life at middlebury...

I'm not going to go into too much detail (already breaking the rules by writing in English), but I just wanted to make a quick post. I'm all settled in and immersed in French here at Middlebury. Time is already flying by, it seems. It's a beautiful campus - lots of trees and grass. I live in a really nice dorm with my own room that is quite possibly bigger than my room in Chauny. I am taking three classes - Stylistics II (to perfect my written French), Oral Production (kind of like Phonetics, but a bit beyond that), and HIstory of France. I like them all so far (lot of work though), so we'll see how it goes. The staff and teachers are all extremely nice. They are either French or from another Francophone country (no Americans here!). Some of them have their spouses and children with them. So cute! We all eat lunch and dinner together, so it's a great way to get to know new people.

Some random things:
- I have met too people who know of Chauny. Okay, so one only knew of St. Quentin (her brother lives in Lille... and judging by her accent she is from the North), but still... uncommon. The other, grew up not too far from Chauny.
- One of my profs from Aix-en-Provence works here during the summers! Que le monde est petit! He's here with his wife and adorable little girl. You might remember him as my non discriminatory flirt French Lit prof. Rumor has it, he's still the same (when his wife's not around...). The first night, I thought I was just going in sane. It couldn't be possible! But a returning student confirmed that it was him. I went up to him the other day and said who I was. We did the bise (got some weird looks for that one) and caught up some. He complimented my French(!) and then had a laugh when I said I lived in Picardie for two years. He also offered to help if I ever need some with my classes.
- I watched the film "Entre les murs", and while my students were no where near as bad as those kids, I definitely saw a lot of similarities. Especially with the way the French educational system works. It made me miss my students. A lot.

As for the Paris side of things, we've had one meeting and have done housing. I was so lucky. Thank God for the dance and all the parties the night before! I had number 17 out of 25(?) to select my place. However, a lot of people before me didn't show up on time. So ha! I will be living in a studio in the 14th off of line 4 of the metro. It looks really light and airy in the photos. Plus, there is TV, internet, and phone already set up! There's a futon, so I expect visitors! Okay? Also, the owner is a teacher here during the summer, so I will be meeting him soon. I've probably seen him, but just didn't know. We only selected housing yesterday.

On Friday, we have another meeting. Since I have somehow become an expert on visas, I will be talking about those to everyone else at the meeting. Joy. Explaining the fine details of that in French. Looking forward to it. Although because of my knowledge, I have really bonded with the Parisian woman who helps us with a lot of things (she's not the director of the Paris program, but she's in charge of a lot). I think this is going to be really useful. She comes off as really cold, but now, she's extremely nice and helpful to me.

Okay, I need to go record my Phonetics exercise. Eep. I think I'll be talking F. up on his offer to help me soon enough.