I'm here!

So I have officially been in France for 5 days! I suppose I will start at the beginning of the trip.

My parents took me to the airport nice and early. Turned out my big backpack was too big as a carry on, buuuut the lovely lady at the counter said I could check it for free! Whew! That was a relief. So then we got some cheesy fries at an airport restaurant and said our goodbyes. The flight to London went well, except the lady next to me liked to talk. After a good amount of wine and cognac, I learned that her husband died a few years ago and she hasn't quite let go yet, all of her friends are dead, and her son lives 5 minutes away and never see's her. Luckily she had an English accent and a pleasant voice so it wasn't too bad to listen too.

Then when I arrived in London, I found that I had to go through security again. I believe this is the first time I've had to do that when I had a connecting flight so I was a little confused. I didn't really care though since I had a while to wait. Except, I suppose I forgot to put some lotion and hand sanitizer in my liquids baggy with my mascara (which I didn't need to do in Baltimore), so my bag was set aside to be searched. The man searched it and had some sort of paper thingy that he rubbed on the bag and my stuff to get tested. It seemed like he was taking a longer time to do the test for me than the person before me so I was a bit confused, even more confused when he asked for my passport. Finally a man came and asked if anyone told me what was going on, which they hadn't, and he told me that the test came positive for something at first, but then when the tested it again it came out negative and that they have to document all these things. I think it might have been GSR or something, I didn't really hear, but afterwards he asked if I carried a firearm or if anyone in my family carried a firearm, since, ya know, people do that in America. Obviously I said no, and they finally let me go. I then went and got a sandwich and a new bottle of water, since I had to throw my old one away, and had some lunch.

When I boarded my next flight, I was supposed to have a window seat, but somebody was already in my seat and I was really confused and didn't feel like asking him to move so I took the open seat on the aisle. It was only an hour flight so I didn't really care.

So finally I am in France at the Orly airport. It's much smaller than Charles de Gaulle. I get all my bags, and I take one of the Cars AirFrance (really it's a bus though) to the Montparnasse train station (only 10 euros for students and definitely better than dealing with the metro). I take the earlier train to Saumur (someone was in my window seat again here) and end up waiting a bit for my contact person to pick me up, but I didn't mind. I got some credit for my phone and another bottle of water (since I lost the one from London somewhere along the way) while I waited. Finally she gets there (at the time I told her I'd get there) and she takes me to my lovely apartment! Here are some pics!

 

Dining room I guess

 

Living room

 

Kitchen (with a sink, little oven, and two burners on top, plus a little fridge and microwave)

 

There's the fridge and microwave, and you can see into the little hallway and my front door

 

There's my lil toilet

 

And my bedroom

 

And of course the bathroom with a bathtub and the lovely shower that I have to hold myself. But at least there is good water pressure. 

The first night was a bit rough. I was tired and homesick and all alone, but I discovered that there was internet and that made everything better. I was able to send emails to my mom, and call my dad on Viber, and Skype with my boyfriend which all made the large apartment seem less lonely

On Monday I went grocery shopping with Audrey and met the other English teachers along with the Principle. They all seemed really nice. The secretary gave me some paperwork to start filling out, which I just turned in today. Then the next day I went and talked to the other teachers a little more as they were trying to figure out how my schedule would be (sounds quite confusing). I got an Attestation de Logement from the secretary so that I could open a bank account, which Audrey helped me do on Tuesday as well. Then afterwards I went to her  place and met her husband and her 8 month old baby boy, who was obviously adorable. They were all super nice, and they drove me back to my apartment afterwards. I haven't visited my other school yet, and I also haven't really talked to them besides one e-mail, so I'm not really sure when I will go there.

I also met up with the other assistants in Saumur a couple times. There is Rebecca, who is another English assistant, Ana who is a Spanish assistant, and a German assistant named Katharina. They are all really nice and seem like fun, so it looks like we'll have a nice little group here. Unfortunately we have discovered that there is nothing really to do. So it looks like we will be planning many trips to Angers and other surrounding cities.

So in this short week that I've been here I have discovered that my apartment is extremely far away from everything. It is at least a 30 minute walk to get to centre-ville, 20 minutes maybe to get to the grocery store (haven't attempted this yet), and I believe it will be an hour at least to get to my other school. There are buses, but they only run once an hour it looks like. It takes about 20 minutes to get to centre-ville and will take about 45 minutes to get to my other school by bus, which I guess is better than an hour. I would like to get a bike, but I'm not sure where to find a cheap one, since I don't particularly want to pay 200 euros for a new one. So it is a bit of a bummer that I am so far away from everything and everyone, but it will get better. I am extremely grateful to have this apartment for so cheap, and that I have access to internet here.

Sorry this post is so long, but here are a few pretty pictures of Saumur that I took this week!