Playing catch up: Week 1 in Vichy

Well it has been quite the first week in Vichy! I feel like everything that could have happened, happened.

On Tuesday, I was walking to lunch with friends, and I somehow managed to trip on one of the few completely perfect sidewalks in France. I landed facing the opposite direction I'd been walking with a skinned knee.
After the fact, it was pretty funny, and Hannah had a fantastic time recounting what my fall looked like to her. We cried we were laughing so hard. My skinned knee isn't too bad; it doesn't hurt to walk. But I'm interested to see what it looks like when it heals because it's about the size of a paper towel roll.

Then on Tuesday, on my way to school (we all know I'm not functional early in the morning) I tripped on an actual object and the strap of my shoe broke. I continued the walk to school like a penguin, with a big floppy flipper.
When I arrived at school, I walked up to the desk and said "Ma chaussure est casseé. Est-ce que vous avez quelque chose pour ma chaussure. Comme 'tape'?" The receptionist just stared at me. But a very nice man, Monsieur Jacques, got out the electrical tape and sat down with me for a good ten minutes to fix my shoe. His tape invention was genius and lasted me through school and to the shoe store for a new pair!

So far, my group of friends and I have done a lot of walking around Vichy, eaten a lot of sandwiches for lunch, and hung out by the river in the shade. It's quite the relaxing routine!

We've done exercises in French class like have a debate about whether new technologies are worth the risk, put on skits, run relay races to read and write paragraphs in French, talked about items that have sentimental value to us, and describe important monuments in our own countries. I really enjoy the learning style that CAVILAM implements.

On Saturday, we went on a day trip to Clermont-Ferrand, the closest big city to Vichy. It was so much fun! We goofed around the whole time and window shopped in the rain. Clermont-Ferrand has a lot of beautiful churches and amazing chocolates. We walked up a down a few streets several times, looking for clothes and food. We had gourmet Belgian chocolates at Leonida's, and I bought a 36 euro tunic at Yawatah's. Even though it was raining and cold, we didn't let that spoil our fun.

Hannah very confidently told a Frenchmen who asked us a question, "Nous ne parlons pas beaucoup de francais" in a very loud, very American accent. It sounded more like "NEEW NUH PARLYONS PA BOWCOOW DE FRANSAY!" We've been laughing about that since.

Our Turkish friends Ovgu and Seda taught us a few Turkish words that make up the core of my Turkish knowledge. Sapsal means cute; kankacim is like hey, bro; lyi aksamlar is good evening; and tesekkuler is thank you. As Hannah would say, I'm now tri-lingual! Some of the Turkish sounds are really hard for me to pronounce, and I found my self leaning forward like that would help me enunciate. Ovgu and Seda that that was pretty great.

These are Vichy's girls, and I love 'em!

Ovgu, Hannah, Kacie, Seda, and Salome. 

On Sunday, we all got together again to have lunch at a pizza place. The pizza was great! I learned that it's incredibly rude here to bring your own water bottle into a restaurant when the server scolded me for having mine. Oops. Won't make that mistake again.

Ovgu, Seda, and I walked on the other side of the Allier River from where we usually walk and the view was gorgeous!

I'm loving it here in France! Beautiful weather, a fantastic learning environment, a welcoming host family, goofy friends from all over the world, and gorgeous, wonderful French food. But I do miss all of you back home quite a  bit. All the French food in the world can't replace my life in Oklahoma.

Sending my love,

Alissa