des cours? vraiment? nah...

D'accord. I just got back from a "sortie" sponsored by the AUCP around the Luberon, which are these gorgeous mountains to the North of Aix that Peter Mayle wrote about in A Year in Provence. We visited the villages of Lourmarin, Bonnieux and Roussillon. I was super excited about the last one, like a true Shakespeare nerd would be, because it's the village where All's Well That End's Well takes place. Eee. Sorry.

Anyway, I'll get to that eventually...I hope...now I'm onto the beginning of my second week in Aix. Okay. Let me attempt to recall...

Monday I started classes. The whole week was an Add/Drop period, so we were advised to go to the first class of all that interested us. We each can take 5 classes, 1 being the required "French Cultural Patterns, 1 being either English-French Translation or French Oral and Written Expression (which I'm in), and the other 3 what we want from the selection.

SIDE NOTE: I JUST WENT TO THE MUSEE GRANET WITH MY HOST SISTER ALIX AND IT WAS SO AWESOME. WE HAD FREE TICKETS (AHH) TO THE EXHIBIT THAT'S CLOSING TOMORROW WHICH IS PICASSO AND CEZANNE AND HOW THEY INFLUENCED EACH OTHER. It was basically Dove-O'Keeffe but bigger and, while my loyalty to the Clark will never be broken, it was better.

ANYWAY. BACK TO WEEK 2.

So I had 4 classes that interested me--Major Scenes in French Theatre, French Cinema, The European Community, and Architecture and Urbanism in Provence. All the classes seemed really cool, but at the end I decided on Theatre (duh), Cinema and Architecture. Sweet.

Other than classes? I spend beaucoup de temps avec Emily and Liz, mes favorites, drinking smoothies and being awesome. Wednesday night, we (just Liz and me at this point? I think?) went to the Brigand (free drinks for girls--what!??) where I met up with Dave Gorleku--yayy Williams abroad. It's so nice to have a little bit of Williams here--and some of his friends from the Wellesley program. After we went to the O'Shannon, where we--really I--made friends with the barman, GABRIEL. Not kidding. He's named after, and resembles, and might as well just BE an angel. Sigh. Most beautiful sight seen thus far in France. Tour Eiffel? Pshaw. Gabriel is where it's at. Vraiment.

Then Martin, Clement, etc. met us at O'Shannon and accompanied us to Scat Club, where we (Martin, Liz and I, pas les autres, parce qu'ils sont lame-os) totally started a dance party. OH and there was the creeper who had been majorly creeping on Liz at O'Shannon's and then appeared at Scat Club too...NOT OKAY.

But yeah pretty sure it was at this point I started kind of falling for Martin--he's way gangly and awkward but he loves to dance, and though he may not be technically very good at it, he's SO eager and adorable about it that I find myself not even caring. So yeah. We stayed there I guess for a wicked long time, because all of a sudden it was like 2:30am and Liz and I had class the next day (she had a 10am, no clue how she managed that), so we said our goodbyes, and I told Martin that we would plan to sortir Friday night.

Thursday around noon, I was walking to the marche (open air market. Incroyable.) that happens Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday every week in Aix, and I saw Gabriel just like randomly on the street (RUE DES CORDELIERS. EPIC STREET. NOT REALLY, I JUST ALWAYS SEEM TO BE THERE.). He approached me and kissed me on the cheeks, and I practically died.

Thursday evening, I went to a salsa class at a place called the Expresso Cafe, which is super far away from like everything. The class itself was really majorly beginning level, and the instructor was kind of annoying. The group itself (not even sure what group it was...) also seemed really disorganized, and I was pretty turned off by the whole thing. I decided like half way through the class that I would search for something else for my "club" for AUCP.

On my way back chez moi, I decided to walk through centre-ville rather than taking the more direct, quicker route, because I had a really good feeling about it. As I passed the Brigand, who should be standing right outside but Martin and Florian. Martin was on the phone, but Florian kissed my cheeks (FAIT LES BISOUS. IT MAKES MORE SENSE IN FRENCH, SO I'M GOING TO SAY IT IN FRENCH FROM NOW ON.) and we chatted a little before I said that I had to go. I then passed by O'Shannon, but Gabriel wasn't there. I was a little distraught. THEN I decided to take a kind of random route, and then I turned a corner and WHO SHOULD BE RIGHT IN FRONT OF ME BUT GABRIEL AGAIN. I SWEAR IT'S LE DESTIN. So yeah. I suppose I discovered my 7th sense (Now, Sara, we're just missing 6th, yeah? Or do we believe Haley Joel and Bruce?): knowing the route to take through Aix to see my boys. Sweet. As soon as I got home, I got a text from Martin that said "rendez vous au brigand!" It was perfect. I didn't go, as I had work for the next day, but I wanted to so bad. So I told him he had to text me the next night, Friday.

Friday there was a horrid, epic thunderstorm that almost prevented me from going out to meet Martin, but finally the rain slowed down and I met him (after like lots of confusion of where he was, because he told me he was at O'Shannon then I got there and no sign of him because he's totally clueless) at O'Neals (the French LOVE IRISH PUBS. IT'S AMAZING), which is just South of Cours Mirabeau. Liz met us there (oh, and Clement, Florian, Mark, Nicolas and Nicolas' girlfriend, Pauline were there too). We ended up dancing there for a while before going back to the Brigand, then going to Cours Sextius. Sextius is a big street semi-close to chez moi that has a bunch of bars and restaurants and stuff. Liz and I wanted to go to IPN, a dance club, mostly because the bathrooms there are FAR nicer than those at Brigand, but it turns out that it's only free for girls. So Martin, who didn't have any money, disappeared, and because of the fact that IPN is like underground (vraiment), there's no service there, so I didn't get his text that he wasn't coming in until much later. Suck.

Saturday a bunch of us from AUCP went out to dinner at a Senegalais restaurant. After I went out with a bunch of the girls, but I was feeling pretty out of it (okay, I'll admit it. Martin hadn't texted me back. I was not happy.). Turns out he wasn't even in Aix, but then Liz and I ended up finding Florian, etc anyway (and Miquel (sp?)--MAJOR CREEPER. TRIED TO KISS ME LIKE THE SECOND WE GOT ON THE DANCE FLOOR AT IPN. I HAD LITERALLY KNOWN HIM FOR 5 MINUTES. I DO NOT THINK SO.) and having a pretty good time. IPN was playing some pretty epic tunes--(including Lady Gaga and 50 Cent)--and was packed.

So yeah. Thus ended my 2nd week in Aix.