earlier...mostly dominates boys fashion here and that's what people do in clubs. Well here's the link to the like most populer music video in France right now. The movement started in August or September in Paris, and I didn't even see ppl doing or dressing like this in Germany. But soon some American star will have someone dancing like this is their video and then everyone will be doing it and France won't get any credit for starting it. At least that's what the kids tell me here, pretty good theory. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t5XN-yiAj0Y&feature=related
I like when they dance together at the end, it looks cool.

Here's another one... this is what a lot of boys dress like here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bytf3gZMFkY&feature=related

Then here's one of the most popular pop songs the whole time I've been here. I think it's brillant. This guy maked fun of things in every song he does. I think it's funny b/c he makes fun of the teenagers that want to be american, the mowing of the lawn and the outfit, and the video is set like in an American suburb, yet the cars are cleary French or European, then you can see the "guys" standing there wearing the Lacoste warmups, that's what kinda of the french gangsters, north africans wear, yet instead of the lacoste hats they have american ones. The the high school is supposed to be american bc that's where like the majority of american music videos are set, but it's funny bc..they're french!! There are no lockers here and the pay phone in the video is french, clearly not france telecom...anyways, I could go on and on. This one even has the enlish translation next to it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q4FamibkUH4&feature=related
I'm on break for 4 more days! Yay! The I basically start school fresh with my new class. I'm gonna be so nervous. Hopefully I'll have friends.

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 12:40:00 +0000

hello
2 more weeks have gone by, very quickly it seems like. I can't really remember anything super special happening at school, except being really surprised when the history teacher said that WW1 is the most studied war in France, yet we only spent 4 class hours on it. 14% of France's male population was killed in it and our class mates couldn't even name a battle! Crazy! Then we spent time on the Russian revolution. But the big thing that happened on school was on Thursday when Liza and I decided that we should really be separated so we make good french friends, so after this 2 week vacation I will be in one Terminale ES class, and she'll be in the other one. This'll be so scary, like the frist day of school! I hope they're nice! It's just since all 3 of us are in our class, we are kind of like think block of kids that the others don't try to be friends with. So I'll have philosophy, economy-sociale, english, german/spanish, math, and hist-geo. And being 19 (my birthday is tomorrow xD ) is a little weird. I went to soccer once last week and 3 times this week, it's kind of a hassle since my host family won't pick me up now. I ran home the 5.2 miles last week, then this week I walked most of the way, then thursday and I friday I rode a bike to and from. But with now being moved up to 12th grade I have a lot more school so I get done a lot later every day so my whole riding-the-bike thing to soccer will have to be modified. But I don't want to quit! I actually have a game tomorrow now! On my birthday! Hopefully the weather is nice bc I'll be on the bench most likely. The weather has been so nice lately, all sunshine and in the 50's everyday. Last weekend was the 2nd exchange student weekend of the year. There were 17 french outbound kids and 11 of us inbounds. Saturday we had a meeting then lunch, then visited the chateau in Foix...9th century! Then drove to a village called Gouliers in the pyrenées, so cute and picturesque, and stayed at a gite. The rest of the night we just hung out, played hide and seek, ate dinner, listened to music, played cards, etc. it was pretty fun. Then Sunday we went on a hike the whole day. Such beautiful scenery and weather. I love mountains! It was fun talking to people and stuff. The group was big enough that you could separate into smaller groups without feeling like you left people out. We found some snow and it was fun throwing snowballs, especially for the australiens who never have snow. The third one came, Josh, total surfer guy from north of Melbourne, he's so nice and funny! The weekend was fun and went by super fast, and it was nice getting some sun. Last week I saw the movie Juno, so good! and this wednesday we did some shopping. This weekend should be fun, a friend is coming over soon and we are making a chocolate cake for my birthday. Next week I'm going to my first host family's house for a birthday dinner and then off to Germany on Wednesday! Yay! I'm so excited! The sad shooting this week made my hometown known for a horrible reason, and my deepest condolensces go out to all those who were involved.
I want to thank my family for their thoughful birthday presents they sent me. Dad(dy), your present was the best thing I've ever gotten. I love you.

ok so photos might not be a possiblity this time, it's taking forever. more later! bisous!

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Sun, 27 Jan 2008 17:18:00 +0000

Coucou!

I hope everyone's January week went well. I had a very interesting, tiring and ok week in this very un-january like weather. Pretty sunny the whole week and like 50's. I can't even think in temperature anymore because when I see it in Celsius that doesn't tell me anything, then I never see it in Farenheit either. I think watches should have the temperature on it, that would be helpful. I mean my alarm clock does. Nothing super memorable happened Monday, except for the fact that we heard that 2 Australians arrived. Tuesday I did my acro-gym routine (see picture). They were so stressed out it was crazy. I mean I guess it is kind of the final grade for this part of the year, but it wasn't that hard so I don't see how we could've messed up. Then in the afternoon I came home before thinking that I was going to soccer...then I couldn't get the door of the 400 year old house open, so I spent the afternoon reading outside. Luckily, it's not really cold. But I did take a picture of the house. Then my host mom came home and I felt like a complete idiot and realized that you just have to pull the door really hard before starting to unlock the 3 locks. What's new? Then I actually didn't go to practice and instead went to see "La jeune fille et les loups" for the national 100 years of Rotary day. All the movie theatres in toulouse were filled with clubs, I guess Rotary was started 100 years ago in Evanston, IL. The movie was about a girl in the alps (if you couldn't tell by the title), it was ok. I did sit by the 2 Australians, Abbey and Nick, so that was fun. It's fun not being the new exchange student anymore :)

Wednesday morning was a 4 hour "bac blanc" for french class. That means practice for the bac at the end of the year, I think it's June 20th, so it was another inclass essay. Me, Liza and another girl were the only ones still left in there at noon when the bell rang. So I actually spent the whole 4 hours! The dissertation involved explaining why characters would be disguised in costume during plays, and we were to use given texts and also Dom Juan by Molière, which we read in class. I think my time management skills have gone downhill, since I spent the first 2 hours reading and planning, which was a long time. But oh well. We'll see what the teacher thinks. My fountain pen kind of exploded so I looked like a serious writer with blue ink all over my hands after 5 pages. I'm glad I remembered my dictionary though. The afternoon involved walk around Toulouse with the in the afternoon, in the beautiful weather. They appreciated all my random knowledge and hearing everything I've learned about this place. They are super cool kids and Abbey (17) comes from Brisbane and Nick (18) comes from Sydney. We learned a some Aussie vocabulary and Abbey actually lives right by me in Tournefeuille and will go to Ozenne.

Thursday was good, strike!! Just like in November, but we came in for English class. And I don't think there's gonna be a student one now too. But it was fun sleeping in a bit. Soccer was good, we scrimmaged the U16 team. Friday was long, I think I spent almost 3 hours in public transportation. Went to school for 2 hours, had lunch, went to Sarah's house and hung out, then it took full hour to get to Balma for my English class, had that, then came all the way home, then was picked up like 15 min later by Abbey's host parents to go the Rotary thing. It was a meal with my club and another club, the one that is hosting Abbey. It was probably the best Rotary thing so far because Abbey and I sat by eachother and she is probably one of the funniest people I've ever met. Also it was fun talking to people from my club and saying how cool it was that I've been here 5 months and I'm not really new anymore. The presentation was about a space station simulation in the arctic that a guy went to, it was pretty interesting. Also the dessert was Omlette Norvegienne, yummy. I met the girl that my club is sponsoring to go to Japan next year, she goes to my school and is super nice. Then I got a call during it that said I play in a soccer game on Saturday, thought I wouldn't since I wsn't at practice that night.

So yesterday....absolutely soooooo cool. After having a minor heart attack after realizing that it was indeed Saturday and had planned on faulty bus times, I managed to get to the stadium ontime and in one piece with the help of very friendly Canadiens. Then 13 players and 2 coaches got on a bus and we went to Castelnaudary, a town an hour away and home of the cassoulet, beans and sausage dish for our match the gala. The whole thing was so cool I wish that someone had been there to take pictures for me. It was with the 2nd team, I usually practice with the 3rd team, so since it was a friendly match and didn't really count for anything, that's probably why I went. When we got off the bus people were shouting TFC TFC and had scarves, the pro TFC had a game last night too, and we went into the town's stadium. I even signed posters altho I'm not in the picture. We watched a little boys game then went back and got ready, and we met the head of their club and the mayor of the town! The whole thing was different and sooooo cool, I just wanted to smile and jump up and down going "I'm in France! I'm in France!". Since noone actually has their own uniform, just bags and warmups, the coach layed out on the table the shorts, socks and the jerseys number 1 to 14 (2 girls met us there) with the number facing up. Everyone put on shorts and socks and went and warmed up. We came back and he gave a pep talk and read out the starters and positions and the number, me! #13! left defense! Then we put on the jersey with the number he just said and we went and lined up in the covered walkway leading on to the field. We were in numerical order (I was last) next to the other team, with 2 little boys in between us (just like in the pro games on tv!), we walked out onto the field with lots of cheering, holding the kids hand, and lined up my team, refs, the other team. Then they announced the players, totally new version of butchering my last name.., and then we made 2 rows and took a picture of the starters! it was so cool! It's not like it was really that different and its totally custom here, but I guess in the US we never have stadiums really or lockerooms, at least at Central, so it was cool. But the weather was beautiful and the sun was setting when it started around 6 and you could see a mideval church near by and the mountains and I was like ahh!! this is so cool!! Then the game was good, I messed up some at the beginning because I was nervous, but the other girls were encouraging. It was kind of muddy too. They scored first, then we scored twice. The 2nd half wasn't that interesting, but we won 2-1. Then everyone took showers and we had a meal afterwards, yummy malgré de canard (duck) sandwhiches and other things. I thought we would have cassoulet, but no. The coach is from that town, so he seemed pleasantly happy with the win. It was getting kind of chilly, plus wet hair, so we left. Got back to toulouse at like 9:15, during the pro game so the traffic was crazy, then someone gave me a ride home. This picture is of me before the game.

So yes. wooooooooooooot! that was exciting. The funniest thing (ok it really wasn't funny) was that I didn't know anyone names, so when I was playing on the side that the coaches were on, and I was doing a throw-in he was telling me who to throw it to, but I didn't know anyone's names! I only know a couple! They are hard, and all like variations on Marie and other things like that. Oh well, hopefully he doesn't think I'm too stupid.

Ok, now another week, but only 3 weeks till break! halfway! And I'm going to visit Svea in Germany! Yay!

Lots of love,

Bisous,

Lise

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 18:37:00 +0000

It's been 2 weeks!!!

2 weeks and I feel totally at home in this house....I love my siblings....it's so fun!!! I love the weekends b/c I can just relax and hang out, it seems like I'm never home during the week. I went to 7 TFC practices in these 2 weeks, that means I leave for school with all my stuff, then I come back at like 9:30pm, eat dinner, then go to sleep soon after. But they have gone by generally fast and everything's good. This week was interesting, my host sister was an exchange student in Australia in 05/06, and 2 of her best friends from there visited her this week. It was the first time she had seen them since she was in Australia. We were all the same age, but in Australia the school year is the calender year, so it ends in December, so they had finished HS in December 06, then taken a year off and worked. One was an aupère in Switzerland, then the other one visted her and now they were on their little backpacking around Europe trip. They came Monday night, then on Tuesday my host mom said I could skip school so I could hang out with them...so I did! Wep profited from the sales in the city and showed them around Toulouse...Chloé was asking me for directions!! I definitely felt like I got to know my host sister better during their visit because the Australiens didn't speak any French, so we all spoke English, so I could be more of myself, so we got to know eachother better. Wednesday we went shopping again, and I only went to school from 10 to 12 for our acrogym routine in PE class...such a funny sport. I can't wait for volleyball next week! Wednesday we had a pizza party and went out! It was fun. It was pouring rain the whole day on Thursday....and we still had soccer. They made us run outside for 15 min at first...just so we were soaked..then we did agility and jumping over things under the bridge on the basketball courts, then we actually played basketball. One thing that I as better than some of the girls at! It was a pretty athletic game, but pretty funny b/c everyone was playing basketball like soccer, so everytime they had the opportunity to shoot the ball they did..and as hard as they can. After like 30 min the score was like 8 to 4, just b/c no baskets went in...it was so funny. Friday was tired at usual...english class then soccer. Yesterday I helped out at the blood drive in Toulouse, it was being run by Rotary. My job was walking groups of ppl from where they filled out the paper, into the town hall where the blood drive was. I had some pretty interesting conversations, including being told that I was the smartest American this lady had ever met b/c she was from Mauritius and I knew where that was located. Oh yeah, on Thursday Sarah and I got our hair cut...first time in France. The lady complained that b/c my thick, wet, hair was really heavy and making her back and arm hurt...sorry lady! Also I got scolded that I waited so long to get my hair cut...whoops. But its shorter and I like it.

Not much is happening at school these days....Liza and I are trying to get out of the English class, and go to a 12th grade philosophy class or something, but we'll see. In French we are just finishing reading Dom Juan by Molière and some of his other works. In History class we are learning about the 3rd and 4th republics, and now colonisation. There was so much stuff going on in the world at that time, its interesting to learn about, and I have never really before at school.

4 weeks until the vacation, I'm going to Germany, and the new exchange students are coming soon. We said bye to Jenna and Danielle recently, we all cried at the airport and it was sad. There is a strike this week, like the one in November, and I think I can play in a soccer game this weekend. I kind of want to go to band one friday, but now I feel obliged to go to soccer, there's no other way that I'll ever play in a game. You have to go to Friday's practice to go to many of the games. It's so competitive.

* Us after the haircut

* A really old and cool piece of furniture in my house...my host mom loves old things.

* Emily and Julie, the Austrlians, and Chloé and I in Toulouse

From the new house!

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 14:27:00 +0000

Sorry it's been so long since my last update! But I am now on Day 2 of my new host family, I act changed, and I can't believe that it's January, incroyable! The Christmas break was fun, kind of lazy in the end, I realized this was the first xmas break that I haven't gone on a trip since 4th grade! The first week was fun, I went skiing to Ax on xmas eve, it was beautiful weather and not that crowded. I went with the family of one of the boys who I give English class too. They are so nice and it was with his 18 year old brother and the dad. Xmas day was good, there is a shifting of priorities in France, presents are opened the fasted possible, then the rest of the day is spent at the table eating. There was actually a 1-2-3 count and everyone rushes and tears open the presents. I think people are given less presents too. So the downside is you don't get to see what everyone gives and gets. The meal was delicious, a lot, of food, 8 steps, and we ate doe. The rest of the week was ok, Friday I went skiing with them again, this time we went to Baqueira, Spain, absolutely gorgeous. The Pyrénées aren't as high as the rockies, so we were basically at the summit of the mountains at 5000 ft, and skiing above treeline the whole time. It changes it a little. But I snowboarded this time and it was soooo fun. I want to go back. The 18 year old broke his wrist, so I got to have quality clinic time again, and we go back to Toulouse pretty late. The weekend was filled with more eating and cloudy weather, I saw my cousin in Enchanted (in French), and we went to the grandmas for afternoon meal. My host parents went out for New Years, so they said I could have friends over, so I had a little exchange student party of 4. I actually prepared a french meal for my friends, appetizers, salmon, duck, cheese, ice cream. Yummy. Then we danced crazy and had fun and watched movies and stayed call up till 9 am to call ppl on the west coast at new years. The next day we slept and watched more movies. This week wasn't filled with much, but it was fun. Friday I spent packing, then I was delivered to Tournefeuille at 7. If you want my new adress, e-mail me. This house is 400 years old and amazing. My room is the 22 year od brother that goes to school in Australia, its bigt and I have my own bathroom. I have a sister, Chloé, 19 and a brother, Raphael, 16. Chloé went to Australia finished HS this year too, but she went to Australia between 11th and 12th grades. This year she is just working, and is going to be an International Student in Australia at a university starting this summer. Their parents are separated, so its just the mom here. They are all super nice, and its kind of a fun challenge moving somewhere else, yet different b/c you already have a life in Toulouse. Sometimes it's annoying going thru the getting-to-know-you stage, just skip to the part where we are friends. I'm also the 3rd student they've hosted, so that's a little different, they know what expect a little. Today is the holiday where you eat a galette de roi, and the person that has the little figurine in their slice gets to be the king of queen for the day. I live farther away now, so I have to leave for school a whole lot earlier, oh well. I'll put pictures up later, but I don't want to put pictures on this computer already.

Here's our first video blog:
http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=HMkA5O7I8Fs

Here's my pictures from December 24 to 26:
http://picasaweb.google.fr/eceperley/ChristmasWeek?authkey=wl6VGwp20tA

Much Love,
Lizette (that's what the little cousin calls me)

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Wed, 19 Dec 2007 19:08:00 +0000

Hey everyone!

Sorry I've been such a lazy-butt and not updating for 2 weeks....not going to soccer has given me so much less energy. Moral of the story..don't get injured so you can exercise and have lots of energy! Some highlights...

I got my grades from the the first trimester in the mail! No matter what you have out of 20, "good" is if you have above the class average, which I do in math, physics, and PE! Go me! Don't really know how that happened in physics since we have it once every 2 weeks and I don't really remember any of the assignments. And then in both English classes I have the highest grades in the class! Woot! About 2 weeks ago we wrote our first "dissertation" in French class, a four hour time period to write an essay. Although this words gives me chills, here in France it just mean in-class essay. In this case we were given several excerpts from texts and a prompt, then expected to answer it using the texts and also things we've read. I actually wrote the same amount I wrote for AP English in-class essays last year, except we have 50 min. Funny, in France we are given so much more time to do things. I guess the finished product will be better, since you are given lots of time to plan it out and organize your thoughts. So does that mean that in the US we are being trained to think faster and just gets all our thoughts on paper, even if not the best? I mean, that was the whole goal for the AP test last year, 3 "quality" essays in 1 hour and a half. Here it was one essay for 4 hours. But, somehow, I did spend the whole time there, and was rushing at the end. Granted I did spend the first 2 hours (8 to 10am) waking up and reading and rereading the texts over and over. But it was the most I'd ever written in French. We got them back today, I guess my french teacher grades hard, b/c there were tears from some students. But I guess they'll be happy when their Bac grade comes along. The teacher graded mine, didn't give me a grade though, kind of wish she did. She said and wrote on it that I made enormous progress in French, stressed by the waving of the hand, a common gesture, and that it was good, although my "plan", or outline was lacking.....figures haha. I think I'll ask her to start giving me grades. The first page had lots of corrections, then there was less red pen, either b/c she got tired of correcting everything, or my writing improved. But actually most of the corrections wasn't about word choice, just according the adjective with the noun, things like that. I guess I need to write slower so I don't make stupid mistakes. But I seem to do that in English too.

I went to some TFC games, saw them finally win at home. Haven't gone to practice, will after break. But I did get my uniform, and since I've part of the club now, I got in the mail today my little summary from the first half of the season. Mine's not too interesting, but there are 3 graphs on it, one with how many practices I attended and missed per month, the other with my weight and one with my VMA result, the beep running test except in a circle. They they tell you where they want you to be. I think it's pretty cool. Stupid sprained ankle.
Last Saturday was the Rotaract Christmas dinner, an excuse for many of the Rotaract clubs of the district to get together and eat, also all the exchange students to get together. My counselor seems to have a problem or predicting clothing attire, as every event (which is every rotary event I've been to) I've been to with her she's told me to wear something, like a dress, then I get there and everyone else is in jeans. I thought I would give her one more try. When we were walking around the city one time she pointed out Homecoming dressed like and said that's what the xmas party is. My attire was more beach party like, and I was content with it, but other exchange students came in nice formal dresses...when there were people dressed in jeans, and my counselor was in something similar. Oh well, what can they expect, when you are obviously the exchange students its fun to live of to your name and be a little crazy. This fact was affirmed when we were threatened to sing Christmas songs. It was going only mildly horribly and only in the top 5 most humiliating moments of my life, until we started singing Silent Night. I would say that only about 3 of the girls could actually classify themselves as singers....yeah there's a reason I chose to be in band. It was utterly horrible, but I was just laughing most of the time, so ppl didn't have to hear me sing. The worst was for Vincent, the only male exchange student....yeah, he kind of stuck out, to say the least. It was kind of fun when we sang Rudolph, because it was only the 2 Americans and Canadians that knew it, and I realized that they don't shout "George Washington!" at the end of the Canadian version... It was fun spending time with everyone, and especially the south-hemispherers that are leaving in less than a month....so sad.

There is the very cool Christmas market at the Capitole now. So we walk around there some after school. We are making a video blog, well we've been talking about it for a while, finally did it yesterday, so maybe I'll post it on here, if I can figure it out.
They are leaving soon :(
All of us that got here in August!!! except the Russian, but she didn't come
At the Christmas market...with THE MOST AMAZING HOT CHOCOLATE IN THE WORLD!! No joke! It is amazing, plus I have it on my nose.

Christmas is in only 5 days! Thanks to everyone who has sent me stuff! So far...3 cards, 4 boxes, and 2 giant envelopes!!!

Peace and Love

cheville..

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Tue, 04 Dec 2007 16:24:00 +0000

Hey oh
Since last monday started off on a bad foot.....I sprained my ankle Tuesday night at TFC practice...We were playing like 5v5 keep away and I cut the ball behind me and somehow all my weight went over my left ankle. It hurt like the 1st time I did it like a year and a half ago, but still a shock. They carried me off and then my host parents came and got me and we went to a clinic. Clnic = private hospital. My experience on Tuesday night and Wednesday morning with socialized health care was interesting...lots of waiting. The emergency room at the clinic was empty but we still had to wait like an hour. I got crutches and an x-ray, all free. Then on Wednesday I got a sonogram. I had to pay for it because I'm not actually French, but I can get it reimbursed my insurance at the soccer club. So Wednesday was kind of slow and I was bummed...I wasn't in that much pain, I just don't like being hurt...I'm never hurt or sick. Thursday was better, then Friday I didn't go to school either because for only 2 hours with cruthches, I didn't see it as necessary. I did do my english lesson in the afternoon and then we went back there for a dinner party. They were hoping to introduce me to new cuisine my making a tagine....then they were very surprised when I said that I had, in fact, spent 3 weeks in Morocco, and knew very well what tagine was. Then it turned out that my family's trip was almost exactly in the same places and the same time as their's! Crazy! Saturday it rained and I saw a movie...Christmas festive lights and things everywhere. I was happy to see my friends again...3 days seemed like a long time. It was also our 100th day here! Sunday was fun..Liz from Central visited. She's studying abroad in Nancy. She brought 2 others from U of I who are at the aerospace school there. It sounded like they were having a good semester...way different than mine though. Living by themselves and difficult schooling. Unfortunately after finding the correct bus stop, I guess it changes on Sundays, we were told that the Cité de l'Espace was closed this weekend. So that was a bummer...that's why they came to Toulouse. But we filled the rest of the day walking around... the weather was absolutely beautiful..they have been filled with cold and rain by living in the North, Southern France is nice. It definitely wasn't my normal December weather.
I have to leave soon to go to the stadium to see the TFC doctor. Hopefully I can play soon. It rained today...I got totally soaked. If only it was colder it would have been snowing. I have above the average in physics class..13, and the highest grade in the 2nd english class..18. I thought it was unfair on the last test how she took off one point for each of my 2 puncuation/spelling mistakes...when french kids would have only gotten like .5 a point off. Also the last question was opinion, so it bugged my when she took off because I didn't answer the question, when it was my opinion. The other english teacher and I had an argument because she thinks there's 54 states in the US....yeah. Also she thought prom was just walk around didn't believe there were dances. In physics we started doing chemistry...Ozenne has all this super nice equipment and each lab is really nice. We used all this (it seemed) fancy equipment to find the amount of salt in like 5 different brands of mineral water...but there was no "don't break the equipment or else..." speech, or instructions, so that was a change from Central. Liz and I both agreed on Sunday that it was fun talking to someone who came from the same place as us..it was really cool and kind of weird too. But fun. We'll always remember that day. It was also cool showing someone around Toulouse, I didn't get them lost.

Toodles!
Liz

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 21:59:00 +0000

Oodle doodle!

Hello from a turkey and mashed potato crowded world. I have infested little allée Victor Hugo with cranberry sauce and the rest of the 9 plat meal that we did on Sunday. Nadine said that I can get married now because I planned and had a sucessfull dinner party...well it was at lunch and I heard that the grandma is sick now...just kidding! I learned that pecans and cranberries only grow in North America, so the pecan pie turned into a walbut pie, and it was very delicious.

So everything since last Monday have been pretty good....the weather was warmer, so soccer wasn't as painful when the coach shoots the ball right at your thigh, when you are wearing shorts. It actually rained on the Thursday practice, which made things interesting since the fields are synthetic so instead of coming out with grass stains, you have tiny black pieces of rubber in/on/all over your cleats and socks. Liza and I started our pre-pre-triathalon training on Wednesday, with a 2 hour swim at the pool, she's such a good coach, she had me busy the whole time. We were going to go for a 20km bike ride of Friday, to celebrate 3 months in France, but we unable to secure bikes for financial reasons, but that's ok, we went on a little adventure anyway. Saturday was spent grocery shopping in the morning, then preparing things in the afternoon, then in the evening I had my band concert. Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you, that's like 40 musicians wearing bright yellow blazers in a church thats at least 300 years old. And I thought Edison's band uniforms were funny. We played at the appropriate times during the mass, then afterwards we had our little concert. We played nice jolly little festive tunes, and when we played "He's got the whole world in his hands" everyone got up and clapped and sang along. It was pretty cool. I was put in the back next to the drums and right in front of a big plant...so if you know how a french horn is, the plant was the lucky one who got the main sound from me. Afterwards was the dinner. At first I was skeptical about going, since most of the teenagers in the band weren't overly friendly to me, but it I'm glad I went. A sax player that's the same age as me saved me a spot next to her at the table and we talked the whole time. Everyone was super nice and the dinner was good too. They had like a disco ball and someone played DJ music so everyone (and I mean everyone) danced crazy at the end. I'm sure the amount of alcohol there had something to do with it, but it was pretty funny seeing the director and all the members, most of whom are older than 45, let loose and go crazy and dance. Sunday was filled with cooking, until 1pm when everyone came over. 10 people, the 3 grandmas, and then Nadine's brother and his wife and 2 daughters. I finally met my host cousin, who is 18 too! They are in the picture. All the food turned out good. But with 3 entrées, people didn't have room for the turkey, mashed potatoes, and stuffing...so many leftovers! But it was fun. Nadine and I make a good team. Then last night we went to the movies and saw Un Jour sur Terre (one day on earht), the breathtaking BBC documentary about the Earth (surprise surprise). They had a clip of the same field of flowers over like 8 months, but sped it up so you could see it grow. They also had tons of polar bear footage...them swimming in lakes in the summers..not good. Killer whales were also highlighted...I have a little different vision of Shamu now.

They unveiled in Toulouse last week the rent-a-bike system, when you can rent for fairly cheaply one of the cool red bikes and any of the many bike rack thingys, then return it wherever you want. It's free for the frist half an hour, then only 1 euro for the half day or hour. But the marketing strategy is interesting. The machines only take Visa cards, no cash or coins, and you have to have a minimun of 150€ on your card to get a bike, 300€ for 2 people, incase you steal it, so that limits a lot of who can use them.

I can't think of anything else to write... not much analyzing going into my head right now. But here's a joke... why didn't the French pigeon cross the road? Because he was on strike!!
Lots of Love,
Liz

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Mon, 19 Nov 2007 20:59:00 +0000

Lycée Ozenne in fall colors

Everything since last monday went by pretty quickly, things are becoming normal, so where's the line where I stop describing the same things over and over again? I guess I can talk more about school...hmm. I've noticed that a lot more attention is cared about the method about doing things, even if they are simple. Instead of writing in-class essays, we write just as long in-class outlines (why don't we just write the essay???), then we spent the whole hour in math talking about how to read a graph, then we spent the whole hour in history talking about how to label a map of Europe correctly. I guess I am more used to going for the information and that's it. I like the history class, I think I'm learning a more well-rounded history, especially since Europe isn't really covered at all in the 4 year curriculum at Central, unless you took French. It's kind of sad that people don't learn the rest of history of the world, like we just learned how socialism and communism became in the world, why and how etc., we never covered that. Or maybe we did, but not heavily enough that I would actually remember it. Everything was so US centered, especially 11th and 12th grades. Here we are learning about the Civil War in anglais renforcé, enough to know what happened and why. I am usually so posisitve about school, but I really have no homework and I miss having some. I'll know I'll regret saying that next year when I'll be up over my head, but I've always had math homework everynight in high school. It's not like I don't do my homework, I do it mostly at school with Liza and Sarah since we share books, it's just that there isn't much. Nothing is ever collected besides science worksheets (once every 2 weeks is the same class), and for french you can just brainstorm your ideas then ellaborate if she calls on you in class. True, a large fraction of my schedule in english class, so I don't stress about that class. But the other day in math, it seemed so pointless what we were doing, so Liza and I found the equations, sans calculator, of all the graphs we were learning how to read. Our neighbors were impressed. I would be saying otherwise if I was in the Scientific track, they do calculus in 11th grade, but I'm in L, so that's what I think.
Let's see, Saturday was St. Elizabeth day, so in honnor of our fête, Liza and I got together and got chocolate crêpes, so very french. I also met with Lauren and am now helping get the exchange students to sing songs before the rotaract xmas dinner...i can't sing. We'll see what happens. I saw the movie 'in the valley of Elah', saturday night, dubbed in French, but it was pretty good. It obviously inspired a US pilitics and war conversation with my host dad, which is not forcement always that enjoyable. Sunday included a run with Antoine, then a walk in the afternoon with Nadine. We walked past crazy châteaus and had some good conversation about education, culture and history. I also found out that my next host family lives directly across the street from the rugby stadium...wrong one! So this should make my commute to soccer practice very interesting. No metro goes there, but a bus is straight from school to there. I will also have a 19 year old host sister who was in Japan last year who I already met and is super cool, so I'm excited. It's still very weird to even think about changing.
The weather last week was super cold, like in the 30s (F) all week. Soccer on thursday was not so much fun, everything cold, hands, ears, thighs, warm food did well afterwards. But you get e headache when you go into the warm locker rooms right afterwards. Friday night at band I got my funny bright yellow blazer that I have to wear at the concert...this should make for a funny blazer.
Tootles,
peace and love,
Liz

already november!

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 21:06:00 +0000

This week has been a whirlwind of things, all covered by the weather getting colder, leaves changing and other clichés about fall......
hmm. Last week, no school mon, tues, or wed. I got a coat, its black, long, and french. All coats are dark colors, and I didn't feel like braving getting a bright color. But it's proved very useful so far, warm, covering and whatnot. Ok, enough about my coat....
On tuesday we babysat my little "host" cousin Audrey, 6, for the afternoon. We made waffles for a snack, then went on a trek around the backyard and collected leaves and rocks and other earthly things. It's quite ironic, most things that you can eat in the US with your hands are eaten with a knife and fork here, except waffles. You eat them with your hands here, and in the US its so very wrong to, you must sit down. It might quite possibly have something to do with the maple syrup, but shhhhh. We drew pictures and Audrey told me I was pretty and that she wanted me to stay here in Toulouse for her whole life! How cute! Her older sister is the same
age as me but we have yet to meet.
The photo is of her in the backyard.
Then soccer was pretty usual. It's so interesting, some practices are brutal, but some are just repetitive. We only had 7 girls b/c of vacation, so we did the same shooting drill the whole time. After you do it a couple times you can just perfect your shot the rest of the time...and come home with bruises the size of Africa on your ankles.

Wednesday I worked on my presentation most of the day (.......) then met Liza and Sarah in the city. I didn't realize how much I missed them until we saw eachother. A week and half is a long time to not see ppl that you tell everything to. We just goofed around and found things, and more importantly, told eachother about our trips. Nice, Barcelona, and Paris, way to go girls! Then Liza and I were guests at a very entertaining Rotaract meeting. We sat and chatted and laughed and ate (and threw) some pizza while listening to the amazing president talk about the agenda. Some how he threw salt on me.....then Fabien took us back to my house, where Liza spent the night. One of the guys at the club invited us (Liza and I) to his rotaract meeting because we were "amusing". Ha! We got invited somewhere on our own! My room is perfect with 2 beds... so we had a little sleepover.
Thursday...school. The day went by reasonably fast b/c Liza and I spent most of the day laughing (we were rather sleepy...hence giggling a lot) and plotting things against the carpetman. But I did get 19,5/20 on the english test and was called a snob by the english teacher....yes, a snob. What is a bunch of flowers called in english? Bouquet? Yes, that's what I thought. Then I hurried home and worked on my presentation again (......) for the rotary meeting, till I went to the TFC vs Prague soccer game. We didn't have practice thanks to the game, and I went with Franziska, the german girl that's on my team. We had a good time together..speaking french the whole time... and also trying not get as pissed off as fabien, who was sitting next to us. TFC started off well.......yeah. Didn't really end well. Getting scored on with like 4 min left doesn't leave the fans happy.

But when I got home I got a very happy text message :) , so I slept well (if I slept at all), so that was good. I forgot about my english class, so I had to prepare that stuff.

Friday was hectic and not that fun as usual....but I made it. All the things I went to: sucessfully got my carte de séjour by creatively speaking my way out of bringing the wrong kind of bank statement (ha! Liz-1 Sarkozy-0), then I went to the rotary meeting....being horribly nervous for like an hour and half until they realized then didn't have the video projector and it wasn't worth to do my presentation with out since I had photos....so next week! Thanks guys..Liz being stressed out for nothing. Then I killed some time in the city, then went over to Balma to spend the oh-so-enjoyable time with my 2 favorite 12 year-olds. We played vegetable BINGO and then I just had them draw vegetables...I don't know if they enjoyed me making them draw eggplants and corn stalks, but I liked keeping them busy. Matthieu's mom dropped me at home, then Nadine took me back to Balma for my repas de classe, class dinner at a pizzeria with my class. It was fairly entertaining, people dancing and being silly. I left at 8:45 to go to band though. Good thing I went tho, because the chef was kind of pissed that I hadn't been there for the past 3 weeks, since the concert is soon. He loves his only french horn though. I think I'm gonna quit it after the concert since it's so impractible..friday night, I have soccer, and I can't drive myself there, especially when I switch families. But it makes me sick to my stomack to think about it because I hate quitting things, and it's so perfect and fun, so I'm dreading having that conversation. I don't think I've ever quit an acitivity before. But now I'm registered for the TFC so I can't just not come every friday if I ever want to play in a game. This is Marie from my class, she is really nice.
Crazy day... do not actually wish to do that many things again, although the class dinner gave me tons of energy. Before the rotary meeting was crazy...never felt that way before. Being nervous plus going to french bureaucracy alone and other reasons my brain and mouth were not on the same planet. Liza was laughing at me because I couldn't really speak or focus on anything.....different story :)
Saturday... slept in, went running, then met Liza in the city for the Festa Tolosa, the festival to promote Toulouse to be the capital of European culture by 2013. I don't know why it's all this crazy stuff now...who knows, maybe it's really 2012 right now? But there were parades everywhere and concerts, and we caught some people salsa dancing on a truck as well as techtonic (don't get me started on techtonic, crazy stuff). But we did snag some flourescent bracelets that say Toulouse 2013 for our blazers, as well as these super cute pics! All along the street there are these things with the photos of 7th graders (will be 18 in 2013), then there's one with a hole, so we decided to go into it. The other is a pic of the Latino parade.

Sunday... I went for a walk with my host parents and saw some little chateaux, complete with guard dogs! Then I went into Toulouse. end of story. I might have had an awesome walk around the city with a local, or I might have worked on a project with Liza...one will never know. But either ways I had a good time and want to do it again. Hmm...either ways I got a good message afterwards :) .
It felt like I hadn't been to school in ages today, but got back into the swing of things...
Only 1 comment on the last entry (thanks Hannah) ! That was the most time consuming entry ever...if no one comments or emails me how will I know that people read it, thus why will I continue to update it? I guess that's not the point of a blog, but I keep my own thorough journal so I do not really need this....but I will continue, I know I have some requests for updates out there :). Somehow I'm blonde in France, never happened before. Besides the like 5 full-out blondes at school, everyone has darkish brown hair, so I guess I do look more blondish. But all my friends in the US had my color hair, dirty blond/light brown....weird.
So I can't think of anything else to analyze right now....but I'm pretty happy with everything and everyone. My friends are awesome :)
Peace,
Liz

voilà! les photos!

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Wed, 07 Nov 2007 13:31:00 +0000

Here are some picture highlights from the week
Enjoy

Monday
- Me sitting on the Cap d'Antibes
- The back of their house, there is a pool close by

Tuesday
- Nadine and I in the market in Vieux Nice
- Pretty building in Nice
- Pretty leaves in Eze
- The 4 friends at the top
- Me with the cloudyness behind...when it's really the Med. Sea!

Wednesday
- Changing of the guard in Monaco
- Some fishies from the aquarium
- Us with our fierce looking jack-o-lantern, à la française

Thursday
- Pretty building in St. Paul de Vence
- View of St. Paul de Vence
- The horse sculpture in the town (I think Matisse but I'm not sure)
- Me on top on the cliff after our hike up (where the guy got airlifted from)

Friday
- 3 different views of San Remo

Saturday
- palm tree that looks like a giant pineapple in their yard
- Chantal and Nadine in Vence

the Mediterranean sunshine felt so good

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 21:35:00 +0000

I'M REALLY SORRY THERE IS ONLY ONE PICTURE. THIS WEBSITE AND INTERNET IS BEING RETARDED AND NOT LETTING ME UPLOAD THEM. I PLANNED FOR MORE, I PROMISE!! IN THE NEXT UPLOAD I WILL HAVE THE PICS, BUT I WANTED TO UPLOAD THE POST FIRST.

Caution...long post ahead

I'm back in Toulouse! My 7 days in the Côte d'Azur went by way too fast, but I also miss my friends at school so I'm glad to be restarting (opposite to the usual of me
dreading the end of vacation)school on Thursday. The French are geniuses in making all these vacations evenly spaced throughout the year..so smart!! Like 7 weeks,
break, 7 weeks, break..x4 throughout the year! Genius! My host brother in Woostock was feeling jealous, and now my host parents keep asking me if I felt deprived of vacations in the US....no not really, I guess I never realized we didn't have that many throughout the year. But I do remember the week long break last year in February b/c of the snowstorm..ahh how nice. Anyways, here's a little (well I'll make it as short as I can as not to bore my dear readers) summary of the past week......

...I'll put the days of the week in french so you guys can build up your french vocabulary as it might be needed in the future when english disappears from my brain....

Dimanche: I helped with the marathon, handing out massive amounts of water and gingerbread as people ran past the 25Km marker. I got soaked a couple times and felt like a failure when I was instructed to cut lemons by the president of my rotary club and then sliced my finger on the first one! Luckily we were located right next to the first aide tent! Then we drove all the way across the South of France to Vence, located a little ways NE of Nice. I still can't believe we drove all the way across in the whole bottom of the country in a little less than 6 hours. Insane! My brain is still stuck on US size proportions. This whole week we stayed at the house of a couple who are friends of my host parents from college. They had 3 sons, none of whom were there, they are all of studying and working other places.

Lundi: In the morning we took at hike to La Gaude, a village near by. All the towns in this area are all beautiful and renaissance looking, with gorgeous views of the sea, and then the snow covered alps in the other direction. In the afternoon we walked around the town of Antibes, like Cannes but with one less dosage of luxury steriods, then we walked around the Cap d'Antibes, the cape that was super pretty. It's all rocky and the whole inside is the property of a gigantic mansion. Talk about money! I think they should tear down the pointy walls and video cameras and make it a big park, that would be useful.

Mardi: In the morning we went to Vieux Nice, the old part, the part I'd never been to before. All of the buildings were pretty shades of yellow, pink and orange and the Italian influence was evident. We went to the market and had bunches of yummy snacks for lunch that come from that area. All the streets aren't wide enough for cars and were bustling. I can only imagine what it would have been like there when a rugby world cup game was there. I also heard and saw the most number of Americans since my time in France. We're pretty easy to pick out, guys! We hiked up to the ramparts of the fort of Nice, giving us tons of pretty views. It's so pretty! Then we drove over to Eze, hasn't really changed since I went there in March, except it now costs 5€ to enter to the exotic garden on the top, when in March it was free. It's such a beautiful place and I'm amazed at how everything is built up there...how did they get all the rocks up there to build the buildings?? Then we drove on the top cornice (there are 3 of them at 3 different levels that allow you to drive along the coast, since it's basically all a big cliff) and went to a big park that is for bird watching. Since it gets dark so quickly with the time change, by 5pm it was already dusk. All the fog rolled in to so it was kind of erie. The picture of me with just white fog is funny, behind me is a big drop off then the Med. sea.

Mercredi: This was the day where Nadine and Chantal stayed home and made foie gras and grape jam, so Antoine took me to Monaco. Somehow I managed to visit everything else in the 2 sq. miles of this tiny country that I didn't do last time, so that was good. The weather was strikingly the same though. I will always remember when we went there though, Antoine really wanted me to see the changing of the guard in front of the palace at noon, and since it took us almost 2 hours to get there, we pulled into a spot in the parking garage at 11:56am. We proceeded to sprint up to the palace, running though all the little cute streets to get there. If you are at all familiar with Monagesaue geography, you will know that it is situated on a cliff, and the parking structure is inside the cliff. As with most palaces/castles, the palace of Monaco is located on the highest point in the prinicpality. Using some basic logical reasoning, you may now see that my little workout that was see the changing of the guard began with a couple hundred uphill stairs. An american family was blocking the stairs, so I said "excuse me, can I just squeeze by, I'm in a hurry", they all turned around looking stunned, but bu that time I was already past them. I will always remember that. Antoine yelling aller! aller! vite! depeches-toi! But we did make it and so here are some pics to prove it. The guards were even playing things that looked like mellophones! yay! Then we went on a tour of the palace, like a mini Versailles, complete with audio headsets. I was stuck in the middle of a tour group of British 70 yearolds. It was slightly amusing to watch them figure how to "press the green button" when we got to the next room. Princess Grace Kelly's portrait was everywhere. Then we visited the Musée Oceanagraphique (I know that's spelled wrong), that was started by prince Albert I, and now prince Albert II went on the same expeidition in 2005 to commemerate the 100 years of it. The aqaurium was pretty, and I used the aquarium setting on my camera for the first time! It was full of fishes from the Med. sea and Indian Ocean, a smaller version of the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago. I founnd the museum on top floor more interesting though. It was full of cool artifacts from his expedition in the land around the north pole in 1905. It was very interesting, and was about science and discoveries in the past century in general. They had the first submarine there! It was used in the Revolutionary War, interestingly labled "the American War for Independence" on the sign next to it haha, as in all the English in museums and whatnot is by British standards. I didn't see any evidence that it was halloween until we went in the cathedrel and there was a guy walking around the balcony wearing a yankees hat and a really scary mask. I find it kind of funny and ironic that the only halloween I saw was in the church. Grace Kelly's and her husbands tombs were both beautiful decorated with flowers..but then all the other like 7 former prices and spouses had nothing...don't their spirits feel left out? We checked out the real estate prices for kicks, almost as high as Aspen. I read that there are only 40,000 people that live in Monaco, but only 7,000 have Monagesque nationality, therefore live a good life and don't pay taxes, what brings the others there then? The part my the palace was so clean and perky looking, almost like Dinseyland renaissance town. Antoine was joking that we should have alerted the police when we saw trash on the ground. We drove back to Vence and carved my pumpkin! It was so funny because until I carved a hole in the top and started pulling out the insides, they all (the 4 adults who were so utterly oblivious of pumpkin carving) thought they we were going to be baking it at some point! Chantal even had the oven on! We made a grimacing face and it was fun. Then we lit it and put it outside. No trick-or-treaters this year or tons of candy, but that's ok, I made up for it in cheese and deserts. Yum.

Jeudi: We started off the day by driving and visiting St. Paul de Vence, a beautiful town made famous by many artists like Picasso, Matisse, Cézanne and others. It was so pictuesque and beustiful I thought I was in a movie. Overridden with tourists, I'm glad I was not there in the summer, that must be insane. Every other store was an art gallery. Then we went back to the house and ate lunch before heading out again for hike. We hiked from at town called St. Jeannet to the top of the cliff (baou) above it, 800m up. The temperature was perfect that you got warm in the sun, but then the cool breeze in the shade cooled you off. We we got to the top and man slipped on a boulder and dislocated his shoulder pretty bad, it was not a pretty sight and his arm was not well. So a helicopter came and got him, it landed on a piece of rock that was just big enough. The man seemed in pain, and the helicopter did not come fast enough, but I think he'll be ok. I want to be a helicopter pilot! That would be so tight to have to land on those dangerous places and save people. Then we continued on our hike around and down and around. The mountains were so beautiful and we stumbled upon the remains of a house from the 17th century that never really got finished being built. It was way out there so I can understand that transportation for all those rocks would be hard, but boy, talk about the view. Dinner was especially amusing that night as we were all a little sunburn and tired, there was a lot of laughing.

Vendredi: Italia! We went over to San Remo and got a little taste of la vita bella. It was interesting going to another country in Europe with Europeans. It was as if Italy was as foreign to them as it was to me, coming from the US. I think I had even been to Italy more times than they had. I mean, its only 30 Km away, yet this was only the 2nd time they had come. They kept comparing things to France, yet in my eyes, things were almost the same. Yes the mail boxes changed from yellow to red, and the lines on the road seemed to fade as the driving became borderling insane, but the architecture and currency was the same. Yes it's a different country, but to me it seemed like we were still in the same place, yet not, b/c we were in Italy. San Remo was very charming and full of boutiques. I found a purse and some shoes to buy, and saw that Italians come in more shapes and sizes than French people. I had spaghetti carbonara, but hate to say it, liked my mom's better:) But the gelato for desert was delicious. We walked around the whole old part, plus the beach, and got good use out of the shopping. My brain got a good workout because when the sales ladies spoke Italian to me I don't really know what language came out! It was a mixture of French and English and gibberish. A majority of the shoppers were French, but then when they saw and heard that my brain and tongue weren't really on the same page with eachother, they spoke English. Blah. I had a headache. Then we drove back and had some dinner, followed by a game of Camelot, my new favorite game. They were all making fun of me because I won both games, and they said at the beginning I had the whole innocent façade of "I don't understand this game b/c I don't speak French etc....", but then I whooped their butts! What can I say...beginner's luck.

Samedi: We started off the day by a pleasant little game of pétanques, or boules. They had a little court thing of dirt in the corner of the yard. Again I was a clutch player and scored all the points for my team (we played girls vs boys), but we unfortuneately got beat in both games. Now I know all the rules...so get ready for the first annual C-U pétanques tournament next summer. In the afternoon we walked around Vence, a beautiful charming town, part of the church dates back to 230 AD..that's pretty dang old! Everything is provençale and all charming. People playing pétanques in the square, then of course the teenage boys dancing techtonique off in the corner. The dance has me laughing everytime, but people here are pretty serious about it. Techno music blasting and crazy arm movements. The clothes, the haristyle, its everywhere. We also visited the chapel that Matisse decorated, very beautiful. After watching Gasquet lose and Nadal win in the tennis masters at Bercy on their giant TV, we played another couple games of Camelot. I wasn't as sucessful as the night before, but did snag one game. This is a picture from their yard.

Sunday we drove home and ate at the grandmas, today we ran some errands and went shopping in Toulouse. I got a coat! Now I offically look French. And it's black. Colors in outerwear is not permitted here (I'm kidding but it seems true).

So this week was fun, getting to see my host parents in a different house and atmosphere was good. Everyone was so relaxed, and I don't think I've laughed so hard recently. Antoine is so funny, when we went to Italy we spoke French with an Italian accent the whole day, it was funny. All 4 of them mixed English words into their sentances the whole time, leaving us all laughing the times where I didn't even catch they were doing it. I did much explaining, and I still feel like I'm a disappointment. I'm not the repulican, 5 meal a day, never have travelled, and does't know anything, american that they all want to me. They keep telling me that I'm an excpetion. But no! Americans are a mixture of people, and I am finding it extremely difficult to define a country when they ask me such general questions about the US. Yes I am different, and just because I lived in France for a year already doesn't make me any less or more american than someone that has never been out of their state. They seem annoyed that I already have tasted things and know things...but sorry. We ate raclette on Wednesday night and it actually reminded me of home. Except for the partirdge eggs that went with it...not those. But they were quite tasty. It was interesting living with other people for a week, see the changes. They had a giant TV they had 400 channels (Antoine and I went though each one and saw that 200 of them came from Germany), ate we ate an apéro every night, but no entrée. That bit of alcohol before dinner was probably why they were so funny. The deserts were amazing, créme brulée, tirimisu, and i made the cheesecake, many others but I foget them.

As a response to the questions left as comments, yes le canard is delicious, in confit or magré or anyother way. I don't know how they made foie gras, but it's good that way too. I think Nadine bought foie that was not gras, they they put stuff with it and let it sit for 3 days, et voilà! its gras! To the second question...umm I think the french people I'm with think americans are a friendly folk who don't know much about the rest of the world. honestly. that we are closed off and live in our own universe of strange sports such as baseball and football, and have a horrible economy (at the moment it sucks like crazy!). I agree with them on this. I think americans are slightly mysterious. And to be honnest, most people in France think americans are like the cast of desperate housewives and prison break. These are just my observations so I hope they don't offend anyone :) But keep the comments coming people!

I changed the title of my blog because Liz in France was just a temporary one until I thought of something more local and original. It was good to talk to my real parents on skype when I got back to Toulouse, yet I did chat with them at night online in Nice, plus I had many enlightening and memorable chats with friends online (you know who you are) so I didn't miss people too much. I have to give my presentation about Champaign and myself etc. on Friday at Rotary so I should be working on that now.

Peace,
Liz

....I can't really think of a title

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Sat, 27 Oct 2007 16:25:00 +0000

coucou!
This week went by fast...I went to soccer all 3 times, and I hopefully sucessfully registered for it. On Monday we had to read Guy Môquet's letter from 1941 that he wrote to his family just before the French police killed him for being a Communist, on October 22. It was required that all classes all over France read it, as ordered by le President de la République, Sarkozy. It was kind of big deal, not really about the letter, just that he could order something like that, and why was it necessary for 6 year olds to hear it too. And why this letter?, as it was kind of morbid, a 17 year old saying that he's going to die. Wednesday I felt all grown-up because I opened a bank account all by myself, in French. There are banks everywhere, literally every corner, so I just picked BNP Parabis because it's by my school and it was open and looked friendly. This way I can have a Carte Bleue, a french debit card, b/c some machines only accept them. On thursday our english teachers weren't there, so we didn't have school between 10 and 3, so Liza and I went swimming. We got weird looks when we told our classmates later in the day, b/c noone really does sports (ok except the girls on my soccer team). Everyone is super skinny, smokes, eats tons of chocolate and cheese, and doesn't do sports. We haven't had PE for 3 weeks b/c the teacher had a meeting Wednesday mornings. Soccer this week was the biggest full body workout of my life. I was put with the 1st and 2nd teams because my team had a tournament this weekend, and I can't play in it b/c I'm not registered. So Friday was an hour of conditiong and sprints, and Thursday was a French version of the beep test, except you run in a circle. I finished (as in I felt like I was going to throw up and couldn't breathe) after 12 minutes, and 5th out of 10, so I was satisfied. Friday was slightly insane, I counted I swiped my metro card 13 times. I went to school, then rotary meeting, then home, then english class with 2 very hyperactive 12 year olds, then soccer, then home. I couldn't go to band bc I would have been really late. A family friend lost his vision in one eye too, so my host parents were kind of stressed out about that. Amoury and Matthieu, my oh-so-eager-to-be-there 7th graders were already on vacation in their minds, so my english class was kind of all over the place. It's tough on Fridays, plus this class was their mother's idea, not their's. But I thought I should update a little before I go to Nice for a week. We are staying with some friends, the ones that visited 3 weeks ago. None fo their kids will be there, so hopefully I will be good. This week I got an awesome package from my mom, halloween candy, a halloween beanie baby and keychain, halloween stickers and hair clips too. I gave canday at school yesterday and that was fun. She also sent me a little kit for carving a pumpkin, and Nadine bought and nice and big pumpkin to carve and take with us to Nice. I also attempted to make an apple pie on Wednesday, it tasted good, but didn't really resemble an american apple pie, more just like baked apples with tons of sugar and cinnamon on a crust. Tomorrow I am helping with the marathon, unfortunately I can't run b/c you have to be 19 (STUPID), but all the rotary clubs are supplying volunteers for the aid stations and handing out water etc. We are driving to Nice tomorrow afternoon and staying the whole week. Then school starts the following Thursday.
No picture highlights this week, it's all getting normal. Except my brain is switching to French, I think, because now everything is half and half. Some things that I want to say I can't think in either French or English. Or when I want to speak french I speak english and vice versa. No speaking english this whole week haha, I won't see Liza and Sarah everyday :( . Today we dropped off U2 at a doggie hotel, it was so cute.
Later,
Liz

cinémawww, théâtre, rugby et le foot

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 23:22:00 +0000

So it's Sunday........today was a relaxing day. Last Sunday I went to the Pyrenées with Sarah and her host parents. We drove up to ski town on La Mongie, then took a cable car ride up to the highest point in the French Pyrenées, Pic du Midi. It is an observatory, with astronomers and physicists that stay up there for a week at a time to do their research on the sun. The elevation was a little under 10,000 ft...so you can tell the difference between these mountains and the Rocky Mountains...yay for Leadville, CO at 10,000 ft!! It used to be only an observatory, but then in 2000 they built the cable car and made it t tourist attraction because they didn't have enough money for all the science equipment. Coincidentally it was science day, only happens twice the whole summer and fall, so we got a free tour of the gigantic telescope and we met the scientists and stuff. It was so beautiful at the top...I love mountains!!! Then I thought...hmm I did get accepted into 2 colleges in Colorado, and I could easily be a freshman at one of them right now....but I'm happy here!!!

The night before I watched France lose to England in the Capitole, after eating yummy Paella made by Antoine's mom, he's Spanish.
So this week...Tuesday night I went to the theatre, Théâtre Garonne, and saw "Derniers remords avant l'oubli" by Jean-Luc Lagarce. I'm not that experienced in contemporary theatre, but I really liked it and understood most of it. We talked about it the next day at school, so that was good. Wednesday Liza, Sarah and I saw "the assasination of Jesse James" after school, with Brad Pitt. In English, of course, and I really liked it. The music was all modern with a western movie, and I kept thinking that it would turn into a Moby song, haha, but it never did. It was good we saw it in the afternoon, because it's a long movie. Then Thursday was the strike against Sarkozy's new policies against functionaires, so 3 of my teachers were striking, so I only had school from 1-3pm. here are some pics from the manifestation. The trains and metros and buses weren't working, so only 11 people in my class were there. My host parents didn't strike, just because they didn't want to get behind in their classes, so we drove. Then after school, Fabien and I hung out because he was in the city during the day, then he could drive me to soccer. We didn't know what to do..so we went to the movies! I saw Michael Clayton, lots of thinking, but a good film. It's a little different than in champaign, because i live in a big city, so you just walk up to the movie theatre and see what are playing and go to whats convinient, no looking online or in the newspaper..i like it.

I'm officially on the TFC 3rd soccer team...my name Lise Geperlex...was on the wall. I know that that's me...but i guess they couldn't read my handwriting before because I wrote it when I was really out of breath lol. So that was exciting. I'll turn in my papers and stuff next practice, no hurry bc there's not a game for a while. Friday night I went to a soirée with my Rotary Club. It was a big dinner to finish their Ferrari fundraiser. In June they raised 15000€ for a children's hosptal by showcasing Ferarris, and selling tickets and rides etc. So yesterday, I did things around the house...then I went to the TFC vs St. Etienne football (soccer) match!! yeah!! It was so much fun. I went with Liza, Sarah, and Danielle, plus Liza's host dad and sister came with us. TFC lost 2-0, so it was fun screaming really loud. We experimented with the cool features on my camera, so thats why these pics look a little funny haha.

Then at night we went to Clementine and Emmylou's house for a dinner party, us "kids" didn't have to eat with the "adults" so we ate pizza and watched South Africa win the world cup! Congrats! And Sarkozy handed the cup over to the SA coach. It's funny, many people here wanted England to win bc they are from Europe...even tho they beat France and its, well, England. As for the divorce.... according to the opinions of the people sitting at my table at the Rotary soirée, that Cécilia is being seen kind of as a 21st century héroine because she stratagized and wisely played the divroce. They metioned Mme Bovary too. I guess their marriage was bad a while ago, so she purposely didn't vote at all in the elections, so her husband wouldn't get her vote. Then she waited until he was elected so she would be finacially stable when she divorced him. Now that he's president, she can get all those financial benfits when the divorce happens. Then they said she'll leave France and go to the US...so heads up for the tabloids! I guess she has a lover in Miami or something. Who knows. But many covers of newspaper say Deseperate Housewife...funny because EVERYONE here watches Desperate Houswives religiously.
But I have mastered the french dining course..I'm sure you don't care but here are my learnings:
1-apéro (cashew, cheese crackers, crackers etc. with champagne, marntini, pastis, liqueur etc)
2-everyone moves to the table for the entrée (soup, variety of veggies, fish, anything really)
3-plat principal (anything. today we ate confit de canard with mushrooms and baked pears)
4-cheese!! (always 3 types, a hard one like conte, a soft like brie, and a chèver or blue) w/salad
5-desert or fruit
6-café
These are the 6 steps. Everday weekday dinner omits step #1, but we have all the others. We usually eat fruit for desert, and I usually don't get coffee, sometimes a decaf. At the rotary dinner we even had 2 entrées..so 7 steps. On sat. night they started their apéro at 8:30pm and we left at 2am!! No joke! Lots of time is spent at the table in France. I'm sure you all needed that information. Today we had the 2 grandmas and the great grandma over for lunch. I noticed that Nadine adresses Rose (Antoines mom) by "vous", although they have known eachother since Nadine was 18, when my host parents met. This afternoon we went for a walk and I asked her about that. It's just a form of respect, even if you know them really well, like for 30 years! I like that in French, bc there are only a certain amount of people in your lives who get to be called "tu", apart from all kids and pets. So if you're a teacher you call your whole class "tu", well unless you are actually talking to the whole class, then its "vous", duh. It makes an intamacy that doesn't exist in english.
So yeah...enough for now. One week then vacation!! Going to Nice.
Lots of love, Liz

time moves too fast

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 17:14:00 +0000

9 days since my last post! crazyness...time just flies by. I'm home alone now sat. afternoon, my host is at her tennis lesson, and my host dad is out shopping for something. So this week...

Highlights:

This weekend was relaxing, and Saturday night was super fun. We had Nadine and Antoine's friends from Nice with us the whole weekend, and we are visiting them at the Toussaint vacation (2 weeks!). We just did things around the house, but Sat. night we went to place de la Capitole to watch the match of the quarter finals of the world cup between N-Z "All Blacks" and France. It was an indescribable feeling being in the center of thousands of people screaming the Marseilleise. France won. It was so awesome. Tomorrow they play England.....Liza met us there. Here is us watching the game, and with some guys that dressed up like Chebal, the French star player who has a long beard. The other pic is of my host parents and their friends.

Mondays fly by, but also go slowly. It's the only day I have class from 8-6, so by the time you get home, eat dinner, do some homework, then it's Tuesday. I went to a collegue of my dad's for dinner, since he lives in Toulouse. I met him and his family for the first time. I receieved my ski jacket and snowpants that my parents had given him in Lyon. Their daughter Lou is my age so hopefully we can do things together.

Tuesday soccer practice was alright...much running but ok. So much harder playing on synthetic grass. Wednesday night I went to the Orchestra de la Capitole, the professional orchestra in Toulouse. It was a special preview night for Rotary Clubs, since the regular season of it opened on Thursday. Rotaract clubs were invited too, so I went with Fabian. The theatre was amazing, a hexagon stage, with seats coming up in every direction, so everyone had the same awesome accoustic experience. Half of the stage was for the musicians, the other half for the audience. We were sitting right behind the french horns, so that was awesome. The music was exceptional, and it's cool to see a professional orchestra live, I guess they are one of the premiere ones in Europe. Fabian had never been to any sort of band/orchestra concert ever, so I told him all the names of the instruments. It was kind of funny b/c I didn't get home till really late b/c the peripherique was closed in one direction, so he had to drive all the way around Toulouse to take me home!

I won a TFC jersey at soccer on Thursday night! All 3 teams were combined, and we did a scavanger hunt run. It was really fun, and I got to know some new ppl, there were 7 teams of 6 or 7 girls, and 2 of the women on my team are on France's national soccer team! We got a map of the area and had to find things. They do clues and make a sentance, and come back and do a soccer drill to get the next one. 6 different challenges, and we ended up running nonstop for 1h30! Our team had the fastest time overall and got the sentance first, so we got last year's pro jerseys for free! This is good b/c I don't have my own yet, but I'm going to a TFC mens pro game next sat, 10€ for women! so now i have something purple and TFC to wear.

My host parents went to the Opera last night, so it was up to me to find a ride to band. Soccer was cancelled because there's no game this weekend, so that made things easier. After 4 different phone calls I got hold hold of the English women who plays clarinet, and she was able to take me there and home, that was so nice of her. Band is really fun, the songs are nice and jolly. The chef doesn't really talk to me during the practice, but last night while he was looking down at his score he said (as much as I caught and understood), wow this french horn is so wonderful, you don't realize how much the sound adds until you have one...then 30 pairs of eyes turned and looked at me, and some of the flutes continued to look at my while I was playing. The horn part in all the music is usualy backup stuff, so I hope they enjoyed watching me play long notes! I had my english lesson yesterday, it was harder than the first time. This time I had both boys, so they goofed off more together, and it was friday so they didn't really want to be in more school...but I learned my lesson, need to prepare lots of things to do!

I got my first graded test back, 16,75/20 on the math test...3rd highest in the class! I told that to my host parents, so now they now I wasn't lying when I said I knew what to do for it. The scoring system is always out of 20, yet it's not the same numeric system as in the US, no I did not get 83%, it's more subjective, with noone getting a 20/20, even if you did get all the problems right...there's always something you did wrong. So I think my score is more like an A-.

Differences I've noticed in school..they want to participate more, and the teachers ask for the students opinion more, class time is more orientated on expressing your opinions and thoughts, than just covering the material. This depends on the class of course (this doesn't happen in science), but in English class WHY is asked more, so they can practice expressing themselves in another language, even if it is simple things. We started discussing the novel in French, and everyone just couldn't stop talking about the characters and everything....although I am in the Littéraire section, so my observations might be biased. We haven't written one in-class essay in french class, but many lenghthy outlines, I guess this shows that the teachers are trying to show them how to organize their thoughts, so they essay will be good. In the Civics class that is only held every 2 weeks, we are working on in groups a big project that is due in January, but as far as I can tell, we don't actually write a research paper, we just write the outline for it, then we will have a debate. My group is doing it over laws getting out of prison..or something like that.

I have not written about bisous on here...that is a big cultural thing, kiss everyone on each cheek when you meet them, before school, at night, for the first time (mostly me), basically anytime you see anyone. You are not obliged to stay and chat, it's just saying you acknowledge eachother's prescence and that you know them..like I see my neighbor on the bus home a lot, we give bisous, but I don't really talk to him. But other than that I've noticed that French ppl don't really casually touch eachother, like high 5s or pats on the back or anything. I really noticed it when I was with Anna Victoria from Mexico b/c she couldn't stop jus grabbing my arm or putting her hand on my back. When I was really happy one time I really wanted to hug someone so I said that to Nadine and we had this awkward like kiss/hug thing, but then I explained and we had a good conversation about things like that.

Also everyone here is skinny! All the girls at school would be considered skinny or really skinny in the US, and we heard that a French girl exchange student was sent home from Australia because she was anorexic. Liza and I deduced that the French's bones are just smaller b/c noone really does any sports, plus everyone smokes. I think its funny how half my class smokes a cigarette while waiting for the bus to PE. It's just weird, everyone has smaller hips, and the biggest size in most stores is equivalent to US size 10 (for women). Guys are all really skinny too, and you can pick the ones out that have played soccer or rugby out b/c they are more built up. Everyone eats, and a substantial part of the diet is white bread...so I don't know how it works. I do know that I've gained weight b/c I was weighed at soccer on Thursday. They weight all the players every month to keep track, a hint that I might actually be on the team since they made a point of me doing it.

I got 3 pieces of mail this week...yay! A card from my granparents, and 2 things from Marci!! Thanks! Gum and letter, then a cool word search puzzle with all our memories. The picture below is Liza playing with Sarah's crutches at school, with the guys laughing at us in the background. Sarah was on crutches for her ankle, now shes not, but we got to know the elevator and how the school is not all the way connected all the way around. Notice that the crutches are a different kind than in the US...weird.

Tonight France plays England for the Rugby World Cup semi-finals!! Allez les Bleus!! I'm going to watch it in the Capitole with Sarah and Franziska, a german girl who's on my soccer team and is an exchange student in a different program. We speak french together so it's slightly funny since we are still searching for many words. But I think my French has reached a new level, I now speak with out really stopping that much, and I even found myself mumbling...not good. And while I was writing this I had to delete french words, without realizing I had written them, bizarre.

bye for now

Love,

Lize (how they spelled my name at soccer)

fun weekend/ package

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 15:17:00 +0000

Bonjour!

This weekend and week went by way too fast but I also can't believe that it's Thursday! Saturday I went wakeboarding with Laure (my counselor), Sarah and Anna Victoria. I was quite cold but we got wetsuits (I got a cool cammo one) and I made it up every time. We only had an hour, and because I fell each time on the 2nd turn, which is the exact opposite side of the lake, I only got to start 3 times. After you fall I had to swim to the side, climb out, and walk all the way back.

Sunday I went on my first outing with my Rotary Club; we biked along the Canal du Midi and had lunch, and came back. 12Km each way, but the wind was so strong that it took twice the time to get there than it did to go back! There were only 4 of us that biked, 2 rollarbladed and everyone else (like 30) people just drove to the restaurant. We ate in a greenhouse and it was like an organic restaurant, and everything we ate came from there. So an interesting twist on French food....gaspacho with strawberries and foie gras inbetween gingerbread....my club is on the older side, and I saw a lot of plates being handed back with a lot of food left on them... Here's a picture of one of the many locks along the canal.

This week has gone by so fast!!! And after complaining that I wouldn't find any activites to do...now I'm busy! Monday is the only day I have school till 6pm, which is good b/c its the only day I haven't done anything at night. Tues/Thurs I had soccer, and Wed afternoon I gave my english lesson to twelve year old Amoury, and then went to a Rotaract meeting with Fabien. With Amoury I had him read and answer the 20 questions I made on a little worksheet about Henry the soccer player and then we read some dialogues and did his homework...the 1.5 hours flew by and I got 20€! yay! Soccer is good, the beginnings of the practices are super hard, but then we just do drills the rest of the time so that's alright. Everyone is pretty nice, but it's so disciplined that there isn't really much time to chat. If you talk, you go home! There's a canadian on the team, I think she has lived in Toulouse for most of her life though, so she has a more french friendliness, but it's nice to speak english with her. I've experienced the weirdest looks at soccer...I guess that's what happens when you speak french when you're really out of breath..haha. It turns out that there's soccer friday nights too, and tomorrow they return to the Stadium, so this will be a little complicated with band...ahhh but I want to do both! Christophe, the coach said that they would probably take me in the club, which is exciting, since so far it's been kind of like a try-out.

Today in History, we spent the 2 hours of class time going on a tour of the 19th century history of Toulouse, learning about why and how all the building fit the bourgouisie lifestyle, all the streets and boulevards in toulouse were expanded and modeled after those in Paris, at the same time. Its so awesome to learn about history and then see it!! kind of crazy. In Anglais Renforcé we watched parts of Bowling for Columbine and then we had to describe what we saw. The students were just supposed the practice speaking with out having anything written down. Then we analyzed the American culture and why this happened in the US, and what were the causes and how this couldn't happen really in France. It made me a little uncomfortable because the teacher asked me so many questions and just assumed that my family owned a gun (NO) and everything because the statistics for the US and guns are so much higher. They asked me about violence at my school and I said there were video cameras, fights and a police officer there, so now I think they are all scared of me because my school doesn't sound very nice! But it is! On a more cultural note, people here have to restraint in asking your political views. I have been asked coutless times whether I am a dem. or rep., something you would never ask anyone in the US! But there's no shame here, it's like an icebreaker. I was kind of disgouraged when a girl in my class asked me who I voted for in 2004, and whether I was going to vote for Bush or Kerry this year....hello....I was 15 in 2004, and Bush cannot run for pres, idk about kerry, and the election is next year!! Also noone has heard of Obama! Only Hillary, because everyone likes Bill Clinton here. So that's kind of weird too. Also my host dad always grills me on American things and then seems upset when I don't know the anwser to specific laws, and all the rules of american football....I don't know how long a game is? A couple hours? Today I got my first mail from Champaign! yay! Andrea sent me a Parkland tshirt, Oreos, and a long letter. Thank you so much! I was so surprised and happy!

Bisous for now...it's late now...need to go to sleep.
Tomorrow will be rather hectic, trying to do soccer and band.
Later,
Lise
ps- here's an added photo....my mom has her own neighboorhood (and street that's right by it) in Toulouse! She really needs to come visit soon to see it :)

Le Foot

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 16:42:00 +0000

Salut!

Things are good! This school week went by so fast! If I'm not careful the whole year will fly by! It seems like class time this week was minimal, but we finished the first half of our first unit in French, we are starting Liasions Dangereuses on Monday. But the highlight of this week was Le Foot! Yes, I did indeed manage to make it to 2 soccer practices with TFC. Tuesday night was cancelled because of the world cup game, but we went on Wednesday. Wednesday night was perhaps the most frightening soccer experience of my life....Sarah and I realized that the women who were wearing the French National Team warmups didn't just buy them, it meant they were acutually on the national team. The first half of the practice was conditioning, and that was the same as I've done before, so I didn't know what I had gotten myself into, yet. The 2nd half was just playing 5 vs 5 games, but I was scared when they shot the ball and played because they kicked it so freaking hard! I would have rather watched in awe than running around in circles panting. I did manage to get the ball a couple times. The coaching method was a little different, I guess when you play for a pro team and the classement in the league is the most important thing, you are allowed to yell. But I thought the coach was going to lose his voice! Oh well. Afterwards we learned that the 30 women made up the 1st and 2nd teams of TFC, some of them were my age while some looked more like 30. So we went back last night, Thursday, and played with the third team. Sarah, unfortuneately, hurt her ankle at the beginning, but I stuck out the whole practice. The girls were all high school age with a couple older ones and they were all nice and talked to me. One even is in 1° at Ozenne too and knew about me. They said they had a small team, so maybe they need me! We did sprints for the first half, then since we were on a field with out lights, we moved to play on a gravel field. It was actually kind of tight. Really fine gravel made up the whole field and it almost like playing indoors except it hurt worse when you fell and your shoes get really dirty. We played the rest of the practice jsut keep-away with like 6vs6. The speed of the game is way faster than I'm used to, but I tried my best to keep up. It was only about 40 degrees, F, outside so the weather was alright. I'm def. true that if I play with them I'll improve. I learned that they practice Tuesday and Thursday 7h30 to 9pm, and next week is the last week in the suburbs before we can go back to the Stadium (the rugby world cup occupied it for the month). This coach was pretty nice, and yelled a lot too. He said he would see us play next week and they deceide if we could join the team. It's true it'll different being on a really competitive club team, where everyone really tries their best in practice if they want to play in the games, plus since practice is only twice a week, with games like every other sunday for the rest of the year. But it would be cool being on it, I would make good friends and get tons of Lotto gear (TFC is sponsored by Lotto and not Adidas or Nike). I really hope I can. I can lose the weight I've already gained! This morning I could barely move my legs I was so sore and my oblique muscles were sore, never knew that could happen from soccer. This picture is from last Saturday when I went to the TFC game at the stadium, before the game started:

So I hope it works out! Fridays Liza, Sarah and I only have school from 9-11 so we decieded to go shopping and profit from this great city in the afternoon...after waiting till noon to eat a delicious lunch at the school cantine. We went on the community swingy chairs in the little park byt the Capitole and here are the pics of the colorful benches and stuff...they were still being constructed when I got here...so they are only like 2 weeks old!

Then we heard that the All Blacks, New Zealand rugby team who are favorites to win the world cup, would be making appearance a the Place de la Capitole at 2h30 this afternoon, since they play here tomorrow in Toulouse. We got there at 3 and we were pretty close to the front. We waited till 4h30 and FINALLY they came and it was this big Adidas campaign too. They had break dancers and they some of the players came out. There were bunches of New Zealanders too all around us, following their team around france, so they were fun to talk to. Heres a pic of us waiting for the hour and a half in the crowdedness. None of my pics really came out that well since Im not too tall and there was really a lot of people.

So à tout à l'heure for now! I have an exciting weekend planned. The weather has been kind of weird. It was so wonderful since I've been here till Wednesday, then it got colder. Yesterday it was like 40 and drizzly all day long, really cold. Then today the same but sunny. I want to buy a leather jacket/coat like everone here!

Lots of Love,

Leez

Things came through!!

noreply@blogger.com (Liz Cep.) — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 19:29:00 +0000

BONJOUR!
Our internet hasn't worked since Thursday so now I can update! Highlight if this past week: I found a band to play in and its so awsome. Every friday night and it's at a music school, but noone takes French Horn lessons, so he had 2 really nice horns for me to choose from. So I picked one that looked practically new and it was awesome. There were like 15 people there, usually more but since it was the same time as the France-Ireland rugby game, there were less. The music was nice, and the director kept saying that he couldn't believe he was going to have a french horn this year. Also in french its called a cor d'harmonie. 3 out of the 6 flutes are teenage girls that were super nice and talked to me after it. The only problem is getting there since its in another town and the only way to get there is driving. I hope this doesn't inconvienece my host parents too much. There are Ecole de musiqe everywhere, but the american system of teaching music in school at such a high level (at least in Champaign) is, I think, taken for granted too much. I played almost everyday from 5-12 grades for free. I didn't have to take private lessons, but I did. Here if adults or kids want to learn how to play an instrument its private lessons like once a week.
Also this week I got a cell phone, thanks to my mom. My parents are still in Europe, and have been, since I've been here. They are in Germany now so she sent me the cell phone she had before they left france...thanks so much!
On Saturday I went to a TFC pro soccer game, my first european live soccer experience. It was so awesome. We were right behing the goal and it was so cool watching somebody actually score doing a bicycle kick! Toulouse tied Lens 1-1 and are ranked now 9 out of 20 in france. I went with Fabien, who is a rotaract and came on the weekend to Cahors and loves soccer too! He picked me up and bought me a ticket and everything! Thanks so much, it was so fun. Yes, that is the same pro club, and they have a womens pro team, then 2 teams under that, then a U16 team. So hopefully maybe we can be on one fo those teams.
I found a pool in Toulouse! It only cost 1.40€ to swim laps and its 50m by 25m and so beautiful. It is super deep for like national diving competitions and has 2 full water polo courts in tile that u can see when u swim. the first time i went the lanes were the 50m direction, the 2nd time the other way.
Yesterday I saw Ratatouille, in French, and it was so adorable and cute. Life is so good and unfortunately I don't have time to add any pics this time since host mom needs the computer. School is good, I add to write my first in class essay today in French, over a passage from Sentimental Education by Flaubert. In History we talked about immigration and it was interesting to see that only 4 out of 24 students granfather were born in France. Most peoples were from Italy or Spain, who came as children in the 30s to avoid Franco and Musslini. Others were from Tunisia and Morocco. Spanish class is hard, since I don't know very much spanish. English class is just funny because the teacher keeps telling Sarah, Liza and I that we speak American and not realy English, and that our grammar is all wrong. So we laugh. In between classes is fun because we go to cafes and get croissants and crepes. Yummy. We also scored some of the rugby world cup stickers for free to put on our blazers! sweet! Toulouse is such a beautiful city and theres a campaign to make it the capital of French culture by 2013 so there are these fancy public swings and many colorful benches and stuff that werent even here when I got here a month ago. There are also posters of lots of 7th graders, kids who will be 18 in 2013, everywhere.
Ok salut for now,
Love, Liz