Tuesday was nice because we made some new French friends. The German boys and I hung out with them Tuesday night and spoke a lot of French. I'm always happy to meet real French people because then I have to speak French. Two of the guys were really happy to speak English adn kept saying how much they loved America. It was really fun overall even though one of the girls got irritated with us for speaking so much English...it wasn't my fault though, they really wanted to practice!

Yesterday Peter and I went to our second meeting which turned out to be completely pointless and stupid. We got up early and got to the Fac where we found about 1000 students (not kidding) waiting in line. Because nothing is online, everyone in their 3rd year goes to this one room to get the schedule. Ridiculous! I talked to these French girls and they said we weren't even registering today! Peter and I were so annoyed. The French girls were very nice and were really surprised that I was American and couldn't believe I had come from so far away. I am always pleasantly surprised how nice and friendly the French students are.

Peter and I left the Fac and went to find the coordinator (who is German) so we could ask our questions. There we ran into a bunch of other German Erasmus students and then into our UK friends who were just as lost as we were. Everyone pretty much told us the same thing; since we're international students, we don't need to be here. Grr. So we went to a cafe and went over the schedule trying to pick classes. While getting lunch we saw a poster hanging up that we've been wanting and the woman at the cafe let us have it! Yay! Then while we were walking Peter starts singing Jolene (which was soooo random) and we sang that all the way to the bus stop. I'm sure the people of Besancon think we're all nuts.

After lunch I went home to nap, then went back into town with Igga and met our friend Flavien. After hanging out with him for a bit we bought some waffles from a street vendor and ate them with our German friends. Then we all met back at the cafe to sit and talk. We ran into our Spanish friends, some more Germans, Pierre, and eventually we met two girls from Northern Ireland who were really fun. They're teachers' assistants at a local school. Peter in the meantime showed off the English slang I'd been teaching him all day. His new favorite word is dude. I can't believe how he remembers everything! You never realize how much slang you use until you hang out with a foreigner and they repeat everything you say. Gotta watch out!

I learned a new word; Meerschweinchen! It means guinea pig. Word of the day. I find it so bizarre that I came to France and I end up needing to know German instead of French. Crazy. We had such a fun time with everyone last night. We were talking about cultural stereotypes because Peter and Jurgen are so funny and we commented how Germans have a reputation for being serious. We all agreed that we had broken each other's stereotypes of each other's countries. Though I have to say, while we were making schedules Peter was using a ruler to make his lines and I had to tease him about his German precision.

My courses are still pretty confusing, I don't really know what I'm taking. The good thing is that no one else does either so I feel better about it! I guess I'll just figure it out as I go. You don't register until about 3 weeks after classes start, so it gives you time to try classes and then leave if you don't like them.

Last night after the cafe we came back to campus and Peter, Igga and I made omlettes in our sucky kitchenette. I'm really jealous because the 2nd floor kitchen actually works and gets hot enough to cook things. We had so much fun we promised to cook together again.


Here's Igga enjoying the fruits of our kitchenette labor!

Today has been pretty blah...slept late since there are no meetings and have basically been slogging through these schedules trying to make sense of things. Bleh. No fun. Tomorrow I'm going to Paris to help Oma. Yay!