Well hello there...

Whoa! What?! Cortney is posting again??

I know. Crazy right?

Sorry about ditching on this for so long. I started writing so many times but then I thought I should just wait, or I didn't have time to finish. So... I finally and done with homework so I have a few minutes before bed to write you all!!

So lets see, since school started life has been INCREDIBLY stressful. I really wanted to drop down into the level below me, but like mom always quotes "I can do hard things." So I decided to stick it out and see the progress I could make. In a lot of my classes everything is going well, I understand the teacher, I get the subject, and I'm doing well on the assignments. Yet, there are a few others that I just feel... like I'm a third grader and they handed me a Jr. in high school's work load and expect me to be good at it. Its really really rough. And the girls I'm with are OK about helping me but they get annoyed by me asking so much and not understanding a lot. Its really hard. I've taken the least amount of classes out of everyone and I'm in the highest class. There is SO much I was never even taught, but am expected to know. I'm very bad at speaking the language, and most of the time I have just been completely depressed and/or discouraged over the past few weeks.

But then ya know, I had to realize, I'm in France! So many people would kill for my spot. And I came here for fun. This is supposed to be enjoyable to me. This isn't for my major, and to tell the truth, if I flunk one of these classes it will do nothing to my transcripts. Yet there I was cryin pretty much every night wanting my headaches to stop and for everything to just go away. But what do you do when you get completely discouraged? Turn to someone who can help, and the person who can always help up stairs! So I started reading the BOM like I've never read it before. I started on October 9th from the beginning and I've already finished with the book of Mosiah! I got my inspiration from my lovely cousin Kelsey and my buddies out in the mission field to try that. Anyways, its AMAZING how much of a difference it makes!! I've been so much more positive. And more of a peacemaker with the people around me. Also, yesturday I've finally gotten in touch with the members around this area. You wouldn't believe how excited they were to have me. This city is huge, as in bigger than Phoenix but they only have 3 wards and 50 young single adults. So they bent over backwards to help me out, drove me to an institute class, and are getting me a French copy of the Book of Mormon (Livre de Mormon hehe) so I can practice reading my French. And I've been so much happier the past two days with other people I know in the city. I definitely don't feel so alone and helpless anymore. The sister missionaries even offered to give me French lessons so I don't feel so left behind in my college courses. Its pretty awesome!

Other than that, its turning fall here! All the trees are changing colors and its getting colder and very rainy. So far I like it but I miss the sunshine too. I bought a little flower for my dorm to brighten my winter up. Its very pretty. I hope she doesn't die. I need to name her.

So, the grand total of people getting engaged and/or married since I've been in France has come to 9 as of yesterday. I can't even BELIEVE that is possible. Speaking of, family you will get a kick out of this, one of those individuals is Jenny Sturman if you haven't heard already. Ohhh goodness! How crazy is that?

I'm trying really hard to think of the cool things I've seen since I've last updated, but I don't think there has been anything. Honestly. I have spent the last forever cooped up in my room studying my face off to no avail. I've gone shopping multiple times and haven't bought anything. :/ Everything here is expensive! I need to find something totally worth it. Mehhhh....

So I'm off to Italy next week! But first I'm going to Paris for a few days. I can't wait to see the Eiffel tower!! Or anything else there! We want to go to Versailles too witch will be SO amazing. Then from Paris, we fly to Rome, visit the Vatican and Colosseum and whatever else we can. Then a train to Florence so I can visit my favorite works of art in person! I will probly cry my eyes out. Then to Venice! To ride in a gondola and get fat. Then back to Lyon after that. I'm so excited for this trip. It will be so nice to get out and relax. Even though I have a ton of homework to do over break. If you all want pictures of something specific, or a little trinket from Italia let me know now!! I will have very limited computer access while traveling. :D

Well sorry for being so lame. I'll try to be much better about this. Love you all SOOOOOOO much! I couldn't ask for a better family! MWAH!

Oh!

And by the way, just to make you all even more jealous... ;]

I'm losing weight. The pants I bought just before I left are baggy enough now I have to keep pulling them up. Hooray! I need new pants....

love you all

9/20-22/11

Alright, I know its been a while. A lot had been going on and the internet situation has been terrible. The McDonalds we were using for internet is being renovated or something. So we haven't been able to do that. Then, the people told us we would have our internet on the 19th, but it actually took them until today (the 22nd) Oi. Lots to update on.

Well the day after the museum Canovas took us on a riverboat tour of the city. It was really neat. The boat went up the Soane and around a famous island and then back down and talked all about the cool things you can see from the river. The island is especially beautiful and was always the home of royalty or nobles, and much loved by artists. What was really cool was Charlemagne (you know, the first christian roman emperor) had a home there. All that's left is a tower from an Abby but it is still really neat. There wasn't that much more that day I think, that's probly why I didn't write.

Anyways, on Wednesday we went to the university to get our school IDs and turn in insurance papers. Again I don't think we did anything really. We all are too poor to keep going out for food and its starting to get too cold to just wander around for long periods of time.

Yesterday was really neat though. Canovas took us to a Mansion from the 1800s that still has most of its original furniture and everything is preserved from that time. It's one of only a handful of mansions that are still left. During the French Revolution most of the aristocracy homes were destroyed. Then they had converted half of the home into a museum of fabrics. They had fabrics from the Egyptians to today. We went through the home and Canovas explained how people lived and the daily functions of the house. I am always in shock of the AMAZING things he knows. Then we got to go to the fabric museum where they had an exhibition on 1800s garments. The dresses and clothes were incredible! But an interesting tidbit, people back in that day on average were a lot shorter than the average of people today. I was taller then almost every mannequin (including the men) in there. The girls were all about 3 or 4 inches shorter than I am. Crazy! They also had the tiniest waists I've ever seen. But then, maybe that's just the corsets. :]

One thing I really do love here, is everything, in one way or another is revolving around beauty. I can't tell if it is a virtue, or a fault. Everything they do is about being beautiful, or what is more appealing. They just love to look at things. I love the respect EVERYONE here holds for the arts. Everyone here loves history. I don't know I just think its so interesting. It rules their lives I think. The constant search for beauty.

So, on to serious stuff. I think I might have gotten in over my head. Today, we found out what group we tested into and what our classes will be starting next week. The levels go as follows: A1, which is roughly translated to 101-102, A2 which is about 201-202, B1 which is some 300 courses, and B2 which is upper division French. Then there is C1, and C2, which are intensive courses reserved for year long students and everything. I expected to be in A1 honestly, after how poorly my tests went. Which I didn't mind. I thought it would be nice to review. Sarah and I are the only 102 students. Everyone else finished courses higher than us. Sarah also speaks Spanish so I thought for sure I was the furthest behind and would have to work my booty off to keep up. Alma, the girl who has been here a for two semesters, got here after finishing 102 and tested into A2 and then did B1 and is now in B2. She said I would probly test into A2 and not worry about it. Well... We got the results and I tested into B2.... That the highest level I could have. I have NO IDEA how this happened. I could have sworn I failed all of the exams. I am really not that good at French. I'm a little conflicted though. I don't know whether or not I should just remove myself down a couple levels, or if I should stick to it and work my hardest to keep up. I really want to be in this level, it will be just what I'm looking for in terms of finally getting in depth with the language and really learning it well. But at the same time, I feel like I still need my basics... I don't know what to do... help?

anyways, I have internet finally so I can update a bit more regularly. Thanks everyone for your love and support. Wish I could be there for Daxton's blessing. my thoughts are with you guys. Love you

9/19/11

I have found my heaven. :]

Today we got to sleep in a bit and then we met with Canovas in le place de Tarraux. I hadn’t been there before but you can see it from Fourviere. It’s the square with the town hall and the opera house. It is also home to one of the most beautiful fountains in Europe. It was done by the same sculptor who created the statue of liberty. When we came up from the metro the first thing we saw was the opera house. It is a more modern building but you can see inside because the walls are almost all made of glass and the interior was BEAUTIFUL. Think phantom of the opera and how the statues looked and everything. It was so intricate and incredible. Then you walk up a little bit and you get to what Canovas told us is called the most beautiful town hall in France. I believe it. The front façade was so detailed. It had a huge statue of Henry the 4^th on the front on horseback in a roman breast plate to relate him back to the times of the Romans. Around the buildings were large circular bronze medallion type pieces of art depicting all of Henry the 4^th’s posterity, which includes Louis XIII and Louis XIV along with his parents and wife. On top were figures of Greek mythology, Hercules the symbol of strength and Minerva the goddess of wisdom. Canovas said they were put there because the government needs to have both of those things. When I went up to the fountain, I was literally in awe. I couldn’t take my eyes off of it. It was so incredibly detailed and beautiful. It was four horses jumping toward you pulling a carriage type things with a woman (I’m not sure who it is supposed to be) and her child. It sounds dull, but look it up. Its incredible. The tension in the horses bodies, you swear they were alive and you could hear them tearing their way out of the water. They even had an effect where mist would come out of their noses like they were really living.

Then Canovas turned us around to a building across from the fountain that was equally as pretty as the others around it. We went into it and it had a large courtyard with beautiful gardens and bronze statues in it. This was the musee des beaux-arts de Lyon. (Lyon’s fine art museum) Canovas explained that it was a nun convent for a very long time until Napoleon decided it should be a museum. He brought back all his painting he took from his conquests and brought them back here, and to Paris. Interesting fact. Napoleon did a lot of bad, but he also did a lot of good. He was a visionary with a passion for art. He was the person who created museums. Art was either in private collector’s homes or in religious buildings until that point. So I for one and extremely happy he did that. Anyways, this museum is the second largest in France after the Louvre. It covers everything from ancient Egyptian art, to the turn of the 19^th century. You can imagine my excitement. Canovas explained the historic content of the building and showed us some of the more prominent paintings then set us loose. It was incredible. I saw 3,000 year old sarcophaguses and artifacts from Egypt, paintings by Poussin and other major French painters, and sat in front of some of Rodin’s most famous sculptures.

I think one of the things that got me the most was I was walking through a gallery full of Lyonaise painters through history. They were all very good. How cool is it to have people that lived in this city hundreds of years ago still influencing the artists here today? I was wandering through the gallery when one caught my eye. I stared at it for a little while, thinking that it couldn’t be what I thought it was. I looked down at the name and gasped, grabbed the other girls and covered the name plate and asked them if the picture looked familiar. They all agreed with me and then I showed them what the title was. The picture was of old roman aqueduct ruins that were tile and red and white and a landscape behind them. The title was simply ‘the roman aqueduct ruins on St. Just.’ I dunno you caught it, but that is where I live. The roman aqueducts are maybe 100 ft from my bedroom. I walk by them every day. The hill I live on is called St. Just. Someone had been sitting where I live now in the 18^th century and had painted the ruins I see everyday. It was surreal to me. The history of this city is intoxicating the more I learn and see. Where else in the world can you just run into a painting hundreds of years old where the artist was sitting where you walk everyday. Just. Wow.

I think my favorite will usually be classical or neoclassical sculpture. Its so incredible to me how detailed and beautiful it is. There was a sculpture by James Pradier called Odalisque that I stared at this girl’s hands for at least 20 minutes. They were so real. The tendons in her fingers that gripped her leg, the muscles in the fingers, her fingernails… I felt like if I were to touch her she would move. I wish I could do that. Being at that museum just made me want to run home and draw all day. It was like my experience at the Getty with aunt Carolyn and Emily. Although I don’t know if anything can compare to the amazing time I had there, this is a so close. It was so eye opening. The courtyard is open all the time and the museum is free to students on certain days. I am going to spend every second I have around that place. In the square next to the fountain, in the courtyard reading, sketching the opera house or the town hall. I loved it so much.

That’s all I really have today. Other than that, I went grocery shopping and now I’m huddled under my blanket (its been rainy and cold all day). Maybe I’ll try to draw something. :D

Bon soiree.

9/16-17-18/11

To quote daddy’s and mine favorite poem: “Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.” This is Cortney’s life motto. Haha After a weekend like this I’m so glad to be in my quiet little dorm room. Sometimes you forget you can hear yourself breathe, and to me that is a really comforting sound.

The craziness started on Thursday. My oral exam didn’t go so well so I was pretty stressed. Then we learned that to catch our 6 am flight to Berlin we would have to spend the night in the airport because the public transport system stops at 12 and starts again at 5:30. So our friend Rhiem showed us how to get there and where to sleep in the airport. Everyone was really worried about their stuff getting stolen, so I volunteered to stay up and keep watch. It was a long night. Finally after running my ipod batteries into the ground and staring at the floor for a few hours the world started to wake up and we had just enough time to grab a pain au chocolat before we left. The flight was about an hour and a half, which was weird to me because that’s about the same flight time from Phoenix to Salt Lake but in the same amount of time here we jumped countries.

Flying into Berlin isn’t what I expected. Berlin wasn’t what I expected. The whole place is covered in a dense forest full of oak, birch, and walnut trees. It was incredibly pretty. But other than that, we all kinda had mini culture shock getting there. It is SO different from France. Everyone is loud and disorganized. It isn’t as clean as France and the people have insane style. So many people had neon colored hair and incredible amounts of tattoos and piercings. There were no officials anywhere. In the airport and train station we looked around to find someone in some sort of information kiosk to make sure we had the right train to our hostel, but there wasn’t one. There was no one anywhere. They just don’t exist in Germany. No one checks tickets on the train, no cops walk the street, its crazy.

The hostel we went to was really nice. I have NO idea how it was that cheap. It had everything we needed. They had a free breakfast, wifi, everything. We checked in and went to go see Berlin. We took a train to the center, and more touristy part, of Berlin. There was beautiful buildings there and a park that had so many trees you couldn’t see 10 feet inside. The parliament building was beautiful as well. We decided we wanted a German meal so we stopped at a restaurant and I got some bratwurst and mashed potatoes. The bratwurst in America is nothing like it is in Germany. Texture, taste, smell, not even close. It was good, but so heavy and weirdly sour I could barely move after. We all ate so much we all just wanted sleep, especially me cuz I hadn’t had any the night before. We got to the hostel, and I was out. I slept for 4 hours, which I kinda felt bad about because Melinda really wanted to go out and see some sights. After that, it had gotten a little late so we just went and got food and came back to the hostel and we hung out in the lounge and watched some German soccer on TV before heading to bed.

The next morning we woke up and went to Sachsenhausen the concentration camp. That was a crazy experience. We got an audio tour because we couldn’t read the signs and started to walk around. I can’t believe half the stories I learned there. To know that that could happen? Its so sad. I’ll put up more about it when I put up pictures because a lot of it you just have to see to understand. Most of it had been destroyed but what was left was terrifying. They wouldn’t let you into the crematorium, which in a way I am thankful for. I think that would have taken its toll on me. There was two remaining Jewish barracks. It was amazing to see how crammed they were and how poor the living conditions were. The stories of brutality, honestly, were incomprehensible. I just, have no idea how one person could do those things to another. They talked about the German soldiers that worked there. Sachsenhausen was one of the first extermination camps there were, and for that reason it was used as sort of a training ground for new German officers. They said 9 of the officers trained there went on to be commandants of other extermination camps. What I thought was very interesting about this camp was it was for mostly non-Jews. There were 68 barracks and only 2 were Jewish barracks. The rest were Russian prisoners of war, homosexuals, People who aided Jews, Germans that were married to Jewish girls, women prisoners, and Jehovah’s witnesses (or bible students as they were called at that time). Its weird to me that this was never made a big deal out of. All you’re ever told is the holocaust was against the Jewish people and a few others, not targeting so many different groups of people. Also, another thing I thought was interesting is the German government used the people in those camps that had certain skills to do illegal things for them. One story was of a Jewish printer who was brought to Sachsenhausen with others to create forgeries of British pound notes and other official documents of the allied countries. Also they would make the people in the camp to hard labor, which I already knew but the story here was interesting. There was a track going around the camp with different materials on the path, gravel, cobblestone, sharp rocks, etc. anyways the prisoners were fitted with backpacks that were the same weight as a soldier’s pack would be and given a pair of boots, (didn’t matter what size they were they were just expected to get them on causing quite a few deformities and injuries) and run the track from 5 in the morning until it got too dark to run anymore. It was to test the durability of different soles on shoes for German soldiers. There are a ton of other stories but I get sad thinking about it so I’m gonna stop now.

We found the Berlin wall too. I found a chunk of brick on the ground from it and I’m going to bring it home with me. I’m excited to have a cool piece of history. :]

I think that was all we really did. I think we just relaxed after that point and went to bed. The next morning though, I’m not sure how, but we woke up late and scrambled to get our stuff together to catch the train. We got to the track just after it had left, so we decided to wait for the next one and bought our tickets, and then found out, there wasn’t another train. So we panicked and called a taxi and ended up getting to the airport pretty early. I was really upset about the waste of money… sigh… Airports in Europe are weird. They don’t post your gate number until like 5 minutes until you have to board. So people are running all over the place. We sat and waited forever for our gate to be posted and booked it to the gate right on time.

I don’t know why, but I was almost glad to leave Germany. It was so different from what I was used to. France and Germany are like night and day. Not that I didn’t love Germany, I did. It was beautiful, but getting back here was so nice. Knowing what people are saying, and knowing how to navigate. Its wonderful. Today, as almost a welcome home from Lyon there was an antique expo going on just outside our dorms. I walked through it and there was SOOO much stuff mom would love. Old pots and pans and wash basins, silverware, candlesticks, and TONs of furniture. It was amazing. I wanted everything. :]

And now I’m happily settled into the quiet of my dorm. So happy to be back in my home away from home. Hearing the church bells ringing, everything smells good and is clean. I love Lyon. I will have a hard time leaving it I think. Which is funny because just a few days ago I was tired of it here. But now I’m in love with the culture and how they take 5 hours to eat and everyone is quiet and proper and clean. It took a reality check of how intense another culture was, how hard it was for me there, for me to again really appreciate what I have.

I love everyone! I’ll talk to you all soon. Hopefully I will have internet on the 20^th but don’t count on anything. Talk to you soon.

9/15/11

Hey everyone!

I don't have much to say today. The test didn't go very well. I did pretty dang bad. I don't think the lady could even understand what I was trying to say. oh well... :/

We leave for Berlin early tomorrow and we will have internet at the hostel we have reserved so I will be able to post more from there. :]

So far I am just gonna upload the pictures on Facebook. its a lot easier than this uploader.

go look at them! Love you.