Nationwide Protest

As is normal everytime the French decide that they're upset, they protest. Normally though it's just one sector of the society - teachers, public transit workers, the post office, or something like that. Today has been dubbed "black thursday" because nearly every major sector in France is protesting. They're worried about job insecurity. Personally, and maybe this is just because I'm American, but you'd think that protesting wouldn't really help because the companies would fire them and just hire different people. But that's just me. If you're at all interested, here's an article from cnn.com.

The other night my host mom and I were talking about how German is not a "beautiful language" and she was like "yeah but I'm biased because of the German occupation" and then proceeded to tell me about her experience during the Nazi occupation! I was really surprised - I knew she lived through it and must remember it but didn't think that I should ask. But it was really cool and sad. She was 7 or 8 and had to shelter Nazis in her house because it had enough room for several of them - and her house became like Nazi headquarters for her town. But then she was like "I remember when the Americans came to liberate us; my mom had old curtains that were in blue and red and we made little French flags and gave them to the American soldiers as they walked past our house." And then she was like "it was really cool because we'd see them all over town, getting their haircuts or something" lol. She said she kept in touch with a few of them and they sent her gum and cigarettes until she turned 18 - even though they were only in her little town for 2 days or so. But I thought that was really cool (and sad obviously, that she had Nazis in her house).

Other than that not a lot is happening. I'm getting back into my classes which are alright. The class selection this semester sucks but I have enough classes so whatever. I miss you all!

The French take on the Inauguration

We officially have a new president. And of course, since the French were *such* fans of Bush (haha not really) they are all very excited that America has a new president. I didn't see the whole thing, but I did notice a few things that I found very interesting. 

1) Everytime someone said "Barack Obama" in English, the French translator would say "Barack Hussein Obama"

2) They showed George Bush leaving the White House via helicopter and then promptly stopped talking about him - that was their way of saying goodbye, I guess. 

3) Miss France, who is of a mixed heritage, was in Washington to see the inauguration and started crying and really couldn't say more than three words. It was quite amusing watching the reporter handle that

4) The news showed a black and white picture of Superman standing in front of an American flag and superimposed an image of Obama's face on it - with the caption "Un nouveau Amèrique" (A new America) and then the reporter said that nothing could shake Obama. Somehow I don't think that's true

and finally

5) In true French style, after the actual inauguration and speeches and all that jazz is over, they show pictures of the parties and all the famous political people and start discussing (and criticizing) the food choice for the dinners and lunches. 

It's been quite interesting over here today. I think all of France is glad that Obama's the president. We shall see how long that lasts. 

Retour à Nantes

I got back to Nantes yesterday. My flights were long and I barely made my connection to Paris in Amsterdam but I made it. I couldn't really do anything in Paris. I got my bag - it was one of the first ones off the plane, how weird! - and then I hung out at CDG/the train station until 3:45 when my train was supposed to leave. It was a few minutes late though. So I got to Nantes and unpacked and went to bed. It was very uneventful.

Today, though, I'm really tired. I'm still jetlagged and I didn't sleep well last night which surprised me! There was really strong winds last night and since I sleep on the top floor, they kept me up which was really annoying. I was laying in bed thinking to myself - why am I awake, I just want to sleep!!

I've only had one class so far today, grammaire, which was really easy (just for today though) and then later this afternoon I have French Romanticism which I didn't really want to take but I needed another class, so....yeah. Annoying. I might still find another class to take instead though. Anyway, that's all for now!