garcon

So, yeah. That's Clement. Not Martin, but his best friend. They actually call each other "Papillon." Yes, I did manage--naturally--to find the most adorable/frustrating bromance in France. I have skillz. Kill me.

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.

observez et imitez

So. Sunday in Aix. A gorgeous day, of course, because literally every day of my first week here was absurdly perfect. Went to a fete with my host family (sometimes I might accidentally say "famille d'accueil," just to warn you) at the house of their friends who turned out to be Australian. So, on my first full day in France, I spoke a lot of English. It was weird. I tried speaking with the French people more, but it was just so good to hear some English.

The next morning was my first day at the American Center (that's what AUCP is called in Aix, as it's also for Frenchies to learn English). I met the other students, promptly forgot most of their names and had quite a whirlwind of a day. We had lunch in groups with some French students in Aix. My group was with two guys, Paul and Christophe, and they took us to a restaurant called like "the Bulldogue" or something, which turned out to be a British restaurant. So weird. We all got burgers. Delicious, but not quite how I was expecting my first lunch out in Aix to be.

The rest of the week went pretty smoothly--each morning I walked to the Center with Liz (Huessy, from Vermont), who lives near me in Aix, and whose grandfather (THIS IS SO WEIRD) was friends with my grandmother at Putney School in the 1930s and remained friends for the rest of his life. Like, wtf. Anyway. Each day was pretty long, as we had "French Cultural Patterns" in the morning starting at 9, then Intensive French class in the afternoons that finished at 5:30. Exhausting. It was also SUPER chaud every day, so that was fun.

Thursday night I went to the official going away party for the Australians, as they were returning after 8 months in Aix to Australia the following Tuesday. That was really fun, and I had my first wine!! It was a rose, therefore mild, and quite delicious.

That Friday, we met our language partners. Mine is named Claire, and she's really cool. Unfortunately, that night she was taking a train to Paris, so she couldn't spend the evening with me, like the rest of the partners did. I ended up tagging along with some of the other girls and their partners to a new bar in Aix called "The Wohoo." Not kidding. Kind of wish I were. So it's this "international" bar with all the signs in English and some in French and kareoke in the basement and all in all pretty strange. It was fun for my first night out in Aix, and it was nice to get to know some French people as well as the other American students.

That Saturday, I kind of bummed around chez moi during the day, then went out to dinner with Liz, Emily and Grace. Emily (from Kansas City, KANSAS) and Grace (from Illinois? Right?) both go to Grinnell, and Liz goes to Oberlin. We had a lovely dinner at a Vietnamese restaurant en centre-ville, then we went to the pub O'Shannon, which just happened to be right next door to our restaurant. We were all just planning on having one drink--I had a Guinness, I felt so Irish...in France...er...--then heading home, but then we were approached by Martin and Clement, two French boys who were fascinated by us. They (well, mostly Martin, who was drunk) ended up taking us (though we dwindled to just Emily and me at one point, then just Liz and me at another) on a tour of "the best bars in Aix," as they said, with their friends: Florian--a "Franco-Espagnol musician. Not kidding. Kill me, please--Mark, Martin's sister Margot and maybe someone else, I don't know. Martin kept insisting that we all had to come to his housewarming party in Marseille on "the TWO October! Two October! You hav to come!" We'll see. We exchanged phone numbers and parted ways at the end of the night. But trust me, that's not the last you'll see of Martin, just wait.

ADDED: I can't believe I forgot to mention this, but Martin actually looks like Roger Federer without the weird nose or the tennis skillz. As far as I know. And Clement is short, but beautiful. Pictures soon, I promise. At least of Clement, I don't actually have any of Martin...damn.

Oh yeah, and we finished ended the night at the Wohoo. Again. Good lord.

Ensuite, ma deuxieme semaine.