So much has happened in the past 48 hours it's unbelievable! Friday morning, woke up and my parents drove me to the airport. I didn't sleep well the night before and was hoping to be able to sleep on the plane (which never really happened). When we got to the airport we were really early (we left at 8am because we thought there would be bad traffic) and so the person checking me in asked if I wanted to get on an earlier flight. I decided sure, why not? So I got aboard a plane at 11:45 and got off two hours later at 1:45 in Philadelphia. The flight wasn't bad but there was some turbulence. Then I met up with the rest of my group as we waited for the flight to Paris. After a minor hassle with Jake's passport and alot of sitting we got on the plane.
I love the large planes for the international flights for two reasons, one they are usually very quiet (because everyone is sleeping) and two they have the screens in the back of the seats so you can watch tv or movies and such. One thing I do not like about these flights however, is that they make me really tired but no matter how tired I am I cannot fall asleep for more than 10 minutes. Anyways we finally make it to Paris and get past the mean customs officials (I swear the one that I had did not like me at all!) we decide to hang out in the upstairs lobby before going over to our gate so that we can get food and relax since we have 7ish hours to kill. We tried to nap, ate food, played some euchre, and finally went to our gate a couple of hours early. When we got to our gate we relaxed for a while until when we were less than 30 minutes from boarding because of a slight problem. The screen with all of the flights on it showed that we were delayed... first it was ten minutes, then it was twenty and we were starting to get anxious. Finally we got on the tiny plane and took our short flight to Clermont. When we arrived we were greeted by Joelle who was very excited to see us. We got all of our luggage and walked into the atrium to see our families.
My host mom walked right up to me and said "Are you Breanna?" I was like "oui" and got introduced to both her and her husband Frank. It was my first real chance using French and I am please to say I didn't fail. After two group pictures we were off in their van. As we toured a little bit of the city before going to the apartment, they asked me questions about my life and I answered (all in French). It felt quite rewarding to be finally here with my host family talking in French. When we got to the apartment I was surprised by the size because it was quite a bit bigger than I imagined. Then I got introduced to three of their five children and the other exchange student who is from Bolivia and arrived on Wednesday. After a tour of the house and unpacking we sat down for an "Aperitif" which is drinks before dinner. I had a small glass of wine which was considerably stronger than what I am used to. Then we had dinner.
Dinner was great, there was lots of food and lots of fun. The bothers like to pick on each other which creates quite an entertaining and homely environment while the parents and the eldest brother would ask questions of me and the other exchange student. The food was really good, we had beef and mini potatoes and salad and cheese (of course!). When we were done we had fruit tart as dessert (it was this fruit that is kinda like grapes and kinda like prunes). Then I explained that I haven't gotten hardly any sleep on the plane and little the day before so I turned in after a shower (at about 9pm their time, lol). I slept so soundly and when I woke up I realized I had slept for about 11 hours straight!
As soon as I woke up however, there wasn't much time to get around because as soon as I had changed the host mom informed me that they were going on a walk so I brushed my teeth and combed my hair and had a quick bite to eat and then we were off in their van. We made our way up to a plateau nearby and hiked for a while. It was just the two exchange students, the two parents and Jean-Baptiste (the youngest son) but it was alot of fun. I really wanted to take some pictures but couldn't because my camera wasn't working. Anways, I am going to see an exposition so Au revoir!
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