The big, long, overdue update

Finally, I managed to get all the pictures and text I wanted to bring you all up to speed on my adventures here in France. I shrunk the pictures down here so the post isn't 15 feet long, but you can click on them to see each image fullsize.

Well, Thursday's strike wasn't as bad as people seemed to expect. In Aix, I didn't have any classes, but some buses still ran and some banks were even open. In Marseille and Paris, of course, there were huge riots, and our program directors urged us to stay away from any demonstrations.

Unfortunate news about classes, though. One of mine, which was to be about French literature of the 17th and 18th centuries, has been canceled for the entire semester. The professor who was going to teach it just had a baby, and so instead of finding a replacement professor, the class has been canceled. Obviously.

Anyway, I promised pictures of the school (La Faculté) and here they are. Here's are some rundown signs:

And here's the entrance to the "Grand Hall":

Inside, things look like this:


The other big news is that on Friday I moved to my new homestay. It's closer to everything important and above all, a nicer place to live. To move, Dan and I tried to just walk... but with our heavy bags and tiny French sidewalks, we quickly gave up and took a taxi. I now live with a Mme G and her dog Leica. They're both really nice, and I even have Internet at home now—so long, annoying cyber café!

One slight problem was that, because I moved in on Friday instead of Sunday, my room wasn't quite ready yet. As you can see, when I arrived there were still file folders and a giant stuffed dog there, but no desk or place to store my clothes. That's all been rectified now, and my room is positively homely. I even have my own balcony!

I'm so much happier in this new homestay because I actually get to interact with my host. Mme G is very willing to talk to me and help me understand what's going on in France at the moment—see last's night's post about Les Guignols, for example. We've had long, fascinating conversations about everything under the sun, and we even watched Dead Zone dubbed into French! Moreover, getting to La Fac is no longer a 40-minute proposition, which makes me especially happy given that most of the times I go there I don't actually have class.

Saturday was another day trip with our program. We started off at a modern art museum near St Paul de Vence... which was nice, but not amazing. Modern art isn't really my thing, and the museum seemed a little bit lackluster. Next we walked along a tiny little road toward the ancient hilltop town of St Paul de Vence. As you can see, the views along the way were amazing and the town looks incredibly pictaresque and postcard-like, perched as it is atop a hill. Centuries ago, this made the town a perfect natural fortress.

There, I ate poulet frites with some of the other American students before exploring the tiny, twisty back streets of St Paul de Vence. It's endearingly quaint and old-fashioned, although some other students from our program did manage to find an American-style diner for lunch, and a coffeeshop called Le Pink Cadillac. Can't stop globalisation!

After, we went to Antibes and saw the Picasso Museum. They perhaps have too many works by Picasso—one room of his sketches and drafts proved only that Picasso had a penchant for pencil drawings of fauns and women. But the museum was right on the sea, and Antibes was also a quaint town to explore for a while.

Over the last few days I also planned out some travel here. In our February break, I'm going to Milan and Florence with some friends, and in our April break, I'm going to visit someone I know who's studying abroad in Grenada, Spain.

Phew, I think that's about all for now. There's no class due to the strikes today, and I'll try to keep the updates a little more frequent than they have been recently.