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.

9/14/11

Well, the trip lived up to the hype I gave it. :]

We got on a train and traveled out to the French countryside, which is INCREDIBLE. Lush, and green, and beautiful. It seriously looks like you are in a painting. Haha. We stopped at a cute little town. The train station was absolutely adorable. It was just a platform with a cute little white trimmed in blue building. Then to get to Perouge we had to walk from the little town the train stopped out about 20 minutes up a hill. Once we got there though, it was totally worth it. It was perfectly preserved and beautiful. I kept thinking if mom was here she would just say ‘yup. This is cortney.’

It was a tiny little town with less than 500 people still living there. It was encased by a fortress wall for defence with two gates. One facing east to Lyon, and the other west to Geneva. Perouge is about half way between the two cities and was the major stop for merchants making their way between the two. Because of that it flourished. It was often fought over by two different princes and that’s one of the major reasons why it was built like a fort on a hill. Inside the wall though, there is pretty church on the outside wall that is half used as defense and half a religious center. One wall is full of turret holes where archers could attack oncoming enemies, and the other wall was full of chapels and stained glass windows. The streets were all cobblestones and all the little shops were preserved. People will usually live in them now but the first floors look how they did back in the day. The town square is pretty small, but most things in the town were. Everything was cobblestone, but instead of the sanded square cobblestone like here in Lyon, it is just stones they plucked from the river so it is uneven and they are all rounded. Its pretty, but a little difficult to walk on. You can still see the lines in the cobblestone though were booths were set up for market in the renaissance. There is a HUGE tree in the square that was planted during the French revolution, and is now so old it has to be held up by posts. There are two old wells in the city. They are still intact with the mechanics but are full of incredibly beautiful flowers now instead of water. There are signs that look like they are from the renaissance festival hanging in the streets. The studded fortress doors on the east gate are still attached to the frame, but almost falling apart. The west gate has a plack put up by the people bragging basically about how the towns people fought off the army of one of the princes who was trying to take control of the city by themselves. It is written in Latin and Canovas translated it for us, it was pretty funny actually. It was like “haha, you suck. We won” only in old English and longer.

After our tour Canova took us to the restaurant in town and bought us the traditional dessert that they are famous for, which is a very simple sugar pizza type thing, and also the cider they are famous for. They have ALL sorts of cider. The kind I got to try was delicious. :] We took a picture of our group in front of the restaurant so I will get that up the next time I can. There were some abandoned houses in the city, which I honestly could not fathom. How is that place not the hottest piece of realistate ever. I asked Canova about it and he said that not many people want to live there. There is no school, and you have to go 10 minutes to get to a store. But seriously, could you imagine living in a perfectly preserved stone house?? The whole town looks like it was ripped out of a movie, like straight up Ever After or something. Really, it looks just like that movie. The one I saw that was abandoned needed a little work, but it was incredible to me that someone wouldn’t snatch that up. Canovas even said that would be a fairly cheap place to buy a house. He said it would be about 30,000 euro to get the four story house that had been abandoned. I am SO all over that when I’m older. It would be the best place ever to live, have a vacation home, or retire. Maybe I’ll shoot for retirement so I have time to save. But its beautiful. :]

After that we just wandered around and ate and such. We tried to go to McDonalds tonight, but the internet just didn’t work. I got pretty upset because I haven’t been on in like a week almost and I really would like to talk to everyone I love but I can’t. I think I am getting really worked up over it just because the other girls get calls from home every day and text everyone back home all the time but I don’t have the money to do that… It is really hard for me. I really like these girls, but they aren’t my friends back home who know me. They aren’t my family. I just really want a little contact from home. Besides maybe 3 text messages, and a failed attempt at skyping, I’ve haven’t really talked to anyone since I’ve been here… Canovas talked to the people here and they said we might be getting internet sooner than October 1^st, and I REALLY hope so. Oh well.

Well the last bit of my test is tomorrow, and I need to sleep. Goodnight.

9/12-13/11

The past two days have been better for me. :] I am still a little in the difficult stages of my culture shock, but I have been trying really really hard to get better about it and I think it is working. So don’t worry everyone, I’m ok. :D

Yesterday it was incredibly nice to get back into the swing of things with professor Canovas. He took us on some more tours of the old renaissance parts of town. We got to see beautiful buildings and what used to be courtyards the people of the time all would come to be out of doors, get water, socialize, and relax. When I say ‘courtyard’ though, I’m using the term lightly. Its about a 20 by 20 ft square of cobblestone encased by 4 to 5 story tall buildings on every side. One of them he took us to was built by a famous renaissance architect that had studied the Greek and Roman style in Italy. The architecture was beautiful. It was commissioned by a very rich family at the time, but it now is used as government housing for people without a sufficient income.

Our tour was cut short however because we have a lot to do for insurance and all those other things we need to get done before school starts. Today we didn’t have anything because again, we were busy getting things done for our housing people. But we have a pretty exciting week planned. Tomorrow we are going to a preserved renaissance town in the outskirts of Lyon. I can’t wait to take a ton of pictures and see how beautiful it is! I’ve always wanted to go to a place like this! Thursday we were supposed to go to a museum, which is actually a preserved aristocrat’s house from the 17^th or 18^th century, along with a fabric museum full of dresses and traditional garb worn in the 18^th and 19^th centuries. But, sadly we have the last section of our comprehension test on Thursday so we might have to postpone it. :[ I’m really upset about that. And Friday, we leave for Germany! But this weekend is some other holiday in France and all the old public buildings usually closed to the public are opened for Saturday and Sunday. So hopefully when we get home from Germany I won’t be so tired I can’t go for a nice Sunday afternoon walk through the old opera house or town hall. I would love it. I wish we weren’t going to Germany now for all the cool things going on here and what a pocket book muncher it is turning out to be, but I already bought a ticket so I don’t have a choice now. Its ok. I’m sure Germany will be wonderful.

I’m trying SOOOOO hard to budget myself. I pulled out some cash today and I’m going to make it work for the rest of the month. Even if I have to just eat a spoon full of my nutella I have in my cupboard for every meal. At least I would come back skinny like a French girl.

Speaking of skinny French girls… I wanna go off on some useless tangent about the stereotypes we have about French people. First off. French people are very nice. I’ve only ever encountered two rude ones and both were working at a busy shop, and it was just due to bad communication. So, don’t believe that one. Other than that, I kinda think everything is true. Oh, no one wears berets. (spelling? Yeah?) :[ For some reason though, EVERYONE walks around with a baguette in their hand. When I buy food I go back to my dorm to put it away, but for some reason they like to carry their bread around with them. And sadly everyone here does smoke. But it is different from Americans smoking, the French usually roll their own cigarettes, so it is straight tobacco and not the nasty chemicals they have in American cigarettes. Still smells nasty and is a PAIN when you’re at a sidewalk café and all you smell is smoke, but it’s a heck of a lot better than sitting next to the nasty nast American smoldering death cylinders. I have seen quite a few people in stripped shirts, though that may just be the fashion at the moment, not the norm. I have yet to see an overweight person. They are all very pretty and skinny, but not too skinny. Jealous. Everyone (and I mean everyone, babies, kids, teens, adults, and all the sweet little old people) are incredibly fashionable, all care a great deal about their shoes, and have perfect posture. Its like walking through a magazine. One interesting thing that I thought people were just making up is men here actually do carry purses. Not big ones or anything. Very small. A lot like the one I have from India. So I got quite a few odd looks for carrying a man bag. I have an actual purse now. :]

A few things I really really do love about the people here… I adore the greeting. I met a french friend from the residence today on the street and he gave me and my friends the traditional kiss on each cheek. I love it. Its sweet, and fun, and completely diffuses the awkwardness when you see someone you know and you don’t know if you should wave, high five, or hug. Haha. Another thing is another stereotype I think we get wrong. I always thought French girls would dress kind of skimpy. Absolutely not the case. The girls will wear longer tops, and jeans or a skirt that hits just barely above their knees. (odd fashion tip from France, everyone here rolls up their jeans, everyone. And they don’t like socks) The dresses are always appropriate length and never show off too much. I want to steal their fashion. Its cute and playful but modest and sweet. I adore it. And also, the girls here only ware the bare essentials of makeup. They will put on maybe eyeliner and a bit of concealer. Or just mascara, but never the full blown paint-on-your-own-face like we do in the states. And no one cares about their hair. But in a pretty way. It will be in a messy braid or lazily swept up into a pony tail but usually just left down. I think its so incredibly beautiful. No fake tans, no dyed hair, just natural beauty. I wish America was like this.

There are a few things that always catch me off guard though. Me and the other girls are still trying to work our way through them. Everything in France is late and they take their sweet time doing whatever they are doing. Yet, the city is run on a very strict schedule. In the mornings, the bakeries (and newspaper/ magazine stores) open first and set out tables on the sidewalks. The rest of the stores will open at about 9 or 10. Everyone gets breakfast at a bakery and sits and eats then wanders off to work or whatever else it is they are doing. Lunch is complicated because not all restaurants will serve lunch. And all the shopping stores are open during the main part of the day and close sometime between 6 and 8 pm for dinner, the French just really love their food. haha. If you need something after 8 you’re in trouble. Restaurants will open at about 5 but won’t serve food til 7ish. If you get there at 5 you can order drinks and that’s it. The French way of having dinner is sit at table and have a coke or fruit juice usually, or alcohol if you do that, and talk for a few hours. Then the waitress will take your order at 7ish and you will get your food at 7:30-8 o’clock. They expect you to take a few hours to eat, so they won’t be back to take your plates unless you wave them down until about 10. Then they offer you coffee, cheese, or dessert. And even if you refuse, they will just leave you alone until about 11-midnight when most people would wave down the waiter for the check. It is a pretty crazy process. They will not by any means try to rush you like American waiters. They want you to stay. Eating is a huge cultural thing here and a lot of personal time with friends or family. Even if you leave, often times they won’t turn over your table and give it to a new group. This is still hard for us. We have only ever twice stayed from 5 until about 10. Mostly we will show up at 7 and leave at 8. Most waiters think we are crazy. Oh well. One of the weirdest things to me is it will be the whole family out past midnight for dinner every night. You would think just the adults and young people. Nope. Families with strollers, little kids, bring the dog along too a lot of the time, grandparents, all out past midnight. We always feel strange going back to our dorms at like 10:30-11 and all the little kids and grandparents will still be sitting at the dinner tables chatting away…

Well again. Not much to report. I’m nervous for my last bit of my comprehension test, but I’m really glad I’ve started to make French friends to practice my speaking with. The one I saw on the street today is really good about trying to help me speak French. When he speaks I understand him really well, which is a good sign. But I get nervous speaking back to him in French so I will usually just answer in English because he speaks English pretty well as well. But he has been trying to get me to speak French so I’m starting to break the shell. The other girls can speak with him pretty well. Well, I mean they will speak French to him. Not that we are that good yet, they just don’t mind talking to him in French. I’m the only one so far that is nervous about talking to someone in French. I guess we will see how it goes. Uhm… Everything is pretty good other than that. I’m still a little unhappy with things going on, but today was the best day yet so I think I’ll be ok very soon. Hopefully I’ll get to enjoy tomorrow fully. Well… yeah. I’m sleepy.

My French friends say that the French have an odd thing they do when they say goodbye. They will start out with a “Bon, booonnnn…” (good, goooood…) and then count to five and then say “bon soiree!/ bon journee!” etc. So. Bon bonnnn… (1,2,3,4,5) Bon soiree. Je t’aime.

9/9-10-11/11

Sorry for the mass blog, but the past few days don’t have much interesting facts to report. Friday Professor Canovas let us have the day off and so we were all very excited and started to think of all the fun things we could do this weekend. Soon, though, that died out pretty quickly. For me at least. Felicia really wanted to go to Germany for a weekend before school. We all figured why not because you won’t get a chance to just travel to Germany for the weekend for 200 bucks very often in your life. But then, that got me looking at money, and now I’m more anxious than ever about my money situations. I just thought everything was such a good deal I hadn’t been really keeping track and now I am realizing I put myself in a bad place and I should have been more careful.

The weekend didn’t really go as planned. We all wanted to go out and explore the city and take as many pictures as we could. But apparently this is some sort of celebratory weekend for Lyon. There are hundreds of people EVERYWHERE. Not only that, but it has been the hottest temperatures in Lyon yet, reaching mid 90s, and I definitely don’t have any shorts or warm weather clothes. It was miserable. The French don’t believe in public drinking fountains either so you have to carry around a massive water bottle with you everywhere you go. It looks like rain today though so hopefully that will get this hot weather out of here.

We did get opportunities to take some pictures though, and a few turned out well, so I’m excited to show them to you all when I get the chance. The cathedrals are really beautiful I just want to sit in Saint John’s all day. Fourviere is beautiful too, but something about Saint Johns in its simplicity and history gets me.

I think that I’m finally getting the effects of culture shock sadly. They explain it to you over and over again before you leave. First you’re so happy with the new place you could explode. Then something will happen where you just nitpick at what is wrong with this country and why you want to be back in America. And if you don’t keep that in check you’ll get depressed. I didn’t think it was possible for me to not like anywhere I would travel, but right now the heat, the people, the sloth-like pace the people move at and everything else is just kinda getting to me. Especially it’s all kinda topped off by today being the 10^th anniversary of 9/11 and we don’t get to pay our respects. No one cares here and it bothers me. I wanna watch the specials on TV and cry, I want to see the shrines, and hear the speeches. But nope. The stupid French could care less about what happened to us.

On the upside, I think some of the other girls are getting like me. Really frustrated with this place. There is a lot that is so different from home. Plus not having internet and not being able to talk to my family is taking a big toll. Its really not like me to complain about this but it really is an issue right now. I just need school to start or something so I have something else to focus on. Maybe I just feel lazy this weekend because all I’ve done is eat and walk. And I’m angry at myself for being irritated with it here. This has been my dream and I’m irritated with where I’ve always wanted to go? It makes me angry. And we all get together and complain, and that just makes me more angry because I HATE being that person who sits there and complains about a situation you can’t change, or isn’t something we should be complaining about. This trip has been NOTHING but wonderful. Canovas has been fantastic. I’ve eaten good food, seen beautiful things. And the past few days all I wanna do is sit and stare at a wall and be angry.

I don’t want anyone to worry though. Once I get working on something I think I will be a lot better off and I’ll be back to being in love with it here again. I really do love it. It’s just silly culture shock.

Like I said, nothing really to report this weekend. I’ll upload the pictures as soon as I can but the internet is still terrible. Love you all.

9/8/11

Today was a historic day for Lyon. I think I wrote in here earlier how the Arch Bishop was coming to Lyon to bless the city like he does every year. The city was in jubilance. We woke up and met Canova in the metro station and he said we had to book it up to Fourviere because the monasteries and nunneries surrounding Notre Dam de Fouviere were, in celebration of the day, having a sort of flea market of their books and pictures they’ve collected and don’t need anymore. On the way up Canovas told me that he collects antiques. Especially books. He has a collection of books so rare the ASU museum has part of his collection on display. His crowning piece is an official document had written on velum and signed by Louis XVI. That is seriously incredible.

Once up there I went into a frenzy. The books were BEAUTIFUL. And because I was a student they sold them to me for dirt cheap. I got four books for 6 euros. The books have incredible spines and odd swirly patterns all over them. Canovas explained that it was a combination of oils and water that separate from each other and make those cool designs. That’s how they used to decorate books. The books are right now my prized possessions. I don’t think I’ve ever owned anything I’ve loved more. Most are from the 1850s but my oldest one, an edition of one of the books of Psalms is from 1815. They are sitting on my shelf and I’ve been staring at them lovingly all day.

While we were all fawning over our books and waiting for Canovas to finish sniffing out all the most amazing ones, the churches on the hill started to celebrate the arrival of the arch bishop in Lyon with bells chiming. We were standing in Notre Dam de Fourviere’s courtyard at the time and it was overwhelming. It was beautiful, I’ve never heard anything like it. I took a video, hopefully I can put it up eventually. After that we went down to the renaissance district and went on another history tour. We went to the Cathedral de San Jean, or Saint John the Baptist’s Cathedral and looked at how the base stones of the foundation were actually stones from the old temples and other roman buildings up on the hill. There were still engravings in Latin on some of them. Next to the cathedral are old ruins of other parts of the church complex during the renaissance ages. There was a small perish for locals, and also a baptistery. One of the interesting things I learned about the baptistery is that in the early ages of Catholicism, they did baptism as Mormons do. They had a huge basin where people would go in and become fully emerged and rise out of the water a new person.

Those two parts of the church complex fell to ruin because the cathedral was still in progress. That particular cathedral took over 300 years to complete. So at the time they were part of the cathedral but once the cathedral progressed in size they weren’t needed and were blocked off.

After that he took us to see a house of a noble family that lived here in the renaissance. It was incredibly ornate and beautifully painted on the inside. They had they’re own well and a coat of arms on everything. He told us that Lyonaise people are different from most people in Paris or other parts of France. He said that Parisains are very flashy and ornate and the Lyonaise are more conserved on the outside, but once you walk inside it was lush and beautiful but never overdone. It could be his bias for the city, but I believe him.

He took us to a restaurant for lunch and we had a traditional 3 course French meal. It was insane and I’ve been stuffed ever since. It’s a bit ridiculous. After that the girls and I went back to San Jean and looked around inside. It was BREATHTAKING. I felt like I was walking into a picture in one of my art history textbooks. The beautiful vaulted ceilings and the stained glass windows… I really don’t know how to put into words. When I have more time I’ll try. Haha

I had the second part of my placement test today. Listening and reading comprehension. Honestly I think it went really well. But that kinda scares me. Haha. Its hard to gage whether or not you did really well or not. I did realize however how much I am picking up here. I didn’t think I was really doing very well with the language but the amount I caught off the bat today was awesome. I am really excited. But at the same time I still have quite a ways to go and I am so rearing to go.

Well off to our next adventure! A bientot!

9/7/11

Well today wasn’t quite full of the adventures of the past few days, but it was still pretty good.

We all woke up early to get down to the university to take our placement test. I enjoy the public transportation system around here, but I’m starting to notice it makes some trips a lot more complicated than it needs to be. The trip to the university for example, we just have to follow one road across the two rivers and turn two corners and we are there. But, with the route we take it becomes a bit of a mess. We have to take a bus to the train station navigate the 3 floors of chaos to the tramcars and then take one of those to a stop before the university, then walk a block. I suppose it doesn’t sound that complicated but at 8 in the morning it really feels like it is.

We all gathered with professor Canovas in one of the front rooms before the test. He told us once again not to worry and took us to the designated lecture hall. All of us, as his students are starting to realize this man is somewhat of a local celebrity. Everywhere we go people come up to him and give him a traditional beize and are always genuinely excited to see him. The people who were running our informational meeting today at the college were no exceptions. They rushed to greet him and when he pointed us out as his students they gave us the special treatment of making sure we got our informational folders first and all got the same dates on our mandatory meeting with the secretary. I looked over to the other girls and we all kind of realized, now we have to live up to this man’s reputation. Crap.

Once the meeting got underway at 8:30 they explained things like insurance, (which we had taken care of) paying for classes, (also taken care of) and other things that just irritated us we had to get up so early for. Way to serious and important topics to be talking about with a lack of food in our stomachs and too much sleep in our brains. After the meeting, Canovas gave us a smile and a ‘bon chance’ and left us to wait. The test was supposed to start at 10:30 sharp. Apparently, when the French say “sharp” they mean give or take an hour. The teachers stood at the front of the room sifting through papers and chatting, while the students sat unsure of what was supposed to be going on. Melinda came to the rescue with her ipod touch and the stupid little games we played. We also kind of realized that stereo types of Americans are definitely true. Once it hit 10:45 we were all furious. Get on with it already. It wasn’t the first time either. Here it is super impolite to eat quickly, but it seems to prove impossible for us. We ask for the check directly after we are finished eating and the waiter always seems shocked. I guess that’s what we get for being raised in a RUSHRUSHRUSH culture.

Anyways, the teachers took their sweet time, and though the test was supposed to start at 10:30, we actually started writing around 11:45. It was a bit ridiculous. The test itself was a bit difficult. It was for every level though, so that meant some parts of the essays would be really hard, and others would be easy. I felt like I did a decent job but, probly not enough to get me in the advanced class. I am hoping to get in the one up from beginner. Haha. I would be happy with anything though.

After the test we all met up for lunch at a café that Canovas had taken us to before for breakfast. We figured it would be good because the breakfast was good, but boy were we wrong. This was my first bad encounter with French food. And it was a horrific one. We didn’t know half the words on this menu, which was strange because we usually could decipher it well. Sarah and I decided on some meat and salad dish we thought sounded promising. Felicia, the resident vegetarian, got a goat cheese dish, and Melinda got pork in a citrus sauce. Felicia’s didn’t seem so bad, but the cheese was so potent we could all taste it from across the table. Melinda’s pork was literally candied. And worst of all, Sarah and I ended up with what we decided to dub “rabbit jell-o.” It was chunks of rabbit meat, carrots, pecans, and sour cabbage in what looked like congealed fat cut into slices and put on top of incredibly bitter lettuce. It. Was. DISGUSTING. I tried to be good about it and eat as much as I could, but once I got through one slice of the rabbit jell-o I had to put down my utensils and push the plate away. I felt like I was going to vomit. Never get the rabbit jell-o.

After that we decided to go shopping because we needed backpacks for school and other things. We walked around an area that’s known as having lots of nice shops but we struck out everywhere. Not only that, but I was feeling really queasy from my disastrous lunch. Then we tried to find the cell phone provider to buy more minutes, but couldn’t find the right provider anywhere. Altogether, that day so far had not been quite a win with anyone in our group. We made our way back to the residence where we napped off the rabbit jell-o and I woke up needing American music. I know the Beatles are British, but they hit the spot anyways and I was happy and ready to go again after that.

We went into town looking for a sandwich and ended up with pizza, but it was one of the most magical pizzas I’ve ever had. Absolutely delish. Completely made up for the rabbit jell-o. We walked around for a while admiring the scenery and then came back up to our rooms to eat the box of macaroons I bought the other day. One thing I’ve always thought of in relation to France is macaroons. Possibly the cliché comes from Gossip girl, but nonetheless it was worth trying out. And let me tell you. Those have to be one of the best desserts ever invented. The box had pistachio, strawberry, coconut, butterscotch, chocolate, and lemon. All absolutely wonderful. I’ll try to bring some home.

I keep looking for postcards, but I can’t find any that really capture the beauty of the city. So I think I will just try to take my own pictures and print them somewhere… If that doesn’t work out you will all be getting regular postcards of decently pretty pieces of Lyon. I’m excited for tomorrow. Canovas is taking us on a boat ride down the Roane and then out to lunch. It will be another wonderful day in paradise and I can forget about the long and stressful morning I had today. Well, its 2:30 in the afternoon your time, but that’s past my bedtime here. I need another good day of sleep.

Love you all.

9/6/11

Today has been another for the record books.

Professor Canovas took us to the area of the city that started to be more inhabited in the middle ages. After showing us a picture of what the city looked like back then, he spoke to us about the people of the time. He said after the decline of the Roman Empire the city started to gain momentum as a trading town due to its easy access to the rivers which converge, and flow directly into the Mediterranean. The Peninsula was the most crowded part of the city at that time because it is where the warehouses had been where all the goods were transported up the river and more people came to dwell there. The entire city on both banks was surrounded by a wall because it was still a time of uncertainty. He took us to the oldest church that is still in use in Europe. It was built on the eastern edge of town at the time in the middle of fields and other small monasteries around it. It was basically the welcoming committee for any merchants into the city. The monks would take the merchants in and take care of the goods. The church became a strong force in the city. Because of their money and strong structure, it became in a way a government. They would build bridges for cities and then use a toll to get the money they loaned back. This wasn’t just in Lyon, this was all over Europe. The word for Pope in Greek to this day still means “bridge builder.” Churches were also a major part of social life back then. They were usually protected by a large wall, so in times of danger people would conjugate behind the church walls for safety. Also markets would pop up around churches, and lots of charity work from the monks would draw poor people in.

The church we went into was a beautiful example of Romanesque architecture. It was built of lightly colored stones and columns all through the church. The four massive columns were granite from Egypt. They were thought at one time to be instead of four columns, two columns that were once used in a Roman building somewhere around the city before it fell. Once the paganism started to disappear as a religion, the Christians recycled a lot of the things they had used around the city. They even recycled ideas. At the time, paganism and Christianity were not completely separate. On the outside of the church there is a freeze of astrological signs. Inside the church there were half goat, half lion creatures that were part of pagan mysticism.

We had the opportunity to see one of the only surviving relief sculptures of the time. The sculpture was over 900 years old and told the story of Soloma dancing for king Herod, and the death of John the Baptist. It was incredible to see everything that I had read about again so close. I honestly never saw I would see a piece of work from that era though. They are so few and far between that are still surviving.

Overall everything is still going wonderfully. I am constantly overwhelmed with how beautiful it is, and how much I already love this city. I have never been anywhere more incredible.

Tomorrow is the placement exam and all the girls and I are anxious. Conovas says that we should not be nervous, that it will all work out better than we anticipate. But, all the same we are still going to study tonight just in case. We got a chance to walk a little around the university today. Our campus is incredible. It was a university built in the early 19^th century. It’s the classic French grey stone with the curving blue roofs. Very ornate, and very old. It seems fairly easy to navigate so far, but I guess we will see. There are quite a few students in our program, which is also comforting. I suppose I’ll be meeting lots of people from everywhere who want to study French. I am still a bit nervous to start speaking to actual French people. We decided we needed to start speaking French with each other more so that we had a chance to get better with speaking the language before we have to others.

I’m pretty tired today, so I don’t know what else to write. We have been walking quite a bit. Its hard to get used to walking everywhere. I feel so much better though. The food is healthier (and Canovas is very strict about eating healthy and natural foods, which he loves to teach us about), and we get more exercise so I feel a lot better. Granted, I just got a box of macaroons to share with the girls tonight. Oops. Oh, we got our phones today as well. I pulled out money to buy it but I have to go back to buy any minutes. But, if you want to call me anyways, from the US you dial 0.11.33.627.651.553. The cool things about French phones, is that if someone calls you, you don’t get charged. Only if I place the call to I get charged. I know I have magicjack and we will use that once I get internet, but I figure I would give you that number for emergencies.

Well. Bye bye. Love you.

9/5/2011

The expression, “I felt like a kid on Christmas,” is supposed to describe the absolute wonder a child feels. The pure, sweet joy of knowing something so wonderful is happening just for you. That expression, was useless to me today. There are NO words, NO expression that can give an accurate account of what I felt. I don’t believe I have ever been happier in any moment.

Melinda, Sarah, Felicia and I woke up early to get breakfast before the adventure we knew was coming today. We wandered the streets in the medieval district until we came upon a bakery where I bought a raspberry tart for breakfast. It was incredible, of course, this is France after all. Who is better at pastries then the French? We met up with professor Canovas and he took us on another rail car up to Fourviere. Fourviere is one of the main hills in Lyon. It is dubbed ‘the praying hill.’ Walking out of the metro station up to the street, I had no idea what I was about to take in. Before me stood Notre-Dam de Fourviere, or Our lady of Fourviere, the main cathedral in the city. The massive building in its cold grey exterior towered over me with intense and commanding presence of an angel or other holy being themselves. I was overpowered and awe-struck. I stood trying to take in the massive structure as Canovas tried to usher us toward the view of the city.

Once there, he explained that sadly, we weren’t there to see the cathedral, we were there to start our tour of the history of the city. He promised another day we would go but not without relating a few wonderful stories of the indescribable place. He said the cathedral was built because of a promise. Lyon was home to two popes. It is also the home of the arch bishop of Lyon, (he is also considered a cardinal) which is the highest station next to the pope there is in France. One of those bishops had made a covenant with the Virgin Mary in the ancient days when hordes of barbarians from Eastern Europe threatened to invade southern France. He promised that if the Virgin Mother would give the city protection, he would build a cathedral purely dedicated to the virgin herself. This wasn’t a used concept back then, as most churches and cathedrals were only for the worship of Christ. When the city evaded invasion, the bishop kept his word and built the magnificent building we see today. It has two chapels, one upstairs and one down and on top of the building is an over 80 foot tall statue of Mary, completely gilded in gold leaf. The arch bishop comes every year to bless the holy city of Lyon, which in fact was the home of the papacy for many years. The next arch bishop is coming to bless the city this Thursday.

I suppose I should move on from the cathedral now. I had never been to one before, and I had never seen anything so beautiful. I was choked up and teary eyed at just the trivial glance I had at the interior. And I know you don’t think I could get much more excited about anything else I saw later that day, but you’re wrong. Professor Canovas has an incredible and extensive knowledge of the history of his city. When he told us about it you could feel his love, passion, and connection to his birthplace.

He started by telling us how the city was set up. Fourviere the hill we were standing on, and the other hill you can see from there, Croix Rousse (named for the giant red cross that had been painted on the hill hundreds of years ago) were the two first places inhabited by people before Christ ever came to the world. The Lyon valley is trapped between two of the largest mountain ranges in Europe. Any people of that time had to travel through the lush valley, where two groups settled. The first was the Galles a Celtic people that had moved down from the Celtic tribes of Northern France, England and Ireland. They settled on Croix Rousse at the edge of where the Roane and Soane river connected (it has later dried up and they connect further down now, making a peninsula). The second group was the Roman Empire. For years the two civilizations grew up staring at each other over the rivers, but never really came in contact. Eventually, for one reason or another, the two cultures started to merge. The Romans came bearing the Latin they spoke, and the Galles spoke a form of Gaelic. The two languages began to merge as well, and that is where basic French came from. The two civilizations thrived together under the Roman Empire’s rule and ended up being the birthplace of two Roman emperors as well. One of these emperors was the man who petitioned the roman senate to make the Galle people full-fledged Roman citizens. The action was passed and his speech was bronzed in a plaque that was later found and put in the Lyon museum.

The city was officially founded by the romans on the 10^th, of October somewhere in the 40s B.C. The name Lyon, has no actual relation to the animal. Lyon is a shortened form of the original name of the city which was a combination of a Gaelic word for their god of light, and the Latin word for hill. The day it was founded, and the exact spot it was founded, was exactly where the sun’s axis passes over the hill. The Romans built a street, kind of like a main street or central avenue, following that axis perfectly. There is still a street there today. Where the cathedral stands today, was a huge temple dedicated to the Roman Gods. There were two theaters built, bath houses, and an amphitheater; the ruins of which still stand today. We got the opportunity to see the theaters and the bath houses. The theaters have been fully excavated and are still used today. There is a celebration each summer in Lyon where they celebrate their heritage and put on plays and shows in the old theaters. They are incredible to behold. They had paved streets leading up to them, with chariot wheel gashes and worn indents completely visible in the stones. The orchestra pit was completely preserved. And in the smaller theater, most likely reserved for the noblemen and extreme upper class people, the orchestra pit floor was made out of chunks of marble. These chunks of marble weren’t just white, they were colored. The colors of the far reaches of the Roman Empire: yellow from northern Italy, spotted from southern Italy, green from Greece, and red from Egypt. Lyon was the capital of the Roman Empire more than once. And when the political power moved away after the conversion of the empire to Christianity, Lyon remained the holy city of the empire. That isn’t quite where the strong history of Catholicism started however. In years after Christ, and the word of Christianity spread, a few people throughout the city were converted. And in those days, just like you read in the Bible they were discriminated against. They first were excluded from politics, then public meeting places like the bath houses, and finally exterminated. The amphitheater built on Croix Rousse (across the river from the temple and other theaters) was used as an execution ground for Christians as they were thrown in the pits with lions for spectator’s pleasure. Later when the city became the Catholic stronghold, the site was blessed as the first place of Christian martyrs in France. The deaths included the very first bishop of Lyon, and a young girl named Blondine. They have become large symbols for the Lyon religious scene.

Once things got complicated again, and wars made their way into the Roman Empire, the beautiful city on the hill started to fall to ruin. The aqueducts the romans built were getting knocked out, or out of use. Without a constant fresh water supply the people had to migrate down to the river’s edge. The people were safer behind a wall they built near the water’s edge. And with years of neglect, the roman city fell into ruins and was buried. After that point, the city began to spread sideways along the riverbank. The island (which is now the peninsula, remember) was used as a way to transport goods up from the Mediterranean Sea and put them on the island which became full of warehouses and shops. As time went on, the city grew up Croix Rousse, which is dubbed ‘the working hill.’ This hill became a place of business. There became less and less room at the base of Fourviere hill and the city needed a working district to expand to, which is what Croix Rousse became. Later after the middle ages that hill became the perfect and most productive place to produce silk in all Europe. But that’s getting ahead of the Gallo-Roman time period, which is mainly what I saw and wanted to talk about today.

I don’t know how to tell you how it felt to run my hand across a stone hand carved by a man alive before Christ was even born. I don’t know how to tell you what I saw as I looked over the city and saw the layer upon layer of history. I don’t know to tell you what it is like to be so closely intertwined with history you can feel a connection I’ve never had before. The love for history I’ve always had has intensified tenfold today. I never knew I could be so in love with a place. Sitting in the theater today, was a feeling I cannot and will NEVER forget.

Canovas took us also to different parts of the medieval district we hadn’t seen yet; we will be covering the medieval period of the city tomorrow. He showed us an old baroque church that was stained with what looked like black tears, and overrun with foliage. And he showed us the second bishop of Lyon’s tomb witch is only about a block away from our dorms. Overall, the best day yet, and its only Monday of our history tour!! I can’t wait to learn everything else I can. I am so blessed to be here, and especially for professor Canovas to be my teacher.

Love you all. Sorry about my history rant. You’ll get them all week. Haha…

9/4/11

Today started out on a sour note for me. I kept waking up in the middle of the night. The jet lag was really getting to me. Once up though I was ready to go. Professor Canovas brought us to an open air market and taught us how to buy things and what was grown locally. He showed us a little more around town and one of the avenues in old town. Le rue Marchent… basically the street was built in the middle ages as a merchant avenue. There were lots of printing shops there when it first became big. Now the street is full of resturants. The best place to eat in France according to Canovas. He stopped mid tour and told us he wanted to show us a secret only residents of Lyon knew. He started walking into a restaurant and we were really confused but followed after him. He rounded a little corner and all the sudden we were in a mini back alley. He explained they were called trouble and the French built them in as passage ways to get up the hill faster for selling goods in multiple places. He also explained that during World War 2 there was a secret army the French had called le resistance that took out nazi armies as they moved through france. They used these passageways to move around the city and get away from the Nazis because it is almost impossible to find the entrance of them without a local’s help. So go ahead and tell my brother in laws and everyone else that is just the Parisian men in france that are pansy’s. The people of Lyon are fighters. :D

After that we went to a little café and prof Canovas bought us all breakfast. We walked around some more and wandered through the mideval district. When Canovas had to leave Allma, Felicia, Melinda and I bought a local dessert and visited some local fountains and sculptures that are famous around here. We got in the cable car to go home and it ended up POURING rain by the time we got back to the dorms. So we stayed inside for a while and went to mcdonalds to get some internet.

After that we went out in search of dinner and ended up having the BEST crepes I’ve ever had in my life. They were amazing. We met the newest addition to our program and we are out with her now at the internet place in mcdonalds. We met another student from our dorms from Bolivia and he seems really nice.

Not much else to report. Sorry I’m trying to hurry this one so I don’t sit here too long.

Tell dad I’m sorry I couldn’t find the time or place of the church without internet, plus we had a meeting with canovas this morning. IF he wants to send that to me I’d be really greatful. Thanks! Love you all!

9/3/2011

Bonjour!
So, I decided to do this so I could keep anyone interested (most likely just my mother) informed of ma vie en France!
My flight into London was pretty miserable. We sat squished all together with barely enough room to breathe. Forget moving your arms and legs. Then again, it didn’t end up being a big deal anyways because they all went numb and you couldn’t move them if you tried within the first 4 hours. I sat next to a sweet elderly British couple who kept getting into witty little arguments, and were really fun to listen to. The woman sat next to me and told me about a study they did in the poor houses of England once, where they determined how much room a person needed to be happy. And since then people stopped caring and just crammed everyone into smaller and smaller places for money purposes. This was her theory on why the plane was arranged like it was. I watched a couple movies and then decided to try to get some sleep, but they kept bringing me food and drinks. A thoughtful act but most of us wanted to be asleep at that point. I ended up sleeping maybe 3 hours on and off tops. Needless to say I was a bit miserable at that point.
The plane landed about a half hour early in Heathrow airport in London and automatically I was ecstatic and refreshed. All my life I had dreamt of going to London and here I was! I tried my best not to jump out of my skin with excitement as I wandered around the airport. But by the time I got to my terminal I was jet lagging a bit. Then came the good news that my flight had been delayed an hour and a half. So I had gotten there early and was leaving late. Perfect. I don’t know if you have ever been in Heathrow, but the place is an upscale shopping mall with an airport thrown in for good measure. So I dragged my dying, sleep deprived body from store to store looking at the overpriced goods. I sat down in a random terminal and tried to turn on my computer, but you had to pay for internet service so I shut it back down and pulled out a book instead. I was trying really hard to stay awake so that when I finally did get to Lyon and it was night time I’d fall asleep and be in decent shape for the day ahead. But, two paragraphs into where I was reading I face planted into my book and was dead to the world. I woke up with just enough time to get to my terminal, sit down, start to doze off again and then get called up for general boarding to Lyon.
Once we got on the already delayed flight, they told us our taxi had broken down and we had to wait another 45 minutes or so to get a new one before we could take off. Of course I just slept, but it would have been nice to been off in time. When we took off I got a Dr.Pepper to keep me awake for the rest of the flight and tucked into my ipod. I wanted to see us fly over the English channel. No way I was missing this. As we took off from Heathrow I fell in love with the sweet brick English houses, and the double decker buses I saw driving around. I really wanted to stay there. But! Onto the next adventure.

We were flying over the French countryside just as the shadows were starting to get long. The lakes and rivers all turned to ribbons and flecks of gold in the deep green of the farmlands. Only occasionally did I see a village with red tiled roofs and dirt roads go by. Half way through the flight they switched to all French instructions. That’s when my stomach began to turn. There were little to few English speakers after this point. I hadn’t been really nervous my whole trip over. I guess I was just caught up in the trip. But once I realized I would be hearing nothing but French from this point on sent me spinning.
When we landed the nervousness was in full swing. I would have done anything for another American to speak to. I refused to even settle for British at this point, I wanted another American. We went through customs, which was literally them stamping your passport and you walking through a door. French and American security systems are quite a bit different. There was a girl standing next to me waiting for baggage. She looked pretty lost herself and I wondered if it was her first time to France. I looked down and she was holding an American passport. SCORE! I asked her if that’s all customs was and she said she had no idea. We kept talking and found out we were on the same study abroad program. What are the odds, eh? Her name is Felicia and she’s from Tempe. She’s a pretty cool girl so far.
Once Felicia and I got our bags and wandered around trying to find Professor Canovas we decided we were lost. We tried a phone which got angry at us and after 3 failed attempts to dial a number, changed to English instructions and told us to hang up the phone. So, we kept wandering. Professor Canovas finally found us and said his train had been rerouted because of some problem with the tracks. So we got a taxi and hopped in. As we drove out of the airport, we were a bit out of town. I kept thinking besides the French signs everything looked a lot like just outside of Salt Lake. Very green, a few trees, and lots of fields. When we got in the city it wasn’t quite what I had expected. We drove through the modern part of town, which looked like it could be an American city. Only the driving was a bit different. There was lots of swerving was involved and little to no signals. It was pretty frightening I won’t lie. We got to a hotel were Prof Canovas paid for a room for us until we could move into the dorms. The rooms were tiny, almost the same size as the actual dorm room but they had a bed, decent showers and free wifi which is what I wanted at the moment.
We both tried to contact family and friends which was a little difficult because of the time difference but, it was nice to have a little contact with the outside world. I flicked through the TV and found a few American movies dubbed over in French. They got annoying after a while, because that was definitely NOT Gerard Butler’s voice, so we shut it off and went to bed. The morning was difficult. Felicia and I got dressed and went down to a breakfast buffet that came with our room. With no instruction from the waiter we just went towards a table and were suddenly converged upon by two people with rapid instructions in French on what we were doing wrong. One asked if we were there for our breakfast and without thinking I accidently said yes in English. The man sort of exhaled like he didn’t want to be rude to the stupid Americans, and in poor English told us to eat the table. We figured out he meant that the buffet was over on the other side of the restaurant where we would be seated.
We ate quickly and left, not wanting to get in anymore trouble. We walked around the block once, and through a closed air market across the street. The market was a weird combination to me. It was everything you would expect, little vendors selling mostly fish, meat, cheese, pastries and wine. And yet tiny upscale restaurants were crammed in there as well. Once prof Canovas got there we took another taxi to where we would be living for the next four months. We got the chance to drive through the main part of the city, which is more what I was expecting. Old beautiful buildings, small winding streets, and lots of people wandering around. We got to our dorms, which are inside and old 19th century military fort. Huge studded Iron doors are at the entrance but have stone doorjams now so they are always partially open. The walls are the beautiful old yellow stone and brick with the black marks of time all over them. The whole thing is set on a very steep hill and dragging our luggage up the old roads was a pain. We saw more of the old military barracks, and modern buildings build around them. In one of the courtyards prof Canovas pointed out ruins of old roman aqueducts that used to bring water to the city hundreds of years ago. My building was built in the 1960s I believe, has no elevators and shared bathrooms and a kitchen. The rooms are quaint, newly repainted and blue vinyl floors. We have a desk, bookshelf, and bed. Everything is nice, but I’m having a little trouble working some of the doorknobs and locks. I thought I locked myself in the bathroom already once today, and couldn’t get my dorm room door open for about 15 minutes. The view out my window is beautiful. I can see back to the older part of town with the big buildings and the cathedral of the city on the top of the hill. And lots of trees.
We met another of the girls on our program, Melinda. Shes a really sweet girl who already has done a yearlong study abroad in Spain. Two more came in tonight, Brokay and Sarah. The last of us gets in tomorrow. Felicia, Melinda and I got a chance to wander in old town shopping to pick up some lunch and other things, like I bought shampoo. I went with the cheapest, but still French looking shampoo I could find. They have lots of American shampoos here, but I wanted to see the difference in American and French hair care. Haha, Hopefully my hair doesn’t fall out or something. The public transportation system here is a lot of fun. We have to walk a ways to get to the rail car, which takes us to the metro, to take us anywhere. Confusing but, really kind of neat. I’ve always loved going on trains and things like that. I only saw a bit of old town today while we were shopping, but it was incredible. Professor Canovas is going to take us on a tour of the city next week and explain the historical context, which of course I’m incredibly excited for. I can’t wait to go to the cathedral I can see from here, I bet it is exquisite.
After everyone got settled in tonight, we got together and talked. Two other girls from our dorm joined us. There was Jean-Marie from northern France and Phuyng from Vietnam. I guess our residence is an international one. There are people here from Spain, England, and lots of other places too. One of the girls who came on this study abroad program last year, and loved it so much she just decided to enroll in school and live here came up to see us too. Her name is Allma. She took Melinda Felicia and I out to get a kebap and wander around the more touristy part of town. Tall old buildings with beautiful architecture and tiny cobblestone streets winded around until we were suddenly on a bridge over the Roan and were looking back at the two major cathedrals in the city. Everything was all lit up and it was absolutely incredible.
I think I’ve already fallen in love with this city, and it’s only been one full day here. I would have a harder time if I didn’t have anyone else to speak English to I think, but I’m getting along really well with everyone I’ve met so far. I am kind of understanding how terrible my French is. I’ve been able to make small conversation but I think all the other girls have me beat in terms of semesters they’ve studied. At first I was kind of worried about the placement exam, but I was on the cable cars today and I kinda figured that I should just really put down what I know because I really do want a good understanding of the language. I want to work really hard and be able to be solid. And I can’t do that if I cram for the placement exam and start somewhere I’m not. I just want to get to work. Now that I’m here and see what a difficult process this will be, I really want to get started. I want to better communicate with the people around me.
That’s about all I have to report so far. We don’t have internet yet in our rooms (I wrote this in my room while I was bored, much to your dismay because I had time to write with excruciating and irritating detail, and then pasted it to the blog) and we won’t until school starts so we have to go to the McDonalds here because it’s the only place with free wifi. So, sorry if I don’t get on the internet very much yet. I will once I get the password to it here.
Love you all. I’ll try to update soon.