Friday was Armistice Day so we didn't have school, so it was only necessary to take advantage of this! My friends Manon, Dimitri, and Alex were driving down to the south of France for a friend's wedding, but the cool part is I have two other friends studying there at the moment, Fabienne and Jovanni. So they know I've been wanting to make my way down there ever since I've been here, and although this has been my fourth time in France I've actually never really been to the south. So they kindly asked if I wanted to ride down there with them and of course I was more than happy to take them up on the offer..!
So to back-track a little bit, Thursday was my first basketball game. We played against the University of Poitiers, and unfortunately, we only had seven guys show up for the game, so this meant that we were going to be dead at the end! Especially since the other team had a full roster and was able to sub in and out to keep everyone fresh. But because this was our first match playing together we still have a lot to work on, but we ended up losing the match, however, there's still plenty to come! We finally got back to Orléans around 8pm and I went straight home to pack my things and as soon as I was finished, Dimitri came to pick me up so I could stay at his house since we were leaving so early in the morning on Friday.
The only hard part is by car, it's a 7 or 8 hour drive, so we had to wake up early and get the car loaded up and get on the road. The early morning was really foggy but after about an hour or two the sky opened up to sunshine and blue skies. Seeing the country side of France like that is amazing. It simply reminds you how beautiful the world can be. But even more, how diverse one country can be. One point it was all rolling green hills and then at another point it was forests that looked like it never ended, and then rocky mountains at the next area. It was absolutely beautiful. During the car ride, I figured I would make an attempt to translate a riddle I learned back in high school during one of my business class trips. It's a very simple game yet complicated that it takes a while to catch on. The idea is you can take any object (not physically, but rather this is the object you say) you want - I like to use a hat and it works by saying something like "If I give my hat to Dimitri; who has the hat?" then the first person who respons/or talks..has the hat! So for example each time I asked the question after making up a story about who has the hat, Alex would respond but he never understood why it was always him even if I finished the story with "I threw the hat out the window; who has the hat?" But it's such a fun game to play because you get to watch people get so frustrated! We finally reached Aix-en-Provence, which was where we were staying for the weeked, around nearly 4pm. The others dropped their stuff off in the hotel and then they took me to Fabienne's place where she so graciously hosted me for the weekend. After I dropped my bags off in her place, Dimitri, Alex, and Manon went off to search for some gifts because they were going to a wedding on Saturday while I stayed and visited the city with Fabienne and Jovanni. So Fabienne and I went and walked around the city and she showed me a bit then we went to the grocery store so we would have some breakfast and dinner to eat for the weekend and afterwards we grabbed a pizza to go and went to the house of Fabienne's friend Pauline. We went there to watch the football [Yes, that's right. Football. Not soccer.] match with France vs. United States. It was a great game and France won but of course I was glued to the TV and occasionally letting out a few yells but it was lots of fun. After the game was over the three of us met up again with other three when they had finished with the rehearsal dinner [or at least I think it was this that they went to] and we grabbed a drink and stayed and talked for a while. Once we were all tired, we split our ways and crashed for the night.
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| My first attempt with my panoramic picture app on the iPhone |
Saturday morning, Fabienne and I jumped on the train to go to Marseille. Marseille is one of the three largest cities in France. Once we got there, we just started making our way around and seeing things in the city. We spent most of our time in Vieux Port which is where they keep all the private boats and yachts. After we grabbed some lunch there we made our way up to the city's main cathedral, Notre Dame de la Garde. It was the best view of the whole city and the cathedral itself was beautiful.
We came back to town after grabbing some Starbucks and jumping on the train with 10 minutes to spare. We stopped by the grocery store again because we needed a few extra stuff and put it up then we went to try and see if it was possible to see a movie with Pauline and Jovanni before dinner but the whole town decided they wanted to go at the same time so there were no seats left, so we bought tickets for the next showing which started late enough to give us enough time to go back home and Fabienne cooked all of us a steak and potatoes dinner which was perfect. Like I always say, as long as there is cooked meat on the table; I'm game. I picked out some cookie dough ice cream that we found in the store for dessert, I was extremely excited for this..! Oddly enough, I've only eaten ice cream a number of times since I've been here but never have I found cookie dough, so this was gold that was found in the freezer aisle! After we finished dinner, we headed back to the movies and saw a french film called Intouchable. It was a really good movie and most certainly recommend it. When the movie finished, we all headed back home and went to bed for the night.
Sunday morning we woke up and Fabienne took me around this city again, this time in the daylight so I could take pictures of the city. In the middle of our little tour, we stopped by Jovanni's apartment so she could show me her cool place that's right next to a church and a couple schools. Then we walked around a bit more and stopped for a slice of pepperoni pizza which was to die for. I slathered it in hot sauce and finished it in probably three bites. But it's not normal to find something this spicy in France, so I had to get my fix in before I left. Then we topped it off with some Haagen-Dazs...where again...I found/got cookie dough ice cream.
Then Dimitri, Manon, and Alex came back to pick me up and then we headed on our way back home, and finally got home around 2am after leaving around like 5pm. But overall, a wonderful weekend and an even more exciting weekend to come!
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